Not So Bad After All, chapter 2

Dan Scott rolled his eyes when he entered the kitchen and saw his firstborn readingthe same all the book he had brought from his ex home.

Dan had told him several times then he could just take any book he wanted from his office or any other part of the house to read, but Lucas had refused. He had been doing nothing but brooding since Karen's little scene... Apparently, Dan was back to being the bad guy, even he had actually done nothing to earn back the title.

"Hey, son," Dan decided to act as if he didn't notice the obvious disdain the teen sent his way, "Haven't you read that book already? We can go to the store later and get some new ones if you want."

"I like this one, thank you."

Despite the sharp answer, it was nice to at least know the kid still had good manners. Dan was getting tired of the whole situation, though... How was it possible he had just gotten his son to be with him and even then the stupid Karen still managed to make Lucas hate him?

"Well, you now there are plenty of books in my office, in case you dead tired of reading the same book over and over."

"I don't want anything from you, but I'll keep it in mind."

So they were back to the point of not wanting anything with each other? Really?

"Well, I'm sorry, boy, but you live with me now, so you get to be in my house and eat my food, and that counts as something from me."

Lucas put the book down.

"I'm totally not surprised that you are throwing that in my face even when it's your fault I'm here."

"My what?" Dan huffed, "Don't get me wrong, son, I like having you here, but if I remember well, you were the one that wanted to get to know me."

"So? We could have just gather to talk, there was no need to get my mom to know it or throw a social worker to her."

"Excuse me, young man, but that was the correct process. I had no need to hide in order to talk to you like if I were a creep child stalker." Like hell he was going to meet with his own kid in secret just to not upset Karen.

"My mom didn't deserve it!"

"Come on, I didn't do anything but ask for the right to see my son! That's nothing bad or harming to her." Not like he had tried to ruin her life or something alike.

"She raised me without your help, she..."

"Because she wanted it that way. Look, I'm no angel, but she sure as hell is no martir either. She struggled because she wanted to, period." He’d had enough of that “Poor Karen” bullshit.

"She didn't want you to have power over me!"

"Newsflash, kid: every parent in the world has power over its children and that's completely normal,” Duh, “They're children for a reason, so stop it with that shitty excuse. Did I make some mistakes with Nathan? Yes, but your mother didn't have any way to know how things would go between us when she forbade me into your life."

"You wanted an abortion!"

"But there wasn't any, alright? And it’s stupid to think that just because I was aware I wasn't ready, it means I'm forever the devil." He had told Karen to get an abortion, yes, they hadn’t been ready back then, but that didn’t mean he had hated the child since day 1 and would always do.

"Whatever."

"No, whatever nothing. I didn't do any of this to harm your mom, I wanted to have a chance of being a part of your life now that you are old enough to decide, just that, she was the one that decided it was all or nothing and kicked you out." It sounded harsh, but was the truth. "I have my flaws, sure, but she's selfish too and it's damn time you recognize it."

"Don't talk about her that way!"

"Fine, like I want to spend my day talking about Karen, but you better listen to me, because I'm running out of patience: it's the first chance ever we get to get to know each other and spend some time together, so let's take advantage of it. I'm getting tired of this passive-aggressive brooding tantrum you've been keeping up." 

"I don't..."

"You know damn well what I'm talking about. That said, I know we are starting over, and for me this is not about getting a new Nathan, so I'm going to really do things right this time... One thing hasn't changed, though: I'm not one to just let disrespect go. Understood?"

Lucas rolled his eyes and tried to ignore him, but Dan grasped his chin to force the boy to look at him.

"I asked if you understood."

The kid glared at Dan when he failed to free himself.

"Yes."

"Good," the man let go off him. He didn't want to make the same mistakes he had done with Nathan, but that didn't mean he was about to let a teenager walk over him... Dan had been pretty patient, supposed it was hard for Lucas to have to practically choose between both of his parents, but the kid had to understand that Dan hadn't done anything at all that time, and that he was taking it out on the wrong person. "I hope you understand that includes going back to school tomorrow."

As if being a disrespectful little shit wasn't enough, Lucas had decided that being apart from his mommy's skirt was worth a depressive episode of some sort. He had lost days of school, practices, surely not turned in some homeworks and spent the last days going just from his new room to the kitchen and back.

"Fine."

Apparently they were progressing from passive aggressive to sharp and cold.

“Fine, then.”

.

Even though Lucas wasn't so keen of the idea, the boy soon found himself bored to death and decided to take one of Dan's books. However, it was not like he would talk to the guy after he had been such an ass earlier... Instead, he opted for waiting until his so-called father had to go out to enter his studio. It was a mess because Dan had decided to remodel his office at the dealership and had brought a lot of stuff from there until it was finished, but Lucas still thought he might find something decent to read in there.

Without thinking too much about it, the kid started looking through the stuff on the desk, soon acting more out of curiosity and forgetting about the book.

What he found instead was way more interesting than any other book, after all.