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A Season In Purgatory
Chapter 13

Lucas felt a shadow move over him as he read for his physics class in the back of the Café. It had been a wasted effort in that his mind was too busy racing with the events of the day. Run ins with Dan always left Lucas discombobulated and confused. In the past, seeing or talking to his father felt like someone had a hold of his heart and was squeezing it, like a pressurized pain in his chest that made it hard to think or react to the man. But with basketball bringing them together more frequently, Lucas' discombobulation and hurt had turned to anger. It was a red-hot fury that burned with great intensity whenever the man was in the same room with him. Nathan had the same, if faded affect on Lucas. He was a pale imitation of the man that Lucas hated, so Nathan wasn't deserving of his intense hatred but rather a vague dislike.

And the idea that his mom was forcing him to associate with both Nathan and Dan made Lucas even angrier. The words on the page blurred in front of him as his hurt and confusion grew.

"You're going to get wrinkles if you keep scowling like that, handsome," Brooke murmured as she slid in the booth across from him. Lucas looked up in confusion, having been completely lost in his contemplations of hatred that he'd not heard anyone approach him. A smile quickly replaced his scowl and he was genuinely pleased to see someone for the first time that night.

"I can honestly say that I'm happy to see you," he said, emphasizing the "you" part as he looked around the room to see if Nathan and Dan had left yet. He couldn't help but feel territorial, seeing them all over his home away from home. Not to mention how he'd had to suffer through Nathan drooling over Haley all night and his mother coddling him through normal chores like washing dishes. He shook his head and refocused on Brooke. "I hope your day has been better than mine," he offered, taking her rumpled appearance.

She shrugged her shoulders in response to his words. "I'm just waiting for the end of the day, end of the week…" she said, her voice growing wistful at the idea of just getting the hell away from her so called family. Looking up, she noticed him staring at her in something akin to concern. "But on a happier note, how are you holding up?" she asked, motioning toward Dan. She watched as his shoulders tensed up and his frown returned.

"I'm grounded for a week for fighting during the game, and then another week for coming home Friday night after curfew. No television, no car, no cell," he bitterly replied, his voice and his visage showing the annoyance he clearly felt. "Oh and just for fun my mom decided to band together with Dan in order to get us kicked out of practice for two days, during which I get to work with Dan."

Brooke's eyes widened in surprise. "Wow. Your parents' speaking to each other is kind of shocking, but them working together is nothing short of…cataclysmic." She couldn't remember a time that her parents had even noticed she wasn't at home, let alone take the time to lecture or ground her for doing something 'wrong'. Brooke wasn't sure that her parents even knew what was right and what was wrong. God knows, they weren't the center of anyone's moral universe.

"Nice word," he muttered, his eyes still boring a hole in an oblivious Dan Scott. Even from across the room he could see the relaxed curve of his mother's shoulders. At least one of them was comfortable with the creep. Lucas just didn't understand where Karen's new found comfort level with Dan was coming from.

She tensed at his comment. "I'm not stupid, you know." It was a natural reaction after years of people assuming she was stupid because she was a cheerleader with a great body.

Lucas frowned, realizing by her tone that she was hurt. "No, I meant that it's just a really good word to describe the situation. I myself have been using 'fucked up'. So, I think your words wins," he explained, reaching over to grab her small hand. He gently rubbed it for a moment, realizing how small and soft it was. He felt himself relaxing for the first time that night.

Brooke practically glowed at the reaction the small gesture sent through her. "Well, I'm glad you like it. Besides, I told your mother that I was coming over here to ask you a homework question," she revealed, motioning toward his book. "Maybe we should make this look legit." He turned the textbook so that they could both look at it, smiling at her ability to maneuver around his mother.

She sneaked a look over at the counter and apprised the older couple that stood there chatting in what she could only describe as a conspiratorial manner. Something was definitely up with those two, but she didn't want to speculate as to what. "They must have been a really cute couple," she blurted out; nearly shocked she had voiced those words out loud.

Lucas looked over at Dan and Karen in shock. He'd never really considered them as anything other than adversaries, two people who couldn't translate dating into parenthood. Shaking his head, Lucas stared at Brooke. "I can't imagine them as a couple but I found this album a few months ago…" his voice trailed off.

She gave his hand an encouraging squeeze. "What album?" she gently asked, knowing that Lucas hated to talk about his family. She watched his deep blue eyes cloud over with doubt for a moment, as he stared back at her.

"It was like a collection of their dating years. All sorts of school pictures and pictures of them at various parties and family events," he told her, confusion dripping from his words. "I just never imagined them so…"

She picked up where he trailed off. "So young and in love?" He nodded at her, looking down at the shiny surface of the tabletop. "I don't see how you could love someone and then walk away from them as if they were dirt." Lucas didn't need anyone to tell him that they were in love. That much was obvious from the way the two looked at each other in all those pictures.

Brooke understood his pain so very well. "Yeah, I know the feeling," she admitted, not wanting him to see the embarrassment in her eyes. Gaining courage from the way he held her hand, she finally met his eyes. "Lucas, sometimes parents just suck. It's not a commentary on you as a person or as a child, but on them. Dan isn't horrible. He's been pretty good to me over the years, but his lack of contact with you isn't your fault, it's his."

Obviously choked up, Lucas slowly nodded at her words. "I tell myself that. But every time I see Dan with Nathan, it just reminds me that I wasn't good enough to be his son. And it doesn't stop me from thinking that I screwed up my mom's life just by being born." It was if Lucas had spent his entire life looking in from the outside at Dan and Nathan and their indifference hurt, especially in light of how deeply it effected him.

Brooke nodded silently, agreeing with both the pain of abandonment she heard in his voice and pain from knowing that your parents just didn't care. "I understand how you feel. I sometimes think my grandparents paid my mom to get pregnant, just so they'd have another generation to run the family empire," she said, realizing that she and Lucas had a lot of things in common. Sighing, she looked over and noticed Karen staring at her in an apprising manner. "I think your mom is getting a bit irate."

Lucas made a fake motion toward his physics book and muttered under his breath. "I'm surprise she could take a break from plotting with her friend to spare us a thought." He looked down at their intertwined hands and wanted to find words that could give them both comfort. "Well, I'm pretty much out of the social picture for the next few weeks," he paused, not sure how to phrase this. He shyly looked at her and smiled in a way that warmed her heart. "Do you think we could do something together when I'm ungrounded? You know, kind of like a real date?"

She smiled at him in return, a huge grin that made her dimples stand out even more. "Yeah, I'd really like that, Lucas. If we both survive the next few days, that is. Do you and Nathan have to work together tomorrow?"

Lucas closed his physics book with a bit more force than necessary. "Oh tomorrow is a special treat. I get to go to work at Dan's dealership, for that extra bit of torture for my punishment." He was still so mad at his mother that he couldn't think straight. He'd never felt such a deep anger toward her before and the strength of it nearly scared him. And the idea that he'd be at Dan's mercy for an entire evening was too much for Lucas to deal with. The man had no right to tell him what to do or order him around.

Brooke sat back in the booth, a bit stunned at that piece of information. "Wow. They really are thinking this madness through, aren't they? Well, I guess you and Nathan won't be taking swings at each other." In a way, she was relieved that the threat of no basketball might calm the two boys down. She was already worried about trying to date a guy that her best friend hated.

He thought about her words for a moment before answering. "Not unless the jerk totally gets in my face. And even then, I'm not sure that hitting him is worth having to put up with Dan."

Sighing, he realized that it was finally late enough that he could attempt to weasel out of this nightmare and go home. He looked over at her in confusion. "Did you come here to see me?" Not that he wanted to question why she was with him, but Brooke wasn't exactly a Café kind of girl.

She avoided his eyes for a moment before answering. "Actually, I called around and found out that Nathan was here. I needed a place to crash tonight and his guest room is my home away from home," she lightly commented, hoping that he wasn't incensed by the mention of his half brother's name. She and Nathan had been friends for years and Lucas had to learn to deal with that.

Lucas looked confused. "Why do you need a place to crash?" The panicked look in her eyes confirmed his fears that something was definitely wrong at her house, but he couldn't read the specifics just yet.

Brooke looked away, not wanting Lucas to know just how screwed up her life was. If her own dad didn't want to spend time with her, what made her think a guy like Lucas would want her if knew all the dirt about her life. "Uhm, things are just kind of bad right now, what with the new step father and all. Some days it's just easier to not go home than to go home and face that kind of pain," she admitted, looking up and finding nothing but compassion in his eyes.

Lucas subtly nodded toward where his mother still stood with Dan. "Yeah I know the feeling. I'd do just about anything to get out of going home and having to listen to her rationalize what she's done to me."

They sat in a comfortable silence for a moment before he looked at her. "So are you going to crash with Nathan?" She gave a weak shake of her heard, dismissing the idea. "Seems like Dan Scott has finally decided to enforce a grounding for once in his life," she revealed, still shocked that Dan was sticking to it. "I guess I'll just hang out in my car until tomorrow morning."

Lucas moved his book from the table and slid it into his backpack. Her words suddenly caused him to look back up at her. "Stay in your car? You can't be seriously thinking about sleeping in your car, Brooke?"

She shrugged her shoulders and tried to play off his concern. "I've done worse before, Lucas. I had a fight with Peyton and I can't stay there. Nathan's off the list now and that means none of my regular spots are free tonight," she blithely replied, not wanting him to think she was freaky. She caught the concern in his eyes and placed a hand on his shoulder to reassure him. "Lucas, I can sleep in my car for a night. I've done it a couple of times before when my parents were fighting all night long. I just drive around until I find a clean parking lot in a brightly lit area." All she needed to do was put her back seat down and curl up under a few blankets. The blankets not only blocked out the light but they made it hard to tell that anyone was sleeping in the car, as well.

Lucas shook his head in disagreement. "No, you are not sleeping in a parking lot where any homeless person could snatch you." He glanced around and found his mother still totally distracted by Dan. He turned back to her. "You'll stay with me tonight. Just wait until 11pm and softly walk across the side porch to my door. I'll leave the door unlocked and you can slip in after my mom's asleep."

Brooke wasn't one to make public displays of affection, but she threw her arms around Lucas and gave him an intense hug. "Thank you for caring enough that I have a safe place to sleep, Luke." She hated being so needy, but at the same time she didn't have a lot of options available. Something was building at home and she didn't want to be there when it all exploded.

Nathan peeked around the corner and watched as his best friend put her arms around his estranged half brother. "I can't believe she's…. hugging him," he snarked, his brows growing closer together in consternation. Haley peered around Nathan and watched as Lucas slowly reached over and brushed his hand against her check. She leaned back against the kitchen wall and shook her head in disbelief. "Lucas is never touchy feely like that. I mean, in the entire 9 years we've been best friends I have never seen him act so goofy."

Nathan took in the bright smile on Brooke's face. "Brooke's never that happy. I mean, she doesn't smile that much when she's cheering." He knew she was having a hard time lately, what with her parents getting remarried, but he hated to see her repeat old patterns of behavior. She'd started drinking regularly after her mom got remarried. In fact, Nathan was hard pressed to remember a party that Brooke hadn't been drinking or flat out wasted. It seemed that the more distant she grew from her parents, the more guys she slept with. He just didn't want his friend to get hurt by a loser like Lucas.

Picking up a pitcher of Coke, he shoved it at Haley. "Go get them drinks. Do something to break this up before something bad happens to Brooke," he urged her, desperate to find any way to get Brooke alone. He knew she had to be upset if she was looking for a place to spend the night. Maybe he could pull Dan aside and ask him to reconsider letting her stay the night.

Haley seemed taken aback by his meaning. "Before he hurts Brooke? What about before Brooke decimates his heart?" she asked, not happy that Nathan always painted Lucas out to be the bad guy. Haley pointed through the order window. "They're leaving. Get out there and stop her from leaving with him."

They pushed through the kitchen door and interrupted Dan and Karen who were still deep in conversation. Haley noticed that Lucas had already opened the Café's main door for Brooke, while Karen was oblivious to his attempts to leave. Haley took a deep breath and called out to him. "Lucas, are you leaving?"

Karen looked up immediately, making eye contact with her escaping son. "Lucas, I wasn't aware that you could come and go as you pleased," she noted, stepping back into her authoritarian role. He paused, still holding the door open for Brooke, who hesitated at the tone of Karen's voice. Her own mother, while shrill, could not match the sheer smack down tone that Karen was copping at that moment.

Lucas rolled his eyes toward Brooke, before letting the door close and stalking back toward his mother. "Not that it rivals torturing me with their presence, but I have a physics test tomorrow and if I don't go study, it's a fairly good bet that I'm going to fail it." Getting less than an A, failing. It was all relative and his mom didn't need to know that he'd already studied enough to pass the test.

Karen's eyes narrowed at his tone and his choice of words. "If you have a test, where's your syllabus?" she questioned, sticking her hand out for proof of his test date. Lucas brusquely shouldered his way past Dan and dropped his backpack on the counter with a thud, riffling through a folder until he found his class outline. "This good enough or do you need to call Ms. Harris and ask her if I forged the syllabus?"

Dan frowned at the boy's insolent tone but refrained from saying anything to Lucas about respecting his mother. He'd used that line earlier in the day and it hadn't gone over well. And while he and Karen were working together, she'd not given him any kind of signal that he should correct the boy's behavior.

Karen gave the document a quick once over, noting that there was in fact a test scheduled for the next day. "This is good enough for now. But next time I expect you to tell me you have homework at the beginning of a shift and ask for permission before you leave," she reminded him, restating rules that had been in place for as long as either of them could remember. Karen had structured every day of his life with rules, which was the only way she could get anything done as a single mother with a demanding business. Other parents might let their kids run wild, but Karen expected to know where Lucas was and what he was doing.

Lucas shoved the class outline back into his backpack and muttered under his breath. "Whatever. I'm going home to study some more."

Nathan looked at Brooke for a second but couldn't resist. "Brooke, I didn't know you were in physics. Isn't that kind of an advanced class for someone who hasn't had chemistry yet?" He had an innocent tone to his voice, but her eyes narrowed at such a blatant attempt to get Lucas into trouble for spending some of the night talking to her.

"What can I say, I'm a science girl," she sweetly replied to Dan and Karen, her tone not revealing her anger at Nathan's intrusion. She was still incredibly mad at him for blowing her off at lunch to spend time with tutor-girl. And she'd managed not to lie either. Karen looked at Dan with a knowing glint in her eyes. Brooke was more than likely a girl who excelled at biology, but Karen wasn't entirely sure about her academic skills.

Lucas shook his head in disgust. "Please, this coming from someone who made cow eyes at Haley all night," Lucas declared, finally having lost his temper. "You get to spend this experimentation in horror flirting with Haley and I have to spend all day tomorrow trapped with him," Lucas said, gesturing at Dan. "Can someone tell me how this is even remotely fair?"

Dan visibly flinched at his oldest son's words, while Nathan avoided Haley's attempts to pull him away from Lucas. "Well, I think you spent enough time flirting with Brooke Friday night. Oh, I meant when you weren't stealing a bottle of dad's most expensive scotch to get drunk, that is." Karen's eyes narrowed at Nathan's words, putting pieces of the puzzle together. "Well, at least I know why you came home four hours late from curfew," she offered, completely upset that her son was out late drinking. She knew that on some level she should be happy that he'd waited to sober up before driving home, but even that small thought was of little consolation.

Lucas crossed his arms and stared at Dan and Karen with a near rebellious look on his face. "Don't tell me, I'm grounded another week?"

Karen nodded at his words. "And if you keep up that tone, you'll not have a social life until you can legally drink," she added, staring pointedly at Brooke. While Karen understood his anger, she couldn't understand his sudden disregard for her long standing rules.

Dan watched as Lucas lowered his eyes, effectively ending a stand off with his mother. He tried not to think about the how much Luke's foraging had cost him, knowing how much that one case of scotch had set him back. Sighing, Dan realized that he could take some parenting tips from Karen. While Nate barely obeyed Dan's grounding, Lucas looked like he genuinely feared his mother's use of that particular punishment.

Lucas rolled his eyes at his mom's near hysterics. "I wasn't drunk, but you were having sex with Haley," he accused Nathan, hoping to obscure that night by bringing his friend into the situation.

Haley's eyes widened in shock, as half the people in the restaurant turned around to look at her like she was some kind of scarlet woman. "I was NOT having sex with him," she assured everyone in the room, not really sure why Lucas was so intent on humiliating her in public. "We were just going to his room so he could show me something," she explained, not certain why she felt the need to clarify her sex life to the entire room of customers.

Brooke stepped in between the two friends and shoved Haley's accusing finger out of the way. "Don't you have a slide rule to shove someplace, tutor girl?" She wasn't overly fond of Nate's new friend to begin with, but seeing her jump all over Lucas was too much for Brooke to take.

Lucas and Brooke gave each other a knowing smile at her words. "Oh yeah, Hales. I wonder what the guy wanted to show you in his bedroom," Lucas snarked, pleased to see that they'd finally gotten a reaction out of Dan.

"Nathan the rule is that you can't have parties at the beach house with alcohol. And you are supposed to keep everyone downstairs and away from the bedrooms. I can't believe you would let things get that out of control," Dan exclaimed, not pleased with all the liabilities he was now responsible for.

At the rate that insults were flying around the room, Dan decided to take a page out of Karen's rulebook, rather than let Nathan off the hook. "Nathan, you can consider yourself grounded another week. And there will be no more parties at the beach house for a very long time," he added, watching as Nathan scowled at Lucas in response. The two had effectively managed to rat each other out to no avail.

Nathan attempted to sputter out a response but Karen stepped into the middle of the group. "Lucas, go home and we'll discuss this situation after your test. Haley, go in back and fix two dinner specials to go. Nathan, thanks for your effort tonight, but your father is ready to take you home," she said, taking the apron he readily pulled off. She finally turned toward Brooke. "Brooke, it was nice to meet you. Don't get my son drunk again." Of course it was the girl that got her little boy drunk. That's the only way Karen could work her mind around the idea of Lucas drinking. She shooed everyone away before they could start snipping again.

Waiting for the crowd to disperse, Karen leaned back against the counter and looked at Dan with a hint of amusement in her eyes. "We should sell tickets to this and call it dinner theater," she observed, hearing him laugh even as she watched her son make his way across the street with that girl. "What's her story anyway?"

Dan sobered up a moment, considering Brooke and Luke's retreating figures. "She's Katherine Brooks' kid, you know from high school?" he prompted, getting lost in the tangle of married names that accompanied getting older.

Karen's eyes grew softer, instantly feeling sorry for any child born to that woman. "I'm surprised that her ovaries didn't shrivel up along with her heart from years of neglect," Karen retorted, not caring in the least that she was being bitchy. She and Katherine had never gotten along when they were in school. The girl had been a total snob and a complete bitch from day one. The Brooks' family was one of the most powerful families Tree Hill had ever seen and Katherine didn't hesitate to throw that fact in everyone's face.

Nodding, Dan had little use for the woman himself. The fact that as teens she'd often tried to lure him away from Karen hadn't helped matters. Katherine was a big fish in the small pond of Tree Hill and Dan had possessed the only ego large enough to match hers. She'd eventually gone away to some fancy school in South Carolina, where she'd ultimately met Brooke's father. The town of Tree Hill was relieved until they'd moved back to town in order to run their family's' mill businesses.

"Brookes been one of Nate's friends for years," he commented, not really sure what Karen wanted to know. He'd surreptitiously watched her and Lucas during the time they were together and he knew that there was a lot more than studying going on. He wasn't much of a matchmaker, but he could easily see that Nate was going after Lucas' best friend while Lucas was apparently going after Nathan's. Things were definitely getting messy. "She's a nice enough girl, but she's never gotten any attention at home. Deb used to say. . ." his words trailed off, as he looked uncertainly at Karen.

She reached over and gently touched his shoulder. "Dan, you were married to her for 8 years. I don't expect you not to mention her name or act like she never existed," she gently informed him, knowing that they were both having to adjust to this new relationship.

Dan's eyes remained down, suddenly finding the worn hard wood floors fascinating. He cleared his throat, trying to get back to the subject. "Well, she used to notice that while Brooke was immaculately dressed, that no one ever seemed to know where she was or if she was okay. We used to feed her all the time, just because it looked like she never got regular meals at home," he explained.

Shaking her head, Karen realized that some people just weren't cut out to be parents. "But as long as she had on expensive clothes and looked cute, that was where Katherine's job as a mother ended?" She'd always been furious at parents who dropped their kids off at the playground or the library without a second thought for their safety. She'd seen enough of that over the years to be sick of it.

"I think she had a nanny at one point, but with the parents not caring about her, I don't think the nanny really cared either. Eventually, she just started hanging out around the house more often, and even now she tends to crash there a couple of times a month. Nathan mentioned that before the divorce, her mom and dad were pretty violent. I think she just needed a quiet place to stay."

Considering his words, Karen frowned in concern. "Maybe that's why she asked Nathan if she could stay the night?"

Dan shrugged his shoulders. "We were at the country club last night and I thought I heard her step father mention a trip they were going on this week. Maybe she's just lonely," he speculated. "Either way, it's usually not a problem since we've got enough guest rooms and she's fairly quiet. I guess I'm not used to this boy/girl best friend thing." He was also feeling a bit guilty about denying her a place to stay if she had no one else at home. Dan hated being a parent at times, with all those rules and parental things he was no good at.

The sound of laughter floated out from the kitchen, causing the parents to turn toward the kitchen. "Oh things are so going to get bad," Karen expressed, realizing that Lucas was going to do everything he could to prevent Haley from seeing Nathan. And Haley seemed completely unaware that Nathan had a huge crush on her. She moved to pick up the take out order that Haley had placed in the order window and turned to hand it to Dan.

"What's this?" he questioned, trying to identify the various smells that were rising from the containers. All night he'd fought the urge to ask Karen for something to eat, not wanting to push her hospitality more than he already had. But he fondly recalled all the dinners she'd made for him when he was a kid and he couldn't help but miss real food. More often than not he picked up food from various take out places, as his attempts at cooking tended to be failures.

Karen felt nervous for some reason. "It's dinner. Though I have to wonder what you've been feeding Nate," she conversationally asked as she tucked various condiments and napkins into the bag for him.

"Um, food?" he replied, not sure what she was asking.

"Well, a customer asked him for another serving of broccoli and I found him at the stove, staring at all the green stuff, attempting to figure out what the vegetables were. Please tell me you aren't buying those frozen lasagnas at the store and calling it dinner?" she admonished, knowing that was all he'd ever attempted to cook when they were young. She took his silence as a guilty verdict. "Dan, those things are horrible. And your son can't identify common vegetables."

She made a rash decision, but one that she felt comfortable with. "I want you to start bringing Nathan here once a week for dinner. We tend to eat what's left over from the day's specials and that way Nathan won't have to resort to eating pop tarts for dinner."

Dan smiled at her gracious offer; warmed by the kindness she could offer him after years of his callous behavior and indifference. "Karen, we'd love to do that, but Lucas is bound to get upset," he rationalized, knowing that the boy had good reasons for not wanting to be around him.

"We want them to interact, Dan. And what better way than to eat meals together? I know Lucas is going to be upset, but I think that with time, he'll get used to your presence in his life and move on. He just needs to get some regular exposure to you and Nathan."

Dan nodded in agreement, but silently worried about Lucas in general. He'd be lucky if they could manage sharing a meal together without either a food fight breaking out or food being poisoned. Then he recalled Karen's words from early that day. "Tiny steps."

That's all they could for now.

Thanks for reading!