Roommates with Benefits [18+ only]

61. Meant to be

"Why does this feel so weird?" I mused just as we passed the sign that welcomed us into our hometown.

Lukas smiled as he took a left turn. "People here have known us all our lives."

"And they'll see us together." I bit my lips, feeling slightly nervous.

"Is that a bad thing?" He turned to me for a split second before focusing back on the road. "It's not like we're that much different. In terms of background, I mean." He must have noticed my confused look, because he added: "I mean, we're not ... Ali from Encino and Daniel from Reseda."

I chuckled. "Really? The Karate Kid?"

"What?" Lukas shrugged. "It's a classic."

"I guess we have more in common than I thought."

Lukas smiled, taking the chance to place a hand on my thigh, which he had done for the most part of the trip. Amazingly, an eight-hour long car trip from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania wasn't boring at all, if anything it gave us a chance to talk a lot more and get to know even more about each other. In terms of likings, that is. We dissected all the regular topics we never really got to even while living together. We could have taken the train, but Lukas insisted that we used his car, which made the trip a lot longer, but we enjoyed it.

"Wait, do they know I'm with you?" Lukas wondered out of the blue.

"It's a bit late to ask that, don't you think?" I chuckled as we crossed the familiar roads that have seen us growing up – close yet far away from each other.

"I can always sleep at my place." He grimaced a bit. "It's empty anyway."

"Completely?"

"Well, I haven't been there in 3 years," he shrugged, "and my father is always traveling, so ... other than George and the others, there's no one."

"Who's George? I thought you didn't have uncles."

"I don't." He chuckled. "George is ... well, the butler."

"Right, right," I laughed, "you grew up with a butler ... and housemaids, I presume?"

Lukas fainted a smile as he clouded over for a moment. "I didn't, not exactly. George arrived after ... well, you know ..."

"Oh, my God, Lukas, I'm sorry." I brushed his arm, realizing my idiocy. "That was so insensitive of me."

"It's fine," he shook his head, but I could see the sadness in his blue-sky eyes. "I don't like that place anyway. It's way too big for one person."

"Is that why you threw all those parties in high school?" I joked, just to lighten up the mood a bit, feeling guilty about having rubbed salt in the wound so gracelessly. The truth is, coming back to our hometown for me meant facing my old insecurities, but for him it meant stirring a grief he's never gotten over.

He smiled a bit. "Yeah, in a way it was to fill the house, make it noisy, distract myself ... but for the most part it was just to piss off my dad." He shrugged. "Worked every time."

"I'd like to see it." I mentioned as I took a chance to entwine our fingers while his hand was on my thigh. "The house, I mean, I'd like to go there ... if it's not a problem for you."

"No, of course, not, it's fine." Lukas offered me one of his sweet smiles, then turned back to the road. "I do miss George a bit. He was always nice to me. I mean, he didn't exactly approve of my ... lifestyle. The wild parties, a different girl coming out of my room every morning, the times I disappeared for days without warning ..."

"Ok, I'm gonna ignore the part about the girls." I wrinkled my nose at him in fake annoyance, to which he chuckled. "But it sounds like George cared about you."