Disclaimer:  The characters don't belong to me, but to the WB's One Tree Hill.

            Lucas was alone in the house while Keith went to lock up the garage.  "I can go with you," offered Lucas not wanting to be alone, but Keith had refused. 

            "You still look shaky from this afternoon.  I want you to rest in case it's a relapse.  I told your mother you were on the mend.  Don't make a liar out of me."

            Lucas almost laughed at the irony, since they both knew they were bending the truth to Karen.  Instead, Lucas smiled and said, "Yes Grandma. I'll rest.  I'll take it easy tonight."

            "Call me Grandma again and I'm going to take you over my knee Lucas.  You're not too old."  This time Lucas did laugh.  It was almost like having the old Keith back, scolding him, but in an almost flip tone.  "I'll be back in a half hour." 

            Lucas went to the phone as soon as Keith was gone.  Brooke had been out of school for three days and he was starting to worry.  He didn't know how her parents had reacted to Whitey's message and hoped her prolonged absence from school had nothing to do with it.  He couldn't call Brooke with Keith around.  He wouldn't understand and would assume he was trying to see Brooke.  Of course, Lucas still hadn't decided for sure what he wanted to do.

            But before he could pick up the phone it rang.

            "Hello," said Lucas.  There was a crackle over the line and then from a distance he heard his mother's voice.  "Mom?" he half-shouted.

            "Lucas, it's so good to hear your voice.  It's been a while.  How are you feeling?  Did you kick that flu yet?"

            "I'm fine Mom.  Keith has been taking good care of me.  Stuffing me with lots of liquids and good healthy food.  How are you?  How's the cooking school?"

            "Amazing," said Karen.  "I've learned so much.  I didn't think I'd be able to take any of it back to my plain old restaurant, but I really think I can.  But I miss you like crazy Lucas."

            "I miss you too Mom."  Lucas twirled the phone chord around his fingers until they turned white.  Hearing his mother's voice, he was about to spill all.  He could tell her about everything and she would give him advice on how to handle Keith.  If it came from him, maybe she wouldn't feel compelled to come home.  But Lucas couldn't bring himself to do it.  Instead he filled her in on some of the mundane.  Regular customers who asked about her, what he was learning in school, and how the restaurant was fairing without her.

            "Lucas, I love you," his mother said.

            "I love you too Mom."

            "Are you sure everything is okay?  Whenever I talk to you or Keith you both sound distant and troubled."

            "It's the connection Mom.  I swear."

            He hung up and hesitated before picking the phone up again to call Brooke.  He picked up the receiver, started to dial, and then hung up again. Lucas did this three times over before he finally dialed all seven digits.

            "Brooke?"

            "Hey Lucas," came Brooke's raspy voice.  She sounded hoarse and stuffed up.

            "So you aren't playing hooky."

            "No. I'm genuinely sick. I guess sitting in the office with my shirt off didn't help any.  It's just a lucky coincidence."

            "And your parents, how did they react to Whitey's call?"

            "Daddy cut all my credit cards.  You know it was the first time he's talked to me in weeks.  I mean more than a good morning or pass the milk.  It was refreshing, even if he was yelling at me."

            Lucas laughed lightly, but he felt bad for Brooke.  He dreaded it any time his mom scolded him and hated that lately Keith was always yelling at him.  He couldn't imagine being glad for that attention.  "So they just cut off your credit cards."

            "Yeah.  What about your uncle, what did he do?"

            "I'd rather not get into it.  It won't help you get better.  Will you be back in school soon?"  He didn't want to tell her that his uncle had forbidden him to see her.  Brooke wouldn't see it as a dilemma.  She would see it as a challenge.  How many ways could they keep seeing each other without Keith finding out?  In truth, that's what he wanted to do, but he just wasn't sure yet he was willing to risk it. Because if he had learned anything lately it was that he was bound to get caught.

            "I'm milking it.  Mom feels bad that Daddy yelled at me, so she's letting get away with missing all this school."

            "Aren't you bored?" asked Lucas, recalling his one day off from school. 

            "I would be less bored if you came to visit.  But I figured your uncle grounded you for life."

            "Close to it."  He heard the car coming up the drive.  "I better go.  Keith's coming up the drive."

            "No phone privileges?  Man he's really putting you in prison.  I'll have to hurry back to school and to make everything better."

            They said good-by and Lucas hung up just as Keith walked in the door.

            "Who was on the phone?"

            "Mom," Lucas said stretching the truth.  "She called to check up on me."

            "How'd she sound?"

            "Happy."

            "Let's keep it that way."

            "Yeah.  Let's do that."  Lucas walked off.

            "Hey, Lucas.  I'm sorry.  That came out wrong."  Keith called out after him.  Lucas stopped in his tracks.  "We were in a good spot today."

            "I guess he'll do that for us."

            Keith chuckled.  "I guess he has some use.  You were really there for Nathan today."

            "He was going to hurt him."  Lucas leaned against the wall in the foyer.  "I never realized – Nathan once said something to me, about how I was lucky not to have been raised by him.  But I didn't believe him."

            "Do you believe him now?"

            Luke nodded.  "I'm starting to.  I still wonder what it would have been like.  Would it have been the same?"  Would he look at me with the same revulsion he did today, thought Lucas  "I just don't get it Keith.  Why does he hate me?"

            Keith crossed the room and put a hand on Lucas's back.  He was starting to have an inkling about what was going on in his nephews mind.  Were all these questions about Dan starting to catch up with Lucas?  Was that why he was acting out?  Was Brooke an excuse?  The bad influence, the easy way to wipe the thoughts of Dan Scott, Lucas's father from the boy's mind?

            He pulled Lucas into a hug.  "Dan doesn't hate you," Keith insisted.  "That's so far from the truth."  Keith took a deep breath, because for the first time he could remember he was lying to his nephew.  Dan was just plain indifferent to his first-born son, but Keith sometimes wondered if Dan hated the sight of Lucas.  It had seemed plain on his face that afternoon.

            "Dan's to self-centered and too much of a narcissist to hate anyone."

            "But he doesn't think about me.  Doesn't care a lick about me."

            "I couldn't say for certain.  He doesn't confide in me.  I do believe you're right. I wish I could say he does care, but it's not the case.  When he walked away from your mother, he walked away from you and I don't believe he's had any regrets."

            Lucas nodded soberly.  He turned and headed back to his room.

            "Luke," Keith called.  Lucas turned.  "Don't let Dan ruin your life.  If you don't matter to him, then he shouldn't matter to you.  And if you want to talk, I'm always here."

            Lucas went back to his room and for the first time ever he felt that his uncle was far from the answers.  Talking to Keith had made it worse.  Flopping down on his bed, Lucas pulled out a tattered copy of Catcher in the Rye, his favorite novel and started to read it again.

*******

            Brooke was back in school the next day.  Her red, dripping nose and the wad of tissues she held in her hands, ruined her perfectly coifed look.  "I feel so icky," she complained to Tina, one of her fellow cheerleaders.  Since Lucas had chosen Brooke, she and Peyton were not exactly on speaking terms anymore and Brooke missed her best friend.

            She noisily blew her noise, eliciting strange looks from her fellow classmates.  "I have a cold," she yelled at them.  "Never saw anyone with a cold before?"  She held her head in her hands and said, "I should have stayed home again."

            "Why didn't you?" Tina asked.

            "I missed Lucas."

            "He didn't visit you while you were sick?"

            Brooke shook her head.  "He's like grounded forever."  With a giggle, she filled Tina in on their little escapade.  Both girls were holding onto each other, laughing hysterically when they bumped into Lucas.

            "Brooke!" he said in surprise.  "You made it."

            "That I did, Mr. Scott."

            "You look – awful."

            "Thanks!"  She slapped his arm.  "I feel awful.  No thanks to you."

            "I'm sorry," he said, wrapping his arms around her.  "I didn't mean to make it worse."

            "That's what I've been missing the past few days."

            "What do you have next period?" Lucas asked.  Seeing Brooke made him resolute.  He was going to tell her what Keith had commanded and they would figure something out together.

            "Math.  I'm so not in the mood."

            "Good.  Let's go.  Bye Tina!" 

He pulled Brooke to the parking lot and headed for her white Volkswagen Beetle.  "Let's talk in here," he said.  He waited for Brooke to take out the keys and unlock the car.  It only took a few moments for them to comfortably settle in the backseat.   They snuggled close to each other, Lucas holding Brooke in his arm, stroking her long brown hair.

"It's so soft," he whispered into the top of her head.  "It smells nice.  What shampoo do you use?"

"Pantene," she said.  "You didn't bring me here to talk about Shampoo.  Did you?"

Lucas shook his head.  "Last night, when I called, I didn't tell you everything."

"Oh," said Brooke.  "You decided you want to be with Peyton?"

"Peyton?  No.  I want to be with you.  That's the problem.  My uncle got so pissed after Whitey called.  He decided that all the trouble I've been in started when I began seeing you.  It's not true," he quickly added.  "But well he gave me a choice."  He quickly described what went down that night.  Brooke clucked sympathetically. 

"So it's either me or your mom."  She sighed.  "I know you Lucas Scott.  You're going to choose your mom.  I don't blame you.  That's one of the reasons I like being with you.  That and you're really hot."  She stroked his chest.  "It's fine."

"I didn't think that's what you would say.  I'm surprised Brooke.  I expected you to see this as a challenge.  I don't want to make a choice and I don't think I should have to.  I want to keep seeing you.  Even if Keith is against it."

"That is so romantic.  Like Romeo and Juliet.  We always have school.  He can't stop us from seeing each other at school and practice.  And for now we'll take it easy.  But we'll figure it out as we go along.  We'll find someone to cover for us."

"Maybe Nathan."

"You think?"

"Yeah, I do think."

He hugged Brooke, keeping her tight in his arms until the next period started and they headed back to class.