twisted - muke - the distortion trilogy 1

0.5

LUKE'S P.O.V.

The whole walk home, I was dying to grab Michael's hand, but I didn't, for three reasons. The first being that I don't even know if Michael's gay. The second reason is that even here, I can tell that not everyone will take kindly to open homosexuals, and I don't plan on getting beat up my first week of school. The final reason is that Michael is fragile. One wrong move and I'll set him off, bringing Gordon out of his shell. I really don't want that to happen, and I can tell Michael doesn't either.

I open the front door of my house for Michael, and he walks across the threshold, like he's uncomfortable going before me. Oops.

"Welcome to La Casa de Hemmings," I spread my arms out, walking into the kitchen, past the massive amount of boxes in the front hallway. "We aren't really done unpacking yet, sorry."

"It's okay," Michael says.

"Do you want something to eat?" I ask Michael, grabbing a banana off the counter.

Michael opens his mouth to answer, but closes it abruptly. He frowns, but shakes his head. "I'm good." He doesn't sound convinced, but I don't want to pressure him.

"Okay then, let's go upstairs," I suggest.

Michael nods, and I lead him towards the narrow staircase. To be perfectly honest, I don't know what I'm doing. Earlier, after Michael's little freak out, I felt drawn to follow him, and as I comforted him, it felt right. All day all I could think about was how badly I wanted to spend time with him, but now that I'm here with him, I don't know what to say, what to do. I don't know if I like Michael as more than a friend, and if I do, I don't want to force anything on him.

But god damn do I want to kiss him.

I open the door to my room, walking in first this time. I plop down on my bed, patting the space next to me. Hesitantly, Michael sits down. He looks extremely uncomfortable, and I wonder just how many friends he has. I haven't noticed him conversing with anyone at school--is this his first time in someone else's room? He clears his throat awkwardly.

I turn to him, smiling. "How was your day, Michael?"

His face immediately turns pale, and he looks scared--threatened, maybe. "It was good," he says without any emotion. "Gordon and I talked about video games at lunch." He sounds like he's reciting lines.

I raise my eyebrows. "That's fun," I say. I want to ask about Gordon, but I know that's not a good idea. Instead, I choose video games, because he brought it up. "Do you play FIFA?"

Michael nods timidly. I stand up and turn on my TV, inserting the game into the game console and grabbing the controllers. I hand one to him and he takes it, holding it in his tiny little hands. At school, Michael was giddy and giggly. Now, he seems nervous and uneasy. He wasn't even like this walking home. Why?

~

An hour later, Michael has beat me at every game we'd played. "Oh, my God," I groan, chucking my controller at the TV. "I give up. How the hell are you so good at this?"

Michael giggles--here's the boy from the cafeteria--and shrugs. "I play a lot. I have a lot of free time."

"Do you play any sports or anything?" I ask him. "Any instruments?"

"Guitar."

I grin at Michael. "Me too! Maybe we can do a duet sometime." I wiggle my eyebrows at him, and his face flushes bright red. He attempts to hide his face in his hands while nodding, but the effort is in vain, because his fingers are too tiny. Pleased with the reaction I got out of him, I make a bold move. I scoot a little closer to Michael, grabbing his wrists and pulling his hands away from his face.