Don't Look Behind You ⇒ Lucaya [DISCONTINUED]

girl meets noodles and smiles

i know i should probably do more povs but maya's are so fun?? i love writing as her.

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{m a y a}

The world was grey, hazed and in slow-motion as it collided with my dreams. It took time to convince my eyes to open themselves, and when they finally complied, the action was fruitless. I still couldn't see anything, as I was currently face-down on the floor.

My nose hurt quite a bit, being squashed up against the discoloured carpet, but before anything else, I wondered, why am I even on the floor? I distinctly remembered going to sleep on my bed.

Afterwards, I felt my left arm sticking onto something quite soft. Turning my head to the left, to see what the object was, I received enough a shock to jerk a bit to the side. My arm was touching human skin. The human skin attached to Lucas' arm.

"What the hell?" I muttered, peeling it away. A mark was already painted on it.
Whatever dream I had must have been something, I thought getting to my legs and planning to jump onto my actual bed, before I saw the time.
Half ten...I was extremely late to breakfast.

(I'd messaged Riley to say that I (and I alone) would be coming over at nine sharp for breakfast, since the only edible thing I could muster up was noodles, which didn't seem too good right now.)

"Stu-pid Te-xan," I gritted, kicking him lightly at each syllable. He groaned in response and pulled the blanket tighter over his head. I was not in the mood for games right now, so I went ahead and pulled the whole thing right off him, leaving him exposed to the tepid August air. He screeched in resentment and then stood up.

"What are you doing?" He eyed the clock on my desk. It took him a couple of seconds to read the time, as it was analogue, and honestly who looks at actual analogue clocks these days?

"It's only ten-thirty," he declared.

"Yeah. And you should be home right now and I should be at Riley's. I promised her that I'd be there by nine."

"Nine? You definitely pulled off more than you can chew there," he laughed, bringing a nice urge to punch him to my gut. "We slept at three, how're you supposed to reach there by nine?"

"I have a very strong urge to report you for trespassing right now."

"Fine, fine, I'll get going. Thanks for letting me stay over," he rolled his eyes, but his tone still sounded gracious.

Not knowing how to reply, I stayed rooted to my spot awkwardly, as he grabbed his laptop and placed it into his backpack. His left hand then reached for his phone, but as he brought it back, it hit the corner of the desk pretty hard.

"Ouch!" Lucas yelped, bringing it to his chest. It was then that I noticed it was his injured hand. Worry coursed through my veins.

"Oh my god, are you okay? Do you need an ice-pack?" I fussed, then remembering that I never actually had an ice-pack in my house.

"No, no, it's okay," he said, nursing it carefully.
It sure didn't look 'okay'. A bruise was already sporting in the area where he'd hit it and the usually perfect 'I can keep my composure' Friar, looked to be in pain.

"Seriously, let me get a painkiller."
I rushed to the medicine cupboard, which thankfully had two or three painkiller tablets still left inside of it. Swallowing one with the help of the free, complementary glass of water (offered to him by his humble host, me), he rested his hurt hand in the softness of his shirt.

After a few minutes (in which I managed to boil up some noodles that fortunately had not expired), he looked a bit better. His face lit up when I brought him the terrible, possibly undercooked noodles and his grin almost made me feel something in my stomach. A fluttering feeling that I wished had lasted longer.

"Thank you so much," he said, eyes gleaming, dimples showing. With that kind of a look, you couldn't help but smile too. It was quite confusing as well, though, because I hadn't seen anyone reply with the vigour he just showed, to a bowl of simple noodles. Just who was he?

"You know what?" I started, feeling sorry for my previous rudeness. "Come with me to Riley's house. They'll have proper, edible food there."

I wasn't thinking of the consequences right then, and was later thankful that he refused.
"Don't worry, my babysitter's expecting me. I'll be off."

He blinked his azure-coloured eyes (adorably) and continued: "After I finish this, though."

I smiled unconsciously, a simple act that I hadn't managed to do in ages. My heart suddenly hurt as I thought of how my mom would react to Lucas being in the house. She would've been interested in him, continuously firing questions for him to answer. She would've been cooking up something other than noodles for my guest. If she were here, the permanent pit of anxiety wouldn't have appeared inside of me in the first place.

It hurt me to change everything to past tense. I so wanted to tell her about my first day as a freshman (although it didn't go too well), about the way Riley, Farkle and Lucas made me smile, at the hopefullness that swelled inside of me as I saw him smile.

Suddenly, I remembered her last bit of advice in the form of a note: Don't look behind you. I wished that she was still here to tell me what it meant.

But what if...she had meant for me to read it after her death? And if so, had she known...?

I abruptly excused myself to go to the bathroom, leaving Lucas to enjoy his meal in peace, or rather to delve deeper into this mess.

Don't look behind you. It wasn't easy to decipher. Had she meant to never look behind me at all? What if I dropped something behind me? Was I allowed to pick it up?

Conveniently, my mind wandered to this Monday. Trapped in the washroom, encaged by doors of smoke and ash with no way out. And most confusingly, the note. "Xo's" funny, little anonymous game. Hadn't I looked behind me to see that note?

Is that what she had meant?
But how could she have known? How--?

My phone, on full volume, rang from the other room, summoning me to it. In a frenzy, I forgot all about my current thoughts and rushed to get it.
I was too late. By the time I got there, a notification read: 1 missed call from "Riley♡".

Ah. I was late enough for her to assume that I was dead.

"Maya? Where are you?" she screamed as soon as she picked up the phone. I shielded my ears for some time before replying.

"I overslept, sorry Honey. J-just coming in ten minutes!"

"It's nearly lunchtime." She sounded sour. Of course, she would. I'd totally forgotten that I was spending time with the person she liked right now. Now, I felt guilty. Before I had been so enthralled with his smile (and was still trying to get over the happiness it caused me), that thoughts of her had escaped my mind.

"I'm so sorry, please forgive me, I just slept really late! I promise I'll be there soon!" I spoke to her sweetly, wanting to regain some of our previous friendship.

"Alright. See you."

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idk.
sorry for the late update, i had this chapter finished in october but didn't publish for some reason.
this is such a short chapter but idk what else to write and i didnt wanna stretch this out unnecessarily :')