Breaking Lacy (Nick & Lacy Book 1) Read online

  Unfortunately, even the instructors weren’t spared the rumor mill, for the pranks and bullying comments went on right in front of them, ignored and unrestricted.

  Each day the gifts at my locker became more crude and lewd. By the end of my first week, I had hoped the anonymous pranksters would run out of creativity or lose interest. The following Monday morning, however, the beginning of my second week at school, proved me woefully wrong when I arrived to find a used condom dangling from the handle of my locker door. A hole had been pierced into the end of it, allowing a droplet of fluid to ooze and coagulate on the outer tip. The note attached read: “Oops!”

  A small crowd gathered to snicker and whisper. Just as it occurred to me that it was time to go to the principal and beg for intervention, my physics instructor, Mr. Holland, walked by. I thought he might empathize, but instead, he only glowered with disgust when he saw my desecrated locker.

  It took every fiber of pride in my body not to burst into tears and run away, but I refused to let them all see that after an entire week of effort, they had finally broken me.

  Not wanting to touch the gooey mess, instead of trying to get into my locker, I turned to head toward my first class, intent on leaving the disgusting scene for the janitor to clean up. Mr. Holland stopped me.

  “I know you weren’t about to leave that mess on your locker, were you, Miss Dalton?”

  Humiliation took a backseat to my defiance over such unfair treatment. Especially from one in a position of authority who would allow such atrocities toward one of his pupils to go unchecked.

  “Actually, that’s exactly what I was planning to do,” I said coolly, turning my back to him, preparing to leave.

  His threat stopped me in my tracks. “If you leave this mess, Miss Dalton, it’ll cost you a week of after-school detention.”

  I whirled back around, glaring at him with incredulity. “You can’t do that! I didn’t do anything!”

  He slid a glance back toward the revolting fixture on the front of my locker as though that were justification enough.

  “I’m not cleaning that up,” I declared. “It’ll rot and grow mold hanging right where it is before I touch it.”

  “Then I’ll see you in my class after school today.”

  Without waiting to test the extent of my belligerence, Mr. Holland strode away before I could protest that Mr. Franklin would be expecting me in the auditorium after school.

  My stubborn refusal to clean the desecrated locker inadvertently put a snowball on its furious downhill course.

  By leaving my locker in a state of defilement and refusing to touch it—much less clean it—I effectively cut myself off from my school supplies, which were still stashed within the locker confines. Most of my instructors hardly noticed the absence of my textbooks, so long as I participated in class and came prepared to take notes. Mr. Holland, however, in his efforts to force my cooperative submission, beleaguered me with an extra day of after-school detention for each day that I came to class ill-prepared. He refused to let the janitor touch my locker until after the last class on Friday afternoon, the end of my second week at school, by which time I had already accrued another full week of detention.

  Nick

  Friday evening, the end of Lacy’s second week at her new school, was the anniversary marking one month since she had come to live with me. I had hoped that her melancholia would diminish once she started back to school, but quite the opposite occurred. With each passing day, she seemed to slip deeper into herself, and further out of my reach.

  I tried cheering her up by bringing home books and magazines from the campus library that I thought she might enjoy. We sat beside each other on the sofa sharing popcorn during our favorite weekly sitcoms. Nothing seemed to work. I had hoped having access to the piano at school would help, but after two weeks of after-school practice, I finally decided that perhaps her music only made her miss home, and her mother, even more.

  Finally, unable to bear seeing her in such a despondent state, I decided to give her some space and drive to Claryville to visit my parents. I had wanted to stay home and spend a quiet evening alone with her while Chris was on a date, but relented when she insisted that she would be fine on her own, and even preferred to have the evening alone for a change. After promising to check in on Jerry, I begrudgingly made the hour-long trip to Claryville.

  My parents had just finished dinner when I arrived, so I waited in the living room while my mom and dad cleaned up the kitchen. I tossed my coat over the back of the sofa, where Kevin sprawled out reading a book. After sitting across from him in our father’s easy-chair, I kicked my feet up on the coffee table with a sigh.

  Kevin looked so forlorn that I wasn’t without a tinge of guilt. He missed Lacy just as much as I suspected she missed him. In the past, Kevin’s Friday nights would have been spent out on a date with Lacy. Or hanging out in one of their bedrooms doing homework or making out. Or planning their wedding and subsequent future together. His current, pathetic state was almost enough to make me feel sorry for him.

  Almost.

  Not being one to pass up an opportunity to gloat, I kicked Kevin’s foot to get his attention. “Heard from Lace?”

  Kevin apparently either missed or chose to ignore my snide undertone. “Nope.”

  “Hum.” I waited for him to elaborate but he didn’t. “Alrighty then.”

  “Alrighty then,” he parroted. Finally, he tore his attention from the book to glare at me. “Have you?”

  “Me!”

  “Yeah, you!”

  “Why would I hear from Lace?”

  “Go ahead and play stupid,” Kevin sneered.

  I shook my head. “You’re paranoid, dude. Get a life.”

  Kevin shot to his feet, prompting me to do the same when he took a menacing step toward me. “I had a life until you fucked it up!”

  “What the… What’s going on in here?” bellowed my father, coming from the kitchen, with my mother on his heels.

  Ignoring my parents, Kevin and I both carried on in our heated dispute. “I didn’t fuck up anything, you little shit. You fucked it up all by yourself.”

  “Nick!” cried my shocked mother, wringing her hands dry on the apron tied about her hips.

  Kevin ignored our parents the same as I by clearing the space between us and daring to put his face close to mine. “Go ahead. Tell ’em how you set me up!”

  “Yeah, Kevin, it was all a big conspiracy! Like I was supposed to know she’d come out looking for you that night.”

  I let out a contemptuous snort as I grabbed my coat and turned toward the front door to leave. My father stopped me before I took more than a few steps.

  “Wait a damned minute! I want to know what this is about!”

  “Tell ’em what you did to me!”

  My mother hurried over to Kevin’s side and put a protective arm around his shoulder. “What did your brother do to you, honey?”

  I rolled my eyes and exhaled a dry, disdainful laugh over my mother’s blatant exhibit of favoritism. “Yeah, what I did. How about you tell them what you did, Kevin? Or should I tell them how Lace caught you and Claire screwing out in the tool shed? Betcha forgot to mention that part of the story when you were whining about her dumping you, didn’t cha?”

  The room fell silent. My mother and father both turned shocked, disbelieving eyes toward Kevin, who paled over being outed to our parents.

  “Kevin?” my father asked. “Is that true?”

  Kevin glared at me. If he had any expectations of coming out of this fight with the upper hand, I had just demolished those hopes.

  “Kevin?” My mother wrung her hands, the disappointment starting in her eyes and etching its way across the rest of her features the longer Kevin hesitated in answering. When he lowered his head, apparently too ashamed to face our parents, his prolonged silence told them both all they needed to know.

  “Oh, Kevin, no!” my mother cried in dismay.

  “If it’s true, Kevin,
I don’t see what Nick has to with any of this,” said dad.

  “I don’t have anything to do with it, Dad.”

  Before I could get sucked back into the fight and possibly slip something incriminating, I shrugged on my jacket, preparing to go next door to visit Jerry. Or even back home without seeing him. Anything to get out that house. I had to leave before my parents switched the focus of their interrogation from Kevin to me.

  “I’m outta here.”

  I strode past my mother, refusing to meet her eyes when she turned to watch me leave. “Where are you going? We need to talk about this, Nick. Your father and I want to know what’s going on here.”

  I stopped at the door and turned to glare at Kevin. “What’s going on here, Mom, is that your precious baby there screwed up. And instead of taking responsibility for what he did, for the past few months he’s been trying to ease his guilty conscience by pawning the blame off on me. He needs to just get over it and move on the way Lace did.”

  Kevin pounced on my words. “I was right! You have talked to her!”

  “Whatever…” I drawled, rolling my eyes, refusing to let him drag me back into dangerous territory. “I’m going to run over and see how Jerry’s doing. I’ll call you later, Mom.”

  I slammed the door behind me before any further questions or comments could follow, mentally cursing myself for nearly falling victim to my own devices.

  Lacy

  When Nick picked me up from school this afternoon, the pity in his eyes over my bottomless well of despondency was too much to stomach. I hadn’t told him of my detention and had been letting him believe I was practicing after school for the past week. Without knowing the cause for my despair, I knew he hadn’t wanted to leave me in such a depressed state, but I couldn’t abide him wasting yet another Friday night trying to lift my spirits in vain. Not when he should have been out on a date trying to get over Claire, or out having fun with Chris and their friends.

  Knowing Nick didn’t want to leave me alone tonight only added to my turmoil because, deep down, I hadn’t wanted him to go. I needed and wanted his friendship and companionship now more than ever. He always had the right words. His shoulder was always there for my tears. His heart always seemed open for me. My growing attachment to him was beginning to breed confusing and inappropriate feelings. Those feeling had started to blossom even before I came to live with him, but had grown exponentially over the past month.

  No matter how awkward and uncertain my relationship with Kevin had been when I ran away, every inappropriate thought or feeling for Nick weighed unmercifully heavy on my heart and conscience. I may have wanted to spend the evening with Nick, but common decency and respect for Kevin, no matter how undeserving he might be, dictated that I avoid throwing myself headlong into situations that would ultimately only compound my guilt.

  Yet, as I strummed my guitar while Nick was gone home to Claryville, I couldn’t help looking at my watch with a mixture of anticipation and guilt, wondering when he would be back, hoping it would be soon. It was that guilt that prompted me to make my first phone call home since leaving.

  I started to dial my father’s number but instinctively knew that he either wouldn’t be home, wouldn’t want to talk to me, or would be too drunk to carry a coherent conversation. Talking to him would only plunge my troubled spirits to new depths. I dialed the number to the only other person in the world who could warm my heart without flooding it with guilt.

  “Hello,” Kevin half-yelled when he answered on the second ring. He sounded so angry and harsh that I almost hung up, not wanting to incur the brunt of his current fury. His mood would only worsen once I refused to offer the explanations he would surely demand. “Hello?” he said again, sounding more impatient than angry this time.

  “Hello, Kevin.”

  The subsequent silence felt so thick that I worried maybe he didn’t hear me.

  “Lacy,” he finally said, as though I were the last person he expected to receive a phone call from on this night.

  “You sound upset. Did I call at a bad time?”

  “No, no,” he assured me quickly. “Nick was just here and we got into a fight, but never mind that. How are you?”

  “I’m good,” I lied. “How are you?”

  He must have decided he’d had enough of the preliminaries, for his voice warmed with heartbreak. “I miss you, Lacy.”

  Trying to bite back a wave of tears, over a lump in my throat I barely managed to say, “I miss you too.”

  “Then come home. Please.”

  I recovered my bearings enough to finally speak with ease. “I just miss you and needed to hear a friendly voice.” Then I added an amendment. “I needed to hear your voice.”

  “Lacy, you know you can call me anytime. You could give me your number so I could call you. Are you really in New York like Jerry says?”

  Unable to lie but unwilling to admit the truth either, I sidestepped his probing. “Kevin, please. This phone isn’t mine. I can only stay on for a few minutes.”

  Put off from further prying, he seemed at a momentary loss for what direction to continue. “Can I let anyone know that you called? Your dad? My mom and dad? Mark? Everyone always asks if we’ve heard from you.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t. You’re the only person I’ve called. I don’t want my dad or your parents or anyone else to feel like I don’t miss them enough to call them too.” My claim must have moved him beyond words, for he remained silent. “I do miss you, Kevin. I’m sorry I left things between us the way they were. There was a lot left unresolved for us both and-”

  “I don’t care about any of that. Just tell me you still love me.”

  “Of course, I still love you.”

  “Then tell me you’ll be back this summer to get married like we planned.”

  I wanted more than anything to tell him yes, that he could count on my coming back. But deep down there was a nagging whisper of uncertainty.

  “Lacy?”

  Wiping tears from my cheeks and sniffling away those that hadn’t fallen yet, I finally found my voice. “I do still love you, Kevin. You know I always will-”

  “And I will you,” he cut in, as though anticipating the unsaid and trying to keep it unspoken.

  So much had happened. I wasn’t the same girl I was three months ago. Kevin deserved to be happy. I didn’t want him wasting away the months ahead of us by believing I would come back. Not when I recognized the changes in myself and knew there was a chance I might not return home. It wouldn’t be fair to give him hope in light of my doubts.

  “I just don’t know, Kevin. You know that nothing is turning out the way we thought it would and I don’t want to make promises I might break. You deserve better than that.”

  He mulled over my claim for a moment, and then finally let out a defeated sigh. “I hate this, Lacy. I want to see you. It’s been killing me that you left without a word or a note or anything, and now I’m just supposed to accept it all with no questions asked?”

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered, regretting the hurt I was causing him. Not wanting to cause him any more pain tonight, I abruptly blurted out, “I have to go now, Kevin. I’ll try to call again soon. I miss you.”

  “I miss you, too. I love you, Lacy,” he called out, a split second before I hung up.

  “Good-bye, Kevin,” I whispered to the silent living room.

  Nick

  “The little shit,” I muttered on my way up the steps of the Dalton’s front porch, still fuming over the encounter with Kevin and my parents.

  Jerry looked sickly and pale, drunk and haggard when he finally answered the door after my fourth knock. At least he was going in to work these days; his briefcase and the suit jacket that matched the slacks he wore were lying on the chair by the door, where he had dropped them when he came home. He had unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt and loosened his tie, which still dangled sloppily from his rumpled collar.

  “Nick! Come in, come in! Tell me, how’s my daugh
ter?” He waved me over to join him on the sofa, where he picked up the near-empty bottle of whiskey from the coffee table and took a long swig.

  Ignoring his question, I posed one of my own. “So, how’s drinking yourself to death working for ya, Jer?”

  “Oh, fine. Just fine. Want some?” Jerry held up the bottle and swished around what was left of its contents.

  I grimaced and turned my head away when I caught a whiff of his sour breath. “No thanks. Knock yourself out.”

  Not bothering with the glass, he emptied the bottle in a few long swigs and set it back down on the table with a thud of finality. Wiping the dribble off his chin with the back of his hand, he asked again, “How’s my daughter?”

  Disgusted, and already put out by the scene over at my parent’s house with Kevin, I stood and turned on Jerry. “What the hell is your problem, Jerry? Huh?” I kicked the empty whiskey bottle off the table, sending it flying across the room. “Why are you doing this to Lace?”

  When Jerry stared at his liquor bottle as though I’d just kicked his favorite dog rather than an inanimate object, I bent over to put my face inches from his. “I thought you were going to straighten up and get your act together, Jer! I thought the reason you wanted me to take Lace away from here was so you could clean up. How do you think she’s doing? She misses you. She wants to see you, but how am I going to allow that when you’re still fucked up like this?”

  “I told you, I don’t want to see her!” As though he were ashamed of himself for admitting such a truth, he lowered his head into his hands.

  I shook my head, even more revolted if that were possible. “You’re pathetic.”

  Jerry raised his head and looked me right in the eye, his expression so stark sober that I bit back any further admonishment. “I don’t want to see her. I don’t want her coming back here because I’m sick. I’m sick, Nick, do you hear me? So, if it’s all the same to you, just take care of her like you said you would and let me live what’s left of my life how I see fit.”