A/N: Thanks for the latest reviews, folks. Drunken Lemon & Zoe are funny, right? Now, how about hungover Lemon & Zoe? ;)

(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)

Chapter 4

Zoe woke up slowly and painfully, her face smushed into the couch cushions and someone playing a big bass drum inside of her head. Her hair was in her face and she seemed to have been drooling. As soon as she tried to move, she realised just how much like lead her body really felt, and then, she fell off the couch into the coffee table and onto the carpet with a clatter.

"Oh my God," she groaned, struggling to sit up a little.

The room swung around in front of her eyes before settling just in time for her to see the bathroom door open. Lemon staggered out of the other room, one hand to her forehead. She looked about as nauseous as Zoe felt herself.

"What on earth was I thinkin' last night?" she asked, giving up on walking and sitting down hard on the rug close to her room-mate.

"I don't think either of us was thinking very much at all," said Zoe, trying to swallow and finding it near-impossible as her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. "Ugh, how much did we drink?"

"Too much," Lemon groaned. "I feel like a truck ran over me... and then reversed and took another shot," she complained, rubbing at her aching head.

"And why did we do this?" asked Zoe, leaning back heavily against the base of the couch, unsure which part of her hurt worse - head, stomach, limbs.

"I have a horrible feelin' it was in large part due to some men that have torn up our lives this past while," said Lemon, shifting to sit beside Zoe. "I, for one, am not exactly a feminist, but surely we should've had better sense and not allowed ourselves to get into such a state over stupid men."

"Amen to that," said Zoe, pointing a wobbly finger at her room-mate. "Stupid Wade. Stupid George. Stupid men!" she declared loudly, immediately wincing at her own volume.

Lemon did much the same, moving her head away from Zoe's noise a little too fast and almost collapsing onto the rug. She managed to catch herself but the motion had obviously made her feel worse.

"I shoulda stayed in that bathroom," she noted, swallowing hard.

Zoe frowned as a thought occurred to her. "Did you sleep in there?"

"I'm ashamed to say that I did."

"Huh. I don't think I've slept on a bathroom floor since college, and even then, it was only one time."

"Oh, I've done my share of sleeping on tile," said Lemon, smiling slightly. "You see, Zoe Hart, you only met the Lemon Breeland that was tryin' to please everybody. Be the perfect daughter, perfect fiancée, perfect head of the Belles. I was a little less... proper, in my youth."

The cogs in Zoe's head made a horrible grinding sound as they turned against each other, but after a couple of moments of painful thought, she realised that what Lemon was saying was true. She had told her stories last night, high school tales, as she recalled. Things about George and Wade and Annabeth. Shenanigans and good times. They were funny in the moment. Now, thinking about it made Zoe feel sad.

"You had a way better time in high school than I did," she said, sighing heavily, head lolling back against the couch. "I was too busy being a dedicated student."

"Well, I suspect that is how one becomes a doctor." Lemon sighed much the same way. "While I am but a lowly waitress... and I won't even be that for very much longer if Wally has his way."

They were leaning into each other by now, physically propping each other up, even though it was almost too hard to keep themselves from sliding into a heap on the ground. Zoe found it amusing, or she might have, if she didn't feel so lousy from the hangover. Still, the holding each other up thing and talk of jobs started to come together and make a thought in her head that actually made some sense.

"Hey," she said, nudging Lemon's shoulder. "Didn't I offer you a job last night?"

Her room-mate shifted to look at her, making a confused face for a while, before the mist seemed to clear and she obviously remembered too.

"No," she said definitely then, shaking her head very briefly before seemingly thinking better of the motion. "I will not work for my daddy. It is not that far removed from being taken care of by my daddy and I won't do it."

"But you wouldn't be just working for Brick," Zoe insisted. "You'd be working for me too, or with us, whatever," she said, waving her hand in a random gesture. "Look, Addy has enrolled in grad school in Mobile and we really, really need a receptionist. You'll make better money than at the Rammer Jammer, have all the benefits, plus, you know, you could actually do the job."

Zoe wasn't entirely sure why she was being so insistent about Lemon taking the job, so she hoped she didn't ask her. Maybe it was because she was aware that if Lemon had no job, she would have to cover the rent alone, but then, Zoe was pretty sure that wouldn't really be a problem anyway.

What she said about them really needing a reception was absolutely true, so that would make as good a reason as any. After all, she did know Lemon had excellent organisation skills. The problem was, neither of those were the real reasons why Zoe wanted Ms Breeland to have the job, something she was forced to admit when Lemon outright asked her about it.

"Why are you so bound and determined that I take this job, Zoe Hart?"

"Because, Lemon Breeland, the way I see it is you and I are the only people in town who really understand each other. Other people think they know what happened with you and me and George and Wade... and Lavon, I guess, but they don't. We know. We actually know each other pretty well at this point, because from what I do remember of last night, we shared."

There was a moment of painfully hard thinking on Lemon's part before her eyes suddenly widened a little bit, proving she remembered some of that sharing too. It meant they were sisters in arms now, against the men that wronged them, against a town that didn't understand them, if necessary. They had an understanding between them that had become stronger than ever in the last twenty-four hours. Zoe knew it and she could see from the look on Lemon's face that she knew it too.

"I suppose you do have a point," she said at last. "You know, there's a good chance that if you and I stood together on just about anything, this whole town would be brought to its knees by our combined power."

Zoe snorted with laughter at that. "I don't think we're exactly the Avengers or anything, but yeah, it probably would be tough to beat us," she admitted. "We just have to stand together, Lemon. We're room-mates, we're wronged women, we're... kindred spirits, kind of," Zoe explained. "Also, this right here, probably the worst and most pathetic either of us has ever looked," she said, gesturing to their general state of hangover. "We have shared something profound here, my friend."

Then it was Lemon's turn to laugh. "I guess I can't deny that I am. Your friend, I mean," she said with a sigh. "What a turn of events, Zoe Hart."

"Yes, indeed," she agreed, sliding a little further down until she was almost lying on the floor. "We really need water."

"And coffee," Lemon added.

"Aspirin."

"Also, a good long shower each."

With all that agreed, still neither of them moved to get up.

"I'm just waiting for the room to stop spinning," Zoe explained.

"Oh, good," Lemon replied, letting out what sounded like a sigh of relief as she slid down beside her. "Me too."

Lemon had her head held high when she walked into the Rammer Jammer late in the afternoon. She was perfectly on time for her shift, not that she intended on working it, necessarily. Before Wally had a chance to fire her, she knew she had to quit. Waitressing was not for her and, thankfully, she did have another option now.

"Hey there, Lemon," Wade greeted her from the other side of the bar. "What happened to you and the good doctor last night? One minute you was there at the festival and the next, nobody could find either one of you."

"Zoe and I were partaking of a little sisterly bonding exercise," said Lemon haughtily, immediately realising that she may have used a poor choice of words, given the expression that took over Wade Kinsella's face. "Does your mind spend all its time in the gutter?"

"I didn't say a thing," he told her; hands held up in mock surrender.

Lemon rolled her eyes. "You really didn't have to. Is Wally in his office?"

"He is," Wade confirmed, "but I wouldn't-"

It was as much as Lemon heard as she walked right through to the back and rapped on the owner/manager's door. She barely waited for the 'come in' before strolling right in there and facing her boss head-on.

"Wally, I quit," she said without pause.

"Oh, thank God!" he said, smiling widely. "I mean, no offence, Lemon, but if you hadn't walked, you was gonna have to be pushed."

That hardly came as a surprise to Lemon, but it still wasn't easy not to flinch at the sound of the words. She really hated to fail at anything, even if it was just a menial job like waitressing.

"I am assuming you won't require me to work any notice," she checked.

The waving of Wally's hands was enough to answer that question, and since she had no more to say, Lemon just turned around and walked out the same way she came in. She hardly even paused to say goodbye to Wade, just exited the Rammer Jammer and kept on going, headed for the practice where her father and Zoe worked.

It honestly didn't thrill her to be a receptionist either, but she had to admit, she probably was better qualified to take phone calls and organise files than she ever had been to serve the public with food and drinks. Just so long as her daddy didn't take to coddling her anymore, they would be just fine. She had made Zoe promise not to let that happen at any cost.

"Hey, if it isn't our new receptionist," said Zoe herself as Lemon walked into the waiting area. "I thought we agreed you would start tomorrow, when Addy had the time to come in and show you the ropes?"

"Yes, we did agree to that." Lemon nodded. "I was just... Well, I quit my job over at the Rammer Jammer and Wally was just a little too happy about it," she said, face crumbling just a little. "It's so stupid that it bothered me."

"No, it's really not," Zoe insisted, shaking her head. "I'm guessing Wade was there?"

"Naturally," Lemon agreed, side-eyeing the doctor, who was quite clearly trying to enquire casually and failing badly at it.

"Did he, uh, say anything? You know, about not seeing me or missing me being at the plantation or...?"

She trailed off, looking increasingly awkward as Lemon stared wide-eyed at her.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me!" she gasped. "I kinda hoped that when you were waxing lyrical about the great attributes of Wade Kinsella last night, it was mostly the alcohol and your hormones talkin'. Do you actually have feelings for him?"

"What? No!" Zoe denied it hotly, too much so, as far as Lemon could tell. "Who has feelings? I don't have feelings. Not for Wade, no way!"

Lemon kept on staring at Zoe until she finally started to crack, just as she knew she had to eventually.

"Okay, fine!" she huffed. "So, I like him. There is another side to him, you know? It's not all about how hot he is, even though he is really, really hot," she admitted, growing in frustration in the very next moment. "Oh my God, what is wrong with me?!"

"Nothin' a doctor can cure," said Lemon, smirking a little, "but also, nothing that a whole lot of other women haven't suffered just the same, especially where Wade Kinsella is concerned. I guess havin' known him so long and always looking to him from the other side of George Tucker, I just put him in a kind of box where the very idea of touchin' him that way is just..." she trailed off, shuddering violently at the disturbing pictures entering her mind. "But I will say this, Zoe Hart. Wade can be a tasteless, uncouth idiot sometimes, but his heart is in the right place. Much as I probably shouldn't be saying this... well, I'm not so sure his behaviour after your night together wasn't anything more than a kind of defence mechanism."

Zoe frowned. "Defence from what?"

"From gettin' hurt." Lemon rolled her eyes at how dumb Zoe could be sometimes. "Wade isn't as stupid as some people think. He has always known, just as we all have, that you had your feelings for George. When he found out there was a chance for you to actually be with the man you really wanted..."

"He acted like he didn't care if I walked away from him," Zoe finished for her, "but you think he does care?"

Lemon shrugged her shoulders. "That's really not for me to say now, is it?"

The conversation was ended, whether they liked it or not, when the office door opened and Brick stepped out. He was pleased to see Lemon and happier still to have heard that she would be working there as the receptionist starting tomorrow. Daddy wasn't always the best at picking up on what was going on around him, especially where his daughters were concerned, but in that moment, he clearly noticed something.

"Everything okay with you two girls?" he checked, glancing between Lemon and Zoe.

"Never better," Lemon assured him. "In fact, I would say that Dr Hart and I are closer than we have ever been. Us moving in together might have been the best idea dear Zoe ever had."

"Really?" Brick checked, looking more at his fellow doctor than his daughter then.

"She's not kidding" Zoe shook her head. "Honestly, Lemon is the best room-mate and friend that I could hope for," she said, glancing at her newest friend. "We kind of bonded."

"We really should've made more effort a great deal sooner," Lemon agreed. "Unfortunately, we were blinded by those ridiculous men in our lives. Oh, present company accepted, of course, Daddy."

"Of course," Zoe echoed with a smile.

"Well, just so long as you're happy, Lemonade," he told her, kissing her cheek. "You too, Zoe," he added like an afterthought before her disappeared back into his office.

"I feel so loved." Zoe rolled her eyes.

"Be glad you feel anything other than disgusting," Lemon told her. "Honestly, I'm amazed how quickly we recovered from last night."

"I guess we're just tougher than we look." Zoe smiled, picking up her paperwork and heading back to her office.

Lemon turned to go, opening the door and spotting Lavon not too far away across town square. "The things life throws at us, I guess we're gonna have to be."

To Be Continued...