The Pull of Destiny

by Hotcheri

  Robyn glanced up and stuck her tongue out at Shazia before resuming her textathon with furious concentration. “Todd,” she replied, the ‘duh’ tone in her voice cracking me up.

  “I can’t believe it,” I giggled, reaching forward to grab a handful of popcorn from Shazia’s bag. “You two have been dating for almost four months!”

  Shazia’s lips curled up in a teasing grin. “Are you going to dump him soon?”

  Don’t judge us; we just weren’t used to seeing Robyn stick with one guy for more than two weeks. And Todd had seemed so generic from the get-go. Forgive me for thinking that he wouldn’t last long. Obviously, the guy had something special going for him.

  “I don’t think so.” Robyn shook her head, finally letting her phone slip from her hands. She beamed. “He’s just- he’s Todd, you know?”

  Um, not really.

  “He’s got that good good?” I asked, dropping a large, theatrical wink in her direction.

  Throwing a cushion at me, (it missed and bounced off Shazia’s head) Robyn snorted playfully. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Celsi! We haven’t bumped uglies yet!”

  Ahmed snorted with laughter as he strolled into the lounge, very shirtless.

  Is it bad that I’m ogling Ahmed’s chest even though I have a boyfriend? He does have a very nice chest. Well defined stomach muscles. Stop it, mind.

  “Bumped uglies? Nice one, Robyn,” he chuckled, plopping himself right in between me and Shazia. Oh, Lord, all that naked flesh right next to me? Why?! Swiping the popcorn bag from Shazia, he took a handful, grinning friendlily at me. “Hey, Celsi.”

  Uncertainly, I smiled back. “Hi.”

  Ahmed had resumed being nice to me since I yelled at him and his cronies that fateful day. He had actually walked up to me the day after and asked me if I wanted him to rough up the guy who had beaten me up. When I told him that he was in prison, he said that was where he belonged. Sure, it was a nice change, having Ahmed being really nice to me all the time, but with him there was always a catch. His sudden spurts of niceness never lasted for long.

  Let’s see how long he can keep it going this time.

  “So, I hear you’re going to L. A. this summer?” he asked me, a curious look in his brown eyes.

  I nodded. “Yeah, I am.”

  “That’s good,” he said, hiding a yawn behind his hand. “At least you won’t have much of a chance to miss Luke while he’s in The UK.”

  For a few seconds after Ahmed spoke, his words didn’t register. Then all of a sudden it hit.

  Say what now?

  “What?” I asked, whipping my head around to face him. Quailing under the look I had fixed him with, (my eye was twitching and my nostrils were flared. Pure madwoman) Ahmed bit his lip tensely as he realized that he had let slip something I didn’t know.

  “Uh oh,” Robyn said, looking up from her vibrating phone long enough to notice the rising tension in the room.

  Ahmed ran a hand over his face. “Oh, shit. He didn’t tell you yet.”

  It wasn’t a question.

  I pushed back my hair with both hands as I frowned. “What did you mean, when Luke is in the UK?” I asked slowly, my mind whirling.

  “If he hasn’t told you yet then I don’t think I should be-,” Ahmed started, sounding like he was getting some tips in how to be diplomatic from Shazia, who was watching the show with her mouth wide open.

  Shaking my head, I cut in. “You’ve already told me. The least you can do is embellish.”

  Rubbing his temples, Ahmed sighed deeply. The look on his face said it all- he was busted and he damn well knew it.

  “Luke's dad is sending him to finish school in England,” he said in a rush. “I thought you knew otherwise I wouldn’t have-.”

  I stood up, pulling down my creased PJ bottoms. “Can you do me a huge favor, Ahmed?” I asked, my whole body suddenly shaking. How could this be true?

  “Sure,” Ahmed said immediately, obviously seeking to make things right.

  Shrugging into my hoodie, I said “Can you please drive me to Luke's hospital? I need to know if this is true.”

  “Of course,” Ahmed said.

  I followed him out of the lounge as behind me, Robyn yelled, “Shotgun!”

  The ride to Mount Sinai was relatively quiet, apart from the vibration of Robyn’s phone and the constant growling of Shazia’s stomach.

  “Hey, I made that popcorn for a reason, okay?” she said defensively the umpteenth time her stomach rumbled and I shot her a side eye.

  It wasn’t like I had any reason to doubt Ahmed, but I needed to find out for myself. I’d been to visit Luke faithfully every single day since he woke up and not once had he dropped a hint about his dad sending him away. What’s going on? Why did he feel the need to keep something this huge from me? Did he just want to leave in the still of the night then call me from across the pond to tell me where he was? Didn’t he think that I had the right to know? Haven’t we been through enough for me to deserve to find out something like this from him?

  Once we arrived at the hospital, I slipped out of the car and trudged up the staircase to Luke's room alone, my feet feeling heavier with each step. There was a huge lump in my throat, making it hard for me to breath. I didn’t know what to think. Part of me was hoping that Ahmed had just reverted to being his old jerk self and was lying about Luke leaving, but a small, niggling feeling told me that it was the truth. If it was the truth, how was I supposed to deal with that? I would only be gone for two months; Luke would be gone for a full year!

  I found Luke in his room, playing solitaire with a deck of cards on the floor. He looked up as I opened the door and stepped in, his eyes lighting up.

  “Hey, beautiful,” he smiled, getting to his feet with a wince as I crossed my arms over my chest, staring at him and trying to pick out any awkward body language from him. Is he hiding something? It didn’t seem like it, he was acting like his normal self as he came over to me and pecked me on the lips. Did that mean Ahmed was lying or was Luke just really good at hiding things? “What are you doing here so late? Everything okay?”

  My voice shook with emotion as I stared him directly in his gorgeous dark green eyes and asked, “Is it true you’re going to school in the UK for a year?”

  CHAPTER 34

  thanks, that was fun.

  “Who told you?”

  I shook my head as Luke spoke, deciding to ignore his question for now. My mind was filled with unanswered questions, things I needed to find out from him, and I didn’t intend on letting him sidetrack me before he told me what I needed to know.

  “Never mind that now,” I replied, perching myself abruptly onto the edge of Luke's bed and staring up at him as he stood in front of me. “Just- please tell me the truth. Are you going to the UK next week?”

  Biting his lip, Luke ran a hand though his hair, a nervous air surrounding him. “CiCi- I can explain.”

  “I’m sure you can explain, Luke,” I replied, my voice thick with sarcasm as I spoke. “You can explain to me that you’re going away easily. But I don’t think you can explain why you didn’t tell me anything. Why I had to hear it from someone else.”

  And that someone else has to be Ahmed, of all people.

  I knew that I was acting like a jerk, especially since Luke was still getting better and didn’t need his girlfriend barging into his room to accuse him of keeping secrets, but I couldn’t help it. My shoulders slumped. It was always something with us, something or someone keeping us from being happy together. Was it a sign that we just weren’t meant to be?

  But why does it seem so right, though?

  Plopping down next to me, Luke hesitantly slid his hand onto my knee, the simple touch bringing sudden tears to my eyes. I blinked them back, not wanting to look at him, knowing that if I looked into those deep, dark green eyes, I would start crying. And the last thing I wanted to do was look all blotchy when Ahmed, Shazia and Robyn were lying in wait downstairs. “Okay, yeah.” He let out a dee
p breath, squeezing my knee. “I’m going to the UK for school next week.”

  Why couldn’t Ahmed just be wrong?

  Swallowing past a sudden lump in my throat, I finally turned to look at him, a scathing scowl on my face. Hey, it’s better than crying! “So were you going to call me when you arrived in London and tell me? Or maybe you were just going to disappear from my life without even having the decency to break up with me.” I nodded as he opened his mouth to say no, to deny, deny, deny. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what you planned to do.”

  “CiCi, stop it,” Luke said, his voice breaking with emotion as he slipped his arm around me, hugging me towards him. I rested my head on his shoulder, snuggling closer to him as he stroked back my hair. God, I felt so safe in his arms. Why did he have to leave? “I’m not breaking up with you, okay? I just- I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I didn’t know how to break the news to you.” He held me tighter, kissing my forehead. “Don’t you understand that this is hurting me too? You really think that I wanna go? That I wanna leave you?”

  His voice rang with sincerity. Even if I had been the most cynical human being in the world, I’d have a hard time saying that Luke didn’t sound a hundred percent genuine at that moment. Raising my head up from his shoulder, I gazed into his sad, worried eyes. Jeeze, some girlfriend you are, Celsi.

  The guy was sick and all I could harp on was the fact that he didn’t tell me he was leaving? Sure, it was a big deal, but he needed me right now. He needed me to get better and my being mad at him wasn’t helping at all. But unfortunately, I wasn’t done being selfish. He needed me, right? I needed him too, maybe even more.

  I sighed, blowing a gust of air over his neck. “Then don’t,” I said, my voice small and hopeful.

  “I have to,” Luke replied, a rueful grin turning up his lips at my selfish plea. “My dad doesn’t want me to stay here because of the negative influences I supposedly have around me.”

  Obviously, this had Mr. Astor written all over it. I should have known. Mr. Astor definitely had something against seeing his only son happy, didn’t he?

  My lips tightened. “He still doesn’t see that you’ve changed, does he?”

  “Nope.” Luke let out a humorless laugh and he shrugged, rubbing his forehead resignedly. “He doesn’t trust me not to slander the all-important Astor name again.”

  “And he doesn’t care that he’s ruining our relationship either,” I said bitterly, staring down at my hands. Although he hadn’t left yet, I knew that this signaled the beginning of the end. I’d lost Luke for good. He was going to be living on another continent. What made me think that having a long distance relationship would work? I hated the pessimistic thoughts that kept swirling in my head, but I couldn’t stop myself from listening to them.

  Separated for a year?

  Luke would definitely find someone else. I loved him and I knew he loved me, but I also knew that a year was a very long time for a just established couple to be apart.

  Gently, Luke tucked his finger under my chin, forcing my head up. “Please don’t hate me for this,” he whispered, eyes piercing into mine.

  “I would never hate you, Luke,” I replied, my lower lip trembling as tears filled my eyes. It was true. He meant so much to me and I knew it wasn’t his fault that he had to leave.

  He bent his head to kiss me softly, our noses bumping from the difficult angle. I kissed him back slowly, trying to memorize the way his lips moved over mine, the way our breath intermingled, the way he sighed as we pulled apart.

  Just one more thing about him to miss.

  “We still have a week,” he murmured against my lips, hot forehead touching mine. “Let’s make the most of it.”

  ***

  And make the most of it we did. During the next few days, when I wasn’t at school or work, I was helping Luke pack and just hanging out, spending quality time. We were both trying to ignore the elephant in the room as best we could, going to dinner with Hope, Faith and Vanessa, (Mr. Astor was conspicuously absent) enjoying the fresh spring weather by taking walks outside and doing plenty of boyfriend/ girlfriend stuff. I won’t go into detail, suffice to say that it involved a whole lot of kissing.

  Who’s gonna complain about that? Not me!

  We hardly talked about Luke's impending departure, trying to sweep it under the rug as much as possible because if we didn’t talk about it, then maybe it wouldn’t happen, right?

  Dr. Khan wasn’t pleased with Mr. Astor's decision to send Luke away so soon because it meant cutting his recovery time substantially. Although Luke was recuperating far quicker than anyone would have thought, Dr. Khan didn’t think it was a good idea to move Luke to a totally unfamiliar location so soon after his aneurysm rupture. But Mr. Astor was stubborn, to say the least. Finally, a defeated Dr. Khan gave Luke a full physical evaluation and had to concede that Luke was fit for travel.

  “But I still think that you should wait a while, Mr. Astor,” he pleaded after he told us the results of Luke's checkup. “Although Luke seems well on the surface, neurological damage can surface after a period of time. It would be wise for him to go to the UK perhaps in September, when the time for danger has passed.”

  Obviously, Mr. Astor wouldn’t hear of it. Once he found out that Luke was talking to Ahmed again and that Denise, Wendy and Joanna had come to visit him, he was immovable in his resolve to remove Luke from his so-called ‘bad influences.’

  Sorry, Dr. Khan, you tried.

  Apart from the day that I had taken Faith to the daycare for the first time, my dealings with Mr. Astor were few and far between. I was happy to keep it that way. He had made it clear that he didn’t approve of my relationship with Luke, even though the rest of his family seemed to embrace it. Vanessa had even invited me to visit them for Christmas, once Luke got settled in. I wasn’t sure what Aunt Kelly would say about that, since we had spent every Christmas since my mom had abandoned me together, but I was hoping for a positive answer from her when I finally got around to asking her permission.

  Absolutely no pressure.

  ***

  Now that Luke was better, Mr. Astor rarely showed up at the hospital, so imagine my surprise when I went to meet Luke so that we could fulfill an important entry in his bucket list and found Mr. Astor pacing outside Luke's room.

  I stopped short as soon as I saw him, twisting my hands together nervously as Mr. Astor spotted me out of the corner of his eye.

  Damned peripheral movement.

  His eyebrows drew together in a frown as he turned to face me and I quaked, suddenly wondering if everything was okay. Mr. Astor had barely visited Luke since he woke up, so seeing him right outside Luke's hospital room with a scowl on his face sent me into panic mode. First and foremost in my mind was the thought- had something happened to Luke?

  He had sounded perfectly chipper when he called me earlier, asking if I wanted to accompany him to Shane’s grave for him to say goodbye to his best friend. My heart sank as negative thoughts ran rampant through my head. Was Luke okay? And if he was, why was his dad here? Was he going to drive us to the cemetery?

  That won’t be fun.

  “Miss Sawyer.” Mr. Astor sounded out my last name in his haughty drawl, his lips curling with a smirk. “What a nice surprise.”

  It didn’t sound like he thought it was a nice surprise, seeing me here and I sniffed internally.

  Right back atcha, bud.

  Reluctantly, I said, “Hi, Mr. Astor,” as politely as possible.

  He was on my crap list for so many reasons but he was still my boyfriend’s dad and I still had to be respectful towards him, no matter how hard it was.

  “Here to see Luke, are you?”

  Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, (Mr. Astor seems to have that effect on me) I said, “Yes. We’re going to visit Shane.” He said nothing in response to that, just continued gazing at me, his eyes sharp. I waited a beat before asking, “Is Luke in his room?”

  Because we really neede
d to leave, and fast. Mr. Astor was starting to freak me out with that little half smile on his face.

  Stepping towards me, Mr. Astor replied, “Luke's showering.”

  He opened the door to Luke's room, gesturing for me to enter. “Have a seat. He won’t be long.”

  Remembering the disaster that had stuck the last time I was left alone in a room with Mr. Astor, I nervously walked into the room and sat down primly, my heart almost thudding out of my chest. He closed the door, waited for me to get comfortable in the armchair I had seated myself in and cleared his throat.

  “So, I’m sure you’ve heard that Luke is leaving soon,” he started, hands clasped behind his back as he stared up at something that had no doubt caught his eye near the ceiling

  Nodding, I said, “Yes.”

  This was the last topic I wanted to talk about. I didn’t even want to think about Luke getting on a plane and leaving, but obviously, Mr. Astor would be the person to bring it up. It was like he enjoyed being the antagonist, shooting down people’s dreams and ruining lives.

  He probably does enjoy it, Celsi.

  “Perhaps being out of his comfort zone will have a positive effect on him,” he continued smugly, sounding like he was doing Luke a huge favor by uprooting him from everyone and everything he held dear.

  I looked up at him, unable to keep quiet any longer. “Don’t you think that Luke needs to be in his comfort zone, to be around people he knows, in order to get better?”

  “Not sure if we’re talking about the same Luke,” Mr. Astor replied coolly. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Miss Sawyer, but Luke is better.”

  He said that in such a smart-alecky tone that I snorted out loud.

  What a jerk.

  “It takes months for people to recover from serious neurological surgery,” I said, my voice taking on a plaintive tone as I stared desperately at Mr. Astor. “Luke hasn’t even made a full recovery yet but you’re moving him to England because you don’t trust him? It’s not fair.”