Luke was good at many things. He knew how to make amazing guitars from scratch: polishing wood, painting the body and making the neck the smoothest thing I had ever touched. He knew how to sing and play guitar like no one I had ever seen. He knew how to make the most spectacular mac and cheese Perth had ever seen and he was a Physics genius. Anything that included numbers and formulae, it was Luke's thing. He wasn't, however, good in English, which was why it didn't come as much of a surprise to me when I saw Luke sitting by my doorstep on the afternoon before his English exam, patiently waiting for me as he scrolled through his phone.

I had locked my window that morning, which explained why Luke was sitting outside instead of in my room. It automatically made me feel bad: I knew it was going to rain, which was why I locked it in the first place, and there Luke sat, drenched in rain with his hair sticking to his forehead and fancy school uniform sticking to his lanky body. He was curled up, legs brought up to his chest and arms wrapped around himself with his phone in hands. His chin rested on his knees and seeing that made me smile. Luke always teased me as a kid for sitting like that, and now, it was almost like he had adopted all of my habits much like I had adopted his of twitching my nose whenever I was uncertain or biting my lip when I got uncomfortable.

He looked up as I approached, relief washing through his features as he saw it was actually me and not just some random person walking past. He quickly stood up, cringing at his soaked up uniform before his eyes met mine again. I knew I was wet too from the short walk from the bus stop to my house, but I was nowhere near as wet as Luke. Neither of us said anything as I took the house keys from the front pocket of my school shorts, unlocking the door and letting Luke in. I knew my mum was going to yell at me for dripping around the freshly polished wooden floors, but I didn't even bother telling Luke to watch out for anything. He was bound to get a tantrum from my mother too.

"What brings you here on this fine afternoon?" I asked with a smirk, knowing exactly what he needed as we walked into my room.

"ATAR Lit." Luke sighed as he began stripping out of his school uniform. He didn't even have to ask me if he could borrow some clothes, we were close enough for him to simply walk into my closet and get whatever he needed.

"I still don't understand why you chose to take Literature. You suck at English." I shook my head as I entered my ensuite bathroom, stripping out of my uniform before drying myself up. I knew I needed to shower, but that would have to wait until I was done with Luke. I wrapped the towel around my waist, taking the clean shirt I always left in my bathroom for situations like this before pulling it over my head. I didn't want Luke seeing my fat self and I didn't want to see it either.

"Because you chose Lit, duh." Luke rolled his eyes playfully, smiling widely at me over his shoulder as he stepped into a dry pair of boxers. I couldn't help but admire his body when he wasn't looking. If only I was enough for a person like Luke, if only Luke was my soulmate. "If I took English, who would help me out?"

"Calum." I shrugged nonchalantly, pulling my own boxers up my legs before dropping the towel and reaching for my joggers. By the time I was dressed, Luke was already sitting on my bed, brand new book in hand. "Did you only just buy the book you were supposed to be reading for the last three months?"

"Calum is useless." Luke snorted, flicking through the pages of the tragedy before giving me a shy smile. "I mean... you know me well enough to know I wouldn't read it until last minute, so, like, yeah. I've read it and stuff, but I honestly don't see it."

"Are you kidding?" I gasped, taking my own copy from my desk. Unlike Luke's, the corners of my book were all bent from being read over and over, the pages were filled with highlighted verses and little notes on the margin of the page, arrows pointing in every direction to link back to certain ideas. "Phaedra is one of the greatest tragedies of all time. It's pitiful and horrifying at the same time, it is obscure and complex and the whole play itself is one big pang in the heart."

Luke nodded slowly, biting down on his lower lip as he saw me open my own book, comparing my messy pages to his perfectly clean ones. He sighed heavily, smile fading as he frowned. "I wish I could be as passionate about this sort of thing as you are."

"You are." I said softly, trying to keep myself from blushing as Luke gave me a questioning look. "Luke, this is poetry. This is like music, and you're passionate about music. Once you figure out the metrics to these verses, you could easily turn this into a song and it'd be like reading between the lines in any lyrics you find out there. What part of the play are you guys studying? We're doing the last scene."

Luke shrugged with a pout. "I think it's the part when Phaedra tells Hippolytus. You know, about her love for him."

"Lucky," I shook my head with a huff. "You got the best part of the whole play."

"How so?"

"Are you kidding me?" I gasped loudly, opening my book on the same act and scene as Luke. "'Here's my heart. Here's where your hand should strike me.' How can this line not hit close to home?" I looked up at Luke, seeing him staring back blankly. "Strike. Or if you think it not worthy of your blow, / If your hate refuses me such sweet torment, so, / Or if your hand by my vile blood would be stained, / Instead of your arm lend me then your blade." I read out loud, catching from the corner of my eye the small smile that tugged at the edges of Luke's lips. "This symbolises so much. What do you see when I read this?"

"Passion." Luke stated, eyebrows etching together as he saw me smile. "Wait, was that right?"

"Well, sort of." I chuckled, feeling my heart warm as I saw Luke smile too before his features were set as a frown once more. I didn't understand why Luke was so serious today, considering he was never this serious. Even studying, he found a way to make it fun. "It is about passion initially, because what Phaedra means is that her love for Hippolytus is so strong and so morally wrong, that she'd rather die. Her soul is cursed by the Gods and her passion for him has overtaken her entire being, and for her, the only way to fix it is to die. But when she says 'instead of your arm lend me then your blade' it symbolises that Hippolytus, in every possible way, is what is killing Phaedra. Either physically stabbing her, or giving her his sword, he is what kills her, him and the passion he ignited in Phaedra. Her uncontrollable passion for him dooms her to death. Do you see what I mean?"

"No." Luke sighed heavily. "I honestly have no idea what you're talking about and how you manage to take that out of this."

I could see Luke was visibly getting frustrated. The vein in his neck was starting to pop and his whole face was starting to get red. It worried me to see him like that. Usually, he'd come over, we'd calmly study for a few hours and he'd leave having a better grasp of what was happening. But this time, Luke didn't even seem to be listening to what I was saying. His eyes were focused on my book, lips pursed into a thin line, and whenever they opened, all he did was sigh. I talked and talked and talked, trying to explain it to him in the best way I could, but the blond seemed completely out of it.

"Okay," I huffed, closing my book before gently laying it next to me. "What's wrong?"

Luke was silent for a few seconds, lightly shaking his head before he covered his face with his hands. I knew exactly what that meant. That was Luke language for I am about to burst into tears and my whole entire body ached at the thought. Before I could even scoot closer to him, I could already hear his sniffles and the quiet sobs that escaped his lips as his shoulders shook and his entire body curled up into a tiny ball. I crawled over to my best friend, gently tugging his hands away from his face so that he'd look at me.

"What's wrong?" I whispered softly, knowing that would make Luke open up. It always did.

"I'm not going to pass this exam." Luke cried, gasping for air as the hot tears travelled down his cheeks. I tried to dry them up, but Luke simple moved away from my touch. "I need an 85 on my ATAR score to get into Uni and that will never happen because I am so fucking useless at my own language."

"85?" I asked in confusion. "Luke, we only need an 80 to get into UWA, we'll be fine." I reassured him with a smile, instantly feeling my smile fade as Luke looked over at me sadly.

"Mike, I'm not going to UWA." He said softly. "I'm going to UniMelb, and I need an 85 on my ATAR."

"UniMelb? Melbourne? Since when? What about our plans for UWA?"

"Well..." Luke cleared his throat. "Ale's moving to Melbourne next year and it makes no sense for me to stay here. We're moving in together there while I go to school and he starts off his acting career."

"That's across the country." I stated flatly, blinking rapidly as I saw Luke look down at his hands.

"Sometimes we've got to think of what's best for us. And Melbourne is best for me."

And that's when I realised Luke wasn't the best for me.

~~~

thank u for 1k reads!! here's an update lol