20. A different Lincoln(2)

What he didn't expect was for Lynn to look at him with sad eyes, to bite her lip and sigh. And of course, he wasn't expecting her to say what she said.

"I would give it all away, my sports, my trophies, everything just to have more time with you", she told him, breaking the hug, almost shunning from his touch. "But… I've already stolen a lot of your time for myself. The other day… later that night..."

"Wow, hang on a second, you didn't steal me from no one" he started to protest, but Lynn shushed him and put a finger on his lips.

"Lincoln, I'm not the only one that needs you", she painfully said. "Lucy… you should check on her. Last night I was with her all afternoon, we even bunked in my bed. And Lincoln… I don't know how to help her."

Lucy. Lincoln was shaking just by thinking how his little sister might be feeling. How she could be coping with this tragedy. After that fateful Sunday when he passed out in the park, Lucy's reaction had been one of his major concerns. That really small talk on the junkyard had barely helped him understand what was going on inside her mind. The biggest conclusion he could make out of that was that Lucy, after all, feared death just like everyone else.

"I see", he finally said, considering his options. "Alright, if you say so..."

He stood up, ready to go back into the house, heading to Lynn and Lucy's room. He gave one last look at the athlete, who was sitting with her back against the tree and looking at him like someone saying goodbye to a family member at a train station. He just took two steps away from her before changing his mind.

"Come with me", he invited her.

"What? No, no, she needs you."

"She needs all of us. We all need each other."

"Lincoln… I know what you're trying to do but… Believe me, I know Lucy", she said, absolutely convinced of what she was saying. "She's different with you. She needs her brother, not me."

"Lynn-"

"Just go", she said, sounding a little impatience and highly soulful. "Go with her. Please."

Lucy and Lynn might fight a lot, but no one could deny just how much they loved and were worried for each other.

To find Lucy lying still on her bed was nothing new. One of her favorite hobbies was to play dead. In theory, it should've been a relief for Lincoln to see her like that. But the circumstances had changed, and Lincoln couldn't even begin to think that she was okay after finding her in a fetal position on her bed, with her poetry journal on the floor with several pages ripped off from it. She didn't move a muscle when he opened the door, nor when he got inside the room, nor when he gasped after seeing the state of her side of the bedroom. The only thing she did was stare at the wall.

Time to be the big brother.

"Lucy, are you alright?" He asked, more out of courtesy than because he needed an answer to such an obvious question.

Perhaps she believed it was Lynn who had gotten in the room and that's why she didn't even flinch, since after listening to her brother's voice Lucy visibly shuddered. She grabbed her pillow and pressed it hard against her face, probably to wipe it clean. She quickly fixed her bangs before sitting on her bed, facing him. She wasn't looking at him in the eye, she was more interested in her own black shoes.

"L-Lincoln", she said, doing her best effort to sound monotonous and uninterested. Trying to sound like her usual self.

"What are all these pages?" Asked the boy, walking carefully not to step on any paper as he got near her bed.

Lucy didn't answer. As soon as Lincoln sat next to her, she simply hugged him. In her eight years, Lucy had never been a girl of many words. To ask her for eloquence or to explain something to the detail during what was undoubtedly the hardest, most painful moment of her life was asking too much. And even though he thought it was awful that he would feel like this, Lincoln couldn't repress a small sensation of relief. To hug his sisters would never be inconvenient for him. He could and would do it for the rest of his life —which, actually, wasn't saying a lot—, he would gladly give a hug to anyone of them that would ask him to.

What he was having trouble doing was talking. Words. Emotive chats. It was impossible to avoid them, they were bound to happen. It was the most logical thing, and he knew he should expect more of them, it was obvious that he'd see his sisters in a vulnerable position and he would talk with them to try and make them feel better. It was one of his objectives, after all, to fix things up with his sisters. Recent experiences, however, weren't really encouraging.

Luan was still locked in her world of videotapes and recordings. Lynn was still pushing herself to the limit, to the point of hurting herself. Before going into Lucy's room he had quickly checked on Luna, just to find the rocker lying on her bed with her headphones at maximum volume. Even from the door, Lincoln had recognized the playlist. It was the same songs he had watched her listen to when the radio announced the death of that drummer from an English band she really liked. The same songs she had lost herself into for a whole week after her short fight with Sam.

He was just accumulating failures. All the talks he had with his sisters were emotionally wearing him out, they stressed him, reduced him to a bunch of nerves and pain. And the worst thing was that evidently, they weren't doing much to help his sisters. All his efforts were fruitless. That's why he was internally thankful for Lucy's silence. By staying silent and let him just hug her, she was saving him the colossal effort of coming up with the right words, explanations, and thoughts that wouldn't really do much in the end. He was saving time, but more important, he was saving a little bit of pain.

The best thing for him would've been to remain in silence and simply wait for Lucy to calm down. To try to avoid creating a new moment that would drain him once again. But Lincoln was simply incapable of doing that. With his scare sister in his arms, he couldn't just stay there and let her suffer. A voice inside him was screaming for him to say something about it.

"You can trust me, Lucy", he said, moving slightly back and forth, lovingly rubbing her arms. "What did you do to your poetry journal?"

"I-I can't-"

She was chocked by her words. He didn't rush her, he simply kept stroking her arms and back, giving her time to pull herself together.

"I can't do it anymore."

"You can't what?" Lincoln softly asked.

"Write", Lucy answered, burying her face in Lincoln's chest. "I can't… everything I write… Everything I can think of… I enjoyed my poems all my life, b-but now that I… Every time I think about that..."

All her body was shaken like a leaf brushed by the wind.

"I don't want to write more poems", she finally said. "They're supposed to help me escape reality. They should… they should help me get through tough times. They shouldn't make me feel this… this… b-bad..."

Lincoln was already trying to come up with a solution to this problem. His little sister loved poetry, she was such a talented writer, incredibly creative and with a tremendous potential. She couldn't resign to one of her true passions. This was very much like Luna trying to forget music so she wouldn't feel depressed for all the songs that reminded her of Lincoln. He couldn't let this happen.

He was starting to get a bit tired of the position in which he was holding his sister, so he moved a bit to get more comfortable. When he moved, however, he heard a sound. He found out a folded sheet of paper between the blankets. Lucy saw it too.

"T-That's… I tried to write something", she admitted.

"Would you mind reading it to me?" Lincoln asked her.

The silence and Lucy's impassivity told Lincoln that she wasn't especially interested in sharing it.

"Please", he begged. "I love your poems. I've always had."

For the first time since the previous day, Lucy sighed. It was music for Lincoln's ears. Lucy's sighs were an important part of his life just as much as Luan's puns, Luna's jams or Lisa's experiments. With trembling hands, Lucy grabbed the page and fixed its folds, trying to make it readable again. She stared at the manuscript and gave one last look at Lincoln.

He nodded to reassure her, and Lucy started to read:

No culpo al que no ve poesía, (I don't blame the one who doesn't read poetry)le temo al que al verla no siente. (I'm afraid of the one that sees it and feels nothing)Prefiero una lágrima fría a cuencas vacías (I'd rather have a cold tear than empty slots)que por callar llantos se mienten. (that for silencing cries they lie to themselves.)

¿Y cómo sé que lo eterno es injuria? (And how do I know the eternal is an insult?)Si nadie otorga un minuto al reloj. (If no one gives the hour to the clock)¿Y quién protege al paraguas de la lluvia? (And who protects the umbrella from the rain?)Si nadie alumbra a la sombra del Sol. (If no one lights under the shadow of the Sun)

Sólo soy huesos y piel… ¿en qué sucio motel (I'm nothing but skin and bones... in which filthy motel)debe haber los manuales de Dios? (are the manuals of God?)Si la vida es tener que aprender a firmar un papel (If life is having to learn how to sign a paper)que al nacer lleva escrito un adiós. (when you're born, saying "Goodbye")

Si quieres la flor por su tacto, (If you love the flower for its touch)no ignores la espina ni el fruto. (Don't ignore the fruit or the thorn)Resumen de amor en dos actos: (Love summarized in two acts:)vestirse de blanco y acabar de luto. (Dress in all white and finish in black)

No se pueden ver lunas brillantes (You can't see shiny moons)si no partes de la oscuridad. (if you don't start from the darkness)Qué infinito se torna un instante. (How infinite an instant may become)Y qué efímera es la eternidad. (And how fleeting the eternity is.)

As soon as she finished reading it, Lucy hugged Lincoln once again. He wasn't the most clever kid when it came to analyzing poetry. He didn't understand much of rhetorical figures or metric, and his vocabulary wasn't particularly ample. He had trouble understanding some of the verses he had just heard, but even so, he understood the general idea. And he knew what was going on with her. That poem was an invaluable x-ray on her feelings.

"That was really beautiful, Luce", he told her, honestly impressed. "Really good."

"Th-Thank you", she said.

"Can I make a suggestion?"

"Yes."

"You're so good writing poems about what you feel. You're so amazing at it, you shouldn't stop doing it."

"But… what I feel right now-"

"What is it?" He interrupted her. "What is it that you feel? In this precise moment. And I know that it's been a hard day for you. I know you probably feel sad, furious, worried. But right now, speaking to me as I'm embracing you, what do you really feel?"

The little goth girl took her time to answer. She closed her eyes and started to take deep breaths. Lincoln felt every movement her chest made, every mouthful of air that went inside her lungs. It seemed like an easy question, but he knew it wasn't easy to answer at all. And more importantly, he knew that Lucy would understand what he meant. After all, she was such a clever girl. After silent minutes of pondering, Lucy finally answered him.

"Love", she simply said, turning her head to look right into Lincoln's eyes.

Finally, he allowed himself to smile. He tenderly stroked Lucy's right cheek.

"I've never done this before, but can I ask you to write a poem for me?"

"A… poem?"

"I know you like dark and spooky stuff, but if you're okay with this, I'd like you to write me a poem about our relationship. I want to know what my little cute vampire thinks of me."

When Lucy's face turned itself into a smile, Lincoln knew that he had fulfilled his older brother duty once again. To see Lucy smile had always been one of those little treats he could only have once in a while. In the actual context, that little, almost imperceptible but absolutely honest smile was all Lincoln could ask for.

"I will", Lucy said, still smiling at him before breaking the hug to pick up her journal.

Sensing that his part was done, Lincoln decided to leave the room. There was nothing else to do there, and his bladder was asking for relief. He started to walk in the door's direction.

"Lincoln."

After hearing Lucy's voice, he turned around once more. She had her journal pressed against her chest. Her head seemed to be still trying to decide whether she should look at the carpet on the floor or the wall to her left. She finally sighed and looked up, fixing her eyes on her older brother.

"I love you."

To say that he was surprised would be underestimating the situation. Just as it would be to simply say that those words had made him extremely happy. Lincoln, for some reason, was really touched after hearing her cute little sister, one of the most reluctant of the Loud family when it came to sharing her feelings, telling him something so exquisite in such a spontaneous way. Of course, he knew she loved him. They all loved each other, they were really close siblings, there was no doubt that they had strong ties between them.

Lately, however, Lincoln had realized that those simple gestures were starting to gain a lot of meaning.

He thanked her, he told her that he loved her too and then he quickly went to the bathroom.

The bathroom was his second little sanctuary in the Loud house beside his own room. While it was true that he had to share that bathroom with ten sisters and that therefore there was always someone asking in a rude way to hurry up, the truth was that everyone respected the privacy of the room. During his eleven years, the bathroom had always been a little refuge.

That's why, knowing he was protected from intrusions, he turned on the shower so the noise would muffle his desperate crying.

He cried for such a long time, not even knowing what was triggering said crying. It was an intense bawl that he was trying to control to the best of his ability. A weeping that came from deep within. He clenched his fists until his fingers started to hurt and his knuckles got white. He had to clean his nose at least twenty times, using a giant amount of paper. He wanted to grab one of Lori's golf clubs so he could start smashing and destroying the tiles, the mirror, the cases, everything. He tried to take a deep breath to get a grip, but every little gesture seemed to make everything worse.

The shower he had turned on as a facade to hide his crying ended up becoming a real one. Just the warm water falling on his face and his back managed to relax him a bit. And even so, when he got out of the tub and started to dry off with a towel in front of the mirror, he couldn't help to look at his face and feel completely drained out of his energies, to feel exhausted, depressed. Still, he was surprised to see that his eye bags had gotten notoriously better. They were now barely more noticeable than usual. He assumed that Lisa's "flu antidote" was somehow related to it. But even though the eye bags looked better and the wrinkles around his eyes were less, he noticed now his iris lacked some brightness. A spark that was now gone.

And finally, he looked at his hair. His pure ashen hair. For all these years, that hair had been one of his most outstanding aspects. Everyone knew him as the white-haired boy just as much as they knew him as the kid with ten sisters. The peculiar color had caused him a lot of troubles, those being bullies that would pick on him or some jokes in the school cafeteria. Still, Lincoln had always been proud of his hair. He thought it made him special. He was happy with his white hair.

At least he had always been happy about it until he found out that the color was a consequence of the tumors in his head. Now, as he stared at his reflection, the only thing he could feel was disgust. Fury. He looked to his right, to the case. All his sister's hair products were there. Dyeing, spays… and scissors.

He grabbed them with a shaking hand. As he looked at himself in the mirror, he grabbed a lock of white hair with his left hand, stretched it out and opened up the scissors. A simple flick of his fingers and that damned hair, that vile reminder of what was happening to him would fall to the sink and it would be gone. It was just a matter of doing it again and again. Over and over until he would be bald. People with cancer in movies ended up bald anyway for the treatment, right? He didn't have cancer exactly, but who cared. Everyone thought of him as a vulnerable weak child, why shouldn't he look like one?

His hair wouldn't have the last word. It wouldn't define him. He was much more than his white hair. Much more! He was…

What was he?

Who was he?

Who was Lincoln Loud really?

He suddenly let go the scissors, which fell dangerously close to his naked feet. He didn't realize he was shaking so bad. No, it wasn't worth it. Why would he do such a drastic thing? The hair itself wasn't the problem.

The problem was another thing. And that was easier to fix. He had the solution right in front of him.

Quickly dressing up again and with his hair still wet, Lincoln left the bathroom and opened the first door to his right. Never in his life, he had dared to come in unannounced, but he honestly didn't care anymore. That wasn't a worry anymore. He went inside the room and found his older sister sitting on her bed with some kind of magazine on her hands.

"Lincoln!" Leni screamed, startled by this presence, quickly hiding the magazine under her pillow.

"What was that?" He asked, surprised by his sister's reaction.

"T-That… it's… well, I..." Leni started to stutter, and Lincoln could see a drop of sweat appearing on her forehead. After a few seconds trying to form a coherent speech, Leni sighed. "Linky… I don't know how to lie. I never knew how to do it. If you ask me about it, I'll have to tell you and… And I really, really need this to be a secret."

Leni trying to hide something from him was new for Lincoln. She was too pure and innocent to have dark secrets, to be preparing an evil prank or to want to keep something good for herself. The fact that she was desperately asking him to not ask her any questions meant that something serious was going on. And of course, his curiosity was rocketed to the sky. He wanted to know at all cost what his adorable sister was hiding. Even so, he respected her privacy, and he loved her too much to pressure her after she asked him not to.

"Don't worry, Leni", he told her with what tried to be a smile. "But, uh, are you busy?"

"Not at all!" She said, suddenly happy as usual.

"That's great because I… I need to ask you for a favor. A big favor."

Leni stood up, walked in front of him and grabbed his hands. She was carrying the most beautiful, joyful and honest smile Lincoln had ever seen.

"Anything for you, Linky."

When he explained to her what he wanted and why he needed it, however, not even Leni was able to keep her smile on.

An hour and a half later, Leni had called for an emergency sibling meeting in his room. They had, of course, dropped everything they were doing, Lori had gotten home as fast as she could, and Lynn even forced Lisa to leave her lab so she could assist to the reunion. Leni had summoned them, but she and Lincoln were nowhere to be seen. The twins were about to start crying from the anxiousness of not knowing what was going on, but right then Leni opened up the door.

Lola jumped over her and almost tackled her to the ground, while everyone else gathered around her and spoke at the same time. Leni was overwhelmed and a little scared, so Lori had to intervene and calm them all.

"Leni, what's going on? Why did you call us?"

The second oldest girl asked everyone else to take a seat. Her sisters looked at each other, confused, but they did it. They sat on the beds and the floor, still nervous, still anxious to know what was going on, where the heck was Lincoln. Leni stood in front of the closed bedroom door.

"Guys, Lincoln is okay", she said, making them all sigh in relief. Lola let herself be hugged by Lana. "He asked me for a favor."

"What favor?" Luan quickly asked.

"Let her finish", Lynn scolded her. "What favor?"

"See, he… he has… uh… like, doctors told Lincoln that his hair isn't white because of Pop-Pop."

"What?" Asked the twins. "What does that mean?"

"The lack of pigmentation in his hair is due to the action of the tumors restricting the correct distribution of melanin across all his scalp", explained Lisa in a rude way. She still considered her presence there as irrelevant and a waste of time, distracting her from her investigations.

"So… his hair is white because of the sickness?" Asked Lola, covering her mouth with her gloved hands.

"Why didn't he tell us?" Said Lana, anguished.

"He was sick for all these years?" Lucy, just like the twins, didn't know all the details about the disease that was killing her brother.

"Girls, girls, like, focus", said Leni, moving her hand in the air like it was no big deal. "The point is that Lincoln says that we never get to know how he really is."

They all half-closed their eyes.

"Leni, what does that mean?" Lori asked with a bit of caution.

"We looked into mom's old photos and we found Lincoln's firsts", she explained with a smile. "Before… well, before he got sick."

"Dude, you're killing us, tell us what's going on", Luna begged.

Leni smiled again and took a step to her right, putting her hand over the doorknob.

"Guys, I present you now our dear brother. Our true brother."

She opened up the door and Lincoln got inside the room.

His sister's reactions were much more dramatic than what Lincoln had anticipated. They all gasped. They were staring at him without blinking, without breathing. They were petrified, nine statues of girls that were staring at something more shocking than Medusa's stare. What was in front of them was something unprecedented. Lincoln knew that his decision would cause controversy. He could imagine some of them angry at him. He thought some would tell him that that little thing shouldn't define him, that he was who he was beyond that detail. But in his vulnerable situation, Lincoln felt a lot better now. A small gesture for many, but it meant the world to him. He was nervous, though. He wanted to know his sister's opinions on the subject. Those were the only opinions he cared for.

"According t-to the pictures… this is me… this is how I should be", he said with a little bashfulness as he used his hand to comb his hair.

His brand-new recently dyed dark brown hair.

The first one to react was Lola. And her reaction was to start crying.

They all looked at her and Lincoln felt incredibly sad. He wasn't waiting for that reaction. He knelt in front of her.

"Hey, princess, what are you crying about?" He softly asked her.

Lola continued with her muffled cries. She was looking at him with almost adoration, with her crystalline eyes due to the tears. She opened up her mouth but she couldn't speak. Luan was the first one who managed to catch her voice.

"Lincoln… you… you dyed your hair", she said, not believing what her eyes were seeing.

"Yes. This is how I should be. How I should have been."

By now, Lola wasn't the only one crying. They were all shedding different amounts of tears.

"Leni and I used to say that you were own little snowflake", Lori said, looking at him with a sad smile and wiping the tears away from her eyes. "We always thought that it made you special… and cute… and adorable. If only we had known… Oh, God..."

"I like how you look now", Lynn hurried to say, also very emotional. "Lincoln, you look… you look-"

"Beautiful."

Everyone turned their eyes on Lola. She was still looking intensely at him, with soft trails of tears falling from her cheeks. Her lips were shaking as she tried to find the strength to talk.

"You look beautiful", she repeated, before her crying consumed her.

Lincoln hugged her. Then Lana hugged both her twin and Lincoln. Then they all gathered around him and started a group hug. They all cried and they told him just how much they loved him, that he looked really good, that brown was definitely his color. Lisa was the only one that kept her distance, taking advantage of the commotion to leave the room and return to her lab. Everyone else stayed with him. They were all really touched by the situation.

The only girl that seemed to be slightly confused was Lily. She was looking at Lincoln with curiosity, but she wasn't hugging him and she didn't give him little kisses. She was looking at him until Lincoln looked back at her.

"Lily, it's me, Lincoln", he said with a smile, taking her in his arms. "I know I look a little different, but it's me."

He could see the confusion in Lily's eyes. She looked around her, probably trying to find the source of the voice she knew so well, not realizing that he was right in front of her.

"Lily", he called her again, starting to get really nervous. What if his baby sister couldn't recognize him anymore?!

The baby stared at him. And in a completely desperate act, Lincoln have her a kiss on the tip of her nose, like he always did whenever he put her to sleep. Lily draw her head back from the surprise and looked at Lincoln with open eyes. She looked at him for a good ten seconds before she gave a smile as pure as a baby's.

"Inky!" She finally said, hugging her brother.

Everyone started to clap and to let out some relieved laughs while Lincoln hugged his baby sister and took that worry off his shoulder.

At least for the moment, everything was alright.

Lying on his bed and after spending some minutes brushing his new brown hair in front of the mirror, Lincoln tried to dial her phone. After an extremely busy day, where he had been with all and every single one of her sisters and with Clyde, he already knew what he wanted to do the next day. Or at least during the morning/afternoon. He dialed the number he knew by heart how and lied down once again, heads up, staring at his roof. He just had to wait ten seconds until they answered the call.

"Lincoln!" Said the excited girly voice from the other line.

"Hey, Ronnie Anne", he greeted her, smiling out of nowhere. "Did I wake you up?"

His friend's adorable laughter made his heart happy.

"Who do you think you're talking to, lame-o? No, I was… you know, thinking."

"I was thinking about you too", he dared to say, knowing very well what he was provoking.

"I n-never said…!" She stopped in the middle of her sentence. "Yes. I was thinking about you. W-Whatever, how are ya?"

"All good here. How about you?"

"Good, good."

It was odd for them to be facing a silence with each other Usually their conversations were really cheerful and entertaining.

"Why did you call me?" She finally asked.

"A couple of things. First of all, I wanted to apologize."

"Apologize?"

"These past few days I barely talked with you. I'm really sorry, honestly, it's just that my sisters-"

"Lincoln, Lincoln", she interrupted him, "you have nothing to apologize for. I get it. Don't worry, honestly."

His smile became even wider.

"Thank you."

"And… why else did you call me?"

"Because I wanted to hear your voice", he answered right out of the blue, not trying to dissimulate his excitement for talking with her anymore.

"L-Lincoln, I… I, uh… Dang it..." she said, and just by listening to her Lincoln could imagine her blushed face.

"I'd love to see you tomorrow. Are you free after school?"

"Are you kidding me? Lincoln, come to my place tomorrow morning."

"Really? But what about your classes?"

"Don't worry, I can skip a day… or two, if you want..."

He laughed. It wasn't the first time that Ronnie Anne suggested skipping classes to make something fun. He was about to comment on what he'd like to do, but someone opened his bedroom door. He turned around and saw Lola and Lana, both wearing their pajamas, with their pillows under their arms.

"Lincoln?" Said the two in unison, looking at him with puppy eyes.

"Can we sleep with you tonight?" Asked Lana.

"Please?" Added Lola.

There was only one right answer to that question.

"Of course you can, you guys! Just give me a second", he said, pointing at his cellphone. "Hey, Ronnie Anne?"

"I heard them, Lincoln", she said with easiness. "Go and get some rest. I'll wait for you tomorrow with a big breakfast."

"I'll hold you on that!" He said, drooling after picturing those delicious waffles she had once cooked him.

The two of them laughed.

"Good night, Ronnie Anne."

"Good night, Lincoln."

He dropped his phone on the desk and looked at his sisters.

"Come on, hop in", he said, moving to the middle of the bed so there was an empty space on each side of him.

The kids quickly arranged themselves, snuggling against their brother. Lincoln put his arms around the girls and brought them to himself a bit more.

"I love you", the two little girls said at the same time, before closing their eyes.

Lincoln smiled.

"And I love you too."

I'm super excited because we're so, so, so close to the end! Even so, with college, my job and several more responsibilities, I don't see myself updating this soon. My goal is to have the 21st chapter ready for the first anniversary of the fic, on August the 2nd (I think, lol, idk) So expect an update between a month and two from now. I wish it could be sooner, but I don't see it happening.

Thank you for your support. Over a THOUSAND reviews in only 19 chapters! So many views, so many followers, so much love from you guys… I am nothing without you. God bless you all. This story is for you.

Until next time, I'll see you later.