OK, just something that my twisted little mind conjured up because as much as I love JVD he's just so not Clint, and in so many ways he's turning Clint into Ross. And it got me thinking on how some other recasts just aren't working for me and how some characters are in scenes where they just don't belong only because the characters they played on other shows used to be couples and their characters when other actors played them worked together. I'm also bringing back some favorite 'dead' characters and using some underused ones, and although this is Nataliecentric, it won't necessarily be Jolie. . . enjoy the ride.
You Don't Know Me
What makes us who we are?
Is it who we tell people we are?
Who we pretend to be?
The names we go by?
The ones people call us by?
What makes up our identity?
Is it our faces?
They're easily changed.
Easily erased from others memories as time goes by,
So, what makes a person a person of any sort of substance?
What makes them one that is remarkable?
Rememberable?
Someone that someone else can't just walk in one day and fool everyone into believing that they're them.
Someone else entirely.
Don't think it can happen?
Well, I suppose, I don't blame you.
Until recently, I would've told you it couldn't have. Not on the scale that I now know it can.
The scale that now has me questioning every person I've ever trusted,
See, I knew it could happen.
It happened to the man I loved, after an accident.
I mean, he was burnt and misidentified. . . I always swore that if my uncle had let me go to the scene I would have known better. I mean, I always said I felt deep down that he wasn't dead. That he was out there.
I turned out to be right. . .
But, the things I didn't know. . .
The ones I stumbled upon. . .
The lies. . .
Half truths. . .
The people who are still lying. . . fighting. . . hurting. . . some who have no choice, some who have too many. . .
And one question remains for me.
What makes any of us think we have the right to tell any of them that they were wrong?
I hear the fighting.
The accusations.
I probably made a few when I started my search for the truth.
That's how I ended up here, in this hospital bed, unable to get up and run away from the screaming and fighting. Unable to know which father to trust--- to comfort.
To help my mother.
My siblings.
And the others. . .
Some thank me. . . say I've managed to do more in a few months than any of them in years. . . but is that a good thing?
All I've managed to do is unleash more questions and anger.
And I didn't mean to.
And I can hear my mother's voice as she walked out of this room echoing in the silence of my throbbing head: "Of course you didn't mean for this to happen, you never do," while my uncle stood there shaking his head in disappointment and a man who was claiming to be my father looked on in confusion while his real daughter looked at him in agony. . . and what was I supposed to do?
Let it continue?
For what?
I didn't know how far it went.
(Admittedly, none of them did.
No way saw how connected it was.
I was the one who found the connections.
The one who wouldn't let this go.)
All because I just wanted to get away.
From them.
My father and his disappointment in how I just couldn't meet his expectations at BE.
My sister and how I wasn't getting over John fast enough.
And Jared.
Jared and all he represented.
I should've known then that something was wrong.
Because Jessie---the real Jessie--- wouldn't have been pushing me towards someone like him, not even to save herself.
She would've been telling me to run for the hills.
She would've gone to Dad.
She wouldn't have isolated us.
No, she would've called in reinforcements besides me.
I saw it then as her getting stronger.
As the integration working--- I should've known better.
Should've known that there was more to the story of her and Jared than what they told me and Nash.
I knew he was a con.
Why didn't I see that she was one too?
That she wasn't the only one. . .
There were so many signs.
But we were blind to them. . . only, not all of us.
Not really.
Because, as I would come to find out, some people knew the truth.
They helped to perpetrate the lies.
The hoaxes that stole a man away from his family.
That kept my father away from me.
Only, I didn't recognize it then.
What does it say about me that I was so easily fooled that I couldn't recognize imposters in my own midst?
That it took me being outside of Land View, seeing pictures of men I shouldn't have known to put me on the path to a truth I never would've expected. . .
Chapter 1
Three Months Earlier
Springfield Illinois
It was pictures that started it.
Pictures of life my boyfriend hadn't been fully a part of.
Pictures for a birthday present he and his brother were putting together.
Innocent enough really, but they would be images that would haunt me till I had to find out the truth. . .
Natalie Balsom laughed as she handed the picture of Buzz Cooper and his late ex-wife Nadine to her boyfriend, and the man's youngest son, Rocky Cooper. "You're kidding me, right?"
"Nope, that's the way he tells the story," Rocky replied, his English accent heavy under his laughter as his sister Harley came up behind him and glared at Natalie: "Rocky, you better get going or you're going to miss class. You can't afford. . ."
"I'm pulling up those grades, sis," he replied easily.
"I still don't understand how. . ." Harley started to complain as she put her purse on the counter. "You haven't come to me or Frank for help, or asked any of the techs we recommended to tutor you."
"Found one on my own," he shot back as Natalie picked up one of the pictures that lay on the table and stared at it. "Besides, I want to get more pictures picked out for the slideshow for Dad's birthday."
"Your forensic classes should come first."
"Yeah, like you put your police work first," he replied sarcastically. "Besides, we're going over breaking and entering techniques today. You really think with Mum's family I'm going to have trouble putting together crime scene theories for that?"
Rolling her eyes, Harley glared at her brother's girlfriend: "find something interesting?"
"Ummm. . . no, not really," Natalie replied uneasily as she dropped the picture of Buzz with Blake Marler and her father.
Grabbing it, Harley smiled sadly, then asked suspiciously: "You knew Ross?"
"Who?" Natalie asked as she picked up another picture and handed it to Rocky. "This is a nice one of you and Coop."
"Yeah, it is," he said smiling at her.
"Guy in the picture with Blake and my dad. You were staring at him. Figured you must have known him," Harley pushed.
"What?" Natalie asked distractedly as she fished through the pictures looking for more of Rocky and his father, of which there were apparently fewer than her and her family. "I. . . uh. . . he looked like someone else," she answered as she paused at another picture, this one of Harley in a wedding dress. Freezing, she tried to comprehend looking into her uncle's face next to the woman next to her.
"What you find?" Rocky asked.
"Ummmm. . .."
"Yeah, that's not going into the slideshow," he laughed. "Although, you and Dinah getting into it sure would be interesting."
"Shut up, smartass," Harley said as she grabbed the picture from him.
"Whatz up with you and Mallet these days anyway? Or is it you and Dylan? Oh, no wait. . . you and . . ."
"I said, shut up."
"That's Mallet?" Natalie asked surprised.
"Ah yeah? What you have some sort of problem?" Harley asked.
"No. He. . . he just looks different now, that's all." Natalie sputtered.
"Yeah, some people age more gracefully than others, don't they sis?" Rocky pressed.
"Don't you have some place to be?" she asked.
"Yeah. Sure. I can finish this later," he shrugged good naturedly as he got off the stool. "You up to helping me some more tonight?" he asked Natalie.
"Yeah, after Ash and I close up. I can probably do that," she smiled. "You want me to put aside what we already have or upload it?"
"Upload it and I will owe you big time."
"Ahhh. . . told Coop you were further along with this then you are didn't you?" she laughed.
"Just don't. . ."
"I'll have it done before I start my shift. . . unless I have to start early. . ." she smiled as she started to put the pictures he wanted in the slideshow in one pile while Harley pretended to peruse the others.
Once Rocky left, Natalie sighed, knowing that the older woman would let her have it.
It was no secret to her that Harley found her lacking.
That she thought she was after something--- money or standing--- from Rocky.
She was only surprised that Harley or Frank hadn't already run a background check on her and found out who she really was, but she supposed that Marina, Coop, and Buzz had talked them out of it. "Find any pictures you want me to add?"
Harley looked up at her and tapped the edge of one picture against the bar top: "my brother's not here. I don't have to make nice. You want to tell me what the real story with the pictures is?"
"I told you. He reminded me of someone else," Natalie shrugged as she stood up.
"And your problem with the wedding picture of me and Mallet?"
"Didn't look like Mallet?" Natalie half asked as she moved to put the rest of the pictures away.
"Riiiiiight. What the hell type of game are you trying to play?"
"I'm not."
"You looked like you saw a ghost when you saw those pictures. Especially the one of me and Mallet."
"Look, I told you. The one of Buzz with Blake and that. . . what was his name?'
"Ross… Ross Marler. Her late husband."
"Right. Ross. Whatever. He reminded me of someone else, ok?" Natalie asked as she dropped pictures into a box.
"Mind if I ask who?"
"My dad, ok?" Natalie sighed. "And he happens to be alive and well. We're just not on the best of terms right now. Can we leave it at that?"
Harley narrowed her eyes: "What about the other picture? Mallet remind you of someone else all of a sudden too?" she asked condescendingly.
Natalie turned away from her, swallowing back tears: "I must just have my family on my mind. But. . . it must have been the angle or something. . . I mean Mallet looks nothing like him in person. . . I was just looking at pictures too long."
"You really are a piece of work, aren't you? Think a few tears will work on me?"
"No, Harley. I don't," Natalie said as she picked up the box of photos: "frankly, I think you're one cold hearted bitch, which just proves to me why it was just a trick of my mind that the man I thought was in that photo was. He never would've been with someone like you. He had too much heart."
"Had?" Harley asked her retreating form.
"Yeah," Natalie answered as she stopped and shifted slightly to look back at her. "He died. People never came straight out and said it, but. . . well, a lot of them thought it was my fault. Thought if I had never shown up. . . never brought Alison back into their lives. . . but, if Mitch hadn't of found the real thing. . . I have no doubt in my mind that he would have turned some poor girl into what he wanted to cause even more trouble for my family than I did back than.
My only consolation is that it wasn't some con that killed him.
That and that because he died other people--- including my mom--- got the chance to live."
"How?"
"He was an organ donor. Mom got his heart--- since he was her husband, you could say it was in more ways than one," Natalie finished before turning. "Now, if there's nothing else. . ."
"No. Not now, but one of these days. . ."
"My past is my past, Harley. It has no bearing on my life here."
"If it hurts my brother it does."
"Well, that's why Rocky and I keep it light. So neither of us gets hurt. I've been hurt enough to last a few lifetimes."
Chapter 2
If only it had been that easy. . .
I didn't upload the pictures right away that afternoon.
Instead I hunted through the box for other pictures until I found others of this Ross and ones of Mallet.
I didn't question the ones of this Ross so much. . . not then.
Sure. . . he looked like my dad, but maybe I was just seeing something I wanted to then.
Maybe I really did just miss my family.
But the Mallet pictures. . .
That was where the oddities popped out.
In the older ones he looked like Ben and in the newer ones he looked like the Mallet I had met here in Springfield.
And I couldn't let that go.
Especially not when the nightmares started.
Not when I started remembering my father as looking as someone different from this Ross.
When he was taller.
Broader.
Built more like Cord.
With jet black hair and shoulders that could carry all my problems.
With a deep voice that made me feel safe.
When he was a man that I knew I could count on.
That wouldn't tease me about someone like Jared.
That wouldn't think he was the 'right man' for his little girl.
When he was a man who would have demanded answers from me and Jessica instead of accepting half truths.
When he wouldn't have accepted someone like Nash.
Would've gone after John for breaking my heart.
Wouldn't have broken Mom's by being with Dorian.
Would've demanded that Uncle Bo find away for get me back into the forensics program or gotten Grandpa to pay someone off to do it. . .
So many things I should've seen and didn't.
But there was one that stood out more and more for me the more I thought about it, and I knew that I had to confront the one person who might know the answer. Might be able to tell me the truth. Who might not have been fooled.
He wasn't with us that day.
It hadn't really made sense.
But, I had supposed it was because he was so much older.
(I mean Matthew wasn't because he was younger.)
But he had reacted to us different.
He didn't come when called like Kevin and Joey did.
Was he afraid he'd slip?
If so? Why?
But before I went I had to be sure I was right. . .
Natalie sat at her computer shaking as she toggled back and fought between the images.
Covering her mouth, she doubled over in realization that she had been right.
The dates of the pictures proved it.
The BANNER pictures of Clint Buchanan pre-Ross Marler's death showed the man who haunted her dreams and begged her to find him. The ones that were dated after the plane crash that presumably killed the Springfield attorney showed images of a man who bore very little resemblance to the Buchanan patriarch in his prime and much more to Marler. "How. . . how is this possible. . . how could they have pulled it off?" she muttered to herself as a few of the pictures finished printing out.
Swallowing back bile, she pushed to her feet started to pace. "Some of the family had to have known.
Think Natalie. . . how do you handle this.
You can't just. . .
G-d Marler has kids. . . they're Starr's and Matthew's ages. . . and there's Dinah too. . ." shaking she fell onto the edge of the bed. "I can't tell anyone here. . . or there. . . but how. . .Forensics. . . Forensics will prove. . .so think forensically. . .you don't have the face recognition software. . . but you can get it. . . if you get your PI license. . . but you need Harley or Frank's help with that. . . Frank would probably be the better pitch. . . in the meantime. . .Henry. . . Henry took the transfer that John got him. . .he'll help. You got him through the class. . .you just have to call him. And then. . .then don't leave the pictures lying around where they can be found. . . and get a copy of the crash report. . . Can't get it on your own right now. . . Get Rex to do it. . .Have him e-mail a copy then get rid of it. . . you know how. . . they taught you. . . you just have to calm down and think that's all. . . you know the steps. . . take one at a time," she reminded herself. "In fact don't call Rex. . . you have to know some one at the FAA. . . someone through John. . . just relax and think. . . you'll figure it out. . ."
hr
"So, why should I help you?" Frank asked suspiciously.
Natalie shrugged: "I could use the extra income?" she half asked.
"Right."
"Look, I can get the license with or without your help. I just hoped you could expedite it."
"You know how hard it is to pass the test?" Frank asked her. "Believe me, I know I used to be a PI."
"Really? I didn't know that."
"You sound surprised."
"You're just so by the book."
"Wasn't always," Frank admitted as he put down his cup of coffee and stared at her. "Why do you want to be a PI?"
"Because I'd make a lousy cop and I can't be a forensic tech," she admitted.
Frank raised an eyebrow at that: "You're the one who tutored Rocky?"
"Yeah."
"Then why. . ?"
"Truth?"
"That would be nice, especially since you want this favor."
Natalie rounded the bar and perched on the stool across from him: "ok. Long story short. I was seriously involved with a detective. Worked as the Commissioner's PA. Helped out where I could. Someone suggested I go into forensics. I really liked it. I didn't do too well on my first few assignments, but I think it was their way of making me prove myself. I worked doubly hard. Took extra shifts in the field when I could. . ."
"I don't see. . ."
"The guy I was involved with was presumed dead in a multi-vehicle accident on a major interstate near us. It was bad. I didn't want to believe it. Took it really hard. . . they gave me some leeway. I was just starting back when a friend helped me prove that the man identified as the town's ADA wasn't. . . he was. . ."
"Your boyfriend."
"Right. Alive, but seriously burned.
It was bad and it took more time for him to heal.
They were good about it. . . and I was back. . . he was at the hospital when he shouldn't have been. There was a murder. . . trace evidence pointed to him or his doctor brother. .."
"You tampered with it," Frank guessed.
"Yeah, I did," Natalie admitted. "I couldn't face losing him again. I lost him anyway in the end."
"Did he. . ."
"Do it? No. He was mad that I thought he was capable, even though he had tried it under the influence of drugs--- you need to understand that this was the man who had killed his father and had gotten away with it for years and taunted him about it. He was mad that I confessed on my timetable and not his.
I got booted out of the program and almost lost my job. He got a verbal reprimand and involved with the main suspect in the case."
"Nice."
"I should say that he and she didn't actually start dating till I dumped his ungrateful ass, but, I had a feeling it was coming so I don't think it should count."
Frank laughed at that: "I'll help you get your license."
"Thanks Frank," Natalie said as she stood up and hugged him loosely around the neck.
"Hey, you making time with my girl?" Rocky asked as he walked into the room.
"Nah, he's just helping me out," Natalie said as she took a step back.
"Something wrong?"
"No, something's getting right," she answered. "How's work?" she continued as she went around the bar to pour him a drink.
"Good, shouldn't you be off?"
"Nope. Took a shift so your brother and Ash could go out."
"Again."
"Well, she's going to be covering a few of mine," Natalie shrugged not looking at him.
"Meaning we get to go out?"
"Not exactly," she said, earning another raised eyebrow from Frank. "I. . . umm. . . I have to go see one of my brothers for a couple of days."
"I thought you didn't get along with your family," Frank said.
"Don't. Doesn't mean I don't have to make an appearance every now and then," she replied easily.
"Guess not," Rocky sighed. "Timing kinds sucks though. I really wanted you here for my Dad's party."
"I know. But I have to do this. The sooner I get this done. . ."
"Besides, once I get her paperwork pushed through she'll be too busy to," Frank put in.
"What paperwork?"
"You didn't tell him?"
"Well, I didn't want there to be a problem if you said no," Natalie shrugged, then at the look from the two men added: "I don't like to be the cause of family turmoil."
"Fine, I'll let you tell him now then," Frank said leaving.
"Well. . ."
"I'm applying for my PI license. Frank's going to push through the paperwork."
"That's great."
"Yeah. It is. . ."
Chapter 3
Getting the FAA report was surprisingly easy.
Turns out being John McBain's girl was worth something after all.
(Of course, saying that I was hired to look into it for a possible civil suit by the deceases' not quite balanced daughter didn't hurt my plea much either, especially when I pretended to be bored by the whole thing.)
I read it over on the flight that the Coopers never knew I took.
The private one on the family's plane.
Of course, read it is putting it mildly.
I devoured it.
Pulled out of it every bit of information I could.
Pulled apart the pictures.
Even realized something that no one else seemed to.
Part of me thinks it was because I was looking for it.
But I can't forget that moment of realization.
When another picture held the truth.
Marler wasn't alone on that plane when it went down. . .
Natalie stood in the doorway of the hacienda tapping her foot in annoyance as she swung her hair over her shoulder and looked at her watch. She was going to give her eldest brother two more minutes before she burst in on him. The element of surprise was all she had going for her and she knew it.
As she was, she was pretty sure she had enough to knock him off balance. "And if I'm wrong he's going to want to send me to St. Ann's," she muttered under her breathe as the maid who had answered the door came towards her and looked at her with little amusement.
"Mr. Roberts will see you now."
"Great," Natalie said as she picked up her briefcase and followed the older woman into the living room, noting that Cord was hurriedly finishing up a phone call and was not too pleased to see her. Well, what did you expect. Even if he's not involve in some insidious plan, he's not exactly the type to welcome you with open arms, a voice in her head mocked.
"Natalie, this is certainly--- unexpected," Cord said as he turned to her and dismissed his housekeeper with a curt nod.
"Well, I could say that I was in the neighborhood, but we'd both know that was a lie," she answered evenly, as she glanced around the room.
Cord laughed slightly at that: "should I take it that you have some reason for being here?"
"Gee, what gave it away?" Natalie asked as she looked at the couch. "Mind if I take a seat? This might take a while."
"Go ahead. . . but. . . I. . . in all honestly, Natalie, I wished you had called. I really don't have a lot of time right now."
"If I had called, you would have given me the round around. You never have much time at any time. Why is that Cord?" she asked as she stared at him, taking in how he seemed nervous--- or was that her imagination.
"I'm a busy man."
"Right," she sighed as she crossed her legs. "Even too busy to join your siblings at your grandfather's funeral for a drink."
"I don't follow."
"Funny how few of us follow things. Then again, how something's just sort of. . . I don't know. . . follow us, no matter how we want to run away from them," she said as she took out a picture of her and 'Clint' from the Casino fundraiser. "You know, it's the oddest thing. I wanted to leave Land View and the family behind me.
Drove and Drove.
Finally stopped outside of this boarding house that needed a waitress and had a room.
Decided to stay a while.
Made a few friends.
Even started to see a guy.
Nothing to serious.
He's a little younger than me.
His sister's not too keen on me," Natalie shrugged as she leaned back in the seat and watched Cord, lifting her hair off her neck as she stretched and recrossed her legs. "Weirdest thing happened though.
I was helping him get together a slideshow for his father's birthday--- real nice guy his dad.
And there was this picture," she continued reaching into her bag again. "Oh, not this one exactly. His sister thought the one that caught my attention should be used in the slideshow--- but I didn't think much of the one I saw," she said laying the picture down next to the newspaper clipping. "Not until she gave me a hard time about staring at it. Asked me if I knew this guy name Marler.
A dead guy.
I just thought he looked like dad. . ." Natalie paused, taking in Cord's strickened look. "That is, until another picture caught my eye. . .
That one doesn't matter right now. Does it? Because the man in that picture with me at Casino Night wasn't Clint Buchanan, was he?"
"Natalie. . . I don't know what you're. . ."
"The internet's a crazy thing. I've learned a few things after what happened with Michael/Mitch," she shot back pulling out a stack of newspaper articles from the Banner and Springfield Journal. "See, after that night I started having nightmares where Dad didn't look like. . . he was bigger. Broader. . . More like Asa. . .I couldn't ignore it."
Cursing, Cord wiped a hand over his face: "You don't know what you're unleashing here."
"So it is true. And you did know."
"I thought. . ."
"I figured it out," Natalie said tiredly, watching him deflate. "Didn't quite believe it. Couldn't. Not till now. . . I mean. . . if he was . . . he had to. . . and other people had to have. . ."
"We had no choice," Cord admitted as he moved to sit next to her on the couch. "Not if we wanted to keep Dad alive."
"So he's. . ."
"Yeah."
Natalie swallowed back a sob and started to shake: "I wasn't sure. . . I didn't want to. . ."
Uneasily, Cord pulled her into a hug: "they said it was the only way. . .one of them had to die and . . ."
"How was he able to pull it off? And what about his family? They think. . ." she started pulling away.
"He doesn't remember anything but what he was told by. . . I don't know who. They had already decided it when. . . Asa, your Mom, and Bo know. I only know because someone has had to be there for Dad," Cord admitted.
"That's why you weren't there when Jess was sick."
"Something like that," Cord hedged as a voice called through the house.
"Cord! Where are you! Someone pulled up the FAA report on the plane crash and we need to. . ." the blonde said coming to a sudden halt in the doorway of the living room.
"Jess?" Natalie asked surprised as she stared at her half-sister, only to realize that something wasn't quite right. The features where similar, but off somehow.
Softer.
And the hair and make up.
It was more sophisticated and understated.
And the clothes. . .
This was. . .
"Sh!t!" Jessica said as she looked at her older half-brother. "Why the hell didn't you warn me?"
"Why didn't you?" he asked as he got to his feet, and then quieted her with a hand gesture. "Doesn't matter anyway. Cat's partway out of the bag anyway. Apparently Natalie's the one who got the FAA report anyway?"
"Why would you do that, Natty?" Jessica asked.
"You don't call me. . .'
"I always. . ." she started to correct as Natalie looked sideways at Cord and let out a harsh laugh: "oh, don't tell me. The Jessica in Land View isn't the real one either?"