Maps || l.h. au

15 // November 2012

   It’s been three months now since he started in Harvard.

   Of course it went beyond his imagination — the small-boy imagination that started ever since his brother mentioned it to him in primary school. The buildings, the classes, the professors and even the few students who greeted him and made him feel like this was where he belonged.

   Though classes for Law were hard, it was everything he and his parents had dreamed of ever since they’ve asked him what he wanted to be in the future. It was amazing; he couldn’t deny that, but . . .

   But there’s always that but.

   He had grown attached to Michael’s little home in California, near the beach, where he mostly spent his nights sitting alone in the sand and trying not to think of her. When Ashton finally moved to an apartment place a few blocks away from the beach, the ‘unicorn man’ often visited. The life there was simple but quite more adventurous than at his house. There were tourists who mistook Michael’s home as a lodging house or a small cottage where they could stay for the night. Often times, girls passed by in their bikinis, which Michael made sure he could spot on as Luke laughed beside him.

   He had also gotten back on playing his guitar again, after the absence of doing so during his trip. It turns out, Michael was played too, and sometimes, they set up their bonfire with Ashton when the beach was near-empty and played random songs. Eventually, Ashton even brought his beat box.

   One day in August, Calum visited them to A) get away from his clingy boss and B) his clingy boss is actually his stalker (which he was not so thrilled to find out about). That night, they were around the bonfire again, talking in near-hushed voices as the sea rolled behind them and the fire crackled, sipping lightly on their drinks and sometimes erupting into laughter. And some time into the night, they ended up randomly singing and playing their guitars again.

   So as Michael’s previous declaration, they did end up having a band. Well, it wasn’t really confirmed or anything. But what Luke liked the most about the experience while being at California was the camaraderie between the four of them. It was the kind of friendship Luke thought was likely to happen, if you had asked him probably at the start of the year. But it was happening right before his eyes and he has never been happier ever since meeting her.

   Now that he was in Harvard, he missed it. The warm night breeze, the sound of the sea rolling behind and the fire giving more warmth and crackling right before their eyes; and there was also the occasional strum and beat and the harmonized voices in memorized and agreed-upon songs. There wasn’t just anything like that in here — because his roommate was a total fuck-boy who probably skipped class a lot because whenever he got back after his classes during the afternoon, his roommate was lying naked with a girl or still in the middle of doing it (no, it wasn’t a pleasant scenery); it was fall so it felt all too cold for him, especially that his roommate preferred the AC to be on rather than use the heater; and Luke was always told off for playing his music (even if he was just in his earphones) while working and his roommate would then play God-awful rap about sex in the highest volume, making Luke go to the library or anywhere out of his dorm even during weekends, only going back during the night.

   He didn’t mention this to his mom because she would probably overreact and such and call somebody from the school; he didn’t need that kind of embarrassment. Instead, he told all of this to the boys who only laughed at his face for getting the worst luck. It didn’t exactly help his situation, obviously.

   Luke thought that being here in Harvard was all for the better; he still continued on to his quest of trying to move on from her. When he had so much to do, he sometimes forgot about her but sometimes, there is always that kind of something that he’d see anywhere that would immediately lead his thoughts to her. There was still a punctured hole to his chest because of this and sometimes, he would go under his covers, hold a flashlight and fall asleep reading Attachments again and again and sometimes crying.

   He always wondered what Leah was doing.