KING LUCAS

CHAPTER 20

Lucas was laying on a bed that wasn't his, he wasn't in New York anymore, still he recognized the room, small and crowded with empty shelves and chairs that his mother hadn't sold or gave away. The white walls almost lost behind the many posters in the room, baseball teams, sweaty women in a beach, a bull riding poster on one side and a signed poster of the Texans on the other. He felt like a stranger in this room, it had been too long since he was last there and he liked to think himself a different person now.

He could hear shouts from outside his room. Why was he here again? He knew what was going to happen, he could feel his heart in his throat again, beating each second faster as the screams got louder. He stood up, even though he was begging his body to lay down, but he wasn't controlling his body, this time he was just experiencing it all over again, he felt the rage coursing through his body again and he knew what was coming.

He opened the door of his room and heard the screaming come from the living room, but he went to the other side, to the master bedroom. He knew the way all too well, he opened his father's safe and took the only item that sat on the little box.

In the living room, one wall was splattered with the stain where a bottle exploded, the coffee table he had build was turned around and everything that once sat on top scattered on the floor. He could see the plate from his dinner broken in small pieces with bits of food around it.

He clenched his jaw so tightly he was scared he might break his teeth. His father was there, he was holding his mother's arm and carrying her around like a puppet. Lucas could only hear her crying, her quivering voice begging for him to let her go, but each time he would just pull her harder.

He couldn't take it anymore, after 16 years of this he just couldn't ignore it. He felt his feet moving and inside Lucas yelled to himself to stop. His right hand felt heavy, but he was strong, just as strong as his father. He took him from the collar and yanked him away from his mother, she dropped to the floor, the marks from his fingers quickly turning red on her arm. When she saw Lucas she cried harder.

"Lucas, don't!" She yelled, but he wouldn't listen to her. He already had his dad against the wall, one hand holding his neck and the other pointing the gun he had taken from his room.

His breath reeked of alcohol and his eyes sparkled in rage, looking expectantly at his son. Elizabeth tried to pull Lucas away, but she was too fragile and she couldn't keep him away. Lucas was frowning, his eyes shedding tears like never before, he was crying because he hated him, he hated every day he ignored the screaming and the beatings, but he hated himself more for not putting a stop to this before.

Lucas felt how his finger moved to the trigger, his father watched the hand slowly and then back at his son. He began laughing maniacally.

"Lizzie, will you look at this?" He said, laughing. "Is this your big moment, Lukey?" He spat, he grabbed Lucas' hand and brought it closer to his temple. "C'mon! Be the man I know you are! Make me proud, son! Do it!" He yelled and went back to laughing.

Lucas screamed so hard he could feel his throat ripping, he screamed at his dad's face, but he let go and the man dropped to the floor, too drunk to stand up. Lucas disarmed the gun and let the pieces fall to his side, emptying the casket on his feet, the bullets rolling away.

"I knew it," his father began, massaging his neck. "You're just like your mother... weak."

Suddenly Lucas woke up, sitting up on his bed, his head spinning around at the fast movement and bright light that was coming from the window. He put his hand to his temple and laid down again, he could feel the effects of the hangover come to life. He was covered in a thin layer of sweat, he stretched to grab his phone from his nightstand but his hand crashed with a lamp that he knocked down.

He frowned, opening his eyes slowly so they could swallow the light carefully. The sheets on his bed were red, but he didn't have red sheets and that wasn't his bed. Just then he noticed the faint smell of perfume, he recognized the smell, but he couldn't put the face on the person it belonged to.

"Hey, sleeping beauty." A soft voice said from the door frame, when he turned, everything that had happened last night flooded his mind. He had gone to Gabbie's house, when she opened for him and saw his face bruised she had taken pity on him, they drank some, then they had sex and then he came here and did the exact same thing and so they drank some more and then he was shirtless and then she was naked and then he woke up.

"Hey." He said, Missy was wearing his shirt and he guessed it was all she was wearing because he could see her clothes still scattered on the floor.

"Advil?" She asked, showing a pill on her hand, he took it gladly, drinking the whole glass of water with it, he was dehydrated.

"I'm sorry I stayed the whole night, did your parents say anything?" Thankfully his drunker self had remembered to put on his underwear to sleep.

"I don't think they noticed and if they did, they pretended not to hear anything." She smiled wickedly, walking towards him and sitting on top of him. She kissed him and he had to go along with it, after all he was still at her house. "Last night was amazing." She said, he turned them over so he could stand up still feeling a little dizzy, he smile at her, but he couldn't let what happened yesterday happen again, it wasn't wise.

"Yeah." He said, picking up his clothes from the ground, he was hungry, he could eat an entire cow right now. "I thought you would wake me up for school."

"Are you crazy?" She asked. "We went to sleep at 2, I wasn't getting up at 7." He checked his phone, but it was dead. "Plus, I thought you would drive us to school. It's only 9, we could still be there for most of the classes."

"I can drop you off, but I don't think I'm going to school today." He explained.

"Because of Riley?" She asked, nochalantly while she used her phone, he narrowed his eyes, he couldn't remember what he had said the night before. "Just remember what I told you."

"And that was...?" He lifted his brow, Missy was super chill, that's why he had chose her last night when he texted her that he might drop by, he knew that she wouldn't take this as a big deal. What he was uncertain about was if she would tell the whole class about the triangle drama, but right now he had no other choice but to trust her.

"Use her friends to comfort her, she has a weak spot for those two." Good, it didn't seem like he talked about Maya, but he shouldn't assume anything. Her advice was useless though, he already knew that, and neither of her friends were speaking to him.

Missy sighed and stood up, unbuttoning his shirt. "I'm going to take a shower." She said on the door frame to the bathroom, she looked at him from her shoulder and dropped his shirt to the floor, leaving nothing to the imagination. "Care to join me?" She asked, like she already knew the answer.

He clenched his jaw and swallowed hard, without saying anything he walked to her and closed the door behind them, after all he didn't remember when it happened last night.

"I'll be right back." He told Missy as he got down from the car and entered his apartment building. After Tamara, Missy's maid, had made them a delicious breakfast which he finished in less than two minutes and asked for seconds, Lucas had decided that he was going to show up at school and talk to Maya, she was the bridge between him and Riley.

It was just passed ten when he was entering his room for a fresh shirt. He quickly changed and picked his backpack from the floor, when he reached for the handle and yanked the door open to run back his mother was there in the hallway.

"Shouldn't you be in school?" She asked, her eyebrow raised, arms crossed in front of her chest and her lips pressed in a straight line. She frowned, "what happened to your face?" she said, grabbing his chin and pulling it forward so she could inspect his cheek.

He clenched his jaw and moved his face away, looking at the floor.

"Are you fighting again?" She asked worried, touching his bruise carefully.

"No, momma, this was an accident." He replied.

"Good, you've already been kept behind a year..." He closed his eyes, he didn't want to be reminded of that.

"I just came to change my shirt, I'm late for school." He said, she knew he hadn't spent the night there, he had told her he was going out, but he thought she had her shift in the morning.

"You didn't text me anything this morning." Liz scolded him. Lucas remembered something and he traced his steps back to unplug his charger from the wall.

"My phone was dead." He showed her the cable. She still wasn't pleased with him, but Lucas was confused, she never cared if he got home late or if he slept at someone else's house when they lived in Texas. Although, back in Texas, her mother had other things that kept her busy, Lucas forced the thought out of his head, remembering the dream he had that morning.

"Mom," he began, "I'm already in trouble with one woman in my life, I can't be in trouble with you, I slept at Missy's, I'm fine."

Her face changed, her mouth opened to say something but it closed just as fast, she frowned, now it was curiousness that he saw in her eyes.

"Are you having trouble with Maya?" She asked casually.

"Riley." He replied. "Why would you think I was talking about Maya?."

"Oh, I thought... You know, since you're always..." She tried to say, but she stopped herself to finish the sentence. "I mean, I didn't know you liked Riley."

"I don't, but she is angry at me for something I did." He explained.

"And who is Missy?" She asked, frowning, Lucas guessed that her mother knew about the girls he brought home, but she preferred to ignore it.

"A friend, who is downstairs waiting for me." He didn't realize until now how complicated life had gotten for him ever since he met Maya, but there was finally a thrill back and he didn't want to let it go so soon.

"Okay..." She said unsure of what to respond. "Well, Lukey, I don't know what you did to Riley for her to get angry at you." She was back into mom mode. "But there isn't a problem that time or love can't fix."

She put a hand on his cheek, but everything clicked for him in that moment. What Missy had told him about Riley, he was remembering it from last night. Riley has a soft spot for her friends, she probably can't live without Maya for week. Even for that skinny kid, Farkle, she would do anything for him.

And now his mother had given him the key to fix everything, there isn't a problem that love can't fix. That was it, he knew what he had to do. How had he not think of this before as a contingency plan?

Farkle.

He was the answer, he was in love with Riley and he had a feeling that after 13 years of knowing each other Riley could feel the same for him, they just needed a little push and some time, Lucas just had to plan that seed on her head.