Elskendes Feud – 15
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(( Again I keep taking forever. I started another fic so that'll suck some of the time away from this one, but it's mostly been due to procrastination. Hopefully next chap will be not too long away. Thanks again for the continued support of my reviewers and readers ))
Mathine hung her head in her hands, how was she going to tell Lukas about all this? She definitely refused to marry this Hans guy, no matter what. Even if she was left on the streets by her parents with no money, she refused to marry Hans.
She wasn't that excited to get up, she looked at the clock though and realised it was way past mid-day. Since they had school that day, it meant that Mathine had missed most of the day, that would explain her miscalls on her phone by her friends. She also noticed that her parents hadn't bothered to tell her to go to school, she rolled her eyes and eventually was up and ready to do whatever until her boyfriend and friends would be back.
Fortunately for her, Mathine didn't spot her parents in the house when she went downstairs to get breakfast (which was really more like lunch, but she still made herself some cereal). Once that was over with, she decided to call the others as when she looked at the clock it showed that they should be passing between the fifth and sixth lesson of the day and hopefully meant that they could talk to her. Of course, Mathine chose to phone Lukas, and nervously tapped her foot against the chair leg, she decided she wasn't going to tell him over the phone, but she needed to organise when the four could meet up.
"Hallo, Mathine? Where were you?!" Lukas had to quietly exclaim down the phone, he was walking towards his art lesson, which he usually had with Mathine.
"I only woke up an hour ago or so, I'm sorry. I thought my parents would wake-"
She was cut off by the sound of Tiina yelling down the phone, that definitely didn't help her head, "Mathine! We were so worried about you! You better be okay!"
Lukas then spoke again, "Ja, you better be"
"Lukas, we need to talk"
Lukas took a step away from Tiina, who had huddled close in order to yell at Mathine. He felt nervous, that was never a good line to hear was it? He didn't think she'd break up with him (although he really didn't know anything about reading girls' emotions...or anyone's emotions at all),
"About what?" he asked, trying not to convey much of the nervousness in his voice.
"Something. Just something my parents told me, nothing's wrong with...us. We need a place to meet up, can we meet at Tiina's?"
Lukas shook his head, then remembered that Mathine couldn't see him, "Nei, her parents said she doesn't want all of us over together for a while, since we got so drunk."
"Fanden...how about my house?"
"You think you can sneak me in?" By now Tiina had moved closer to Lukas again, trying to be nosy and listen in on the conversation. He only moved back away again.
"I can try. Tiina knows the address, I'll text at the end of the school day to say if it's alright or not. See you later"
"Okay, bye"
"Bye bye~"
Lukas found it harder to concentrate for the rest of the day, considering the fact that she had something to tell him about. Mathine also had told him, however, that it wasn't anything to do with them, so he took that as meaning that their relationship wasn't in jeopardy.
He hung out with Tiina and Berwald in the art lesson, and Tiina kept asking him questions about the phone call with Mathine. He had asked her if she could drive him to Mathine's, which made her almost scream at the thought of them meeting up secretly yet again. He swore to himself that if she wasn't his girlfriend's best friend he probably would've hit her by now.
As soon as his lesson was over, he checked his phone and was relieved to see a text message telling him that everything was okay and that he could still come over as planned. He told Tiina and she agreed to stay with Berwald back at his house, Lukas didn't want to know why.
Mathine was pacing around her kitchen, which was something she had never done before. She was afraid, if Lukas was mad or something. She has no idea what an arranged marriage was like...or even a relationship that wasn't arranged. Mathine never really liked boys when she was growing up, so it was no shock to her that she had no idea how to treat a relationship like the one she had with Lukas.
She stepped out the door to wait until she'd see the familiar car that she knew was Berwald's Volvo. Mathine had already texted her parents to ask them where they were. They told her that they were at a business meeting until later that night so she would be alone for the day, she noticed that they didn't mention anything about leaving her to not go to school. Saying that though, Mathine supposed that her parents probably didn't care much about her education, as she was inheriting the family business no matter what, despite what her grades were like.
It wasn't that long until that Volvo had appeared at Mathine's door step. Lukas was wearing a big jacket, with a hood pulled up over his head at the small chance that anyone was watching them. Mathine grabbed his arm and pulled him back into the house and waved to Tiina and Berwald before they drove off. Lukas had texted his own parents earlier telling them they were out at the movies and may hang out at a restaurant and be back late, he really had no idea what would happen in this conversation with Mathine; to be honest, he was quite dreading it.
Before he could register it, he was being pulled into Mathine's house and lead along to a large room which he soon realised was a sitting area. Mathine sat on one of the chairs, and motioned for Lukas to sit in the closest chair; he noticed that there wasn't a sofa for anyone to cuddle together on, which he found slightly strange.
"You should just put your bags and coat down here, I don't know how long we'll be here, but my parents won't be home until late..." Mathine said shyly, looking at the ground. She didn't feel good about how she'd tell Lukas what she wanted to tell him.
Once he put his stuff where Mathine told him to, he sat down on the chair and looked at her. She seemed sad to him, he hoped that nothing was wrong with her, or that she wasn't moving back to Denmark or something! He suddenly thought what he'd do, but that was soon pushed back when he heard Mathine move in her seat.
"Er...what did you want to talk to me about?"
"My parents are ass holes"
Lukas felt guilty that his first thought was 'you're only just realising this?' but of course he didn't voice that. He only nodded sadly and asked her "What happened?"
"They've arranged a marriage for me"
Lukas felt his heart all of a sudden feel a million times heavier,
"Hva?"
Mathine shook her head, "Don't hate me, and I'm not marrying him. But my parents want me to..."
"Who is he?" Lukas asked, his mouth still felt dry, but heating Mathine tell him she wasn't marrying this guy still made him feel a lot better.
"My cousin or something, I'm sure I'll have to meet him this weekend or something, he lives in Denmark and it sounds like they'll just ship him here to marry me or something. Don't worry, I won't let this come between us" she reached over and took Lukas's hands. He nodded, still frowning more than usual though.
"What if he really wants to marry you?"
"I'll tell him that I have a boyfriend. I think first I should meet him before we decide to take this situation fully into account."
Lukas started to feel a bit mad, how can Mathine's parents choose who she marries?! He then realised that he should've expected something like this, Mathine's parents didn't really seem like model parents in his eyes.
"Can they even do this?! What if they marry you two this weekend and don't tell you?"
Mathine frowned at the though, "I never thought of that..."
Lukas nodded, a glare on his face. "What will you do?"
"I don't know, file for divorce! I'm almost eighteen, I'm sure I can sue them."
"Are arranged marriages even legal?"
"Probably not..."
Lukas ran a hand through his hair, "I'm sorry, I should be thinking of you. It's harder on you than anyone else..."
Mathine shook her head, "It's more about us. Seriously Lukas, it'll all be fine..."
He nodded, still not looking too happy. "I sure hope so..."
Mathine nodded and stood, walking over to the stairs and holding out her hand, "want a grand tour of my bedroom?" Mathine then realised that probably sounded more perverse than she wanted, but oh well!
Lukas noticed that Mathine's room didn't portray her personality very well. It was all creams, beige and whites; it also had an array of gorgeous statues and other old looking items in there. It more seemed like a room for a really posh woman, or a dull princess.
He was sat on her bed, and tried to soak in everything. He hadn't been in her room before, and so far her house looked much larger than his, but it held no where near as much character as he thought his has. Either way, he probably preferred Tiina's house, her family were well off, but they didn't have more than necessary, and they were all close together. It was almost the perfect balance, and they were never short of money so they didn't have to worry and use cheap, badly made products.
"So, what shall we do now?" He asked Mathine, looking up at her since she was still stood up. She shrugged, and sat on the bed next to him.
"How about we do what we had fallen in love whilst doing."
He raised an eyebrow, not sure if he was following her correctly, "What do you mean?"
"Practice our lines. The play is less than a month away now."
He shrugged, but he was happy with that decision. He always needed to perfect his emotions and all that other rubbish into his acting, and who better to proclaim your love to than your girlfriend?
"Sure~"
.x.x.x.x.
"What do you mean by you're getting married?!" has been Tiina's exact words.
Mathine sighed and carried on walking towards her first lesson, Chemistry, which fortunately they four of them all had together. "Arranged marriage. I'll get out of it."
"How?"
"I don't know yet!" Mathine cried, she really didn't feel like discussing it. To her right was Lukas holding her hand, and she could almost feel his anger in his grip of his slightly sweaty fingers holding around hers.
"Fine... just don't kill yourself like Juliet did, okay?"
Mathine shrugged his off, but gave her best friend a slight smile, "Don't worry, I'm from the happiest nation on Earth, I won't be stupid enough to commit suicide!"
She felt Lukas's hands squeeze hers and she gave him a small smile, and was reassured to see the neutral face of her boyfriend, instead of the sad glare that he had when she had told him around the arranged marriage.
"You kn'w...your par'nts are evil, M'thine" Berwald had piped up.
Mathine couldn't kept but grin at how Lukas almost jumped he was so surprised to hear the Swede's voice,
"Evil isn't the right word...they are quite the bastards though."
"So, wh'n do you meet th's guy?"
Mathine had asked her parents, and they had sorted out a place and a time to meet 'Hans',
"Saturday."
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It didn't take long for that day to come. Mathine's parents made sure that she was dressed smartly, she wore a cream dress that reached just below her knees. She knew nothing about fashion, but Mathine was sure that cream wasn't her colour, but there was no point in trying to argue with her parents. She would've been lying if she said she wasn't nervous, but it was more that she hoped that Hans wouldn't be an absolute douche. From her parents, Mathine had learnt that he was a second cousin on her father's side, and held the same Densen last name. Her parents could've at least picked a different cousin, made the incest less obvious! However, what was done was done, Mathine could only hope that this guy didn't want to marry her as much as she didn't want to marry him. The Densens (or the other Densens, as Mathine would refer to them as in her head) were going round to her parents' house, and they would just let Mathine and Hans meet. Mathine had asked her parents if this was secretly a marriage ceremony, and even though her parents were as terrible as they were, they wouldn't straight out lie to her, so Mathine was confident that nothing too terrible would happen yet.
There was a knock at the door, and Mathine felt her heart beat so much faster. This was the moment of truth, meeting this Hans fellow, her apparent future husband. Her father went towards the door, since it was his family and his company.
"Hej, Isabella, Edvard! And you must be Hans, I haven't seen you since you were merely a toddler" he greeted them, and let the small family come in. Mathine also knew that Hans had two younger brothers, but since he was the one closes to Mathine's age, that's who she'd be marrying.
The first thing Mathine noticed was how small and young Hans looked, she walked over and shook his hand. He was wearing a white suit, which ironically matched her dress. She wondered if that was on purpose, or if her mother and his mother had the same horrifying fashion sense. The adults then left the room, leaving Mathine and Hans alone. She wanted to talk to him about their wedding, that she said would never happen, so she asked him to go upstairs.
"Sure" he replied, following her up to the room. When he was in there he waited by the door before Mathine told him to sit on the sofa, "nice room..." he said quietly, obviously trying to be polite.
Mathine looked her fiancé up and down,
"How old are you?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
He looked back at her, obviously a bit surprised by the question, "I'm fifteen. You?"
"Almost eighteen... now, I need to talk to you about this...wedding" she said the word with as much disgust as she could muster without appearing rude in front of the guest.
Hans nodded, "sure..." he mumbled again. He wasn't that confident a person, and actually he had wanted to talk about the wedding too, he was just glad that this Mathine girl was fine with talking first so that he didn't have to.
"I have a boyfriend...I really can't do this wedding"
Hans nodded slowly, and tried to stop the grin from forming on his face. He was single, but there was a girl at his school who he liked, and it was when he started liking her that he realised that he couldn't marry Mathine. He had been raised his whole life being told he would marry this girl, and until recently he had accepted that fact.
"I'm fine with that. I don't want to marry someone I don't know anyway..."
Mathine grinned widely, leaning over and giving him a big hug. "You won't believe how happy that's made me!
"It's fine. It's weird that you got a boyfriend even when knowing you are engaged though"
Mathine pulled back, "I was told on Monday"
His eyes widened, "Only that long ago?! Are you parents mad or something? I've been told my whole life!"
That made Mathine feel a bit bad, this boy had been told he was marrying her, and finally after fifteen years or so he meets her and she tells him no. "Really? I hope your parents aren't mad..."
"How will you get out of marrying me?"
Mathine still couldn't take the whole thing seriously, he seemed way too young to be husband material...even if he was around Eyríður's age, he didn't have that mature presence that she had.
"I'm not exactly sure...but if we both don't want to marry, we can always divorce."
"Would your boyfriend want to stay with a married girl?"
"I don't know..."
"It sucks that your parents are still going with this, even though you have a boyfriend."
"Yeah, but they don't know about him."
"Why not?"
"I don't want to tell them..."
Hans shrugged, "Girls are weird. I'm not ready to marry one anyway. I'm going to date Freja anyway~"
Mathine then stood up, deciding that the family probably wanted to meet up again downstairs, see how Mathine and Hans were getting on.
"That's so sweet, young love. When we get down there, pretend that we're still getting married, okay?"
Hans nodded, "Okay, Miss Densen!"
Mathine scoffed, "I hate my last name. Just call me Mathine."
The two walked down the stairs to see the two sets of parents happily chatting. Mathine had no doubt that they were planning the wedding in advance, and she was still on bad terms with her parents so she sent them a deep glare. They sighed and stood up from their seats,
"We're going to go out to dinner with my cousin and his family, okay Mathine."
She gave him a weak nod, "whatever".
The look of disapproval from Hans' mother was quite obvious, and she could almost feel her mother's glare at her, how dare Mathine disgrace the wonderful Densen name, right? Mathine didn't even like that name any more, when she was younger she was quite proud of how much wealth her family had obtained, now that she's older she just sees her family as a bunch of snooty, rich people who think money is everything.
The dinner wasn't very nice for Mathine either, having to put up with a bunch of annoying rich people planning your own wedding? Mathine was very uncooperative during the dinner, not even bothering to talk to her fiancé's parents, despite the glares her parents gave her. Hans barely said anything during the meal, but was still very polite about everything; Mathine thought that despite all this stuff he seemed like an alright kid and really didn't deserve all this stuff going on with him. After what felt like way too long, the dinner had finished.
"Mathine, it was nice to meet you," Hans' mother said (Mathine couldn't even care enough to remember her name). The teenager only shrugged, looking her up and down before turning to Hans and giving him a slight smile. He nodded and walked to the door, his parents following.
Mathine could hear her father, despite him whispering, "I'm so sorry about our daughter...she isn't usually like this. I assure you that next time we meet she'll be better behaved".
Now that made her mad, her parents expect her to be all fine with this do they?! She glares and turned to walk upstairs, but her mother was stopping her by blocking the stairs. They glared at each other for a while, until Mathine felt the presence of her father behind her, they had her trapped.
"What was that, Mathine?!" Her mother was the first to yell, she shrugged, trying to be neutral on the topic and refusing to talk to her parents.
"Mathine, answer us." That was now her dad, she sighed and turned to him,
"You expect me to be okay with having a planned wedding?!"
Her mother's face turned sour, she took a step closer to her daughter, "We've planned this since you were a very young girl. You're marrying that man."
"You call him a man?! I'd be a fucking pedo!"
"Technically only for a few years-"
"That's besides the point Mor! I should get to choose who I marry!"
"Well do you have anyone in mind?" her father asked. Mathine knew that even if she said yes, they wouldn't allow her to pick her husband. They were just testing her, and Mathine knew that at this point it was much better to not tell them about Lukas. She shook her head,
"Nej, Far"
Her mother then spoke again, "Do you realise how embarrassing that was for us?!"
"For you! Do you even care how I feel in this?!"
"Whatever you feel, that won't change this situation!" That was basically all Mathine needed to realise. Her parents really didn't give a crap about her.
She growled in frustration, "So you're going to make me marry him?! You don't even care what I think!"
"It's not that we don't care-"
"YES IT IS!" Mathine then pushed past her parents and to the front door. She was going to come back later, she just needed to vent off.
"Where are you going, young lady?"
"To Tiina's!" That was a lie. Just as Mathine opened the door she turned to her parents again, "When is my life going to be ruined then?"
"July 1st"
Mathine stormed out and slammed the door after her, fighting down the tears that threatened to fall down her face.
.x.x.x.x.
Mathine had ran to her car, well, one of them. This one was an old Volvo (don't let Berwald know she has a Volvo, he'd never let her live it down!) and was red with white tires; hey, you need to stay patriotic to your country! She chose it 'cause it wouldn't stand out, and the last thing she wanted was to have her parents following her.
It didn't take Mathine too long to park around the corner from Lukas' house, where she would normally drive to wait for him in the morning, or whenever she went round to his house she would park there. She wiped her eyes, luckily since she didn't wear make up her face only looked red, instead of like a melting painting.
Once she had made sure there was no one following her, Mathine unbuckled her seatbelt and ran out of the car, and towards Lukas' house. She had no idea if his parents were home, so she went to the balcony much like she did on his birthday, and started climbing up there, landing in Lukas' room with a loud crash. Fortunately, no one heard her, so she continued to slide in through the window and land on the ground without getting hurt. The room was dark and Lukas was no where to be seen, she didn't know if anyone was just outside so she sat on his bed, hugged his pillow close, and finally let out the sobs she wanted to.
After god knows how long, Mathine had finally drained herself dry. She loved the smell of the pillow she was hugging, it smelled of the expensive but delightful smelling cologne Lukas always wore. She sat up eventually, reluctantly putting the pillow down, and headed for the door to see if anyone was out there, especially Lukas.
She made sure to open it slow, and thankfully no one was there. Mathine then stepped out the room and looked down the stairs, slowly walking towards it when,
"Aaaaah!" there was a scream, not too loud, but one that showed they were surprised that Mathine was there.
Her heart sped up, what if it was Lukas's mother who has realised who she was, the person definitely sounded female.
"Mathine what are you doing here?!"
Oh wait, that was definitely Eyríður. Mathine sighed with relief and turned around, but before she could answer, the small Icelander had shoved her into her own bedroom and locked the door.
"My parents are home!" She whispered loudly, if that was possible, "and Lukas is downstairs, you should've at least phoned him-" she stopped talking when she looked at Mathine's face. Her cheeks were puffy and her eyes red, she had been crying. "...I didn't mean that," she said softly and pulled Mathine in for a quick but awkward hug. "I'll go get Lukas and bring him here, okay?" Mathine nodded, and watched as Eyríður left the room, leaving her to look over at the stuff in the young girls' bedroom.
Eyríður found Lukas in the kitchen talking to their parents about something, and she politely butted into their conversation,
"Lukas. Will you help me with something? I want to know what you think of this poem that I wrote"
He gave her a confused glance, since their parents were around Eyríður couldn't tell Lukas that Mathine was up there crying. She just gave him a look saying 'get your ass upstairs now'.
He seemed to have got the message, and nodded quickly. "Ja, sure," he followed her up the stairs, but Eyríður soon grabbed his wrist and dragged him to her room. Lukas couldn't help but think why all the females he knew seemed to like dragging him around, Mathine, Tiina and Eyríður had all done this on multiple occasions.
"Mathine came here earlier, I don't know what happened, but she seems upset"
Before Eyríður was even finished explaining, Lukas stormed ahead of her and into her room, accidentally opening the door quickly.
Mathine had been stood by the door waiting, but without warning she was knocked to the floor. Groaning, she rubbed her sore eyes and looked up to see Lukas frowning down at her.
"What happened?" he asked, she could tell that he sounded concerned but mad.
"Hans is fine" she replied before anything else, she wanted Lukas to know that this cousin of hers was no threat, "he doesn't want to marry me, it's not about that."
Immediately Lukas' expression softened, and he led her over to the bed, "What happened then?"
Mathine explained to him about the whole situation, the argument with her parents, and how she's finally saying out loud that her parents hate her. Others had probably thought it before, but Mathine had usually defended them, saying that her parents were just a bit misguided. It's taken until now for her to finally say they don't care.
He patted her back, trying to calm her down. He wasn't used to Mathine crying or being upset, so he sort of took it with a blanc expression, one that most people would accuse of meaning he doesn't care, which is far from the truth. "I don't know what to say... I think we should tell our parents about us."
Eyríður had casually been listening, and chewing on her pencil (it was a bad habit of hers) this suggestion made her bite down in shock, breaking her pencil in half, and causing her to almost choke.
"Hvad?! But Lukas-" Mathine had protested,
"How about we just hint about it? Maybe our parents can sort it out-"
"Please don't tell them Lukas, I beg you. Maybe mention me and see what they think, if your parents are okay with it, then maybe I can hang out here and not have to be at my home so much."
Lukas nodded, giving her hand a little squeeze, "Sure. Now, do you guys want to get out of her and go eat get something to eat?" he looked at his girlfriend, and then his sister, both whom nodded. "Good, it's pizza time."
The rest of the night was better for Mathine, she didn't get home until way past midnight though, but her parents were already asleep and probably refusing to talk to her anyway. She grabbed her phone and continued to text the others in their usual group chat, up until they all fell asleep.
.x.x.x.x.
Lukas decided to wait until that Friday to talk to his parents. He knew what he wanted to say, and how he wanted to say it. They were sat in the kitchen, his parents talking about some sort of business plan,
"Lukas, come over here. You're eighteen now, you need to start learning this stuff." They ushered him over and he sat there for a few minutes, only half listening to what they were saying though.
After about half an hour of all of the half listening, and nodding his head every few seconds, Lukas decided to just blurt out what he wanted to say.
"You know, next month is the play."
That surprised his parents, they hadn't mentioned the concert at all since Lukas was told he had to do it. After trying to complain to the school and getting nowhere, they all just sort of ignored it, or at least that's what Lukas' parents thought,
"Really? You're not doing it, Lukas"
"I am" he said, as he started to feel a bit sick, "with the Densen girl"
His parents sent a glare his way, which was quite unusual. Sure they weren't the best parents around, their morals were flawed and they didn't really know anything about their kids, but they didn't normally get mad over something like this.
"Her? She's from a rotten family. You better not talk to her at all, you two can fail at your little play, but as soon as you're out of that school you're done for. We don't want our son mixing in with slime like that," his mother said. His step-father probably had very few opinions on Mathine, since he had come from an average Icelandic family and didn't really care about the business all too much.
Lukas had to swallow his words, how dare they talk about Mathine like that?! They didn't even know her, sure her family was fucked up but Mathine was deep down a very sweet girl, even if she was loud and annoying. He sighed and walked past his parents,
"Okay, ja, sure. I'm going over to Berwald's place now, I'll talk to you guys later," he said as he left, greatly disappointed in his parents. He thought his mother was better than that. He texted Mathine telling her to meet at the park and headed off in that direction.
Mathine hadn't had any problems getting away from her parents, they seemed more than happy to not have to see her. She didn't even bother telling them where she went, it's not as if they'd care unless she was with a Bondevik- oh wait, she was. She shrugged, pulling out her earphones as she was listening to the Danish band Nephew on the way to the park, and sat on the bench next to Lukas.
"You look sad, what's up?"
"My parents said they don't want me to have anything to do with you. I thought they were better than that," he sighed, he didn't sound too mad, mostly disappointed.
"If it helps, my parents probably return the feeling," Mathine joked, although it was true, and tried to give him a small laugh, but Lukas' expression soon made her shut up.
"I really hate my family," Lukas said.
Mathine nodded, "something else we seem to have in common. I hate mine too."
Lukas laid back, looking at Mathine and thinking. Their situation, despite how wonderful they sounded, really weren't all that pleasant. Then all of a sudden he got an idea, he sat up suddenly, and Mathine raised an eyebrow.
"I have an idea, but you might not like it."
Mathine nodded slowly, "What is it?"
He pulled her in and whispered in her ear, giving her the idea he had just thought of, she nodded, "I surprisingly like it..."
He gave her a quick peck on the lips and stood up, "Well that's surprising," he waited for her to stand up as well, "Want to go over to Tiina's and practice boring lines for a bit? There is a kissing scene" he suggested.
Mathine laughed, "I can't think of anything I'd rather do, Lukas~"