Asmo's Love

Awkwardness

Lucas is leaning down his head over the rooftop railings, his lit cigarette tucked between his lips. It was time for his therapy again. And he inwardly groans. He hates this place and the smell of it. The scent of alcohol and the flowery substance hovering over the whole damn hallways of the white-colored walls and ceilings makes him feel sick. Mentally sick, unfortunately.

He doesn’t like attending sessions, but the thing is, his father won’t let him do what he wants to do. And he wants out of this shitty place. So, obviously, he can’t do that too.

He looks down the railings, and he’s clinging to the steel bars as he takes a slight sniff of his cigar. There’s a little less likely chance he’d have another stick after this. His dad has been telling him to quit smoking, yet Lucas thought that he still wanted to play against one of his father’s strict rules. At least, at smoking.

Yeah, he wants this too much to ever let go of it quickly.

A few minutes after, he throws his cigarette away when it burnt down to its last crumbs of nicotine, watching it fall like a feather from the roof of the building. The building stood for about twenty-story high and Lucas wondered where the cigarette will fall. Will it land on the ground? Or maybe by the roof of a car parked outside the building entrance. What it would be like if it falls on a guy’s head instead? Would it still feel hot if it did? Lucas shakes away all those stupid things cycling around his mind and sighs.

There’s not much to do here, honestly. He begs for a day to be free. Just free and away from his dad’s stern and grumpy gaze. He quickly looks down to his black watch and mentally noted that he’s five minutes away from being called from up here to see Dr. Stevens.

Dr. Stevens.

The bald guy in a white suit whom he hates. Not for personal reasons, though. He hates him for responsibility reasons. He hates that the man has to do his job as a doctor and ask him questions that needed no further answers, in fact. Apparently, people in this place don’t have common sense in them. They must take things and words for literal. They don’t do vague impressions and subtle nods of the head. They needed you to speak and Lucas hates speaking too much. Especially, when it involves speaking about himself.

Lucas closes his eyes and tried to smoothly brush the temper off of him that he’s beginning to feel. For some reason, his anger issues brought him here. Well, technically, not just the anger issues. It had also something to do with the last time he drove a motorcycle right straight into a convenience store. But, of course, Lucas isn’t crazy. He wouldn’t have run off a motorcycle just to break the glass doors of an establishment for no reason.

He had done it because he was angry. And that anger had been for that damn store’s owner. Because that man seriously needed a lesson so Lucas gave him that. But despite a reasonable excuse for such an ass move, Lucas’ doings cost him a night at the juvenile center and a week suffering under his father’s hawk eyes after that. He must have been stupid to think he can freely live the life he wanted. He missed being alone now. Most of the time, he needs to stay under someone’s watch. He must act appropriately and always speak with manners because one wrong move and will be the end for him. Play pretend. And he’s not even good at it.

Now, he needs to attend that damn session since he had no other choice. As if he can bear another day of mulling over a hundred bucks worth of two hours talking about himself with a man he barely knew. That Dr. Stevens guy seriously needs to learn more about personal confidentialities. And how not to pry over someone else’s issues.

Lucas could just easily jump off from here and end-all of his troubles in one quick move. But of course, who does he think he is? For all he knew, he wasn’t the coward type. And suicide isn’t his thing, he can bravely face all of this and get on with it. He knows he can get out of this, pretty soon. Really soon.

“Hey, earrings guy!” A voice suddenly startles him, coming out of nowhere. He turns around and frowns.

And there, he finds himself staring at a girl in a yellow sundress, no shoes just barefooted, long locks of unruly golden hair, and looks a bit younger than him. The girl was smiling up at him, with big-rounded eyes and an innocent dopey face. Lucas gawked at her and thought, is she for real?

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“You earrings guy!” she says to him, her eyes shining brighter in delight, “Wow! You have earrings on the nose too?! Doesn’t that hurt?”

She gives him a tilt of her head as she looks at him with deep interest. Lucas frowns again, wondering: Who is this girl?

“Are you mute?” the girl asks him after a moment, and when Lucas thought she was being sarcastic, he realizes she was really asking him out of curiosity. Her face has been scrunched up into an anxious frown, making her look like she was really serious about that question.

“No, I’m not,” Lucas says to her after a beat then looks away.

“Wow,” the girl tells him with extreme awe shown on her face, “You’re really very handsome, earrings guy. Really handsome.”

Lucas tensed and hold back himself, trying hard not to scowl or glare at her. He doesn’t like foolish compliments from weird girls.

“Why are you here? Do you know this place is off-limits for patients?” Lucas tells her, grimly trying to dodge his way out of there after knowing he got some uninvited company.

“I’m not a patient,” the girl replies simply with a jut of her jaw like a child does when he or she tries to act mature or smart.

“Oh, you aren’t?” Lucas raises a brow at her. He had heard that sentence so many times before, coming from several people he’d interacted with in this place. But, apparently, none of them had been saying the truth. And so, he knew this girl isn’t an exception.

“I’m not,” the girl briefly defies as she puts her hands behind her back, swinging herself back and forth. She looks at him with deep studying eyes and slowly smiles.

“What about you? Are you a patient? Do you know this place is off-limits for patients?” She tells him, mimicking his voice at the last statement, and Lucas chuckles at this, shaking his head in the process.

“You surely are a very weird case,” he mutters.

He looks down to her feet, all bare and flawless with red-colored toenails. She has a very white complexion like a ghost’s. And Lucas stares at her with slight interest, quietly checking her out.

“Where’re your shoes?” he asks her once he finally meets her face again after giving her a slow once-over.

“I don’t like them,” she simply says, “I prefer the feel of the ground beneath me.”

“But don’t you feel uncomfortable?”

The girl shakes her head no. “Shoes make me feel uncomfortable.”

“Well, then,” Lucas shrugs, totally unconcerned of her own issues since he didn’t really have any care for her in the first place, “Suit yourself.”

The girl beamed at him. “Okay.”

She’s weird, Lucas thought. And anyway, everyone here is weird. So is him.

“Do you often come up here?” she asks him when Lucas didn’t speak again.

“Not really.” Lucas answers, watching her. Leaning his back on the steel railings behind him, he thought he could still spare some few minutes here. The wind felt good and he doesn’t want to move away from where he stood for a while.

The girl slowly walks towards his side. She puts her arms on the railings beside him and rests them there as she looks down the railings. Every move she makes always appears so slow to him, and he finds it quite weird and funny.

““Woaw!” The girl suddenly exclaims, her rounded eyes getting much rounder and bigger, “We’re so high! I feel like I’m flying! Like a bird! Wow!” She breathes.

Lucas laughs as he watches her with silent interest, wondering what she really is. The girl laughs louder when she gives him a glance and the sound of her laughter brought brightness to Lucas’ current bad mood. He suddenly forgot all his troubles.

 “Were you planning to jump from here, earrings guy?” The girl suddenly asks. And Lucas’ grin fades instantly into a scowl after hearing her speak.

“Please stop calling me that.” He grunts, referring to that obscene nickname.

“What? Earrings guy?” the girl frowns, “But it suits you.”

“No, it doesn’t.  I have a name. And I don’t like people calling me anything else other than my name.”

“Oh, I’m sorry… I…” the girl instantly looked so remorseful.

“I didn’t mean to…” she rambles on, “I just thought it really suits you. ‘Cause you know? You have so many earrings. Way more than I have, see? I only have a pair of two for both of my ears. And you, you have three on each one and another one on the nose and---“

“Okay. That’s enough.” Lucas cuts her off, feeling his ears had just bled off at hearing her endless vomit of words, “Too many reasons. You don’t really have to explain yourself, miss. Just call me Luke and we’d call it quits, then.” He offers, sighing exasperatingly.

“Okay, Luke,” The girl easily agrees, nodding willingly, “Luke, right?” she tries again.

“Right.”

“You smell like smoke, Luke,” the girl tells him out of the blue, then suddenly moves forward to sniff him on the shoulder, “Bad smoke.” She adds, cringing.

“I smoke.”

“You do?” the girl gave him a wide-eyed stare, sounding very well pleased otherwise, “Really? What does it feel like? Frank told me it’s not good. But is it true that—“

“Okay,” Lucas cuts her off again, sensing another batch of consistent rambling, “You know what? I don’t really have much time for this chatting,” he explains, pulling away from the railings as he takes a step toward the direction of the door exit, that has partially remained open, “I had an appointment to really attend now so… Bye. Have a nice life. Miss…?”

“My name’s Kate.” The girl says.

“Kate,” Lucas repeats, playing her name on his lips, “Right. Nice to meet you, Kate. And I hope we won’t see each other again.” He gives her a thumb-up just before he turns around to dart towards the door.

“Wait!” Kate calls out, stopping Lucas from walking, “Why won’t we see each other again?” she asks innocently at his broad back.

“Because we wouldn’t?” Lucas turns his head a little.

“Why?” she asks him, sounding extremely anxious.

“Forget it,” Lucas exhales loudly and faced her, “Forget the whole damn thing I’ve said. It was just a dumb joke, really. So, bye.” He waves for one final moment, desperate to leave now. But Kate follows him behind.

“Wait!” she shouts again.

“What now?” he grumbles annoyingly and turns with a glare.

“Can I… Can I go with you?” she says softly with frightened eyes.

Lucas stares for a second and shakes his head, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Kate,” he sighs as he glances down on his wristwatch which has been ticking seconds away past his scheduled appointment now, “Look. I really have to leave.”

Kate hesitantly takes a step forward, “But, I will be nice,” she says quickly, insisting, “I’ll behave. I promise. Can you take me with you? Please?”

“Why would you even want to go with me?” Lucas frowns at her, “Besides, even if I let you come with me, you still aren’t going to be allowed inside the session room.”

“Why?” Kate asks him. And there’s that question again.

“Because it’s the rule?” Lucas tells her, sounding tired.

“Rule for what?”

“For idiots,” he mutters annoyingly and exhales. There’s really no other way she’d get the point.

“Fine. Come on. I’m getting tired of this,” he tells her impatiently, gesturing to follow him instead.

“Okay!” Kate nods gleefully, dancing along as she walks up to him. Her anxious mood suddenly replaced with a cheery smile. And Lucas found himself unable to drive the girl away. Even if he knew he could do it… He somehow, can’t.

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