Feels Like a Party - L.R

five

                 Luke's POV

Today, I was going to ask her out. Emma told me to take it slow, so, that's what I'll do. I'll just invite her over for a movie in our home screening room. It has to be perfect. As we all sat together in the dining room, eating the food Bertram made for us, I took the opportunity to announce that the screening room would be mine, tonight.

"I'm asking a girl from school to come over tonight, so the screening room is off limits."

   "Good luck, brother. May she be the one that completes you."

"Thanks, Ravi."

I chuckled, looking down at my little brother as he patted my shoulder in support. Despite our teasing back and forth, he never failed to have my back when I needed it, and even when I thought I didn't. Everyone simply agreed to let me use the screening room, which seemed easier than I thought. Emma helped me pick out my clothes, that surprisingly weren't that bad. Although, she insisted I wear her perfume, but I refused and wore a little bit of dad's cologne. Once I was completely ready, I followed my siblings into the elevator, going down to the bus.

At school, I didn't bother going to my locker, since my books were in my backpack anyway. However, I found Anushka going through her locker, so I decided to make the cliche move of waiting behind her locker door. I sauntered over and leaned against the other closed lockers, until she closed hers, seeing the smirk on my face as he looked down at her. She wasn't much shorter than me— probably three inches, but I liked the height difference. She saw me and jumped slightly, bringing a smile to my face at her reaction.

"Jesus, Luke.. you scared me."

"Sorry, but it was kinda cute- funny. It was funny." I saved myself, thank god.

"Um.. thanks? Is that.." she paused and sniffed slightly, "cologne?"

"Yeah. It is. It's mine, I own cologne... wear it all the time."

"Okay..? Why are you acting weird?"

"No reason. I mean- weird? I'm acting completely normal."

"..... whatever. We have class, come on." Anushka laughed and led me by my wrist. I just let her, staring at her slender fingers wrapped around my wrist as she walked me to class. Surprised I didn't trip, since I didn't even look up until she let go and pushed me into my seat, sitting in front of me. Class dragged on as usual, I tried to make myself busy by twirling Anushka's long hair with my pencil, watching as it easily unraveled off the wooden tool. She noticed it, and brushed my hands off, continuing with her work, which also made it easy for me to copy down some answers.

Eventually, class ended, and it gave me an opportunity to ask her, but I decided to wait until the end of the day, so that if she rejects me, it's not awkward the whole day. Though, I doubt she will. I mean, come on, the freckles. This time, I led the way, and Anushka trailed behind, simply chatting about how interesting class was, and how exited she was to start reading Romeo and Juliet.

"I mean, this is classic Shakespeare! I'm so excited. I wonder if they'll make it into a play. If they do, should I try out? No, no that's a bad idea, I hate talking in front of a lot of people-"

   "Hey! Relax. For a shy girl, you sure have a lot to talk about." I teased.

"Well, I know you, so it's easier for me to talk to you." She explained, shrugging her shoulders. I just looked at her as we walked for a moment, before facing forward again and leading her to the first of our many classes of the day.

            Anushka's POV

Luke was acting very strange today— all nervous, and shifty. It was like he was hiding something from me? But what? None of it made any sense. He dropped me off to all my classes, just as he did the day before, and how he promised to at the door of my fifth period class. I waved him off and walked in, a girl sitting in the front automatically catching my attention.

"Sorry, but your boyfriend over there is pretty cute." The girl said, making me turn my head to face her. Was she talking to me? She seemed to be, since she looked back at me as well, continuing to talk about Luke, "freckles over there. He's cute. Hope you don't mind me staring."  She had brown hair, and brown eyes, and seemed to be wearing clothes similar to my style; crop tops, high waisted jeans with a natural hair look.

   "Oh, he's not–" I paused. She was pretty, and if I told her that Luke wasn't my boyfriend, she would think he's available. For some reason, every part of me shook in anger at her flirting with him, so I just went along with it, "Well, thanks, but he's mine. Don't stare too much." I said, with a shy smile.

"Don't worry. Names Octavia, by the way."

   "Heh, hi, I'm Anushka." Octavia and I chatted amongst ourselves for a while before the teacher walked in, and we all rushed to our seats before she could lecture us about being up and about, even after the tardy bell rang. My seat wasn't too far back, and also not too close to the teacher, and diagonally from Octavia's. I didn't notice her my first day in class, but I guess that's common, since I was in such a rush to sit down and it be noticed by anyone.

Today, we worked on the history of the periodic table. My least favorite. I made it through, though, remembering that next period would be my last class of the day, and I couldn't wait. Finally, the bell rang, and we all jumped out our seats and towards the door. I was stopped by Octavia, while walking to Luke, who was waiting outside.

"Hey, here's my number. Don't take this in the wrong way, but you seem chill, we should hang out sometime."

   "Oh? Oh, thanks, hah. See ya, Octavia."

We said our goodbyes and I walked over to Luke, who smiled while leaning against the door frame. I waved and we proceeded to our last class. His class was directly across mine, so it wasn't a big difference in the directions we had to walk.

"How was class?"

   "Boring. I was asleep for most of it." Luke responded with a shrug.

"Luke, I'm not going to tell you to stop sleeping, but I can offer to tutor you, after school, maybe?"

   "Actually, I have a question for you. I'll just ask you after class.. we don't have time now." He said, before giving me a quick smile and rushing off to his own class, me stumbling into mine. The whole time, I kept thinking about what he could possibly ask me, and why he was waiting till the end of this class to ask me. Was it that important? I don't know. I tried to block out most of the class, since we were studying religion, and it's always the hardest to study, since there are a lot of ignorant students in class that make jokes about the more popular religions such as Islam and Judaism.

One last time, the bell rang, saving my day, and I was probably the first to run out of the class. I saw Luke standing there, and quickly made my way to him, where he silently led me to the side, away from all the noisy students, pouring out of the school doors. He stood me in front of him, and looked at me in the eye, clutching the straps of his bag.

"Anushka, I wanted to ask you... if, um— if you wanted to come over tonight, for a movie? Like, just the two of us?"

I stared at him for a moment. This is what he wanted to ask me? Was he asking me out? No, he would have mentioned date, right? I can't read too much into this. However, I did want to spend time with him, so a smile curled on my face as I stared up at him and I nodded my head,

   "I'd love to."