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Lucky nearly ran back to the penthouse.
All he wanted was to get that
man, Daniel Forst, out of his head.
But it seemed to be the one thing
he couldn't do. Why couldn't
he just forget, he wondered, as he picked
up more speed.
Everyone else had already arrived
at the penthouse, and were chatting
quietly when Lucky burst through
the door. He hadn't waited on Renaldo
to open the door, who was now standing
behind him perplexed. Everyone
looked at his appearance in shock.
He was pale and sweating, and looked
like something had knocked his
breath out of him. Not taking note of
all the people around him, Lucky
started to his room when Luke jumped up
and grabbed his arm, spinning him
around.
"Lucky, what's wrong?" Luke asked
quietly and panicked, "Did something
happen?"
Lucky stared at his father, his
heart screaming at him once again to
just break down and spill everything.
But he could barely speak right
now.
"Nothing happened, I'm just a little
tired because I decided to take a
jog." He lied.
Laura walked over to them and took
his other arm.
"Sweetie, are you sure that's it?
You can tell us anything, you know."
She said.
Lucky looked at her for a moment
before responding.
"I know mom, but nothing's wrong,
really. I'm just worn out from the
jog, so I think I'll just go lie
down for awhile, okay?" Lucky asked.
"Yeah, that's fine. But if
you want to come out or talk or something,
we'll be here for awhile." Laura
replied.
Lucky nodded and walked out of
the room.
Luke and Laura sat back down, worried
now about their son.
"He was lying." Laura said sadly,
"His mind is going through something
right now, and he won't tell us."
Luke reached over and grabbed her
hand, seeing she was close to tears.
"I know baby doll. We just
have to be patient and try to find a way to
get through."
Emily spoke up from her spot next
to Liz.
"Mr. Spen-, I mean, Luke, maybe
Liz and I could get him to talk. Lucky
and I had a talk the other day,
and he told me he stayed away from me
for so long because he thought
I couldn't forgive him for lying to me.
Maybe it's the same kind of situation.
Maybe he's just afraid to talk
to you because he's scared that
there is something you won't forgive him
for."
"You think he'd say anything to
you?" Luke asked.
"He might. I did tell him
the other day that he could tell me anything,
and he seemed to believe me.
And he already tells Liz everything."
Liz blushed but looked up at the
Spencers.
"Yeah, I think the two of us together
could get something out of him."
Liz said.
Luke smiled at the two girls and
thanked them.
"Well, shall we go ahead and eat?"
Jason asked.
Mike looked at him amused.
"Is food all you think about?"
he returned.
"You gotta eat to live, right?"
Jason said seriously.
Bobbie chuckled as she lifted Michael
into his high chair.
"At least I've got someone raising
my grandson that has the necessities
of life down." She said.
In his room, Lucky sat staring at
the Cassadine medallion. It had
belonged to that man he just saw,
Daniel. He was the one that pulled
him from the car that day.
He was the one that--- Lucky's thoughts
were interrupted by a knock at
the door. Opening his bag, he hid the
medallion as fast as he could,
and reluctantly opened the door. Liz and
Emily were on the other side, and
came in his room and sat down on the
bed.
"Hey Lucky, how ya doin?" Liz asked
cheerfully.
Lucky gave her a questioning look,
but replied.
"I'm fine. What did you two
want?"
"Do we have to want something?
We're you two best friends, right?
Can't we just come in to talk?"
Emily asked.
"Of course you can, but like I
said out there, I'm tired. So unless
this is important, I think we could
'just talk' later."
Liz and Emily frowned at him.
Maybe this wouldn't be as easy as they
thought.
"All right, we'll skip the small
talk then." Liz said flatly, "We're
worried about you, and we think
there is something you're not telling
us. So spill it."
Lucky looked at them uneasily.
Maybe they were two people he could
tell.
He took a deep breath as he pulled
up a chair and sat across from the
girls.
"I saw someone on the docks tonight.
I think I know him, from my past.
I can't remember where or how,
though. He said his name was Daniel
Forst, but that doesn't sound right
to me. And he was talking to Helena
Cassadine, too."
Emily and Liz looked at each other
worriedly at his last statement.
"Lucky, don't you think that if
this involves Helena that you should
tell your parents?" Liz asked.
"I can't! I can't talk to
them about this!"
"Why Lucky? You have to work
at getting over the mistakes they made.
They were just mistakes."
Emily said.
Lucky became panicked now, and
his words came out in a rush. He didn't
notice Luke and Laura were now
standing in the doorway.
"I have gotten over them.
That's not the problem!"
Liz looked at him confused.
"Then what it is? If your
not mad at them for what they did anymore,
why can't you reconcile with them?"
"Because I lied to them too.
Something happened when we were on the
run, something bad. I did
something that I'm completely ashamed of.
But I never told them. For
awhile, I guess I blocked it out, but
recently I've been having these
dreams, that bring back everything. Now
I can't tell them because they'd
never forgive me."
"How can be sure if you don't even
give us the chance?" Luke spoke up.
Lucky jumped at Luke's voice and
stood up stunned. Tears were filling
his eyes, and he backed up against
the wall, almost like he was afraid
of them.
"Lucky, there isn't anything so
bad that we wouldn't forgive you for
it." Laura said.
"Yes there is." Lucky whispered
as he went on, "Yes there is."
Luke and Laura walked over to their
son. Laura reached out and laid a
hand on his arm. It shocked
her when her son jumped and drew back.
"How about we go out to the living
room and talk about this, okay?" Luke
asked.
Lucky shook his head and scooted
down the wall.
"No, I just want to be alone right
now. I have to… clear my head."
Lucky said.
"It feels better to talk things
out." Laura said, still trying, "Don't
you want to give it a try?"
"Not now, please." he wiped
the tears away as he looked up at them,
"Maybe later, okay?"
Laura was going to protest but
Luke stopped her.
"All right, Cowboy, we'll leave
you alone for now. But don't think this
conversation is over."
Liz and Emily stood up from the
bed and walked out, Luke and Laura
following them. As soon as
the door was shut Lucky let all his tears
out. He was going to have
to tell them now. He couldn't avoid it any
longer. All he had done for
the moment was simply delay the truth from
coming out.
Helena sat at her desk, studying
the latest reports that had been handed
to her. The man she had put
on Lucky had discovered that he was staying
at Jason Morgan's penthouse.
Not only that, but the Spencers seemed to
be regular visitors there.
If this had been a normal day, she would
have been furious that the rift
between parents and son seemed to be
closing. But after Daniel's
visit, this was good news. Lucky was going
to need his parents to get through
this.
She would never admit she cared.
It was just concern. Concern for a
boy that she accidentally put in
danger at a young age. It could just
have easily been Nikolas.
All she was doing was following the example
of Stefan and Luke. No matter
how much they feuded, they would not harm
each other's children. Picking
up a picture of Lucky, she ran her
fingers over his face. For
a Spencer, he really wasn't all that bad.
He was intelligent, knew how to
handle people, and could think on his
feet. Had she been able to
totally break his loyalty for his parents
when he worked for her, he would
have been an invaluable asset. Luke
and Laura Spencer didn't deserve
him. They had named him right, though.
The boy had lived through ten years
on the run, been shot, stabbed,
fallen into a bog, and once survived
Daniel Forst. She silently prayed
he could do it again.
She could warn him, but would much
good come from that. If she stayed
on the inside with Daniel, she
might be able to mess up his plans. But
if she told, Daniel would have
her killed. Not only that, Luke would
kill her too for what she did.
Lucky woke up late. He wandered
into the main room and found a note.
Jason had some business to attend
too, and Emily had gone back home, but
would be around a lot to visit.
He also found that Latecia had taken
Michael out for a walk. Just
then he heard a knock on the door, and
Renaldo stuck his head in.
"Mr. Cassadine to see Ms. Quartermaine."
Renaldo announced.
Lucky stared at Nikolas as he entered.
He was too emotionally worn to
get into another fight today.
"Emily's not here. She went
home." Lucky said.
"Oh. Okay."
Nikolas stood there, a little nervously.
Was he just supposed to turn
around and leave now? He
found himself wanting to stay there and talk
to his brother. He was his
brother, even if he denied it. And he
looked like he needed a friend
at the moment. Perhaps he could help.
"Did you want something else, or
does it take this long for your brain
to register what I said."
Lucky said.
Nikolas sighed. Perhaps he
couldn't help. He didn't want to get drawn
into another quarrel started for
no good reason.
"No, that was all."
Lucky regretted what he said as
he saw Nikolas turn to leave.
"Hey, Niky, um, I'm sorry about
that. It was just kinda reflex, I
guess."
Nikolas stared back at him.
Lucky had just apologized to him? Not only
that, but it had even sounded sincere.
For the second time, he changed
his mind. Perhaps he could
help.
"That's all right. Growing
up learning not to be nice to Cassadines is
probably a hard habit to break."
"Yeah, I guess it is. Truce
is still on, right?" Lucky asked.
"Of course. Anything I hold
against you is purely because you're a
jerk, not because you're a Spencer."
Lucky let out a small laugh before
he could help himself. It what just
because of all the stress, though,
he told himself. He would have
laughed at anyone to relieve a
little bit of his jumbled mind. Nikolas
smiled back, though.
"So you here all alone?" he asked.
"Yeah, everyone had somewhere to
go, and I just slept in too late to go
with them."
"I seem to have done the same thing.
Stefan was gone when I got up, and
I missed Emily now, too."
There was an awkward silence now.
Neither knew what to say, but were
reluctant to end a conversation
where they were actually getting along.
"Lucky, uh, are you okay?
You looked a little, uh, stressed out."
"So what's new?"
"If you want to talk about anything…..
I mean, I know we still aren't on
great terms, but sometimes it's
nice to talk to someone who's in the
same position as you. And
if your problems are with you family, I could
certainly sympathize with you there."
Lucky looked a Nikolas for minute.
Maybe he wasn't all that bad…
"Well, you know, we should probably
stay away from discussing family
problems, or we'd be at each other's
throats again. But you know, if
you want to just, I don't know,
hang out or something, since both of us
seem to be alone for the day.
Of course you could probably go catch
Emily at the Q's or something.
Never mind."
"No, Lucky, I think that would
be great. Have you eaten yet?"
"No, I just got up."
"Great." Nik said happily, "You
want to go get something at the PC
Grill?"
"Um, I don't know, I mean that's
rather public, isn't it?"
"Yeah, but that's okay, right?"
Nik said a little hurt, "Unless you
don't want to be seen with me."
"Nah, that's fine." Lucky said
smiling, "Besides, we can get all those
shocked looks from people."
Lucky wrote a quick note, and the
brothers left for the grill.
.
They were halfway through their
meal, and everything was going
surprisingly well. Nikolas
talked of what his life was growing up in
Greece, and Lucky shared stories
of Lulu with him.
"Lucky, can I ask you something?"
"Sure, what?"
"Well, I've talked about my past,
but I really don't know that much
about yours. I know you grew
up on the run and all, but what was that
like?"
Lucky looked down and waited a
moment before he responded.
"It was just life. You know,
we had good and bad moments just like any
other family."
"Except your bad moments were normally
life threatening." Nikolas said.
Lucky nodded. "Yeah. But
it's not as bad as it sounds. I was never
really scared." He lowered his
voice to a whisper, "Except for maybe
once."
"When was that?" Nik asked, carefully.
"There was this one time that I
got separated from my parents for
awhile."
"How long was awhile?" Nik prodded.
"About six months."
"Six months? Lucky, that's
more than awhile. How old were you?"
Lucky replied, his voice flat,
"Seven."
Nikolas looked at him in surprise.
He had lost track Stefan once at an
airport when he was seven.
They were off to another boring meeting with
some royalty, and he had wandered
off. He'd only been lost for two
hours, and it had scared him to
death. He couldn't even imagine what it
must have been like to lose your
parents for six months.
"How did you survive without them
for that long?"
"I knew how to take care of myself.
And we had back up plans in case
something like that happened.
I found a friend of my father's." Lucky
said, moving uncomfortably in his
chair. "Eventually, mom and dad found
out where I was."
"Why did it take them six months
to find you, especially if you were
with one of Luke's friends?"
"It just did, okay?"
Nikolas was about to ask more questions,
but the waiter arrived then
with the check.
"Just put it on the Cassadine bill,
okay." Nikolas said.
"No, wait, my half will be cash."
Lucky said quickly.
"Lucky, stop. Put your money
away." Nik then turned to the waiter.
"On the bill, as I said."
The waiter nodded and walked off,
as Lucky gave Nikolas a look.
"I can pay for it myself, you know."
"Yeah, but I'm the one that asked
you to come to the grill, therefore I
pay."
"Well the other time you paid for
my lunch here with Elizabeth, you
didn't invite me, so me paying
this time evens it up."
"Lucky, just shut up and let me
pay, all right?"
Lucky regarded him with a suspicious
eye for a minute, but then he just
smiled and nodded.
"Fine. But this is the last
time."
"Whatever you say Spencer." Nik
replied smiling.
"So what now?"
"Huh?"
Lucky got a little nervous and
avoided eye contact as he talked.
"Well, I mean, did you want to
do anything else today?"
Nikolas allowed himself a small
smile. His brother actually wanted to
spend time with him.
"Sure, what did you have in mind?"
"I don't know, you want to go see
a movie or anything?" Lucky suggested.
"I've never really gone to the
theater that much."
"Oh yeah. Um, well…"
They sat there not knowing what
to say. They didn't want this to
happen. They had been getting
along so well, but now their different up
bringings were showing up.
Then Nikolas had an idea.
"You ever gone water skiing?"
Lucky look up surprised. "You're
kidding, right? I mean, yeah, I have,
but you?"
Nikolas smiled. "Well life
as a Cassadine isn't quite as morbid and
boring as you think. I got
Uncle to let me keep a speedboat out on the
other side of the island.
Thing is, it kind of take two people, you
know, someone has to drive, so
I haven't had a chance to ski in a long
time."
"Well if you're serious, I can
certainly drive, as well as ski. When I
was down in Hawaii once, dad taught
me how."
"I don't know what was more shocking
about that statement. That you
actually got to live in Hawaii
for awhile, or that Luke Spencer knows
how to water-ski." Nik replied.
Lucky laughed as he replied, "Yeah,
well life on the run could be
glamorous at times. And all
Spencers are people with many talents."
They got up to leave then, a Spencer
willingly following a Cassadine to
Spoon Island for an afternoon of
fun.
It was early evening, as Luke paced
back and forth. Laura stared at him
irritated.
"Could you please sit down, Luke?"
"Laura, our son has been gone all
day, and he only left a note that says
'Gone out to eat, be back later.'
I've had Jason check all his normal
places. He's not at Kelly's
or the boxcar, or anywhere."
Liz and Emily entered the penthouse
then. They smiled at Laura, and
noticed how wound up Luke was.
"Hello girls. Have you seen
Lucky?"
"Not since the last time you asked
us Mr. Spen, uh, Luke." Emily said.
Jason walked down the steps, slightly
amused at Luke.
"You know, Lucky can take care
of himself. Maybe he just wanted to be
by himself for awhile. I
know what that's like."
The door opened then, and Lucky
walked in laughing, with Nikolas behind
him. Everyone looked at them,
shock evident on their faces. Lucky's
smile faded quickly, and he looked
down.
"Uh, hi everyone."
"Lucky. You had us worried,
you know." Luke said confused. "Your note
wasn't very specific."
"Yeah, well, I really didn't know
what all I was going to do when I left
today."
Laura looked at her boys, and couldn't
help but smile. They looked like
they had been getting along when
they came in. It saddened her, though,
that they looked like they'd been
caught with their hand in the cookie
jar when everyone saw them together.
"So what did you end up doing?"
she asked.
Nikolas could see that Lucky didn't
really want to speak up, so he did
it for him.
"Um, well, I came by looking for
Emily this morning, but Lucky was the
only one here. So we went
out for breakfast, and then we went skiing
behind Spoon Island."
There was a deadly silence, then.
Everyone was waiting for the blow up
from Luke. But it never came.
"Well, Niky, since you're here,
you might as well stay for dinner with
the rest of us."
Though it didn't seem possible,
everyone's eyes widened even more at
Luke's words.. Luke just
walked over to the table as if nothing had
happened. If the Cassadine
boy had actually gotten Lucky to enjoy
himself for once, he wasn't going
to ruin it. He just didn't want to
see Laura smiling at him about
it. Lucky and Nikolas exchanged glances,
and then sat down with everyone
else. Lulu raced over and sat on
Nikolas' lap. Still no remark
from Luke, though. This was certainly an
interesting change in behavior,
from more than one Spencer.