It may have been an educated guess, but Rita's chilling proclamation did its job in blasting Lynn Sr. in the chest with the force of a point-blank shotgun discharge. But he did nothing to ease the discomfort as it churned his stomach fit to burst, as if drones of squirming maggots were blindly bustling about for their freedom. In the end, he knew it was pointless to try to pick out the bits of shrapnel out of his soul from the most devastating bombshell he had ever heard in his life.
The futility in denial was as clear as day—all it took was one haunting trip down the memory lane to render the prospect of hope a foolish waste of time. What else other than depression could force such poisonous words out of his daughter's mouth? How could she ever equate her own life as a steep cost to her family's happiness if depression wasn't behind the wheel?
But there was another question that blanketed his sense of direction like a thick fog, and he cast it out in the open with a tremor of uncertainty in his voice.
"What are we gonna do, Rita?"
Through her apprehension, he could sense that she was just as—if not more—scared out of her wits than he was out of his. And yet, here he was, leaning on her for guidance. He was tragically clueless, yet his wife decided not to reproach him for his ineptitude.
"Well," Rita said, her tone conveying careful consideration, "my aunt Bridget got diagnosed after she went to see her GP. We can do that for Lori once she's cleared to leave the hospital. In the meantime, we also need to let the kids know that Lori's going through a tough time right now, and they can't be disappointed if she..."
The spark of the confidence in her eyes dimmed to quivering embers as her face fell—Lynn Sr.'s own sense of reprieve suffered a heavy fracture that was further exacerbated when Rita completed her thoughts with, "...well, if she's not going to be in the best of moods when she sees them."
He was brought back to reality now, his foolish relief snatched away before it could continue to greedily pacify his hope in a quick, mess-free fix. His hands drifted away from his wife's shoulders, he stumbled back in his chair, and slumped—he wore defeat in his features and body language, but he bore the markings of tortured, broken man in his spirit.
"Lynn?"
He couldn't bother to look up at her—his downcast gaze remained on the corner of the dining table, where an empty chair tormented him with the reminder that because of him, it wasn't occupied when his children were eating here earlier.
He did, however, flinch when he felt one of Rita's hands slip over one of his. It was the same vain gesture he did to give Lori some remission, and its empty warmth came back to bite him as her fingers laid cold against his skin.
"You don't have to act as if this is all your fault," she said. "The truth is, we both should've kept a closer eye on her. And we both made it worse by punishing her like we did; I can't imagine that made her feel better about herself."
Lynn Sr. sighed. And there it was; the inevitability of Rita's attempt to ease his guilt only made him feel worse, especially since she had decided that she deserved to consider herself a member of what should've been a one-man guilty party. It wasn't fair to say that she was worthy of being accountable just because his nonsense dulled her sense of responsibility when Lori needed it the most.
But the magnitude of his suffering only intensified when he realized that she wouldn't be in the mood to be convinced otherwise. He thought, without any scorn against her, that it was such misfortune that she couldn't have had that resolve earlier—even if it meant he'd be in for an earful of a venomous diatribe, it would've paled in comparison to...to all of this.
"But," Rita continued, "we're not going to be of any use to Lori if we sit around and feel sorry for ourselves. Now that we knew there's a problem, we can give her the attention that she needs."
He, at last, perked his head up to give Rita attention. It wasn't too much to ask for him to try to scrounge up some mettle, but he couldn't do so at the cost of a lie.
"I'll give Lori whatever she needs," Lynn Sr. said, "but I can't forgive myself, Rita. Nothing I can do for her will change that."
Rita nodded. "Truthfully, I feel the same way about myself. But we have to remember that the children come first, not our self-loathing."
With that, she pulled her hand, got up, and gave her husband a peck on the forehead.
"You coming to bed?" she asked, her body turned towards the living room.
Lynn Sr. shook his head. "Not now, Rita. I just need to...let this all settle for a little bit."
He was thankful that she respected his wishes and did just that when she departed. Now that he was finally was left alone, he could allow himself to weep without interruption—it was necessary to purge what he felt was a bottomless expanse of his grief before tomorrow came. Whether he was ready or not, his children needed him, and he'd be ineffective with the shackles of his misery rendering him unable to do anything but squander his time on self-pity.
His tears and self-absorbed heartache was spent—or at least, kept at bay—when the clock struck one in the morning.
For the first time in quite a while, Lincoln found himself in his bedroom in the early afternoon of Tuesday. He could say the same for his other siblings, whom he presumed were in their respective rooms and getting ready for the day ahead.
Or rather, the visit ahead.
As if sleeping in Lori's bed the night before wasn't enough of an oddity on its own, the fact that his parents were waiting for him and his sisters in the hallway only begged a series of questions from them.
Their news made his heart sink, the sensation bred from worry and joy—Mom and Dad had decided that instead of their children bothering with school, they had given them a choice in how they wanted to spend their day. They could either accept their proposal of calling their respective schools ahead of time and requesting that they could have the day off and visit Lori or they could go to school and see Lori once they got back.
The acceptance of the former was both immediate and unanimous, though Lincoln had to swallow down the bubbling brew of turbulent emotions from making him think to reconsider. Either way, he was going to have to see Lori one way or the other, so he might as well take the option that gave him a day off from school.
But still...yesterday hadn't helped him at all—he was still at a loss for the words that both he and Lori needed for each other. At first, he had been eager to rely on Leni—the only person to have the faintest idea of what he had felt for Lori—but he deemed that a pointless effort. He knew better than to regard Leni as unreliable, especially on matters of the heart, but could she relate to feeling such contempt towards a loved one? If it was obvious that Leni didn't hate him for treating Lori like he had been doing—which was perhaps the number one opportunity for her to come the closest to approaching sibling-centered vitriol—then there was enough reason to believe that a wide chasm separated him from a possible city of refuge.
In the end, he had to face this alone, and it was part of his just dues for putting Lori through the wringer.
Presently, he was reclined on his bed, his head resting against his pillow as his legs crossed. He was too wound-up in reflection and planning to bide his time with anything recreational. He had to think of something fast because the McBrides would be coming to pick them up in about half an hour.
But the weight of time against him grew heavier with a distraction—his open laptop, resting on his desk, started beeping. The telltale sound of a video chat text notification made both Lincoln's ears and his curiosity perk up. The last time he checked, it was only a little past twelve. The only people who video chatted with him went to school, meaning that whoever was trying to contact him was staying at home like he was.
When he shuffled out of bed, walked over to the laptop, and gazed at the notification blinking in the bottom right corner of the screen.
"Huh? Ronnie Anne?"
The profile picture matched his observations, but the message was what truly piqued his interest:
"we need to talk. chat with me as soon as u can"
Whatever it was that Ronnie Anne wanted to talk about must've warranted face-to-face communication. Otherwise, she could've sufficed to just text or call him on his cellphone. Deciding not to wonder what she could want, Lincoln opted to fire up a private video chat session as soon as he could.
Once he did, he waited for Ronnie Anne to enter. It only took a few seconds for her to do so, and before he knew it, Lincoln found himself staring into the narrowed, icy eyes of one visibly irate Santiago tween.
Lincoln gulped, his heart beating a little faster. He usually knew how to get himself out of a tight spot, but there was nothing he felt he could do about a Ronnie Anne that was angry with him for reasons that he couldn't think of. Thus, he was certain that the only way of placating her was with a smile and a wave.
"H-hey, Ronnie Anne," Lincoln said, tugging at his collar with his other hand. "How's it g−"
"Where's Lori?"
Lincoln's hands dropped, along with his grin. He could only blink at the screen, trying to process both the question and the reason behind Ronnie Anne asking it in the first place. His contemplation (lasting all of two seconds) had evidently grown weary on her patience, for the next thing Lincoln knew, Ronnie Anne had leaned a little closer to her screen.
"WHERE'S. LORI?"
Lincoln yelped, his blood pressured spiking a bit. "Woah, woah, woah! Take it easy!"
Though it wasn't an intentional tactic, his frightened reaction must've done enough to effectively quell her temper—the way she shrank back in her chair and loosened her angry snarl was enough to make Lincoln believe that was worth hazarding that kind of guess.
"Uh...sorry," Ronnie Anne mumbled sheepishly, her voice sounding noticeably scratchy. "I got a little carried a..."
A sudden, throaty cough prevented her from finishing her sentence, and it inspired Lincoln's next thought.
"Hey, uh, are you sick, by any chance?" he asked, watching as Ronnie Anne reached down and pulled up a tissue into view.
"Yep," she said before blowing her nose and tossing the tissue over her shoulder. "To make a long story short, Carl got sick with a cold, then uncle Carlos caught what he had, then aunt Frida caught what he had, then I wound up getting hit with it."
She grabbed another tissue to blow her nose, then cleared her throat. "Now, I gotta stay home while grandma Rosa takes care of me and everyone else who's sick."
"Eh, that doesn't sound so bad. At least you don't have to go to school," Lincoln said. "Though, it still stinks that you're not feeling well."
Ronnie Anne groaned. "Dude, being sick isn't the worst part. Those home remedies are the real pain. You ever had to drink syrup made out of honey and onions before?"
"Can't say that I have."
"Lucky you. Believe me, that stuff'll only make you feel worse."
Lincoln chuckled. "I'll try to keep that in mind."
Another watery cough broke the brief second of the proceeding silence, and it didn't take long for Ronnie Anne to ask a question of her own.
"But you know, now that I think about it, what're you doing at home?" she asked, giving Lincoln a puzzled look. "You don't look sick to me."
"I'm home because Mom and Dad excused me and my sisters from going to school today," Lincoln said. "We'll be leaving pretty soon, though."
"Why's that?"
"Remember how you were asking me where Lori is?" Lincoln broke out an amused smirk. "Quite angrily, might I add?"
He laughed as Ronnie Anne shook her head and folded her arms. "Yeah, yeah, rub it in," she muttered, her grin revealing no ill-will. "But yeah, I remember."
"She's..." His merriment withered when he recalled his father's horrid announcement from Sunday, the memory nearly opening up his tear ducts. "...she's...i-in the hospital. She was in a car accident a few days ago."
He watched as Ronnie Anne's eyes widened and her hands flew over her mouth. Though it pained him to see his friend reeled back in abject horror, it was that sort of response that he was looking for—no matter what kind of bone Ronnie Anne clearly had to pick with Lori, it didn't stop her from feeling empathy for her going through such a horrid disaster.
Ronnie Anne's hands came down to her lap, and she looked fit to squirm out of her skin from all the fidgeting her clasped hands were doing. "I'm sorry, Lincoln. I had no idea."
Lincoln had a feeling she wasn't just apologizing because she felt sorry for what happened to Lori—he could imagine that her demanding that she see a victim of a car accident, with the intent of chewing them out over...something, didn't give off a good impression.
Rather than bring his intuition out in the light—for Ronnie Anne to either confirm or deny—Lincoln decided to cover her on both ends when he said, "It's alright. According to my parents, she's recovering just fine. She should be out soon."
When she managed to crack a weak smile, Lincoln thought it necessary to...well, get to the bottom of what Ronnie Anne's beef with Lori was in the first place.
"Anyway, what is it you want from Lori?"
Ronnie Anne's face hardened a little. "An explanation."
Lincoln shrugged. "About what?"
Before she could answer, Ronnie Anne let out another cough, followed by her tearing through yet another tissue. At this point, she looked even more miserable, though Lincoln wasn't quite sure if it was just from her stuffed-up nose or because of the story she had yet to tell.
"Well," Ronnie Anne began, "it all started a few days ago. I noticed that Bobby wasn't acting the same as usual."
"How so?" Lincoln asked.
"He just looked so...dejected. In fact, he still does. He rarely smiles, he's always skipping out on watching Dream Boat with everyone else, and I even heard grandpa Hector complaining that he was going through the motions at the bodega today."
Ronnie Anne took a break to clear her throat once again. "But what makes it worse is that no matter how many times I've tried to ask him what was bothering him, he keeps insisting that there's nothing to worry about."
"He did it again last night, before we went to the dining room for dinner." Her brow furrowed and her frown tightened. "It was like...like I didn't even matter to him. He was in pain, and he didn't even trust that I could help him."
Lincoln winced. Yeah, that sounded like it was pretty awful. All the same, despite how guilty it made him, he wanted to press on with the matter further rather than dwell on Ronnie Anne's pain.
"Sorry about that," Lincoln said with utmost earnestness. "Did anything else happen?"
Ronnie Anne nodded. "Yeah. I overheard Bobby talking with Carlota last night. I guess he felt that he could trust her about his problems instead of me."
She sighed and breathed heavily through her nose in a rush of pent-up exasperation.
"Anyway," she continued, "that's when I heard everything. Apparently, about a week ago, Lori left a message on Bobby's voicemail."
The pause she made allowed Lincoln to lean in with captivated interest brimming in his eyes.
"She broke up with him."
Lincoln gasped and leaned back in his chair, nearly sending himself toppling down on the floor.
W-what?!" he stammered when he started to gain his bearings and look at Ronnie Anne with disbelief. "Lori?! As in my sister Lori?!"
Ronnie Anne rolled her eyes. "Well, duh. You think he was dating another Lori behind your Lori's back or something?"
Lincoln ignored her snarky comment, but only because he was too caught up in trying to process her declaration. As far as he was concerned, Lori would never willingly part ways with Bobby. Perhaps if she were coerced to do so under the most extreme of conditions (like a gun pointed to her head), but otherwise? Absolutely not.
"That's...wow, that's nuts," Lincoln said. "Why'd she do that?"
Ronnie Anne huffed out an angry breath. "That's the thing; I don't have a clue. All I could gather was that she dropped it on him out of nowhere, for pretty much no good reason at all."
At this point, Lincoln didn't need anything more to understand where Ronnie Anne was coming from; he was sure that he'd have a few choice words for Bobby if he ever found out that he had dumped Lori out of the blue.
"No wonder you were mad at her," he said.
Ronnie Anne frowned and made a buzzer noise from the back of her phlegm-filled throat.
"Wrong. I'm still mad at her. I just don't want to yell at someone who got in the hospital after a car accident. When she gets out and she's fully recovered, let her know that the both of us need to have a little chat about her breaking my brother's heart."
In an instant, Lincoln came up with what he felt was a better alternative than that.
"Wait a second," he said with a smile. "I could always just ask her why she did it once I get to the hospital. Then, I can come back later and−"
"No." Ronnie Anne shook her head. "I wanna hear it from her."
'Well...so much for that,' Lincoln thought with a twinge of nervousness. All the same, he told her that that was more than fair.
But just then, his previous bouts of anxiety came back to haunt him when he remembered that the time was winding down, and he still hadn't come up with a good place to start his reconciliation with Lori. Though, as he soon found him, Ronnie Anne seemed to have him figured out before he could call an end to the video chat.
"Look, I don't wanna hold you up any longer," she said. "I know you gotta get going soon. But all the same, thanks for listening."
"Don't mention it. Thanks for telling me what happened."
Suddenly, Ronnie Anne's gaze softened, and Lincoln could almost make out the tender essence behind her bright, brown eyes.
"And look, despite everything I said, I seriously hope Lori gets better," she said solemnly. "She may have been a jerk to Bobby, but she doesn't deserve to be in the hospital because of it."
Lincoln smiled. "Thanks, Ronnie Anne."
She tried to offer a smile of her own, but it twisted into a grimace as she held the side of her head with one of her hands and coughed into her other one.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to learn to keep my gag reflex under control for the next rounds of honey and onion syrup coming my way."
Despite herself, she mustered a laugh in sync with Lincoln's. After that, Ronnie Anne signed off, leaving Lincoln nearly back to where he was before. The only reason he felt it proper to use "nearly" was because, if anything, what Ronnie Anne had told him made him feel even worse about Lori.
Within the period that Leni had supposedly noticed that Lori wasn't acting like herself, his eldest sister did the unthinkable and broke up with Bobby without rhyme or reason. Though Ronnie Anne turned down his offer to get the truth straight from the horse's mouth and relay it to her, he still couldn't help but be curious for his own sake.
But that would have to come after he made things right…
...even if he still had not idea how that was going to go smoothly.
It was ironic that in one of the safest places anyone in distress could find themselves in—that being in the hospital—it took everything Lincoln had not to combust from the coils of tension that tightened painfully in his chest as he, his sisters, and his parents quietly sauntered through the bustling halls of Royal Woods General on the way to the recovery room.
The only one to have any sort of idea of his inner turmoil was Leni, who walked alongside him and held his hand gently in her grip while she carried Lily tightly with her other arm. Ordinarily, holding hands with one of his older sisters in public would be a little embarrassing, but Lincoln was willing to take anything he could get to calm down. Still, her grasp, as comforting as it was, still couldn't keep his shallow, quick breathing from squeezing out of his lungs as his heart fluttered with the speed of a hummingbird's wing flaps.
He was still at a loss for what he was going to do about Lori. And now that he thought about it, his worries were always centered around a scenario where he and Lori were alone together. The harsh reality was that he had nine sisters who were probably champing at the bit to see their eldest sister and rightfully so. Even so, he wasn't sure if he could get so much as a word out with his sisters hanging around, looking on at him intently. It was shameful enough for him to have his ugliest side known to one of his sisters; he couldn't imagine that there wasn't a good chance that at least one of the others would look down on him.
All the same, his morbid musing allowed him to pick up on what his parents were telling him and his sisters at the moment.
"Okay, everyone, I want you all to remember what we talked about before we came here," Mom said.
"That's right," Dad added. "Lori's doing fine, but she's going to need some time to get over the accident. That means that she might not be all smiles when she sees you."
"In any case, whether she's excited or not, we want you to do two things. One, respect her feelings. They may not be what you want from her, but that gives none of you the right to force her to 'get over herself'."
"And I trust you all know what the second thing is, right?"
"No acting up," the children said.
"That's right," Mom said. "That means that I better not catch you trying to steal lollipops from one of the nurse's stations again, Lola."
"Or trying to assist doctors with brain surgery, Lisa," Dad said, giving the scientist a pointed look. "Again."
The children who weren't put on the spot had a good time snickering as the called-out duo muttered angrily at the indignity under their breath as their faces turned beet red.
Well, except for Lincoln. He knew that in a few minutes, there would be no time for laughter.
Thanks to Dad's last visit, Lori knew what she was in for. That didn't mean that the news of her sibling's imminent visit settled well with her, though.
She had endured another near-sleepless night after her father left her, only she didn't have the familiar accommodations of her bedroom to gaze upon as her broken, drained body laid out against the thinly padded mattress of her hospital bed and her willow blanket draped over her.
She could've asked the nurses for better luxuries, but what good what that do anyone who mattered? She was lucky to have one good arm after what should've ended her life—she shuddered at the thought of those who suffered worse than her yet did nothing to deserve their fates. Who was she to take from those tortured souls, writhing in agony of a shattered mind and body as their needs demanded around-the-clock heed? It was revolting that she thought of taking that away from them, even if the selfish aspiration lingered for but a second.
'If Lincoln were here, he'd certainly have a thing or two to say about that.'
Truthfully, any of her siblings would—it was just that Lincoln was the most likely to beat anyone else to the punch. He denounced her that horrible night without shame, his bold anger flashing in her mind when the deep recesses of her darkest memories reared their ugly heads to spite her.
And any minute now, that frightful saga would have another chapter added to its ghastly anthology. He'd chew her out and leave the slashed, hollow husk of her dignity out to dry before the others would surround her with malice in their eyes and tear into her without mercy. If she had the gall to beg and cry, they surely wouldn't relent—they'd be wrong to do otherwise.
Mercy and forgiveness were privileges that someone of her disdainful caliber had been revoked of, far before her most recent succession of harmful deeds wrought such misery on her family and friends.
'You hate how happy they look despite you. That's why you'll never be satisfied until they always look as sad and ugly as you.'
If Dad could read between the lines from what she had told him yesterday, he'd know as much himself. And what he did with that knowledge was out of her hands.
"Hey, it's Lori!"
In the wake of that cry, which alerted the attention of several stern-looking staff that immediately shushed the outburst, she also learned that the preparation required to face such a daunting confrontation—literally thirty feet away from her—was also out of hands.
Lana had apparently decided that the consequences of her joyous holler were worth showing the elation on her face…
...which was matched by just about everyone who accompanied her. Their smiles were etched with varying degrees, but the universal message of their delight couldn't have been more apparent to her. She was torn asunder by the display, rendered into mentally babbling on about how this was all just a delusion or an attempt to keep up appearances. She was left without a counter to how either of those possibilities made the slightest bit of sense, but she was far too concerned with the present to bother with answering for her own dilemma.
Because this couldn't be real. Why? Why were they permitting her the freedom to bask in their glory without shame? How could they not consider the reality that they were in the presence of a wounded, venomous serpent who was still potent enough to evoke widespread grief?
Her eyes quickly searched for solace, anything that could tear her away from their nauseating naivety, and they locked onto her brother's face. Her heart clenched from panic, even as his features remained softened in her midst. But soon, the sight of his faded smile was lost on her when the swarm of her sisters suddenly shuffled in front of him as they made a beeline over to her.
At first, it came as a surprise to Lincoln when he was able to see Lori and manage to smile—he was almost certain his nervousness would make him vomit and cry all at once when he and his family finally got to the recovery room and spotted her.
But now, as he watched his sisters rush over to Lori, it made all the sense in the world why his anxiety was taken down several notches. Hearing that Lori was alive and recovering was one thing, but seeing it for himself tugged at his heart like nothing else had done in the past few weeks.
Still, he could only manage a paltry smile and shying away from approaching her any closer, though. Not only was he still not sure where to start with Lori, but he didn't want to be a burden to the lively reunion that was going on. After all, none of his sisters had hurt Lori, and he was certain that she wouldn't forget that. In the end, it was only fair that she get to soak up the love and attention that she needed before he dampened the mood with his presence.
He jumped a little when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and saw Mom looking down at him with Dad at her side.
"Something wrong, Lincoln?" she asked.
His first instinct was to lie, but he quickly realized that it would do him no good. He'd just be back to where he was now, unsure of how to approach his own sister and get some one-on-one time with her to mend the fences. He might as well appeal to his parents for help—it wasn't like he had to tell them exactly what he had to do.
"I just...I need a little time to talk to Lori," Lincoln said.
Dad shrugged. "You could always do it n−"
"Alone."
Lincoln watched, silently hoping for agreement, as his parents looked at each other for a brief moment before looking back at him.
"What for?" Mom asked.
"It's just really important, Mom," Lincoln said.
"We get that, but what do you want us to do about it, son?" Dad asked. "Your sisters deserve to be with Lori as much as you."
Lincoln felt himself growing more desperate with each passing second. The jig was almost up yet he was nowhere closer to getting what he needed. But the window of opportunity only shrank as he continued to stall, so he decided that being direct was the only thing he could do.
"Look, I did something really bad to her, and I want to apologize," Lincoln said. "I just don't want anyone else to know what it was."
Once again, he found himself at the mercy of tense silence as he watched his parents shuffle away to talk to each other a few feet away from him. The pressure was greatly alleviated when they returned with smiles on their faces, the promise of a pleasing outcome hopefully not out of the question.
"Very well," Dad said. "We'll let you have some one-on-one time with Lori."
"But we have to let your sisters have their time too," Mom added as she looked on at the touching scene of her daughters coming together again. "But don't worry, you'll have plenty of time to get whatever you need off your chest."
Lincoln grinned. "Thanks, Mom and Dad. I really appreciate it."
In fact, he appreciated their generosity more than he feared for the worst. Surely, it took the possibility of losing out on this chance to get him to treasure the opportunity to make amends in the first place, no matter how scary the unknown might've been to him.
But for now, he'd watch from afar until it was time for his moment. His sisters were blocking his view from Lori, but he didn't need to see her to know that she was getting the best treatment in the world from those who mattered to her the most.
He just hoped that, after everything was said and done, Lori was willing to believe that she mattered to him too.
Even as the minutes ticked on by a plodding crawl, Lori had the presence of mind and a strong enough will to keep her smile long and her answers to her sisters' questions short. Being as noncommittal as she was, thankfully, didn't arouse suspicion of the empty dullness that their joy did nothing to slough away like dead skin cells.
It was obvious, based on their excited fervor, that Dad had decided to keep them in the dark. It confused her, at first, why he'd want to be so discrete with what should've been the beginning of a violent witch hunt, run by siblings who were irate for her treachery and for the years of deception it took to for her to keep up appearances.
But as each of her sisters hugged and kissed her, one after another, it slowly dawned on her why this was happening. Their happiness would be deprived if they knew the truth—they'd never waste their affection on someone who they knew wasn't worth their time, much less their charity. Dad kept the wool over their eyes for their innocence, not for her sake. He was just working on borrowed time, trying to keep the family together as best as he could while he figured out the perfect way to quietly sweep her under the rug like the dirty, little secret that she was.
She'd play the part of the deceiver again, but only as long as her ailing, feeble mind could keep up the act.
But in the back of her head, one constant drove her to nearly crack under the pressure of her guise and burst into tears. Her sisters' smothering didn't make her forget Lincoln, who was standing afar with Mom and Dad. She didn't need to know why he refused to come closer, even if that smile from earlier betrayed the notion that he wasn't resentful towards her. Still, it hurt her to know that he couldn't even manage to grin and bear when he didn't have to stomach the sight of her by himself—he had nine beautiful, amazing, thoughtful sisters to lean on, and even that wasn't enough for him.
She probably would've shed a tear had it not been for the merciful intervention of her father, who pushed himself through the mob of her sisters to get to her side.
"Alright ladies, we have to wrap it up for today," he said, his announcement earning a collective groan from his able-bodied daughters. "The McBrides need their car for the rest of the day, and they have to get to work pretty soon."
"C'mon, Pop-Star," Luna begged, clasping her hands together as if she were praying. "Just give us a couple more minutes to come together, yeah?"
Lynn chimed in next. "Yeah, what she said."
"Our reunion has yet to reach optimal levels of heartwarming satisfaction. You must prolong our visit until that occurs," Lisa insisted.
Lily pointed at Lori. "Oree!"
"'Fraid not, kiddos," Dad said. "Until your mother and I rent a car, this is the way it's gonna have to be. Now, let's get a move on."
Lori looked on as her sisters shuffled away one by one, waving goodbye to her as they headed towards the recovery room exit. Her father joined them, but not before his next words raked her bones with a chill bred from uncertainty.
"Oh, by the way," he told her as he turned around, "Lincoln has something he wants to say to you."
She struggled to keep her smile from falling, but she succumbed to the dread, anyway.
It didn't take long for Lincoln to find himself alone, his sisters and parents having left him behind as they made their way to the waiting room.
Everything had worked according to Mom and Dad's plan. The McBrides really were coming around to pick everyone up, but they wouldn't be coming as soon as Dad had let on to his sisters.
"I'll text you when it's time to go. Make your time count," Mom had told him before her departure.
He felt a twinge of guilt for cutting into everyone's time, but he pacified his consciousness with the reminder that he and his sisters could always come around tomorrow to visit Lori again.
And most importantly, Lori needed this. He needed this. And he had decided that, despite how his vindictive treatment of his sister demanded a great measure of penance, he'd pour out his soul without some mental script guiding him. If anything, it was his unfiltered, genuine feelings that were the most appropriate approach.
Getting to the bottom of her break-up with Bobby could wait for another day—Lori deserved nothing less than his atonement.
He was astonished that, even as he walked over to her, he could only feel little twines of nervous energy twisting through his gut instead of volcanic streams of panic bubbling through the veins of his brain as he struggled to keep his resolution afloat choppy waters.
Meditating on that feeling, however, failed to hold his interest like his current situation. Now, he found himself by Lori's bedside, his hands gripping on the railing as he leaned ever so slightly over it. Getting to this point without his heart combusting was a victory that he celebrated in his head, so much so that he only regarded her timid frown with passing concern.
At least, for a few seconds.
His smile evaporated when the depths of his sin slapped him across the face—to see someone as strong and resolute as Lori so browbeaten and jittery with just his up-close gaze shamed him deeply.
Hopefully, he had the words to change that.
"Uh...hey, Lori."
"H-hi, Lincoln."
The passing lull of silence was both a blessing and a curse—it made the fact of Lori's unwillingness to even try to reconnect with her brother painfully apparent, but it offered Lincoln the reins to ease the conversation where he needed it to go.
And he wasn't about to waste it, not even as he felt the mighty jaws of trepidation try to silence his tongue.
"Look, I just..." He reached forward and hugged her. "...I-I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry for everything I did to you."
He couldn't stop the words from tumbling out, not even as he felt his eyes stinging with tears and not even as Lori looked down on him with bewilderment in her widened eyes.
"I shouldn't have treated you like dirt because you messed up. I was so wrong to ignore you. I was so wrong to hate you. You've never done anything like that to me, and yet I acted as if you deserved it. You've been the...th-the..."
He couldn't contain himself—hot tears streaked down his face and dripped into Lori's garbs. "I-I'm so sorry th-that I made you feel so a-awful!"
There was so much more he wanted to say—like how having her away from home tore out a piece of his heart and how —but his choked sobs prevented them. It was fine by him, though. His tears could be all he needed to convey the words that failed him. Perhaps, she would find solace in the fact that he was honestly going out of his way to show her that she hadn't lost him, after all. It might be a long shot, but he'd bank his hopes on—
"You're wrong."
The flow of his tears ebbed, but the shock of Lori's brash statement opened up Lincoln's throat.
He sniffled and wiped his nose with his sleeve. "What?"
He asked in disbelief at what he heard and what he saw—not even his watery eyes could stop him from seeing just how stone-faced and lifeless Lori looked. Her eyes, brimmed with blank apathy, froze him to the core.
She continued with drab, muted tone as she gazed into her lap. "You don't have to apologize for anything. I screwed up, Lincoln. Not you. I deprived you of a good friend, I pushed you down, I acted smug when it looked like you go the short end of the stick when you had to stay home..."
Lincoln winced when a spike of doleful color slipped into her voice. "I even wrecked Vanzilla. Dad was passing it down to you, and I handled it irresponsibly. And he may be getting it fixed, but it doesn't change the fact that I ruined our family vacation."
She was shaking down, and Lincoln held onto her tighter to keep it at bay. The effort, unfortunately, proved to be in vain.
"You were right when you told me that I should've left the house that night. In fact, I should've left and never came back. Maybe then, none of you would have to suffer like this."
A breath hitched in Lincoln's throat as his heart crashed violently in his chest. He was too startled by her proclamation, spoken with such somber intensity, that he couldn't even begin to believe that the depths of her sadness had anything to do with him. He knew he messed up, but this badly? No...no, it couldn't be his fault.
But his fault or not, the poisonous weeds that had taken root in her head had to be hacked away. Now.
"Lori, I−"
His phone buzzed in his pocket, eliciting an impatient groan from him. He pulled it out, looked at the screen, and sighed. Mom had sent him a text.
"Our ride's here. We need to go, Lincoln."
But he didn't want to leave now. He wanted to hold Lori close to her and tell her that she meant the world to him. He wanted to smother her with hugs and kisses until she felt better. He wanted her to hold him in her arms and let him know that she took his words and tears to heart and that he was forgiven for being such a nasty beast.
But that would have to wait for tomorrow. It wouldn't be fair to make things for everyone else difficult. Still, that didn't mean that he had to leave her just yet.
Stuffing his phone away, he leaned in and gave her a quick peck on the cheek. "Lori, everyone loves you and misses you. There's way more to you than your mistakes, and it's because you're one of the best sisters anyone could ever have. Never forget that."
When he forced himself to move away, he couldn't help the sickening feeling that his words had fallen on deaf ears.
God, he hoped not.