Disclaimer: Gee, if I was the person who owned this (Shawn Levy?) then I sure wouldn't be writing this! I would be filming it! XD
Summery: Rebecca and Larry have a fight, and it could mean the end of their relationship for both of them. Can our favorite Night Guard patch things up with Rebecca, or will she leave him forever, heartbroken? -A major fluffy oneshot-
A/N: Oh come on! It's an oneshot people! Stop nagging me, and I know I've got other stories going on! XD
I got this idea somehow while thinking about my new NATM fic (soon to be published...hopefully...), The God Machine, and while having the song Airplanes by B.O.B stuck in my head. That song is waaaay too catchy. (Seriously, I woke up three days ago humming it, and I had no idea what it was even titled, so I did some digging and finally found it thanks to some art work on DeviantART. Yays.) Anyway, I noticed that going through the NATM archive, that there were like, no Rebecca/Larry fics. I mean, I know she's not in the second movie, but come on! Larry was in the museum twice in the whole movie, and the rest he was in Washington! Our Becca is still alive, people!
Ok, I'm going to shut up now. Enjoy, please review! (Note: this is my first NATM fic ever, so please be nice. Thanks. ^^)
EDIT: I finally re-loaded this bad boy. Those lines that wern't supposed to be there are gone!
Rebecca Hutman sighed as she closed her apartment door and flicked on the lights. It was at least three in the morning, and she was completely exhausted. Maybe it was because she was spending too many nights at the Museum of Natural History, interviewing Sacagawea for her book. But not tonight, she hadn't. She had spent the short night there, celebrating, because she had finally finished it after at least two years of writing. She had even sent it in to an editor to be reviewed and hopefully published at a local publishing company. She hadn't gotten it back yet, but she was sure that it would come back with flying colors.
She snorted and kicked off her shoes, while dropping her bag on the floor.
Flying colors.
Flying indeed.
Rebecca's boyfriend, Larry, had recently cheated on her with a woman – a wax woman, but a woman all the same – during his little...adventure to the Smithsonian museums in Washington, DC. He had called her within the first hour he had gotten back, and started rambling about some kind of "Door to the Underworld" and Abraham Lincoln. It had scared her – none of it made sense. She was about to hand up, until Nick – Larry's thirteen year old son, bless his heart – had apparently torn the phone from his father's hand and said, "Sorry, Becca, he's a little shaken up. We'll calm him down and call you back, ok?"
Nick hadn't waited for her to answer, because he almost instantly hung up on her. Rebecca didn't mind – she liked Nick. He was fun and as adventurous as his father. And she didn't need to guess who that "We" was...no doubt it would be those who inhabited the museum during the night hours. Plus, it sounded like Larry needed to be calmed down.
When things had been sorted out, Larry had told her of all that had happened – meeting Ahkmenrah's older brother, running from the French, and meeting some creatures that lives in the deep depths of the Underworld. (When asked about it, Ahkmenrah would stiffen at the word, and politely say that he had indeed been there once, but would rather not talk about it, and that was all she and Nick could ever get out of him.)
However, Larry had conveniently left out the part about the little crush he had gotten on Amelia Earhart. It was Jedediah who had told her about the affair he had with her ("What? It wasn't an affair! It was one night! And she kissed me! I was the kiss-ee, not the kiss-er! And are you forgetting that I was being chased down by bad guys the whole entire time?"). When Rebecca had causally brought it up, he blushed – he actually had the nerve to blush – and stuttered.
But he didn't deny it.
And that was only the start of the argument.
Rebecca would have forgiven Larry if he had only admitted to what he did and said that he was sorry, and they could have gone back to their celebrating. But noooo, he had to turn the conversation into an argument.
"You kissed her?"
"Yes...no...twice, but –"
"Oh so you kiss her twice and you barely talk to be for three months," said Rebecca sarcastically, crossing her arms. "How thoughtful!"
"What are you talking about, I talked to you!"
"Once. When I called you, you said," Rebecca changed her voice so it sounded deeper, in an impression of Larry's, "'Sorry, Becca, can't talk now, I'm at a pitch meeting at Walmart.'"
"I thought you were busy! And I never got to go to Walmart, thank you very much."
"Busy with what?"
"Your book!"
"My book," repeated Rebecca flatly, uncrossing her arms and staring at him blankly.
"Yes, your book," said Larry, wondering what was wrong.
There were a few witnesses to the fight, but the only three that hadn't hurried away were Nick, Ahkmenrah, and Jedediah, who was sitting on Nick's shoulder.
"Should we maybe stop them?" asked Ahkmenrah, shooting Nick a concerned look.
"Are you kiddin' me, robe boy?" cried Jed; "This is just now gettin' good! Ooooh Gigantor's in for it now!"
Rebecca clapped her hand to her forehead.
"Larry, the reason I'm here is because I finished it! I was supposed to be celebrating."
"Well how would I know? You've been so caught up in that stupid book of yours that I thought you had died! And are you sure that the publisher isn't going to fall asleep reading it? Because I sure would!"
The second the words were out of his mouth, Larry instantly regretted them. He clapped his hand over his mouth, as if to pull the words back in. (Ahkmenrah and Nick did the same thing simultaneously with Larry, while Jedediah just laughed, earning a glare from both of the boys.)
"Oh God, Becca, I didn't...," Larry said quickly, but Rebecca held up her hand, shutting him up.
"Listen Lawrence, if you don't want me around, fine. If you want to go running back to DC with the Tablet just so you can see your girlfriend again," – Ahkmenrah made a mental note to check to see if the Tablet was still in his tomb later that night – "be my guest. See if I care. And if you're going to get yourself into more trouble with Dr. McPhee, fine. Bail yourself out of that one. By yourself. Because I'm not going to help you this time, so leave me out of it," said Rebecca, shouldering past Larry and out the door of the museum.
For about three seconds no one moved. Larry – along with the guys – seemed to be in shock. Then three things happened at once. Larry snapped out of it, and ran to the door (which was still revolving), shouting, "Becca, wait!" Jedediah burst out laughing hysterically and actually fell off Nick's shoulder. Nick, who was just as shocked as his father, had his mouth hanging open.
"Oh my God!"
"Will he be alright?" asked Ahk, staring after Larry.
"I dunno dude. I hope so," said Nick gravely, watching from inside as Rebecca flagged down a taxi and slammed the door in Larry's face. He made an attempt in vain to chase the taxi, but remembered that he was supposed to be guarding a museum and thought otherwise.
And here she was, ten minutes later, still steaming; ready to punch whoever said the name, "Larry Daley" in the jaw. Rebecca pulled off her clothes and got into her pajamas with difficulty. She was shaking – either with fury or with sadness, she wasn't sure, and to be honest, she didn't care.
Rebecca's phone rang, and on instinct, she picked it up and said, "Hello?"
"Rebecca, I'm-"
Click.
She didn't have the patience to listen to Larry apologize. She didn't want an apology. All she wanted was to never see his face again.
What about her job? Larry would surly stay at the museum and wait for her to come in order to "apologize". She would have to call in sick. Either that...or quit. She would decide in the morning. Her phone rang again, but she didn't bother to pick it up, and she let the answering machine get it.
"Becca, c'mon, you know I'm sorry. I was just kidding!" said Larry's concerned voice from the other line. The time for the message ran out, and almost instantly the phone rang again. "Becca, please, pick up!"
But she didn't, and she had had enough of his voice. Pulling the plug on the phone cord, she logged off her email and turned her cell phone off, knowing that Larry would try those too.
Hot tears stung her eyes and threatened to fall. Collapsing on the couch and punching a pillow, Rebecca buried her head in a pillow and screamed.
The light streaming in the window was her wake up call. Why was she on the couch? Had she fallen asleep at the museum and Larry had driven her home-?
Oh.
No, she had just broken up with Larry, and now was mad at him. Now that story made sense. Reaching over on the coffee table, she turned on her cell phone. A little reminder pooped up, saying, "You have twenty-two new messages."
Rebecca sat up and blinked twice before reaching for her phone in disbelief.
Twenty-two?
"Larry, we had a fight, not a war," she muttered, getting up and going into the kitchen, listening to the messages on speakerphone. Each one was of course left by Larry, begging each time for her to call her back, for her to talk to him. She felt a slight pang of guilt.
Maybe she should-
No, she thought determinedly, He got himself into this; he can get himself out, or dig himself deeper.
Rebecca called Dr. McPhee, saying that she had a bad cold and couldn't come in today ("But it's July! You can have a cold in July?"). Then she went down to the lobby to get her mail, hoping to get a reply from the publisher.
She did in fact get a reply, but it wasn't the kind of reply that she was hoping for. Her book had gotten rejected.
And the fact that she was still mad about Larry didn't help her already sad mood. Rebecca headed back up to her apartment, the letter still clutched in her hand. Maybe she should call Larry and apologize. After all, it seemed that he was right about her book.
She was about to go back inside, but something was sitting on the door mat. She bent down and picked it up. It was a paper airplane, with her name written on one side. Rolling her eyes, Rebecca opened it and walked inside.
"I messed up. Come in tonight. Please?" was written in Larry's messy handwriting. On the far right bottom corner of the page was a splat of ink that looked somewhat like a little hand print. Above it was Nick's (much neater) handwriting that said, "Dexter got a hold of the pen. He says hi."
Rebecca smiled despite herself. It did sound like he was sorry, so it couldn't hurt...right? Besides, what was the worst that could happen? Her book had already gotten rejected. From her point of view, she had already hit rock bottom and could only go up from here.
Rebecca turned the key in her car, and the engine jumped to life. As did the radio. At first, when she pulled out of the parking lot for her apartment building and onto the busy downtown New York streets, she wasn't paying attention to it. But when she reached a stoplight it finally registered what song was playing.
"Guess this means you're sorry
You're standing at my door
Guess this means you take back
All you said before
Like how much you wanted
Anyone but me
Said you'd never come back
But here you are again."
How cliché. She switched off the radio before it could get into the chorus and she would start singing along.
When she reached the museum, it was already getting dark and Nick opened the door for her, so she guessed that it was already locked.
"Rebecca!" he said happily, Rexy coming to life behind him.
"Hi Nick," she greeted him. "Where's-?"
"Dad's out on the roof," said Nick, cutting her off, grinning like someone who had just won the lottery. She raised an eyebrow, but none the less thanked him and headed up to the roof.
The cool night air took her by surprise, and she almost fell back into the door. She shook her head, and blinked before she walked out and found Larry sitting on an air conditioning unit, his back to her.
"Hi," she said softly. Larry whirled around so quickly that if he were standing up, he probably would have fallen over.
Rebecca! Listen, I'm really sorry, and –"
It's ok. I know. And I probably overreacted too. But that little airplane thing was cute."
Larry frowned slightly. "Airplane…? Oh, that! Yeah, it was Nick's idea. Apparently that's what they did on Valentines Day last year, and everybody loved it. Sorry about the smudges, though. Dexter destroyed that pen."
Rebecca smiled and sat down next to him. "Well he's a curious little monkey. What'd you expect?"
Larry laughed nervously. "Yeah, 'curious'. I'm sure that's what it is." He fished in his coat pocket for something and gave it to Rebecca. "Here."
She frowned slightly, but took the paper and unfolded it. Despite the fact it being dark outside, she still could make out the words that she wanted to read earlier today.
"Oh. My. God."
"Yeah, my friend that used to work for me personally knew the publisher, and he put in a good word for it, so…"
Rebecca still couldn't believe it. "You got my book published?"
"I didn't, George did. But yeah, I guess I did."
"Oh my God! Larry thank you!" she cried, hugging him. Larry laughed nervously again.
"So…are we good?" he asked and she let go. Rebecca looked at him for a moment before kissing his cheek.
"Yes," she said, making him smile, "very good. And I still can't believe you did this!"
"Well, you know me," he said, "do or die. Only, somehow, I think I end up getting stuck with the latter."
Rebecca leaned towards him, but he stopped her.
"Wait a second." She looked at him in confusion and he turned around, and said loudly, "Guys, go back inside!"
There was a stumbling sound, and Nicky's voice called out, "Sorry!"
Larry rolled his eyes and shook his head as they heard the slam of the door.
"I swear, you can never get a minute alone here." He turned back to Rebecca. "Ok, now where we?"
"Well, see if this helps you remember," she said, and she kissed him.
A/N: Longest. Oneshot. Ever. But c'mon, it made you go, "d'awww!" didn't it? XD Whatever…review please! And I'm sorry for the lines being everywhere. Just ignore them, please.