Author's Note (Peak): It looks like my anxiety over the story was for nothing. But who knows, maybe this chapter will change opinions.
On with the show, bruv!
"Care to say that again, Lincoln?" Lynn leaned in her wheelchair.
Lincoln sat on the living room couch, alone, waiting for his family to come back for more just to give him the excuse.
With frustration drenching his voice, "Go away, Lynn. I'm not in the mood." It didn't feel good to say what he did, and he would be the first to admit it. But God had he been wanting to say it for weeks.
With metric emphasis on each word, she said lowly, "Dude. Do you understand what you just fucking said to your little sister?"
Nonchalantly, Lincoln said, "Yep."
Lynn balled her fists. Her nails dug so deeply into her palm that she felt them grow wet.
"So why did you say it?"
"Cause I wanted to."
Lynn's face curled in disgust. Whatever answer she expected, this was the antithesis of it. Hearing it out of her own brother's mouth was almost too surreal to accept. "Is this some kind of sick joke, Linc? Do you actually hate us? Did we mess you up that badly that this is how you get your kicks now?"
"Hahaha, get it? 'Cause Lynn said kicks! Like you do a ball." Lincoln shifted his body on the couch, slouching deeper. "Who knows, maybe I'm still angry. But whatever, time to get over it, I guess." He sat up and said, "You know, whenever she gets mad at me, Lucy likes telling me something." Making his voice monotonic and gravely, he mocked, "I have no brother." He set his feet on the armrest. "You know what I say to that? Same to you. I have no sister named Lucy."
"You take that back!" Lynn screeched her wheelchair in front of Lincoln.
"Or what? OR WHAT?"
Lynn's veins danced on her forehead. She gritted her teeth. The brittle threads of this house were being unraveled once again, and she knew it. But her big sister instincts were riled. She couldn't let this go.
"Don't you remember what I said? Do I need to remind you? I said quite clearly that if you didn't mean to say something, you shouldn't have said it. I said that to YOU, because YOU said you wished I had never been born! Did you just forget that or what?"
And there it was. If she wasn't convinced before, Lynn knew at this moment this all had to be a joke.
"You just said you didn't mean you actually wanted me to break my legs. So what is it? Do you say what you mean or not?"
Lincoln smacked his lips and went, "Look, it's just like Ninja Jack would say—" Lynn cringed at the boy invoking one of his comic book characters, "—You've got to say what you mean and mean what you say. And what I mean is that I'm not in the mood to deal with Lucy. I thought about it a lot and the more I thought, the more I realized I couldn't let it go. Not that easily."
"Then you should'a stopped thinking!"
Lincoln's eyes narrowed. "Oh, so I'd forgive you guys unconditionally, is that it? And then everything would go back to normal and we'd never talk about this again. And maybe you'd kick me out again. Or force me to date a bunch of girls again Or holy heck, maybe you'd screw me out of my dreams. Hmph." Angrier, with his eyes thin and focused off of Lynn, he said, "Maybe I shouldn't have come back. Maybe I should run away again. And stay away." He stood up, only to be pushed back to his seat.
With venom in her teeth, Lynn said, "Lincoln... take it back now. I won't hold it against you, and we can just forget you said anything. I won't even make you apologize to her. Just take it back." She spoke as if beating a bat in her palm.
His eyes closed, he shook his head and said, "Nope."
She beat at the armrests of her chair. "Dang it, Linc, you can't keep being vindictive like this. You can't feel this way!"
"Don't you tell me how to feel! Besides, you started this whole mess!"
"Yeah, well I have half a mind to end it!"
Lincoln looked right at her, slack-jawed and eyes thinning. She made his choice for him.
"Is that right...?" He licked his lips and lowered his voice to a tone no one in the house had ever heard before. He almost sounded like a man. "So... what're you gonna do then, huh? Go on, do it. Go ahead, swing the bat. Win your new prize."
Lynn blinked away a tear and turned away. Was this how she was going to spend her prized and fabled 'second chance?' "No. No, I... Lincoln, I care about you. I know I did you wrong. I'm not going to do you wrong again. Look, if you really can't forgive Lucy, that's on you. I get that it was wrong for me, for us to make fun of you for something Lucy should've fessed up to, but... But look at what you've just done! You just cursed out your own sister, talking nonsense about her deserving to be ignored! Imagine if someone told you you deserved to be beaten down by us. Can't you see what you're saying?" She grabbed his shirt and shook him. "Lincoln, please, th-this isn't right! This isn't how it was supposed to go. It's against the rules! You were supposed to hate ME. Not her. She didn't do anything wrong." Her voice started warbling as she wept. "Don't hate her, please. This has gone on long enough, you dummy. I'm the one who's supposed to lose… Hate me instead…"
His face cold and dazed, Lincoln set his arm around her and pulled her in.
"Lynn, you got it wrong. I don't hate anybody who lives in this house."
"Alright! Alright. Linc?" Lynn Sr. came downstairs. "You made your choice. We're just gonna have to respect it."
"Don't worry, we've grounded Lucy for the entire summer. We'll take you to whatever convention you want."
"No."
"Hmm?"
He shook his head and, after a beat, said, "No, sorry, that's not what I wanted. No, no, no, I think I got a better idea."
"Wha— Lincoln, what are you saying?"
With Lynn a sniffling wreck right beside him and knowing it was going to be the ultimate stake through her heart, he pressed his combined hands against his chin and furrowed his brow. "Let's just say I wanna see what you do right here, right now." Again there was a flash of black in the corner of his eyes.
With genuine horror in her voice, Rita asked, "W-what do you mean?"
The Man with the Plan pulled himself back and said, "Simple. It's either me or her." He bobbed his head towards Lucy, standing in the stairwell.
It took a few minutes for the request to process in their heads.
"L-Lincoln, p-please, I-I don't want to be kic—"
"You're not involved anymore, Lucy."
"Uh, dude? You're literally asking us to disown an 8-year-old girl. I'd say she's pretty involved," said Lori.
Rita added, "I know you're upset, Lincoln. We all are. But I could never kick out one of my babies."
Lynn Sr with the saddest eyes said, "Sorry, champ. But we hafta draw the line there. It's not right to kick one of your own kids out of your home if they've done nothing to deserve it."
Lincoln's eye twitched. He slowly stood.
"Oh ho ho!" shouted Lincoln so loud that Mr. Grouse banged his head on a cabinet under which he was cleaning. He twirled around. "Oh wow! WOOOOOW. What a swing and a miss, eh Lynn? Well maybe your family shouldn't have kicked their only son out of the house over "bad luck" so lightly either." When he saw Lynn Sr's forlorn and defeated expression, he sat back down. His eyes still fixed on the other Lynn, who had stopped sobbing and looked at him through a part in her hair with the most shrunken eyes he'd ever seen on her face. "So what's it gonna be then, eh? Are ya gonna kick me out again and prove that you never wanted me in the first place because I'm so replaceable by one of my precious, perfect sisters?"
"Is that what this is all about?" asked Lynn Sr under his breath. "Lincoln, don't be like this. We're sorry we did it to you, but…"
Lucy threw herself onto the floor, kowtowing before her brother. "Please!" Desperate and panicked, she said again, "Please! Forgive me, Lincoln! I didn't—"
"So you can let me down again? So I can take the fall for your failings some more? Why should I trust you? Give me a good reason." He turned back to the TV only to immediately snap back towards her and angrily add, "And no, 'Because I wuv you, Linky' isn't a good reason."
She balled her hands, tearing at the rug.
From the stairwell came, "But what have we done to prove we're any better than her?" Luan had an uncharacteristically bitter tone. "We let you down too. We betrayed you too..."
"Yeah, well, I'm giving you guys a second chance, and that's that. I'm done playing the nice kid everyone walks all over, and I made my choice." He stood up. "I get it. You don't understand why I feel the way I because this whole family's got problems communicating. But I'm not disowning everyone." He looked at the pathetic mess on the floor before him. "Just Lucy." And then back to the rest. "Not unless you mess up again. And don't go messing up on purpose either. I'll be watching you."
"Winky..." whined Lily. Her own chubby fist balled as she looked at her brother in burgeoning disgust.
As he walked towards the stairs, he said, "I swear I didn't want to be so angry. I knew you'd all react pretty badly, because I guess it is pretty ridiculous. But I'm sick and tired of playing the nice kid. Look where that got me."
Luna sat next to Luan.
"Get out of my way, Luna."
"Sorry, bro. I'm just... confused by why you drew the line at taking the fall for clogging the toilet. We've all done dumb stuff to you. Worse stuff than that. Even me!"
He leaned against the banister, rolled his eyes, and said, "Okay, Looney Tunes. Imagine this: you just stuck your neck out for Luan here in a way that completely inconvenienced you and lost you something you really wanted for years, and then she paid you back by turning her back on you. And not in some small way either, but in a way that genuinely makes you wonder if she even loved you, if she ever loved you."
Luan didn't appreciate being used as an example, but her sad-eyed gloominess overpowered any attempt to defend herself. Luna looked down sadly. Beguiling complacency protected these clowns from reality for too long.
"I guess that since you never experienced such a thing, you wouldn't understand. I forgive you for not understanding. But I've made a choice." He looked back towards the living room. "As for Lucy? I'm sorry. I'm sorry that she turned out this way. But I'm not going to accept responsibility for her actions ever again. Right now, I'm so disappointed with her that I don't even want to live in the same house as her. Maybe that is overkill, but you guys said you'd respect my decision, no matter what it was." He sighed. "Well? That's my decision."
He turned his whole body.
"So... you remember what you told me, Luce? Admittedly after I screwed up? Right back at you: you're not my sister anymore."
The parents gasped and Rita fell into her husband's arms.
Lucy looked up to meet his gaze. So did Lynn.
He passed his finger over the entire family, at least all members that were downstairs. "From now on, I only have 9 sisters, plus one odd girl I share a last name with. Don't even bother asking if that's gonna change."
He turned, Luna and Luan giving him enough space to pass them by, and stormed back to his room. Lola, Lana, and Lisa stood by the corner and watched him explode on through, rattled and too stunned to offer their own opinion. They simply watched him go. Lola in particular backed against the wall, her eye twitching. Some devil on her shoulder wanted to lay down the law— you mess with one Loud, you messed with them all.
She didn't even need the angel to know why that wasn't going to work. Not this time. Her own eyes shrunk and she looked to the floor as she morosely walked to her room.
Lana snapped back to reality and said, "L-lola, somethin' buggin' you?" The dumbest question in years.
A good hour passed before Lynn Sr and Rita stood in his door. He knew it was them, and said, "Keep her around if you want. I don't really care either way. She's not my sister, so..."
Morosely, Lynn Sr made an attempt at being cheerful. "Lincoln, kiddo, that's silly. Of course she's your sister!"
"Maybe she was. But not anymore." He rolled over in his bed. "I'm not mad at her. Just profoundly disappointed."
"I dunno, you sounded pretty mad."
Lincoln pulled the covers over his head.
"Over Princess Pony?" exasperatedly asked Lynn Sr. "If we knew you'd feel this strongly about it, we'd—" He stopped. "Lincoln, champ, are you really mad at her?"
No response.
"Lincoln…are you mad at us?"
No response.
Lincoln sighed and pulled the covers further over himself.
Rita spoke up, "We swear we don't want to kick out any of our children. We learned our lesson. It was wrong to do to you, but it's also wrong to do to them."
"Then don't! Like I said, I don't care. I just wanted to see if you'd actually do it."
"Oh. Oh! Phew, well that's a relief—"
"And I guess you decided I wasn't as important. Makes me wonder if it was a mistake coming back here after all."
Gulp.
It was that cold shockwave of surreality that threatened to blast the house off its foundation. Where reality failed to penetrate, vindictiveness nearly destroyed. Whether the house would succumb to the pressures proved a titanic struggle upon the shoulders of two people who hadn't the strength to rise to the challenge, and yet the challenge could not be ignored lest they suffer the final and most complete collapse yet.
On through the night, a weepy Lynn Sr. discussed this sudden and deeply unwelcome development with a weepy Rita.
Lincoln sat outside their bedroom door. He'd been hearing banging for hours and when he investigated, it turned out to be Lynn Jr. banging her head against the wall, cursing at herself, repeating, 'Why was I so stupid?' and variants of which. At some point the banging annoyed him too much and he went downstairs for some quietness, only to hear such morosely stated sentences like, "He could run away again if we don't give him what we want." Another good one came from his mom: "He feels really strongly about this, and with feelings so raw, anything Lucy does could set him off again."
To which his dad's response was, "I know, honey. I don't want it to be this way anymore than you do." That sigh he dropped was pretty heavy. "Maybe it's for the best that we… temporarily split the family up."
"Dad, wait," were the first words from a puffy-eyed Lori. She ran into the room and said, "Look, Lincoln literally just needs to chill out, calm down, and think this through. I swear that Lincoln will get over this sooner or later."
Firmly, his dad said, "Sooner or later isn't now, Lori."
Is Dad actually being assertive? And against Lori of all my sisters? This really is a dream.
"I think it goes without saying that there's definitely too much tension in the house at the moment."
"B-buh, but where would we even send Lucy?" This next part brought up a good point Lincoln hadn't considered, and the prospect of it made him second guess himself if only for a moment: "The whole freaking town hates us for what we did to Lincoln!"
Just send her to Aunt Ruth. Oh, I'm sure Lynn'll have a good time having a room all to herself.
"Her spooky little friend doesn't want anything to do with her. Who knows if Aunt Ruth or Uncle Rick would take her."
Oh, right. The extended family ignores you guys now. Dang it.
Well… I don't actually want Lucy to suffer. Just get Pop-Pop to take her, if he's not still angry. He was the first one to stand up for you guys when everyone else was going too far, and that worked out. At least he's always there for us when we need him, a-and he's a soldier too. He could teach Lucy to respect trust. He's got it in him. Guys, I'm sure I'm not going to stay upset with Lucy forever. And you said it yourselves. I need my space. So just give it to me, just this once.
"Well... we aren't sure. Though I do have some ideas. If push comes to shove…" Another sigh. Lincoln considered getting up and giving the dense and ever-goofy goobers the suggestion.
Until Rita said, "If only my dad could take her."
Lori went, "Pop-Pop… Mom, that's it! Until this all blows over and the two kids can calm down—"
Lynn Sr failed the family again. "No can do, sugar bear."
"What, but why?"
"Albert expressly told me that if I was going to send my kids away, he wouldn't take any except Lily. Not unless the kids have been forgiven by Lincoln.. And, well…. the only one that doesn't apply to is the one we're in a pickle with."
Defeatedly, Lori said, "Oh…"
Yowch. Sorry, Luce. Guess I tried about as much as you did.
Lincoln's dad huffed and said, "I didn't want it to come to this, but maybe that old cooking buddy of mine can step up after all."
I swear I can hear Lori's eyes boggle.
"Oh crap. No. W-we can't send Lucy to live with Billy Bierpong!"
Who is Billy Bierpong? And why is he so bad?
Rita said to her husband, "Every kid he raised turned out bad. He wouldn't be good for Lucy at all!"
"Dang it, we don't have a choice, you two. Our hands are tied. It's either Lincoln or Lucy. And with Lincoln so upset, we can't afford to waste any time."
As Lincoln sat on the couch in silence, he awaited the line. Go on. Say it, Lori. Say it loud, I know you will.
He didn't get his satisfaction. "I mean…. I don't want to throw Lincoln out... Again." Slap! Her face? She slapped her face into her hands. "Oh man… Why is this happening? I-I can't send away my own baby sister because of something we were literally all responsible for." There was a pause. Maybe she was waiting for them to say something. Maybe she was waiting for him to pop out of the shadows and declare it was all a late April Fools. "Lincoln doesn't seem to be listening. We were really at fault for this. It wasn't Lucy's fault that we're bullies!"
And then something strange happened that Lincoln always wished would happen, though admittedly under better circumstances: his parents sided with him.
"I'm sorry, Lori. Maybe it's your fault for not respecting each other. Maybe it's our fault for not reigning our kids in. Maybe it's all our fault for… a-abusing our son. But Lucy is still the one who failed Lincoln. If he feels strongly about this, we can't change his mind. We have to support him."
Regretfully came, "Your dad is right, sweety."
"B-but…"
"And furthermore, Lincoln has an ally in the case of if he wants to get the police involved: Mr. Grouse, who has a few good reasons to let this family fall apart. And if we went directly into the foster system, there'd definitely be an investigation into what happened. Lincoln doesn't actually want this family split apart anymore than we do."
"Yeah, I know…" She sniffled and backed against the door. "I guess some small part of me wants to ask 'Why not just kick Lincoln out instead,'" and as soon as she said it, Lincoln pumped his fist.
Toldja. I knew she felt that way.
"But that's not fair on him."
No, don't ruin it, Lori! Own it. Take it back. Say that you don't want me! Give me the excuse.
"We can't let Lincoln down again. Not after all that's happened."
Well great. Now I can't hate Lori. Curse you, Queen of No. Guess Lucy's moving out after all.
All this vindictiveness was making him tired.
"But... even if I DID feel that way, Lincoln's not making any of this easy. Our only options are to kick out my baby sister or go to jail and get the family split up anyway."
Oh come on, sis! Don't put it that way. You make it sound like you have no choice.
Lori began saying something, but then started crying. Lincoln leaned in closer, his brow furrowed in concern. He hated hearing Lori cry.
"Oh, Lori, what's wrong?" asked Rita, the second dumbest question in years.
"I-I was g-going to s-say that's such an evil thing to do: kick out your own little sibling from your own house. But... that's exactly what we did! And worse, it wasn't even for a good reason…" Lori slipped to her knees, letting her mascara run across her face. "I hate that Lincoln wants to get rid of Lucy, because he should be getting rid of me! I'm the one who failed him! I was supposed to be his guardian, and I…. I blew it…"
I mean…. I….
Lincoln really hated hearing Lori cry. For all her faults, she wasn't actually that mean. It was the stresses of running this house without help from their wacky laissez-faire parents that really caused all these issues. He remembered that time he tried running the house. The place fell apart in minutes.
He said as much to her. He wished he was stronger and had the power to change this house. How long had he talked about his angsts and anxieties of his homelife? How long had she listened?
"Were we lying? About not forgiving us…"
"Lincoln certainly thinks so now." Beat. "I screwed up. I didn't mean to make him think we were manipulating him. I wasn't thinking when I asked him… I guess…. I guess the only way to make it up to him is…"
Silence.
"Fine… You have my vote as well." She struggled to breathe through her sobs.
He looked over the couch and saw his dad comforting his eldest daughter. Somehow they hadn't noticed him even by that point, so he decided to try his best to sneak back upstairs. All this going up and down, up and down the stairs— his legs hurt!
After a while, she calmed down, and said, "I can't say the others are going to like this…"
"Well how do you think Lucy's going to feel?"
"Dad, she's inconsolable. She already thinks Lincoln hates her. You heard what he said to her, right? It's almost like he actually does."
Eh. Hate is a strong word. Would be something if Lynn thought so, though. Heh.
"But that's not my point."
"Really, kiddo? What is it then?"
Lincoln also leaned in over the banister, cupping his ear to hear this supposed point.
With an extra sniffle, said, "What I'm getting at is that this sets a precedent to the other girls. If we can get rid of Lucy, we can get rid of literally anyone…"
And Lincoln grinned.
Author's Note (Trough): Remember when I said this story is all about dropping a bleedin' A-bomb on Lucy? I lied. Dropped a bleedin' H-bomb on the poor girl. But stories that are essentially a series of unfortunate events (including A Series of Unfortunate Events) are like crack. I said from the outset things were going to be awful for the girl, and I wasn't lying. But don't fret, things will get worse.
Anyway, this is chapter four. As I promised, I'd make my decision about whether this would be short or a long haul by now. That was a short deliberation: we're in it for the long haul, my friends!
Chapter title comes from Alice in Chains' song "A Little Bitter." Actually, Alice in Chains is also responsible for "Rotten Apple" and, to an extent, "A Life in Decline." Rotten Apple's self-evident, but when I was in my teenage baby bat years and getting really into the band, I could have sworn one of the lyrics in "Heaven Beside You" was "a life in decline" (it wasn't even close, what the hell have I?) A decade later, voila.
As a pure aside, I'd love to read a NSL fanfic where Lincoln tries to get revenge on his family… and utterly fails. Like full on the story leads you on to believe that it's going to happen, Lincoln's revenge will be cold and sweet and the Louds are about to get it harder than they ever have… only for a horribly depressing bait and switch. Seriously, everyone literally thinks "Oh, Lincoln calls the police and gets CPS to break his family up." You know how this damn town works. How do you know the police wouldn't side with his family? How do you know CPS and the rest of Royal Woods wouldn't be convinced that Lincoln is bad luck? Sure it sounds too depressing but considering what I'm going to do to Lucy (and maybe a couple other Louds) in this fic, ultra-depressing fics have their audience. Seriously, though! Why is everyone so convinced that the criminal justice system in the friggin' Loud House is actually competent? A truly "realistic" No Such Luck story (at least in the context of The Loud House) would be everyone in Royal Woods being so beautifully incompetent that somehow only Mr. Grouse winds up in jail, and he vows mortal revenge on the Louds. Maybe Lincoln forgives his family, maybe he doesn't, but getting CPS involved in a show this wacky isn't always a good thing.
I know that won't happen anytime soon because I'm not going to dip into the well of NSL any more than I have to and as I posited in the first chapter's A/N most people write these stories to vent and rage at the Loud sisters, put the family sans Lily through a humiliation conga, and achieve closure, but a man can dream. Actually my dream is that people stop writing NSL fics. I know it won't be, but I would not be upset at all if this was the last NSL fic ever written.
Review trends: "I hope Lincoln and Lucy reconcile!": Hmm hmm, we'll see. Maybe we get a happy ending of sunshine and rainbows and two siblings putting the past behind them. Maybe not.
"Wow, Lincoln destroyed Lucy!": Can you blame him? He's angry and has been holding onto his anger. Your anger is a gift. Give him a victory for once and let him deal with the consequences later.
"Is Lucy going to be okay?": No.
"Lincoln's so passive-aggressive!": When your family turned their back on you over a little white lie, it's going to take more than a few months to get over the harsh feelings of betrayal and danger. Hence why stacking up those feelings isn't exactly healthy for a relationship. But okay, I'll throw you lot a bone: Lincoln will foster friendlier relations with his family. Just not all at once. I wonder I wonder which sister will win his true forgiveness first.
Frankbean1313: Put a pin in that. Though I deliberately set out to make Lucy suffer, I couldn't just let Lynn off the hook, now could I…. Heheheheheheheh….
ZeroBeat3030: Gosh, I'm so sorry. I know this is the antithesis of what you were expecting, but oh well… all things come around.
Engineer1869: Maybe he did. It's not just that two months isn't enough time to get over what happened to him but also that two months isn't enough time for people to truly change. But hey, as long as they're making the effort, right?
Junky Crab: It's because people like Lucy. I love Lucy and goths like her. Why else would I write this fic if I didn't? I don't want to make Lucy pay; I want to make her suffer. Big difference. Plus it's shocking for her to star in a story like this. As Unforgiven2Lynn and I have said, Lynn stars in NSLsploitation fics for a reason. And she's going to co-star in this one, don'tcha know.
Gravity Dean: Welcome back. And hmm, wouldn't that be something indeed.
That Engineer: The Casagrandes may be somewhat bland, but at the very least you can tell the writers learned their lessons from the Loud House.
Eteru42: Honestly, Lily gets off infinitely more than Lucy ever does even though she's canonically stated to be a terror. "But she's a baby!" And this is the Loud House. Even among the guilty sisters, Leni and Luna tend to get supported by favoritism well before her. Maybe I just like Lucy too much to face the facts. Still, you're also right. Though readers will gladly lump her into the rest of the sister heap to be punished and disowned when there's no delineation Lucy does tend to get off a bit easier among audiences. But for the same reason NSLsploitation fics focus so much on Lynn and court trials and juvenile hall, NSLsploitation tends to go easier on Lucy because she's not as offensive as her other sisters. Sure, she's not innocent, but she's far from the most guilty, and we know she cares deeply about Lincoln enough to make amends. She may have betrayed Lincoln, but she's also the kind of person who'd go out of her way to atone for that betrayal even at her own expense (like, say, being willing to give up her ability to speak for the rest of her life over "cursing" her family). And that's tragic. First rule of tragedy: the audience must sympathize with and pity the tragic character and fear their fate, even if that fate is deserved.
DreadedCandiru2: Exactly. Lincoln is just a normal kid at the end of the day. That's why we love him. He's the Man With the Plan. The plan that almost never works out.
fmarcsthespot: Like the man standing under Little Boy.