Author's Note: This fic takes place immediately after the events of "No Such Luck".
A day at the beach is usually a fun, relaxing affair. In fact, "a day at the beach" is a common euphemism for something easy and enjoyable, with little to no pain or stress involved. It's a day that we've come to associate with swimming, sunbathing, sandcastle building, volleyball, and attractive men and women going about in skimpy swimwear. What's not to like?
Well... a lot, if you're Lincoln Loud.
The day before, Lincoln had finally managed to convince his family that he wasn't a jinx. He snuck into Lynn's baseball game in a full-body Royal Woods Squirrels mascot suit, and after Lynn won the game, he threw off the suit, changing his family's perception of him, albeit not in the way he intended. After the game, they concluded that Lincoln was good luck, but only if he was wearing the squirrel suit. Thus, Lincoln was allowed to go to the beach with them, on the condition that he kept the suit on at all times.
Lincoln found the whole situation pretty funny... for the first five minutes. Afterwards, the experience went from funny to annoying to painful to agonizing. The suit restricted his movement, disabling him from partaking in any of the beach activities he was looking forward to. What's more, it weighed fifty pounds total and had no form of ventilation; just having it on was exhausting him, and the hot midday sun was turning the suit into a sauna, cooking him from the inside. He was subjected to several rounds of snickering and rude comments from passersby, due to how ridiculous the suit looked.
And all the while, he had to watch his ten sisters and parents going around the beach with big, sunny smiles on their faces, having the times of their lives. Aside from Lola barking at him to keep his suit on, they barely even acknowledged him. It was like... it was like they didn't care.
After about an hour of misery, Lincoln had had enough. He couldn't endure another moment of that God-forsaken suit, and nobody was going to make him keep it on.
"That's it. I've had it. This thing is coming off."
He grabbed the head of the mascot suit, pulled it off, and threw it down onto the sandy floor, revealing a scowling, sweat-drenched face covered in blotches of red. Predictably, this provoked an indignant reaction from his family.
"What are you doing?!" cried Lola. "Put that back on!"
"No!" snapped Lincoln, as he forced himself out of the body and kicked it over. "I'm not wearing that stupid thing anymore! I refuse!"
"Lincoln, we've been over this," said Lynn Sr., using his most authoritative voice. "You need to keep that costume on or there's no telling what'll happen to us!"
"Yeah! What if we get stung by a jellyfish?" asked Lola.
Lincoln swung towards Lola, locking his furious, bloodshot eyes onto her. His vision was marred by the droplets of sweat seeping into his eyes, stinging them.
"We're at a lake, you idiot! Freshwater jellyfish don't sting!"
Everyone gasped, appalled that the normally forgiving Lincoln would address his little sister in such a way.
"And by the way, while all of you have been having a great time, I've been absolutely miserable!" he shouted, turning towards the rest of the family. "I'm broiling, I'm thirsty, I haven't been allowed to go in the water, and five minutes ago, three strangers pointed at me and called me a furry! I don't even know what that is, but I'm sure it's not a compliment!"
His family members - especially his older sisters and parents - started squirming around in their seats, averting their son's angry gaze and trying to come up with a response.
"But none of you noticed, did you? None of you stopped by to ask, 'Hey, Lincoln, how are you holding up?' But I..."
Lincoln was so exhausted that even the act of yelling was tiring him out, and he had to pause his rant midway to catch his breath. "...but I guess you care less about me than you care about your mind-numbingly stupid superstitions!"
"Stupid?!" cried Lynn.
Lincoln turned his head towards Lynn, who was now stomping across the beach towards him. "Lemme ask you this, buster," she seethed. "If my superstitions are so 'stupid', then how come you were trying so hard to get the family to buy into them?!"
Oh, geez. This again.
"Um..." he muttered, backing away from Lynn as his rage petered out.
"Hey, yeah!" cried Lori, as she too began edging towards Lincoln. "You literally broke my golf clubs just to convince me you were bad luck!"
"N-not on purpose!" cried Lincoln. "I was just trying to drop them, not break them!"
"Even if I'm gonna believe that, you still went out of your way to make yourself look like a jinx," said Lori. "Why?"
The worst part was that he already told them why he did what he did; they just didn't believe him. But if he wanted to throw off his "bad luck" stigma once and for all, he was going to have to come clean and take responsibility. Again.
"I... I'm sorry, okay?! I was sick of getting dragged to all of your events and I wanted a bit of alone time!"
This earned him a biting glare from everyone else in the family - which, thankfully, he could only barely see, due to the sweat blurring his vision.
"Not cool, dude," said Luna.
"We're all expected to support each other," said Luan. "What makes you so special?"
Lincoln cringed at that question. She was right. Or at least she wasn't wrong. None of his other sisters seemed to have any trouble making time for the family; in fact, Lynn pointed out that until she bullied him into coming to her baseball game, he was the only one in the family that hadn't attended one.
But how, though? he thought. How do they spend all that time supporting each other, and still have enough time to spend on themselves.
He decided to use that incredulity to fuel his rebuttal.
"Well, nothing, but... but I can't commit all of my time to you!"
He swerved towards Luna. "I mean, look at you, Luna! You've got your own passions, too! How do you manage to go to all of Lynn's sports games, all of Luan's comedy shows, all of Lola's pageants and all of Leni's fashion shows and still have enough time to practice your instruments?!
"Um, maybe 'cause I don't go to all of those," said Luna.
"Yeah, nobody said that you have to go to every event," said Lori. "If you're too busy, just say so."
Lincoln's face hardened up again, twisting into a bitter scowl. "Oh, funny you should say that," he said. "I tried to say that to Lynn when she asked - no, told me to come to her baseball game. You know what she did?"
He jabbed his extended finger towards his sporty older sister. "She threatened to beat me with a baseball bat!" he yelled, triggering a gasp of outrage from his parents.
"Lynn Loud Junior, is this true?!" demanded Rita, shooting Lynn a stern look.
"I was only joking!" cried Lynn, shrinking away from her incensed mother. "And I... I..."
But as she was backing away, her eyes drifted towards the subject of her ire - Lincoln. And just like that, her apologetic disposition vanished without a trace, and she instantly shifted from defense to offense.
"No, you know what?! I'm not the one you should be angry at!" she snapped, walking back towards Lincoln and getting in his face. "Everything that happened to Lincoln is his fault!"
Lincoln, taken aback by Lynn's adamance, struggled to come up with a rebuttal. Not only did she actually have a point, but that hour he spent in the squirrel suit was starting to take a toll on his health. He stumbled as he stepped away from Lynn, and his temples were starting to burn with pain.
"N-no!" he uttered. "Not... not completely-"
"Yes, completely!" interrupted Lynn, jabbing him in the chest with her finger and knocking him off-kilter. "You could have corrected me when I called you a jinx. But you didn't. You carried on with that lie for a week, and now you're just reaping what you've sown. You've got nobody to blame but yourself."
"I... I... I..."
Lincoln started swaying back and forth. There was no way he was going to muster up the energy to argue with Lynn, when he was barely even fit enough to stand upright. He had no choice but to concede.
"I... you're right. It's my fault," he mumbled. "I... I'm sorry I made you..."
And then, he said it - a verbal bombshell that shook his family to their very core. In any other situation, he would have at least hesitated before saying something so audacious, but he was finding it increasingly difficult to organize his thoughts and filter his words. Thus, the following sentence slipped out:
"I'm sorry I made you stop loving me."
Lynn flinched, reacting to his words as if she'd been sucker punched, while everyone behind her shared a massive, harmonious gasp.
"What?! What are you talking about?!" she cried. "When did we ever say we didn't love you?!"
"But-but my room..." he slurred, stumbling about the beach like a drunkard. "And my- and my furniture. And... kicked me out. And what if I was bad luck?"
Lynn could only respond to that incoherent monologue with a look that was equal parts befuddled and concerned.
"That is- what I meant to say was..."
Lincoln tried to steady himself and grasped his throbbing temples, panting heavily.
"Lincoln, what's wrong?" asked Lynn, placing a hand on Lincoln's hot, sweat-drenched shoulder. "Are you okay?"
"I... uh..."
And those were the last two syllables he managed to utter before his body gave up the struggle to maintain consciousness. With one last wheeze of pain, he collapsed face-first onto the beach and passed out.
He awoke some time later in a daze, to the comforting chill of an ice pack enveloping his forehead. In lieu of the coarse, rough floor of the beach, he felt the supple cushions of the family couch beneath his back. Before he opened his eyes, his ears picked up the faint buzz of the ceiling fan overhead, accompanied by several disembodied voices from around the room.
"Is Linky gonna be all right?"
"Give him some space, honey."
"Guys, shhh! I think he's opening his eyes."
The last voice was right; a split second later, his eyes crept open to reveal that he was laid across the living room couch, with a glass of ice water on the floor next to him and his entire family bent over his prone body.
"Are you there, Lincoln? Can you hear me?" asked Rita, who was in the front of the crowd.
"Mm-hmm," mumbled Lincoln.
"What's my name?"
"R...Rita,"
"How many fingers am I holding up?" she asked, holding up two fingers.
"Two."
"Spell your name backwards."
"Um..."
Lincoln pinched the bridge of his nose as he tried to visualize the letters in his name positioned in reverse. "...N-L-O-C...N-I-L."
Rita sighed with relief. "He's okay, everyone," she said, momentarily turning towards the crowd before turning right back to Lincoln.
"What... what happened?" muttered Lincoln.
"You fainted from heat exhaustion," said Lisa. "Fortunately, we were able to act before the situation got too dire. We carried you into the van, placed a cold towel on your head, and drove you right back home with the air conditioning turned to its maximum setting."
"T-thank you," said Lincoln. "I'll be okay, right?"
"You'll be fine," said Rita. "You can just get some rest for now. Drink some water."
Lincoln obliged, picking up the water glass and letting the chilled liquid slough down his parched throat.
"And when you feel ready," said Rita, "we'll have a little chat."
Lincoln felt a slight tension in his chest as his family members vacated the room. His effort to relax was somewhat hindered by the knowledge that, once he was rested, he'd have to answer for everything he'd done in the past week or so. Granted, he felt that they had plenty to answer for too, but he wasn't looking forward to the prospect of another argument. Regardless, the best thing for him to do at the moment was follow Rita's instruction, so for the next few hours, he lied on the bed in silence, sipping his water.
After some time had passed, he saw his family members trickle back into the living room one by one, with Rita leading them. As they entered, they each took a seat somewhere around the room; the parents and older siblings brought in chairs from the kitchen, while the younger ones took a seat on the floor.
"Are you ready to talk?" she asked. "We'll give you a little more time if you need it."
No," said Lincoln, who figured that he might as well get it over with. He propped himself up into a sitting position with a grunt of effort. "I think I'm ready."
"Good. But first, I think Lynn has something she'd like to say to you."
Rita stepped aside, and in her place, Lynn approached Lincoln with her eyes pointed towards the floor and her hands folded behind her back.
"Lincoln?" she squeaked. "I- I'm sorry I bullied you into coming to my game."
"And?" said Lynn Sr.
"And I'm sorry that I blamed everything on you when I lost," she added, cringing with shame as she backed away from Lincoln and retook her seat.
"Thank you," said Rita, giving Lynn a nod before turning back towards Lincoln. "But Lincoln," she continued, maintaining her stern tone, "you have to accept responsibility for what happened, too."
Lincoln bore a guilty grimace. "I do," he said with a sigh.
"You carried on with that lie for a week," said Lori, whose interjection made Lincoln shrink deeper into the couch. "What did you think was going to happen?"
"I-I don't know," said Lincoln, as his eyes darted every which way. "I guess I didn't think that far ahead."
Before Lori could respond, Leni stepped in to request a turn to speak. "Can I ask him a question, too?" she asked, raising her hand.
"Go ahead," said Lynn Sr.
Leni got out of her seat and walked closer to Lincoln. As she approached, the worry-borne wrinkles in her face became clearer.
"My question is... why?"
Lincoln blinked. "Why what?"
"Why did you lie just so you wouldn't have to come out and, like, support us?"
As she spoke, her bottom lip extended about an inch from her face. "Don't you like spending time with us?"
Lincoln winced. He already felt guilty enough for what he did, but that question just twisted the knife even further. It was rare that he saw Leni this hurt, and he knew that he was to blame.
"I do!" he cried, desperate to reassure her. "Really, I do. I just needed some time to myself, that's all. Don't I get to have my own interests, like the rest of you?"
"Sure you do!" said Luna. "But next time, if you need a little space, you can just ask."
"But Lynn-"
"We know what she did," interrupted Lynn Sr. "And she won't do it again. Isn't that right, Lynn?"
Lynn nodded, keeping her gaze focused on the floor and her hands clasped in her lap.
After Leni returned to her seat, Lori got up and took the spot next to the couch. "But Lincoln," she said, "there's something else that we need you to open up about. And please be honest with us."
The eldest sister knelt next to the couch and took Lincoln by the hand, looking him straight in the eye.
"On the beach," she asked, in a tone of voice that sounded more and more pained with each syllable, "when you said that you thought we didn't love you anymore... did you mean it?"
"No," said Lincoln.
But any relief Lori received from that answer was extinguished once she saw her little brother's eyes break away from hers.
"I mean, not exactly..." he muttered. As much as it stung him to insinuate something so hurtful, he didn't want to let his family off the hook for what they did.
Lori's eyebrows arched downard. "What do you mean, 'not exactly'?" she demanded, taking on an accusatory tone.
Lincoln, determined not to let Lori put him back on the defensive, sprung forward and yanked his hand away from her. "You locked me out of the house!" he yelled. "You locked me out of the house and then you sold my furniture!"
To his shock, that last comment inspired not sheepishness but merriment from his mother.
"It's not funny!" he cried, his voice cracking on the last word.
"Lincoln, we didn't really sell your furniture," Rita said with a roll of her eyes. "I was just making a joke."
"I... what?"
"You didn't know that was a joke?" Rita asked with a laugh. "I mean, how would we even find a buyer in such little time? And how would we move all of that furniture out of the house without you noticing? Come on, Lincoln. Use your head."
After taking a moment to let those words sink in, Lincoln glared daggers at his mother, looking even more furious than he did before. "Wha... that's your idea of a joke?! Are you kidding me?!"
Rita lost her smile and started squirming uncomfortably in her seat.
"So you didn't really sell my furniture," Lincoln continued. "Great. But you still locked me out of my own room! And then the house!"
What followed after that outburst was a moment of stony, uncomfortable silence. Lincoln couldn't tell if his family was struggling to come up with a response or if they just wanted to make sure he was done speaking before the responded. Regardless, he decided to go on.
"I... I felt like I wasn't welcome in my own family anymore. Like I was being thrown out into the streets."
The very idea triggered a flurry of light gasps from around the room. "Oh, Lincoln," Rita said as tenderly as she possibly could, her brow wrinkling with worry.
"What were you gonna do if I couldn't prove I was good luck?!" cried Lincoln. "Just keep me out there forever?!"
"Well, we- uh..." stammered Lynn Sr., tugging at the collar of his polo shirt. "...we didn't think that far ahead, I guess," he said.
His excuse, predictably, was met with a contemptuous scowl from his son.
"But we weren't going to keep you out there forever!" he said. "Honest, we weren't. It was just going to be until we knew that your bad luck was gone."
Lynn Sr.'s words did little, if anything, to mollify Lincoln, so Lana decided to pitch in.
"It's true!" she cried. "While you were outside, we were all talking about how we could-"
"It wasn't just the lockout, Lana," interrupted Lincoln, who didn't even bother to look towards his little sister. "The lockout wasn't even the worst part."
Everyone in the room started to squirm, knowing all too well what was coming.
"What happened on the beach today broke my heart," he said, as his voice started to break down. "I was being cooked alive inside that suit and none of you cared."
"We're sorry, Linky," said Lola. "We didn't know."
"Didn't know?!" snapped Lincoln. The sudden fury in his voice caused Lola, among several others, to recoil in surprise. "How could you possibly not know?!"
He leaned up on the couch and pointed towards Lisa. "What about you, little miss brainiac?! You, of all people, should know about how dangerous dehydration is!"
"I do, Lincoln," said Lisa, unfazed by Lincoln raising his voice to her. "But I also know that the Royal Woods Mascot Protection Act, signed into law in 2015, mandates that mascot costumes cannot exceed thirty pounds in weight, and must provide adequate ventilation and internal air conditioning. I assumed that the Royal Woods Squirrels would be decent enough to act in compliance with local law, but apparently I was wrong. I'm going to be writing a strongly worded letter to our mayor."
Lincoln's expression softened, as he was taken aback by Lisa's verbose but surprisingly logical explanation for her negligence.
"Oh. Oh, wow."
"But Lincoln, if you were that uncomfortable, why didn't you speak up earlier?" asked Lynn.
Lincoln folded his arms and sunk deeper into the couch. "I didn't think you'd listen."
"Of course we'd listen!" Lynn cried, springing up from her chair and marching back to Lincoln's side. "Do you know how scared I was when I saw you faint on that beach?! I..."
Tears welled up in her eyes, and her voice started trembling. "...I thought we'd have to take you to the hospital."
"We were all scared, Lincoln," said Rita. "Your father ran two red lights on the drive back."
"And I have the ticket to prove it," said Lynn Sr. "Wanna see?"
"That's all right, Dad," Lincoln said with a chuckle. "I'll take your word for it."
"The point is, Lincoln, we're sorry we put you through all of this," said Lori, joining Lynn at the spot by Lincoln's side. "But we want you to know that no matter what happens, you'll always be a member of this family."
She bent over and hugged Lincoln around the neck. "Because we love you," she whispered, pecking him on the cheek. "Very, very much."
After she released the hug, she backed off and let Lynn perform the same gesture. Lynn held the hug for a considerably longer time, and Lincoln felt a couple of her tears trickle down onto his chest.
"I know," said Lincoln. "And I'm sorry I lied about being bad luck. From now on, I'll be honest and upfront with all of you."
To make things up to Lincoln, Rita and Lynn Sr. decided that they'd allow him to spend the rest of the afternoon lying on the couch playing video games, as long as he remembered to keep himself hydrated. Dinner that night was gazpacho, with ice cream for dessert; while the family expected Lincoln to recover from the heat exhaustion by dinnertime, they decided it was best not to take any chances.
Finally, at that night's sibling meeting, the Loud children conceived of a way to prevent such an incident from ever happening again, which was met with approval from their parents the following day. The following document was taped onto each sibling's bedroom door the following day:
"GROUND RULES FOR PAGEANTS, CONCERTS, COMPETITIONS AND PERFORMANCES:
1. Every sibling has the right to refuse an invitation to any other sibling's event, for whatever reason.
2. If you are concerned that someone is blowing you off, you can bring the matter up at the next sibling meeting, or bring it up to Mom and Dad.
3. Under no circ*mstances can a sibling be denied an invitation on the grounds of being 'bad luck'.
4. No matter what happens, you will never be kicked out of the family."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: So... you might be wondering why I decided to contribute to the endless pile of No Such Luck fanfics, and I suppose I owe you an explanation.
Basically, I lost a bet. Remember Weavillain's popularity contest? Well, see, Epsilon and I decided to make a bet on who would win; he bet Lana, I bet Leni. The loser would have to write a No Such Luck sequel/epilogue.
He won, I lost, and this is the result. It wasn't easy, since there's not much you can say about that episode that hasn't already been said, but I think I did pretty well, all things considered.
