The next day I spent half an hour longer than usual doing my makeup and texted Kat about my outfit twice. I planned on apologising to Luke today and wanted to look better than usual. According to Kat Luke "won't even have another chance other than letting it go, especially if you wear that skirt." I still wasn't sure what to think of that plan.

By the time I got downstairs to meet Kat - my car was being repaired - my mom had yelled upstairs three times, informing me that I was running late. I rushed out the door, trying to pull my skirt down every other second.

"You look amazing!" Kat gushed upon seeing me.

"Really? I don't feel amazing. And this skirt is way too short…"

"Nonsense." Kat interrupted me. "It looks great, just ask Luke later." She didn't convince me but I decided to let it go. It was to late to go back and change anyways.

My insecurities skyrocketed the second we pulled up into the school parking lot.

"Kat, this was a mistake. I really can't pull this off, I look ridiculous." What I didn't say was that I was actually starting to feel nauseous. Was I really supposed to talk to Luke like this? How the hell would that help me convince him that I didn't want to have sex yet? This plan was stupid.

"Trust me, you can and you are. Now common, we're already late." She was already climbing out of the car and before I could chicken out and skip first period to change I was rushing towards the school, trying to catch up with Kat. Which wasn't easy, since I still couldn't keep every thought from circling around my revealing outfit.

Or rather it wasn't easy until we passed a certain pink car with a certain person smoking a cigarette without a care in the world leaning against it.

"Ugh, could she at least try to care about school? Seriously who does this girl think she is?" Kat's disgust was almost palpable.

Tessa looked beautiful but I kept that to myself. Her casual stance, head tilted back, fingers loosely holding the cigarette, were mesmerising.

"Avery! What are you doing?" Kat pulled at my sleeve and I realised I'd slowed down, almost stopping entirely. 
"Nothing, sorry. Just really tired I guess." I responded, trying my best to vaguely explain my lack of focus. Which was hard because out of the corner of my eye I could clearly see that Tessa was now looking at me, a smile on her face.

We weren't late. Thank god, or else Kat would've thought about ways to remedy the situation all week. Tessa however, strolled into the classroom about five minutes late. More specifically seven and a half. I didn't like to admit it, not even to myself, but ignoring her like everyone else was doing it had become increasingly hard - maybe even impossible - since my encounter with her yesterday. She didn't seem to care that the teacher was clearly glad to have an excuse to tell her off and just sat down as if she hadn't done anything wrong.

I glanced in Tessa's direction multiple times that period. To my surprise she actually seemed to be listening, contradicting basically every rumour about how she slept during school most times and texted during the rest. She was definitely paying more attention than me and even though she didn't once raise her hand she was taking notes more than anyone else in the classroom. Once the bell rang she packed her things and walked out without paying anyone much attention.

"Did you see Luke yet?" Lacey asked during lunch. I shook my head, trying to suppress the wave of anxiety rolling over me once more.

"I haven't seen him yet. Maybe I'll just call him after school." My hopes to end the conversation that way were short lived as Kat immediately stepped in.

"No need, I think he's training with the team after school. Just meet him there." The thought of confronting him while the entire team was watching didn't make me feel better in the slightest. Of course it was ridiculous - I had been with Luke for a while now and new all of his friends pretty well - but I still felt uncomfortable around them. They were all tall, broad-shouldered and way too confident. Basically the typical cliche of a football team. The sneaking suspicion that Luke had told them he'd already had sex with me didn't help. I wasn't quite sure when that suspicion had manifested itself but based on the amused grins and stupid jokes it wasn't too far fetched. I couldn't tell Kat and Lacey that though. I didn't need them to confront Luke for me, that would just make everything worse. At least he hadn't broken up with me yet. Although after every fight we've had recently I had been sure that that was it and he'd end it.

"Yeah, good idea." I muttered, doing a bad job at feigning excitement to talk to Luke in person.

"Make sure to get everything between you guys out of the way, winter formal is coming up. You guys have to go together and he has to have enough time to ask you out." Kat pointed out. I just nodded and continued poking at my lasagne, hoping the conversation would move on to some other topic.

I was pulling down my skirt once more - it had become somewhat of a nervous habit at this point - and walked towards the football field. Kat had been right, the team was currently training, so I climbed up the bleachers and sat down somewhere. As I pulled out my phone I saw a car driving out of the school parking lot - a pink car with black spots. Tessa. I watched the car disappear and suddenly wished I was sitting inside it instead of on the bleachers. Escaping wasn't an option though. I had to wait for Kat to drive me home and she still had cheer practise. So it was either sitting here or walking home - an option that became more and more appealing as the minutes ticked by.

Even the book I was currently reading - Pride and Prejudice - wasn't able to distract me from the conversation that was coming nearer and nearer.

No matter how much I wanted to concentrate on another love story all I could think about was my own. What was I even doing here? Apologising to Luke, just to repeat the entire fight two weeks later? What was I hoping for? I had no idea how I'd react if he dumped me. Right now, I couldn't imagine crying in my room, eating ice cream and watching sappy movies even though that was probably what I should do in a situation like that. That couldn't be a good sign right? But I did like Luke, he had always been really nice to me, even before we had been dating, he'd bought me a set of special edition classics to my birthday even though he thought they were boring, he didn't care that I didn't really care about football and he had endured the relentless questioning of my family without complaint. He was really good looking too, although I personally thought everyone else was exaggerating a bit when talking about him - he was still just a normal guy.

I wanted to make up, I decided, finally ignoring the questioning thoughts that kept bothering me and finally immersing myself in my book again.

Just a few minutes later though I heard someone else walking up the bleachers and a shadow fell over me. It was Luke.

"Hey, Avery. Flynn told me you were up here." He seemed unsure of himself, immediately easing my discomfort a bit. At least he wasn't mad.

"Yeah. I wanted to talk about… you know, yesterday." I put away my phone and looked up at him, squinting to see him in front of the afternoon sun. He sat down next to me, leaving only a couple of inches between us. He didn't talk though.

"Um… sorry, I guess. I know I was being silly-"

"No you weren't. I thought about things yesterday and I'm sorry. I acted like a total dick." Everything he said sounded genuine and the longer we sat there the sillier I felt. What had I been afraid of? It was just Luke after all.

"Could we maybe… just forget the whole thing? It's really embarrassing and I'd just like to pretend it never happened. Okay?"

"Fine. I can't be mad at you anyways. Especially not if you're wearing that." He said, gesturing at my outfit. It took all of my willpower to not pull it down again.

"Want me to take you home? I think Kat still has practise for a bit." I wondered how he knew I'd driven with Kat today but then decided it wasn't important.

"Yeah, sure. I'll just text her."

While we walked back down to the field, Luke put an arm around my waist. By the time we reached the car it had travelled down quite a bit, causing me to awkwardly pushing him away. For a moment I was sure he'd be annoyed again but he just kissed me on the cheek and unlocked the door.

I'd been in his car more times than I could count but I still couldn't stand it. It was always a complete mess and I always had to move some kind of trash off of the passengers seat before sitting down. Tessa's immaculate car popped into my mind but vanished as soon as we pulled out of the parking lot. I leaned back and listened to Luke talk about how the current season was going and something about a scout coming to watch a game sometime this season, occasionally nodding or asking a question but otherwise remaining silent.

Even when we reached my house we continued to sit and talk - or I guess he continued talking and I continued listening - until we didn't have anything more to catch up on. We kissed goodbye - Luke was a pretty good kisser actually. Not that I had many references but it was enjoyable. I only leaned back when his hand landed on my naked thigh and traveled a bit too high, thanks to the damn skirt. I was going to burn the thing later, no matter how many other people assured me how great it was.