A/N: Van Pelt in this chapter! :)

Disclaimer: Nothing is mine.


No day but today

'Over the moon'

When Jane, Teresa and Rigsby entered the lot, everybody was already there. After saying 'nice to meet you' countless of times, and stating her name, Teresa knew that these people were likable people. Even if she could see they all had their own troubles. They sure as hell were better than the slutty girls at the club she was forced to hang out with.

A loud applause came, and all gazes focused on the stage, where Grace entered, walking to the mike. She didn't seem nervous at all – of course not, she was Grace van Pelt.

"Last night, I had a dream," she said in the mike, and the sound coming out of it seemed perfect. Rigsby gave Sarah a thumbs up, who just rolled her eyes.

"I found myself in a desert, called: Cyberland. It was hot. My canteen had sprung a leak and I was thirsty. Out of the abyss walked a cow: Elsie. I asked if she had anything to drink, and she said..."

Teresa went on tip-toe to whisper in Jane's ear.

"Is she always like this?" she asked, and Jane smiled.

"Normally, she's even worse," he replied, and Teresa chuckled.

"She said," Grace continued, frantically pressing a button, and a few musical notes escaped the boxes. Teresa wondered how this woman had the patience to write such a performance. But then again, nobody seemed to be living the life Teresa was living.

"Only thing to do is jump over the moon," Grace sang. She coughed, and took a different tone of voice. Apparently the voice of the cow. This woman had a lot of imagination. "'They've closed everything real down ... like barns, troughs, performance spaces.'"

Grace's eyes then almost shot fire, and she looked at Mashburn, standing at the other end of the lot, surrounded by police officers. Teresa froze, and instinctively moved closer to Jane. She didn't know why she did it, but for some reason, she felt saver next to him.

She wasn't scared of cops – quite the contrary, she'd even debated becoming one – she was more scared of Mashburn.

Jane frowned, looked at where Teresa's eyes where focused and understood.
"Landlords are scary, I know," Jane teased, and Teresa rolled her eyes.
"Whatever," she murmured, and looked back at Grace. Much to Teresa's surprise, the woman was now talking to Mashburn, obviously ready to mock him. That woman had guts.

"Then, a little bulldog entered. His name we have learned was Mashburn."
The crowd laughed, looking quickly at Mashburn before quickly averting their eyes because of the officers – Mashburn didn't have much authority on his own, he always needed more people to gain that authority. Teresa didn't even understand why he was here – it was not like he very much pitied the people here. He knew that he was better than all the people here put together.

"And although he once had principles, he abandoned them to live as a lap dog to the wealthy daughter of the revolution."

"Why is she protesting?" Teresa asked Jane, who hesitated before lowering his gaze and looking into her eyes.

"Grace is... a theater person. She didn't always use to be that, but she became one after living with three men for one year. Mashburn wants to own all the apartments in our building so that he can start his own private investigation bureau, and that means that he is claiming the lot as well. The lot... is a sensible topic, for Grace. It's her performance space, she goes there every time she feels frustrated. She can't stand that Mashburn is going to take that away from her, after all the tormenting he's done when the two still lived with Rigsby, Cho and me-"
"Hey, can you shut the hell up?" a person said behind them, and Teresa sighed and turned around.

"Go to hell," she snapped. The sight of Teresa, around 5 foot 4, barking at a what seemed like 6 foot 3 man, was quite funny. Jane changed his opinion about this girl – Teresa was definitely not going to cuddle him to death. She was going to cuff him to the rails on the outside of their apartment and leave him there to die. The thought made him smile even brighter than the sight of her being bossy to somebody three times her size – and maybe even her age.

"Grace and Mashburn have always had trouble with each other, but when we 'broke up' as roommates, that 'disliking' only increased. Now, they can't be alone without bashing each other's heads in."

Teresa chuckled, though it surprised her that somebody actually stood up to Mashburn. She hadn't expected that. But then again, Grace didn't live there anymore so she could do that. "What happened that they hate each other so much?"

Jane shrugged. "Differences of opinion, I guess. Grace wants to do what's right, without hurting too much people on her way to reach that goal. Mashburn doesn't care about other's feelings. He just wants to reach his goal. He would do everything – even sleeping with people, while he's married." Teresa could notice Jane was disgusted by that, and she realized in that moment that he was a loyal person. She even admired him more now.

But he'd said that Mashburn would sleep with people. With her. She shivered.

Jane looked at her, almost worried. She waved it away.
"I'm fine," she whispered, and Jane looked at her for a few seconds more, before the crowd around them suddenly mooed. Jane and Teresa frowned, and looked at Grace on the stage, who was enthusiastically demanding her audience to 'moo' with her. Jane shook his head, smiling.

"Grace is like my little sister. Everybody loves her," Jane said, and Teresa smiled.

"Well, she doesn't seem like a mean person."
"She isn't, I can assure you that. You'll like her, I just know it-"
"Ah, so now you know me?"
"Uh, yes, I do," Jane said, rather confident, and Teresa rolled her eyes.

The audience applauded, and Grace jumped off the stage, into the direction of the group.

The rest greeted her with loud cheers, pulling her into big hugs. As soon as Grace saw the new face, she almost screamed in joy and ran over to Teresa.

"Hi! I'm Grace!" Grace exclaimed, and pulled Teresa into a tight hug. When Grace saw how Jane looked at Teresa, her smile only increased.

"Lucky you," Grace said to Teresa and then went to Sarah and pulled her out of the lot.

Teresa looked at Jane while frowning, but he just smiled at her.

That man knew more than she did.


A/N: Next up: La Vie Boheme, the end of the 1st act! I'm gonna put this story on a short hiatus (probably a week) because I want to start on a new story and need to make an outline for that one. I know that it's a bit strange to begin writing another story when I still have this one, but this one doesn't really take that much to time to write since I can definitely quote the entire musical in one go :). But anyways, after next chapter, this story is on hiatus :).