A/N: For all of you patiently waiting, here it is. The next chapter, yay! And welcome to all of the new readers. I'm so glad you have joined us. Perfect timing too, things are just getting good lol. As always, thanks to my wonderful beta who works so hard to make everything perfect. For reals. Amazing. And thanks to everyone who reviews. You guys make my day. Marshmallows for everyone! (Because that's what we eat in this fandom lol) Seriously. Love.
Chapter 21: Seeing You Again
"Veronica!" Logan called as he ran to her side, seeing her for the first time in close to seventeen years. She looked up at him from her spot on the uncomfortable hospital cot in the E.R., surprise filling her blue eyes.
"Logan…" his name slipped from her mouth almost breathlessly. He watched her stand, carefully, as though to protect an injury she had sustained, before greeting him with a warm embrace and a wince.
Logan was amazed at how well her body still fit against his, like two pieces from the same puzzle. He released her quickly when he heard her wince, realizing that he had squeezed her a little too tightly, a recent memory flooding back into his brain.
"I heard shots and I thought…he began, looking down to see if she was bleeding anywhere.
She shook her head, "I was wearing a vest. I'm just bruised. I'll be fine. I don't even know why I'm over here," she said, as he watched her give a dirty look to the nurse that wouldn't let her leave before returning her attention to him, "Are you okay? They had guns and I pushed over the boxes…"
"I thought that was you… or at least I'd hoped," he smiled warmly as an intern came over, relief washing over him that she was fine.
"Hi, I'm Dr. Gersher, I'm going to need you lie back down so I can have a look at you," he said, pointing to the table where Veronica had been sitting. She protested slightly, insisting he could just sign off on his chart and she would be on her way.
"The sooner you let me do this, the sooner you can leave," the annoyed intern said as Veronica laid on the cot in the crowded E.R. "Honestly, I think you need a psych consult. Who throws themselves in the path of bullets?" He pressed down on her stomach where a large bruise was already starting to form. Logan heard Veronica suck in a sharp intake of breath and looked over with concern.
"I don't know, how about a mother wearing a bulletproof vest in an attempt to save her daughter's life. It's not crazy, it's instinct. I'm fine, can I go now?" Veronica asked, trying to get up again but being forced down by the doctor's strong hands.
"I need to make sure you didn't crack any ribs or have any internal bleeding," he said, shifting his hands around.
As the doctor continued to examine her, Logan got a good look at the damage to her stomach. On one hand he was quite impressed by her visibly toned abs, but on the other, he was concerned about the scars that appeared alongside her newly formed bruise. Slowly his eyes moved across her revealed flesh, taking in the rest of the marks on her body. He didn't need to ask to know where they came from - F.B.I. confrontations gone wrong.
Logan felt like he was going to be sick. This was all his fault: all of the pain she had to endure over the years. If he hadn't put her on that plane, none of this would have ever happened. How could he be the cause of so much pain when all he wanted to do was protect her? Quickly he jumped from his chair and ran down the hall and around a corner before finding a waste bin to launch the contents of his stomach into.
Veronica watched him leave, hurt by his actions. She wanted to run after him, but the doctor still had her pinned to the table. How could he just leave like that?
"Do you know how my daughter is doing?" she asked after a moment of silence, refocusing her attention on to Linley. Logan was fine - she could deal with him later.
He sighed, "No, but we're finished. It looks like you're going to have a pretty nasty bruise for a few days, but otherwise, you're just fine. If you ask that nurse over there, I'm sure she can give you answers," he pointed down the hallway to a woman at a desk as he pulled off his gloves.
Veronica adjusted her shirt before standing up and walking down the hallway towards the E.R.'s waiting room, pushing through the heavy doors that separated them. After a quick chat with the nurse, Veronica learned that Linley was awaiting surgery for the damage done to her leg, as soon as the man in the waiting room finished filling out her admittance papers. Veronica followed the woman's gaze and noticed Logan scribbling on a clipboard, "Can I see her?"
The nurse shook her head, "She's in pre-op right now, probably getting x-rays. When they're ready to take her back, we'll let you know. In the meantime, you might want to go help your husband fill out those forms. He appears to be struggling."
She was about to give the nurse a snarky remark when she noticed the line of people forming, also wanting information. She closed her mouth instead, marching over to Logan. This is where he made a mad dash to? To fill out Linley's medical history before she could? What was this some kind of contest?
Crossing her arms, she began tapping her foot in front of him. "Can I have that," Veronica asked, extending an arm out to grab it.
Logan held the clipboard closer to himself. He needed to do something to make himself feel better about the whole situation. "Why didn't you tell me that I had a daughter?" he asked, looking up into her blue eyes and searching for her thoughts.
"You don't have a daughter. I have a daughter," she said and snatched the clipboard from him, quickly glancing over the pages he had filled out. While he had gotten many answers right, she wanted focus on the ones he had gotten wrong, because this was a contest, right?
"A daughter that you obviously know nothing about. First question: Name. Wrong. Her middle name is not 'blank,' Logan, its Ann. After you. LogAN. Ann. I was trying to compromise, since I gave her my last name. It was the least I could do," she took the clipboard and sat next to him, beginning to fill in the missing information. The questions brought back so many memories.
"Do you want kids?" Logan asked one night as they lay in bed together. Somehow it always seemed easier to talk about these things under the cover of darkness. They were engaged to be married, it was a valid question.
He could feel her shift next to him, adding a little distance between them on the bed, "I don't know. Maybe? I'm not completely opposed to the idea, but I'm not saying we should start trying to have kids, either. Do you?"
He shrugged, pulling her back to him, "I don't know. I wouldn't know how to be a good dad, but I think it'd be cool to have a little Logan, Jr. running around."
"What makes you think we'd have a boy? Or that I would let you name our son Logan, Jr.?" she asked, rolling over so she was partially lying on top of him.
Logan smirked, "Doesn't have to be a boy. We could name our daughter Logan, Jr. too. Logan's a great name like that."
Veronica shook her head with a light smile, "We are NOT naming any of our potential future children Logan, Jr."
He laughed, "Just you wait and see…"
"Never going to happen," she said, bringing her lips to his for a light kiss. He wrapped his arms around her and they were soon drifting off to sleep land.
"How would I know that? I wasn't there when you named her," he shot back, trying to keep his voice down in a public place. He wished he had been. He wished she didn't have to go through that alone.
Veronica rolled her eyes, throwing up her defenses, looking further down on the sheet, "Allergies? Are you trying to kill her? She's allergic to shellfish, like you, and penicillin and anesthesia. If you had turned in this shoddy form, you might have killed her."
"I'm glad you decided to return from the dead to grace us all with your infinite wisdom," he shot back. "What was I supposed to do, ask her for her full medical history before she walked in the door?"
"Or answered the damn phone," she said, writing down Linley's allergies, "I called you twenty-eight times that night," she began, remembering one of the few times she had truly felt alone. It was the first time she actually feared that Logan might never get the opportunity to meet his child, and that thought pained her more than she would ever be able to express. "My dad flew to D.C. to be with me because I couldn't be alone," she continued, "Do you know where you were? At the Oscars." Where was she? The hospital - simultaneously falling apart and holding herself together.
Veronica paced up and down the hallway of the PICU, waiting for more test results to come back. She couldn't believe this was happening. Only a few hours ago they had entered the E.R., Linley complaining of stomach pains.
She was quickly diagnosed with appendicitis and rushed to the O.R. for the "simple" procedure to remove it. It wasn't long before the doctors came back, their surgical caps in their hand, trying their best to explain the complications that arose with the procedure.
They were running tests to determine what had happened and if Linley would wake up, if she would be normal. Veronica had half a mind to scream at them, but instead collapsed into the nearest chair and began dialing Logan's number, over and over again, pausing only briefly to call her dad, before resuming.
The paralyzing sadness quickly turned to anger after each ring, and soon she began pacing the hallway. Up and down. Voicemail. Redial. During the twenty-eighth call, she noticed the television on in the nurses' station.
Pausing for a moment, she looked in. "And the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role goes to… Logan Echolls." Veronica pushed the end call button on her phone and watched the man she was trying to reach walk across the stage to collect his award.
"While you were having one of the best nights of your life, I was having one of the worst. Linley was in the hospital, fighting for her life. She had a severe allergic reaction to anesthesia while having her appendix removed. Congratulations, by the way, for winning. I can't say I ever saw the movie, though. I hope it was worth it," Veronica said, moving down the form.
Suddenly he felt guilty. Though, in his defense, he didn't know he had a daughter in that moment, especially one in the hospital, having such complications. Logan wasn't sure he would ever be able to look at the statue again without thinking about what Veronica just told him.
"I didn't have my phone with me. I didn't know. I would have been there, I would have."
She tried her best not to believe him and scoffed at a blank on the form, "Her birthday, really Logan?"
"It's in February," he commented, "2011." Why couldn't he remember the exact date? It was tearing him up inside that he couldn't remember.
"It's Valentine's Day, Logan. Try spending sixteen hours in labor, alone, on the most romantic day of the year, I'm sure you'll remember it then," Veronica snapped, writing more down on the form, flipping past the first page. Each memory that entered her mind added to the pain that was already taking residence in her heart. She loved this man so much and yet, she couldn't let herself love him.
"Mommy, my class is going to have a Valentine's Day Party and it's on my birthday," Linley as she set the table for dinner one day after school, "What's Valentine's Day?" she asked.
Veronica smiled and brought the glasses over, "Valentine's Day is a day for people to tell other people how much they love them and enjoy being around them and sometimes, people in love will give each other cards or presents."
Linley nodded, finishing with the silverware, "Did my daddy ever give you a Valentine's Day present?" she asked, looking up at her mother with her big blue eyes, her lip sticking out a little in a pout.
Veronica placed the glasses on the table and bent down to Linley's level, "He gave me the best Valentine's Day present ever," she said, grabbing Linley's little hands.
"What was it?" she asked excitedly, "Tell me, please!"
Veronica smiled, "He gave me you."
"Me?" Linley asked a little confused.
"Yup, he gave me my favorite little Martian. No Valentine's Day present could ever top that," she said, tapping Linley on the nose before standing up.
"You better watch it, you're getting awfully close to Aaron-territory…" the words just slipped from her mouth and she instantly regretted them. It was as though her subconscious wanted to match the pain that he had caused her.
Logan's jaw dropped at the insult as he watched her hand over the clipboard to the nurse, flash her F.B.I. badge and be allowed access to Linley. He couldn't believe it.
Slowly he lowered his head into his hands and cried, feeling like an actual failure for the first time since his father had literally burned the thought into his mind. What was he even doing there? Who was he kidding? Veronica was right; his fate was to be exactly like his father.
"Logan, what's wrong?" he felt a hand on his back and a presence next to him accompanying the voice. "How are they?"
"Hey Mac," he said, leaning back into the uncomfortable hospital chair. "Linley's leg is broken for sure," he said and paused, running a hand through his hair, forcing himself to inhale, "Veronica compared me to my dad, Mac, my dad!"
Mac looked around, "Where is she?"
Logan let out a pained laugh, "She used her F.B.I. magic and forced her way through. Looks like her days of elaborate plans of dress up and acting are over. All she has to do now is flash a badge and throw around a few big words and suddenly everyone is bowing to her feet," he said, gesturing wildly with his arms.
"Logan," Mac consoled, "give her time." She paused for a moment, shifting in her chair, before continuing, "Think about it from her side. For the past sixteen years, she's had it in her head that you didn't want Linley. She's been trying so hard to protect her, make her feel loved and wanted, enough for two people. It isn't easy to change overnight."
"I didn't want her? I didn't want her!" Logan exclaimed, "She didn't give me a chance to want her!" He sighed, turning to face Mac. "What if she packs Linley up and takes her back to D.C.? She's my kid, Mac. She has my DNA. I haven't figured out where she's hiding it yet, but it's there somewhere. I've already missed sixteen years. I don't want to miss another sixteen."
Mac sighed, "Then you get a lawyer and you fight, Logan, but I'd strongly encourage talking to her first, once she's had a chance to cool down."
Soon people started arriving, a large, supportive, concerned group: Duncan, Kate, Amelia, and Daniel, Dick, Jenna, Richard the Third, and Benji, Sheriff D'Amato and Austin, Amelia's boyfriend, Joey, Weevil, Rosa… all of the people Linley had managed to touch the lives of so far during her short time in Neptune.
Logan looked around at all of the people who had come out in support of him and realized he wasn't alone. He had done something that Veronica couldn't in sixteen years: provide Linley with a loving and supportive community of people. He wasn't going to give her up this time without a fight.
A/N: Well, I hope their reunion is everything you hoped it would be and more, but like Logan and Veronica, things just can't come easily for them. Anyway, review, please? Let me know what you think. I really liked this chapter. It felt so good to be able to write Logan and Veronica together. Even if they were fighting. Right. Reviews. Okay. Next time: Linley + Veronica time! Yay!