Chapter Five
Logan had five good reasons for not being at school.
Aaron being in the hospital, just out of a coma was one. That was the one Clemmons would swallow without question; not that Clemmons wouldn't swallow spunk for an Echolls. It served to officially excuse Logan's truancy. So what that Logan was not at the hospital, and had no intention of visiting his father any time soon.
Logan being newly cleared from the suspicion that it was he who had put his father there, was another reason. For a while, Logan had almost basked in that blame. There were times in the past when he wished he had been able to do just that. He knew, now, that there may be just such a time in the future, if he didn't kill the movie star first.
Logan had never been a coward so reasons three and four were more irritant avoidance than necessity. But until he prepared his own head for the appropriate persona to adopt, facing his friends and everyone at school would be a pain after being arrested (three) and after being salaciously linked to Veronica Mars (four). Particularly facing Duncan.
This brought him to the last reason and, perhaps, the best reason, for not going to school. Veronica. His friend, his enemy, his…what? All Logan knew is that all the toothpaste in the world had done nothing to lessen the taste of her, one he kept savouring. In this, he knew he was being a coward.
"Shit."
Five good reasons. And not one of them was the real reason Logan Echolls was camped out in the family pool house.
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Veronica was having a bad start to a bad day that was going to get badder. Her Dad would be home tonight and she had something to tell him, something that no good would come of telling him but that she had to do before someone else did. It weighed on her so much that at first, she didn't even notice the stares and whispers that followed her around the school. Besides, she had long ago forced herself to become immune to judgement of strangers. But some people weren't strangers and those people had the power to wound.
Standing at her locker, the sight of Duncan and Meg cuddling across the school hallway wounded. Veronica found herself staring, a mixture of longing and understanding on her features. Veronica was prepared to face this moment but what she was not prepared for, not in any way, was the look of utter disgust that came over Duncan when they spotted her. Veronica forced her gaze away before either chanced to see her eyes fill. She turned into her locker, scrabbling to exchange books.
"Hey."
Veronica blinked rapidly and, with some relief, turned and hugged the astonished Wallace.
"What was that for?"
"Oh, you know, just 'cause I love you."
"You want something."
"Just your support and understanding. And your access to the administration office."
"I knew it!"
"Kidding! About the last thing anyway. The support and understanding I think I'm going to need by the bucketful."
"You know what I'm gonna say, don't you?" Off Veronica's blank look, Wallace paraphrased a past conversation affectionately, "Girl, you should hear what people are saying about you now!"
"I can imagine."
"What's going on?"
"I'll tell you at lunch."
They parted but Wallace's question echoed the one that had been running through her head all morning. What is going on? Breaking up with Leo was about the only thing simple consequence of the events of the weekend. Veronica stood in the hall, students pressing by her, and shivered. The memory of Logan's touch was enough to cause her heart to pound and her flesh to feel electric. Their intimacy, far beyond anything she had ever shared with Duncan or Leo, had left her panting for more, despite her panic. But Logan Echolls? She knew it was bad idea, a really bad idea. There were so many reasons she should be yelling "No!" – Lilly, Duncan, Logan's treatment of her since Lilly's death and her hatred of him, their mistaking a mutual need for comfort after losing their mothers, albeit in her case temporarily, for something more - so many fucking reasons to run, screaming. So why did a voice inside her whisper, "Yes."
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Logan was incensed when he went up to the house for some food and saw Trina holding court for the press, again. God, did she ever stop trying to pimp herself? No doubt she was making the most of her opportunity of front page spreads and as far as he was concerned, the sooner she got offers, the sooner she would be back to being a long-distance bitch. He was on his way back through the house when Trina's voice, usually so easily tuned out, penetrated his skull.
"Well, you know what it is with teenagers. They can be so irresponsible at times. You must understand, to lose our mother was shattering for us both…"
Logan snorted derisively at her nerve.
"…and the incident at the party was just him acting out. I blame her, the girl he was involved with. I mean, the stories I could tell you about her…"
Logan could bear no more. Knowing full well it was a mistake, that he was in a temper, he stormed in to face the press.
"This interview is over. Trina, get them out of the house."
"This is my brother, Logan. As you can see, he has the rude and angry juvenile role down pat. I apologise for his behaviour."
"I'm sure there are more important stories in the world, hell, in Neptune, than the sad delusions of a third rate actress desperate for attention."
"Very funny, Logan. Forgive my brother, he's feeling guilty for not being here on the night and playing the hero. He's gutted that years of comic book study have come to nothing."
"What are you saying, that I could have stopped it, that it's my fault Dad got hurt?"
"Well, maybe if you hadn't been so busy screwing Veronica Mars."
"Shut up, Trina. This is all about you, remember. You leave her out of this."
"According to the sheriff, this wasn't the first time you were poking that particular hole. But what on earth did you do, little brother, to make her cry rape?"
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"Veronica Mars, you have got some balls!"
Realising what he had said, Wallace couldn't help but start to giggle.
"Or had some!"
She had told him how Ashley Banks had been tricked into believing she was giving Logan a blow job and how Ashley had lost no time in spreading the word. She now told him most of the rest, about Logan punching Aaron's lights out, about his pummelling the tree, about his arrest and her attempts to help him. She only left out a couple of things, the ones that caused her own head to spin with fear – the rape revelation and the intimacy she shared with Logan. She was going to have to face the one shortly. She still couldn't manage the other, not yet, not until she understood herself a little better. Not until she understood…
"Where the hell is he, anyway? Logan was supposed to be diverting some of the flak."
"Haven't seen him around today. Maybe he's working out a way to his next blow job."
"Oh, stop it, you."
Veronica slapped Wallace's arm. She couldn't tell him what it meant to her that he was her best friend and what it meant to her that he didn't hate her like all the rest.
The bell rang and they hurried from their lunch to their different classes. As she hit the door to the classroom for English, Veronica's cell rang. She was already in the room when she grabbed it and looked at the caller ID. It was Logan and her heart actually skipped a beat. She was about to answer when Mrs Murphy stared her down. She switched the phone to message and took her seat. Surrounding by the tittering and glares of her classmates, Veronica afforded herself a secret smile.
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"Hey, uh, Veronica, I, uh, I need to talk to you. Call me back…please. Bye…oh, it's, uh, it's Logan, by the way."
Logan's hand shook as he put down the phone. He thought he would speak to her and hadn't prepared himself to leave a message. It was a lame-ass message. But what was he supposed to say, that his sister had told the world that Veronica had been raped? That it was all his fault? All of it?
The reason Logan stayed home that day was not any of the good reasons, the expected reasons. It was for a very bad reason, one shouted out in the interrogation room at the Sheriff's Department when that asshole was still trying to pin something on Veronica, one whispered on the steps before he held her. Veronica had been slipped a roofie and raped at Shelly Pomroy's party. And since the moment he had let her go, since they had parted, he had been frozen by the realisation that it was something he could not fix however much he wanted to. And he wanted to, desperately, but Veronica would and could never forgive him. He avoided Veronica for to face her was to lose her, as friend, as lover, as whatever they might become, and it was that that kept him away.
For it was Logan who brought the roofies to the party.
