Pictures of You [Completed]

Three. Mixed Family Values

Luke had his passport already, thank god. When he was 15 his school took a trip to Ontario where they hit the major spots in the city. Luke always looked at it fondly cause they'd rented one of the cushy charter buses. Luke found the abstract, almost carpet-y fabric on the seat comforting. He'd sat with Michael the whole time, and wondered the whole way to the border if they'd have a problem with his passport and make him stay in America.

Luckily for him no such thing happened. He was able to go through after an agonizingly long stop where he was convinced he and a group of kids were gonna be called off of the bus, but no one was. They made it to Toronto and Luke didn't find it was that different from Rochester except it was a little bigger. But it was still hot from the mid-May sun.

But he enjoyed going to Toronto, even though half the class stayed behind cause they would have rather gone to New York. It was worth it. Because Luke got to see all these important aspects of Canadian culture through the museum. Tried poutine—which was better than he expected. And he got a passport out of the deal.

He wished he'd had more shopping time since his parents gave him the allowance of 100 dollars—which he had to exchange for roughly 73 Canadian dollars—to spend. By then Luke was obsessed with his fashion, and constantly keeping updated with trends. Instead he spent most of it on a Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt, and the other cash on souvenirs from the Royal Ontario Museum. He could make those look cool, right?

But what he really remembered most about his trip to Ontario is that he realized how similar Canada really is to America. Apart from distance and how he was basically on the same latitude as his home town, he had sort of expected everything to be more of a stereotype than it actually was. But then again, he'd only gone to the touristy places a 15-year-old can go on a school sanctioned field trip.

And that was exactly why Lauren and Harry were forbidden to go with Ashton and Luke this time.

"This is insanely unfair!" Lauren whined. "Two months? And I'm not allowed?"

"You're still in school. And you've missed so much already," Ashton hummed as he cooked them dinner. The whole kitchen smelled like stir-fry.

"Well, where the fuck are we supposed to go? I'm still a minor and can't pay your rent for you, or did you forget that?" Lauren huffed.

"I didn't forget that," Ashton voice was calm and understanding. A detail that seemed to be making Lauren more upset—which Luke thought was understandable because he hated when Ashton did that to him.

"I'm calling in some favors and seeing where I can send you. But if everything falls through I might have to take you to our grandparents and transfer schools.

"Oh my god..." Lauren whined, and pressed her eyes to her palms. "This is a nightmare scenario..."

"I really wish I could take you with me Laur, but I can't. It's too dangerous."

"Well you could always not go, and take care of us. It's a wonder we haven't been taken away already."

"Shut up," Ashton snapped back. That obviously struck a nerve.

"You're some kind of fucking drug lord now, so that has to look good on the social service's papers."

"Lauren, taunting me isn't gonna do anything."

"Why can't we just fucking stay with Mali? Since you're hellbent on abandoning us..."

"I'm not 'abandoning' you. I'm making us more money."

"Because we don't have enough already." Lauren gestured around to the surroundings. A lot had changed in this apartment in the past six months. It was very obvious that Ashton had gone from making enough money to afford this pace, to enough money to do whatever the fuck he wanted with this place.