S2 Episode 11
One-Two Punch
Welcome to Trainwrecks: Season 2 (2005-2006)! If you haven’t read Season 1, please start there! Trainwrecks is a free-to-read fiction serial that follows a group of six Seattle-adjacent friends from the year 2004 to the year 2015. Join Luna Cruz, Sebastian Velasquez, Dimitri and Victoria Hale, Duke Kingston, and Jasmine Nolan as they stumble their way from adolescence to adulthood, falling in love, making mistakes, overcoming their pasts, and staying together through it all.
For series introduction, character profiles, relationship charts, and general orientation, check out the Table of Contents!
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Duke had learned how to watch his back from a young age. The harassment and violence he’d endured from his cousins had led him to develop a keen sense of danger, and that prickly awareness tickled the back of his neck as he approached the lunch table, where Victoria sat stabbing her salad with a fork. “What did those poor leaves do to you?” he asked, hoping to defuse her temper with humor. When she only glared at him, he sat down with a muttered, “K den” and parked his sandwich and Coke on the table in front of him.
Victoria had been experiencing these foul tempers on and off for the last few weeks. He knew it was because of the Juilliard pre-audition, and the combination of nerves, her own high expectations, and her inability to control her emotions was churning itself into a perfect storm of rage. Duke wished he could take her stress away, or even just give her a hug, but she tolerated physical touch even less than usual when she was angry. A hug was out of the question.
“So what’s tripping you up this time?” he asked, because if he couldn’t avoid the topic, he might as well confront it head-on.
“The fucking Mendelssohn piece,” Victoria snapped, impaling several leaves in one stab. “I could play that thing in my sleep two weeks ago.”
“You still can,” he assured her, “but you’re not getting much sleep, are you?”
“No.” She crammed her salad leaves into her mouth and chewed.
Duke unwrapped his sandwich. “You should try melatonin. Mom and I used it in Colorado because the elevation made it harder to sleep.”
“You don’t need to act like you want this audition to go well for me.”
His hands paused. He let the first wave of irritation roll through him before speaking. “Come again?”
Victoria waved her fork around impatiently. “You don’t want me to go to Juilliard.”
“When the hell did I say that?”
“The other day, when you told me to look on the bright side because if I failed, I could stay in Washington.”
“It was a joke, V.”
She threw her fork down. “Sure it was. Unless I’m wrong and you’re just eager to be rid of me. Because who needs a mental girlfriend, right?”
Had it been a few weeks ago, Duke would have seen through Victoria’s temper, checked his own anger, and reminded her that she wasn’t crazy and that he thought the world of her. But her patience wasn’t the only one fraying, and after days of verbal abuse he had no reserves of calm left to draw from. “Are you done taking your shitty mood out on me?” he asked. “Last I checked, it’s not my fault you keep fucking up your audition!”
“No, but you’d be thrilled if I did, wouldn’t you? So I could stay here tethered to you!”
Duke’s mouth fell open. “Where is this coming from? Have I not spent the last few months telling you how awesome you are, and how Juilliard would be insane not to take you? Yeah, not being able to see you every day will suck, but if you’re going to keep treating me like this then maybe it won’t be so bad after all!”
“Oh, bugger off!” Victoria shrieked, her beautiful face contorted with rage.
“Fine!” Duke yelled, grabbing his lunch and shoving it haphazardly into his bag. He didn’t need to take this shit. When she got over herself, she could come and apologize and he’d forgive her if he damn well felt like it. He was halfway out of his seat when she spoke again, so quietly he almost didn’t hear her.
“My God, Dimitri was right, wasn’t he?”
The mention of her shithead brother was too much to bear. He looked down his nose at her. “What the fuck does that mean?”
Victoria’s complexion had gone from flushed to pale, and she stared at the remains of her salad as if seeing it for the first time. “Maybe… this isn’t going to work.”
The white-hot anger inside Duke was shot through with anxiety, making it difficult to think, impossible to feel anything but pain. He’d always suspected Dimitri of trying to turn Victoria against him. It wasn’t like he made a secret of his disapproval, and yet—had it been too much to hope that she would take his side? His hands clenched into fists. “Fuck Dimitri,” he spat. “And fuck you too. I’m done.”
He stormed out of the cafeteria without looking back.
~*~
Luna yawned. It was the last day of school before Christmas break, and she along with the rest of her classmates had no attention span left for algebra, dead writers, or history lessons. Thankfully, the district was letting them out an hour early, so she only had two more hours to endure before she could go home and pack for her flight to Puerto Rico. Her mouth watered at the thought of her grandmother’s yellow rice, her uncle’s roast pork, Puerto Rican bread, the white-frosted cakes with sprinkles from her favorite bakery, quesitos, piragua, and how she’d be allowed to wash down her fried food breakfast with Malta India and no one would care—except her dietician, but she’d worry about her later.
The second lunch period had just ended. Luna flipped through her biology textbook, and she’d almost reached the day’s assigned chapter when Marcus burst into the room, out of breath from running. He nearly collapsed on her desk. “Duke,” he wheezed. “Duke and Victoria…!”
Luna’s eyes widened. “What happened?”
“I don’t know.” He straightened up to try and get more air in his lungs. “They got into this huge fight, and he left, and she just sat there for a while and then she got up and left too!”
Luna was already digging through her backpack for her phone. She needed to call Duke. She knew things had been reaching a boiling point between him and Victoria, but…
“I went after him—couldn’t find him—!”
She was halfway through her contacts list when her phone was plucked right out of her hand by Mr. Vaughn, the biology teacher. “Ms. Cruz, you know Remington’s cell phone policy.”
“It’s an emergency!” Luna blurted.
His brows lowered. “Did your parents call you?”
She looked around her wildly. Marcus had backed away towards the door—he wasn’t in her class—but lingered at the entrance, his expression apologetic. “I… no, they didn’t…”
Mr. Vaughn sighed. He wasn’t a bad teacher, and she could see that he’d noticed how upset she was, but he didn’t give her phone back. “Then I’m afraid you’ll need to retrieve this from the office at the end of the day,” he said, and added gently, “It’s only two more periods. Can you make it until then?”
Luna nodded. Because she could make it. She wanted to find out exactly what had happened between Duke and Victoria, but she could make it. She could. Duke’s dad was taking her home that day. He wouldn’t be able to avoid her.
She did her best to focus on the textbook in front of her. Her eyes kept darting to the clock. Time moved too slowly. After this she had history, and then she’d be home free. Duke and Victoria’s classes were on the other side of the school. She wouldn’t be able to run and find them before last period without making herself late.
Biology ended. In the hallway, Luna bumped into two of her friends from her art class who had also witnessed the fight.
“It was bad,” Kaylee said, her brown eyes wide.
Xiomara nodded her agreement. “Duke didn’t show up to class. Have you talked to him yet?”
For the next hour, Luna could not bring herself to focus on history. She didn’t give a shit about what had happened a hundred years ago. She cared about what was happening now. If she didn’t find Duke right away, she’d find Dimitri’s car in the parking lot because he was picking Victoria up. She’d wait for her and interrogate her, and then she’d drag Duke over and make him apologize. Or make Victoria apologize to him. Whoever had offended who, it didn’t matter.
The final bell rang, and Luna tore out of the classroom without bothering to put her books away. She ran to the office, paced as the secretary took eons to get her phone from wherever they kept the confiscated phones, and fled the building without so much as a thank you. She stood on the front lawn as groups of students made for either the buses or the parking lot. No sign of Duke’s truck. No sign of Duke. She saw Dimitri leaning against his Firebird, staring up at the sky. She started in his direction.
And that’s when she spotted Duke, also walking towards Dimitri. Even from a distance she could see the wrath on his face. “Oh no… oh no, Duke!” she screamed.
Too late.
Her shout drew Dimitri’s attention. He looked up at her, eyes wide, frightened by the panic in her voice. And then Duke’s fist collided with his face.
“Duke, no!” Luna shrieked as she ran towards them.
Chaos. Students and parents alike scattered from the two grappling in the parking lot. Several teachers were on Luna’s heels. “Stop it!” she begged them. She saw Dimitri shove Duke away when he tried to swing at him again.
“I’m gonna kill you, you piece of shit!” Duke roared.
Luna nearly slipped on the wet grass. “Please—!”
Dimitri pulled back his arm and slammed his fist into Duke’s cheek, knocking him flat.
Another scream. Luna’s head whipped towards the source and she found Victoria standing in the grass, her face white as a sheet, trembling from head to toe.
And then like a bolt from the blue, Mr. Kingston appeared. He stood like a brick wall between Dimitri and his son, who hadn’t picked himself up, but sat on the pavement cradling his face. “What the hell is going on?” he bellowed.
“He started it!” Dimitri shouted back.
“I don’t care who started it! He’s a kid!”
Luna lowered herself to the pavement beside Duke. “Hey…”
He didn’t respond. Didn’t look at her. Didn’t stand. Luna reached for his shoulder, but he brushed her off.
“Get your ass in the truck,” his father said to him. And then, realizing Luna was there too, he softened just a little bit. “You too, Luna.”
Duke stood and walked away without another word. Luna hurried after him. When she glanced back over her shoulder, she saw a couple of teachers talking with Mr. Kingston. Dimitri stood behind him, glasses bent, hands in his pockets, jaw set. An ugly bruise was forming under his eye. Victoria hadn’t moved from the lawn. She looked as if someone had stolen the very breath from her lungs.
A few of their classmates stared as Duke and Luna climbed into the backseat of the truck’s cab. She closed the door behind her, cutting them off from the outside world. Duke sat as far away from Luna as he could, back turned, head resting against the window. Undeterred, she slid closer to him. “Duke… what happened?”
He said nothing. He was shaking so badly that it wasn’t until he took a sudden, unsteady breath that Luna realized he was crying. She lifted a hand to her mouth. Duke never cried.
He curled up on the seat, the backside of his uniform covered with dirt and wet from the parking lot, and kept his face hidden even as she closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “I’m sorry,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say or even what had happened between him and Victoria. All she knew was that her best friend was in pain, and it filled her with a blinding rage.
Author’s Note: Cue “It Ends Tonight” by The All-American Rejects.
Oof...
Well... OUCH. I'm genuinely hurting right now. And what a cliffhanger to leave us on when we're getting a Q&A instead of a regular Wednesday episode! I guess this is when the Civil War starts...