Running from You

19

"LUCAS FARELL, PUT SOME GEL IN YOUR HAIR".
It's always so much fun when you're at a friend's house and they start fighting with their parents. It happens only occasionally when I'm at Lucas's place, because we often go straight upstairs. But Lucas isn't in a good mood today. Neither am I, but I'm trying to hide it. I know showing the fact that I feel like absolute shit will only make Lucas feel worse. So, I'm trying to keep up my composure and help Lucas not get murdered by his stressed out mom.

"Why would I? It's not like I'm going to go anywhere today. Except for Paris, of course".
"Lucas, I can't deal with your attitude today! If it wasn't for the fact that I can't possibly handle a train ride and a plane ride filled with your chatting, I would've forced those meds down your throat!"
Lucas frowns at his mom, and I can see he looks hurt. Part of me is telling me to get up and defend him, but a very large, prominent, smarter part of me is telling me to wait it out. It would be best if I didn't get involved.

"Well I'm sorry I annoy you so much" he says, suddenly a lot more quiet. "But it's not like I chose to move across the world with you guys".
His mother keeps a stern look on her face.
"And we didn't ask for a hyperactive son, but we handled it when we found out and we're doing just fine handling you to this day. Or actually yesterday. I just can't..."
She rubs her eyes.
"Go upstairs, we'll call you down when you can be useful again".
I look over at Lucas, and to my absolute horror, I can see tears welling up in his eyes.
"I didn't ask to be "hyperactive" either" he says, choking up a little bit. "Sorry I'm being such a burden to you".

He turns around on his heels, and walks towards the stairs.
"No, honey, wait" his mom says, but he doesn't listen and keeps walking. I wait for a moment, hoping she won't notice me so I can sneak after Lucas unnoticed. She turns to me.
"Sorry you had to see that" she says. "He's just... A lot".
I suddenly feel the urge to tell her she's being a real uptight asshole, but I repress it. Doesn't she realise that you can't just say that to your own son? Doesn't she know him at all?
"I'm going to go see if he's okay" I say. "He looked really upset".
She frowns lightly, and looks at the top of the stairs where Lucas just disappeared. I feel a small sense of satisfaction when I see the regret in her eyes. I quickly run up the stairs, and knock on Lucas's door.
"Dean?" I hear from the other sound of the door.
"Yeah" I say. "Can I come in?"
It's quiet for a moment.
"Yeah".

I open the door, and walk into his room. He's sitting on his bed, looking in the mirror with a tube of hair gel in his hand. He looks a little lost.
"Are you okay?" I ask. He looks up, and sighs, flailing around the tube.
"My mom usually does this for me. If it was up to me I wouldn't use any hair gel at all".
I can't help but relate to that. He just looks so cute without any.
"Do you need help?" I ask. He smiles, a weak, joyless smile, and nods.
"If you want".
I walk over to him and sit down on his bed. I've seen him try to do it himself, but he either uses way too much or way too little. I've also watched his mom do it countless times at sleepovers, so I think I could figure out how to do it.

He hands me the tube, and I open the cap. I suddenly feel slightly nervous because I'm going to touch his hair and he'll be fully awake to see me blushing like crazy this time. I run my hand through his hair once without gel first, feeling my heart skip a best because of how soft it is. Then, I put a bit of gel on my fingers.
"How do you want it?" I ask.
"Just the usual" he shrugs.
That won't be too hard, I've been staring at his hair for the entire week.

I scoot a little closer to him, and put the gel in the tips of his hair. He smiles at me, a more genuine smile this time, and I feel a little relieved. I don't like it when he's in a bad mood, it doesn't fit with his personality. I carefully spread the gel through it hair, satisfied with how it's turning out. It looks pretty much the same as his usual hair.
"Hmm" he hums, closing his eyes with a sigh.
"What?" I ask.
He opens his eyes again, and starts blushing a little bit.
"Oh, it just... Uhm, it feels nice" he stutters. I feel my face heating up too, but I just laugh it off quietly.
"You're a lot more gentle than my mom" he says, staring at his lap. "She usually yanks my head towards her and starts pulling my hair".
"Yeah, I just want to be sure it looks right" I chuckle, putting some more gel on my fingers. "I don't want her to yell at you again for doing it wrong".

He giggles nervously. I feel myself freeze for a second because of how adorable that sounded, but then continue. At the end, when I finally feel like I'm done, I ruffle his hair gently to give it a less polished look.
"Done" I say, satisfied.
He opens his eyes again, and looks at me with half awake eyes.
"I might have fallen asleep a little bit" he admits. "It's extremely relaxing".
"I could do it again sometime" I say. I think for a moment, and I see the realisation hit Lucas at the same time as me.
"Yeah, in a few months" he says quietly.
"If I can afford the flight" I sigh.
"I'll make my parents pay for you" he says. "It's the least they could do after forcing me to go with them".
I smile, a sad smile, and look at his packed suitcase. I feel like opening it and throwing everything on the floor and hiding his passport so he can't leave. But I don't do that. That wouldn't be very smart.

The rest of the day is just us watching Friends while part of me hopes he'll fall asleep on my shoulder again. He doesn't, he stays wide awake so he can sleep on the train and in the plane. That's probably for the best. We chat a little about things he can do in Paris, and I fill him in on the situation of my father.
"So yeah, we don't really talk much" I say, as he scrolls through the messages my dad has sent me.
"You don't" Lucas says. "He does. He's really trying to talk to you".
"All he asks is how my day is" I shrug.
"Your responses aren't very encouraging though. When you keep replying with just one word, it doesn't make him feel like talking very much" he explains quietly. I look at him, and raise an eyebrow.
"I always talk like that" I say.
"I see through it. I know you're just to lazy to type full sentences. Your dad doesn't though" he says. "And by the way, when I'm in Paris you'll need to start typing better. I can stand it now but when I'm gone I can't talk to you in person anymore".

"Okay" I say. "I'll do my best, but we can still Skype".
He nods slowly, but then shakes his head.
"Timezones" he says. "One of us would have to wake up in the middle of the night".
"I won't mind" I say, without thinking too much about it. He smiles hesitantly, and shifts a little on his bed.
"Technically there's a six hour difference, we could do it in the morning" he says. "Evening for you, then".
"Yeah, that would work" I say, and I smile awkwardly. He smiles back, and we're both quiet for a moment.
"You wouldn't actually wake up in the middle of the night to talk to me, right?" he asks, breaking the silence.
"Yeah" I say bluntly. "Not every night, obviously. But if there really was no other option, I would".
I see a red colour making its way on his face, and he giggles nervously, my heart exploding at the sound. He scans my face, making me blush even worse than him, and his eyes rest at a spot a few centimeters below my eyes.

"Lucas!"
We both look up at the sound of Mrs. Farell's voice, and he gets up from his bed.
"Yeah?" he asks.
"Come downstairs! We're having dinner, and we're leaving to the train station afterwards!"
I feel a sting of pain shoot through my chest, and I see Lucas biting his bottom lip.
"Okay!" he yells back. He shuts off the TV, which I now realised has been on the entire time, and looks at me.
"You'll eat with us, right?" he asks.
"Of course" I say. He smiles, and opens his bedroom door. As we walk down the stairs, I feel a weird pressure on my chest. It hurts to think how close we are to him leaving now.

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