Underneath by V. J. Albert (best e reader for academics TXT) 📖

General Information

Summary:
Luca Goldberg's life is simple. He has amazing best friends in Alexis and Zachariah, and amazing sisters. Mostly. So he thinks till he's dragged to a Meet & Greet plus concert of the famous singer Henry Shaw that his sisters are totally gone for. Luca isn't. He actually thinks nothing more of Henry as his image shows; bad boy, womaniser, bad joker. But what if he finds out that what you see is not always what it seems?

 

General information:
Any similarity to other books or movies isn't attended. The story is completely made up.

 

Trigger warning:
Story may contain triggering content - offensive language and boyxboy SMUT!

 

©2018, by V.J. Albert - All rights reserved.

Preface

 

 

 

 

 

"Strip away the flesh and bone

Look beyond the lies you've known

Everybody wants to talk about a freak

No one wants to dig deep

Let me take you underneath"

 

~ Underneath by Adam Lambert ~

 

 

 

One

 

 

 

 

 

 

Raindrops fall softly on the window pane. It's already getting late.

Luca is already talking with Alexis for three hours and they actually just talk about trivial things. This is so typical.

At such moments Luca questions if he shouldn't have been born as girl because he doesn't even mind Al annoying him about this one guy, he can't even remember the name of.

"You know Luca, I'm just not sure if he is being honest with me. How do I know he's not playing?"

"Did you ask him?"

"Of course, I didn't, Lu, don't be stupid. If I ask him, he'll think I'm some annoying little girl." Luca sighs and walks back to his bed.

"Al, why don't you just say exactly that, but not to me but him? Just make it fucking clear that it's serious to you. Then you'll see how he reacts."

In that moment someone bangs at his door. The person doesn't wait for a reply but storms in immediately.

"What the heck, Chels. Ever heard about privacy?" Luca stares annoyed at his little sister. He tells Alexis his goodbyes and hangs up. "What do you want that you couldn't wait till I was finished with my phone call?"

"Luca you have to do me a huge favour! Please!"

"How about you start telling me what you even want!"

"I saved money for over a year and now I finally got enough to buy myself tickets to see Henry Shaw’s show in Manchester. It was even enough to get Meet & Greet tickets!"

"Well congrats… and what do you want from me?"

"Luca you have to go there with me!" Luca isn't sure if he should laugh about this or not. How ridiculous is that? His sisters know he hates this Henry Shaw guy. That obnoxious little heart-drop that is cute and nice looking from the outside but is nothing more than any other celebrity – a womaniser, a macho, having bad humour and for sure is high up his own arse.

Fuck no!

"Are you fucking insane? I won't go to a stupid Henry Shaw concert and for sure not to a Meet & Greet!"

"But you have to!"

"I don't!"

"You do because otherwise mum won't let me go!"

"Then you won't go, sorry!"

"You better not ask me for any favour ever again then!" Chel screams angrily and storms out of the room again.

Finally silence again.

What is wrong with teenagers today? Obsessed about some dumb arse pop star that won't ever notice them or be a real part of their lives. Why was a meet & greet so important to Luca' sister? She would meet this Henry Shaw guy and then? He might hug her, tell her something he tells every fan and then she might also get a picture – that's it. Henry Shaw will have forgotten about her as soon as she's out of the door because she's just another fan that makes him rich as fuck, thank you very much. She will always just be one in a million, nothing special. Chel might not even ever meet Henry again. That's just life. Plain and unfair. There's nothing more to that and maybe, just maybe Luca is a bit bitter. Maybe Luca is just the only one who gets what life is – nothing more than a masquerade, a farce. There are more people existing than actually living and this is for sure a fact. One hundred percent.

All these fucking teenagers being completely obsessed with some idiot of a superstar and throw even more money at them than they deserve. This is business. Some are better in this shit than others and apparently this Henry lad seems to be especially amazing in this, this – Luca can't even name it. He finds all of this just plain annoying. There's more to life than running after someone's attention that you won't ever get because this someone is in a whole other league and is kind of looking down on you. Where's the sense in that game? Life's too short to waste it on irrelevant things and that's what this bloke Henry Shaw is to Luca. He won't waste one day to drive from Doncaster to Manchester, so his sister can meet the guy of her dreams. She won't ever know his real him anyway and that's something Luca finds the most annoying. He might not know much about this X Factor winner but well, there's enough proof for him that he isn't that amazing. He's a charming cocky arse. Henry's a womaniser, playing with woman like they're dolls. Even his jokes aren't funny and still everyone calls him funny and shit. Luca doesn't know what shall be so special about this guy. Is it the elusiveness that draws woman to him? Maybe it's his womaniser image? Do woman hope they can manage to be that one girl that conquers his heart and owns it for their self? That they're the one and only that breaks the womaniser curse?

Luca laughs.

How ridiculous is that!

 

When Luca enters the dining room there's this weird arse silence that isn't usually. It's when he knows that something's to come and it makes him unease and uncomfortable. He doesn't like it when it feels like this, like the calm before the storm. Luca' feeling slightly nervous, sitting on his chair waiting for his mum to come back from the kitchen. The girls all sit in their chairs – completely silent.

What's going on?

It's so unusually for the girls to be quite at the dining table. The house is always vivid and loud, no matter when.

He looks at the twins that silently play some clapping game – which of course is weird to look at for the fact that they never care about how loud they usually are with their games. From the twins his glance flickers to Fay who sits opposite the twins and silently stares back at Luca with a look her brother can't really place. Something that maybe tries to tell him 'You won't like what will happen'. It doesn't help Luca to relax, not one bit.

And then finally he looks at his oldest younger sister. Chel's typing away rants after rants on her phone; god knows who she's texting with, maybe she is tweeting, but it must be something pleasant because she looks happy compared to Fay, excited even.

Seconds later their mother, Joan, enters the room with supper, sets it on the table and sits down on the chair next to Luca.

"Before we start eating, I need to talk to y'all", Joan starts and it's unusually that his mother has something to announce before dinner. Luca looks at Chel, who did put her phone down and grins broadly back at her big brother.

Okay, what the hell is going on today? 

"You all know I always try to reasonable about my decisions of what I let you go through and what not", his mother continues. What prep talk is that supposed to be? Luca doesn't understand where his mum is going with that and it kind of scares him. It's so unusually. He knows Joan always tries to be more like a best friend than a mother with her children and she tries to allow them as much freedom as possible before her protective feelings started to ban the 'fun' out of a teenager’s life. Most of the time Luca was pretty happy that he has survived his teenager time and was now in his twenties and kind of free from restrictions.

Still, was Joan going to tell them she won't approve of so much anymore like before? No way, she already was like the best mum ever! She had some responsibilities, so it was impossible to like not to care at all anymore and allow the kids everything. So that couldn't be it.

"Since it was Christmas two weeks ago, Chel used her saved money to buy something that really means a lot to her–" Pause.

Wait what? This was about a Christmas present Chel had bought for herself?

Oh god!

Didn't she buy the Henry Shaw concert tickets plus Meet & Greet recently? Wasn't that something she did consider 'it is dear to me'? Why would Joan even point this out? Chel already asked Luca about it and he had refused. Or was Chel asking again and their mother had changed her mind and allowed Chel to go now though? Or did she point out none of the girls were allowed at any concert at all?

God, please!

"I really appreciate if you do save money and spend it on something that makes you happy." Chel smiles happily and nods.

You'll see soon, Chels! Sorry that you won't see your precious Henry.

"Still, when Chel said she will go to a Henry Shaw concert in September I didn't approve of that."

That's right! Don't let a 15-year-old go freak out at a concert of her big famous pop star idol she will meet for two seconds at her stupid Meet & Greet that won't be worth the money at all!

"But since I know how important this is for Chel, I decided that she's allowed when you go with her, Luca–"

Wait what? Did he hear that right?

Chel has already told him that mum would just allow her to go when Luca came with her, but he had refused! He had bloody damn refused! So, what was this even about?

Luca stares at his mother in shock and sees his sister's wicked smile just out of the corner of his eyes.

"I know you have refused earlier but