A/N: I feel I must warn you that I disregard everything said about age in canon. If Veronica's birthday is in August, then there's no way she would have been in the same grade as Duncan and Logan because why would her parents have kept her from starting school until she was six? In the series, a seventeen year old Veronica should have been starting her senior year in season one and should have been in the same grade as Lilly before her death. This has alwaysbothered me more than it should, and since we have so little info about everyone else's ages and birthdays, I have decided to adjust Veronica's to be more reasonable at the same time as I worked out everyone else's. This does apply to all my Veronica Mars fics, but this is the first time it's come up explicitly and so I thought I'd point it out. (Sorry about the length of this note!)
Golden
Somehow, despite how it ended, the memory of that day was always a golden, happy one, a bright spot he could always pick out when he looked back on the blacks and blues of greys of how it used to be.
Logan's just turned eleven years old when his family moves to Neptune, at his mother's rather unusual insistence. His sister, Trina, pouts and moans about leaving her friends and her life in L.A., where she's just entering her senior year of high school, but Logan doesn't complain. He's pretty sure his mom decided to leave her friends and her life behind so that Logan's dad will have to be away from home even more than he already was.
That's an indisputable improvement for Logan, of course. Still, he's eleven and school just let out for the summer, so he's facing the possibility of not even meeting any kids his age for two months, and that kind of blows. Logan's long known that the more time he spends away from home, the less likely he is to run afoul of his dad's temper, and without friends in this new town, Logan doesn't have anywhere to go.
Suddenly his melancholy is interrupted when he spots a small girl running across his back yard. "Hey!" he calls out before thinks about it.
She freezes, looking pretty well terrified. Logan's sorry about that, a little, but honestly, she's the one trespassing in his yard, right?
"I didn't think you would be here," she says hurriedly when he approaches her. "Lilly told me the new family wasn't arriving until next week, and, um, I'm sorry?"
"We got here early," Logan explains, because it's true and because it looks like she might take off running if he doesn't keep the conversation going. He rushes to continue, "My dad had to go do reshoots in London, so my mom figured we might as well move now."
"Oh," says the girl, her blue eyes still too wide. He thinks maybe she isn't as young as he thought at first, just kind of short.
When it becomes clear that she hasn't got anything else to say, and it starts to look like she's going to start edging away, Logan rushes to ask, "Who are you anyway?"
"I'm Veronica," she admits, a bit warily.
"Logan," he offers in response, and now he's wondering if he shouldn't have just let this Veronica girl go when she wanted to, because lonely silence is starting to look a lot better than awkward silence.
"Look, I'm sorry I cut through your yard," she says, and, hey look at that, maybe the whole silence thing was going to work out for him, if she couldn't stand it even more than he couldn't. "It's just, this house has been empty for a while and I know where there's a hole in the fence and a gap in the hedge because Lilly's cousin used to live here and it's the fastest short cut to Lilly's house."
"Okay," Logan responds, a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of words the tiny girl had thrown at him. Even Trina doesn't talk so fast.
"Okay," Veronica responds, grinning at him like he's a hero for not caring that she took a short cut through his backyard to her friend's house. "Well, bye, Logan."
And then she's turning to go, blonde hair flying behind her again, and it hits Logan that he doesn't want her to go yet. "Wait!" he calls, stumbling a few paces after her.
"Yeah?" she asks, thankfully more curious than bothered.
"Who's Lilly?" Logan asks when he can't come up with anything else.
"Oh, Lilly's my best friend," Veronica says breezily, then she peers at him for a minute. "She's the best; want to meet her?"
"Okay," Logan agrees quickly, hurrying to catch the rest of the way up to Veronica.
"Awesome," Veronica says. "Oh, and she has a brother, too, who was in my class at school. You might like him."
Logan nods, not because he's particularly sure he'll be fast friends with this brother, but because he's pretty sure he'll agree with anything Veronica has to say, so long as she lets him tag along with her rather than sitting by the empty pool outside his mostly empty house.
ooOoo
"Ronica!" calls an imperious voice as she enters the Kanes' backyard. "There you are! You took forever!"
"Sorry, Lilly," Veronica responds, because it's not worth arguing that she managed to walk all the way from her house in less than twenty minutes, a feat which Lilly would never be able to duplicate.
Lilly frowns, "There's a boy following you, did you know?"
Logan looks startled, but doesn't seem prepared to offer any response, so Veronica pipes up. "Yeah, I know. He's Logan," she tells her friend, "He's for Duncan."
"Oh, in that case," Lilly says, as she crosses to the patio doors and yells into the house, "Donut! Get out here! Veronica's brought you a friend!"
"Ducan's the brother?" Logan whispers to her, and Veronica nods. This new boy is kind of shy, she thinks, even though he seemed to have no problem yelling at her before, when she was in his yard.
"Duncan's nice," she assures him, hoping that they'll get along, because otherwise she's not quite sure what she'll do with a boy. "You'll like him."
"Hi, Ronnie," Duncan greets her cheerfully. "Hi, new kid."
"I'm Logan," he manages to tell Lilly's brother.
"He just moved into the house two down from yours," she further explains, anxious to facilitate some friendship between the boys. "The one with the loose fence board and the hole in the hedge."
"Oh," Lilly says, her smile a little teasing now, "So you caught Veronica trespassing and decided to follow her like a lost puppy?"
"Lilly," Veronica scolds mildly, because, well, she shouldn't tease the poor kid.
"Basically," Logan agrees, kind of surprising her. "Although I almost didn't make it through the hedge; I'm not quite little enough."
"I'm not little!" Veronica protests heatedly, "I'll be eleven in August!"
"I'm already eleven," Logan boasts smugly, and why did Veronica bring him along, again? "My birthday was last week."
"And Duncan will be twelve in September and I'll be thirteen in October," Lilly says, rolling her eyes. "Now that this fascinating topic has been covered, let's do something fun."
Veronica considers telling Lilly that she's being kind of rude, but she knows from experience that it's pointless and likely to make her more rude instead of less.
"Do you like video games?" Duncan asks the new boy, who looks at him like he's a little slow.
"Who doesn't?"
"I'm going to kick all your butts at Mario Kart," Lilly declares, racing inside. Veronica is kind of surprised, since when Lilly had called earlier, she'd been gushing about her new nail polish set and demanding Veronica submit to a cuticle makeover.
Of course, it wasn't every day they got a new kid in Neptune, and even Lilly Kane might be susceptible to that kind of mystery.
ooOoo
It's nearly six o'clock before Mrs. Kane suggests that maybe Logan and Veronica should think about heading home, and he doesn't know where the day went. He likes these kids, even the two girls, and spending time with them was way more fun than hanging around on movie sets or being asked by nosy people when he's going to start acting and doesn't he want to be just like his dad?
No, thanks, Logan thinks every time, but he never says it out loud.
Veronica and the Kanes didn't ask about his dad once, except when Duncan had realized his last name was Echolls and asked if Aaron was his dad.
"Oh," he'd said in response. "My dad does computer stuff; he's kind of lame."
"My dad's cool," Veronica interjected, "He's the sheriff."
And then Lilly had won the fifth straight race in Mario Kart, and they'd given up and decided to go outside rather than wasting time trying to beat her, and no one had mentioned parents again.
"Come over tomorrow," suggests Duncan as Logan goes to follow Veronica out the door, "We can swim in the pool or something."
"Alright," Logan agrees, because Veronica was right; Duncan Kane is just nice.
"Are you coming?" Veronica demands from a little ways down driveway, and Logan hurries to catch up. "My mom doesn't usually care if I'm late, but if I'm not home before my dad, he'll probably come looking for me."
He remembers her saying that her father's the sheriff, and hurries along beside her. He's never met a real police officer before, and Logan think maybe he doesn't want to meet one for the first time when he's angry at his daughter.
"So, do you want me to stop by for you on the way to Lilly's tomorrow?" she offers when they've nearly reached his gate.
Logan grins in response, "You just want to know if you can keep using your short cut, Ronnie."
"That, too," she agrees easily, making him laugh a bit, and he's feeling pretty happy because she let him use Duncan's nickname for her, and Logan thinks she's probably his friend, and he's just sort basking in the feeling.
Then he spots his dad's car in the driveway of the new house and stops laughing.
"Tell you what," he suggests hastily, "I'll walk you home and you can show me the long way between your house and Lilly's."
"Okay," she agrees happily enough, setting off down the block again, getting a few steps ahead of him. "But you're going to be sorry we didn't take the short cut through your yard."
Not likely, Logan thinks.
ooOoo
The new boy seems a bit weird to Veronica, but she ignores it because, well, he is a boy, and it's not like she knows any other ones, except Duncan. Maybe all boys are odd. Anyway, she likes him because when he's not being quiet, he's pretty funny, and because she kind of likes the way he glanced at her first before agreeing to go to the movies with Duncan and Lilly later in the week, like he didn't want to go unless Veronica was planning on it.
So when he offers to walk her home, she figures she'll let him, even if it's kind of a stupid idea when he leaves between her house and Lilly's. She asks him what grade he'll be in the fall, and when he says sixth, like her and Duncan, Veronica smiles and goes to ask about where he used to live. Logan beats her to the punch and starts asking a lot of questions about Neptune and which school she goes to and a million other things.
She answers every question, because she figures being the new kid isn't much fun, and then when they get to her house, she just walks in and gestures for him to follow. He looks pretty happy to be invited in, so she doesn't bother worrying about the fact that she doesn't exactly live in a mansion. After taking her shoes off, Veronica shouts, "Mom!"
"Yeah, honey?" comes the reply from the direction of kitchen.
"Is dad home yet?"
"Yes, I most certainly am," her dad responds, walking in the front door behind them, and kind of making Logan jump. "Are you just getting home now, daughter?"
"Yeah, but it was Logan's fault. He didn't want to take the short cut so we had to walk the long way around from Lilly's house," Veronica explains, throwing her arms around her father's waist and ignoring the panicked look on Logan's face when she blames him.
"Who is Logan?" dad wants to know, and since he's looking right at the kid, Veronica understands he's after details.
"He's new," she offers, "He's going to be Duncan's friend and he's going to stay to dinner, okay?"
"Did you ask your mother?"
"Well, no," Veronica responds, "But she won't care."
"Did you ask your parents, Logan?" he wants to know next, and for a second she thinks Logan is going to run out the door instead of answering.
"Mr. Mars," he says, kind of surprising her, "Ronnie didn't even ask me."
That makes her dad laugh, and Logan smiles, so Veronica excuses him for sounding so plaintive.
"Yeah, Veronica is like that," her father chuckles, the traitor, "I've tried my best to raise her to be a good soul, but she's an irredeemable heathen, despite my best efforts."
"Oh, she's okay," Logan tells her dad, "Even if she does kind of suck at Mario Kart."
"Hey!" Veronica shouts in protest, because it isn't very nice to bug someone about the dismal digital skills when they've just invited you to dinner.
Her dad, though, he's laughing again and ushering Logan into the kitchen to call home and check in, and the new kid looks pretty happy, so she guesses she can let this one slide.
ooOoo
It's pretty late when Sheriff Mars drops Logan off that night, like shortly after 8:30, and Logan is pretty pleased with the amount of time he managed to spend not at home that day, but kind of worried his dad is going to be pissed at him for not being home when he arrived. Sometimes he cares about that stuff, usually when he's got somebody with him he's trying to impress.
"Thanks for the ride, Mr. Mars," Logan says, because he hasn't quite figured out the protocol for what to call Veronica's dad. Duncan had referred to him as 'Sheriff Mars' earlier, and boy did that ever fit, but he'd changed out of his uniform before they ate dinner, and then he'd spent an hour playing rummy with Logan and Veronica. It was kind of hard to think of someone as 'Sheriff' anything when he was sitting cross legged on the floor with you, groaning as he lost spectacularly at cards.
"No problem, son," Veronica's dad responded, and he kind of sounded like he meant it. Logan grins, and is hopping out of the car, waving goodbye to Veronica, when suddenly there his own father is strolling out of the house with his why-yes-I'm-a-movie-star smile on. Logan stops by the driver's side door as his father approaches, and wishes with all his might this weren't happening.
"Hey, there, Logan," his dad said, and there's that certain glint in his eye. "I missed you earlier today."
Well, crap. Logan's in for it now.
"Hello," Veronica's dad says, rolling down his window. "You're Logan's dad?"
"That I am," his father responds, grin widening as he plays proud father. "Aaron Echolls. Nice to meet you."
"Keith Mars," is the polite response. "And this is my daughter, Veronica."
"It was mighty neighbourly of you to invite my son to dinner, seeing as we're new in town," he says, and god, does he have to talk like he's in a bad movie even when the cameras aren't rolling?
"Oh, it was no trouble at all," Mr. Mars says easily, "Logan is welcome any time."
"We're going to go swimming at the Kanes' house tomorrow!" Veronica chimes in, then rushes on when her dad shoots her a gently chiding, amused look. "If that's okay with you, Mr. Echolls!"
"Well, of course it is, sugar," his father responds with a wide grin, and god, Logan just hates his dad sometimes. "I imagine anybody would have a pretty hard time turning down an invitation from a sweetheart like you."
But from the heavy weight of his father's hand on his shoulder, as the Mars family car pulls away, Logan can tell that he's not going to be in any shape to swim the next day.
"Rich Snyder and his son drove back from the city with me today," Aaron Echolls informs his son, waving jovially at the disappearing taillights, "They were real disappointed not to see you."
"Sorry, dad," Logan mumbles, whishing pretty desperately that he could go back to earlier that night in Veronica's living room with her family, and maybe just stay there forever. But wishes like that don't ever come true for kids like Logan, and pretty soon his dad is steering him into the house.
Still, Veronica promised to come get him on the way to Lilly's tomorrow, and that's something to look forward to.