Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.

Also, fair warning this chapter has rightfully earned its T with its language.

"This," Fang spat the word out of his mouth like it was vinegar. "Is Plan B?"

"Well it's not like you came up with anything better," Iggy said defensively, his arms crossed across his chest in a defiant gesture.

"Iggy," Fang said slowly, as if talking to a daft child. "We are standing in front of a rundown motel."

"Yes we are," Iggy agreed.

Fang sighed and said angrily, "We're rock stars Iggy!"

"Since when?" Iggy asked sarcastically.

Fang growled softly before shouting, "Rock stars don't stay in rundown Super 8 Motels!"

Iggy snorted and waved his hand flippantly in the air. "Of course they do." Fang opened his mouth to start arguing when Iggy interrupted again. "Especially when the only other option is to go around asking random people to stay in their house. So yes. Rock stars stay at Super 8 motels."

"Is there really no other option?" Fang asked, desperate at this point.

"No," Iggy said firmly.

"Nudge?" Fang was practically begging.

"Nope," Iggy shook his head. "I already asked and she shot us down without blinking."

"My folks?" Fang really was desperate to ask if they could stay with his parents whom he had a rocky relationship with at best.

"No Fang," Iggy said shortly, implying there was no room for argument. "Besides this is only temporary. I put in an application for an apartment and they said they'd get back to me in like a week. So this is just until then."

"Only a week," Fang repeated, eyeing Iggy wearily.

"A week," Iggy nodded in confirmation.

"Alright," Fang caved with a groan and Iggy smirked in victory. "But that doesn't mean I have to like it," Fang said warningly.

"Oh shut up," Iggy said with a grin as he started lugging his suitcase over to the elevator. "This is going to be fun!"

"You and I have very different ideas of fun," Fang grumbled more to himself as Iggy was jamming his thumb impatiently on the close door button in the elevator. Fang rolled his eyes and jogged over, sticking his foot out to stop the doors from closing. Iggy stuck his tongue out at Fang and pouted dramatically in the corner of the elevator.

"You're acting like a child Iggy," Fang pointed out, a hint of amusement finally creeping into his voice. Iggy heard the change in tone and he waggled his eyebrows at Fang.

"This is going to be fun!" Iggy proclaimed again. Fang raised an eyebrow skeptically but said nothing else.

"Dude, what the hell is a jicama?" Iggy asked Fang who was leaning moodily against the grocery cart.

"I don't know," Fang snapped in irritation.

Iggy brought the potato looking object up to his face and sniffed at it curiously. "Smells like dirt!" he proclaimed proudly.

"Good to know," Fang said with an eye roll. Iggy nodded absently and brought the round thing to his face again. This time, instead of sniffing at the thing, he licked it. "Are you kidding me Iggy?" Fang sputtered as Iggy smacked his lips contemplatively.

"Tastes like dirt too," Iggy said matter of fact.

Fang slapped his hand over top his face and asked sarcastically, "No really?"

"Don't be like that," Iggy grinned as he tossed the dirt potato in the cart. "This has to be the first time you've been out grocery shopping since who knows. Enjoy yourself!"

"Iggy," Fang's words were clipped and tight and Iggy finally stopped goofing around and looked at Fang with a quirked eyebrow.

"Fangles?"

Fang narrowed his eyes at the nick name and growled, "Iggy!"

"Princess Fang?" Iggy's sense of self-preservation had apparently remained behind in Los Angeles.

"Iggy!"

"Fang-a-licious!"

"I give up," Fang groaned, his head sinking to his arms folded on the shopping cart.

Iggy thrust both hands into the hair, the traditional peace sign being waved everywhere as he shouted, "Victory!" Iggy's sense of humility also remained behind apparently. Fang looked around quickly, looking to see if anyone was watching. When he realized that it was the middle of the day on a Wednesday and that the only people that were going to be in here were stay at home moms and dads, Fang relaxed marginally.

"What's got your panties in a wad?" Iggy asked curiously as he grabbed three boxes of Cinnamon Toast Crunch off the shelf and tossed them into the cart.

"I just don't want to be here," Fang said with a scowl. "This place hasn't changed at all."

"You say that like it's a bad thing," Iggy sounded slightly bitter, but Fang couldn't find it in himself to care.

"I left a full-staffed mansion to come back to a small, backwater, town where you can't sneeze without everyone and their brother finding out about it. You're right Iggy, I should be happy and chipper as hell," Fang said, sarcasm dripping off his words like honey.

Iggy turned fully around, his glare pronounced and pointed as he reminded Fang, "And this place is your home. Much as you loathe admitting it, everything this town is made you who you are. So stop hating it and just enjoy your summer for once."

"Fine," Fang scowled even deeper than before. "Oh and Iggy," Fang remembered what exactly he was trying to remember what he was supposed to ask Iggy.

"Yes Fang?" Iggy responded with an exasperated sigh.

"Why have you been filming everything I've been saying with that stupid camcorder?"

"You just now noticed?" Iggy snorted slightly as he tossed an ungodly amount of ice cream and chocolate syrup into the cart.

"Shut up," Fang snapped, irritable again.

Iggy turned around, his camcorder in hand, as he said to both Fang and the camera, "I'm filming this summer and posting regularly on our band website. Brigid and the manager thought of it. It's supposed to keep our fans excited and pumped for the release of our album and since we'll be out of prying paparazzi eyes, they want up to keep everyone updated. Also, there sort of a betting pool on you."

"Betting pool?" Fang asked curiously. "For what?"

"If you can really stay off girls the whole summer," Iggy replied with a mischievous smirk. "Odds right now are NOT in your favor my friend."

"Oh kill me now," Fang groaned as he softly hit his head on the side of one of the food shelves.

"Oh can I really?"

"Shut up Iggy."

"You hurt me so."

"SHUT UP!"

"So, Fanganator," Iggy asked lazily, his feet in the air and his various appendages hanging off the bed at odd angles. His camera was currently on, the infuriating red light blinking away as it filmed Fang from its upside down position. "What exactly is your plan for the summer of no girls?"

Fang scowled at Iggy but answered anyway, "I've got no idea. Any thoughts?"

"Well, I would suggest that you just relax and write music, but we all know how that will turn out, so that one's no good," Iggy chuckled. Fang scowl deepened and his ears turned slightly red.

As embarrassing as it was to admit, Iggy had a point. Fang was no poet or even really a song writer. He could belt lyrics out all day and night and make any half-assed song sound epic, but he couldn't write his own. And it wasn't even from lack of trying. Since he and the band had first started out, Fang had tried again and again and again to write a song, but he just couldn't do it. Iggy and Dylan were the song writers and Gazzy could match their lyrics pretty easily with music. Fang usually just sat in the corner and looked pretty.

"Why don't you just meet up with all our old friends and see what everybody's been up to since we left," Iggy finally suggested.

"Maybe," Fang sighed.

"Oh!" Iggy exclaimed, jumping slightly. He ended up in a pile of limbs tangled on the bed and it took him several moments to struggle out of the human knot he'd put himself in. Fang looked expectantly at Iggy, wondering what had him so worked up. "We could go egg Lissa's house!"

Fang's curiosity vanished and his face turned dark. "No," he spat. "I want nothing to do with her."

"Come on Fang!" Iggy whined.

"No!" Fang snapped shortly, signaling the end of that discussion.

Iggy rolled his eyes and turned the camera to his face. With a fake philosophical face, he said seriously, "Princess Fangles has some unresolved issues with Lissa."

"Iggy!" Fang roared as he threw a pillow and a shoe in quick succession at Iggy's head.

Iggy let out a rather undignified squawk and flattened to the ground shouting, "Take cover!" Fang rolled his eyes and stalked out the door of Iggy's motel room, slamming it loudly behind him.

"Drama queen," Iggy mumbled as he switched off the camera now that Fang wasn't around.

Iggy smiled broadly as he leaned against the sink, his toothbrush still wedged firmly in his mouth. Today he was going to go get caught up with Nudge again. Today was her day off and they had more to catch up with than one lunch get together could possible cover. "Fang," Iggy shouted while he pounded on the door to Fang's motel room. "FANG!"

The door was suddenly yanked open to reveal a rather irate and sleepy looking Fang. His dark hair was even more disheveled than usual and his eyes were lined with red and puffy. "Dude you look like shit," Iggy said bluntly. He supposed he probably could have phrased it better and sounded a little more concerned, but too late now.

"What do you want?" Fang growled, an intimidating glare accompanying his question.

"I'm going out with Nudge today; would you like to join us?"

"No," Fang slammed the door in Iggy's face and he could vaguely here him shuffling around on the other side. Iggy's good mood wasn't put off by Fang's crappy early morning moods. In fact, his general grumpiness seemed to almost make Iggy grin wider. With his hands shoved deeply into the pockets of his sweatshirt, large framed sunglasses hiding his pale eyes from the sun, and a baseball hat on with the bill pulled down low, Iggy stepped out into the sunlight. He inhaled dramatically as he revved the engine.

"I love the smell of gasoline in the morning," he said to no one in particular. When Iggy stepped into the old Ride diner, Nudge spotted him and made her way over immediately.

"Come on Iggy!" Nudge said with a wide grin. "We've got stuff to talk about!"

"We?" Iggy chuckled as Nudge tugged aggressively on his hand to the booth he and Fang had sat at yesterday.

"Oh shut up," Nudge grumbled with a grin on her face nonetheless. "Now back to where we were yesterday…"

An alarm clock blared loudly. A tan hand snaked from underneath a twisted pile of limbs and blankets. "Damn it turn that thing the hell off!" a voice from the other side of the apartment shouted through the not thick enough walls.

"Oh shut up Amanda," the owner of the tan hand snapped.

"Don't be so bitchy Maxie pad," the other girl snapped. "Just turn it the hell off. What time is it anyway?"

Max rolled over and landed with a loud "Oof!" as she landed on her back on the ground. "Ouch! What the hell is down here?" Amanda finally gave in and yanked the blanket off from over her head in her attempts to block out her roommate's loud awakening. Max heard her stomping around her room and jerking the door to Max's room open and letting it bang like thunder back on the wall.

"Turn. It. Off!" Amanda ground out as she kicked the prone form of Max.

"Ouch, knock it off bitch," Max groused. She finally managed to drag her cell phone off her night stand and hit the alarm button. "There, happy?"

"Very," Amanda spat, stalking back to her room, slamming her door dramatically. Max rolled her eyes and sluggishly started moving around her room. Despite what their interaction might suggest, she and Amanda were surprisingly good friends. Just not in the mornings.

In the kitchen Max shoveled a granola bar, the ones she bought specifically with peanut butter and chocolate, into her mouth and grabbed one of her many college sweatshirts off a hook by the door. Although San Francisco was in California, it wasn't even sort of warm at 5 in the morning, Max knew from experience. With her headphones in and the volume cranked up loud, Max got started on her five mile run. An hour and a half later, Max was jumping into the shower, her sweaty Stanford sweater in a crumpled ball on the bathroom floor. About halfway through rubbing shampoo into her hair, Amanda started pounding on the door.

"MAX!" damn that girl's voice could carry. "Are you almost done?"

"No!" Max shouted back over the sound of the shower.

She was rewarded with a few seconds of silence before the knocking continued. "Max! How much longer?"

"Damn it Amanda, go away! Go and throw your glorified rock or something!" Max didn't have to see Amanda's face to picture her expression and the accompanying eye roll.

"Who shoved your pole up your ass?" Amanda snapped like Max knew all too well that she would.

"Oh shut up!" Max shouted back as she finally went back to showering.

Amanda grinned to herself outside the bathroom door. These arguments were far more common, though they held far less malice than the one this morning did. Max and Amanda were both studying at Stanford and spending the beginning of summer in one of Amanda's parent's many apartments.

Amanda and her family were loaded and thought nothing of having an apartment in the crazy expensive city of San Francisco. When Amanda had found out that her parents were going to be gone all summer, she immediately offered Max to stay with her in the month long gap between graduation and when Max would be flying back to her home state. Max, being at Stanford purely on scholarships with little money to her name, had jumped at the opportunity.

The two had met on Stanford's Track and Field team, Max doing the pole vault and high jump while Amanda was in shot-put and discus. The two had similar senses of humor and instantly hit it off the first day of Hell Week, or Conditioning as most upper classmen called, freshman year and they had been fast friends ever since. It was very rare to see one without the other, especially at track meets.

Amanda wasn't happy that Max was flying out of San Fran in about two hours, but she wasn't going to make a huge deal out of it. She knew that it had been a long time since Max had seen her family the last being two Christmas's ago since Max had had an internship over summer and had spent last Christmas with Amanda and her family to save money.

When Amanda heard Max come out of the shower, she called out, "Dumbass, are you packed?"

"Yes I am bitch, thank you very much," Max shot back with a grin. Her hair was wrapped up in a towel and her clothes were slightly damp. "Now let's get going. Don't want to get stuck in too bad traffic."

Amanda rolled her eyes and went to grab her keys. Max was weird about driving. She had something against cars apparently. She got around mainly walking or riding on a skateboard and if the destination was too far for that, she'd ride on her motorcycle. Amanda was fairly certain that Max had her license, she had just never seen her use it.

"Damn, what'd you pack, cinderblocks?" Amanda wheezed as she hefted Max's bag into the trunk of her car.

"Don't be a weeny," Max shot back, though she too was struggling to get her bag into the trunk. When both bags were situated and Max's backpack at her feet in the passenger seat, they started off to the airport.

At the security point, Max and Amanda both paused. "Be safe and smart Dumbass," Amanda chided the other girl, only half kidding.

"Yes mom," Max said with a laugh. Amanda stuck her tongue out and hugged Max tightly.

"Text me when something interesting happens Max," she whispered into Max's hair.

Max's chest rumbled with laughter. "It's a small town in Michigan Amanda. Nothing interesting ever happens." With one last hug, Max was off into the airport, waiting impatiently to board her plane back home.

Sorry it's taken me so long to update. Whoops? Oh well, you all know the drill. Review and let me know what you think, okay?

As of right now, I've fixed the fact that I swore I put in line breaks but apparently I did not. Whoops.