It's 5:28 AM.
Luka had just finished training in the gym on campus for the day, he had gotten up at 4 AM sharp and did his daily morning workout before practicing on the field, it was normal for him to be here since he was the captain of the football team and he still felt like he had a lot to prove to people.
Given Luka was an exceptional player and the best this college had ever gotten on the football team, there was always a small voice in his head telling him he could be better, not only for himself but for those who look at him with scrutiny.
He was an outsider in this college, arriving late in the first year due to his parents divorcing he had no choice but to move countries and colleges, leaving all of his friends and ambitions behind to start again from the bottom.
Everywhere Luka went it was the same, yes he missed his friends but it took no effort to make more friends anywhere he went, people went to him and wanted to be around him, was it the money his parents had or was it his looks that attracted people to him?
He didn't care, why should he? He wasn't interested in social titles in college, he was often misunderstood because he said so little around his friends, especially since moving colleges.
When he was by himself Luka was quiet and liked to be alone yet to his friends he was something entirely different, and he had no idea where they got their view of him from, he never tried to be anything other than what he knew he was.
Luka was, in his words... lonely.
He would never mention this to his snob mother who was busy spending his judgemental father's money, or to his friends who always had an opinion on people with any sort of problems, he knew what kind of people his family and friends were, that they lived far from reality.
A month into the new college and Luka was getting used to being the new 'popular guy on campus' and he was used to being asked out by girls and invited to exclusive parties of his new popular friends on campus.
The day went on as normal, he woke up, went to the gym, trained with the team then he went to all of his lessons, everything was normal until he opened his locker in the hall to grab his bag so he could head home.
At first, he thought it was some joke one of his friends had made, who else would do something so bizarre like leaving an apple in his locker?
This wasn't the first time someone had left something in his locker, love notes, chocolates, one time there was a stuffed teddy bear with a voice recording of a girl asking him out on a date, but never just an apple.
It was odd, but he thought nothing of it.
Until the next day, at the same time, Luka had opened his locker and there was another apple.
Luka couldn't quite grasp what was happening, he felt stupid thinking about bringing it up with his friends, he could hear their laughter in his head as he told them someone was leaving him fruit, so he didn't say anything.
It's been a year since then at the new college and the apples were still being put inside of his locker, he had even tried to catch the person in action but he could never see anyone put anything in his locker, he had rearranged his days and changed things around just to see who was leaving them, for a while it drove him insane and threw the apples away when he couldn't find out who was doing it, then he just accepted that whoever was leaving them, wanted to give them to him.
Luka would think about this person, whoever they were, and wonder why an apple, it was such a strange thing to leave someone you don't know, he had heard of teachers getting them from students but never a student getting one at random, for almost a year without making themselves known.
He knew it was harmless so he didn't bring it up with anyone and never reported it to campus security, he left nothing of value in his locker but his books and sometimes his gym clothes, so whoever was gaining access to his locker had no interest in any of his things.
Luka had finished his morning workout and was heading out the door when he spotted his best friend and the only guy with who he actually got on well with, Jake, his roommate and teammate.
"Sup man, you just finish?"
Luka nodded his head and noticed he wasn't wearing his gym clothes, in fact, he was dressed as he had just woken up, his hair was a mess and he looked half asleep.
"Yeah, just needed to blow off some steam."
Jake laughed. "I feel you but it's 5 AM bro, and it's a Saturday."
Luka shrugged and took a drink of his water bottle. "What you doing in here anyways, you look homeless." Luka teases, making Jake eye roll.
Jake tossed Luka his phone which he almost dropped as he went to catch it and then he looked at Jake questionably.
"Why do you have this?"
"Dude, you need to seriously start taking your phone with you, because if another chick disturbs my sleep at 5 AM I might just break your phone man, I'm serious. I need my beauty sleep L, we can't all be born with a face like yours."
He looked at his grumpy friend and ignored his threat as he touched his phone to turn the screen on, and doing that he noticed multiple missed phone calls and texts from people he knew and some he didn't.
One had caught his attention, it was from his sister who he was close with and the only family member he could speak to without having it judged or spoke about with others, she was the only one he spoke with about his personal life.
"Sorry man, look I need to ring Nat, see you back at the dorms. " Luka exclaimed as he pushed open the gym doors, giving his friend one last nod goodbye.
"DON'T FORGET TO MENTION ME!" Jake yelled teasingly out as Luka left.
Luka ignored him, he knew Jake was saying it to get a rise out of him, knowing that every one of his friends had a thing for his twin sister who went to college overseas, she would come to visit during breaks and holidays and that's when he had introduced her to his friends, and since he then, he had regretted it.
He knew he was protective of his sister Nat, and the guys used it against him and teased him about it on the field, but he laughed it off and carried on knowing they were harmless and none of them would seriously try anything with his sister, Luka would never let them.
Luka kept jogging down the hall until he made it to his locker so he could grab his bag, he desperately needed to shower, then he could phone his sister back and see why she called him two times this early, knowing the time difference is different in Europe where his sister studied.
Like every other day, Luka opened his locker but this time he was shocked for a whole other reason, like every day he expected something unusual yet familiar, and this time he got a surprise for a different reason.
There's no apple, but a note with a letter attached to it.
"What the fuck."
What the fuck indeed, he couldn't believe what was written, he read it over and over again before the words sunk into his brain, like somehow he wondered if he was seeing if what he was reading was real, because theirs no way he could make this up.
'I want to lose my virginity, can you help me?'
A joke is what he thought at first but that was before he opened the letter and saw what was inside, expecting a love letter or even an explanation to what he had just read but what he got instead made him feel sick.
Inside the letter were five $100 dollar bills.
He knew this was from the person leaving the apples, the note had a small drawn apple in the corner of the ripped piece of paper the person had written on.
Luka had tried to think of who would leave something so strange but could literally think of no one, he knew a lot of people at this college and everyone knew him, but not once had someone asked him for sex and were so desperate that they asked with the intention to pay him.
Someone was asking him to take their virginity, so he knew it was a girl, the handwriting was really neat and pretty, all the guys he knew could barely write their name in a straight line so he knew after almost a year that his suspicion was right, Apple was a girl.
Why the money though he thought? He looked around the hall at college and it was still too early for students to show up, so he started to wonder if she was a student or a teacher, because everyone at this college knew Luka had money, and that he would never need money, so why the money?
For now, he would just leave it there in his locker he thought to himself, he couldn't think straight as he reread the note, he had too much going on to stress about who this girl was and why she wanted him to take his virginity, it was such an odd thing that he grabbed his bag and then shut the locker.
For the first time since he got an apple, Luka was not looking forward to the next day.