Chapter 3/5 Welcome Home (Sanatorium)
Remember when I spoke to you about moments that change everything? Interviewing Lucas Scott certainly did change everything. With the transcripts of my interview and other reference material I banged out the paper. Boy did I feel confident when I turned in my paper.
The following week the Prof wanted to see me in his office. First he accused me of making up the interview. I assured him it was legitimate and I had the original tapes. He smiled, and then told me it was a major coup this interview and it disproved much of what was thought of Lucas Scott and his work. I was in heaven, I scored a major thing.
Over the next hour the Prof and I were on the phone with a major literary magazine. Talk about pressure they wanted to have me write an article and publish the interview. They were also throwing money at me to do it. I used Bee's negotiation tactics and my mom's knowledge on what I should be paid and scored a major payday, and told them give me a week to get all the permission I needed. They agreed to everything, gotta love me.
Dirty Little Secret Number 9: Also be in control that is my motto. Epictetus said, "First say to yourself what you want to be, and then do what you have to do." Yes I do read philosophy; it helps me get through the day.
First thing I did was calling my mom and tell her everything. She was happy but not excited. When I told Bee, she was ecstatic, and Cee was just so proud of me. Next I called Lucas, he answered on the second ring.
"Hey Lucas, its Kas," I said.
"I remember, how the paper turned out?" he asked.
"Awesome, my Prof wants me to publish our interview in some big magazine for literary stuff," I said, playing down my intelligence.
He laughed, "You know damn well what magazine it is, Kas never play down your intelligence," he said.
"Okay Lucas," I said and giggled, for some reason he made me giggle like Cee would make Hales and Sawyer giggle. Well he has sort of started to become a mentor to me. Maybe it's because my mom and him are from the same town. He had very fatherly interest in me.
Dirty Little Secret Number 10: I've always kinda been jealous of Hales and Sawyer. They have Cee as their father. Cee'e been a good fill in but there still feels like there is a hole in my heart.
Lucas told me do the article and it would be my big break. He also said to call him later and we'd set up a webcast interview to add to it. He also gave me his fax number for the paper work and his personal email for the transcripts. He's just been too good to me.
Well jumping ahead a bit, don't want to bore you with the non-essential details. The article blew up, I mean nuclear blow up, soon I was getting calls from Time, Newsweek, and People, and they all wanted to run my interview. I couldn't believe it, I told my mom and she gave me her fake smile and said go for it.
My Mom doesn't seem happy that I've made Lucas my mentor. One night just before the end of semester we had it out. I told her that he was a good influence and was helping me relies my dream of writing a novel. She didn't want to hear it. She told me I was just like my father and didn't listen. Of course Ms. Smarty Pants shot back, telling her how I would know he's dead and you never talk about him. I even accused her of keeping his memory from me. I must of struck deep because she locked herself away. Bee couldn't even talk to her.
That was when I booked my summer vacation. Since Hales and Sawyer were going to Europe with Bee and Cee I wanted to get away from my mom. I would spend the first month with Jen in Savannah and the rest of the summer in Tree Hill. I really had connected with Grandpa on that weekend and I wanted to spend time with him. Also Lucas was there and my mom's friend Rae lived in Tree Hill
Well back to the life changing interview. I solid it to a large circulation magazine, that issue it was published in just flew off the shelves, mainly because the big news I dropped was Lucas Scott was writing a new novel, called Sins of a Father.
Thank god for Savannah, I was able to hide and catch my breath. Soon every television news magazine wanted an interview with me. Simon and Sulester wanted me to write my story, and to sweeten the deal their sister company The CW would produce a movie based on the book. Of Course I was giddy, and excited, but my mom wasn't.
Finally I made it to Tree Hill; I had shipped my car out here, and drove up from Savannah. The drive up to Tree Hill was just what I needed. It allowed me to clear my head, and think about the story I was about to write.
The River Court, that's what they called it, was a great place to think, I told myself. As I drove along the river drive the car sputtered and died. I was able to get it to the side of the road, and popped the hood.
Cee was not mechanically inclined, so he didn't pass on any knowledge about cars to us girls. So here I'm staring at this engine, completely clueless.
I called Grandpa but he was not answering. The only other person I knew in Tree Hill was Lucas. So I called him and he said he'd be right out. About a half-houir later he pulled up in his Mustang.
He climbed out and removed his button down shirt. Lucas kept himself in great shape, and it showed, and I could clearly see a tattoo on his arm. His eyes registered shock when he saw my car, and then he laughed, "Like mother, like daughter," he said, and worked under the hood.
After he figured out what was wrong with the car he had it towed. Lucas drove me to Grandpa's.
Grandpa was waiting for me when Lucas pulled up. We both got out and Grandpa had a smile a mile wide on his face. He greeted me with my favorite thing from him, a Grandpa hug.
"Hey Rakeboy," Grandpa said to Lucas.
Lucas smiled, "How you've been, Mr. Sawyer?" he asked.
"Not bad, I've seen you've continued the habit of saving Sawyer Women," Grandpa said.
Lucas nodded and smiled, "It's a hard habit to break."
Grandpa nodded, "Well I'm glad you've become friends with my Granddaughter, she's never known her dad," was it me or did Grandpa make a pointed statement at Lucas.
"Well Mr. Sawyer, Kas is a great girl; I just wish Reagan could turn out like her."
Grandpa nodded. My head was swimming at Lucas' complement. "Well Karen," Grandpa said, he always called me Karen, "is like her mom, in most respects, but she had a lot of her dad in her."
Lucas nodded, "I hope he was a good man."
Grandpa nodded, "Most of the time he is."
"Well we're all human."
Grandpa nodded yet again. What is it with men and nodding? Lucas started to walk back to his car.
"Hey Rakeboy," Grandpa finally said.
"Yes?" Lucas asked.
"Eating at the café tonight?"
"Yes."
"See you there."
That whole exchange was totally weird. These North Carolina people are weird, and they say people from California are weird. That is what I thought the rest of the day.
Later Grandpa brought me to Karen's Café. I finally got to meet the rest of the Scott Clan. Let me tell you they are a unique bunch.
"Lucas," I said as I walked through the front door.
"Hey Kas," he said and smiled, "Let me introduce you to my family."
I smiled and was introduced to a world wind number of people. Finally I formally met Lucas' brother Nathan. He was still grumpy. There was his ex-stepmom, and Nathan's mom, Deb, his mom Karen,, which was weird her having the same first name as me. I re-met Jamie, and he was still checking me out. There was also Jamie's sister Kaylee, who was going to be a senior in High School. My near clone Lily and she greeted me warmly.
That was when I met Haley. Another weird thing since I have a Spiritual Sister named Haley. This Haley had warm brown eyes and honey blonde hair. Her smiled greeted me warmly. She was Jamie and Kaylee's mom and Nathan's wife.
"Kas right?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"So how do you like Tree Hill?" she asked me.
"This is only my second visit so I really hadn't formed an opinion yet."
"I think you'll love it here," Haley said.
Dirty Little Secret Number 11: I love Tree Hill, so I lied to Haley, see Dirty Little Secret Number 10. My Grandpa is here and of course Lucas. Lucas has been more then a mentor to me, he's been kinda father like.
Finally I met Reagan. Lucas' daughter looked at me jealously. I guess she's sick of me stealing her Dad's time. One thing that struck me about her was she looked kinda like Lily, just with red hair.
"Kas," I said, introducing myself.
"Reagan," she said, "So you're my Dad's disciple."
I nodded. "He's a great writer and he offered to help me become one so I jumped at the chance."
Reagan snorted, "Yeah my Dad the hero."
"What?"
"Well my Dad always does things because he feels they are the right thing to do," she stated.
"Like what?"
"Marry my mom when she was pregnant with me," she said, bluntly, "Even though he was heading to California to find the lost love of his life."
My eyes went wide with shock, "Wow!"
"Yeah, well my mom's a slut. She only slept with my dad because he turned her down in high school, she had to get him drunk, and it happened one night. I was the result," she said, like she wanted to relieve a burden, "But he's a great dad. So don't even think of sleeping with him."
Wow she just put me on notice. Shit! That was almost as good as when Rae puts me on notice. You could tell she loved her dad, and didn't want him to get hurt, or for anyone to come between them.
"Reagan, I have no intention of sleeping with your dad," I said.
She nodded, "Good."
It was surprisingly a fun night with the Scotts. Lily and I fell into an easy friendship. We almost quiet literally talked the night away. She was nine months older then me as well.
"So when is your birthday?" Lily asked, after I told her I was nine months younger.
"March Twenty-second," I said. That's it three two two my lucky number.
Lily laughed, "I'll have to remember to send you a card."
Later that night, I was sitting down listening to Reagan talk bad about her mom. This girl really didn't care for her mom, Rachel. I saw Grandpa, Karen, and Lucas talking. Of course I was a prefect angel that I am and didn't listen in on them. Are my horns showing?
"So she's Peyton's daughter?" Karen asked.
"Yes Karen, she's Peyton's daughter," Grandpa said.
"She's also nine months younger then Lily and looks almost just like her," Karen said.
"There is some resemblance," Grandpa said.
"Who is her father?" Karen asked.
Grandpa shook his head, "Peyton had sworn me to secrecy on her father's idenity, buut I can say one thing, Peyton and her father were very close."
Karen nodded, "Really, any other hints?"
"I just can't get to the heart of the matter," he said.
I wondered what that meant. My Grandpa knew who my dad was. Why was Karen asking about my dad? Why did Lucas want to know? I'll have to ask later.
My time in Tree Hill went by slowly. Most of the time I spent it on the beach tanning or trying to surf in the Atlantic Ocean, hey I had at least had to try it. The afternoons I spent with Lucas working on my novel. Grandpa and I had dinner together every night.
Lily and I became good friends. We hung out all the time. We would end up crashing at each other's places too.
One day I got my hair cut to the same length as Lily. That night after drinking heavily we got the idea to straighten my hair and curly Lily's. After that we passed out at Lily's.
Well the next morning I got up first and made sure I took my pills. Now being hung over I stumbled around Lily's room and grabbed an old grey hoodie that was lying around, it had the name of some body shop on it. Hey I wanted something to eat and this isn't California so I'm not going to wander around nearly naked, and hung over. That was when I smelled coffee, just what the doctor ordered.
I stumbled out into the kitchen and reached for a cup. Karen came in to the room in a rush. She looked over at me.
"Lily, I'll need you at the café around seven tonight," she said, I turned and looked at her and was about to speak up," No double talk you're twenty-two and said you wanted to take over the café, you need to be there."
I nodded; shocked that Karen confused me with her daughter. Just then Lily came into the kitchen. She was wearing my hoodie that I skate in. Karen looked at Lily on her way out of the kitchen.
"Hi Kas, did you have a good time last night?" Karen asked and didn't wait for an answer. Lily just shrugged and went for a cup of coffee, once we heard the front door close we both broke up laughing.
"Did my mom just get us confused?" Lily asked.
I nodded, "Gee I wonder why?" holding my hair out.
Lily grabbed her hair and laughed, "Doesn't help you're wearing my sweatshirt."
I looked down at it. "What is the story with this, it looks like its seen better days?"
Lily had a sad look on her face. "The sweatshirt belonged to Lucas. It was my Dad's body shop."
Now I feel bad.
Dirty Little Secret Number 12: I speak without thinking most of the time.
"I'm sorry, my dad is dead too," I said.
Lily nodded, "I never met my dad, and he was murdered by a younger brother he loved."
I gave Lily a honest look of sorrow, and hugged her, "I'm sorry," I said, "I never met my dad either."
She smiled at me, "No problem. So what did my mom want?"
I shook my head; Lily seemed to shake off every major blow given to her. Well if your life started like hers I guess you'll be use to shaking things off by the time you are her age. People never question me about not having a dad, I guess it was a California thing, or the fact that Lily's tragedy was played out in the news.
"Karen wants you at the café at seven tonight," I said.
Lily nodded, and then started to laugh.
"What?" I asked.
"We can so pass as twins," Lily said, finally letting the events of the morning sink in, as she handled her hair.
"Yea! I think I'm keeping it straight, it's kinda grown on me."
Lily laughed, "Yea really confuse everyone. So how did you get nicknamed Kas?"
I shrugged, "I guess I was always going to have the initials, my mom thought I was going to be a boy so she chose the name Keith Alan Sawyer for me. Well as you can see I'm a girl, but everything with the initials K.A.S. was bought already, so I became Karen Anna Sawyer."
Lily looked at me weird. "My Dad's name was Keith Alan," she said.
I made some noise. To describe it would be impossible, "Wow weird."
To tell you the truth as much as I loved my time in Tree Hill it was very surreal. People looked at me strangely sometimes. I liked my straight hair so I kept it that way, and Lily straightened her hair again. So people were really getting confused. One positive was I did get closer to Reagan.
She still looked at me jealously like I was taking her dad away from her, just not as bad. I did find out she really hated her mom. From what I was able to put together Lucas slept with her mom one night when he was drunk and Reagan was the resolute. He did the honorable thing and married her, but the marriage was hell and they divorced by the time Reagan was three. Her mom only wanted visitation and Lucas raised her. His book a Serpent in Red Grass was about that marriage.
The one last crazy/goofy thing we did before I went back to my mom and California started with Lily commenting on how Reagan looked like a redheaded version of me. Then Reagan shot back that we could all pass as sisters. So we came up with a crazy/goofy idea.
We all did our hair the same as Lily wore it. Next we went to Pac-sun, I hate Pac-sun but it was the only place to get decent surf wear out here. So we all dressed like I would when I was skating/surfing. Reagan chose the River Court for us to take pictures. We took a series of pictures of us together all posing the same. They were digital so we emailed them to every one of the Scotts and Grandpa. It was something to remember the summer by.
Lily was great this summer. She helped me with much of the key choices concerning the deals steaming from my Lucas interview. She was a shoulder to cry on, and I did the same for her. It was a great experience for me; Lily became my third spiritual sister. Next summer I hope Reagan and I could get that close. She would have to get over the whole jealousy thing though. Reagan is a great girl.
My mom and Bee picked me up at LAX. There she was, still not totally happy with me. I swear I've busted my ass to be who I am and Pea never seems happy. Yet Bee was just gushing over seeing me.
Bee felt my hair, "You've straightened your hair," she said, "It looks great."
I smiled, "Thanks Bee, I felt like a change," I said, and looked over to my mom. She gave me a disapproving look.
"Pea, don't you just love what she has done with her hair?" Bee asked, my mom.
"It's nice," Pea said, fakely and turned away, I heard her mutter under her breath, "It reminds me of her father."
Bee nodded and then smiled at me. "Tell me all about your summer, and you have a great tan. Were there any hot guys?" Bee was excited to see me, thank god one of these women were.
Later that night I unpacked and put away my cloths. It was nice being home, but my car had yet to arrive, so I can only surf on our private beach.
"I bet you lost some of your cut," Sawyer said as she walked into my room.
I squealed, I'll admit, but I did miss my spiritual sister, and I hugged her. "So Sawyer how was Europe?" I asked after we broke our hug.
"You know Rome, Milan, London, and Paris, you went two years ago. The guys are still foreign and hot," Sawyer said. She's kinda a scatter brain, but I love her still. She walked over and looked at the new pictures I had from Tree Hill. After studying them she turned and faced me.
"Sweet when did you learn photoshop?" she asked.
I looked at her, "What do you mean?"
She showed me a picture, "You made this on photoshop and even chaged your hair color in one," she said.
Shaking my head, I looked at her, "That is Lily Scott," I said and pointed to Lily, "She's Lucas Scott's sister and that is Reagan, Lucas' daughter."
Sawyer was looking at me like I had three heads. "No!" she said.
Nodding my head yes we both laughed. We just chatted and caught up. Finally Sawyer left for one of her dates. It was time to check my email, so I sat down at my desktop computer.
Bee had been using it and forgot to log off, again. I get to read a lot of good shit this way. Once, Bee was having a Cyber Affair with some dude named Hellenkeller. It was innocent but still funny to read there cyber dirty talk. On her Yahoo, Cheerygirl06, were several emails from Broodyboy06. Interesting maybe she has another cyber lover, Cee doesn't consider that cheating by the way, just her having fun, as long as she only ate home cooking he didn't care where she got the appetite. I laughed, I have internet friends too, so normally it's no big deal, and then I noticed the subject line, "Kas Tree Hill Visit." And there were attachments and she had replied to it.
I clicked on the newest of Broodyboy's emails; it was dated today, and read it.
Cheery,
Kas had a great time. She really bonded with Lily and made some connections with Reagan. My mom also loves her, and hopes she can visit again. Reagan is a harder nut to crack, though. I could blame her mom for that, but I'm partially at fault. We all enjoyed spending time with Kas. Have you considered answering my question? Attacted are some photos taken out here of her for you. Also when are you coming out? We all would love to finally meet your girls.
Broody
I looked at the attached pictures. They were all of me, and everyone from Tree Hill. All the Scotts were in at least one picture with me. I then clicked onto her sent folder. I opened the newest one she sent to Broodyboy.
Broody,
It is great that you've bonded with Kas. As for your question, I promised that I would keep it a secret, but I'll give you a hint, she has his eyes. My favorite picture is of her, Lily and Reagan dressed the same, god do they look alike. Reagan has gotten big, I wish when Rachel comes out to visit she would bring Reagan, but she never does. Reagan is so much a Scott except for the hair, that's Gatina. Tell Tutorgirl that this summer I'll drag the girls out there. Because I also want to meet Reagan.
Cheery
That was totally weird. Who is Broodybooy? Why is Bee asking about me in Tree Hill? Why would he have pictures of me that I had taken? Who's tutorgirl? Reagan's mom was out here while I was in Tree Hill? I swear my life just got weirder. What has happened to my family? How come we all have secrets now? Where is the trust? Where was the happy home I grew up in? Our house use to be like what EM Forster said, "One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life."
