the boy who was afraid of the dark

sunday 11:32 am, lucas

  eliott and i have been texting all weekend. i never wanted to meet up with him now that my leg is in a cast because i still don't have a good excuse about what happened.
i told him i was sick. and really contagious.

i don't know why i just wrapped myself up in a trap if i was going to school on monday, where i would see him and he would see me in a cast.

i figured i would just tell him i dove off the balcony when trying a stupid skateboard trick.

but i let the lie go on. i told him i'm fine. i told him that i wasn't too sick and he didn't need to worry. that he should be focusing on rugby and his schoolwork this weekend.
he wanted really badly to come see me and bring me food or candy or something, but i convinced him against it.

it took a lot of energy.

i also didn't let my friends come over because if any of them did then eliott would have seen and i know he would have felt like shit.
he wouldn't get mad. he wouldn't even say anything.
he would just assume that i hated him and i didn't want to be with him. and i was not about to make eliott feel that way when he means everything in the universe to me.

so that weekend was just the roommates.

i spent most of it on the couch, as the coffee table was a nice place to prop up my leg and i was too lazy to go through the hassle of getting my crutches and moving to my bedroom.

i watched cheesy chick flicks, as i always do, while mika slept off his hangover and lisa did whatever lisa does when she's alone.
i wasn't thinking much about emma and manon because i figured they were out with alex, daphy, and imane.

so i was a little surprised when they came out of manon's room for the first time all weekend and curled up next to each other on the couch.

"nice to meet you," i joked. "i'm lucas."
"okay, dad." manon snorted.

"where have you guys been all weekend?" i asked, further pressing the conversation.
"sleeping." emma yawned. she didn't seem very interested in what we were talking about.

"oh," i nodded my head. "i see."

i decided to drop it because we have very thin walls at the colloc and i can confirm that they were not sleeping.
and also because eliott was face timing me.

i realized that i couldn't leave the room, and manon and emma would be too lazy to, so i just answered the call where i was.

"good morning, elly." i beamed at the screen before his cute little face even popped up.
"good morning, lulu." he replied with a smile sharing the same energy.

manon snorted again.
i rolled my eyes, "what?"

"no, no, nothing. nothing at all," emma declared.

"then mind your business!" i growled back. "i don't your judgmental glares following me around 24/7."

  emma snorted, but manon knew better. she detected the offense.
  "slow down there, lucas," she began. "what's your problem?"

  "one moment, e." i quickly muted the call before he heard anything else.

  "nothing." i crossed my arms and looked back at the TV screen.
  i wanted to talk about it, but i couldn't really get it out without feeling too self-centered.

  "you can tell us, lucas. we're listening." she replied.

  okay, that works for me.

  "what the fuck am i supposed to tell eliott? i don't blame him but he's gonna blame himself. and those guys didn't mean to break my leg, it was accident. they just wanted to break the window and, by some weird twist of fate, it landed exactly on the coffee table above me." i explained.

  this was really stressing me out. i kind of felt like shit for putting him through this, all these really difficult choices to make and stuff.

  but manon had a different opinion.
  "what do you mean? you're not telling eliott? you HAVEN'T told eliott?"

  "manon, oh my god," i sighed. "of course not. he'll lose it!"

  she paused, "at you?"
  "no no no no no," i reassured her. "at the guys who threw the brick. he knows who they are."

  "they deserve it." emma mumbled.

"violence isn't the answer." manon directed at emma.
"they used it first."
"you can't fight fire with fire."

emma thought for a second, then nodded, "touché."

"then what do you suggest i do, manon?"
"okay, tell him," she looked me right in the eyes. "be honest. but talk to him calmly about it. ask him not to take the matters into his own hands. tell him you can take care of yourself and this is your problem, not his."

i nodded, pretending to understand.
  then i unmuted the call.
"stupid skateboard trick" it is.