june, age 18
Mira dropped down onto the seat opposite Lucas with a tall glass of iced coffee in her hand, her speciality that she had introduced Lucas to and she had taken it as a personal offence when he had disliked it, even though he had warned her that he didn’t like coffee. While she sipped the cold, milky coffee, he cupped his hands around a mug of tea. It had taken him a while to appreciate his mother’s favourite brew, which she drank at least five times a day, but now he started and ended every single day with a comforting cup of chai.
“Crazy,” Mira murmured, shaking her head.
“What is?”
“That freshman year’s over.”
Lucas had had to get used to her language as much as she’d had to get used to his, each frequently baffled by the words they assigned to things that seemed to make no sense. “Yeah, it’s pretty weird,” he said. “Very weird, actually. Are we the only ones left now?”
“And Carey,” Mira said. “His last one was today. He finished at five, I think.” She pushed back her sleeve to check her watch, almost knocking over her drink. “Oh, he should be back any minute.”
Over the past couple of weeks, Hermione, Ned and Xavier had slowly drifted back to their homes once their exams had finished and they had packed up their bedrooms. The flat felt so empty, half of the kitchen cupboards totally bare, and it would be deserted by the end of the weekend. The first Wednesday of June had marked Lucas’s last exam: now Friday, he only had one more night before his father would drive down to help him move out for the summer.
It was more than summer, really. After a lifetime of six weeks off as a summer holiday, Lucas wasn’t sure what he was going to do with himself now that he was off for four whole months, a sixteen week break before his second year would begin. The majority of the vague plan in his head centred around spending time with Asher, the two of them enjoying each other’s simple company as much as they could before university pulled them in separate directions once more.
“How d’you feel?” Mira asked. She stirred her coffee, the ice clinking against the glass before she took a mammoth gulp.
“Good,” Lucas said, nodding to himself as he thought about the question. “I think everything went ok and I’m excited to be home for the summer.” He sipped his tea, taking the bag out when it was just the right strength. “I love it here but I miss Asher.”
“I bet,” she said with a sigh. “I’m looking forward to seeing Mar.”
Lucas smiled. After the sudden night on New Year’s Eve when they had gone from zero to sixty in the blink of an eye, the two had been inseparable. Any time Lucas passed Mira’s room, he heard her video chatting with Mawar and as many weekends as possible, she headed up to Manchester or the two reunited in Farnleigh. Every break had been spent together, which had been made much easier by Mawar’s parents’ acceptance of their daughter’s girlfriend.
They had barely batted an eye when Mawar had announced that she was bisexual and she was dating a woman: her mother had merely asked when she would get to meet Mira while her father had expressed his relief that he wouldn’t need to worry about her getting pregnant and ruining her studies. Her parents were young, both only eighteen when she was born: all they cared about was making sure she got as much out of life as possible before she was responsible for someone else’s.
“Is Mar coming down?” Lucas asked. Mira nodded.
“She finished on Monday,” she said. “She moves back home today and she’s coming down tomorrow to move me out. Not that there’s much to move – I literally have two suitcases and that’s it. I could get the train, really.”
“You could probably come with Dad and me tomorrow,” Lucas mused, thinking out loud. “I don’t have much stuff and he needs to come down anyway to get me; it’d save Mar a journey.”
Mira pursed her lips. “Maybe. I’ll text Mar later, see what she wants to do. She quite likes driving – she might want to spend a bit more time on the road before she can’t for the next three months.”
Mira and Mawar had had their summer sorted out for almost six months, virtually since the moment they had got together. Mira had announced her plans to spend the eight weeks of the break working as a camp counsellor at Caper Canyon Camp near her home in Caper Cove, Michigan, and it hadn’t taken much encouragement to get Mawar on board. The two were due to fly out in a few days, spending a couple of weeks with Mira’s family before they began work as a general counsellor and an art specialist at the camp.
Several metres away, the front door slammed shut. A moment later, the kitchen door opened and Carey stepped in with hardly a flicker of acknowledgement for his friends. He headed straight for his cupboard, pouring himself a whiskey double before he took a seat at the table. Mira raised her eyebrows and grimaced, showing her teeth.
“That bad, huh?”
He pressed his lips together and slowly nodded, knocking back the hard liquor with the slightest twitch of his nose. “Pretty sure I bombed.”
“I thought that about my last assignment but I got a seventy-eight,” Mira said, “and apparently that’s really good.”
“That’s a first,” Lucas said. “It’s very good.”
Carey sniffed and scratched his nose, tapping his nails on the table before he finished off the glass. He had drunk it far too fast to enjoy the taste: Lucas presumed his intention wasn’t to taste the alcohol but to have it seep into his bloodstream and numb his brain.
“I still don’t understand your system,” Mira said to Carey, “but I’m sure you did great. I bet it wasn’t a disaster.”
“It was a disaster,” he said. “Look, thanks, but I don’t want to talk about it.” He stood and refilled his glass before he took his seat again, sipping the inch of whiskey slower this time.
“Ok,” Mira said. “Want to go out for a drink? We could head to the bar – it’s not quite as sad as drinking in the kitchen.”
Carey shook his head. “I’m good,” he said. “I’m just gonna go to my room. Seeya.” He scraped his chair back and took his drink to his room, the door swinging shut behind
him. Lucas looked over at Mira and winced.
“Is he gonna be ok?” he asked. She shrugged.
“He’s a big boy,” she said. “If he can’t handle a rough exam and he won’t talk about it, he’s gotta deal with that shit on his own.” She downed the last of her coffee and sucked on an ice cube, crunching it before she popped the last one into her mouth and washed out her glass. Leaning over the kitchen sink, she peered out of the window at the city and the swirling colours of the sky above. “Wanna go for a walk?”
Lucas thought about it for a moment before he shook his head. He and Mira had frequently wandered around the city together when they had needed a break from revision or assignments, occasionally ducking into a coffee shop or a bar to refuel. Lucas had learnt the pleasure of a gentle cocktail with a friend, the joy of a simple walk around the city he could call home, but he didn’t feel like it today.
“No, thanks,” he said. “I think I’m just going to read, if you don’t mind.”
“You do you,” she said with a grin. “I’m just gonna go for a wander, I think. Say goodbye to the city for the summer.”
“After how long should I begin to worry that you’ve been kidnapped?”
Mira laughed. “If I’m not back by nine, you have permission to be worry. But I highly doubt I’ll be that long, and I don’t think it’s kidnapping when I’m nineteen.” She put her hand on Lucas’s shoulder, bending down to give him a half hug. “I’ll let you know when I’m on my way back.”
“Thanks,” he said with a smile. His usual worry about his family transferred to his housemates whenever he was at university, unease kicking in whenever he realised he hadn’t seen one of them for a while – relative to how often he was used to seeing them, of course. For Xavier, that was every three days whereas with Mira, it was every couple of hours.
Once Mira had left and the flat was back to its state of odd calm, Lucas turned off the kitchen lights and headed to his room. He was completely packed up and ready to head back home, his things packed away into a couple of suitcase and a few bags for life. Everything was neatly stacked along one bare wall, his desk clear and his cupboard empty. It was weird to think that he only had one night left in that room, that when he came back in September it would be to a new house. He was just glad he got to live with Mira for another year – two, hopefully. Maybe even three if they both did the master’s courses they had been considering.
The only things he hadn’t packed away were his book and his bedding: even his laptop was stowed away for home, relying on his phone for the final evening. Slipping out of his shoes, he lay down on his bed at the far end of the room and adjusted his glasses and he picked up his book. He held the paperback carefully so as not to crease the spine any more than absolutely necessary, rolling onto his front when his arms tired after twenty minutes.
Lucas could do pretty much anything he could put his mind to, his brain absorbing knowledge the way a sponge sucked up water, but in almost nineteen years of existence, he had yet to find a reading position that didn’t get uncomfortable within half an hour.
Time flew when he had a book in his hand. Before he knew it, two full hours had passed and he had less than a hundred pages left of his book. That was the home stretch, the point at which he felt like he was almost done with a book, whether it was two hundred pages or almost a thousand. A hundred pages was an hour’s work. Adjusting his position again, he settled on his side and prepared to finish the novel. His first year of university had given him a taste for the classics, a copy of Wuthering Heights in his hands after he had finished Jane Eyre and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in the past week.
There was a slow knock on his door. He noted the page he was on and finished his paragraph before he shut it and set it down on his nightstand.
“Hello?” He stood and opened the door. Carey was leaning against the door frame as though he couldn’t stand without its assistance. Lucas had been so absorbed in his reading that he had tuned out of any noise in the flat, forgetting that Carey was even home. He hadn’t heard him clinking glass in the kitchen.
“Hey,” Carey said, his voice low. “Can I come in?”
“Um, ok.” Lucas stepped back, taking care not too knock his packing. “Are you alright?”
Carey nodded and then shook his head as though he couldn’t decide. He rested his shoulder against Lucas’s cupboard. Lucas didn’t know what to do: he wasn’t used to emotional comfort, nor was it something anyone expected of him. His friends knew better than to expect him to understand when they shared their woes, when he only ever responded with advice. That was far more valuable than sympathy, he reasoned.
“I’m sure it’ll be ok,” he said, shifting on his feet as he clasped his hands together. He didn’t know what to do with his body. “Maybe you should just sleep on it. Have some water and go to bed.” He checked his watch. It was only seven thirty. The sun wouldn’t set for another two hours, though hazy clouds across the darkening blue gave the sky an ethereal quality. Pinks, purples and blues swam together over the city and Lucas had a feeling Mira would be out for a while longer. She was obsessed with photographing the city.
“I screwed it up,” Carey said quietly.
“You don’t know that yet. And even if you did, one bad exam isn’t the end of the world,” he said, though he didn’t follow that advice himself. Any time he got less than a first on a piece of work, he felt as devastated as most people did when they outright failed.
Carey took a deep breath and stumbled when he stood. Lucas darted forwards to steady him before he fell and knocked over his neat pile. Carey held onto him for a moment, hardly enough time for him to register what was happening.
He jerked away a fraction of a second before their lips met, pushing his flatmate away.
“Hey! No!” he cried out. “Don’t kiss me. What’re you doing?”
“It’s just a kiss,” Carey said, his words on the cusp of being a slur.
“I have a boyfriend,” Lucas said, standing straight as every nerve suddenly jumped to attention. “Don’t do that.”
Carey stepped forward again and tried to grab him, tripping when Lucas slipped out of his grasp. “Aw, come on,” he said. “I know you want to.”
“No, I don’t,” Lucas said. He grabbed his phone from his nightstand, unlocking it just in case he would need it. He hoped he wouldn’t; he hoped that Carey was just a little drunk and a little sad. “I want you to go.”
“Lucas…”
“No. Can you go, Carey?” He nodded at the door. “You need to go and sleep or something.”
“I don’t want to sleep,” Carey said, lurching towards Lucas. “I want you.” He held his shoulders, trying to pull him in for a kiss that Lucas leant away from, fighting against him. Carey was taller, though, stronger in every way.
“Get off me, Carey. I said no.” His heart was racing, adrenaline and panic rushing through his blood like a toxic cocktail that he was sure would give him a heart attack if he didn’t get it under control soon.
“It’s just a kiss,” Carey said again, pinning Lucas against the wall and pressing his body against him. He was hard: Lucas could feel him against his thigh, nausea flooding him.
“I don’t want to kiss you. I don’t want you in here. Get out of my room. Get out,” he said, fighting against Carey. When he leant back a little, Lucas pushed him away and gasped for breath, his fight or flight instinct kicking in. Mustering every ounce of strength he could, he shoved Carey’s drunken, lead-heavy body towards the door despite his protests. Carey fought him but he was drunk, missing when he tried to fight Lucas off him. He tripped over the suitcase and fell into the hall, crashing to the floor.
Lucas slammed his door shut and locked it, leaning against it with his heart pounding and his brain thrumming so hard that he wasn’t sure he would breathe normally again for a while. He could still smell the whiff of alcohol on Carey’s breath, the stench that turned his stomach.
Trying not to throw-up from the mixture of stress and that smell, he clenched his phone in his hand and as soon as he had hit dial on Mira’s name, he felt that familiar feeling he despised. The heat of shameful tears, residual fear pushing itself out of his eyes. Out in the hall, Carey dragged himself to his feet and thumped on the door.
Lucas ignored him, drowning out his words as he waited for Mira to pick up. She did at last, after several rings.
“Don’t worry, I’m not dead,” she said when she answered the call. “The sky is so freaking gorgeous right now!”
“Mira?”
She only needed the two syllables of her own name to realise that something was wrong. “Shit, Lucas, you ok?”
“No.”
Carey thumped again, slurring Lucas’s name.
“What was that?” Mira asked.
“Carey,” Lucas said. “He came into my room. He pushed me against the wall and he tried to kiss me and I locked him out but he’s still there and I’m scared.”
“Jesus Christ, oh my God,” Mira said, her voice a mix of horror and shock. “Are you ok? Did he hurt you?”
“No … no, he didn’t do anything. He just tried to,” he said, curling up on his side. Quiet tears wet his pillow. “Are you near home?”
“I’m on my way back right now. Give me fifteen minutes. Shit, Lucas. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” The call went dead when she hung up. Lucas closed his eyes tight shut and covered his face with his hands as he tried to regulate his breaths. His lungs ached and his throat burned, his chest tight with fear that Carey would find a way back in, that he would hurt Mira when she got back. He had never done anything before; he always got a little suggestive when he drank but he had never been so forceful before. He had never made Lucas feel so afraid.
Opening his eyes, he found his phone again and unlocked it, finding Asher at the top of his contacts with a star by his name to keep him there. Hitting the green dial icon, he dropped his head back on his pillow and waited to hear his boyfriend’s voice.
But he didn’t. It rang and rang until it went to voicemail, an automated message. Asher had never got round to recording his own voice.
Lucas didn’t by any means expect Asher to be glued to his phone twenty-four seven but he pretty much was, hardly going anywhere without his mobile – he had answered it while he was in the bath before now, as mad as that made Lucas. Seven thirty on a Friday night was usually a good bet, a time that he was pretty much guaranteed to be hanging out at home. Not on his phone, evidently.
He tried again, each ring grating against his ear drum until the message came and he ended the call.
By the time the front door clicked with Mira’s arrival fourteen minutes later, he had tried ringing Asher five times. Each call had failed and he had given up, telling himself that he was out with his family. The Knights enjoyed the odd meal out, not needing a reason to head out to the pub as a family. Perhaps Asher had just left his phone at home.
“Lucas?” Mira knocked on the door. “Hey, can I come in?”
He dragged himself off the bed and unlocked the door, checking the the corridor when he let her in. “Where is he?”
“I think he’s in his room,” she said. “Are you ok? Oh my God, I’m so sorry, Lucas. Do you want me to call security? I think I have the number for the college security somewhere.”
Lucas shook his head. “There’s no point,” he said. As much as he hated it, there wasn’t much that could be done about a drunk flatmate attempting a kiss. It would be brushed under the carpet as a misunderstanding and that would be the end of it.
“Are you sure?”
He nodded. Mira pushed the door shut and hugged him. He found her embrace comforting despite her angles. She wasn’t a soft person to hug, tall and slim, but there was a lot of heart in her embrace
“I’m going to make you a cup of tea,” she said. “Milk and no sugar?”
He nodded. “Thanks, Mira.”
“Don’t mention it. God, he’s such an asswipe!” She continued to mutter to herself as she swung into the kitchen and put the kettle on, making herself a coffee and a tea for Lucas.
He dropped back onto his bed and idly reached for his phone, his fingers working of their own accord to ring Asher again. He craved his voice. Even when he hardly said anything at all, Asher always managed to soothe him.
It rang three times before he picked up, his voice a little strange and out of breath when he said, “This is a really bad time. I can’t talk.”
“Asher-” Lucas began. He was cut off when the line went dead, leaving him with his mouth hanging open. Confusion spelt itself out in his eyes, his stomach tying itself into a knot as his brain replayed the words he had just heard.
Mira came back with two mugs, shutting the door with her hip. “We’re all out of milk now. Pretty good timing, really,” she said. When she looked up and saw Lucas’s face, she set the drinks down and dropped onto the bed next to him. “Hey. You ok?”
“I just called Asher,” he said.
“Is he ok?”
“He sounded weird,” he said. “He said it’s a bad time and he can’t talk.”
Mira frowned. “Oh. What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.” He stared at his phone as though it had wronged him, as though it could be to blame for the abrupt call. “He sounded like he just ran a marathon.”
She put her hand on his knee. “Maybe that’s it, maybe he just went for a run and he literally can’t talk.”
Lucas shook his head. “He’s asthmatic,” he said. “He doesn’t run. And he never cuts me off like that.” He looked up at Mira, distress and despair hugging his eyes. “What if he’s…”
“Cheating on you?” Mira offered, finishing off Lucas’s thought. “Oh, come on, Lucas. You can’t seriously think that, can you? You two are an amazing couple.” She slung her arm around him and rested her cheek on his shoulder. “I bet there’s a totally reasonable explanation. Maybe he’s just in the middle of a heated game of monopoly.”
“He doesn’t play monopoly,” he said. “Too many fights.”
Mira gave him a sad, hopeless smile. “Well, I don’t know what you can do, really. Maybe ring him back in twenty minutes? I bet he’ll call you and apologise and it will have been nothing.”
Lucas hoped that. He knew that his brain was irrational and that he was tarnishing his boyfriend with a dark brush but no matter how much he loved and trusted him, he couldn’t shut off that horrendous ‘what-if’ section of his brain that just loved to hurt him. He often felt as though there was a part of his brain that was a separate entity to the rest of him, a separate section that carried out checks and balances on his thought. For each modicum of happiness, it had to remind him of something embarrassing; each time he had a worry, it amplified it a thousand times.
“What d’you wanna do?” Mira asked.
“I…” He trailed off, his shoulders slumping. “I want to go home.”
“Only one more night,” she said with a supportive twinkle in her eyes.
“No.” He shook his head. Reaching for his wallet, he checked that he had his railcard and his debit card. “No, I want to go now. I want to go home right now.”
“Right now this second?”
He nodded, stuffing his charger and his book into his bag that he hoisted over his shoulder. “I’m going to the station. I need to go home.”
Mira looked a little stunned but she stood. “Ok. Ok, well, I’m coming with you,” she said. “I don’t think you should be on your own and between us we can get my cases home. Save Mar a journey tomorrow.”
“Ok.” He patted his key in his pocket, slipping his phone into the other. Mira grabbed both suitcases from her bedroom, checking that she hadn’t left anything behind, and she met him at the front door with everything she’d gathered over the year. There was more at Mawar’s house, the bits and pieces she’d collected over the the past nine months that had found themselves a second home.
“Are you sure about this, Lucas?” she asked when he opened the front door. “We could just put a film on and have an early night.”
He shook his head. “I don’t want to be in there anymore. You don’t have to come, Mira. I just don’t want to stay.”
She nodded. “Ok. Ok, let’s go.”
*
Mira bought both tickets on her card, telling Lucas he could buy her a coffee sometime as though he didn’t know exactly how much an on-the-day ticket home cost. It was a lot more than a coffee but she insisted and his head was elsewhere, imagining every worst case scenario. The part of his brain that seemed to have a vendetta against him told him that Asher was sleeping with someone else, that his calls had ruined a good evening. The worrywart panicked that he had been in an accident, that something horrible had happened.
The whole way home, Mira chatted to him just to keep the words flowing and take his mind off his own thoughts though that was difficult when they were permanently inside his own head while Mira could be tuned out. Every now and then she nudged him to get his attention, poking him when she saw him disappear behind his eyes.
“What’s your plan?” she asked when they got off at Farnleigh station as the clock struck ten.
Lucas dialled Asher’s number again, his heart sinking when it went straight to voicemail. Either he had turned his phone of or it had died, collapsing under the weight of all the calls it had missed.
“Lucas? What’re you doing? Did you ring your mum?”
He shook his head. His mother would only worry and the last thing he wanted was to be the source of any more of her worries. “My dad,” he said. He had texted his father an hour ago, receiving an instant response that yes, of course he could pick him up from the station. Floyd was about as reliable as a parent could get, always willing to do whatever his children needed. A night owl who could survive on little sleep, he had drilled into Lucas – and the girls as they grew up – that they could always count on him if they needed a hand, even if it was three in the morning and they were at a party across town.
“Is he here?” Mira asked. Mawar was, her car just turning into the station. Lucas spotted his father’s car parked up ahead and he nodded.
“He’s there.”
“Ok,” she said, giving him a hug. “Hey, just keep a calm head, ok? I’ll probably see you tomorrow. Have a good night’s sleep – you need it.”
“Thanks, Mira,” he said, hugging her back. He waved to Mawar but didn’t stop to talk to her, heading over to his father’s car. Floyd smiled up at him when he got in.
“Hey,” he said, bringing the engine to life. “What’s with the surprise visit?”
“Can you take me to Asher’s?” Lucas asked.
Floyd laughed. “And hello to you too,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Sorry. Hi, Dad. Thanks for getting me.” He buckled his seatbelt and gave a heavily edited version of the evening, cutting out the part about Carey when he didn’t feel like repeating it.
“I’m sure everything’s ok,” Floyd said once Lucas had finished talking. “Did you ring him again?”
“It went straight to voicemail. I just want to check.”
Floyd chuckled to himself, heading out of town towards Asher’s house. “That’s dedication, coming all the way back here just to check.”
Lucas didn’t mention that he couldn’t face spending another minute in the flat with Carey there, his skin crawling at the thought of spending the night with him just next door. He had visions of him picking the lock, drunkenly sneaking into the room while he slept. It made his stomach ache with that sickening sense of dread. It wasn’t worth it.
The roads were quieter than the journey, hardly passing a single car as they drove in virtual silence for fifteen minutes.
“Do you want me to wait?” Floyd asked when he pulled up in the driveway, the gravel slowly crunching beneath his tyres.
“Can you wait for a bit? I’ll text you,” Lucas said. His father nodded. “Thanks, Dad. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem,” he said with a smile. “I’ll be right here.”
Lucas got out of the car and headed to the door, knocking quietly. Sadie would be asleep by now and he hoped he wouldn’t wake her – her room was at the far end of the house, far enough that he hoped the sound of the knocker wouldn’t disturb her sleep. Digging his hands into his pockets, he looked down at his feet as he waited. There were lights on inside, the drive full of various cars belonging to the family: they were home. Asher was too, his car tucked away beside the house.
A full minute passed before the door opened as he was reaching to knock again. Ishaana stood on the other side looking quite unlike the version of her he knew best. Although he had known her for the vast majority of his living memory, she always made an effort to brush up, especially to answer the door, but she answered in nothing but a nightdress and a bare face, her hair loose around her face.
“Lucas, hun, hi,” she said. He swallowed hard when he saw the redness in her eyes, the glisten in her irises. “Did Ash call you?”
He shook his head. “I called him. He hasn’t been answering. I was getting worried. Are you ok?”
She nodded and smiled, welcoming him with a hug before she shut the door behind him. Lucas didn’t believe her but he didn’t know what to say, thrown by the emotion on her face. He had never seen Ishaana look the slightest bit down; he had certainly never seen her cry. Standing in front of him now, the tears in her eyes were unmistakable.
“Is Asher here?”
“He’s in his room,” she said. “Are you alright, Lucas?”
He nodded. “I just wanted to check that he’s ok. I couldn’t get through to him.”
“Oh, hun. You’re such a sweet boy.” She squeezed his shoulder. “Well, he’s upstairs.”
“I’m really sorry if I woke you, Ishy.”
She looked down at herself and let out half a laugh. “Oh, no. Don’t worry. I wasn’t in bed. You know me – the early hours are my favourite. Do you want anything? Something to drink?”
“No, thanks. Thank you, though. I’m going to head up,” he said. She smiled and nodded, a far more downplayed version of herself than the one Lucas knew. He was on edge, walking on his tiptoes as though he couldn’t bear his own weight as he headed to Asher’s room with baited breath. He knocked first. No reply. He knocked again.
“Asher? It’s me,” he said as he pushed it open. There was a table lamp on in the corner of the room, enough to softly illuminate the room. Asher was lying on his bed on top of the duvet, hardly making a sound, but his shoulders were shaking. Lucas’s heart jumped into his throat.
“Asher…” He slipped out of his shoes and sat down next to his boyfriend, his hand on his shoulder. “What’s going on?”
Asher said nothing but he let out an audible sob. Lucas lay down next to him on his stomach and put his hand on Asher’s back, feeling the heat of his skin through his shirt before he slipped his arm around. They lay like that for a moment before Asher took a deep shaky breath and shifted onto his side, swiping at his eyes.
“You came over,” he said. His voice was small, his chin wobbling.
“I was worried,” Lucas said. Part of him was relieved that infidelity wasn’t on the cards, though he had never truly thought it could be. “You sounded weird when I rang and then I couldn’t get through to you and now I’m even more worried. Has something happened?”
Asher closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “My dad…” he managed before another sob broke out. Lucas’s skin flushed hot and cold, panic gripping him.
“What happened? Is he ok? Asher?” He propped himself up on his elbow, pulling Asher’s hand away from his face. Asher screwed up his eyes and gasped as though he couldn’t breath, a strangled choke escaping him. He pressed the back of his hand to his forehead and rolled onto his back.
“He has cancer.”
There was a split second when Lucas really thought he was going to throw up, heat collecting in his mouth as a chill passed over his skin. He reached for Asher’s hand, wrapping his fingers around his boyfriend’s.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered. His eyes began to sting, a lump forming in his throat at the three words, something he had feared ever since he had learnt what it was. “Asher, I’m so sorry. What kind? Is he going to be ok?”
“Hodgkin’s lymphoma,” Asher said. “Stage three.” His voice cracked. He pulled Lucas into a hug, gripping him as though he would never let go. “I don’t know. I … I don’t know.”
Lucas held onto him, shushing him in the semi-dark room that felt like it was getting smaller and smaller. The walls were closing in on them, the air tightening.
“I’m sorry about earlier,” Asher murmured. “I’m sorry I didn’t answer your calls. You rang right as Mum and Dad sat us down. I’m sorry I snapped at you, I just…”
“You don’t need to apologise,” Lucas said. “Don’t apologise. It’s fine. It doesn’t matter at all.”
“I’m sorry,” Asher whispered again. “I just … I couldn’t talk. I could hardly breathe.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, burying his face in Asher’s neck when he felt his tears begin to run out of his eyes. He couldn’t control them, dread settling in his gut.
“Why did you ring?”
Lucas hesitated. “Nothing, really,” he said. His evening faded into insignificance in comparison to Asher’s, guilt washing over him. “I just wanted to talk.”
“I’m sorry,” Asher said again, as though he was stuck on an unnecessary loop. “I love you, Lucas. I’m sorry.”
“I love you too. You have nothing to be sorry for, oh my Goodness.”
There was a gentle knock on the door, followed by a louder one that Asher would be able to hear. He lifted his head, slowly unfurling himself from Lucas.
“Yes?”
“Hey,” Bishop said softly as he stepped into the room. He didn’t look any different. Just a little more tired, Lucas thought. That was probably a result of having to tell his four children that he was battling a disease desperate to ravage his body. He smiled down at Lucas. “Hi, Lucas. I just wanted to come and say goodnight. Mum and I are heading to bed.” He sat down on the edge of Asher’s bed as though his son was a child again, rather than months away from his twentieth birthday. He rubbed his arm and sighed.
Asher sat up, folding himself into his father’s embrace. Bishop smiled at Lucas over Asher’s shoulder as he hugged him back, comforting his youngest son.
“I’m going to be ok,” Bishop said quietly. His murmur was quieter than a whisper to Asher. “I’m going to kick this thing, Ash. I’m not going to let a stupid bit of cancer take me down.”
The word was like a knife to Lucas’s ears.
“It’s going to be ok,” Bishop said, soothing his son. Asher didn’t ask the question on his lips, the one that none of them wanted to hear the answer to. “I’m going to go to bed now. Tomorrow’s a brand new day. We can talk more then, if you want to. I love you, Ash.”
“I love you too, Dad,” Asher said, slowly letting go. Bishop kissed his forehead and smiled, showing Lucas his appreciation in the curve of his lips.
“Do you want me to go?” Lucas asked.
“No,” Asher said immediately. “Don’t go, Lucas. Please don’t go.”
Bishop left, pulling the door shut behind him. Lucas sent off a quick message to his father, thanking him for the lift and apologising for interrupting his night. Asher took a deep breath as he lay down again, the day having drained him of every ounce of energy. Turning onto his side, he lay facing Lucas, so close that he could feel his breath on his cheek. Dipping his head, their foreheads touched, their noses meeting. Asher put his arm around Lucas, holding onto him as though he was a lifeboat.
“Please don’t go,” he said again, his eyes close. When Lucas shook his head, his nose bumped against Asher’s cheek and their lips brushed together.
“I won’t,” Lucas said.
“I need you,” Asher murmured.
“I’ve got you.”
+ – + – +
i hope you liked this chapter! sorry for the delay in posting – I got a little caught up planning a new project, which has bumped All You Knead down my priority list, to be written after Little Spoon – my Canada project!
have a little lucas being a cutie to lighten your heavy hearts!
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