Luca's eyes drifted away from Ashton's and instead met Benji's. Benji was looking straight at Luca with a large lopsided grin on his face.

"I'm Benji," he said, sticking out a hand.

Much to his surprise, Luca found himself reaching out and shaking it. Benji's hand was soft and his smile was ever so warm. He actually didn't seem that bad.

"Luca," he greeted back, his eyes then widening as he realised Ashton's grip was still on his arm.

He peered down at the contact and both the boys followed his gaze to which Ashton quickly let go and Benji just continued smiling.

"Sorry," Ashton apologised sheepishly.

Luca realised how close he was standing to both the boys, especially Ashton and stepped back as the line moved forward.

The air around them was sickly hot and languid, and the three boys kind of just stood there in silence—one with a blank glare aimed at the poor ground, one with his features scrunched up in confusion and the other with a smile spread out over his lips.

Luca soon realised how odd it was for him to be awkwardly standing there stuck in a day dream of thoughts and swiftly, he turned to head back to his sister and father.

Again, Ashton stopped him, "Do you want fairy floss? I'll buy if you want."

This time there was no arm grabbing, just a fair distance between them and a completely normal question that Luca was probably going to overlook into.

"No, I uh–I don't like fairy floss," he replied, shrugging his shoulders.

Just leave and quit talking to him. God, what are you doing? he told himself, but he couldn't. He couldn't shift from where he stood—his feet wouldn't move.

He hated talking to Ashton. He hated it, so why couldn't he allow himself to stop?

"Oh," was all Ashton said.

And then Benji perked up, "What year you in Luca?"

Luca glanced over to him, almost forgetting he was even there, "Twelve. Like you guys."

Benji's eyebrows elevated in surprise and Luca wanted to roll his eyes—though he had expected that.

"What? So you must be... Oh my god! You're twins with Betsy!? That's so cool!"

He sounded excited, like finding out this news was the best thing he had ever heard.

Luca just nodded and attempted at a joke, "Yeah..maybe if I dyed my hair red people would notice."

Lame was the first word to enter his mind after he spoke.

Lame and awkward. Fuck, what was he still doing there?

Benji laughed though and even Ashton had the hint of a smile creeping up onto his face.

"No but seriously dude I know basically everyone in the year, and I didn't even know there was a Luca. Do you even have friends?"

Ok, that one hit. Right in the feels, the sole core of them. Benji's question hurt more then he probably intended it to, and he noticed too.

"Shit sorry man, that was not cool at all. Fuck, I didn't mean it like that.."

Luca went to speak, tell Benji that it was okay. He didn't mind. He did.

Ashton got out his words first.

"Of course he has friends! I'm one of them! He's very best."

Luca actually wanted to laugh at what Ashton said, he really did. He didn't laugh though, he swallowed it back and looked over at Ashton who was staring back at him with a grin.

"That's not true," Luca said, "We are not friends."

"Oh Luca you've broken my heart.."

Luca didn't laugh but he did something. He cracked a smile. It was small, but it was there and the lightest of dimples were hardly noticeable but to Ashton, the dimples were what he saw first.

Ashton liked the boy's smile. He liked it a lot.