A/N: In this chapter, I have made Mara a bit more on the wild side and despite the fact that she looks like an elegant person, her wildness still shines through-with a little help from a punk rocker.
Val and Erik were discussing one of their favorite shows, Mara noted with disgust as she drove wildly around corners, once almost hitting a Corvette, and another time hitting a mailbox, yelling out the window to the angered owner: "Sorry!" He told her what she was and where she could go in very colorful terms.
"Yeah, well same to you, jack!" she shouted back.
Val and Erik looked at each other, and suddenly bubbles of laughter rose in Val's chest at seeing this really elegant-looking person talking in the terms of a street-rat. It was so like My Fair Lady minus the romance that she couldn't help but laugh.
Mara glanced back in surprise as Valerie burst into peals of laughter and rolled around in her seat gasping for breath. She and Erik looked at each other, a bit scared. "Val? Are you, like, okay?" Mara asked cautiously. "Fine," Valerie gasped, wiping tears away from her eyes. "Absolutely...fine!"
"So, which Star Trek do you like again?" Erik asked after a pause and a moment of panic as Mara almost wrecked for the thousandth time. "The Old Series," she answered. Erik went on to say that he enjoyed TNG, whatever the heck that meant, and they were starting to converse about warp drives and such. Mara tuned out until they finally reached the theater.
"We're here!" she announced loudly, jerking the car to a stop. Val and Erik tumbled forwards, hitting their heads on the dash. "Ow!" they complained. Mara leaped out of the car, her dress skirt flying up. She pulled it down with little difficulty and Val inched out of the door, her head pounding.
"Next time, I drive, Mara," she said. "Agreed," Erik said as he came out of the other door. Mara rolled her eyes. "You guys have no sense of adventure," she said with a heavy sigh.
They walked up to the door where a very strict looking man was standing, apparently the ticket taker. They handed him their tickets and got in without very much trouble, which greatly surprised Erik as he was expecting Mara to do something stupid and get them thrown out.
"See?" Mara grinned. "I can be a lady." "We'll see," Erik said firmly. "You still have the whole rest of the play to screw up. What do you plan to do? Sneak backstage and get autographs and get thrown out? Or sneak backstage and then steal a costume? Or better yet-"
"Give her a chance," Val interrupted. "Yeah, gimme a chance," Mara said with a hurt look. Erik rolled his eyes. Just then, Valerie spotted something out of the corner of her eye. "Uh-oh, trouble," she whispered urgently to Erik. A man who looked extremely like a punk rocker was approaching Mara with a smirk on his face. "Get her out of here!" they both hissed at each other, both for themselves so they wouldn't get thrown out, and for the man's protection against having several very hard bruises.
Erik grabbed Mara's arm in a vise-like grip. "Hey!" she said, being dragged away from where she had been glancing at a poster. "What are you doing?" "Why don't you come over here and look at this poster, Mara?" he asked with a strained smile. "No!" Mara yanked her arm away with surprising strength and returned to her poster. Erik and Valerie stared in despair as the scene started to unfold.
"Hey," the man greeted her. Mara didn't even glance in his direction until he made 'some rude comment', as she later put it. She froze and Valerie winced in anticipation. "Excuse me?" she said. He repeated his words, calling her a 'chick'. Mara's face was starting to get very red with anger, and she scowled at him. "You did not just call me a chick," she said. He started looking confused, but quickly recovered and whispered something in her ear, slipping an arm around her shoulder.
"People aren't supposed to hit on other people at Broadway plays, are they?" Erik hissed at Val. "He's a street-rat," Valerie pointed out, and it was true.
By this time, Mara had reached her boiling point. "Boy, you had better back off before I count to five," she said, and proceeded to count to five. "Here she goes," Val said. "Five," Mara said, and drew back her arm, and punched the guy right in the eye. He yelled in pain and clutched his eye. Mara shook her fist, and kneed him.
He gasped, and bent over. Before Mara could do anymore damage to the punk, Erik and Val dashed through the crowd that had gathered to watch and pulled her away. However, she wrenched out of their grasp and returned to finish the job of teaching a hopeless womanizer a lesson he would never forget.
"You grab that arm, and I got that one," Erik said. They tried again, this time catching her and effectively pulling her out of the fighting ring. She had to be lifted off her feet in order to be pulled away. She kicked her feet and swung her arms, yelling insults at the poor man who was on the floor groaning. "Son of a bitch!" she screamed, and kicked her foot so hard one of her slippers flew off and hit him on the head-right at the temple. He went unconscious. Mara grinned victoriously and brandished her fist with a triumphant "Yes!"
Security entered, and the three vanished into the crowd quickly and with ease as medical teams attended to the man-medical teams from Mara's hospital, including Beth, the nosy nurse.
Mara giggled as Val and Erik directed her to their seats. "Did you see his face?" she cackled as they sat down. "Aren't nurses supposed to be caring people?" Erik asked. "Where'd you hear that lie?" Mara asked, breaking into laughter again. "Here is what nurses really are, according to Mara East: Nurses are people who enjoy caring for sick people and nursing them back to health. However, deep inside, nurses are savage beasts who are in reality street-rats and are very well educated in self-defense. If someone hits on them, you can bet that person will be in the hospital the next day, with the same nurse kindly caring for them as if nothing had happened. Then, when the person is all better, the nurse will punch him out again and quit her job so that she won't have to worry about punching him out again."
Val and Erik listened to this monologue with varying degrees of astonishment and amusement. Mara continued.
"And you can bet," she said, "that tomorrow, that guy will be in the hospital with my handiwork all over him. And guess who'll be caring for him?"
"Ooh!" Val and Erik chorused and started laughing along with Mara. Just then, the play started, and they settled in to enjoy the show, Mara's slipper missing, and her fist slightly bruised from hitting the guy's eye, living proof that nurses are more than they appear.
Just then, someone came to stand beside Mara's seat. It turned out to be Beth, who had snuck away from the emergency team for a moment to find her, recognizing Mara's screams and handiwork. She had helped to aid many other men who had thought Mara was nothing more than a 'babe', or a 'chick', etc.
"Mara," she whispered. Mara looked up in surprise, and then grinned. "Hi, Beth!" she said. "Good work," Beth complimented her, patting her shoulder and then running back to reach the ambulance before it pulled off. Mara laughed softly, and sat back to enjoy the show.