Three cheers for quick updates! HOORAY!

And everybody, you've gotta stay in the dark about who's landing in jail... It's a surprise. But you should find out in 3 chapters or so.

Girl Talk

Lou was frustrated and Jo saw it plain as the daylight. And she could understand it. The day had started off with the whole bacon incident, then progressed from bad to worse for Lou as she realized that there were a lot of "housewife duties" that she wasn't ready for. Laundry, cooking, cleaning… About the only thing she could do was wash dishes, and only that because she'd had to learn early on. In her life with Jo, that had been Lou's main responsibility, besides working to pay for everything.

Jo, on the other hand, had always been the one to do the laundry and clean up—since Lou was basically a pig. So she had a better outlook on the way things were going for her and the way things would go for her after the wedding.

She could say with more than relative certainty that Luke was going to be more taken care of than Bo after the double wedding.

"Wipe that dang smug look off your face, Bobbie-Jo Johnson," Lou growled, leaning back heavily on the couch. "Or I might just have to knock it off."

"A: you know better than to call me smug, Lou," Jo replied, taking a seat on a different couch. "B: I know better than to think you'd actually hit little ol' me."

"Dang, did I ever tell you how much I hate it when you're right?"

Smiling at her sister, Jo nodded. "Only a million times, Lou—make that a million and one."

Loudly, Lou groaned.

It was then that Daisy Duke walked in the door, home from a day at work. When she noticed the twins lounging on the living room couches, she smiled brightly. "Well, did you two have a tiring day?"

"Yes," Lou quickly answered.

Daisy took a seat. "Well, what was so bad about it?"

"I am not gonna be a good housewife," Lou whined. "I can't do anything! I burnt myself trying to cook bacon, almost ruined a bunch of clothes trying to wash them, and just don't have the patience for cleaning up. Chalk that up to just one more reason for Bo to hate me."

"Oh, he doesn't hate you, honey!" Daisy quickly assured Lou.

Good luck getting her to believe that, Jo thought at Daisy, inwardly rolling her eyes at her sister. And it'd be just as hard to convince Bo that Lou doesn't hate him. In either case, you'd have better luck trying to pry old Boss Hogg's wallet right out of his fat little hand.

"I've ruined his life, he ruined mine, and it looks like it's gonna keep on going that way," Lou replied. "The reason I left Hazzard in the first place was frustration with him. We're just two people that are too different, Daisy."

"A lot of people think that way until they see things will work out."

"Yeah, right," Lou retorted, wrinkling her nose. "We're like two horses trying to pull in opposite directions: we can't get anywhere."

"Well, if those two horses weren't quite as stubborn, maybe they could get where they need to go," Daisy replied softly. "You give a little, you get a little."

"Maybe," Lou said quietly.

"Maybe nothing," Jo retorted, opting to throw her two cents into the conversation. "You know if you gave in a little, Lou, you might actually get somewhere. I think you're scared to throw in the towel even a little. Because you know things might just work out."

"Excuse me?" Lou growled. "I'm not afraid of anything."

"Except giving in," Jo countered. "And appearing weak."

Lou's jaw tightened, and she made no reply.

Fine, get angry at me, Jo thought at her sister. But I'm going to ride this out to the end and show you just what it is you're doing to me, yourself and these poor Dukes.

"You've always been afraid of looking like you're not the tough, strong girl," she said aloud. "When we were younger, you had to be. I realize that. And that strong façade has made us keep things held in, ain't it? That strong 'I'm Lou and I can do anything' personality is what kept us hiding things, ain't it?"

Lou's gray eyes turned towards Jo murderously, and the firm set of her face commanded Jo to shut her mouth right now, or else. But for once, Jo had had enough of Lou's commands, and she was going to press onward anyway.

Now of course, Daisy was curious as to what was going on, but was also scared about what she might be about to hear. Oh, my gosh, what have I gotten myself into? she thought.

And when Jo turned her gaze to Daisy, she was sitting there like a deer caught in the headlights.

"So, do you want to hear mine and Lou's big secret, Daisy?" Jo asked.

"Uh…"

"We're just about broke," Jo continued anyway. "Yeah, that's it. We have no money to our names. That's part of the reason we came to stay here."

Daisy just nodded slowly.

"Yeah, doesn't sound like much, huh? But it's true. We have nothing but our suitcases and our car."

After throwing back her head to groan at the ceiling, Lou sighed. "So, wondering how that came about, Daisy? I'll tell you anyway. See, we've always had to work for a living, and when you're pregnant, it's kinda hard to work. Even harder to get work after you get fired from your first job for being pregnant. We both kept working as long as we could, which was up until about a month ago, and then we just ran out of money. Couldn't pay the rent. So we took all we had and came out this way. I figured your family had to do something for us. And besides, living in Hazzard's cheaper than living in Atlanta."

"What about your father?" Daisy asked. "Why didn't you ask him for help?"

With pain in her eyes, Lou glanced at Daisy. "He disowned us after he found out what we did."

"Oh." Daisy looked like she personally had been slapped. "I'm so sorry."

"He never had much to do with us after our mom's death," Jo said quietly. "It just took a little something like Yvonne and Xavier's existences to push him over the edge into turning his back on us."

"You girls have it harder than anyone realizes," Daisy said with compassion for the twins in her voice and eyes.

"All we can do is deal with what the Good Lord deals us," Jo replied.

"Well, don't neither of you go worrying." Smiling, Daisy took one of each of the twins' hands. "You two are gonna officially be Dukes in about a week, and you're already part of the family. You're gonna be well taken care of for the rest of your lives."

Go, Jo, go:D I've been working on another special Christmas story about the Dukes, just for everyone's info... And for anyone that missed it, I already did one called the Santa Claus of Hazzard...