SINCE DAY ONE ― luke hemmings ✓

14

My heart kept pounding over my chest even after he walked out and I stayed a bit more to let what happened sink in on my already confused as hell mind.

My stomach kept turning about I didn't know if it was because I'm sick or was it just the familiar smell of his perfume still lingering under my nose it made me cling to somewhere for support as I felt close to passing out. He still smelled the same. Being enclosed within his arms for a short amount of time was exponentially fucking over my head again and again until I found myself thinking about it even after leaving the train to find Kyle.

My eyes found his figure near Calum and I wasn't about to cross another bridge after Luke that I stayed at the side of the room lined up with snacks and sees Michael with a cup full of sliced apples, dipping them over some chocolate fountain. I gathered his attention by grabbing a slice from his cup, taking him by surprise as he was close to reacting violently when he calmed after seeing it was just me. "Hey, you okay?" I nod once, dipping the same fruit under the fountain while my head was still half full of Luke Hemmings. "You don't look okay."

"Hey, Mike?" I called, eyes never moving from the way the chocolate drips down on and on and on... "Why is there a gash over Luke's arm?" It was beyond me how I was asking for something probably unrelated to anything whatsoever but when my eyes hovered over his arms, there was a questionable gash that worried me so much I had to ask how he got it.

Mike didn't answer for the first few minutes while we stood over the fountain. I finally gazed at him and he beheld a sullen face. And I was already regretting asking about it when he looked as though he couldn't tell. "It's okay, you don't have to—"

"August 19th, 2017." Two and a half years ago. "A week after—after..." I cleared my throat, bile threatening to come over me but I willed my hazy head to listen to whatever it was. "He was staying over because he didn't—wanna go home." Our... home. "Cal brought his new guitar over to cheer him up and distract him to make some new tunes but—but halfway, he just lashed out." Oh. "He gave himself a gash from a wood that flew over his arms. And he couldn't touch an instrument for so long or else he'll actually break it—shit—"

I ran. Even if Michael called for my name two times, I ran as far as I could until I reached the empty bathroom and spilled over what little of food I've had for the day, and hunched over the toilet, vomiting everything out even if it hurts my stomach and my chest for heaving too much. I didn't even notice—but there were tears over my cheeks as soon as I leaned over the door. I was crying, and my chest hurts so much I could hear it breaking over the deafening silence of the stall.

I've always known that heart break is a bitch of a pain. Heart break is what I felt when Luke walked out on me one time because I was too stubborn to admit I was wrong. Heart break is what I felt when I thought I was gonna lose him over not being with him on a year tour. Heart break is what I had felt as soon as I walked out of our door that day—but I didn't know heart break could break a man so much not even an instrument he loved with all his heart—not even that could save him from what happened.

I broke a man so deep it probably hurt him even more that I couldn't tell him why, and it was so hard keeping it in when all I ever wanted was to say everything.

But what good would that do to him? To me? To—us?

What good would that do to a man who already moved past the days he couldn't love the things he always have? I would only break him even more. And he doesn't deserve that.

But I do. I deserve this shit. I deserve to feel everything. A price to pay for the damage that I did to a man who deserves no less than the whole world.

I would give him the world—I still will—but not the truth.

Never the truth.

"Theo? Are you there? You okay?" A knock came over twice that I splashed some water on my face before facing Kyle wearing a frown across his forehead. "What the hell happened to you? Mike was calling for you but you keep on running. Is there a problem? Did he said something—" I laid a hand over his shoulders and sighed.