Chapter 10
Percaline
It was nearly midnight when they finished up in the library. The toll of the night weighed on Percaline heavily as she walked alone through the hallways to her bedroom.
Savannah and Mason were doing fine. She had checked on them an hour ago after things settled down. The advice Savannah had given her earlier had started to seep into the only empty space left in her head and it turned like a growling stomach.
She didn't know what she should do with Lucas. Savannah wanted her to forgive him but it wasn't that easy. Or was it?
She thought about the reason that she was giving him the silent treatment. He had slept with Mischelle at the lighthouse, which was the place where she had the best memory of her mother in New Haven. Only it turned out that Lucas hadn't actually committed the crime she was doling out the punishment for.
She thought of the real reason she was giving Lucas the silent treatment. She had told him that she was in love with him and he hadn’t reciprocated.
She needed time alone to think about everything. She wanted to try to separate her feelings of friendship for Lucas from her romantic feelings.
How had she gotten herself into this mess? A week ago she had no intentions of settling down. She didn't want to get married, rescue a dog, or paint the picket fence white, but now that all of those things that had seemed so far away were the exact things she wanted with Lucas.
Percaline's room was unpretentious, organized, and practical. These were all of the things about herself that she took pride in. It had a four-poster queen-sized bed, two nightstands, a lingerie chest which doubled as a TV stand, a chair, a dresser, and a dog bed for her zombie dog Basil, who had followed her from the library and was now circling on the bed, trying to find the most comfortable position.
The only items that looked out of place were her plaid flannel sheets, pillow cases, and comforter. Percaline loved the way flannel felt again her skin. Any other bedding felt scratchy against her ears and that was enough to keep her up at night. It wasn't glamorous, and because it wasn’t glamorous it irritated Savannah at home, but it was her.
She walked to the bathroom that she and Lucas shared, hoping that Lucas wasn't already using it. She wanted to take a shower. That would help her think, but she couldn't think about Lucas if he was already in there. If she got in the bathroom first, Lucas wouldn't bother her. She lucked out and the bathroom was empty, but steam filled the air, indicating Lucas had already taken a shower.
The bathroom was the opposite of minimalist. It was twice as big as her bedroom with a huge double sink that glowed under twenty vanity lights. There was a standalone bathtub big enough to fit a car in with a waterfall cascading down the back.
The shower was her favorite part. Multiple shower heads and faucets were encased in light brown and antique white stone and closed in by transparent doors. The shower itself was about the size of her bedroom. Percaline stripped down and got into the shower. The water would help her think.
She was having self-esteem issues for what was perhaps the first time in her life and all because of one boy named Lucas.
She’d had a date with Alejandro and he turned out be a bad guy. Not in a ‘that jerk didn't call me’ kind of way but in a literal bad guy way. He tried to kill her, and if Percaline believed what Don said, he could have killed her if not for Lucas. Then again, she probably wouldn't have been on the stupid date at all if it wasn't for Lucas and Truthaven.
She would have forgiven Lucas for Mischelle and moved on if she hadn't already told him she loved him. Now she couldn't take her confession back. It was out there and she was dealing with it. Going on a date with another guy was maybe not the best way to handle her hurt feelings, but hindsight was always twenty-twenty.
Lucas’s rejection came with a whole new set of issues. Wasn't she supposed to marry him? Now he was going to fall in love and marry some other girl that Percaline was sure she wouldn't approve of because no one was good enough for Lucas. Right now she wasn't even good enough for Lucas. She should have believed that he would never in his right mind have done something so defiling in a place that Percaline held in the highest regard. If she was a true friend to him like he had been to her over the years, she would have known. Hadn’t Savannah figured it out first?
Percaline decided she was going to forgive Lucas. She needed to put her hurt feelings aside and act like the friend he had been to her all these years. Vampires and Sirens had been gallivanting around in his mind and instead of being there for him, she had given him the silent treatment. She felt like an asshole. He would never have done that to her.
Maybe this was why he was no longer in love with her. Maybe he had never been in love with her at all. Was it possible that everything she had interpreted as his being in love with her over the years had just been her imagination and just his attempts at being a good friend? But that didn't make any sense. Hadn’t Lucas been flirting with the bartender for the sole purpose of making Percaline jealous? And hadn't he done the lean in on her when they were in the bathroom? What if she made that up?
Lucas deserved a non-selfish best friend, one that would put aside her own insecurities and be present for him. She would be his friend again, she had decided that. Weren’t they friends above all else? She would have to deal with her heartbreak on her own. She would have to get over it so that they could maintain their friendship.
Percaline turned off the showers. She was now shampooed, conditioned, and clean shaven. She pulled a towel from the rack and wrapped it around her hair, then wrapped another around her body. She didn't need Lucas walking in on her naked. Not now. Not when she had decided to be just his friend.
She went to her side of the vanity and looked in the mirror. She remembered what had happened after she had kissed Alejandro. The look on Lucas’s face, before it had turned to rage, was hurt. She had hurt her best friend intentionally. She thought he had tried to hurt her intentionally with Mischelle, but she had been wrong. Lucas may not have been with Percaline but he would never have tried to purposefully hurt her like she had hurt him.
Savannah was right. It was simple. Percaline didn't need to forgive Lucas for Mischelle. She needed to forgive him for not being in love with her.
That was the issue at the bottom of it all. She had felt selfishly that Lucas needed to be punished for not loving her back. He didn't. It was her issue, not his. Her feelings were hers to deal with and there was no need to project them onto Lucas. He was her best friend and she was the one who needed his forgiveness.
Percaline dried her hair and then, as if remembering a distant memory, willed her hair to dry. Before her eyes the damp and slightly waved hair that had been hanging limply down her back puffed up dry and curly. Not having wet hair would be convenient for Lucas’s pillow.
She had made up her mind to seek Lucas’s forgiveness and that forgiveness needed to be obtained tonight. She would change into her pajamas and then, for what she thought was another first in her life, she would sneak into Lucas’s room and attempt to redeem herself by being there for him.
The lights were off in Lucas’s room when Percaline entered. She knew he wasn't sleeping because he was a notoriously light sleeper and when she closed the door, she heard his breathing change. This was a strange turn of events. Usually Lucas was the one to sneak into her bed after a particularly stressful life moment or sometimes just after a bad dream to comfort her, but tonight she was sneaking into his. Hopefully just this one act would show him that she was there on bended knee.
She was wearing a man's pink button up shirt and a pair of boy shorts. There wasn't anything predominantly sexy about her clothes because that wasn’t why she was there. She was there to apologize.
She tiptoed to his bed and got in. Lucas stirred. “Hi,” Percaline whispered. She had used up the nerves that had carried her to the bed. Now she needed to work up some new nerves that would get her to the part where she told him she was sorry wit
hout vomiting, passing out, or making things any more awkward than they already were. She could do it. If Savannah could be there for Mason without passing out even though they were both covered in blood, Percaline could do this. Lucas drew her into the crook of his arm so her chin rested on his shoulder.
"I'm sorry!" she blurted out as she wrapped herself around him. "I should have known that you would have never done that with Mischelle."
Lucas was always warm, which was very comforting to a person that ran cold like Percaline. He wrapped his arm around her so she took the initiative and snuggled in more closely without breaking the friendship distance. He smelled good too, like spring breeze or whatever scent they always put in men's deodorant that made girls go crazy. That was going to be the most difficult part for her. Keeping the closeness that they had in their friendship without her over-analyzing everything and turning it into something more than what it was.
"I missed this,” Lucas said. "I missed you."
"Me too,” Percaline said and she closed her eyes, experiencing the moment with just touch and sound. Lucas was her rock, and the last couple of days without him had been emotionally draining. “Do you want to talk about the possession?” she asked him.
“No,” was his reply.
Basil jumped up on the foot of the bed and made himself comfortable below their feet. Seconds later he started to lightly snore. Percaline fell asleep in Lucas’s arms with him smoothing her hair.
According to the digital clock on the nightstand Percaline woke up at precisely three fifty-five and surveyed the room, forgetting for a second that she had fallen asleep in Lucas’s arms in his room at the House of Phoenyx. It had been a weird couple of days. Lucas wasn't there. She was alone except for Basil.
She went to her room, leaving the zombie dog passed out on the bed. Lucas wasn't in her room either and it was too early to think of the ramifications of him being gone, at least not before she had some coffee. The Navy sweatshirt from Lucas that she’s kept after that day in New Haven was now magically folded on her bed. She threw it on, brushed her teeth, and wandered down to the kitchen.
Lucas
Lucas was waiting for Percaline in the kitchen with his guitar. He wanted to get this right. It had been a while since he had picked up a guitar, let alone played one. In high school he had fantasized about becoming a musician and the guitar had been his instrument of trade, but it had been many years and several grown up dreams since that time.
He remembered the basic fundamentals of reading music and playing chords. Savannah had told him that he needed to be out of his comfort zone and he trusted her, so if she said that he needed to play this song to show Percaline that she was the only girl for him then that's what he would do. Hopefully this would work. If not, he would at least walk away with a newfound respect for the song writer Taylor Swift.
"Lucas, what are you doing?" Percaline asked as she came into the kitchen and her eyes adjusted to the poorly lit room. Lucas could have turned on the light but he hadn’t wanted to. This was difficult enough without the added pressure of being seen clearly. They routinely only used the light of the refrigerator to navigate through their early morning encounters in New Haven.
He felt emotionally naked as he answered her. "I have something I want to explain to you."
"Okay then," Percaline said as she headed towards the refrigerator. Lucas stopped her, pointing to the cup of decaf coffee that he had made and placed with creamer on the placemat in front of the stool he wanted her to sit on. Before he had fallen asleep the night before, he imagined how he wanted things to go. Now he was trying to make those dreams a reality and in his dream she sat at that stool and he stood where he was.
Percaline sat down. She seemed nervous too but he couldn't imagine why, since it wasn’t like she was about to serenade someone.
“Lucas, I think I know what you want to talk to me about and let me reassure you that –” Lucas cut her off. In his dream she didn’t speak. “Percaline, will you please keep quiet? This is difficult enough as it is.”
She sat quietly and Lucas began to play the opening notes of Taylor Swift's song “All Too Well,” singing the lyrics as they had been written with only two significant rewrites; he had changed the word “scarf” into "sweatshirt" and the word “glasses” into “braids.”
She was wearing the sweatshirt he was singing about, so that made the entire event seem destined. The song was a love letter from him, recognizing the moments they had shared together over the years while creating a new moment now in the kitchen.
He closed his eyes as he was singing. It made the whole experience easier. He didn't want to see Percaline's face as he sang, but halfway through the song he opened his eyes, realizing that he also didn't want to keep singing if she had left the room. She hadn't. She looked more surprised than he would have imagined. He didn't think it was because she felt like she was on the spot. When he had played this moment before in his mind, he always made sure that she would in no way feel caged or on display. The surprise on her face was something else. He would have to ask her when he was done, if she was speaking to him.
He continued to sing the song, recalling how the moments reflected in the song corresponded to their life together: The rejection he’d felt after she’d said no to his marriage proposal, the day they bonded at the beach after they’d lost Uncle Jon, him sneaking into her bed to hold her at night so she could sleep, and the overwhelming sense of paralysis he felt when he thought about losing her. He remembered all of it too well.
On the day that she had locked herself in her room after Mischelle told her about the lighthouse, she had played this song and a couple of others over and over again. She knew the song well, which was probably why Savannah, or maybe it was the House, had chosen it. It was about heartbreak and she must have felt heartbroken after Lucas ignored her confession of being in love with him. That’s how he would have felt if the situation had been reversed.
The song ended, the music ended. Lucas looked at Percaline desperately waiting for a sign, any sign. She didn't say anything, but she also didn't leave the room. Savannah had told him that this might happen. She’d said that if Percaline didn't like it, she would disappear faster than he could blink. She also told him that any girl in their right mind wouldn't leave the room if a guy sang this song to them, and when he was finished singing he was going to have to make the first move. He breathed in for courage, thought about his promise to himself of what he was going to do if the moment ever presented itself again, and went for it.
He set his guitar and eased over to Percaline. If he leaned in this time and she didn't reciprocate, that would be it. He would be finished. This would be the last time he tried to be anything more than her friend, no matter what she said.
He traced her jaw line with his hand, testing the water. She was still staring at him. He cupped her head with his hand and leaned in. She was still there. Then he did what he had dreamed of doing since he was seven years old and kissed her.
It was a long and passionate kiss, like something you'd experience only after you’d deprived yourself of the person whose soul was the missing piece to yours.
After what seemed like eternity he stopped kissing her and took a step back. This was the real moment of truth. He looked into her eyes and she looked into his and as they breathed in the same breath he traced her lips with his thumb. She grabbed his hand and kissed the inside of his palm, then pulled him into her for another kiss.
Lucas had so many emotions running through his body, and at the top of his list was desire. He broke away from the kiss and moved away so that the table was between them. He needed time to think, time to breathe. That had been so much better than he expected. Everything that had happened since he’d gone to bed last night was better than he’d expected.
“What’s wrong?” Percaline asked him teasingly.
“That was better than I imagined,” he said. He sat back down on his stool, his knees weak.
“If it was so good, then why are you all the way over there?” Percaline asked, acting upset. She was pouting and Lucas thought that was pretty darn cute.
“Because I want to do this right and I can’t with you being so close to me,” he said, exasperated.
She stood up and walked around the table, pulling her sweatshirt off in the process, so that she was standing behind him in only a shirt and a small pair of shorts. “And what’s your definition of too close?” she whispered in his ear.
Lucas jumped up from the stool. “That. That is my definition of too close,” he said and again moved himself so that the table was between them. She was making it very difficult for him to control himself. But he wanted to ask her out and to take her on a date. He wanted to court her before they did anything more than kiss.
He remained standing behind the table. She was not going to get the jump on him this time. Instead, Percaline undid one of the buttons on her shirt. Lucas’s eyes were glued to the shirt as it moved. He shook his head. He regained his composure, turned his back, and said, “I’m going to bed.” That should do it. Leave while he was still a head of the game.
“Seriously, you’re going back to bed?” Percaline asked. She sounded confused and sad. Not the emotions Lucas was trying to produce in her.
He turned back around, rushed to her, and picked her up, lifting her onto the island. She was so light and trusting when it came to him. He needed to stay in control but he wanted so badly to see behind the curtain. He argued with himself and the devil on his shoulder won. He moved Percaline’s shirt up so that he could see her belly button, slipped his hands around her waist, and rubbed her stomach with his thumbs. Percaline stroked his shaved head. He loved that.
He bent down to gently kiss her waist. This was something else he had wanted to do for a very long time. It was his favorite place on her body. As he kissed her waist and explored her belly button with little darting kisses he breathed, “I’ll pick you up tonight at seven.” That was all she got for right now. Or rather that was all he himself could handle right now. He smiled at Percaline with the grin that usually killed the ladies, and left the room. The last look on her face was desire. Fair was fair.
House of Phoenyx: House of Phoenyx book 1 Page 11