The Son of a Preacher

Chapter thirteen: Picking up the pieces

Lucas,1985,Huntsville,Alabama 

These last two months have been tough. Watching the man you love, act like he doesn't care about you. It hurts, no it burns me from the inside out. I didn't just lose a lover, I lost my best friend. Now I didn't have any one left, it was just me and the club house. He hasn't even been back there. Right now I'm sitting by myself at lunch, under a tree. At first everyone questioned why we weren't friends anymore but now everyone's forgotten about me. Which I'm happy about, I'm tired of people reminding me of what happened.

 As I sit there, Caleb walks by with his friends, laughing. When he looks up, I gasp when I see his beaten face. I tell myself that he hurt me, that I shouldn't care. Too bad life, doesn't work that way. Wouldn't it be great if we could tell our heart to stop loving someone and it actually listen. I sit there munching slowly on my apple, when someone plops down next to me. I look over a part of me hoping it's Caleb. When I look next to me, I see it's just Greg. 

" Hey Greg." I say trying to hide my disappointment.

" Hey Lucas." He says smiling sadly at me.

" What are you doing here?" I ask genuinely curious.

" I just wanted to see how your doing." He says, his sad smile turning into a frown. 

" Oh now you care." I say bitterly. 

" I'm sorry Lucas, I just thought you wanted some space." He says with a guilty look on his face. 

"  Don't use that excuse,you've been ignoring me since you fought with Caleb." I mutter angrily. 

" I just thought that you chose him over me." He says looking away nervously. 

" Just because I stayed with him, it didn't mean we couldn't be friends still." I say, with less anger in my voice, too tired to be angry anymore. 

" Do you want the truth?" He asks,his leg thumping nervously. 

" Yes, I don't want any bull shit." I whisper exhausted. 

" I didn't want to stick around to watch Caleb hurt you." He says not even looking me in the eyes.

" If you knew he was going to hurt me, why didn't you warn me?" I ask not really angry, just curious. 

" Be honest Lucas, if I tried to tell you to leave him, would you have listened?" He questioned.

" No, I guess I can see where your coming from." I whisper. He's right, I was so blinded by my love for Caleb that I wouldn't of listened to anyone. Not even my daddy if he was alive. 

" I'm sorry for not being there after he finally chose her over you." He whispers as the bell rings.

" It's fine, I'm used to being left alone." I whisper painfully. 

" You shouldn't be used to something like that." He whispers, staring at me with that ever present depressed smile. 

" Meet at my car after school, we can hang out." He says as we get up.

" I don't know." I say scared of opening up again.

" Please Lucas, I don't like seeing you like this." He pleads as we walk to class.

" Fine, I guess it couldn't hurt" I say deciding to give in

" Thank you." He says stopping at his class room door.

" For what?" I ask confused.

" For giving me another chance." He whispers with a broken smile. 

After this I walk to my class and for the first time in months, I'm kind of happy. It's been a while since I had real human contact. I hung out with mamma sometimes after school, well more like took care of. She never said anything though it was like talking to a zombie. All she did was make weird noises and stare into nothing. Well that wasn't completely true, sometimes she would throw in a scratch here and there. My brother was always drunk so no eligible conversations ever occurred between us. I had plenty of fun conversations with myself though. I could argue and make fun of myself for hours, it was so enjoyable. Sometimes to spice things up, I would play a card game against myself, wow so much excitement.