Summary: What is the relationship between Amata and Lucas thru the years in the vault?
10 years since Lucas' birth
Lucas' pov
Lucas doesn't have many friends. Not many friends at all. In reality he has only one friend in the vault, and that is Amata, the daughter of the overseer. The two of them are of the same age, and have known each other since they have been babes. It is not enough to say that they know each other very well, even at ten years old.
One of the reasons why they are so close is the loss of their mothers. Lucas has never even met his mom, in comparison for Amata which was given two years with hers. Even though she doesn't remember much of her mother, she actually does remember her. Amata have some recollection of her voice, when she sings different lullabies. Lucas knows this as Amata have told him about it.
One day, when Amata and Lucas were in Amata's apartment and explored the bathroom they found something that belonged to Amata's mother; a perfume bottle. When they used it to smell the perfume inside Amata suddenly starts to cry. Lucas wonders what might be wrong she tells him that there is another thing she remembers from when her mother was alive: it is her sent. It was a certain perfume that her mother just adores.
That's when Lucas does that only a true friend would do; he hugs her and comforts her. When Amata is done crying she tells him that she have never said to anyone that she remembers her mother, not even her father, and that it is their little secret.
That's when Lucas realizes that Amata might not only be his one friend, but also his best friend in the entire vault.
15 years since Lucas' birth
Lucas' pov
Lucas knows the exact moment when he starts to feel more than friendship to Amata. The day started as any other day; Lucas gets up from bed, eats breakfast with dad and then goes to the classroom to start the same old routine. But that day each and every one of the pupils has to talk in front of the class.
It might not be anything big per se, but it is the first lecture they have had in their entire life. The subject have been given the week before, which is what makes the overseer so great, and until now they have to write one page each about it that they have to read out of to the others in the class.
Amata, who is the daughter of the overseer, have the most first hand experience with it. She has seen how her father works with her own eyes, and therefor she feels like she has the most pressure on her to do a good work with the lecture. And she does a great job. But Lucas, on the other hand, does not do such a good job. He stutters and says wrong on many occasions, and gets Butch and his small gang to snicker many times. Lucas gets the idea that the entire class might find him funny, and that they all laughs at him secretly.
On one occasion however he looks over to Amata. And there she sits, looking straight at him. When she sees that he glances over to her she gives an honest smile that is so encouraging that Lucas stops to stutter and to do wrong. After the class Butch and his gang bullies him anyway for all the slips he have done, but Amata only encourages him and says that he have done really good. That's when he understands that he might love her.
18 years since Lucas' birth
Lucas' pov
Once 18 years of age Lucas have almost everything he wants in the world, with the single secret wish to get out of the vault and explore. He have gotten together with Amata, he have his own apartment and he have gotten an own job as a waste manager specialist. He still remembers the day he proposed to Amata that they were going to be a pair, and thankfully she have said that she feels the same thing for him that he does for her.
Lucas has scheduled to ask the question on Valentines Day the year prior. He has even managed to save food coupons to a small cake for the occasion, with candles and everything, to really surprise her. And she got surprised alright. "I have been the best day of my life," she has said that evening, when they have gone hand in hand down the corridor from the mess hall. "It's like a dream come true."
It has been like that for Lucas as well that day, and it still is. If only the vault entrance can be open and that he can get out it would have been perfect, but he knows that dream would never be real. Or at least not in the way he imagines it.