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chapter twenty eight; is that a hickey?
"You do realize you're going to have to talk to me about it eventually, right?" Luke expressed, sitting across from Ava on the carpetted floor, eyes still concentrated on his chess piece as he was trying to figure out where to put it.
It had been a couple days since the Thanksgiving incident and Luke had yet to figure out what was said to her while he was roaming the halls, looking at baby pictures of her and her siblings. Currently, the two of them were sat crisscrossed, their legs sprawled onto the floor as they sat near the couches and played chess on the coffee table in Luke's apartment, some music playing in the background that Luke had connected from his phone to the speaker.
Ava made a face and shook her head, not having anything to say, taking yet another one of his game pieces. "I'd rather not discuss what happened on the holiday that is realistically just celebrating sugar-coated genocide, thank you very much. Oh, and checkmate."
He let out a laugh, "At least your brothers and sisters exchanged contact info with you again. Hanako is—no offense—different than I thought he'd be. Very scary."
Luke shuddered at the memory of meeting her older brother Hanako, who was 6'5'', a quarterback on his college football team, buff, and highly protective over Ava. The instinct to pummel any person who hung out and had intentions with his sister had been a feeling that Hanako had missed, and it was an understatement that he had fun messing with the blonde haired boy. It was a nearly traumatic experience, but he wasn't sure it could compare with the rest of Ava's family. Her aunts and uncles were brutal, and really didn't know when to stop being offensive, especially with the comments they would whisper when Ava would walk away, and he had to force himself to not disrespect anyone on the first night he met them.
"My little brother and sister love you though. I think Ryuu thinks you're her best friend now. Kaito is jealous though. He says that only twins should be best friends," Ava told him distractedly, moving her piece a couple times as she thought about it in her head. Realizing she won, she let out a high-pitched cheer and wiggled in her spot, doing her victory dance. "I won, I won, I won. Take that, loser!"
"It's chess, Ava. Calm down."
Either not hearing him through both her own cheering or through the pop song playing from Luke's phone, or choosing to ignore him for her own personal enjoyment, she stuck her tongue out at him, gloating about how excellent she was at chess. Luke returned the gesture, getting up off the floor to clear the chess pieces, stuffing them into the box before placing everything back on the shelf. He came back to see the shorter girl laid out on the floor, craning her neck to look at him. He got down on the floor and laid the opposite way, so that his head was above hers and he was looking down at her. Weaving his fingers through her soft, dark hair he sighed and played with it, embracing the love song that could be heard echoing in the nearly apartment, even if it was a bad one.
