Intertwined

Luke - Obsession is just another word for "I love you."

Hello there! This is rather a departure from the chronological form of writing; it's a story written in multiple perspectives about the exact same night, in order to give a broader view of the big picture. Don't forget to vote, comment, and become a fan if you think this story is worth it after reading! Enjoy!

Credit goes to Obsidian Dawn Resources (http://www.obsidiandawn.com) for the brushes I used in making the book cover.

Warning: One-sided incest

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Five lives. One stormy night. Their stories are strung together by the threads of Fate.

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Luke – Obsession is just another word for “I love you.”

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The glossy calendar hanging on the stark white hospital wall displays the page for July 5.

It’s today. Does she even remember?

Luke watches through a window as a woman bursts out of the doors of the Intensive Care Unit with a smile on her face. Dr. Lara Christina Hayes. She has always wanted to be a doctor. It is like her, he muses, to choose a profession that’s so selfless, so noble, so…good. From the look on her face, she has likely taken in yet another successful operation under her belt. He wonders whose lucky life she has saved now. With a long string of accomplishments and accolades already behind the young doctor, there will be certainly more to come.

In her doctor’s garb, with her glasses slightly askew, her messy red hair, and tired but triumphant eyes, his twin sister is the most beautiful woman in the world.

He calls to mind one particular afternoon of their youth. They were out in their garden with a few friends who lived in the same affluent neighborhood, playing London Bridge at the insistence of Lara’s best friend, Katie. Giggling and shrieking, the children raced beneath the arch made by Dan and Mario’s outstretched arms – Luke had never liked those two, because they kept trying to attract his sister’s attention, but Lara wanted everyone to be included – running as fast as they could so that they wouldn’t be caught at the end of the song.

“London Bridge is falling down,

Falling down, falling down,

London Bridge is falling down,

My fair lady!”

Katie was captured first, and then Rick, and then Caroline, until there were only Luke and Lara left, dashing together underneath and around the two boys while the rest of the kids shouted the lyrics of the song happily, waiting to see who the victor would be. Lara and Luke were laughing and making faces at each other as they ran along. Suddenly, in Luke’s distraction, he had lost his footing and tripped on a large chiseled rock, scraping his hands and knees on its rough edges. Luke stared in horror at the sight of blood on the rock’s bleached white surface and his own marred skin. The pain was exquisite, but registering the presence of other children who would certainly taunt him for being a crybaby, he held back his tears.

All was silent; everyone was simply gaping at the minor disaster that impeded their playtime. Only his twin sister had the presence of mind to rush to him and guide him back to the house, telling everyone else that they’d continue playing when Luke was better again. When they were finally, blessedly alone, it was then that Luke started to cry.

“It’s okay, Lukie. I can fix you,” Lara said, smiling. She pressed a clean towel on the wound to curb the bleeding, dabbed alcohol around the wound, applied ointment and clumsily bandaged the wounded area. Afterwards, she kissed the injured areas like she’d seen their mother do a thousand times whenever one of them got hurt.

“Lukie, are you feeling better?” she’d asked, looking up at him with the wide, innocent eyes of a child. He had nodded; he knew that he wasn’t going to be playing again anytime that day, but he was going to be okay. Lara went on talking. “You know what? I want to be a doctor when I grow up, so I can save people, you know, like Superman but not really. Whaddaya think?”

“You’ll do awesome.” He gave her a childish grin, and she smiled back.

She was like a goddess when she smiled. Mind-blowing. Beautiful. The world could come crashing around your ears and that smile would be the only thing tethering you to existence. And before Luke could catch himself, he fell.

That was the day he knew he would love his sister forever. 

As they’d grown older, he tried to shield her from males and treated any who were close to Lara coldly. He felt a kind of dark satisfaction chasing off boys who tried to get near her – almost as if he were her secret knight in shining armor. Lara, the darling ingénue she was, probably didn’t even realize anything was going on. A lot of people he knew chalked up Luke’s behavior to an adorable case of brotherly over-protectiveness. They knew nothing.

It wasn’t over-protectiveness. It was possessiveness. He wouldn’t stand for it if she belonged to someone else. If he could snatch her up and live with her alone on some remote island so no one could get to her, he would do it. She was his and his alone. And if he couldn’t have her, then he very well couldn’t let anyone else do so, now could he?

The sharp sound of something that sounds like a gunshot slices into his thoughts. He whirls around, tense and searching, until his eyes spot a bunch of raggedy street urchins hiding a few yards away from an exploded cherry bomb, snickering at some people who had been alarmed at the sound. Luke overhears one old woman distinctly ranting to her little grandson, catching excerpts like, “Grow up to be a respectable man” and “Kids these days.” His initial fear subsiding, he begins to feel the familiar anger creeping back into his soul that fuels his very existence in this world. Rage and vengeance. These are concepts he can understand very well, especially when directed towards mindless idiots. It is maddening how something as simple as a cock-and-pull motion can tear two people apart forever.

…Then again, he thinks, pulling back into the present, I’m here now. And to some extent, I am with her. I guess that’s all that matters. He reaches out as far as he can with his hand, fancying that his fingers are caressing her face, the face that is so like his. They have the same red hair, the same mouth, the same glasses that never want to stay put on their matching noses; it is like seeing himself in female version. Their dark green eyes, he believes, are their most striking similarity. Of course, his smile could never compare to hers.

His attention is drawn by the sight of a dark-haired man in a navy button-up who glides past the hospital doors up to his sister. One thought races through his mind, searing it like a branding iron: It is him. The man attempts to hide an enormous bouquet of pink begonias behind his back (idiot, she prefers roses, red ones), embraces her, and brushes his lips against Lara’s cheek.

Luke can feel his own blood boil under his skin, his temper rising closer to the surface each second he sees this man who is with his sister, who is talking to his sister, who is touching his sister – the man who should be Luke. He watches, seething, as the man whips out the bouquet like some cheap, side-street magician and gives it with a pretentious bow to his sister. Lara laughs in amusement and accepts the flowers, dipping into a little curtsy and smiling at him.

“London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down…”

It is that smile the completely undoes Luke, because it is supposed to be his smile, the smile that should be reserved for him. How he could almost taste that man’s life meeting a horrible death at Luke’s hands. He smiles. It is a twisted, murderous smile.

“London Bridge is falling down…”

Luke knows all about him and his little secrets, that Devon Sanders. He spits the name in his mind. It would be a joy to end him. His heart races a little faster in anticipation and he lets out a wicked laugh. And then Luke and Lara can be together forever.

“My fair lady...”

Luke’s form begins to disappear into the night, but before completely vanishing, he says in a whisper like the rattling hiss of a dying man…

“I’ll see you in hell.”