#lori 003.

where: lori + cricket's apartment

The walk from the library to Ocean Crest had gone as Keo expected it to. A little awkward, a lot unsure, the change in a previously comfortable shared presence residing almost completely with him.

Like most things that were difficult, it makes him want to cut and run. Trail back a little in the last few metres between them and the apartment building, a sharp turn in the opposite direction when he was out of her peripheral and he would be in the wind.

There's no mistaking the appeal, but if he doesn't have a long overdue conversation with her now, he never will.

The hesitancy stays with him even as he follows her into her apartment, wondering if the silence and now eyes glaring at him from the kitchen was a false sense of security and either of her roommates may pop out at any given moment.

where: aurora bay library

"Why are you always here?" Lucky asked in a whisper as he placed himself down in the empty seat opposite Lori on the table she was studying at. He had wasted a Sunday morning at their dad's trying to catch sight of her only for him to tell him she was at the library studying in between trying to get him to on board with his next dreadful business endeavour.

He had barely managed to escape with his bank balance undisturbed.

"It's a Sunday. Get a life."

It would have saved him plenty of hassle if he had of texted his twin first, but that would involve actually letting her know that he needed to talk to her and he much preferred to orchestrate a happenstance at their parents and pretend otherwise.

There was no sense in pretending he was in the building for the same reason she was, which is why he didn't pluck a comic book off the shelf and pretend to be studying the ins and outs of the Sanctum Sanctorum from Doctor Strange.