A/N: Yo yiggidy yo. I got stymied by whoring myself out for various auctions and such. Really. Really. We are almost done with this story.

I'd like to take a minute to pimp out a story I'm betaing, Temptation Girl's "Walter Cannon's Theory, Expanded." I have NO idea where the story is going, but it begins with Edward working in a morgue, and it's got gruesome scientific detail and awesomeness. It's in my faves if you want to take a look-see. And you should, for there is much to behold.

Disclaimer: I have no interest in ever making money off of this shit, so Stephenie Meyer, you are safe. Please do not sue.

Chapter 25: Rid of Me

I'll make you lick my injuries
I'm gonna twist your head off, see
'til you say, "Don't you wish you never, never met her?"

- P. J. Harvey [1]

I was just putting my socks and shoes back on when I heard the clanging of the double doors swinging open and shut. I stood up quickly, not sure who I'd see.

"Mary? Mary Alice? Is that you? What are you doing here?"

I felt the cold clamminess come back, but Jasper was there, steadying me. I gulped and turned around. His voice hadn't changed, and I felt like a teenager again.

"Hi, Mr. Crandall. You still work here?"

"Are you kidding? I love it here. They'll have to drag my corpse out of this building." He kept walking toward me. I noticed he had a slight limp. Did my mother do that?

I ran down the stage steps and gave him a hug. He didn't flinch away from me, and for that I was grateful. "It's good to see you," I said.

"How's your ..."

I held up my hand. "I'd rather not talk about …"

"Of course, of course. I'm sorry to bring it up." He smiled at me the way I imagined a dad might smile at his kid. His hair was graying at his temples, but otherwise he looked the same, skin unlined, his smile warm and easy as ever. It was good to see him without the bruises and puffy lip. He could heal. It was as if it had never happened. "You look wonderful, Mary Alice."

"Thank you." I stared at my feet, and then my eyes drifted toward the cowboy boots next to my small shoes. "Oh. Hey, Mr. Crandall, this is Jasper, my … um, my boyfriend." I didn't know if I'd ever get used to calling him that.

"It's an honor," Mr. Crandall said, holding out his hand.

Jasper gripped it, nodding. "I've heard a lot about you," he said. "Alice says you were quite a teacher."

He chuckled. "Oh I don't know about that. I didn't have to teach her anything. She's amazing. Have you seen what she can do? Have you seen how she can fly?"

"Actually, Mr. Crandall, I … don't … do that … anymore."

"Don't do what?" he asked.

"I haven't been on stage since, you know, since that night."

His eyes clouded over. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. I always figured … your love of theater …" He sighed. "That never should have happened. You know that, don't you? I did everything I could to…"

"I know, I know. Of course none of it was your fault. I just … couldn't go back. I didn't want to be who I was. And I didn't want to be anyone else. So I became no one." I shrugged.

He shook his head, smiling sadly. "You know I think about you every year, every time I hold auditions. No one can hold a candle to you. You are that once-in-a-lifetime student. I was lucky to be someone allowed to see your light. Did it make you happy?"

Did it make me happy?

I tried to remember everything before my mother's breakdown. I remembered the feel of stage makeup, the smell of spirit gum, first night jitters. I remembered the minute I stepped out on stage, felt the heat of the stage-lights on my cheek, how in that moment the rest of the world melted away. I lived another life. I lived many other lives, and I could feel the love of the audience. They loved me, whatever flaws I poured into the character I played, the sorrows of home, of not knowing my father, of feeling, but not understanding, my mother's unhappiness. I could let all that show on the outside, and they loved me because of it. Not in spite of it. And then the applause, the cheers. Audible love for me in all my mistakes and regrets, myself turned inside out. Me.

"Yes," I whispered. I closed my eyes, still hearing the applause, the approval. The permission to exist as I was, without secrets.

He grasped my hands roughly. "Then don't forget who you are," he said. "Don't let some teenage assholes take that away from you. You have a gift, Mary Alice. If you said it didn't matter either way, I'd be content if you let it fade. But it meant something to you. So fight for it. Goddamn it, fight for it as you would your own life."

I opened my eyes and saw Mr. Crandall peering at me. I felt a little nudge inside from Mary Alice. He's right, you know, she whispered in my ear. I nodded slowly, not sure what to say.

"Just think about it, Mary Alice. And I'm always proud of you, no matter what you do."

"Thanks," I mumbled, swallowing down the lump in my throat.

His tone shifted, all business-like again. "I've got to do some Xeroxing before rehearsal tonight," he said. "First read-through of Once upon a Mattress."

Jasper's face lit up. "That's such a good show!" He hummed a little of "I'm in Love with a Girl Named Fred."

We both stared at him. "Why do you know so much musical theater, Jasper?" I asked.

"Rogers and Hammerstein, Sondheim, and Bernstein were the Baby Einstein in the Whitlock household," he said.

"Wait, how do you feel about Andrew Lloyd Weber?" I asked.

Jasper just made gagging sounds.

"Oh good," I said, wiping fake sweat from my brow. "That would have been a dealbreaker, you know."

Mr. Crandall laughed. "I'm glad to hear some things haven't changed, Mary Alice. 'Doubt thou the stars are fire; / Doubt that the sun doth move; / Doubt truth to be a liar; / But never doubt Mary Alice's hatred of Andrew Lloyd Weber.' You take care now."

I gave him another big hug, and a part of my heart sort of settled and sighed into my body as he squeezed me back. I watched him walk away.

"He's nice," Jasper said when we were alone again.

"Yeah."

"What now?"

I wrinkled my forehead in thought. "I'm not sure. But I think I'm done here."

Jasper gently tugged the visitor's sticker off my shirt and kissed my forehead. "Let's go, milady." We held hands and walked back to Fitzsie's car.

I felt okay driving after seeing Mr. Crandall. That wasn't so hard. When I was back inside the car, I clutched my mother's diary to my chest. "Thanks, Mom," I said, feeling a spark inside my belly, something asleep that was slowly waking up. He didn't hate me. He thought of me. Fight for it, he'd said.

I wasn't even sure where I was going until I turned into the parking lot. Was it fate, then, that made me drive to the diner where we'd go after rehearsals? Was I just showing Jasper all my old haunts, trying to show him things because I couldn't show him everything inside myself?

"Are you hungry?" I asked, putting the car into park and pulling up the emergency brake.

"I'm always hungry," he said, and I laughed.

"I'm not sure where you put it all," I said, patting his tight stomach.

"Hey, careful with my food baby. He's delicate."

"Who's your food baby daddy?" I asked, cupping my hands over his nonexistent paunch.

"In the case of Unborn Baby Whitlock: French fries, you are the baby's father," he said in a booming Maury Povich voice. I was surprised I could tell he was doing a Maury Povich voice, but even more surprising was that he knew enough Maury Povich to do a half-decent impression.

I was too busy laughing to be paying attention to the people coming out of the diner. I got out of the car, slammed the door, and was about to tease Jasper about watching those paternity-test shows, when I heard a braying laugh. My blood ran cold, and I froze where I stood. Fight or flight. Fight or flight. One hand was on the car door handle, the other clenched in a fist.

"What's wrong, sweetpea?" Jasper could always feel my mood shift.

I folded myself very, very small, crouching, wanting to crawl underneath the car. I wrapped my arms around my belly as if I could squeeze the air out of me to become smaller still.

Jasper was by my side in a second. "You're shaking, baby. What is it?"

My teeth were chattering, but I managed to grind out, "He's here."

"Who?"

"That laugh, it's him." I crossed my arms over my chest, remembering his unwanted, rough touch.

"Mitchell?" Jasper whispered, his eyes almost black with anger. I nodded, biting my lip. "Motherfucker," he said, letting me go and turning on his heel.

"No, don't, Jasper," I said, but no sound actually came out. It was as if I were in one of those game show silence chambers. I reached for his sleeve, but he was too fast.

"Which one, Alice? Which one is it?" I'd never heard him like this, so uncontrollably angry.

His shouting drew the attention of Mitchell, who'd gotten fatter and balder since I'd seen him last. It was him though; I was sure of it. "Don't," I said hoarsely, barely phonating. "He's going to see me."

When I dared to look, I saw Jasper striding over to the guys coming down the diner's handicapped ramp. They were wearing some sort of uniform shirts, and it turned out that Jasper didn't need me to identify him, since they all had embroidered nametags. It looked as though Mitchell worked at a gas station or auto body shop or something.

"Mitchell?" Jasper said, waltzing right up to him with a small smile curling up the corners of his mouth.

"Yeah, bro?"

"You from here?"

"Grew up here, sure." He started looking uneasy. "What's it to you, homo?"

"Charming," said Jasper, and he drew back his fist, punching Mitchell right in the mouth. I thought I heard something cracking. Mitchell's two friends looked pretty tough, but the minute Jasper decked him, they backed away, not wanting to get involved.

Mitchell was holding his jaw, blood oozing from the corner of his mouth. "What the fuck was that about? You're dead, man, dead." He wiped his bleeding lip roughly with the heel of his hand.

I ran up and grabbed Jasper's arm as he drew it back to hit him again. "No, don't do it. Don't. He's not worth it. He's not worth anything," I pleaded.

Jasper lowered his fist. His knuckles were bleeding. I kissed his hand. "He's not worth it," I said again.

I heard a rush of wind behind me, and Jasper's other fist was up, blocking Mitchell's ineffectual punch. "Don't try me, fucker," Jasper said, his voice like acid. "You were going to hit her?"

"I was trying to hit you, you fuck, but your little bitch got in the way," Mitchell said.

Jasper pushed me gently behind him, ready to fight, but I held onto his arms. "Please, don't. You're just making it worse." I peeped out behind him, trying to get him to look at me, to calm down. I just wanted to get the hell out of here.

"Brandon? Is that you?" Mitchell said, squinting. "Well, I'll be fucked. Is this your girlfriend, Mary Alice? Your big burly girlfriend you brought to fight your battles?"

My mouth wasn't working. I was shrinking again. I'd soon disappear, small enough to fit in Jasper's back pocket, shrink until I would be visible only under a microscope. I'd blow away in the wind and be lost forever.

"Say the word, Alice, and he's dead." Jasper was breathing hard, in control for the moment, but ready to explode.

Inside me, Mary Alice pushed and prodded and kept my outline the same size. I'm here. We're here. Together, no one can hurt us. I felt her stretch inside me, filling me up like a balloon. She flowed through me, from my toes to the top of our head, and she was in my lungs and inside my vocal cords. Her words started coming out of my mouth. "No." Mary Alice was firm. She wasn't pleading; it was a command.

She made me step calmly in front of Jasper. He stood behind me with his hands on my shoulders. He could sense the change.

"Funny, isn't it, Mitchell? So this is my girlfriend, because I'm a big dyke, right? But guess what? My big dyke girlfriend beat the shit out of you without even trying. So what does that make you?"

He was staring at me, gaping, mouth still bloody.

"What, you don't have anything to say to me? I'm here. Want to humiliate me? Want to win another fucking bet with your loser friends? How's that gas pumping job working for you? Do you feel inadequate because of those big nozzles?"

He spat blood in the dirt by my feet. "You're just a flat-chested little whore."

Mary Alice laughed in his face. "Is that the best you can do? If we're going by physical appearances, doughboy, I think I'd easily win 'most bangable.' By a long shot. Both sexes, any sexual orientation."

"You're as crazy as your mother."

I could feel Jasper's hands on my shoulders, squeezing me. I could feel him itching to fight this battle for me. But it was mine to fight, and he knew it. He knew he had to stand and watch me do it by myself.

Mary Alice wrapped around my throat, covered my skin like a shield. She was on the inside and the outside now, and I couldn't tell which parts were her and which parts were me. "You're wrong," we said. "Crazier."

He took a step back.

"You remember what started all this, don't you? Do you remember how bad Mr. Crandall looked? Do you remember the bruises blossoming on his face, the rainbows of blood under his skin?" We licked our lips and bared our teeth.

We walked toward him, feeling ten feet tall.

"So if she did that, and I'm crazier, what do you think I'm capable of?" we whispered. "Do you want to find out?"

We tilted our head up to look him right in the eye, unflinching. My legs wanted to buckle, but Mary Alice was like steel in me.

"Fucking psycho," he muttered, turning around and running to catch up with his chickenshit friends.

"Run away, Mitchell. Run home with your dick between your legs," we called after him.

We waited until he'd gotten in his friend's piece of shit car and driven away. Mary Alice faded a little, and my legs gave way, but as always, Jasper was there to catch me. He picked me up and spun me around. "Alice! Jesus, Alice! You were brilliant. And dead sexy, I might add."

I started shaking for real now, no longer having the steel of Mary Alice in me. She was still there, but resting. I sobbed against his neck. "Shhh," he said, setting me back on my feet and holding me tightly. "It's okay. You did it. You were amazing. If you can face down that asshole, you can do anything."

I couldn't stop crying. "I'm okay," I said, sniffling.

"I know."

"I'm really okay."

"I'm so proud to know you that I want to climb on top of this diner roof and sing like Tony in West Side Story."

"Please don't."

He pouted, and I bit his adorably protruding lip. "I thought you liked my singing," he managed to say around my mouth.

"I do. I love it. But you might break your neck. And I want to take a look at that hand. Who knows what kind of nasty diseases live in his mouth? Let's get you some Neosporin."

"Even first aid sounds sexy coming from your lips, baby."

"Gauze. Sterile bandages. Medical tape. Hydrogen peroxide. Am I getting you hot?"

"Unbelievably."

"Analgesic."

"Don't make me blow a load in my jeans."

"Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug."

He pounced, kissing me so hard that the wind was knocked out of me. I grabbed handfuls of his hair, trying to pull him closer and closer to me until weren't two separate people anymore. It was only when I heard him wince as I grasped his hands in mine that I remembered his bleeding knuckles.

"Let's get you cleaned up." I pulled him to the car and drove to the drugstore down the block. He held the shopping basket on his arm, and I knocked things off the shelves in the first aid aisle, doing a goofy act of rubbing the boxes on my face and my breasts, presenting them like Vanna White, and tucking them into the basket as if he were a Chippendale's dancer and the basket were his tiny G-string. "Here you go, big boy," I said, slipping in a tube of Neosporin.

People were staring, but I didn't care. All I could see was Jasper, the want in his eyes. I pulled him toward the family planning aisle and tossed in a box of condoms.

"Oh, really?" he said, his eyebrow cocked.

"Paregoric," I said breathily.

"If you keep talking that way, this won't be enough," he groaned, putting a few more boxes in the basket.

"Hotel check-in is after three," I said, leading him to the cashier.

"It's after three," said Jasper, picking me up and setting me on the counter.

"Exactly," I said, ignoring the pimply faced cashier flushing red behind me. He was clearing his throat, trying to get our attention.

"Um. Um. You can't. Um. I'll have to get the, um. Manager." His voice cracked awkwardly.

I took pity on him, so I gave Jasper another big kiss and slid off the counter. "Sorry. Newlyweds, you know." I winked.

"Cash or credit?" he asked, blushing harder as he bagged the condoms.

Jasper threw a couple of twenties on the counter. "Keep the change. We're in a rush."

He looped the bag over his arm, threw me over his shoulder, and ran to the car. I squealed the whole way, kicking my feet and pounding on his back with my fists. He deposited me as carefully as a baby in the driver's seat, slid across the hood of the car, Dukes of Hazzard style, and was next to me before I'd even gotten the key in the ignition.

"You're in for the disinfecting of your life, Whitlock," I said, starting the car. He just leaned over and started kissing my neck, running his hands through my hair. "Oh god," I breathed. "If you want us to get to the hotel in one piece, you're going to have to ease up."

"I'll be good," he murmured, tracing patterns on my collarbone, lightly brushing his hands lower, giving me hints of the paradise that awaited us on unfamiliar chintz bedspreads and rough, bleached sheets.

[1] P. J. Harvey, "Rid of Me," Rid of Me (1993).

A/N: You may call me Feisty Y. Cockblocker.

I'll TRY, I PROMISE, to stay on top of reviews. Eighth grade journal delights, as usual.