Intertwined

Part 21: Two Weeks Missed

Two Weeks Later:

It's been painful.

The first week back to school was one that had Helen and Lukas—amongst the others- on edge.

Logan had been missing school since living with Akash.

He hasn't reached out to Lukas or Helen about anything. He hasn't come to school and at first the office simply informed Helen that he is still enrolled and receiving his homework online.

The second most amount of useful information Helen received from Dora in the office—was that a request for two weeks student absence was put in by Akash Panthaki for Logan, and he was to be sent his work via Google classroom.

And Helen looked over his assignment boards. He's completing his homework and studies which means he has at least been keeping up with school despite him physically not being in the building.

Yet it worries Helen greatly.

A two week 'absence' from school.

Two weeks of not seeing her son or hearing from him- has sent her off the rails slightly.

The first week was one that filled her with frustration. She seen it as a petty attempt to just piss her off. That Akash was setting the point that he could easily remove Helen from Logan's life in that way.

But the second week of his absence made her insides feel like they were doused in gasoline and set ablaze. Burning from the inside out because where had he been taken?

His app was disabled on his phone and that made it all the more worse.

So as Lukas tries to help his mother keep her mind off the starting of week three by priming canvas' before school.

He's been way more docile and closed off since his brother left. He finds himself clinging more to his Mum voluntarily than he ever had before.

They're still in the motel, but they have been spending every night having dinner with Max and Luna—which he has secretly come to appreciate because he misses the noise. Logan would always be rowdy and mucking about at home. Between playing his cello or bothering his brother, Logan was the cornerstone of amusement and life at home.

Any more, it's relatively silent between his mother and himself in the tiny motel room.

But now.

Now Max and Luna have filled that hole for Lukas. Frequently Max will engage with Lukas in debates about basketball teams, television, movies, some video games he palys with Max when Helen is too busy with art therapy with Luna—which they now do before dinner every night upstairs in her room.

It's become a new routine that helps distract Helen and Lukas from the pain- but also Max and Luna from the loneliness. It's a symbiotic relationship on most fronts.

But that doesn't necessarily include the closer relationship that has been slowly building between Max and Helen. The pair have been secretly sharing tender kisses just after dinner when Lukas is finishing up his studies and Luna is coloring in a coloring book or drawing a picture.

Yes.

At least for a few moments here or there, Max and Helen sneak off to the front porch, the basement, or even the backyard for a very very brief snog.

And sometimes it's not so private. Sometimes- whether they know it or not- Luna watches them from a window or creeps down the first few steps of the basement stairs to over hear their sweet smooches.

Neither Lukas nor Luna comment on the kissing of respective parent participated in. They all simply say goodnight and leave- pretending the small little trysts are nothing more than Max showing Helen his gardening plans or something in the workout room or even Helen asking Max to look at her engine block in her Coop to see if it's running okay.