Love at First Fight - A Gallagher Girls Story

Chapter Three

"It's okay."

"You deserve to know. They should be keeping you in the loop."

"It's fine."

"I wanted to—"

"Why have you been avoiding me all summer?"

The question was just as much a shock to me as it was to him. I hadn't been expecting it, but then I realized that it had been in my head for the longest time now—a buzz as persistent as the cicadas. I needed to know why he always looked the other way or why he shut himself behind closed doors. I needed to know why we were no longer on speaking terms because—god. I couldn't stop thinking about him. More accurately, I couldn't stop thinking about what it had felt like to lose him.

Because Luke Collins had run towards the explosion at the top of the world. Because in that moment, Luke Collins had been dead. Because I was terrified by how much I hated the idea of losing the boy who doesn't lie.

"That's a valid question," he told me.

"Yeah, I know," I said. "That's why I asked it."

He looked at me then, and even in the fading light, I could see those eyes of his. Everything about him was made up of steel and strength, but those eyes were the exception. Those eyes were fragile and glass and practically begging for me to see through him. "What don't I know about you, Luke?"

And then he looked away, back towards the hidden sunset. Back towards the forest where he and I might have once climbed trees or collected stones, had we not been asked to grow up far too quickly. "There's a lot that you do know about me—"

"Answer the question—"

"You know everything, Morgan," he said, but I could hear his heart skip a beat and I knew it wasn't the truth. He knew it too, because he amended his statement, never quite willing to lie. "You know everything that you need to know. Some things are better left unsaid."

"I don't believe that."

"Yeah, I know you don't believe that," he said, and when he looked at me this time, his eyes weren't glass anymore, but rather stone, just like the rest of him. "You've made it very clear that your philosophy in life is to blurt out everything you think."

"There's nothing wrong with speaking your mind," I argued.

He leaned in close, then, and I tried to ignore the fact that whenever he got closer, my heart raced faster. "I don't know if you've heard..." I watched his lips as he spoke, his words a warm breath against the oncoming autumn. "But in this business, we like to keep the occasional secret."

I pulled away.

"Don't treat me like an idiot—I'm not an idiot."

"I know you're not," he said as he pulled away too.

"I get that we have secrets," I told him. "I get why we have them. But in my experience, having the people in my life keep secrets from me doesn't end—"

"So I'm a person in your life, then?"

Pause. The air between us had taken on a sudden charge. This wasn't our usual fight. There was something broken about the two of us, there on that deck with our feet hanging and swinging. The flame was out, but I wasn't sure that was a bad thing. In a moment like this one—a moment when a single spark could cause something to blow—we couldn't afford to fight with fire.

"Well," I started. "You haven't been recently."

"Sorry about that."

I could tell he meant it. That he really was sorry it had to be this way—but it did have to be this way. Of that, he was sure. I could hear it in his tone. "What aren't you telling me?" I asked, but I didn't expect him to answer.