Title: Satiate: You Could Mean Everything
Author: alakewood
Warnings: Vague spoilers for season three. If you know about Piz's crush on Veronica, you're good. And, after assuming V and Logan are no more, this goes a little AU. Also, strippers ahoy and some semi-misogynistic guys.
Rating: PG-13, maybe R
Summary: Piz gets a really big surprise for his birthday.

xOxOx

LIVE! NUDE! GIRLS!, boasted the flashing neon sign outside of the strip club. Piz felt the blush burning his cheeks before they had even crossed the street.

It was his twenty-first birthday and some of his buddies had come down from Portland to surprise him.

"Sam, I – I just," he started to stutter as he was forced through the door and into a small room with another door, and a counter with a window.

The girl on the other side of the window looked at them tiredly. "ID's," she said.

"Come on, Piz. When was the last time you saw any, much less got some?" Sam asked, to Derek and Jon's agreement. "Just loosen up and have fun. Stare shamelessly at some titties."

Piz rolled his eyes as the girl at the counter wrapped a band around his wrist. "Sorry," he told her.

She pushed his change through the cutout in the glass and said, "Have fun boys," in a tone that made him wonder if, maybe, she were related to Ben Stein.

He tried to not look at the girls performing on the various stages throughout the club, noticed a couple of huge-ass Hi-Def TV's with different sports games on.

Sam had found an empty booth within a couple of feet of one of the stages and set his cooler down in front of the table. He looked up at the girl on the stage. "Nice." He elbowed Piz, who was extremely focused on a baseball game. "Dude. There are naked girls all over, and you're watching baseball?"

"Piz, man, seriously." Jon pushed him towards the stage and set a dollar bill at the edge.

The stripper, a leggy brunette, finished a little dance for an old guy in a cowboy hat before sliding over Piz. She looked a little thankful for the reason to get away. She glanced at Piz, and his buddies, and smiled slowly. "Hi, boys. How ya doin'?"

"Excellent," Jon said. "It's my friend here's birthday."

She came up off of her elbows, drew her knees together to sit up and kneel. After brushing Piz's hair away from his forehead, she brought his face between her breasts and, pretty much, snuggled him in. "Happy birthday," she said, picking up the dollar and tossing it into the pile behind her, before getting up, the song finishing.

Piz was still in shock as Derek pushed him into a chair along the side of the stage. "You like those titties in your face? Don't you want to motorboat 'em?" Piz laughed with him as he mocked Sam.

"Not really, no," he replied, a new song – Nelly Furtado's Say It Right, he was sure – started, and a new dancer came down to the stage. Piz was instantly drawn to the blonde, her petite-but-fit frame. Just entranced by her for some reason he didn't understand, took in the little details like the black lace underwear and the pink mesh shirt. He watched as she strode over to the pole, swung around on it, swirling down to the floor, writhing there for a moment.

As she flipped her hair back off of her face, he understood why. He reached for his wallet with a shaking hand, pulled a couple of dollars out, laid them down.

"There you go, buddy," Sam said encouragingly, handing him a beer.

"Thanks," Piz weakly managed, the now-topless stripper starting right for him.

She turned in front of him, dropping down to a crouch, her back to him, started her dance.

He knew that she was avoiding looking at him, because he knew she'd have recognized him right away if she had seen him, but he could only stare at her breasts as she bounced in front of him, then she leaned back and pulled the underwear off in a move that probably would've qualified her as a professional. She writhed a little more before rising up to her knees and finally looking at him.

"Veronica."

"Piz. Hey." Her eyes betrayed the calm in her voice. "Whatcha doin' here?"

"I was just going to ask you the same thing. But, uh, it's my birthday."

"Well, surprise!"

"No kidding." He set another dollar down.

"I've gotta..." Her fingers trailed across his forehead and pushed his hair behind his ear as he pulled his head towards her.

He breathed in deeply of her perfume and just her, having the decency to look a little ashamed. "Awkward," he said.

"Sorry," she laughed. "I'll come talk to you in a bit, okay?" She stood, giving him a small smile as she headed for another customer.

"You know her?" Sam asked. "Nice."

Piz just shook his head. He was totally blown away by the whole situation. And all he could do was sit there and wait for Veronica while images of her dancing on the stage flitted through his memory. Something he never could have imagined and certainly something that would wind up as a recurring dream that would help get him through his lonely nights.