Almost Love (Lucaya)

Mona Lisa

Lucas's POV
Waking up to the blonde beauty has to be one of the happiest feelings in the world. I can't believe she's mine, I can't wrap my head around being her boyfriend. We've been laying in her bed cuddling for a few hours and honestly I never thought I'd like ditching school so much.

"Maya," I whispered

"Hmmm"

"Since I'm here, can I see some of your art?"

"It's not that good, trust me. You wouldn't want to see it."

"Come on let me see some of it."

She let out a groan and got out of the bed, leaving me cold. She walked over to her backpack and started taking out some pieces and a sketch book.

"Hey do you have a phone charger I can use, M?"

"Yeah, look in the drawer in my bedside table."

I opened it and felt a blush creep onto my face. The drawer had a few scattered condoms in it and I embarrassingly tried to move them to find the charger. I grabbed it but something else caught my eye. I pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

"You can have one if you want," she replied cooly as she walked back to the bed.

"I'm good," I laughed nervously, "I didn't know you smoked."

"Only every once in a while," she immediately changed the topic, "So here are a few of my favorite pieces."

I looked down at a beautiful painting of Riley's neighborhood. Next to it, a self portrait, but her face was smudged.

"Why is your face smudged?" I asked

She hesitated and looked at the portrait for a second, "To symbolize how I don't really know who I am yet."

"Well I know who you are," I replied with a smile. She looked up at me with a questioned look on her face. "You are a fearless warrior. You're the strongest person I know and you're the kind of person who would do anything for a friend. Every time you get broken, you don't stop trying to put yourself back together and I that's what I love about you."

She smiled, "Thanks Huckleberry."

The quiet lingered until I broke it. "Are we gonna talk about the cigarettes?" I inquired.

"What's there to talk about?"

"The fact that these are horrible for you? Your bedside table drawer looks like a drug dealer's trash can!"

She laughed, "What do you mean?"

"What do I mean?" I got up and took the drawer out of the table, dumping the contents on her bed. Condoms, loose cigarettes, a lighter, and dirty tissues littered the bed.

"Oh," she snickered. I looked through the stuff and something shiny caught my eye, so I picked it up. Maya immediately looked up at me with wide eyes.

"That's not what it looks like." She said quickly.

"Maya..." I whispered softly.  I held a small razor with dried blood stained on it in my hand.

"Trust me, that was a while ago. I don't do that anymore."

"How did I not know about this?" I said, my voice feeling like it was about to break.

"Nobody does. Well except Riley, she walked in on me cutting myself once and forced me to stop."

"So why do you still have this?"

"I didn't even know that was in there honestly."

We remained silent for a second before a question popped into my head, "Well, how come I've never seen any scars on your body?" I questioned.

"I've made sure you don't. Why do you think I've never agreed to go to the beach with you guys?"

"What do you mean?"

"One sec," she answered. She grabbed a pair of shorts for he dresser and left the room. When she came back with them on, my eyes went wide. Her thighs were covered in scars.

"Yeah I know," she responded quietly, "I get it if I'm too much of a problem case for you."

I shook my head and got up, pulling her into a tight hug. She grabbed onto my shirt and starting silently crying into my shoulder.

"Hey hey hey it's gonna be ok, I would never leave you because of this. I'm just happy we're being honest with each other."

She pulled away, wiping the tears from her eyes. Just then, we heard the doorbell ring.

"Why do you people keep randomly showing up here?" She asked annoyed

We both walked to the living room and she opened the door. Riley was standing there with a worried look on her face.

"Hey, you weren't at school today. What's wrong? Are you sick? Are you cutting again? I hope you aren't smoking-"

"Riley Riley! I'm fine," she responded, cutting her off. She looked behind Maya and straight at me.

"Oh, I see. You were busy today I guess."

"Not like that, we were just hanging out," she responded.

"Do you want to come in?" I added

"I'm good, have fun," she said before leaving.

Maya and I looked at each other with worried looks on our faces.

"She seems upset, you should probably head home. I'll go over to her house tonight to check on her." She reasoned

I agreed and headed out the door and onto the subway. When I got home, my mom was sitting in the living room.

"No backpack. Same clothes as yesterday. And I got a call that you weren't in class all day." She spat

"I'm sorry, it was an emergency." I said defensively

"Emergency? What kind of emergency?"

I just stared at her with no excuse.

"I knew it, this is about a girl."

I looked at my feet and felt myself blush.

"Alright, what's her name?"

I looked up with her, confused as to why she hasn't grounded me for life yet.

"Maya."

She smiled a little and continued, "Ah, Maya. I knew you two were gonna get together at some point."

I just looked her, shocked, "What?" I said surprised.

"Whenever you hang out with Riley and Maya here, you and Maya always have such good chemistry."

"What about me and Riley?" I inquired.

"You two were kind of boring together," she laughed. "You and Maya are gonna be a good couple, I know it. Don't sneak out again or I will beat your ass though."

"Yeah, haha. I won't. I gotta go do some homework though," I replied and started walking upstairs.

"If things get serious with Maya, remember to use protection!" She yelled.

"Mom, oh my god." I blushed a little and kept walking. Don't worry she's got enough of that in her bedside table.