#3 Lost in You (fan fic - in progress)

Chaper Fifteen

Six months earlier...

Lo sat in his favorite spot on the roof of the athletic building overlooking the students on the field below. No one could see him up there. No one even knew about this place other than the LSU maintenance crew. This and Mr Theo's restaurant were the only two places where he could escape whenever he started feeling the darkness close in. The world turning upside down. Losing his footing, slipping closer and closer to that ever present black hole. Even with his medication he still had days where he just didn't feel quite connected to life and all he wanted was to be left alone. Or to be in a clouded haze of drugs and sex where nothing real existed. Even worse was that euphoric feeling right before he started fucking up his entire world again... but those days were very rare lately. These darker days however were not. So he escaped to his hiding spots and cut off his phone and just sat with himself. The sounds of the student athletes on the field below.  Whistles blowing. Distant lawnmowers. A soft breeze tickled his nose.  The heaviness weighing on his shoulders finally abated slightly.

He let out a long held breath and leaned back against the concrete wall. He had left his shirt off after practice. The stifling humidity of Louisiana in late july had driven most inside an air conditioned refuge this summer. But Lo like opened spaces. Lingering effects of growing up on your very own 50 acre compound in the middle of the bayou.

If his thoughts got too heavy he would call his therapist. Otherwise he smoked or found some girl willing to entertain him. Or stuck his head in a book to fill his mind with something new or worked his way through some new music. Anything to distract his anxious thoughts. It was an attempt. It never worked. But he usually felt somewhat better after he turned off all the noise and had some time to himself.  Found an open space free of people. The quiet that the introvert in him longed for.

He knew if anyone ever found out they would surely think he was weird. He was weird. He definitely wouldn't be the cool as shit Lo Beckham who everyone expected him to be. So he worked his ass off to keep up the front so no one found out about this part of him.  The anxiety, the depression, and definitely not the uncontrollably pressured impulsive thoughts. He chose women and friends who were too superficial to ask the deeper questions and he kept his head down as much as possible.

He had been up there for a few hours and the sun was starting to set. Summer football practices were supposed to start tomorrow. There was a house party tonight and he knew he needed to return to the world of the living in order to set off his junior year right. The draft was coming up this year. And everyone expected him to go in the first round like his father. This was his year.  And yet his entire body felt heavy just thinking about it. The truth was he was having trouble bringing himself to even care. He once found some pleasure in his athletic successes and how people around campus literally worshipped him. Now he just felt numb to it at best. At worst, he felt like shit. Because he knew didn't deserve any of it.  He was an imposter. No one had figured it out yet.

Maybe something would happen tonight. Something big to pull him completely away from this hole before he completely got sucked in again.

He finally turned his cell phone back on as he climbed down to make his way to his car. In the next second, he literally got blown up with text messages and DMs.  He didn't bother to check any of them. He loathed social media. Instead he texted his homie, Kev. 

Kevin Thompson was the only one on campus who knew anything about the war that was constantly being fought inside of Lo's head.  It was only because he had known Kev since they were young kids and he was Lo's most trusted friend. His only real friend. But Kev still really didn't know the details.  He knew Lo got depressed.  He knew that Lo disappeared from time to time and there were times when Lo's behavior could literally be off the chain. There was no rhyme or reason to any of it.  It just happened... sometimes.  He knew Lo took meds and saw a therapist. But he also knew that Lo didn't like to talk about it, so they didn't talk about it. And that was that.