The Long and Winding Road 7/?
Title: The Long and Winding Road
Pairing: Reid and Luke
Other Characters: Henry, Ali, Gretchen and Charlene.
Summary: This is a story about the courtship of Reid and Luke
Disclaimer: These are not my characters. All mistakes are mine.
Rating: PG
A/N: Thanks to the lovely sleeper6 who inspired this chapter. I apologize that I have screwed up the kidney transplant story. I didn't reealize that Luke had kidney failure before he began drinking. I thought that Luke came out to Kevin first, but apparently not. So this is more AU than I had intended. Thanks to ericvanjake for the corrections. Again I apologize for the errors.
“Luke, why did you have a kidney transplant?” Reid asked.
Luke turned bright red. He should have realized that Reid would know exactly what that ugly scar represented. Luke pulled down his shirt, cursing himself for letting Reid see it now. Everything had been magical and now it was ruined because of him and his stupid past.
Luke sighed deeply and stared at the ground. “That’s a long story, Reid. I really don’t have time to get into all of it right now. I’ll tell you at lunch, okay?” Luke asked not looking up from the ground. He couldn’t bear to see the disapproval on Reid’s face. Luke glanced at his watch; it was later than he had thought. “Can we push lunch back until 2:00? I need to go home and shower, and check in with the foundation before I can get away.”
“Okay,” Reid responded, knowing that he wasn’t going to be able to concentrate on anything until he found out about Luke’s health status.
Luke turned to open the door, anxious to escape, but Reid reached out and grabbed his hand. Luke turned back, startled by the contact; he looked into Reid’s eyes and saw confusion and concern but no judgement.
Reid leaned forward and kissed Luke warmly on the lips. He had seen the searing pain in Luke’s beautiful brown eyes and desperately wanted to take it away. ‘What fresh hell is Luke going to reveal to me today?’ he wondered to himself.
Reid broke the kiss and leaned in to whisper, “Luke, you can tell me anything, I won’t think any less of you,” he promised.
Luke grabbed onto Reid with both arms and hugged the older man tightly. “Thank-you,” he whispered against Reid’s ear. Then he turned and left Reid’s office.
“I’ll see you at 2,” Reid called after him, needing reassurance that Luke was actually going to show up.
Luke gave only the smallest of nods and then disappeared around the corner.
Reid went back into his office to brood.
As Luke rounded the corner he passed the nurses station. He was so consumed with how he was going to tell Reid about his stupid teenage behaviour that he didn’t notice the curious glances he was receiving from them.
The nurses took note of the fact that Luke was wearing scrubs. They were pretty sure that he had been wearing jeans when he came in. Charlene was about to make a comment when she noted the haunted look on Luke’s face.
“I wonder what happened between the two of them. They were in Dr. Oliver’s office for quite some time, but Luke just looks…broken. I wonder how Dr. Oliver is feeling,” Gretchen said with a shudder.
The other nurses all nodded in agreement and went back to work.
Just as Luke was about to exit the hospital he bumped into Ali.
“Hey Luke, are you okay?” Ali asked taking in his haggard appearance.
“Yeah, I’m okay, I just really need to go,” Luke said, not wanting to be rude, but not wanting to talk to anyone either.
“Okay, well call me if you want to talk… anytime,” Ali said giving Luke a hug while reminding herself to talk to Casey. She was worried about Luke. He just looked so lost and sad.
“I will Ali,” Luke smiled weakly at her. “Bye.”
“Bye”
Luke drove home and hopped into the shower. As the scalding hot water pounded over his body his mind began to panic. What am I going to say to Reid, he is going to realize that I am not worth his time? I know that he is way too good for me and now he is going to realize that as well. Fuck, why was I such an idiot back in high school. Maybe I should just cancel on Reid. What’s the point of going, he’s just going to leave me anyway. Tears began to stream down Luke’s face. Fuck, fuck, fuck, what the hell am I supposed to do now. Christ I think that I’m in love with him.
I’m going to have to face him and tell him the truth and hope that he can see past my mistakes. After all I’m not drinking anymore. Surely to God that will count for something. I could lie to him, but I don’t want that kind of relationship. I’ve seen how destructive lying can be so I’m just going to face him and tell him the truth. He did promise not to judge me, and Reid is nothing if not honest, so maybe it will be okay. God I hope so!
After giving himself his mini pep talk Luke got out of the shower and put on fresh clothes and headed for Al’s. It was almost 2:00 he would have to check in with the foundation later today or tomorrow. That was one of the perks of running the foundation; he could pretty much set his own hours.
When Luke arrived at the diner he found that Reid was already there waiting for him.
Luke entered the diner and was greeted by Henry. Luke managed to say hello to Henry while keeping his eyes firmly on Reid.
“Hi Reid,” Luke said softly as he reached the table that Reid was sitting at.
Reid visibly relaxed when Luke sat down.
Once again Reid reached across the table as an invitation to hold Luke’s hand. Luke smiled and let out a breath he hadn’t been aware that he was holding as he grasped the older man’s hand.
“I hope that you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of ordering for you. I’m starving and I didn’t want to eat alone,” Reid offered up as an explanation. The truth was he had ordered for the two of them so that he had something to do while he waited for Luke.
He hadn’t managed to get any work done as he had been too preoccupied by Luke’s reaction to his question about the scar. He hadn’t meant to upset the younger man; he just wanted to understand Luke’s medical history.
He could have looked up Luke’s records at Memorial, but he felt that that would have been an invasion of privacy, so instead he had waited until Luke was there to explain it himself.
“So what did you order for me?” Luke asked curiously.
“Chilli and corn bread with a coke to drink, I know that you like their chilli because that’s what you brought for the plane trip to Dallas,” Reid answered with a slight smile.
“An excellent choice, thanks,” Luke replied.
The two men then lapsed into silence, both of them knowing what they were supposed to be talking about, but neither of them wanting to bring it up.
Reid opened his mouth to broach the subject when Henry arrived with their food.
“Thanks Henry,” Luke said smiling warmly at the other man.
“You’re welcome Luke. I hope that everything is to your liking,” he added throwing a pointed look at Reid.
“Everything looks great, Henry. You know that I love your chilli.”
“Well that’s great. Enjoy,” he told them before sauntering back to the kitchen.
“So,” Reid started with his mouth full of the club sandwich he was eating. “You were going to tell me about your kidney transplant.”
Luke gulped audibly, and looked scared, but he nodded in agreement.
Luke ate a spoonful of chilli and then a long drink of his coke before taking a deep breath to steady himself.
He stared at Reid who was giving who was staring back at him with concern in his eyes, so Luke began to tell his story.
“Well the short answer as to why I had to have a kidney transplant is that I abused alcohol while I was a teenager,” Luke began.
Reid was shocked by this answer, but tried to keep his face as neutral as possible.
“So now tell me the longer answer,” Reid coaxed, keeping his voice as gentle as possible.
Luke sighed, “are you sure that you want to hear all of the gory details of my misspent youth?”
“Yes,” Reid stated emphatically. “I want to know everything about you.”
“Remember when you told me that you had realized that you were gay when you were 9 years old and that you were completely fine with that information?”
Reid nodded, not wanting to interrupt Luke’s story.
“Well, it wasn’t quite like that for me. First of all I didn’t really figure out that I was gay until I was in high school. I mean I knew that I wasn’t interested in girls, but I just figured that I was a late bloomer. I just didn’t get why all of my friends were so interested in boobs, you know what I mean?”
“Yeah,” Reid smiled. “Girl parts are kind of gross,” he concurred with a slight shudder.
“Well anyways, I was best friends with a boy named Kevin and gradually I realized that I had feelings, other than friendship for him. I started dreaming about him all the time, and every time we were together I kept staring at him, desperately wanting to touch him and of course I was hoping that he felt the same way about me.”
“Is this the straight guy you mentioned having a crush on the other night?” Reid inquired.
“Yes,” Luke answered with a sigh. “I finally screwed up the courage to come out to Kevin, partly because I wanted to be honest about who I was and partly in the hopes of him telling me that he was gay too.”
“I take it he wasn’t the most sensitive guy to come out to,” Reid stated, feeling angry at the unknown boy.
“No, he completely freaked out on me and so I ended up alienating the first boy that I was infatuated with.The worst part was that I also lost my best friend. I was devastated. I just wanted to escape from myself.”
Reid nodded, his heart hurting at the thought of the enormous amount of pain that Luke, beautiful Luke had gone through.
“So alcohol became my new best friend. It offered me the easiest escape I could find.”
“Where were your parents, didn’t they see what was going on, how much pain you were in?” Reid asked feeling angry with Lily and Holden.
Luke shrugged, “they were going through their own problems. I hadn’t come out to them at that point, although I think that my dad guessed that I had feelings for Kevin.”
Luke felt the tears streaming down his face again. ‘God I’m a mess. Reid must hate me now. I’m sure that he just wants to leave and forget that he ever met me.’
Reid stood up.
Meanwhile, Henry had been watching the interaction between Luke and Reid with growing concern. He didn’t know what they were talking about, but he could tell from Luke’s body language that the young man was terribly upset. Reid he noticed, continued to eat his lunch, nodding occasionally, but not really supporting Luke.
Then Henry noticed that Luke was crying, not loudly, just gently letting the tears run down his face. It was heartbreaking to watch. He looked over to see if Reid was going to comfort him when he noticed that Reid was getting up.
Henry gaped at Reid, ready to step in to rescue Luke. “I knew Reid was heartless,” Henry muttered to himself, hurrying over to rescue Luke.
He was stopped in his tracks as he saw that Reid wasn’t leaving, he was merely moving to the other side of the table so that he could sit right beside Luke and comfort him.
‘Maybe I’ve misjudged him,’ Henry admitted to himself grudgingly.
As soon as Reid sat down beside Luke, he put his arm around the younger man, trying his best to comfort him.
Luke couldn’t believe that Reid was still there. He moved his body closer to the warmth of Reid’s body, tucking his head onto the older man’s shoulder.
“You must hate me,” Luke whispered into Reid’s neck.
Reid jerked away from Luke so that he could look the younger man in the eye. “I could never hate you Luke, never. Drinking your way into kidney failure was stupid, but it wasn’t entirely your fault. I'm sure that you didn't intend to damage yourself . You were just a kid. I’m just sorry that you had to go through all of that.” He gently ran his thumb over Luke’s face to wipe away the blonde’s tears.
The two men sat there for a long time. Reid gently running one hand through Luke’s hair while using his other hand to hold one of Luke’s. Luke had never felt so safe before. He wanted to stay there forever.
Eventually, Reid decided he needed to get Luke home. He could tell that the younger man was exhausted.
“Come on Luke, I think that it’s time to get you home.”
Luke looked stricken, he wanted to stay with Reid, but he didn’t want to force Reid to spend time with him. So Luke stood up, and dug his car keys out of his pocket.
“Put those away,” Reid stated sternly. “You’re in no condition to drive. I’ll drive you here tomorrow morning to pick up your car.”
“Okay,” Luke responded feeling bewildered.
Reid left money on the table to cover the bill as well as a large tip, as they had stayed at the diner for a long time, and hadn’t been interrupted by annoying wait staff. Reid had appreciated the privacy, particularly for Luke’s sake.
“Hank, Luke is leaving his car here overnight. We’ll pick it up tomorrow morning,” Reid stated.
“Sure, no problem,” Henry nodded. ‘Would it kill Reid to say please and thank-you? Why can't he just call me Henry?’ He gave Reid a pass because even he had to admit that Reid was taking excellent care of Luke.