Love Thy Neighbor ✓

four

FOUR  |  LATE MARCH

( unedited )

IT WAS BARELY past one in the morning and the muffled din of the party was still bursting against the front door, but Luca could barely hear it. He was so focused on the melody of Blake's silvery laughter, occasionally accompanied by the faint chirp of crickets hidden in the night, that everything that came before it seemed to be only a vague and distant memory, lost in since faded lives.

"I think the worst thing about having your own party is that you can't just leave whenever you want," Blake continued, his head tilted to the side in thought. One of his feet was flat on the porch and he was using the other to gently rock the two of them back and forth on the bench.

"You did leave," Luca pointed out, glancing at him as his pink lips pulled into a faintly amused smile, "to come and sit outside."

"That's true," he agreed, his face contemplative as if he was only realizing this for the first time, "but I wish I could stay out here instead of going back inside."

Luca's heart jumped, his grip tightened around the seat of the bench until all of the color seeped out of his knuckles. "You can't stay out here all night," he tried, hasty and desperate.

There was a twinge in his chest and he wished he could agree, he wished he could tell Blake that if he stayed out here for a million years then Luca would stay for a million and one just to make sure he wasn't coming back. But he couldn't say that, so he didn't.

"I could," Blake grinned, his head tilted against the back of the bench, "if I really wanted to."

A fresh, brisk wind was dancing across the porch, breezing further into the enigmatic abyss of night; an endless tunnel that blinked out like the extinguished glimmering of a long dead star. All of the dead stars were hung above their heads and Luca silently mourned them until he looked back into Blake's eyes and found them alive again.

"People will notice that you're gone soon," he reminded, hopelessly praying he wouldn't stumble over his words as he identified each burning star, swimming in pools of deep blue. "People would notice you were gone even if it wasn't your party."

For a second, he only hummed and there was a beat of silence. Then, gazing curiously at Luca, he asked, "Would you notice?" His eyes were soft and flecked with midnight.

In Luca's stomach, there was a soaring; a storm built from the fluttering of the butterflies bursting through him, dancing through him like the gusting song of the sky. He could feel the breeze carrying itself through him. He inhaled it into his lungs and embraced the thrill of it.

"I would," he admitted, too nervous to smile, while he fiddled with his fingers. Then, in an attempt to soothe his unsettled nerves, in an attempt to hide this exposing sliver of honesty, he added: "it is your party."

"Right," Blake nodded with a half-hearted smile, glancing at Luca and swiftly looking back towards the sky, "and if it wasn't?"

"If it wasn't your party?" Luca echoed, his eyes wide. For the first time, he noticed that Blake was sitting closer than he had been only a few minutes ago; their thighs almost grazing. Blake's hand was, like Luca's had been, curled around the edge of the bench and was dangerously close.

"Yeah," he grinned, crinkles forming at the corners of his starry eyes, "would you notice?"

"I don't know," he shrugged, almost smiling back. His heart was beating everywhere and he wondered if Blake could hear it. He wondered if he was brave enough to put his hand back where it had been before, right beside Blake's. "I don't usually see you at a lot of parties."