A/N: They said it would never be done. There were only whispers, rumors, speculations that somehow, someday, he would renounce his oath in the pursuit for an opportunity.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, that day...is today. For the first and quite possibly only time ever, the sole producer and writer for Weavillain Inc. is proud to present…
…A SEQUEL FIC. DUM DUM DUM DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM.
Okay, but seriously, if you all saw "L is for Love", you just KNOW that a sequel fic had to happen. It just had to. I'm happy we got what we got, and I almost don't care that it was at the expense of my dignity and resolve. Almost.
Anyways, while I question myself and my lofty adherence to my principles, let's begin this "epic" tale with Chapter 1.
That smile.
It confirmed nothing in the absolute, but it still couldn't help but make Luna's heart palpate in giddiness. Everything in her letter was a pure expression of admiration, and it was reciprocated with a genuine, flattered smile that told her that her message was received with open arms.
The nature of the situation, however, was still ambiguous, and it was a fact that Luna wasn't quick to forget; just because Sam appreciated the letter didn't mean that she'd appreciate who it came from. From the couple of months that Luna had gotten to know Sam, she was grateful, now more than ever, to discover that she never came across as the harsh, abrasive type that would turn her down out of revulsion, even if her feelings about the letter were still in question.
However, her amicable but indefinite association didn't unearth anything that Luna could unearth about Sam's…preferences. By all means, her letter was a stage dive into a crowd of twenty people in a ten thousand seat stadium…while she was wearing a blindfold and earmuffs. There was no guarantee that there'd be a happy landing. Perhaps Sam just wasn't into girls. It would be a shame to lose out on a chance of experiencing happiness by being pushed aside because of what was supposed to be "normal"—society's accepted, default setting when it boiled down to romantic relationships.
But if her mother had inspired her to be bold, she knew that she couldn't half-ass the venture into the unknown by second guessing herself now. There'd be a time and place to fret about unreciprocated feelings, but only if she was confronted with them.
The fact of the matter was, there was still a chance. She had hope, hope that Sam wasn't "out of her league" after all.
The day after the Loud children's love letter excursion was one full of report; some negative, some positive, and some still unanswered for. Dinnertime was when their parents had given them the floor to spill their guts.
Leni, Lana, Lynn, and Lucy addressed letters that told their respective crushes to meet them at a later venue. Luna had done the same, indicating that she'd reveal herself to Sam in a week's time.
Lisa's pursuits, unfortunately, ended almost just as soon as they started. Though Lisa was smart enough to disguise her handwriting, she still couldn't resist her Id-driven desire to pontificate her feelings in a way that only Lisa Loud could. Thus, by snack time, David had confronted Lisa and told her that he found her advances unsettling (the pig's heart had sealed the deal) and that he wasn't interested in her, platonically or otherwise.
Luan's retelling of events provided an optimistic yet still incomplete conclusion. Unlike her sisters and brother, Luan's fishing line approach left no room for doubt about who Benny's not-so secret admirer was, since it ended with them standing face to face by the time Benny was able to secure the letter from the hook. According to Luan, Benny was delighted about the message and appreciated the prospect of friendship but nothing more…for now. The addendum was of Luan's own invention; stirred from Benny's smile, which she interpreted as a subtle sign that friendship wasn't all there could be in the near future.
Lily was hitting it off wonderfully with her bear. Thanks to interpretation from Luan, apparently, they had a wonderful time yesterday at night, gazing up at the star mobile in her crib.
By now, it was Lola's turn and from the look of her hostile body language, she did not have a pleasant experience to disclose, though everyone was correct in assuming that she'd be sure to outline her indignation as gaudily as possible.
"Winston is the most arrogant, stuck-up, pigheaded, spoiled, egotistical heathen I've ever met!" Lola proclaimed after banging both her fists on the dinner table, threatening to knock over the cup of water in front of her.
The pause she got was inspired from the shock of the outburst itself, as well as Lola's scathing usage of adjectives. The silence didn't last long, though, as a certain ponytailed jock couldn't help herself from the opportunity for mischief that Lola's rage presented.
"What, did he forget to tip his hat to you or something?" she said with a smirk.
"Not funny, Lynn!" Lola barked over the snickers and quiet guffaws the retort had earned.
Even Lynn Sr. couldn't resist but hoped that hiding his curled mouth with his hand could serve to exonerate him. The swift kick in the shin from his left, which could've only come from his wife, put a halt to those ambitions.
"What?" the patriarch mewled pathetically as Rita glared at him disapprovingly while he rubbed his sore leg. "I didn't say anything."
An unamused Lola sat rigidly in her seat, frowning dramatically until Luna recovered fast enough from her snickering spiel to address her with a better sense of consideration.
"But seriously, Lola, what'd that git do to you?" she asked.
The frown didn't unfurl, but Luna was perceptive enough to tell that Lola was happy to be given the floor, at least from a cathartic standpoint.
"Oh, it's not about what he did. It's about what he was going to do," she began. "My letter told him to meet me at the sandbox at school today and naturally, I thought that after he found out I was the sender, he'd realize how lucky he was to be receiving such attention from me. Y'know, like any boy with any brain cells in his head should feel."
She took a moment to breathe harshly through nose and tighten her fist before slamming it down on the table again.
"But noooooooooooo. Apparently, Winston's just full of hot air. Apparently, he's got a whole club of admirers and guess what? He has this list that has all the girls that drool over him on it. And get this; all those girls get reservations about "having the honor" of doing stuff like tying his shoes, carrying his books, and even using themselves as a stepladder for the water fountain. And after he found out that I was the secret admirer, he was going to put me on that list, like I was going to go along with being stepped on like I had no respect for myself!"
While Lana offered her condolences, the rest of her family muttered to themselves disdainfully. They didn't know who this Winston was, but Lori's sarcastic utterance said it all, "Wow. He doesn't sound conceited at all."
"So, what'd you do?" Luan asked.
In an astonishing turn, Lola reclined back in her chair and folded her arms primly in her lap. Any swells of anger in her face were now gone as well, not a vein or anger-blotched cheek in sight.
"I did what any reserved, mature lady would do," she said stiffly and daintily.
…
…
"I KICKED SAND IN HIS STUPID FACE AND MADE HIM CRY! THAT'S WHAT I DID!"
Lola seethed in her seat, panting and heaving from the explosive outpouring. She regarded her family's stunned expressions without much care, seeing as how they would be calling her out for her actions soon enough. No way would they have accepted her actions as anything but…
No, hold the phone. They were applauding her. Lola smiled and soaked in the admiration of her deed with a few bows. She was so into the moment that she didn't bother to notice Lincoln trying to quietly slip away from the scene as inconspicuously as possible. Unfortunately, with twelve pairs of eyes at all sides, it was a feat that was nearly impossible to pull off successfully, a fact that he found out when he felt a hand grasping him softly by the shoulder, just as he was about to scale the staircase.
Dang it.
She had been noticing the signs all night. Luna wasn't one to force herself onto anyone, opting to take the "let them come to you" approach unless the predicament demanded immediate attention. But Lincoln had looked miserable ever since he shuffled sadly into the dining room. Of course, with the whole love letter discussion, no one else had taken the time to take notice him, but Luna's eyes couldn't be fooled by the brief hints of sadness on display.
The way Lincoln poked lethargically at his liverwurst with his fork, the droopy, pale eyes that scanned his plate, the lack of any reaction to any of the stories that his sisters had told…something had happened to Lincoln today, and she had a good feeling about what it was.
"Linc?"
The question only procured her a sideways glance over the shoulder from her despondent brother, who was forcing a tiny smile that only made her more suspicious.
"Where you goin', bro?" she asked a little more forcibly.
Along with the fake smile came a practiced grimace that nearly made her reciprocate one in kind. He was trying way too hard to play at an angle here, and that worried her severely.
"Sorry. I've got a stomachache. I just wanna lie down right now," he said, his voice lacking any vitality.
Luna let her hand fall loosely from her shoulder, breaking Lincoln free of her hold on him. Without a further word, Lincoln sauntered slowly up the stairs, unknowingly igniting Luna's maternal instincts with each squeak of his sneakers against the steps.
When Lincoln finally disappeared from sight, she knew where she'd be going after dinner was over. It meant that she'd have to purport Lincoln's obvious lie to save him from any unwanted attention but then again, there wasn't anything in the world that she wouldn't do for her little bro.
"Lincoln?"
The question, like she expected, wasn't going to get her much answers at dinner so it didn't come as a surprise to her when they failed to coax Lincoln out of his room hours later after everyone had retired to their rooms for the evening. Still, it was worth a shot.
"Lincoln, you feelin' okay?"
This time, she braved a knock against her door, one that she hoped wouldn't arouse the attention of anyone to the scene down the hallway. She wanted to do this alone. Any potential interlopers might force Lincoln into more reclusion at the embarrassment of having his dilemma broadcasted to a wide audience.
"You know, if your stomach's still buggin' ya, I could get Lisa to whip something up that could take care of it," she presented courteously, hoping that playing along with the lie would stir some form of communication.
She paused to consider her offer and shuddered at the immediate consequences such a course of action could lead to. Lisa wasn't the best when it came to medical aid.
"On second thought," she said, "that's probably not a good id-"
The door cracked slightly, revealing a sad eye peeking through the crevice. Well, that hadn't taken long, a thought that Luna both relished and feared. Was he inviting her in or asking her to go away?
"Hey, Luna?"
"Yeah?"
He peeled the door back a bit more, fully uncovering his once obscured head and face. Luna flinched. He looked worse than before.
"Could you just leave me alone? I don't wanna talk to anyone right now," he told her and took a moment to look down at the floor. "I still feel a little sick."
Luna frowned. Enough was enough. No little brother of hers was going to wallow in funk while she did nothing. If anything called for her to reject the notion of easing back, it was her brother looking like Charles got shot and died.
"Dude, I know your gut's not the problem," she said firmly.
Lincoln flashes guilt in a pained facial contortion and it's all the evidence Luna needs to ask knowingly, "It's your heart that aches, isn't it?"
He closed his eyes and sighed. Before Luna could asked him again, he nodded and opened the door invitingly. Inwardly thrilled at the acceptance, Luna entered the room and sat on Lincoln's bedside while her brother shut the door behind him.
"How'd you know?"
She waited for Lincoln to take a seat right next to her. She resisted the itch to reach a comforting arm around him to give him a one-armed hug. It was blessing that she was allowed this much and didn't want to push her boundaries.
"I'm your big sister," she replied warmly with a trace of banter. "It's my job to know stuff like this."
Lincoln just hummed lowly in disinterest. If anything, that was Luna's cue to kickstart her talk before Lincoln decided against it.
"So, what happened with Paige? Was she not into you or something?"
"Well…" Lincoln started monotonously but bit back from continuing to reconsider his words. "…not really. Kinda. I…I don't really know how to put it."
"Give it a shot," Luna offered. "Just let it all out."
Lincoln rotated towards Luna and let his head rest against her shoulder. Again, Luna did nothing that could've spurred Lincoln to brush her off.
"She didn't say 'no' but she didn't say 'no'. Y'know?"
"No," a befuddled Luna said bluntly.
Even his melancholy couldn't suppress Lincoln's short amused laugh from the immediate response.
"I thought it was a big sister's job 'to know stuff like this'."
"Well, I can't get to the root of it if you sound like a vague excerpt from one of Lucy's vampire novels, can I?" Luna responded with a cheeky grin.
"True," Lincoln said almost as dryly and sadly as he had sounded before and Luna bemoaned how quickly the atmosphere had succumbed to the bleakness of Lincoln's unaccounted quandary.
"See," Lincoln explained after a short pause, "I overheard her talking about my letter at lunch today. If things went well, I was gonna send her a second one, maybe something like a poem that time around."
His face twisted in agony and Luna threw caution into the wind, rejection be damned. She draped her arm around him and was happy that he didn't find the new development uncomfortable. "But I heard her saying that she wasn't interested. She wants to focus on high scores and leveling up at the arcade instead of worrying about boys. See, she didn't know it was me, but she might as well have been turning me down to my face. I didn't want to share all of that at dinner, so I made the whole stomachache thing up so I could get away."
He broke away from staring at the floor to shoot her an apologetic glance. "Sorry for lying, by the way."
"I understand," Luna said, hold no resentment to Lincoln's actions. "But back to the matter at hand…"
It was a pretty tricky spot Lincoln was in. Supposedly, Paige wasn't even in the dating scene and it was a respectable choice for someone her age.
Still, that didn't mean that Lincoln had to lose hope. Maybe it was her own determination to not relent in her own pursuit of love, doing most of the talking, but either way, there wasn't a chance that she was going to let her brother feel defeated.
"Well, that doesn't sound too bad. I mean, it's not like she turned you down, right? There's still a chance that someday, she might consider dating you."
Lincoln shook his head and groaned. "I don't think that's possible."
"Why not?" Luna asked, casting him a genuine smile. "You're a great guy. You're smart, funny, considerate, and charming. What's not to like about you?"
"She didn't give me a chance," Lincoln said resolutely, seemingly mindset on feeling down in the dumps. "From what I heard, she didn't even read the letter. I know she doesn't know that I'm the secret admirer but those were still my words. Those were my feelings. And she turned them down without even thinking about it. If I'm not good enough for her now, maybe I'll never be good enough for her."
"No."
Lincoln, taken aback from Luna's assertive, motherly glare and tone, squeaked out a whispered, "What?"
"You heard me. You can't just give up like that. It wasn't easy for Mom, remember? You shouldn't quit just because you trip up over one little bump in the road. We're Louds. We're not quitters."
Lincoln indignantly pushed away to stand on the floor.
"A bump? More like a mountain," he said with arms spread wide to emphasize his point. "Besides, it was easy for Mom. All she had to do was work up the nerve to confess with the letter. I did all of that and it worked out in the worst way."
Though slightly hurt from the departure, Luna wasn't going to bite his head off over it, especially when he did have a point. Not only were the outcomes different for her brother and her mother, the way love was treated was dissimilar on a level of maturity. A college kid having a crush was way different than an eleven-year old boy having one, especially if failure was what the outcome seemed to be.
Still, that didn't mean that this would be the end. Not if Luna had anything to say about it.
"Well, Lincoln, you're right; your sitch is a bit different from Mom's. But the way I see it, you have the same issue that Mom had; confidence."
"But I already sent the letter and-"
"Dude, forget the letter," Luna said, closing the gap between them by rising to her feet and clamping onto his shoulders. "Take it to the next level. Like you said, she doesn't know it's from you and you know that she knows that she has a secret admirer, right?"
Lincoln shrugged. "I guess."
"So, try to get closer. I mean, you both like gaming, don't you?"
She already knew the answer but said nothing until Lincoln nodded.
"See? There ya go!" Luna exclaimed, shaking him a bit. "You already have something in common! And since I'm sure you know where she likes to throw down with those games, all you have to do is start hanging out with her. Then, once she sees what a cool dude you are, she'll be champing at the 8-bit to go out with you."
Luna cringed at pun she made in the spur of the moment (Luan was more of an influence on her than she though), though it seemed to resonate well with Lincoln, who asked her, tone brimmed with hope, "You really think I could do that?"
Luna chuckled. "No, bro. I know you can. Go show her what Lincoln Loud can do and I guarantee you that she'll be falling head over heels for you."
Lincoln contemplated on the call to action while, under his notice, Luna pulled him in for a hug. She felt his face shift against her chest as he gazed up at her with the first real smile she'd seen from him all day.
"Alright. If you believe in me, then where can I go wrong?"
They silently stayed there for a few seconds, sprawled in the comfort of their embrace. Luna wished that moments like these could last forever but she knew that soon, all good things had to come to an end and this moment was no exception.
She just didn't expect it to happen the way it did, after Lincoln pulled away and belly-flopped onto his bed.
"By the way, how're things with you and Sam?" Lincoln asked over his shoulder. "Did he read the letter?"
Luna grit her teeth at the pronoun and it reminded her of why she had taken her vow of silence of telling her family exactly who she was in the first place. It hadn't even crossed their minds that the Sam she was pining after could be a girl. Not once did any of them regard that possibility.
But in the end, she felt that she had no room to judge them. It wasn't their fault that they wouldn't consider it. It wasn't their fault that her societally "normal" family couldn't understand her. It'd hurt to have her feelings misinterpreted and perhaps, even unintentionally disregarded, but how could they possibly know what a step in her shoes was like? The fear of landing on the bad side of the extra coin flip that came into play with romantic pursuits? The wondering of whether her blind advances would be worth it or not? She knew her family would love her, even after coming out, but it was clear that their image of her didn't align completely with her true self…
…and she found the anonymity better than having to face that for herself.
Forcing a smile, Luna answered eagerly, "Yep. I saw Sam reading it yesterday and as it turned out, it looked like Sam was diggin' it."
"Of course, Sam dug it," Lincoln said as he turned around to flick off the lights with his lamp. "You're Luna Loud."
Yawning, Lincoln called out in a hushed volume, "Goodnight, Luna. Thanks for the pep talk."
"You're welcome, bro. Any time," Luna said dully and drifted away before her culpable tone could coax Lincoln to ask her if anything was wrong.
'That was way too close.'
Luna slid further under her covers at the thought of Lincoln picking up her moody vibes. It was a thought that made her yearn for a happy ending with Sam even more. She knew that she couldn't keep it a secret forever. If she wanted to express herself in public, with Sam or any other girl that tickled her fancy, her family would find out and yes, confusion would most certainly be their first response but…but at least it'd be done and over with. They'd have no choice but to let their own "benign" prejudices fall to the wayside without her having to peel them away herself with a verbal, "intervention-esque" meeting, that would only be filled with invasive questions and shocked, befuddled expressions that serve as a painful reminder as to just how wide the canyon between her and her family truly was.
But if she failed? If her courageous aim was met with resistance? What then? They'd be sure to ask what happened with her and Sam, especially since she was the center of attention with the love letter objective in the first place. And whether she lied to them about Sam's identity or not, either way, they'd console her with words that befitted a purely heterosexual girl but not someone like her.
She shut her eyes, trying to let the "cloud nine" feeling from yesterday return. It was all she had to keep any doubts and images of rejection at bay while she held her ground for the remaining six days of her week to conclude before show time.
Just one week. One week and everything would be over.
Hopefully, it just wouldn't mean it'd be over in her place in an understanding, welcoming family to an unanticipated change of pace.
A/N: I always like to consider myself a one man show when it comes to my fanfics. I don't consult beta readers and I don't exactly seek out advice on how to improve my writing.
But this time, it's different. I'm already slipping through a minefield, trying not to have this story blow up in my face by taking a misstep in a direction that could seriously offend someone. I mean, I know I shouldn't be sensitive of hurting anyone's feelings or worried about having anyone take my writing to heart in a negative way but as you've probably guessed, this story will delve into very…sensitive territory and the last thing I want to do is piss anyone off by me misrepresenting a delicate topic.
So please, if you have any advice or personal experience with this story's subjects, please don't hesitate to hit me up in my inbox and offer me some pointers before I venture any further. For what it's worth, I'll be sure to give you my thanks for giving me a hand.
With that said, I hope you all liked Chapter 1.