The silence of his apartment was deafening after a night of excitement; he thought back on the party's constant motion and Amber's apartment with its cacophony of television screens, CD player and timers. He'd designed his apartment to be quiet and warm, my fortress of solitude, to cut him off from the stream of societal pettiness and immerse himself in though: most of the time he seemed to go through life on autopilot, only at home could he take the time to think it through, to think of her, about Lilly, Veronica and yes, sometimes even his mother, of the woman who would elude him his whole life.
"She was almost exactly the same," he thought, "She looked great."
"She looked like herself," said Lilly. He nodded, she did, a tiny orb of pure light.
"Always the poet," replied Lilly shaking her head of blond hair.
"Yeah." Logan picked up one of the only framed pictures in the apartment; there were no people in that picture, no grinning family members, no birthday parties, just a simple black and white shot of the ocean at night. When Amber had asked where he'd got it, he'd said a friend had taken it, but he'd never bothered to specify. The truth was that it was the only evidence of his relationship with Veronica that wasn't stuffed in the box in the closet, the one memory that hurt more to forget than remember.
He waited for her at the corner, far enough from her house so that her father wouldn't hear when they peeled out.
"Hi." Veronica said kissing him sweetly and slipping into the seat beside him.
"You ready?" he asked her with his foot hovering over the accelerator. She nodded.
I was happy, he thought, we were happy, we were alone… no weird looks, no expectations, just me and Ronnie listening to the ocean and waiting for the sun to come up.
"Here's a picture to remember me by," she had said. That voice had haunted him for years, but things had a tendency to do that didn't they?
Veronica pushed the play button on her answering machine only to find herself confronted with Duncan's overly cheerful voice.
"Dinner, my house, be there at nine."
Less like an invite, more like an order. All hail King Duncan…Whatever happened to the days they used to ignore me? she asked herself.I think you know." said the voice in her head. Veronica sighed.
"Come on, I'll drive you home on the back streets." Logan had said his forehead pressed to hers staring straight into her eyes. That's all it had taken; she'd known then that it was no use hiding from it all anymore, she'd known the instant he'd kissed her the second time.