Put Me Back Together(28)

I would have agreed, except going right then would have meant getting him down the stairs in this state with a couple of hundred people watching. He was in no condition to weigh in on the matter, but I was pretty sure making his panic attack public knowledge wasn’t something Lucas would want. Lucky for him, I was pretty much an expert on panic attacks, having had one at least once a week for as long as I could remember.

Grabbing his left fist, I quickly opened up his hand and placed it on my chest, just below my collarbone. His eyes flew open and I nearly smiled despite myself. At least I had his attention.


“It’s okay, Lucas,” I said in my most soothing voice, focusing my eyes on his frantic ones. I placed my hand over his. “You’re going to breathe like me. Nice and slow, okay? Close your eyes and breathe.”

His chest continued to shudder at first and I worried that it wasn’t working. My next best idea was to put his head between his knees, but considering how tall he was he would have probably ended up knocking skulls with the guy sitting in front of us. Worriedly, I reached up with my free hand and cupped his cheek, rubbing my thumb gently over that clenched jaw muscle until I finally felt it ease. I continued to whisper to him as his breathing slowly returned to normal, not even really hearing what I was saying. I knew I’d always found it comforting when my father had done this for me. I’d just never done it for someone else before. It was sort of nice, being the strong one for a change.

As the attack subsided, I let go of his cheek, but he didn’t move his hand. I was keenly aware all of a sudden of how close his palm was to my breasts and of the fact that only a few moments ago a number of girls had been avidly watching us. Were they still watching now? I nearly turned to check, but then Lucas opened his eyes.

“Almost lost you there,” I teased. He blinked at me as though he was coming out of a long sleep. Then I watched his eyes lower to where his hand was still pressed to my chest. A grin pulled at his lips.

“If I’d known this was the reward I would get, I might have come to more games,” he joked and I threw his hand back at him, swatting him hard on the arm while I was at it.

“Do you still want to go?” I asked as I watched him glance down at the game still going on below us. Somebody had just scored and the crowd around us cheered.

“After all that?” Lucas said, taking a deep breath. “Hell, no.”

“Good,” I said, handing him one of the sketch pads from my lap and two pencils. “Let’s get started.”

“What’s this?” he asked, giving the pad a quizzical look.

“I told you, we aren’t here to watch the game,” I said. “We’re here to sketch.”

This was something I did all the time when I found myself stuck in a social situation I couldn’t handle. Art was my passion, but it was also a really great smokescreen. When you were drawing, people thought twice about bothering you or even talking to you. The trick was to look really absorbed and focused. I took a sketchpad with me everywhere I went, just in case. You never knew when you might need to disappear.

“This is speed sketching,” I informed him, “so don’t waste time trying to make it perfect. The idea is to get at least twenty solid sketches in by the end of the night. You’ve got to just pick something and start drawing. And we’ll be moving around to get different angles.”

I’d expected a little bit of push back, but Lucas surprised me. He flipped open the pad and set it on his knees, his pencil poised, and when I said, “Go,” he went right to it, sketching a player running for the hoop. I guessed it was the challenge that piqued his interest. He was an athlete after all. He was used to playing to win.

Even though sports bored me to tears, there was plenty to draw in the gym. I got in a really good sketch of two girls gossiping while their boyfriends watched the game, and another of a player sitting in the front row with his head bowed, a towel over his neck. Then it was time to move. I’d thought this part might be tricky, everybody’s attention drawn back to us again as we blocked their view, but after the first few moves it seemed to be working in our favour. The crowd had lost interest in keeping track of us and nobody was looking our way.

At my elbow, Lucas sketched diligently. Since he was taking Introductory Fine Art II, I knew drawing couldn’t be entirely foreign to him—they never would have let him take the class otherwise. He frowned as he drew and chewed on his lip. It was adorable, and I couldn’t help but picture the little boy he had been once, with that same look on his face as he built a sand castle or aimed for the basket. When he looked up at me, surprised to find me watching him, I realized it was time to move again and I hadn’t drawn a single sketch.

“Maybe we should split up this time,” I said, my cheeks reddening. “I don’t see any two seats together.”

Big, fat lie.

“Whatever you say, Hero,” Lucas said with undeniable amusement.

But before I could squeeze past Lucas to get to the stairs, I found my route blocked by a pair of long, thin legs ending in spike-heeled boots. They looked like the kind of heels you would use to stab someone through the skull. Looking up, I realized that description was right on the money, because from the look she was giving me, I was pretty sure she would have stabbed me if she could.

“Hey, Lucas,” Stabber Girl said in a sickly sweet voice. “Who’s your friend?”