Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2006 19:37:04 -0400
From: Miss Meehan <lilliluthor@hotmail.com>
Subject: Playing For Keeps - Chapter 2

It wasn't until he looked around and saw the time that he remembered
freshman orientation. With classes due to start in another week, there were
a variety of activities this week to acclimate freshman to the campus and
college life. Lucas grabbed his robe and stuffed his feet into his
slippers. He rummaged through his top dresser drawer where he kept his
toiletries. He supposed that Nathan was already in the shower. He seemed to
have a thing for being ready on time. The floor was relatively empty since
most of students wouldn't be returning until the end of the week. A few
shower stalls were in use but from what he could tell, Nathan was not
there. 'Maybe he went for breakfast,' Lucas assured himself. A rising fear
that the jock was somewhere telling everyone he'd met that his roomy was
queer began to bubble in the pit of his stomach.  He'd read about incidents
like that in the online newsletter he subscribed to. One guy had been
viciously attacked by a gang of jocks after such an incident.

Lucas fought hard to swallow down his fears. He quickly left the shower,
returned to his room and dressed. By the time he was ready to leave, there
was still no sign of Nathan. Lucas stopped by Haley's room and knocked but
there was no answer. He hurried across campus, this time to the Harriman
building. He located the main auditorium and walked in looking around to
see if Haley and her roommate Brooke were there. A small hand waving
frantically confirmed this.  He jogged down the side aisle to where they
were sitting. To his surprise, Nathan was sitting there too on Haley's
right side, Brooke was on her left, leaving Lucas a seat next to the
cheerleader.

"Why didn't you wake me?" Lucas leaned across the girls to ask.

"I thought you were hungover," Nathan apologized, "I know I was. I don't
remember a thing about last night."

Lucas stared at the boy incredulously. Nathan could scarcely hold his gaze.
'So that's how you want to play it,' he thought bitterly.  At that moment
Lucas decided two things, the first was to be more choosy about who he
slept with and the second was to get as far away from Nathan Scott as
possible. The latter would prove more problematic since they happened to be
sharing a dorm room.

During the morning break, students milled around the dining hall sipping
coffee and juice and eating donuts. Most were reconnecting with people
they'd met at last night's mixer. Since making a reconnection was not on
Lucas' agenda, he stood by himself as even Haley, led away by Brooke joined
a group of what he assumed were sorority wannabes. He was so busy feeling
like an outsider that he didn't notice the figure that walked up to him
until a cup of coffee and a powdery donut were shoved in his face.

"Here," Nathan said, "you missed the refreshments they served this
morning."

"Thanks," Lucas said grudgingly. He had no intention of even speaking to
the jerk now standing before him.

"I could drink four cups of this," Nathan said, raising his coffee cup "and
it wouldn't do any good. I swear my head is pounding and last night is a
complete blank. Man, I must have been totally wasted."

Lucas felt his anger bubbling up inside of him.

"So you told me," he answered tersely.

"What's that supposed to me?"  "I don't know Nathan, last night was a blur
for me too. Is that what you want to hear me say?"

"Lower your voice. Your acting like a girl."

"And you're acting like the prick I met yesterday morning."

Lucas tossed his coffee and donut in the nearest garbage bin and left the
dining hall hastily. He knew he couldn't do it, stay there and pretend
nothing happened the way Nathan wanted him so desperately to. He hurried
across the quad back to his dorm taking the steps two at a time until he
reached his floor.  By the time he got to his room his chest was pounding
and he felt dizzy. He fumbled with the lock and entered in time to grab his
medicine.

#####

Haley walked up to Nathan who stood shell shocked by Lucas' outburst. "Is
everything okay?" She asked gently.

"Yeah. Sure. I'm just the biggest jerk to ever walk the face of the earth,"
he said, dumping his refreshments and exiting the hall as well.

"Nathan wait up," Haley called after him. Nathan slowed just a little,
allowing the girl to walk by his side.

"What's going on? Did you and Lucas have a fight?"

"Something like that."

"Was it about the party?"

"Why would say that?" Nathan asked defensively.

"Well, he didn't seem to be having a good time and we were all drunk so..."

"Oh. Well...yeah....something happened and now he's mad about it.," Nathan
answered trying to be as evasive as possible.

"Look, I know you two didn't hit it off well..."

"He told you that?"

Haley shut her eyes momentarily. She hadn't meant to let him know they'd
talked about him.

"Well there was some obvious tension between you two so it wasn't hard to
guess."

"Well now you can say there is even more tension but it's no big deal. Our
living arrangement is temporary. My dad is sort of a legend around here and
in a couple of weeks I'll be in his old fraternity. Till then, I'll just
have to keep my distance."

"Sorry things aren't working out between you two," Haley offered
sympathetically.

"Why? You're his friend not mine. Why should you care how I feel?"

Haley briefly thought Lucas was right, this guy is a jerk. But something
told her their was more to the jock then his brash exterior. She willed her
self to not judge him too harshly.

"Look, Luke would kill me if I told you this, but he's sort of been a loner
since he was a kid. He never knew his father and the only thing that gave
him a sense of identity was basketball."

 "He plays basketball?"Nathan asked in disbelief.

"He used to and he was pretty good at it. Almost got a scholarship here to
play."

"So what happened? Injured knee?"

"He has ..." Haley bit her lip wondering why she was about to confide
intimate details about her best friend to practically a stranger.

"Does it have something to do with the meds he's taking?"

Haley stared at Nathan in disbelief. She never figured on Lucas sharing his
medical problems with someone he thought was a jerk.

"He told you about his heart condition?"

The confusion on Nathan's face made Haley realize she'd blundered again.

"He has a heart condition," Nathan said slowly. It was more a statement
than a question..

"If you didn't know, how did you know about his meds?"

"I guess I was snooping." The jock's face flushed with embarrassment.

"Look, I'm going to go find Luke," Haley said, barely controlling her anger
over his last statement, "you go back to the orientation. Maybe you can
fill us in later."

"Haley wait, I think I should go."

"I think you've done enough already," she fumed.

"You don't understand. Something...happened last night.  I need to talk to
him."

She watched Nathan nodding at her as if he was waiting for her to
understand something. The problem was what she thought he was implying
couldn't be possible, not after the things Luke had said about him.

"Alright, you go." She was about to give him the classic warning about
hurting her friend when Brooke called down the hallway.

"Hey there you two are. Where's Lucas, the next session is about to start?"

"He wasn't feeling well," Haley and Nathan said in unison. Something about
it made her trust the guy just a little more.

"I'm going to go check on him," Nathan added. "Take good notes," he called
over his shoulder as he jogged down the corridor and disappeared out the
door.

"He's probably hung over," Brooke humphed, dragging Haley towards the
auditorium by her arm.

#####


The door was opened when Nathan arrived. He knocked first just to warn his
roommate he was coming in. He felt the blood drain from his face when he
saw the blond laid out on the floor, pills scattered everywhere. He rushed
to the boy's side grabbing him up in his arms.  He didn't appear to be
breathing and his lips were turning a bluish color. Nathan wasted no
time. He fished out his cell phone and dialed 911, calmly giving as much
information as the operator asked for. He pushed down th desire to curse
her out for asking so many questions. That would be something his father
would do. He realized the more information he gave, the better prepared the
paramedics would be to help Lucas when they arrived. He read off the
medication to the operator and gathered as many of the pills as he could.
He cursed himself for not bothering to ask Haley what type of heart
condition Lucas had.

He called security to alert them to what was happening to insure that the
paramedics were sent up without delay. Security told him they would also
contact one of the medical personnel on staff.  Nathan just prayed that
someone would get there soon.

"Just hold on and I'll make everything right." He held Lucas close in his
arms.

It seemed like an eternity before anyone showed up and then the room was
abuzz with paramedics, one of the school nurses and the dorm monitor plus
on lookers who skipped out on the freshman orientation.  Lucas was floating
in and out of consciousness as they loaded him up on the stretcher. Nathan
rode with him to the hospital. It wasn't until he was asked to step outside
of the treatment area that he remembered Haley. Hoping that she hadn't
turned her phone off, he stepped out of the ambulance bay into the sunlight
and dialed her number.

"Haley, thank god," he sighed when his new best friend answered.

"What's going on?" Haley asked, heading out of the auditorium to better
hear Nathan.

"It's Lucas. We're at Kensington General."

The stress of all that transpired finally took its toll on the teen and he
found himself barely keeping it together as his voice threatened to break
while he relayed all that had happened.

"I couldn't help them. I don't know his mom's name and number or what type
of heart condition he has."

Haley told him about the HCM and then told him she would call Lucas' mom.

"Hang in there Nathan. I'm getting Brooke and we'll be there shortly."

"I don't even know where this hospital is."

The teen sounded so lost to Haley, that was the quality in him that made
her feel compassion for him earlier.

"Don't worry, I'll find out where it is. Just sit tight, we'll be there
soon."

Haley clicked off and called Karen, Lucas' mom. Not having money enough to
book a flight on such short notice, Karen picked up the phone and dialed
the one man she never thought she would.

"You're son is sick, I need a ticket up to his school."

#####

When Dan insisted on flying out with her, Karen had no idea why. Dan had
never acknowledge that Lucas was his son. He even refused a paternity test
to prove it. 'Maybe he's softening in his old age,' she thought before
chucking that notion aside. In any event she agreed to let him come with
her.

Dan was pretty sure Karen wouldn't deliberately send her son to the very
same school his son was going to. The fact that she didn't object to his
coming along made it almost clear that she had no idea Nathan was
there. Nathan was about six months younger then Lucas. Dan had opted to
marry the well off woman he knocked up shortly after refusing to own up to
his responsibilities with Karen. He'd heard that Lucas had been sick and
that was why he didn't graduate a year earlier.  Though their sons went to
different schools, Dan made it his business to keep tabs on Karen and her
son. He couldn't figure out how he'd missed this vital piece of
information.

While he believed Karen thought it was a nice gesture on his part to fly to
the school with her, he actually wanted to talk to his old pal Dean Whitey
Durham and see what he could do to insure that Lucas Roe would not be
returning for another semester.

		#####

Lucas' condition was stabilized but the doctors were going to keep him
overnight for observation. Brooke seemed totally bored to have to spend the
rest of her day hanging out in a hospital so after receiving the news that
Luke would be alright, Haley gave her the go ahead to leave which she did
without hesitation.  Karen had called to say she was flying in and would be
at the hospital within the next two hours. Haley had given her the doctor's
name and all the information they knew. The staff had been reluctant to
update them since they weren't family until Nathan blurted out that Lucas
was his life partner.

After convincing Nathan to leave Lucas' side so he could rest, the two
walked over to the cafeteria for coffee. As soon as they were settled by a
window near a secluded corner Haley started in.

"So what's all this about you being Luke's life partner?"

"We needed information and they were being pricks."

"You could have said you were brothers?" Haley offered.

"I doubt they would have believed me," Nathan said, staring down into his
coffee.

"Why?"

"Because when he woke up...I sort of...kissed him."