Author: Modern-Insomniac1138

Pairing/Character: Logan/OC Friendship, LoVe eventually, a little V/D, Beaver/OC, Ensemble

Word Count: 2,425

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Carly Hayes is a freshman at Neptune High, and she's an old friend of the Echolls Family. Slight AU. Season 2.

July 15, 2002

"I still can't believe you made me sneak into three movies with you!" 17 year-old Cecilia Hayes exclaimed.

Logan Echolls just laughed. They had just spent the afternoon sneaking into movies at the local movie theatre, and Cecilia was now driving them home.

"It was fun, wasn't it?" Logan asked.

"Yeah, it was fun." Cecilia answered timidly.

"Oh my, is the great Cecilia Hayes actually admitting that I was right for once?" he asked in disbelief.

"Hey, I never said that! All I said was that I had fun." she reasoned.

"Sure you did." he said rolling his eyes.

"Hey, who's the one driving, here?" she asked.

"You are, of course. I mean if you're driving the car you should at least know that you are driving!" he shouted sarcastically.

"Haha." she said.

"So, where's Carly? Why couldn't she join us this time?" he asked as he stared out the passenger's side window.

"She's shopping with my mom. I swear, my mom will do anything to make sure that Carly becomes a girly girl of some sort, but I keep telling her that she will never succeed at her master plan." Cecilia answered.

"Why?" Logan asked curiously.

"Because she's too much like you." she said as she glanced over at Logan and smiled.

Logan smiled back and said, "Anyway, I can't believe we snuck into three movies, and we didn't even get caught!"

"I know, that was a miracle." she said.

"No, that was the Echolls Family charm." he said smirking.

Cecilia laughed and said, "Thanks Logan for suggesting this. I had fun, today."

"Aw, it was my pleasure. You're actually still a lot of fun." he said.

"Now what is that supposed to mean?" she asked.

"Nothing, just saying that you're a lot of fun." he answered.

"No, tell me what 'still a lot of fun' meant." she demanded.

"Well, ever since you started hanging out with Heather and dating Jeremy, it's just that, you sort of grew up. I mean, you were still there for me, but you just became mature, not that I'm saying it's a bad thing." he answered as he weakly smiled at her.

"Oh, okay." she said sadly. "You know, even though I may have grown up a little, I still care about you. You know that right?" she asked.

"Yeah, I do." he answered smiling.

"Do you want to do this again?" she asked suddenly.

"Do what?" he asked slightly confused.

"You know, hang out. We haven't really hung out with just the two of us in a while." she said.

"Yeah, I know." he said.

"Yeah, well, do you?" she asked.

"Of course, I would! Just name the time and the place and I'm there." he answered.

"Good to hear." she said smiling as they pulled up in front of Logan's house.

Present

"Oh the weather outside is frightful but the fire is so delightful and since we've got no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow..." Julia Hayes sang cheerfully as she and Carly decorated their Christmas tree.

"Snow! Snow!" Dakota giggled as she grabbed handfuls of silver tinsel out of a box and threw it into the air.

"Carly, would you..." Julia trailed pointing at Dakota.

Carly looked over at Dakota and sighed. "Yeah, yeah, I'll clean Dakota and the tinsel up." she said reluctantly.

Julia smiled as she said, "Thanks, Carly."

Carly knelt beside Dakota and proceeded to put all the tinsel back into the box. Julia's cell phone, then, started ringing. Julia went over to it and checked the caller ID. Her smile was soon replaced with a frown as she answered it.

"Hi, it's Julia, did you find out where he is yet?" she whispered impatiently into the phone.

As Carly finished cleaning up, she started eavesdropping into her mother's conversation.

"What do you mean you can't find him?" Julia asked loudly. She then looked over at Carly, who looked up at her in confusion.

"Excuse me." Julia barked to the person on the other line. "Carly, can you tuck in Dakota for me?" she asked softly.

"Yeah, sure." she answered hesitantly as she picked up Dakota and headed towards Dakota's bedroom which was located next to her own.

After she tucked Dakota in, she slowly walked towards her own bedroom when she heard her mom, who was still on the phone. "What do you mean he may be out of the country? How hard is it for you to find a college football player named Jeremy Maran, for goodness sake? My God, I hired you to find him for me and all you can do is tell me that it can't be done! Just drop the case, I'll be finding my business elsewhere!" she shouted loudly as she hung up.

Carly was shocked at what she just heard. Was her mom really trying to find Jeremy Maran, Cecilia's ex-boyfriend? Why did she need to find him so badly? Was this because of Dakota? Was she trying to find Jeremy to find out if he was Dakota's father?

Carly shook herself out of her thoughts as she went into her bedroom. She sat on her bed and tried to find out what she should do. Should she ask her mom? Should she just forget about it and move on? Or should she take matters into her own hands? If her mom couldn't find Jeremy, then she would try to find him herself.

To be honest, Carly has always wondered who Dakota's father is. Maybe this was her chance to find out. Her head told her that Jeremy was Dakota's dad, but her heart told her to look somewhere else.

She quickly gathered her thoughts and grabbed the phonebook from under her bed. She quickly skimmed through the pages until she found what she was looking for, a private investigator. She looked through the names and ads until she came across, Keith Mars. "Veronica's dad?" she asked herself. Of course, Veronica had told her about her father's line of work before. "Well, my dad's a private investigator, if you want to find somebody or find something out, I'm sure he can help." Veronica had once said. She closed the book and closed her eyes as she laid down on her bed. She knew what she was going to do the next day at school. She knew what she had to do the next day at school.

"Hey Carly!" Logan beamed happily as Carly slipped into the passenger's seat.

"Hi Logan." she said sullenly as he started driving.

He looked over at her in concern and asked, "What's cracking your egg, Care Bear?"

She shook her head and replied flatly, "Nothing."

"Are you sure?" he asked a little more worried.

"Yeah, I'm sure." she said as she weakly smiled at him.

"Okay, but you know that you can tell me anything right? You can trust me." he said.

She looked up at him and for a split second she had truly thought about telling him what she had overheard, but her heart stopped her for some stupid reason. Instead she looked at her shoes and said, "I know."

As she and Logan made their separate ways into school, she saw Beaver at his locker. She contemplated whether she should go talk to him or not. Their date had been amazing. They talked and laughed and became closer, but he had been avoiding her the past few days. She decided that it was time to break the ice and go fine out why.

"Hey, Cass." she said as she went up to him.

He glanced over at her and continued to gather his books. "Hi Carly." he said.

"I had fun on Friday." she said.

"Yeah, me too." he said as he closed his locker shut.

"Did I do something wrong?" she asked suddenly.

"No, why?" he asked.

"Because it seems like you're avoiding me." she answered as they started to walk down the hall together.

"I'm not avoiding you." he said.

"Yes, you are. You won't answer my calls, you've been avoiding me at lunch, and you seem to be conveniently "taking a shower or out" every time I go to your house. Did I do something? Do you not like me? Did something in your mind click saying that I'm just not your type?" she asked.

"Carly..." he trailed.

"No, tell me." she demanded.

"Carly, you are my type and that's why I'm avoiding you." he said.

"What?" she asked in confusion.

"I like you, and that's all I can say right now." he answered.

"I like you, too, but then what's the problem?" she asked.

Beaver bite his lip. The real reason that he had been avoiding her the past few days was that he honestly liked her, but he knew that if he would go through with the bet that he would hurt her in the process. "The problem is that I like you. You're my friend and it's just complicated right now. It just a little confusing." He answered.

"So what does this make us?" she asked.

"I don't know, but I do know that I want to go on another date with you." he answered.

"You do?" she asked smiling as she abruptly stopped walking.

"Yeah, I do." he answered as he stopped, also.

"Great, I want to go on another date, too. Well, I should go get my stuff out of my locker and head for class. I don't want to be late for homeroom." she said smiling.

"Yeah, you should." he said.

"I'll see you at lunch and we can discuss plans for another date." she said.

"I'd like that. See you later, Carly Hayes." he said sweetly as he walked toward his own classroom.

"See you later." she said as she watched him walk away. She quickly turned around and bumped into someone. Both of their books fell and they both knelt down to pick them up. As she gathered her books she looked up to see that she had bumped into a brown-haired boy with blue eyes and glasses. He looked like he was a freshman, also.

"Sorry." he said hurriedly as he scurried away.

"It's... okay." she yelled after him. She shrugged her shoulders as she continued walking to her locker. As she walked toward her locker, she spotted Veronica Mars and Duncan Kane arguing in the hallway.

"God, Duncan, I'm sorry that I forgot to call you last night! For your information I actually work!" she shouted.

"Well, Veronica you should have at least told me so I didn't have to leave a dozen messages on your cell phone! I thought you were hurt or something!" he barked back.

"No, you just thought that I was with another guy." she shouted loudly.

"Yeah, like you would cheat on me. Who would cheat with you, anyway?" he shouted angrily.

"You cocky son of a bitch. You know what, don't bother even calling me tonight." she said bitterly as she walked away from him and into the girls bathroom.

Carly quickly followed her into the bathroom. She walked in to find that Veronica and her were the only ones there.

"Veronica?" she asked.

"What?" she snapped angrily as she turned around. "Oh, I'm sorry Carly." she said.

"It's okay. Are you alright?" Carly asked.

"Yeah, so I guess you witnessed one of the many fights of Veronica and Duncan, huh?" Veronica asked.

"Yeah, I guess I did, so why were you guys fighting?" she asked.

"Yeah, well because I was supposed to call him last night and I forgot. He thinks that the world revolves around him and his small..." she trailed as she realized that what she was about to say was very inappropriate. Instead she ended the sentence with, "brain."

"Well, do you guys fight all the time?" Carly asked.

"No, just recently. He thinks that I like another guy." she answered.

"Who?" Carly asked curiously.

Veronica's mind was screaming, "Logan! Logan! I love Logan!", but instead she answered, "Nothing, it's fine. He just thinks that roses and candy will fix everything. He doesn't get me. I guess he never really got me. He thinks that I'm the same ol' gal from the "fab four" days with him, Lilly, Logan and me, but he's wrong. We've all changed, but I guess he'll never get that through in his mind."

"That sounds complicated." Carly said.

"Yeah, it does. Well, I've got to go or else I'll be late for class." Veronica said as she headed toward the door.

"Wait!" Carly shouted as she remembered why she had to talk to Veronica in the first place.

"Yeah?" Veronica asked.

"I didn't just come in here to ask if you were okay. I came in here to ask you something." she answered.

"What do you want to ask me?" Veronica asked.

"I want to ask you if your dad can help me find someone." Carly asked.

"Look, Carly, my dad's a little busy right now. Everyone's looking for someone. It's usual really busy around Christmas time." Veronica answered.

"Oh okay. Well, thanks for hearing me out." Carly said disappointedly.

"No, just because my dad's busy doesn't mean that I can't help you." Veronica said.

"Really, you can help me?" Carly asked hopefully.

"Yeah, I can. So who do you need to find?" she asked.

"I need to find Jeremy Maran." Carly answered.

"Okay, who's he and why do you need to find him?" Veronica asked.

"He's Cecilia's ex-boyfriend, and I need to find him to get a DNA sample from him." she answered.

"DNA sample for what?" Veronica asked curiously.

"DNA sample for a paternity test. I want to find out if he's Dakota's father." Carly answered.

Author's Notes: Thanks for reading. Please review! Those reviews inspire me to continue, and they help me write. Stay tuned for the next chapter and for the demise of a certain couple.

Ally