The Carlin Girls
Chapter 1
By JewWitch
Disclaimer: Characters from South of Nowhere are property of Tom Lynch.
Summary: AU. South of Nowhere, with a Gilmore Girls twist…set in Northampton, Massachusetts, a.k.a. Dyke Disneyland. Intrigued…?
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Ashley Davies woke to two very familiar, not particularly pleasant sensations. One, she had a blinding hangover. Two, she was in a strange bed, with a strange girl lying asleep beside her. Stifling a groan, Ashley sat up, managing not to hurl on the aforementioned strange girl or bed, but only just barely. Her head felt like it had spent the night having hot metal rods shoved through it, a sensation that seemed linked to the slow-churning nausea lower down. It was agonizing, but then again she was used to it. She'd even managed to leave a bottle of water for herself on the bedside table (she had absolutely no memory of this, but there it was), which she now cracked open gratefully, taking a small sip with a tiny sigh of relief. Carefully, she slipped out from under the covers and stood up, having no desire to wake the sleeping stranger beside her. Then she'd have to say something, and try to act like she actually remembered anything from last night—like the girl's name, at the very least.
Taking a step toward her clothes, which were flung over a chair across the room, Ashley winced. Guess I picked a rough one, she thought, glancing down at her bruised thighs, feeling the ache all the way up between her legs, into her soft, raw insides. Then again, maybe I told her to do that. It didn't really matter. This was how Ashley was used to feeling. This was how Ashley thought she was supposed to feel.
The hangover, at least, she knew how to cure; after easing her bruised body into her clothes, underwear stuffed into her back pocket, she downed a handful of Advil and tiptoed out the door, sunglasses in place before the bright September sun hit her face. Times like these, she appreciated the small-town life of Northampton, Massachusetts, where she could wake up with no idea where she was, and still be within walking distance of her favorite coffee shop and juice bar. She made a beeline for the place, already crowded now that a new school year had begun, and all the sexy Smith girls were back in town. Even with the continual thudding ache in her head (not to mention a few other places), Ashley grinned behind her sunglasses. Hunting season is now open, she thought, pushing past the gnawing feeling of emptiness in her gut, past the nausea and the soreness and the pounding in her skull, focusing instead on the eye candy all around her.
"Hi, what can I getcha?" The question snapped Ashley back from her daydreaming, to find a living, breathing daydream right in front of her. The girl behind the counter was an angel. She wasn't Ashley's usual type at all—she wasn't sultry or dangerous looking, she didn't have any visible piercings or tattoos; she wasn't even wearing any makeup. The girl was blonde, for god's sake. And her smile wasn't sending any throw-me-against-a-wall-and-fuck-me vibes. It was a different kind of smile all together, and Ashley couldn't say exactly what kind of vibe it sent…only that it momentarily quelled the nausea churning up her stomach, like a ray of sunlight pouring out of those tropical ocean eyes, calming the storm inside her. The blonde angel cocked her head, still smiling, and Ashley realized a little late that she was supposed to say stuff now.
"Oh, um, right…give me a 9-1-1. …Please." She normally didn't say please, but it just sort of slipped out.
"Okay, 9-1-1…don't tell me, that's, um…" Blondie closed her eyes, a little crinkle of concentration forming above her nose. There was no denying it was freaking adorable, but by now Ashley's hangover was getting impatient, and her momentary impulse of politeness was brushed away by a stab of pain in her head.
"Okay, see, if you open your eyes, you can see that there's a big ol' menu right behind your head, with a handy-dandy list of all the things that go in the blender."
"I know, but I spent all last night making flashcards of everything on the menu, and if I can remember them today, I'll never have to look up again."
"Look, cupcake," Ashley snarled, "You're not getting a grade for this, okay? I'm really not interested in your psychotic study habits, and I'm not gonna give you a gold star. I just want my goddam smoothie sometime today." The smile drained away, as a harder expression settled into her blue eyes.
"Coming right up," she said brusquely, her eyes completely flat as she turned and glanced up at the menu, then bustled off to make the smoothie. Ashley closed her eyes and groaned. Captain hangover strikes again, she thought ruefully. Oh well, she's probably straight, anyway…there are one or two straight girls poking around this town. She stood there feeling sick and irritable for a couple of minutes, and when blondie came back with her drink, she already had her money out and ready.
"On the house," the blonde girl said when Ashley tried to pass her the cash. "For your trouble." If it had been one of the regular baristas making this statement, Ashley would've considered it a come-on—she had slept with most of them, so she knew the flirting rules of The Haymarket—but there was nothing inviting about the blonde girl's voice, or her expression. It seemed more like she'd just realized she'd pissed off a customer on her first day, and didn't want to make it any worse.
"Um…thanks," Ashley said dumbly, unable to think of anything more intelligent or gracious to say in her current miserable state. Blondie nodded curtly, and turned away to go help the next customer; as soon as she did, Ashley stuffed a ten dollar bill in the tip jar, and went to find a table.
Half an hour later, her smoothie gone, Ashley was feeling much better. It was mid-morning by now, and the café was fairly quiet; most of the college kids had cleared out to attend their big-brained classes, and the working adult population was long gone. The only customers left, besides Ashley, were a few of the regulars, freelancers who sat all day with their laptops, mainlining espressos and nibbling vegan wheat-free cranberry muffins while they worked, and young mothers with strollers stopping for a juice break on their way to whatever fruity baby percussion or African dance class was en vogue that week.
Ashley watched the blonde while she worked. She looked angelic again, now that she didn't have a pissed off Ashley in her face, and she actually seemed to enjoy the trivial tasks of the morning, from cutting up an entire crate of bananas to be stacked in the freezer, to wiping down all the tables in the place. She had a tranquil, almost meditative expression on her face as she worked, her blue eyes faraway…Ashley felt a bizarre, fleeting desire to be wherever the blonde girl was at that moment. Get a grip, Davies, she shook herself. She's a hottie, sure; but she's not the queen of the fucking Nile. You just want to nail her. That's it. Her brain back in its most familiar zone, she strode back up to the counter, sliding on her most sultry grin, and leaning over the counter on her elbows with catlike grace.
"Hey. Sorry I was such an uber-bitch before. It wasn't you; I just had a monster hangover." She looked up from below her long lashes, giving the blonde a teasing smirk. "You know how it is."
"Vaguely," the girl shrugged coolly, looking up for only a moment from her task of wiping down the counter.
"Aw, come on," Ashley prodded, determined to get another angelic smile like the one she'd gotten before. "What are you, eighteen? And you have no sympathy for one little moment of bitchy-hangover weakness?"
"I'm nineteen," the girl replied coolly, "and I'd have more sympathy for your hangover excuse if it wasn't 10am on a Tuesday."
"What's your beef with Tuesday?" Ashley asked, realizing as soon as it was out of her mouth that this girl was probably one of those prissy, I-only-party-on-weekends-and-holidays types. She managed to hold in her grumble of annoyance, getting only a stiffly raised eyebrow in return. Still, she wasn't ready to give up.
"I'm Ashley," she said simply, holding out her hand. "I come in peace?" Finally, she got another smile, a real one, and it flooded her stomach with the same sunshiny feeling she'd gotten when those bright blue eyes had first landed on her.
"Spencer," the blonde girl replied, taking her hand and giving it a surprisingly firm shake for someone so delicate-looking.
"So Spencer, what dorm are you in?"
"Oh…" the blonde girl—Spencer—looked up uncomfortably, a slight blush tingeing her pale cheeks. "I'm not…a student, or anything." She shuffled her feet a little, like she was admitting something terribly embarrassing.
"Oh!" Ashley exclaimed, a little thrown, but not particularly disappointed. "That's cool, me neither. I just assumed, cause, it's September, and you're new in town…"
"How do you know I'm new in town?" Spencer raised her eyebrow again, and Ashley was sure this time that there was something teasing, maybe even a little inviting, in her expression.
"Oh, I'd definitely have noticed you," Ashley grinned, pleased to see a warm, pink blush rising in the other girl's cheeks. "So, since you bought me breakfast…can I buy you dinner?" Spencer's smile faltered.
"Um, that's really nice of you to offer, but I can't. Sorry." She quickly went back to wiping down the counter, her hand moving in brisk circles over the crumbs and water stains, as if it was the most urgent task in the world.
"That's cool," Ashley shrugged, not thrown off as easily. "Another day, then?"
"Look…Ashley." It was the first time she'd heard the blonde angel say her name, and she knew right away that she wanted to hear it again, preferably gasped in the throes of pleasure. "I'm really sorry, but I can't really make any plans right now. I just…don't have a lot of free time." She frowned down at the counter like it had just said something nasty to her, while Ashley stood perplexed.
"What do you mean, you can't make plans? You don't go to school, so you don't have homework or classes; and even if you were totally psycho and worked here like 12 hours a day, you'd still have another 12 to do stuff. What are you, a secret agent or something?"
"Yeah, sure," Spencer shrugged, her movements stiffening as she finished wiping down the counter, and tossed the rag into the sink. "I'm a secret agent. Excuse me." She turned her back on a bemused Ashley, and started cleaning out glasses.
"Um, okay…" Ashley raised her eyebrows, surprised but in no way discouraged. "Just so you know, I come in here pretty much every day."
"Thanks for the tip," Spencer said over her shoulder.
"I'm just gonna keep asking, until you give me some kind of tangible reason why not."
"Knock yourself out."
"A'aight, then…" Ashley blinked, totally at a loss as to how she'd gotten herself into such a ridiculous conversation. "See you tomorrow, Mata Hari." She was sure she heard a snort of laughter from Spencer as she walked out.