LUKE

"I'm actually very proud of you for agreeing to this, Luke." The curly haired boy comments as he grips the steering wheel, driving down the traffic-filled highway. "I was beginning to think you had gone brain dead or something."

We are currently sitting in my car, my head leaning against the window as Ashton drives. Calum is sitting in the backseat, constantly grumbling about the fact that he is always in the back and never in the front. This afternoon, Ashton had the grand idea to go to a club, somewhere I can get my mind off things, he says. I had been sitting on the couch watching Mean Girls for the fifth consecutive time that day when he suggested it, and I can't say I was particularly crazy about the idea. My mum was the one who finally convinced me to get off my ass and go, mainly just so she can have the couch to herself again.

It took another two hours to coerce me into getting a shower and getting dressed, which proved to be a very difficult task. My two friends were quite relieved when they finally shoved my limp body into the front seat of the car, and now here we are, parked in front of a building throbbing with music, shouts and voices vibrating from the walls. I grimace. I can practically smell the alcohol already.

"Calum, are you going to be the one who is going to get shit-faced tonight, or will it be Luke? Because one of us has to be sober enough to drive home." Ashton asks as he pulls out the keys, dropping them into the pocket of his tight jeans.

"I want to get drunk, but I'm pretty sure Luke won't be able to drive home even if he's sober." Calum comments, and I shut my eyes, sighing. Ashton hums.

"I guess I'll stay sober, then. Somewhat sober. I'm still going to have a drink or two." Ashton resolves as his long fingers curl over the car handle, pushing it open and swinging his converse covered feet over the edge of the seat.

I swallow grimly, preparing myself for the hyped up energy that will be present inside the club. After hearing practically no sound besides Regina George's voice, this will be quite the dichotomy. I push open the door just as Calum does, and we both crawl out of the car, shutting it firmly as Ashton locks the door.

The air is bitterly cold out and I wrap my arms around myself, following my two friends into the mouth of the club, eager to be invited into its warmth. Immediately, the loud atmosphere swallows us up when we step inside. It is clear to see that nearly everyone here is absolutely drunk, and doesn't give a fuck about who they are grinding on. I clench my jaw, moving away from all the people and following Ashton to the bar.

The bartender offers us a lopsided grin. "What can I get for ya?"

"Just one shot for me. A ton for these two." Ashton points to Calum and I. He then glances at me and firmly grasps my shoulder. "Especially this guy."

I push Ashton's hands off my shoulder. "I'm not looking to get really drunk tonight, Ashton."

The hazel eyed boy stares at me before taking his single shot in his hand, bringing it towards his lips. Before the glass touches them, he cocks his head. "Come on, man. You've been through shit. You and I both know that it's nice to forget every once and a while." He tilts his head, letting the drink slide down his throat before placing the glass back on the table. Ashton doesn't get drunk easily, thankfully. He still looks completely in possession of his actions as he scans the room around him, sighing. Then his eyes catch on someone near the DJ Booth, talking to the man softly.

"No way, Luke, is that Alex?" Ashton jabs my ribcage with his finger. I glance over at the boy by the booth and turn back the bar.

"Yeah."

"Oh my god, I haven't seen him since I moved away. I'm gonna go talk to him." Ashton pats my shoulder and begins to walk away. Then he stops and looks back at me. "Let loose a little. Have a few shots. It won't hurt anyone."

Ashton leaves and Calum shrugs at me, climbing up onto the barstool beside me. The bartender pushes a platter of small glasses full of unknown liquids toward us, and Calum wastes no time, grabbing two. I pluck one from the plate and bring it to my mouth, gulping down the sour tasting drink. I groan, pushing the empty glass away.

"They taste like shit." I state, and Calum drinks his third.

"They're supposed to." He says, and downs two more before he looks satisfied with his un-soberness. He pulls himself up, staggering a little, and looks at me with slightly red eyes.

"I'm gonna go hit on some girls. You wanna come?" Calum offers, but doesn't give me a chance to answer before he stumbles into the mass of swaying bodies, moving in a way that I suppose is supposed to be dancing.

I turn back to the plate of shots. There are still plenty left. I shut my eyes, gulping down a few more. I've never been a lightweight. It takes a lot to get me drunk, but I can't say I don't like the feeling it gives me when I am.

After swallowing more shots than I probably should have, the alcohol begins to take a toll on me. My vision blurs a bit and stays there, making everything look disoriented and abnormally funny, and my mind is a mess of smeared thoughts that are too illegible to decipher. The more I sit there and the more the drinks course through my bloodstream, I am nearly unconscious. I probably shouldn't have taken that many, even for such a heavyweight, but there is not going back.

I push myself off of the bar stool, my legs almost giving out on me, and turn in the direction of the music and stumble into the herd of moving bodies.

It is somewhat comforting to be surrounded by bodies who are no more conscious of their thoughts as I am, and it is nice to have my eyes dry and gleaming, not stinging from the thought of the kitten boy. A girl steps in front of me and starts dancing and swaying beside me, running her hands down my sides. The only thing I make out is that she has reddish hair, sort of blonde. That's all I can tell of her as she dances, and that's all I really want to know, considering girls aren't really my cup of tea.

All the same, I continue to dance with her for the sake of having someone to dance with, my body moving sloppily against hers. She continues to run her hands around my sides and my shoulders and I don't think much of it, my hands going nowhere near her body. The entire room pulses to the beat of the music and I find myself enjoying it, letting a smile slide onto my face.

Eventually the song ends and the girl in front of me moves away, grabbing a random guy by the neck of his collar and smashing her lips against his. The guy frantically moves his hands around her and I grimace, stepping back and closing my eyes, accidently bumping into a different body.

I turn around and begin dancing again before looking up to see who I am dancing with, and I immediately regret doing so as my eyes fall upon the familiar blonde and brown hair of Calum. He isn't looking at me, so he obviously can't tell it's me, or that it is a guy he is dancing with at all. I stumble back, trying to get away as fast as possible.

"Shit, no." I manage to cough out, alcohol lacing my breath. I may be completely wasted, but I could never be drunk enough to dance with Calum.

Thankfully, the next body I am thrown against is unfamiliar. I turn around to find a tall, broad body with jet black hair and fair skin, bright green eyes meeting mine. His hands run through my hair and then travel down my arms, and I continue to dancing, letting all my thoughts drown with the music. It's nice, surprisingly, to forget.

The boy grinds up closer to me as the music continues, and I feel his lips press against the side of my neck, his hands skimming down to grab my bum. I'm not used to being so submissive and I hate the feeling of his lips against my neck, but the alcohol blurs up my thoughts and reality too much to where I can't tell the difference.

It isn't until his lips press harshly against mine that I realize his intentions. My eyes fly open and my head throbs, struggling to mask away the alcohol enough to think correctly, but my movements are slackened by all the shots as the boy's tongue forces itself inside my mouth. I struggle to get away, not liking this at all, and I press my hands flat against the boy's broad chest, but his muscles are stronger than mine and he only pulls me closer to him.

He shoves his tongue deeper down my throat and I gag a little, disgusted by the taste of the man's vodka breath inside my mouth. His right hand grips my arm to keep me from scurrying away and his left trails along the edge of my black jeans, stopping at the front. I can feel his fingers slide down the front of my pants and I try and cry out, try to get him to stop, but he keeps his lips over mine, preventing me from making any noise.

The moment his lips break away from mine to get a quick catch of air, I push away from him, stumbling away from his grasp and falling into the mass of bodies, desperate to get away. His green eyes stare after me for a moment before he finds someone else to dance with, and I turn around, trying to get my eyes to clear up as I search for the exit.

My eyes are blurred with frightened tears as I finally find it, staggering to the door and pushing it open. The cold air sharpens my thoughts briefly enough to allow myself to trail along the sides of the building, collapsing at the corner and slumping against the brick walls that can't silence the music that throbs inside. I pull my knees up to my chest, wiping my lips repeatedly to try and get the taste of that boy's lips off of my mouth, and horrified tears drip down my cheeks.

The air is freezing, enough to turn my lips a tint of blue, and I wrap my arms around myself, trying to focus my thoughts away from all the alcohol I consumed. Why did I drink so much anyways? Why did I allow myself to get so drunk?

To forget. To forget about Michael. To forget about the way his ears flattened against his head when he was scared and how his small form fit perfectly against mine. To forget about the fact that he was taken away by a herd of detectives, shut away in a cage and driven off to a place where the location is unknown.

The alcohol makes me more raw, more emotional, and more teardrops trickle down my face at the thought of him. Normally I am able to compose myself, to put on a blank face and distract myself from the analyzing looks of everyone around me, but I can't do that. Not with the liquids pulsing in my blood and causing my thoughts to melt, dripping down my cheeks in the form of tears.

You need to be doing something, Luke. You need to be searching for him, you need to be driving all around Australia to look for him. I criticize myself, stabbing my bones for not doing better to look for him, although all other options would be nearly impossible. I can't afford to buy every plane ticket in the world and search each and every country for the hybrid boy. I don't have the ability to scream out for him and strain my ears to here his small voice answer, and I can't find it in me move on from him as though he never existed.

How do people do that? Move on from their loved ones as though their death didn't penetrate their heartstrings? Michael didn't die, no, but I have no way of knowing he isn't dead now. There is an enormous possibility that they took him to the facility and killed him off, dumping his body in the mud to decay into the soil. How do I know that they didn't shove a gun up to the temple of his soft skin and pull the trigger, letting the bullet pierce his pale flesh? How do I know that they didn't inject a mysterious vial into his veins to stop his heart, letting it slow and die as though it never started beating in the first place? How do I know that I am not crying about the memory of a dead kitten boy, whose heart no longer pulses in his little chest?

The idea of him dead is enough to make me break down completely, without the help of the alcohol. It is quite easy to imagine from Carter's haunting words back at Ashton's house. He'll sooner be dead, he said. He'll sooner be dead than you go and save him from the facility of broken hearts and bruised bones.

My vision is hazy, going in and out of vision as I stare at the empty sidewalk in front of me. My thoughts are a mess, and I am only able to pinpoint a few ideas here and there, but there are quickly dissolved when I try and think hard about them. Black dots form at the corners of my eyes, my head fogging up, and I am nearly unconscious when I hear a voice.

"Luke? Are you out here?" Ashton's high voice rings out into the cold air, but I am too weak and too intoxicated to answer him, so I stay limp against the building. I hear Ashton's footsteps against the concrete as he rounds the corner, and then they stop.

"Hey," Ashton says quietly, bending down beside me. "Hey, buddy. Are you alright?"

I mumble something in response, and Ashton slides his arms under me, lifting me up and carrying me princess style. My mind is too intoxicated to care, and I let myself be carried out to the parking lot, somewhat aware of Calum stumbling beside us a few feet away.

Ashton somehow manages to hold me in one arm and opens the car door with the other, and then he places me carefully inside, wrapping the seat belt over my waist. He helps Calum get in the back and I can hear the kiwi boy shouting slurred words that none of us understand.

I lay in the leather seat and roll my eyes towards the window, where I can see a few drunken bodies staggering out of the club and collapsing against the side of the building. I stare at them, unblinking, as Ashton climbs into the front, sticking his keys into the ignition.

The hazel eyed boy pulls out of the parking lot, and I watch the drunk bodies fade into the distance, trees and empty highways replacing their sad faces.

I'm tired. I'm so tired. And no matter how much alcohol I force into my bloodstream, nothing can get rid of the thought of Michael engraved into my skull.

---
A/N my dad was so mean to me tonight and i wanted to slap him but if i did then my mom would yell at me and then they would yell at each other and start an argument like they always do and sigh it made me v sad and angry

but anyways

huge thanks for 50k reads. i'm kinda freaking out. a bunch of really cool wattpad authors are reading this and it makes me want to cry and excessively sweat at the same time lol

i love you guys so much! please vote and comment :) i read them all because i have no social life and you guys make me super happy bYe