before the pain | luke (JATP)

XL

Sunday morning, after a long night of heavy bass and alcoholic teens drinking before the legal age, the basement was left untouched. Not by wanting to, but because there was something more important.

There are two sides to a story, there will always be the bad and the good. While Halloween La Black, for the whole school was seen as the best party of their senior year.

Alex was left crying, with the feelings of his ribcage in pain and the sore parts where bruises now had come. While lips were smashed together in the hallway outside the bathroom stall that prior night, Alex had decided to come a little later to the party, causing him to not show up at all.

Mila woke up Sunday morning, with a weird feeling in her stomach, butterflies from the kiss of the night prior, as well as the thought of something being wrong, as she was woken by Aera saying someone wanted to speak to her on the phone.

Mila put on her rope and walked down to the house phone. Finishing the only two-minute conversation, she was out the door five minutes later, wearing a mess of a hoodie and skinny jeans, her shoes almost not on as she ran quicker than ever before.

The morning air almost burned her lungs, as Mila ran down the streets, her broken down converse hitting the ground harder and harder as she sprinted, the wind blew in her hair, making it messier than before, as baby hair flew everywhere, her breath being heard miles away.

She got to the garage, having run for 20 minutes in her shape, made her sound like someone with asthma, who was dying. The sweat was dripping down her back as she walked into the garage. All the boys were already there, with Alex sitting in the middle.

You see the short two-minute conversation they had over the phone was quick. It was something along the lines of Reggie yelling into the phone:

"ALEX RAN AWAY FROM HOME AFTER HAVING BEEN BEATEN UP BY SOME DUDES WHEN HE WAS WALKING TO THE HALLOWEEN PARTY AND NOW HE IS LIVING IN THE GARAGE WHERE WE PRACTICE AND WE DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO AND HE IS BLEEDING A-"

That was around the time Mila had hung up the phone, she took a deep breath trying to stop herself from dying.

"Who - d-do I -.... ne-ed to ..... kill?" She asked, trying to breathe as she leaned against a wall with her hand. Alex looked surprised at her, she looked like someone on the edge of fainting.

"You ran over here? Jesus Woman, calm down" Alex asked with a confused face, he had a black eye and you could see the bindings on his rib cage.

"Are you gonna be okay?" She asked as she walked closer to him, studying his face, where his lip was ripped with dark dry blood covering it.

"I'm gonna be okay Mila, I will just live here for a couple of months" Alex explained as he leaned back on the couch shrugging. "It's not bad here, so I will manage "

While the other boys seemed okay with this sudden decision was Mila however not that impressed. "You can't live in a garage," Mila said as she put a hand on her hip. Luke looked at her with a gentle smile, as memories of the night prior ran in his mind, making him smile even more.

"Why are you smiling at Mila like that?" Bobby whispered as he lifted an eyebrow, Luke widened his eyes as he began coughing. "Well, Alex can you still play? "

Reggie slapped Luke's arm. "Can you focus on anything else than music right now? Your friend was almost beaten to death and your only question is if he is able to play drums?" Reggie asked as he looked annoyed at his friend.

Luke laughed awkwardly as he looked at Mila almost for approval of his next words. "I meant that we have the biggest gig of our life just in a couple of months, and I want us all to be prepared and not have Alex die before we even go on stage"