A/N: This is (hopefully) going to be a multi-chapter fic from Logan's POV, built around country songs that deal with loss and heartbreak. (I realize that this may not be the first thing that comes to mind when one pictures Logan Echolls, but there is a method to the madness.) After all, sometimes it's the unfamiliar that reaches deepest when someone's dealing with heartbreak. At any rate, each chapter will focus around a different song and build off its lyrics, so if you're interested in the connections, just check out the chapter title to figure out which song is referenced.
As always, feedback is deeply appreciated. Hope you enjoy. :)
He hates country music. Always has. Whoever said it was the sound of Americana was fucking insane, in his opinion. But, for whatever reason, every time she breaks his heart (how many times has it been now?) he finds the one country station in Neptune and listens to it for three days straight.
Right now there's some song playing about whiskey and a faithless woman and death at the end of a bottle. It occurs to him that this should be a painful subject, considering his mother's end and all, but at the moment it makes perfect sense. What better reason to drink yourself to death than betrayal by the love of your goddamned life? And it only gets more appropriate when you multiply both loves and betrayal by two. Even Nashville couldn't have come up with something as fucked-up as that.
He chugs whiskey straight from the bottle, cheap stuff from a corner liquor store with dust on the shelves and bars on the windows. He just wants to forget, that's all. Forget Lilly and Veronica and his father and the burden of breathing in and out. Take the easy way out, like his mom, feel the alcohol and pills numb his brain and then let the cold dark water slip over him like an embrace. There are days when he regrets more than anything the decision to not jump off her bridge. It's such a missed opportunity for poetic justice, he muses.
….
It's the beginning of senior year, and he knows Duncan is worried about him. He catches the sideways looks, the crinkle between DK's eyebrows, and he almost wants to laugh out loud with the sheer idiocy of it. Of course Duncan doesn't say anything. How could he? But sometimes when the concerned glances have become a little much, he likes to imagine how exactly that conversation would go. Logan, man, might want to lay off the whiskey a bit there. Looking a little worse for the wear. Not that you'd have any reason to drown your sorrows. Certainly would have nothing to do with the fact that your father killed my sister/your girlfriend and almost killed your next girlfriend and generally acted like the sociopathic asshole that he is. And, speaking of girlfriends, did you notice that your ex is currently wrapped around me like a clinging vine? Because I'd like to rub that in your face as much as possible, if that's all good with you. But, all of that aside, don't drink so much anymore, m'kay?
And then he gets sidelong looks for chuckling dully for no reason at all.
He knows that he's doing a terrible job of acting like he doesn't care about Duncan and Veronica. He tells himself that he doesn't give a damn that the Donut and his (brief) former flame have gotten back together. He tells himself it was always going to happen. He flaunts Kendall—practically waves her like a red flag in Veronica's face, if he's going to be perfectly honest—but not a bit of it changes the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach every time to she comes to their door. He has always reacted to her too intensely, and he can't stop now. Even when he feels their pitying glances, sees the worry in their eyes, he can't make the mask stick.
He's trying too hard, and he knows it. They all do.
…..
One Saturday morning he wakes up, pulls himself groggily from the tangled sheets, and slouches into the bathroom for a shower. It's earlier than he usually wakes up, but for some reason he doesn't feel like his usual weekend tradition of cartoons and Lucky Charms. He just wants to get out, go feel the wind in his hair and the sun on his face, drive down to the beach and walk for a while.
He isn't paying attention when he turns the handle of the bathroom door, and so he's paralyzed with shock when he hears the sound of water running and the murmur of voices. He could have just as easily used the smaller bathroom that adjoins his room, but he likes the luxury of the bigger shower with its strategically placed heads and heated tile. Apparently so do Duncan and Veronica, if the silhouettes behind the frosted glass are to be believed. He's about to turn and go, face flaming, when he hears that breathy little moan that he's only ever heard from her. It stops him dead in his tracks.
Oh god—they aren't—she can't be—but she is, and he's frozen there, and he's listening to his best friend and the girl he can't stop loving and he's pretty sure that Dante was right, that the deepest circle of Hell is sheer agonizing cold. There's a lump of ice in his belly and a rising sickness in his throat, and he can't believe that he's standing here and he can't force himself to move. She moans again, a soft sound that she only makes when she's getting close, and the breath he takes is turned to ice, shards that pierce his lungs and close around his chest like a vise. For some reason he only thought she made that sound for him, thought that it was something they shared, never thought that he would stand with his hand on a doorknob and hear her making it for someone else.
And then she cries, "Oh, god, Duncan!" and the ice cracks and he moves, faster than he would have thought possible, sliding backwards out of the doorway and closing the door so quickly and quietly even he can't believe it. He goes back to his room on shaking legs, can't stop the muscles in his belly from trembling like he's had an electric shock. He tells himself fiercely that this is pathetic, he shouldn't care like this, that he should call up Kendall and have a rousing fuckathon that will drown out every noise known to man. But he doesn't, just lays down on the unmade bed and stares at the ceiling until he no longer knows what time it is. He hears the footsteps going towards Duncan's room, hears her laughter a little later, and hates himself for wondering what she thought was funny. He doesn't move until he hears them go out together, hears the soft snick of the door latch closing. Only then does he pad silently out into the living room and head towards the built-in bar.
He opens a bottle of vodka (his mother's drink of choice) and turns up the stereo until the bass is pounding at the walls and he's sure that the residents next door are complaining loudly to the front desk. He drinks his way through the bottle, lets the harsh insistent beat thud through his bones and weave through his brain. It hurts, and he welcomes it.
He doesn't want to hear anything else.
