Free Falling (3 page)

“What up, bud?” Luke greeted him, slinging his arm around my
shoulder, stopping my escape. I sighed quietly and sat on the hood of his car,
preparing myself to be bored stiff, when surprisingly Luke shook his head.
“Can’t stop to talk, my lady has a birthday today so I’m guessing she wants to
go see her friends?” Luke said, looking at me with a smile.

I kissed him quickly and nodded. “Yeah. You stay here and
talk though, I’ll see you at lunchtime,” I suggested, jumping off of the hood
of his car, ignoring how the girls sneered at me and looked me over in my
choice of outfit. No one thought I was good enough for Luke, no one saw what he
saw when he looked at me, but that was okay as far as I was concerned, as long
as
he
saw it then that was all I needed. I couldn’t resist sending a
smug smile to Sandy, the queen bee at our school whom every young and
impressionable girl aspired to be. I knew she wanted Luke, but he’d never shown
the slightest bit of interest in her. She gave me a fake smile in return and
just turned away, bitching about me to her friends, it couldn’t have been more
obvious if they whispered behind their hands whilst pointing at me.

Luke frowned and shook his head, pulling me closer to him.
“No way. If I could, I would spend your whole birthday with you, but I guess
that’s not possible, so I’ll settle for every spare second you have,” he cooed,
kissing me softly. Immediately his friends started jeering and making cat calls
about how we should get a room. I just ignored them the same as I did every
other day.

He pulled away laughing and playfully punched the nearest
guy to him, before nodding towards the front door, signalling for me to lead
the way. I practically skipped up to the building, clinging to him. So far,
this was easily the best birthday ever. Last year had been pretty special too
though, because that was the night that Luke and I first slept together, but
for some reason this one just seemed perfect from the very first second I woke
up in his arms.

As we approached my locker, I saw my two best friends, Beth
and Charlotte, there waiting for me. They were holding open a homemade banner
that said happy birthday on it. I laughed because of how much effort they’d
gone to, there was glitter and everything. Both of my friends were adorable,
yet so different at the same time. Beth was extremely ditsy and was always off
in her own little dream world. Charlotte, on the other hand, was a computer
geek. What she could do with computers blew my mind; if something technical
needed doing then she was the one to ask. She’d gotten herself into some
trouble when she was only fourteen because she had accidentally hacked into the
police department network. She hadn’t meant to, she was just fooling around
trying to break their security for fun, and actually did. Thankfully they
realised that she wasn’t actually trying to do any harm, but I think she was
now on their hacker watch list – a feat she was secretly quite proud of. 

“Happy birthday!” they both cheered as I got up to them.

I smiled and they both grabbed me into a bone crushing hug.
“Thanks.”

“Here, we bought together,” Beth chirped, holding out a flat
rectangular present that I already knew was a book because of the shape of it.

I smiled and tore off the paper. “You didn’t need to get me
anything,” I gushed as I pulled it open. Inside was a photo album, they’d done
a design on the front, both drawing on it and writing ‘Senior year’ on the
front. “Aww, I love this. Thanks girls!”

“Open it,” Charlotte encouraged.

I frowned, confused, but opened the front cover to see three
tickets for the midnight preview screening of the second Hunger Games movie
that came out in a few weeks. I squealed excitedly as I threw my arms around
them both. “These are great, I can’t wait!” I chirped as we all started doing a
happy dance in the middle of the hallway. From the corner of my eye,  I saw the
A-list girls looking at us with disapproval, but I just didn’t care, I was
happy being a nerd so they could disapprove all they wanted.

Someone cleared their throat next to us, so we stopped and I
looked to see it was a freshman. He shifted on his feet nervously, probably a
little scared to approach a senior. “You’re Maisie Preston, aren’t you?” he
asked, flicking his eyes to Luke who looked like he was body guarding me
because of the glare he was shooting the poor guy.

“Er, yeah?” I confirmed, confused.

“Principal Bennett wants to see you in her office,” he muttered,
cringing away from Luke as he stepped closer to me possessively.

The Principal wants to see me?
“Oh really? Okay,
thanks for telling me.” I smiled at the guy reassuringly because he looked like
he was three seconds from passing out. Without saying anything else, he turned
and scuttled off. I turned to Luke and raised one eyebrow, waiting for an
explanation for that face. “Death glare for a freshman, really?”

He shrugged casually, not seeming bothered by my stern face.
“He was looking at your butt as you were jumping around.”

I rolled my eyes. Luke could be a little possessive
sometimes, but I could handle that, being with him was worth putting up with a
little jealousness every now and then. “So what? People look at you all the
time, does that mean I have to start glaring at the girls for looking at
something that’s mine?” I asked, smirking at him playfully. 

He smiled and pulled me closer to him, crushing the photo
album and tickets between our bodies. “I love it when you call me yours,” he
whispered, looking at me hungrily. I smiled and pressed my lips to his, biting
on his bottom lip gently, making his fingers dig into the small of my back.

Suddenly his arms were gone from my waist and his body
jerked away from mine. I looked up, shocked; Luke was now a foot away from me.
My brother, Alex, had hold of the back of his sweater as he frowned angrily.
“Five inch gap between you and my sister while I’m around, you know that,
Hannigan,” he growled, pushing Luke away from me.

I sighed in exasperation. Sometimes my twin was the most
annoying thing in the world with his protectiveness. “Grow up, Alex. Just go
run along and try and get your fill of some slut’s pants before school starts,
huh?” I waved my hand dismissively. Alex didn’t like Luke much, never had done
for some reason.

Alex frowned at my comment but didn’t reply. Instead, his
blue eyes that were the exact shade of mine turned to Charlotte. He swept one
hand through his messy dark blond hair as he turned on the charming smile that
most girls in the school swooned over. “Hey, so am I getting a birthday
present?” he asked, looking at her suggestively.

I groaned and rolled my eyes because he was starting earlier
than usual today. Flirting with Charlotte was usually restricted to lunchtimes
or after school when she came over to our place. It was innocent enough; they
were friends really too, but he just liked to tease the life out of her because
she wasn’t very experienced in that department. “I forgot to buy you anything,”
she answered, shrugging.

He smiled, his eyes glittering wickedly. “That’s okay; I’ll
just take your first kiss.” He leant in close, his lips heading towards hers.

She squealed and pulled back, frowning at him, pushing on
his chest to get him away from her. “That’s not for you to decide!” she
retorted, clearly annoyed.

He smiled and kissed her on the cheek quickly. “You know
I’ll get it sooner or later, Char.” He waggled his eyebrows at her before
walking off, laughing at her horrified expression.

I sighed and handed my presents to Beth. “I’d better go see
what Principal Bennett wants. I’ll see you guys in class later.”

Luke groaned and kissed me again as I went to walk off. I
kissed him back, gripping the front of his hoodie, not wanting to leave either.
“I wanted to spend more time with you on your birthday,” he whined, pouting.

“You could always sneak in again tonight if you want,” I
suggested, shrugging.

He grinned and nodded eagerly. “I like that idea!” I laughed
at his enthusiasm. Luke was coming to the meal with us tonight, so he’d just
have to go home then sneak back in again once everyone else was asleep. “I’ll
park more than two houses away this time so your ninja mom doesn’t know I’m
there.” He laughed, kissing my forehead softly.

“Good thinking. I’ll see you at lunch.” I patted him on the
backside as I walked past, heading to the office to see what the Principal
wanted. I knew I wasn’t in trouble, I was never in trouble. As I walked into
the reception, I was immediately waved through to Principal Bennett’s office.

She looked up as I walked in, pushing her thick rimmed
glasses up her nose as she smiled warmly at me. “Maisie, thank you for coming,
dear. I have a favour to ask of you,” she trailed off looking at me hopefully
as she waved at the seat opposite her desk.

I nodded, sitting down. “Okay, sounds intriguing.” I was
always being asking to do things, I was on a lot of the committees and panels
at school, arranging dances and charity events, I was kind of a ‘go-to girl’
for our Principal.

“We have a new student starting on Monday. His name is
Zachary Anderson. He’s transferring from another school.” A frown lined her
forehead. “Anyway, I wondered if you wouldn’t mind meeting him in the morning,
giving him the tour of the school, helping him find his classes and locker,
that kind of thing,” she said, looking at me hopefully.

I shrugged and nodded in agreement. “Sure, no problem.”

She smiled gratefully. “Thank you, Maisie, I appreciate it.”
She shuffled some papers on her desk, pushing her glasses up her nose as she
read one over. “It looks to me like he was struggling a little in his last
school and his aunt has requested a tutor to help him catch up with the new
schedule. Would you be interested? She’s willing to pay.” She looked at me
questionably over the rim of her glasses.

I nodded enthusiastically. I loved tutoring and the money
always came in handy considering Luke’s family had a ton of money. Compared to
the Hannigans, my family looked relatively poor even though my dad earned
really good money in his engineering job. Extra cash was always good, and then
I didn’t have to let Luke pay all the time when we went out, even though most
of the time he insisted anyway.

“Absolutely. What does he need tutoring in?” I asked,
curiously.

She smiled and clicked her tongue, not looking too impressed
over whatever she was reading about the new guy. “Looks like just about
everything. I would concentrate on the staple subjects though. There’s not long
left before graduation, so it’s more important to pull up his average on those.
He’s already repeating senior year.”

I raised one eyebrow at the repeating a year comment. He
obviously didn’t make much effort at school. Staple subjects meant English, mathematics,
and science, all of my favourites. “Okay sure,” I agreed. She handed me a stack
of papers. I flicked through them quickly, seeing they contained his locker
combination and schedule, everyday things. “I’ll just meet him at the front
door then, the same as usual?” I’d done a lot of these initiations. Usually I
just got the new people settled, ate lunch with them for a couple of days until
they found their feet, and then they went off to do their own thing with friends
they’d made.

She smiled. “That’d be swell. Thanks again.”

I headed out of the office, folding the papers and pushing
them into my bag, heading to class quickly.

The next couple of days passed quickly; luckily Luke didn’t
get caught staying over that night. The only ones we really had to worry about
catching us were my parents, because his were hardly ever home. He actually had
a better relationship with his housekeeper than he did with his parents. The
Hannigans had their own pharmaceutical company that they were both CEOs of, so
they travelled a lot. Luke was, therefore, very lonely, though he never
admitted it. He liked to spend as much time at mine and around my family as
possible. If he had the chance, I had the feeling that he would move into mine
permanently.

Saturday finally came around, though not soon enough in my
opinion. I finished packing up my camping things excitedly. Luke came by just
after lunch to pick me up. He had the whole range of camping gear, so it wasn’t
like we were going to be living in squalor tonight. He had a six man tent with
different sections for bedrooms, a little area in the middle for sitting in,
and it even had a canopy outside so you could sit under cover if you wanted to.
Luke liked to camp. Apparently it was something he did with his dad when he was
little, that was, of course, before Mr Hannigan started to get too busy to
spend time with his son.

“Hey there, baby, are you all packed?” he asked as I walked
down the stairs with my rucksack on my back.

I nodded and smiled, looking him over. He looked extremely
handsome today in loose fitted jeans and a plain fitted white T-shirt. Today
was going to be a good day, but tonight would be even better because I’d get to
lounge around a camp fire eating Luke’s perfectly cooked s’mores. “Yeah, you
got everything? We’ll stop at the store and buy food, right?” I asked, mentally
checking off what I was supposed to bring. The only things I had to bring,
according to Luke, were my clothes and my flirty smile.

“Yeah, we’ll stop on the way. Come on then, let’s get going
before your brother or dad start to lecture me about looking after you again,”
he suggested, laughing quietly to himself.

As if on cue, my dad walked out of the lounge and frowned.
“You guys all done? Luke, can I have a quick word?”

“Too late for a discreet exit,” I whispered, squeezing his
hand gently.

He laughed and kissed my forehead before following my dad
into the kitchen. I felt so sorry for Luke; he undoubtedly loved me a lot
because he put up with the overprotective guys in my family and never once
complained. I flopped down next to my mom on the sofa. “Can’t you rein dad in a
little? Surely he knows Luke well enough by now that he doesn’t have to give
him the talk every time we’re staying out for the night?” I asked, resting my
head on her shoulder.