Pretending to be Pregnant

Nineteen

 His eyes were still as startling as ever and his smart appearance slightly ragged, but in a sexy way. His hair was messy and his mouth formed an 'O' shape. He was still every bit gorgeous and no matter how hard I tried, I could not pull my eyes away from is hypnotising ones. We both stood there, transfixed and as frozen as statues. What was he doing at a high school dance?

I brushed a stray hair out of my eyes, looking down and when I looked up, he had gone. Had I dreamed it all? Had he really been there?

Out of nowhere, Rita came hurtling towards me.

"You'll never guess who is here!" She shrieked. I shrugged my shoulders, pretending that I hadn't seen what I'd seen.

"Who?" I asked humouring her.

"Luke." I gasped, so I hadn't imagined it.

"I know." I pulled Rita to one side. "What do you think he's doing here? What if he talks to me? He already broke my heart, I can't let him do that again." Tears pricked at my eyes, but I refused to waste anymore of them on him.

"I don't know. I don't know why he's here. I just don't know." I shook my head, I didn't know either.

"Come on Esme, let's just forget about him and enjoy the dance. This is our last high school dance!" I giggled, it really was. Next year we'd all be heading our seperate ways to different universities around the country and in one or two cases, around the world.

"Okay." I let Rita lead me to the dance floor where we crazily danced until I saw him again. This time he was talking to the head, they seemed to be having a serious conversation and then, unexpectedly the head turned towards me, smiling, whilst nodding at Luke. What was going on? Abruptly, my attention was diverted from their conversation as the head boy, Michael approached me.

"He likes you." Rita whispered in my ear before zooming off, I didn't get the chance to ask her whether she meant Luke or Michael.

"Hey." He said. Surprised at this approach, I smiled.

"Hi! You ready for our traditional dance?" I asked him. He smiled.

"Ready as I'll ever be." He smiled sheepishly. Usually the conversation ran quite freely between Michael and I, we were good friends, having worked together so much over the year, however this seemed somewhat forced.

"Do you want to go and get a drink?" I asked him, trying to establish his comfort zone, which was clearly not the dance floor.

"Yeah sure, nothing alcholic though." He teased, wagging his finger in my direction.

"Yes, because that would be against school rules." I winked. In the end we ended up with two cokes. Michael smiled at me as we sipped at the glasses.

"Esme, I really need to ask you something." I was glancing over at Luke now, wondering why he was here. He was still talking the head and they seemed to be laughing. Every so often his eyes would awkwardly meet mine and before long one of us would quickly look away. "Esme, are you listening? Will you come outside for a quick moment?" I smiled at Michael. His suggestion seemed perfect, I felt like I was choking in this dimly lit dance hall and was in drastic need of some fresh air. Additionally I desperately wanted to escape Luke and the constant flitting awkward eye contact.

I placed my glass on the counter and followed Michael outside into the now cold night air.

"Esme, this is really hard for me. But I need to say something."

Oh no.

"Esme, I really like you, I have ever since you flounced into the head's office with your head girl badge sparkling on you jacket. You're beautiful and  you have a sparkling personality! I just, I really want you to know this. I think we could work together. We could be perfect together Esme." I gasped, this was so unexpected. Never in my wildest dreams had I imagined that Michael could quite possibly feel this way. I stood back for a moment, Michael was cute, he was kind and actually, he was fairly attractive.

"Michael, I don't know." Slowly, Michael leaned in towards me his mouth slowly meeting mine. "Michael, wait." I pulled away from him. "I do like you, as a friend. I'm so sorry, but you're a great friend and I really don't want to lose that." He shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

"It was worth a try. If you ever change your mind." I giggled.

"Thanks Michael. See you on the dance floor." He placed his hand on my arm before leaving me standing outside in the cold alone. I breathed in the fresh air, soaking in the cold air. I turned around, almost jumping out of my skin, behind me stood Luke.

"How long have you been stood there?" I asked, shivering slightly.

"Long enough. He really liked you Esme. You should have accepted his offer." I shrugged my shoulders and Luke took a step closer twoards me. I could almost feel his warm breath on my tingling face.

"I guess, well, I guess I love somebody else." I glanced away from Luke and looked up at the sky. I felt Luke stand in line next to me and a quick glance told me he was also looking at the sky, casually leaning backwards and balancing on the balls of his feet with his hands in his pockets.

"That's always a tricky situation to be in." He sighed.

"I know, especially when there's never any chance of them loving you back." Luke turned towards me, yet I continued to look at the sky. I could feel his eyes burning into my neck.

"I know what happened Esme. I've never stopped thinking about you since. You're so beautiful and if it's possible, you've turned out even more beautiful than I could ever have imagined. Over the past year, I've tried to forget you. I've tried to move on. But the truth is, I can never love anybody as much as I love you. And if anything had happened to you, I don't think I would have been able to cope. You're the best thing that has ever happened to me and I know that I hurt you."

"You broke my heart into pieces Luke. You hurt me so much. You didn't even let me explain."

"I know, I know."

"Thanks for hitting Ryan for me though." Luke snorted, suppressing a laugh and then all of a sudden we were back to a sombre atmosphere. "What are you doing here anyway?"

"I funded the event Esme." I smiled, of course he did. "But why?"

"Because... because I wanted to see you again."

"Lucky I came then."

"You look beautiful by the way." I ignored his comment. "Esme, look at me." He gently turned my head towards his own, so that I was facing him. "I should never have left you. But I believe that if I hadn't, we wouldn't have felt the way we do now. I honestly believe that."

"I can't imagine feeling any different."

Luke looked at me and gently moved towards me, I pulled away.

"How do I know that you're not going to leave me again?"

"Because...." And before I knew it, I was kissing Luke and he was kissing me and I almost felt that fireworks were exploding around us. Gently I pulled away.

"I love you know."

"I love you too."