"and she grows into a young woman who constantly mistakes the two

because no one ever taught her the difference

'boys will be boys'

turns into

'that's how he shows his love'

and bruises start to feel like the imprint of lips"

-

Iris is 14, just barely beginning ninth grade. She sits in her honors english class in front of Luke, the same Luke whose striped shirt from first grade was stained with her tears and blood from her fragile body being carried from the dirt.

She's ignoring the teacher and rolling her pencil up and down her desk. Her hand is supporting her chin when she feels a tap on her shoulder. She turns around to see the flushed blonde boy struggling to get his words out.

"I want to go to homecoming." He told her.

Iris blinked at the ocean eyed boy.

"And I thought it would be fun if we went together."

She inhaled and let out a heavy breath through her nose, smiling at him. If she wasn't going with the 10th grader who asked her just a few days before, she would've joined Luke. She explained that to him before turning around in her seat and going back to pretending to do her work.

Iris thought about her homecoming date for the rest of the class.

She thought about his muscular figure and slightly upturned nose. His wavy light brown hair that nearly covered his matching eyes. He was a varsity football player with a hell of a temper, and Iris liked that. This was just his way of showing that he liked her.

The bell rang everyday at 11:02 to dismiss their class together. It rang four more times that day before dismissing the school for a whole week and a half break. It was then that Luke worked up the courage to confront her about his worries.

"What are those bruises?" He quietly asked her. They stood in a sea of teenagers. She began to giggle and hide her neck with her flowing hair.

"They're love bites."

Luke watched as she ran her fingertips over the purple spots, wishing that it was him that left them there on his beautiful friend's neck.

"I meant on your arms."

She stopped walking in the crowded hallway. Iris was staring through his near grey eyes. She watched him nervously swallow before he interrogated her again. He whispered this time.

"And on your shoulder, right where your sweater falls." He let his eyes trail over Iris's pale blue sweater, over her barely noticeable collarbones, up her bruised neck then to her blank face.

She chose her words carefully, but then decided to not speak. She shrugged her shoulders and gripped onto her back pack straps. Iris turned her back to Luke that day.

Luke burned a hole into Iris's back as she walked away. He wanted an explanation for her apparent clumsiness.

So then Iris came to school for the next few months with bruises galore, not all by the imprint of lips. She didn't know any better. The attention she got from the sophomore boy, Ashton, was enough to make her feel loved even though she did not know how to love herself. And Luke loved her more than every bruise, scrape, and scratch lined up together on her body.