chapter eleven - the shore

chapter eleven — the shore

LUKAS HAD DECIDED TO KIDNAP ME. He'd locked me inside the car with that stupid smirk of his, disarming my Mum with a hug. All I wanted to do was to go inside and play video games, but Lukas was adamant about us going to the shore. My hands slapped down on the dashboard, fingers fumbling to find the button that unlocked the doors. I pushed on a lever, jumping back with a shout as the radio sputtered to life and the windshield wipers started flailing. Lukas shot me an amused look from the porch, turning back to the door to accept a cliché-looking picnic basket from my Mum. I hastily waved my arms at her, screaming for her to unlock the door since I didn't want to go to the beach. I figured that wide eyes and panic was the universal sign for 'help me', but my Mum just smiled cheerily and waved before going back into the Schmitt's house.

I scowled, letting my head fall onto the dashboard with a concussing thump, regretting the decision immediately as a headache sprung up. I heard the driver's side door open, nose twitching as it picked up the smell of Mr. Schmitt's infamous sourdough. Everyone in the Schmitt household smells like fucking bread.

I wanted to hate the smell so bad, but I found myself drowning in it. I didn't even bother to put up a fight, slumping back into my chair as Lukas thrust the basket into my lap, turning the windshield wipers off as he backed out of the driveway. I nuzzled the basket close to my chest, sighing at the comforting warmth emanating from it.

"Don't fall asleep on me, Keke," Lukas' hand slapped at my thigh and I jerked away with a scowl.

"I've planned for us to have a wonderful afternoon on the sandy dunes of sand, water lapping at our feet like a Cocker spaniel with a foot fetish"

My lips twitched and I quickly ducked my head so Lukas wouldn't see.

Lukas spoke like a stupid intellectual whenever he got excited. He'd layer on a terrible British accent, hand brandishing in the air around him like it was pedigree oxygen and he owned the shit. I'd normally play along, mimicking my Mum's faint Irish accent, or, if I was feeling particularly excited, my Dad's unintelligible pseudo-Irish-British accent. Mum was from Ireland Ireland, land of the leprechauns and Molly Malone. Dad said he was from Northern Ireland, which, weirdly enough was connected to mainland Britain and not Ireland, so I blamed his mixed accent on that. There was also the fact that he tried damn hard to Americanize his English, so he ended up sounding like an absolute mess.

Not that I'd ever call him that to his face.

It was Lukas and I's secret.

But I refuse to humor the jerkwad today.

"Aw, c'mon, Keke," Lukas frowned, eyes darting over to me.

"It's not that bad, right? We would've been hanging out anyways, but now outdoors"

I stayed silent, determinedly looking out the window. When I was little, I used to imagine a little ninja running beside the car I was in. With a mix of incredible acrobatics and a fuck-you to the Law of Gravity, he'd leap from cartop to cartop at insane speeds. Now that I was grown, I liked to imagine the road falling apart as our wheels crossed the tar. It was a little darker than my ninja but much cooler. We whizzed past a decaying carcass— some animal stupid enough to cross the freeway— and my gut twisted uncomfortably. I looked away, foot-tapping as we took the exit to the shore.

I looked over at Lukas quickly, realizing that it was far too quiet in the car. He was gnawing at his lip, the skin a bloody red as his nerves ripped through him. White-knuckled grip on the steering wheel, his dark eyes scanned the road for something. Lukas didn't give a shit about what others said about him, but the same couldn't be said for people he liked. His family. His friends. Like me. Fuck. Is he sad because of me?

I scoffed. So what if I'd made him sad? Lukas should quit caring about the shit I say. I don't mean half of it. I stubbornly crossed my arms over the picnic basket, willing myself to concentrate on my frayed shoelaces and not the sad-puppy-looking boy next to me. I tried envisioning myself electrical taping the ends of my laces like Michael had done with his. They looked cool on him.

Lukas flit into my head again, the way he'd smiled so easily at Michael. Nope. Shoelaces, not sensitive jerkwads and their f-friends.

I managed for a solid sixty-three seconds: a record for me.

"Lukas," I was ashamed by the weird melting feeling in my stomach when Lukas looked at me, eyes brightening just by hearing my voice filter through the hum of the car. I fidgeted under his gaze, wanting to snap at him to turn back to the wheel. I'm such a fucking sap, Jesus.

Lukas had a way of looking at people and making them feel better. It was insane how well it worked, even on me. I'd known him for nearly three years now, and the longest we'd been apart was a week at most — yet, I still fell for his 'everything'll be alright' bullshit just as easily as the girls who flocked around him.

Does that make me a part of his posse?

Fuck no. We're best friends. I have Lukas-privileges.

"Don't look at me, focus on the road" My fingers fumbled with each other, managing to tie themselves into a knot on top of the basket.

"Sorry, sorry," Lukas rushed, eyes darting back to the road, "I don't know how to get back to the highway from here"

"What do you wanna do that for?" My eyes narrowed in confusion. Lukas rolled his lip back into his mouth, and I fought the urge to make him stop. I wasn't sure how I could even make him stop to start, but I had no doubt that touching him randomly would be fucking weird for both of us.

"Well, I kinda dragged you here," Lukas straightened up, look at me with full seriousness. He was the weirdest goofball I knew, and I knew Marco, yet he could go from "aliens are invading" to a fucking SWAT commander in ten seconds flat. Marco was just always batshit crazy, so I learned to tune out his shit, but Lukas. It was always a surprise with him.

"I don't want you to be miserable, Keke," He smiled ruefully, "So let's go home and play Rainbow Six, yeah?"

"Nah, just keep driving Schmitt" I tried putting my feet up on the dash, but failed catastrophically as the picnic basket began to tip over. I caught it, my composition slipping as I looked at Lukas, red in the face and hoping he didn't catch me almost drop our lunch.

Lukas looked like he was still trying to process what I'd just said, his brows screwed together, eyes dark and brooding like some kind of 90s teenage heartthrob.

I rolled my own, sun briefly blinding me out of nowhere.

"Lukas, don't overcomplicate it, you prodigal moron. Let's go to the shore."

"You wanna?" Lukas looked over at me, his forearms flexing as we turned subtly on the road. Sand was becoming more and more prevalent on the fringes of the tar and my stomach flipped, thinking of spending an entire afternoon just laying in the warmth of the sun, sourdough in my stomach and the only person I could never get tired of chick-hunting with me.

"Yeah, I wanna, you-you nincompoop" I censored myself, unable to fully blast Lukas the way I wanted to. His smile grew on his face like a megawatt bulb, all six-foot-and-spare of him glowing with happiness. Lukas was normally a happy dude, but it was a rare sight to see him so fucking happy. I relished the sight, my own smile tugging at my lips when he shot his goofy grin at me.

"Keke, I love you" he sang, sounding more like a Disney serial-killer than a Broadway wannabe.

"Shut up and drive"

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"I can't believe you forgot sunscreen" I scowled, trying my best to not cave in to my desire to curl up into a ball and die, frying up in the heat on my sand griddle. My belly was comfortably full with sourdough and the host of other things Lukas had brought, but I still reached for a piece of sourdough just to eat it for the sake of eating it.

Lukas looked at me worriedly, half-amused and half-guilty as his shadow blocked the sun from my eyes. He plopped down next to me and I hissed, ducking my head to gnaw on the bread like some kind of vampire-rat being. He shuffled closer to me, his shadow giving me some kind of placebo comfort as my skin steadily crisped.

"We can go back-"

"-No. Now sit there and let me eat my bread, bread boy"

"Bread boy?"

I ignored him, eyes mirroring the ocean as challenging any onlookers. Some of them eyed the narrow space between Lukas and me suspiciously. In any other situation, I'd have punted Lukas across the beach, but my sunburn changed things up a little. Keeping my skin intact was marginally more important than not looking gay. I scooched closer to Lukas by a hair, my legs curled in close to my body as he tried covering me in as much shade as possible.

I probably looked like a fucking freak, curled into a ball of red skin, nibbling on my sourdough and hissing whenever the light hit me. Some kinda vampire-rat freak, for sure.

"I completely forgot that you sunburned so easily," Lukas muttered, his hand falling in the minute gap in between us. His pinky grazed my thigh and I let it sit there, too stiff and tired to move.

"Well, yeah, 'cause I normally douse myself in sunscreen. You know? Sunscreen? The thing that stops me from being sunburned?" I spat, angrily chewing on my sourdough.

"I'm sorry," Lukas sighed, shifting back on his hands. His pinky slide up further and I held my breath at the way it felt: like ice running down my leg. I froze, eyes pointedly glaring at his pinky pressed up against the side of where my ass met my leg. This has surpassed okay-shit to gay-shit. Abort, fucking abort. Move your pinky motherfucker.

Lukas was in a state of blissful ignorance, his eyes roaming the horizon with the look of a weathered veteran. The wind pushed the smell of sourdough and I curled further into a ball, miserably giving up on moving or trying to get Lukas to move. Lukas looked like fucking sand guardian (Poseidon quivers before him), skin glowing in the amber sunlight. My skin was a lovely shade of pink, already starting to peel at my elbows and knees. I look fucking gross.

I relaxed my shoulder, deciding to focus on the smell of bread and salt instead of my burnt skin and the screaming kids around us. The shore was always crowded at this time of year, but we'd managed to snag a decently deserted spot. I blamed it on the resident seagull who was eyeing my sourdough with fiendish malice. He looked like the type to have shitted on many unsuspecting victims and I leaned towards Lukas, subtly indicating to the seagull that if anyone were to be shitted on, it would be the ignoramus next to me.

"You meet your dad yet?" Lukas' arm brushed against mine and I winced on contact. His skin felt cool to the touch, and I leaned into him a little more like he was a human ice pack.

"Nah," I held a water bottle up to my other arm, sandwiching myself with cold. The sun disappeared behind a cloud and Lukas moved away from me, leaving behind a numb burn running down my right side.

"Didn't feel like it?" He probed, leaning back on his hands. His shirt rolled up a little, tanned skin peeking through the space above where the band of his shorts started.

I stared at his lower stomach, jealousy creeping on my features. Both my Mum and Dad burnt to crisps in the sun, and it would be a cold day in Hell by the time I managed to tan. Lukas, on the other hand, could tan in the fucking winter if he wanted to. Lucky bastard.

"I forgot," I answered honestly, looking away from him with a start. I had a fucking six-pack, Lukas' tan was insignificant compared to my abdominal strength. I was statistically superior.

At least, that's what I tell myself.

In reality, Lukas would always be better than me. He could fake a smile, make you feel like your problems were small. He had the insane ability to make people's hearts swell and chins rise. Everybody loved Lukas.

Not many people liked me.

"Isn't he going to be mad?" Lukas looked at me worriedly, moving closer again.

A group of girls walked by us, one wearing board shorts and a t-shirt like a guy. It suited her and I watched the group retreat absentmindedly, thinking of the way her long hair made her look like the freshman I'd pushed by. I didn't remember his name.

It suits him too, I guess.

"He's always mad," My lips twitched up, "Like me"

I elbowed Lukas so he'd catch my joke, but his lips remained curled into a small frown. His hand reached across the narrow space between us, gently landing on my shoulder. I didn't nudge him off, reveling in the feeling of his cold fingers against my burnt skin.

"You're not always mad, Kieran"

Kieran.

I looked over at him, stomach fluttering and uncomfortable. I drew in further to myself, my temples beginning to ache ever so slightly.

"Yeah, I am" I laughed, the noise tinny and dry, "It's my brand, you know?"

Lukas shook his head.

"I don't think you give yourself enough credit"

I raised an eyebrow, unsure as to why Lukas wasn't getting the joke. It was just a joke. I knew I wasn't always mad. I knew I was a decent person. I knew I was.

"You're a fucking amazing person, Keke" Lukas looked up, eyes connecting with mine like they were magnets. They repelled harshly and I looked away, rolling my eyes and sliding away.

"Says you," I muttered, "If I'm fucking amazing then you're like," I bit my lip, "like a fucking god, Lukas"

Lukas flushed under the praise and I fought the urge to punch him in the shoulder. How did he not know how perfect he was? He had girls falling every which way in the hallway just so they'd accidentally catch him in their selfies.

Girls only liked me when we split a Heineken and a bed.

"You're fucking smart, you know how to talk to people, you make everyone feel better," I sighed, looking at the sourdough in my hand, not hungry anymore.

"I'm just a fucking mess"

Silence passed between us, my phone buzzing in my bag. Mum liked to update me about her daily activities, my phone always flooded with pictures of her students' artwork or a cool thing she'd found on Facebook. I reached for my phone, pausing when Lukas cleared his throat.

"I don't make everyone feel better" He murmured, cheeks Rudolph red.

"You make me feel better"

I pulled my phone out, lips twisting into a grimace as I skimmed them. It was Mum, but the messages weren't sweet like they usually were. My Mum liked to pretend she could hide her emotions well, but hiding panic was never her forte.

"We have to go home" I sat up lethargically, shoving my things away into my bag.

Lukas didn't question me until we'd reached the car.

"Everything good?"

He put the car in reverse, hand reaching over to help me put my seatbelt on.

"Dad decided to give Mum a surprise visit"

Lukas exhaled lowly, whistling through his lips. I nodded, knowing he could see me through his peripherals.

"Mum' still not," I paused, "Entirely over him just yet"

"So you need to go back" Lukas affirmed, raising the speed a smidgen. He would never go way past the speed limit, he wasn't the illegal-driving type. Even so, he pushed the speed limit and I watched him the whole way home, wondering how the fucking hell I could be 'fucking amazing' to a guy like him.

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2762 words

I'm so sorry for the late update guys :( It's been a hectic week and midterms are coming up. That being said, I am rather fond of this chapter. I wasn't sure I wanted to introduce Kieran's father just yet so that's an upcoming event. I just wanted this chapter to focus more on Lukas' and Kieran's relationship with each other. :)

What do you guys think?

Thank you so much for reading and I hope you all have a beautiful week! <3