Disclaimer: I own a globe that lights up but I don't own Veronica Mars or any related copyrighted material. That's Rob Thomas' baby.


On The Tide

"It's probably not just by chance that I'm alone. It would be very hard for a man to live with me, unless he's terribly strong. And if he's stronger than I, I'm the one who can't live with him. … I'm neither smart nor stupid, but I don't think I'm a run-of-the-mill person. I've been in business without being a businesswoman, I've loved without being a woman made only for love. The two men I've loved, I think, will remember me, on earth or in heaven, because men always remember a woman who caused them concern and uneasiness. I've done my best, in regard to people and to life, without precepts, but with a taste for justice."

- Coco Chanel

It was evening when her plane landed, a steady stream of rain pelted the crowded streets.

Though the sky was growing dark the city was just beginning to brighten up. The gaudy colours of the neon flashed across the dark glass of the taxi window as she stared out at the city.

Even at this hour it bustled with life, a bee hive, full of drones and workers, soldiers and queens. Her reflection, pale and small in the glass was washed out by the brightness and life of the world outside.

Here there were no memories or assumptions, no friends or enemies.

Here everything would be different and better.

Cliché, she knew, but this was her chance at a clean start.

No one would claim this city as the beacon of clean and wholesome but the dark, wet streets before her eyes looked more appealing now than the sun soaked paths of her past.

Here she was anonymous.

It would be okay, she would work hard, like she always did, and she would succeed, like she always did.

Well in everything but that one thing.

That one thing that everyone made such a big deal about, that they wrote poems and plays, movies and songs, big epic sagas about.

A sigh like the last of the summer breezes, just beginning to grow cold, left her lips.

She was tired of it, that weight, let them keep their stories and songs, she would lock them away and move on.

Maybe one day when her bones felt hollow and light she would seek the weight of a past so dark and deep, like a gaping chasm , like a boiling ocean, to hold her to the world. She would sit with her ghosts and fondly remember a girl made of gold, a boy with a shy smile and another with eyes like fire.

But today was a day for burying the past and walking away. She had thrown it away and fled the ocean before the tide could return it. Maybe she would fish it out some day, like an old piece of driftwood.

But not today, today was new and Veronica Mars was just another girl without a past trying to make it in the bright lights and the big city.

Alone.


The sun was just beginning to peek out from behind the waves, painting their crests in golden light.

The dim world beyond the gold tipped waves was still dull and washed out from the night. Soon the painted fingers of the sun would revive the world in its palette of yellows, oranges, reds and pinks.

Till then the bright yellow of the taxi idling by the curb outside the beach house was the only splash of colour among the hazy blue of the mid mourning fog.

Dressed in white, bag slung over his shoulder , Logan walked purposely towards the car. He cast a tall silhouette against the side of the house, a temporary imprint of his presence.

He didn't look back until the door of the car closed, he thought he saw a shadow by the front window, thought he saw the blind twitch. He closed his eyes and inhaled the scent of salt and a lingering fragrance of flowers. A smile flashed across his eyes, liquid and warm.

She would stand by the window and watch the car pull away and turn out onto the almost deserted street, till the after-image of its rear lights faded from her vision. Then she would put on her armour and proceed to fight her battles while he speed away, towards his own.

He would worry but so would she, each in their own way.

This was a fact as much as the fact that they were both fighters, backing down just wasn't either of their had sent them reeling away to opposite ends of a continent but it had also dragged them back together to the small town perched on the edge of the ocean.

No, even the vastness of the ocean wasn't enough to keep the secrets of the soul.

One thing Logan knew, eventually all things thought lost or discarded returned on the tide.

Always.

"I fell in love with her courage, her sincerity, and her flaming self respect. And it's these things I'd believe in, even if the whole world indulged in wild suspicions that she wasn't all she should be. I love her and it is the beginning of everything."

- F. Scott Fitzgerald.