Title: "Meet Me in the Bathroom"
Author: Lila
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing: Logan/Veronica
Spoiler: "Rashard and Wallace Go to White Castle"
Length: one-shot
Summary: When Donut runs, who's left to pick up the pieces?
Notes: Missing scene between the confrontation in the coffee house and Weevil's beatdown. I wanted to only take it as far as "Donut Run," but Logan's comments at Java the Hut made me push it a little further into canon.
Author's Note: I'm not much of a LoVe fan anymore and have most definitely hopped off the LoVe train, but I couldn't resist writing this because there was too much season one goodness last night to resist. Title and summary courtesy of The Strokes. Hope you enjoy!
The night Duncan rides off into the sunset with his daughter clasped in his arms, he dreams of Lilly.
She's wearing her Homecoming dress and her hair is pulled back off her face and she holds a bottle of champagne in one hand and beckons to him with the other. "Come here, lover. I have something to show you." Her gold dress trails in the wet sand and the crystals gleam and her laughter rings in his ears as cold fingers wrap around his and he follows her down the length of beach.
They stop walking when he feels freezing water brush against his toes and she drops the bottle in the sand, pulls the tie out of her hair and it spills down her back in a fall of icy gold in the moonlight. He offers to help with the clasp, but she pushes his hand aside and the dress pools at her feet and she steps out of it, all that golden hair spilling over her shoulders and those full lips inching closer to his. "I'm going to miss you, baby," she says and kisses him, and it's hard and wet and feels like a goodbye. "I'll miss you forever."
She pulls away and angles her head, her body white and naked and glistening. She holds out her hand and he's surprised to see Duncan there, tie loosened and jacket missing, the tails of his shirt hanging awkwardly over his dress pants. She holds out her hand and Duncan takes it, wraps his fingers around hers with a tight squeeze. "Never have I ever been skinny dipping," she says with a giggle and takes a step towards the water, Duncan following behind. "You ready, Donut?" she asks and Duncan barely nods, eyes never leaving the foaming waves crashing to his shins. "Awww, Duncan, don't be such an ass," Lilly scoffs. "Tell her you love her, tell her you'll miss her, tell her good bye."
"Goodbye," he whispers and grips his sister's hand tightly as they disappear into the surf.
Veronica is next to him, her blonde hair wild around her face and her pink dress stained with sand and salt, and she's crying as the Kanes disappear under the waves, the moonlight glaring angrily off the water. "They need me," she screams, yanking on the zipper of her dress. "I need to save them."
He grabs her, pulls her back, ignoring the feeling of her nearly naked body clasped against him, the heat of her skin against his hands. "They're gone," he croons, feeling her heartbeat slam in regular intervals against his chest. "You need to save yourself."
He wakes up sweating and shaking, his back cramped from its position on the couch, the TV fuzzing statically in the background, opening credits of "Grand Theft Auto" paralyzed onscreen. "Fuck you, Veronica," he whispers to the dark. "You need to save me."
School sucks, it's always sucked, and it sucks harder now that Duncan is gone and Veronica hates him and Lilly's still deader than dead. It's been barely a week, but all anyone can talk about is Duncan skipping town with Meg Manning's baby, and all they can do is shoot pitiful looks at poor, naïve Veronica Mars whose boyfriend ran off with his illegitimate kid and didn't even say goodbye. He knows better. He knows Duncan, and more than that, he knows Veronica. He bets they have some secret bat signal they'll flash each other across the border, keep up the good fight, keep the puppy love alive and ticking. The thought of it makes him want to puke more than Saturday night when he and Dick "celebrated" Duncan's escape and trip into infamy with too many bottles of Big Dick's best scotch.
"Bummer, dude," Dick says as he sidles up to him at their lockers. "Gonna miss Duncan's smokin' suite. He didn't take the Playstation, did he?"
Logan has to laugh because it's too ridiculous not to. "Yeah, he left the Playstation. Your girls are safe." Dick grins and he doesn't want to think about what Dick's thinking about when it includes video game cartoons clad in skimpy bikinis. The warning bell rings and they head to class, English he thinks, and tries to remember the last time he opened a book let alone got to class on time.
Dick is prattling on about a big party that weekend and he's trying to listen, because he likes Dick, he really does, but Dick isn't DK. Dick wouldn't have rubbed cream on his back every time he made his father mad, and Dick wouldn't have pulled back the covers and let him slide up next to him every time his dad made his mom cry, and Dick didn't stand by him when his mother jumped off a bridge and his girlfriend was murdered and his life fell apart in pieces around him.
They're almost in class when he sees the sign on the girl's bathroom, "Out of Order," and he knows that's his signal. "Uh, pit stop," he says. "I'll meet you in class." Dick barely even registers comprehension as he flicks up his hand in goodbye and turns a corner.
He waits a moment for the hall to clear out and when the coast is clear, opens the door, cursing himself for doing his best impression of a long lost puppy jumping at the first sign of affection. But he knows his limits, knows what he'll do when it comes to her, and pushes the door open anyway.
She's waiting for him by the sink, narrow hips propped against the counter, and arms crossed over her chest. Her hair is long and blonde and her shirt is pink and for a brief moment he remembers feeling her bare skin against his, that ugly pink dress pooled at her feet, and for a second it's so real it's like it really happened.
"You beckoned?" he asks, dropping his bag at his feet, keeping a healthy distance between them.
She sighs loudly and drops her arms, but she doesn't judge. "I thought about what you said, and I'm sorry."
"About not helping me, or about being a bitch about it?"
A thick line forms between her eyes and she crosses her arms again heatedly. "About Duncan, actually. I'm sorry he didn't say goodbye."
He laughs, again, because it's too funny not to, and his voice is anything but sincere. "You, you're sorry? I mean, he was only my roommate, only my best friend. You were the love of his life. Of course I didn't rate a goodbye."
"Come on, Logan. You two didn't even speak for a six months! We weren't sure we could – " she starts but stops before she can say the words out loud.
"You weren't sure you could trust me, right? Cause I'd really rat out my best friend for giving his kid a better life. Whatever, Veronica."
The line between her eyes eases and she looks almost sorry, really sorry, like she means it. "You knew why he took the baby?"
"It's not like it was so hard to figure out. Look what Celeste did to Lilly – Duncan wouldn't want that for his kid." The look he sends he is thinly-veiled attack. "Besides, we all know what Duncan likes to do best is run."
As quickly as it disappeared, the line forms between her eyes again. "And for a moment there I thought you had a heart. I said I was sorry, Logan. It's over, there's nothing else I can do."
He looks at his feet, the stall doors, even the mirror, and when he can't take the image of the two of them staring back at him, he looks right at her. "Lilly died, and she was still your best friend. Duncan dumped you, and he's this savior who rescues babies. You have your memories; I have Lilly screwing my father in digital."
She doesn't look surprised at his revelation. "You erased the tapes. You erased the only evidence connecting your father to Lilly."
He ignores the challenge in her voice. "That doesn't make it go away."
"Logan," she says, and her voice is soft and her eyes are softer. She reaches out, like she wants to touch him, but pulls back sharply. "Lilly loved you, you have to know that. She – "
"I don't want to talk about Lilly," he interjects and wraps his arms around his chest. "I don't want to talk about Duncan either. What do you want, Veronica?" he asks and he sounds tired, and for the first time she realizes how much is weighing on his mind, the murder charges hanging over his head.
"I'm going to help you, Logan." she says and pushes through and reaches out to rest her hand on his tightly wound arm. The muscles jump under her touch, but she doesn't let go. Her face is inches from his, her legs angled slightly between his, and he's reminded of another time, another life, when he'd propped her on the bathroom sink and she'd wrapped her legs around his waist and his knees had hit the hard formica so hard he had bruises that lasted for weeks, but it hadn't mattered because she'd been kissing him and touching him like she meant it, like it mattered. He pushed the memory away, knowing how the story ended, not wanting to go there again. She smiles up at him hopefully, the lines gone from her face, and she's so close he can hear her heartbeat thudding in her chest. "I mean it. I'm going to get you off."
He cracks a joke, just to break up the tension. "Yeah? Is it my lucky day?" And he's surprised when she just rolls her eyes and swats his arm like old times, the tension easing out of his body.
She pulls away and picks up her bag. "I'm going to plant the camera later today," she says. "I'll let you know what I find out."
"Okay."
He stands there awkwardly, hands in his pockets, not wanting to go but not having anything else to say either. He won't talk about Lilly; he doesn't want to talk about Duncan; things are going too well to talk to Veronica.
She scrunches her nose for a moment, watching him, and pulls a slip of paper out of her bag and into his hand. It's a photo of a baby, swaddled in head to toe pink, and smiling at the camera. He recognizes the familiar slant of her eyes and his own round with wonder. "Is this…" he trials off and Veronica smiles like a doting mother.
"He named her Lilly," she says and doesn't have to say anything further. "And for what it's worth, I was the one who wouldn't let him tell you." She almost looks guilty, even when he knows she'd do it all over again if it meant doing the right thing.
He stares at the photo for a moment or two, tracing the Kane genes with his eyes, wondering for a moment what might have been if Lilly hadn't been such a selfish bitch. "Can I keep this?" he asks, and she looks surprised, but agrees. He curls his palm around the photo, pushes aside thoughts of a future as dead as his ex-girlfriend. "I met Duncan when I was five-years-old," he says. "I can't remember a time when my life didn't have a Kane in it."
She smiles sadly, reaches out and spreads his palm flat, the baby staring up at them with Kane eyes. "I saved them," she says and her smile is no longer sad. "And I'm going to save you."
The bell rings and he's missed another period of English and he'd miss every day of English if it meant his life would be like it used to and Veronica didn't treat him like the dirt beneath his shoes. She slings her bag over her shoulder and he pretends it doesn't hurt when she tells him goodbye.
She's halfway to the door when his question catches her off-guard. "Why are you helping me, Veronica?" he asks and she slowly turns to face him. She doesn't tell him that she loves him or wants to keep him safe or that it's her moral responsibility. Instead, she turns her eyes to the photo still clenched in his hand, her eyes full of pain. "Because you're all I have left."
He watches her walk out of the bathroom and knows it will all be okay.
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