I'm so sorry for not having updated this in such a long time. It wasn't a writer's block, it was just that I've been very very busy. If someone's still keeping an eye on this story… I'm sorry again! I'll try to update more often.
I've made some Lizzie McGuire fanvids, please check my profile page and you'll find the links! I've put a lot of work and heart on them, and I hope you like them! Please check my new homepage too. )
Hope you like this chapter. Special thanks to Dario, my beta reader.
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Chapter X: The truth on video
After talking to her mother, Lizzie lay flat on her bed staring straight at the ceiling. She couldn't help but think about the events that had happened earlier. She had witnessed her best friend, the love of her life being kissed by her worst enemy. Just thinking about it hurt like hell. She wasn't sure how much more she could take.
A few minutes later, Matt had just come home, oblivious as to what had happened that day. He didn't bother to wait for his mother to finish telling him the entire story before rushing up the stairs to talk to Lizzie. He knocked softly on her door.
"Lizzie, can I come in?", he asked
Lizzie attempted to wipe away the tears off of her cheeks and tidy up her hair.
"Yes, Matt, come in."
"How are you?" Matt asked timidly
"Did mom tell you everything that happened to me today? If not I'm sure you will find out eventually anyway."
"She didn't tell me much… but enough to know what happened. Sorry Sis, I know how it must feel.
"You just don't understand. You have no idea how I feel!"
Matt was silent.
"Matt… I'm sorry…" Lizzie said, sobbing. He hugged her. She then told him everything that happened. It was hard for her to talk, as sometimes she wanted to cry but had to restrain herself, and other times her tears streamed down her cheeks without control. When she finished, she seemed to be more calm, but still angry.
"I don't know what to believe after what I saw. What if there's something going on between them?"
"That's impossible Lizzie, and we both know it! Don't let those ideas to get you… Kate is so despicable and Gordo never could love someone like her. Believe me… if it wasn't that way," Matt made a kung-fu fighter gesture, "he would have to give a credible explanation to Jet-Li's sidekick boy!"
Lizzie laughed a bit; a weak laughter mixed with a sob, and looked Matt in the eyes.
"I'm really sorry, Lizzie. But I'm sure that everything is going to be okay. I'm sure it wasn't his fault, Gordo loves you. He couldn't do something like that to you."
"I'm so confused, and tired, and just want to go to sleep. I wish I could just wake up tomorrow and none of this had ever happened.…"
"Everything will be fine. If Gordo promised to get you out of this trouble, I'm sure he will do that, and that will show you that he loves you for real."
"Thank you, Matt."
"You're welcome… 'my dear sister'" he answered
"Hey!" she said, taking a pillow and hitting him with it over his head. They started a long pillows fight that had to be stopped when Sam entered Lizzie's room and got accidentally hit by a pillow by Lizzie.
-s-
Meanwhile, Miranda, Gordo and Larry were at school, executing Miranda's plan to prove Lizzie's innocence. Things had got complicated for them since the security guards were on to them. Larry went to try to distract the guards, while Miranda and Gordo made copies of the security tapes to prove Lizzie's innocence.
"Gordo, we have to hurry, Larry won't be able to distract the guards for much longer without us getting caught."
"I know, don't make me nervous! Let's see. Out of all these monitors, which one is the one we are looking for? Damn it! Which is it? Miranda, help me!"
"What's the tape I should look for?" Miranda answered, nervously.
"The one of the corridors with all the lockers…"
Gordo stayed thinking for a moment. He realized that the tape of the Principal's office corridor wouldn't be enough. If it was true that there was two 'Lizzies', one of them must have been there. And the other must have been at the lockers corridor!
"Gordo, what happens?"
"We also have to find the tape of the Principal's office corridor… If it was true that there was two 'Lizzies', it's obvious that one of them must have been there, and the other 'Lizzie' must have been at the lockers corridor!"
They started to read the screen labels frantically looking for the ones they needed. Meanwhile, Larry was running fast and cautiously towards the store rooms.
"C'mon, I hope Melville hasn't arrived yet to the store rooms, please…"
When he turned the corner of the corridor he saw Mr. Melville, not more than ten feet away from the door.
"Come on… I got to find a way to distract him!"
Larry saw a picture hanging from the wall, and without thinking twice, he took it and threw it to the floor. The glass broke and made a loud noise, causing Mr. Melville to turn back to see who was sneaking around. Larry waited a second as he leaned on the wall, then ran to the end of the corridor and broke another picture to distract Mr. Melville. It had worked, but now he was being chased. It wouldn't take much longer for him to get caught.
Miranda and Gordo had already found the tapes, had rewound them and started copying the parts of the recordings they needed. Gordo looked impatiently at his watch, waiting for the tapes to be copied. Miranda had the walkie-talkie in her hand, ready to answer when Larry calls.
"Do you think they have caught him?" Miranda asked in a fearful voice. "He hasn't talked to us over the walkie-talkie."
"I hope they don't. He couldn't have let them catch him."
There was still al lot of things to think about 'Saving Lizzie' operation.
"Miranda, have you thought about how are we going to tell the vice-principal about the tapes without him realizing we have watched them? I mean, without him knowing we've come tonight to make copies of them?"
Miranda lowered her head and made a quick grimace.
"No, I haven't. But we'll have time to think about it."
When the tapes were almost ready, they received a transmission over the walkie-talkie:
(Bzz) Gordo? Miranda? (Bzz)
"Oh my God! Larry, where are you?" Miranda answered.
(Bzz) I've got Mr. Melville and Mr. Miller tracking me down… and I've managed to get them away from our exit. Did you finish copying the tapes?"
Gordo asked Miranda for the walkie-talkie. "We just need two minutes more. Please keep them distracted just a bit more!"
(Bzz) "Well, that's what I'm doing." Larry answered. "See, when you're done, I need you go to the store rooms, but be careful. I'll do my thing here to keep them away from you a little longer, but you have to be fast!" (bzz)
Miranda snatched the transmitter from Gordo and asked Larry: "But… What about you? How are you going get out of there?"
(bzz) "Don't worry about me, I'll figure that out. What is important now is that they don't get you busted. If they catch me… well, I'm not going to rat out anyone. But, please, get out of there quickly!"
Gordo approached Miranda and said: "No way! We're not leaving without you! We're going to wait for you!"
(bzz) Don't be stupid! Do what I say! If you don't get out of there they are going to… (bzz)
"Larry? Larry? Larry!" Gordo tried to get an answer, but he didn't get any. He tried several times to contact Larry, but the efforts were useless. Miranda was about crying.
"Gordo, what happened to Larry?"
"I don't know…"
A red light activated in the consoles indicating that the tapes were ready.
"What are we going to do?" Miranda asked.
"We have to get out of here."
"We can't leave without Larry!" Miranda replied. "I'm going to help him!"
Miranda rushed towards the door but Gordo held her by the arm.
"Miranda, don't go! You'd make things more complicated for him! You know him; for sure he's already got a plan!"
"He needs help! We can't leave without him! I can't believe you want to abandon him!"
"It's not like that! See, we have the tapes and Larry told us to leave! We're going to wait for him outside, and we must go because we can't expose ourselves! We got to hurry!"
Miranda couldn't refute.
"Ok. Let's go."
Miranda and Gordo made sure they left the room just like they found it, and they could go back to the store rooms without any problem. They crossed the store rooms using the flashlight and came out from the school. Miranda suggested talking to Larry over the walkie-talkie, but Gordo didn't let her to, because the transmission could reach him in an inopportune moment.
They jumped over the fence and climbed a tree to wait there. Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed but Larry was still not showing up.
"Gordo, I can't wait anymore. Can we talk to him?"
"I guess that's not necessary" a voice coming from the sidewalk assured.
Miranda and Larry exclaimed in one voice: "Larry!" Miranda came down and hugged Larry. "Hey, how did you get rid of the guards? Tell us everything! Why did it take so long?"
"Well, I just had to set some traps in the Science Lab, mix up some substances to produce smoke, play some sound effects in the multimedia lab… you know, whatever it was necessary to confuse them and make them look for me in the places I wasn't. For real, I had no idea of how to make it, but when you're about to be captured, you have to think fast, don't you?"
"I guess…" Gordo replied. "I'm happy we made it. But now we must go before they start looking for us outside the school. Let's go to my house to analyze these tapes."
- s –
"So, what do you want to talk about, Andie?" Kate said, pretending to be calm.
"Look, it's just that I was thinking about what we did today and I wanted to make sure that I won't get in trouble in account of you 'little' plan."
"What do you mean, 'your little plan'?" Kate responded. "You agreed! You wanted…" - Kate stopped, then continued in a very low voice - "… you wanted to take revenge too, didn't you?"
"That's right. But it mainly was your revenge. So I don't want to get involved if they catch you. You understand?"
"Andie… I've been thinking about this too, and I realized that Lizzie didn't deserve this… and I need you to help me to fix up the disaster I caused."
"Some revenge, uh?" Andie said, sarcastically. "What you want to do is totally pathetic, you know? How it comes that the same day you execute you plan you want to undo it?"
"Andie, please… both you and I know that Lizzie didn't do anything but helping you… and both you and I have treated her as harshly as we could… we got to remedy the damage we caused, and you have to help me…"
"Are you nuts? I'm not going to help you, don't even think about it, do you understand? Goodbye!"
Kate heard for a moment the intermittent tone of the finished call. Then she violently hang the phone up.
"Damn it! Anyway, I don't need you help, idiot! As ridiculous as it could seem, I'm determined to help Lizzie!" she murmured, clenching her teeth.
She was sure she could do it withoutAndie's help. And she had to think of a plan. Maybe delivering herself to the Principal could be the easiest way, but it would mean that she'd be expelled.
She didn't want to think about that for that day. So she went to sleep. And she slept quietly, without nightmares, maybe because her decision to save Lizzie was tranquilizing her.
-s-
"Hi, David!" Roberta Gordo greeted his son when he arrived home with Miranda and Larry. "What happened? Didn't you finish your assignment?"
"Oh…! Hi mom! See, we were at Larry's but we realized we needed some information that I had in my computer so we came here to finish our homework! Oh, by the way, he's Larry --- he's my classmate since we were in elementary school but he has never come over…"
"Hi, Larry. Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you too, Mrs. Gordon."
"Miranda, you came too!"
"Ah… yes! Good night, Mrs. Gordon!"
"Mom, we'll be upstairs." Gordo said, and with a gesture, he told Larry and Miranda to follow him. But then her mom called:
"David!"
He almost dropped his backpack with the tapes inside.
"Why… why you three are wearing the same kind of clothes?"
That was the moment when they realized that they were wearing 'unusual' clothes for just going to do homework. Those clothes are the kind of clothes people needs to… hide from something, or for camouflaging.
"For nothing special!" They three exclaimed at the same time. Roberta narrowed her eyes and looked at them suspiciously.
"Are you sure?"
Gordo answered: "Yes, mom… I guess…" – a nervous smile came to his face and finished his phrase: "… I guess it has been a coincidence!"
"All right. Off you go."
Once they were at Gordo's room, Miranda commented: "Your mom suspects that we were doing anything but studying."
"No worries. I know it's not right, but sometimes, being a 'perfect son' has a side of which you can take advantage of."
Gordo set up the necessary connections and started copying the tapes to the computer. Miranda and Larry were sitting on the bed looking some Gordo's photo albums. Gordo was leaning over the table, waiting, aiming his sight to an indeterminate point, and thinking.
"Why Lizzie reacted that way when Kate kissed me? Did she feel that I was betraying her by doing that with her worst enemy? Or it's true that she's in love with me?
And his memories started to flow:
- -
"Hey chico, how are you?" Miranda asked, cheerfully. "What's up?
"Hi, Miranda. I'm fine, thanks."
"Hey, wait a moment. Why do you speak in that voice tone? What's wrong?
"It's same thing of the last days. You know I'm madly in love with Lizzie. I've decided to talk to her today. I'll call her to ask her to go out today to the Digital Bean."
"WOW! Gordo, I was thinking that you'd never take the courage to do it! And don't be afraid, it's obvious that both you and Lizzie would move mountains the one for the other one!"
"What do you mean? Do you mean that Lizzie…?
"Yeah, my dear friend. She also loves you, and she cannot hide that. You both are the only persons who haven't noticed about what feels the one for the other one!
- -
"Good afternoon, Mr. Dig."
"Hi Gordon. Sit down, please. Tell me what's happening with you."
"It's nothing, Mr. Dig. I was a bit distracted, that's all …"
"Gordon, I know. I realized how you were looking at Lizzie; I saw the drawing on your notebook… I suspected it long time ago."
- -
Gordo, there's something I want you to know.
"What… what is it...?"
Gordo… I like y…"
- -
"Hey Gordo, is that going to take too much time yet?"
Gordo went back to reality and realized that the tapes were already copied.
"No, it's ready. Come here."
Miranda and Larry took a seat and stared at the screen.
"Here we have two videos: The first one: the video of the lockers room."
"Look!" Larry pointed. "The first 'Lizzie' I met at the lockers!"
"Andie!" Miranda and Gordo exclaimed at the same time.
"Andie? Who's Andie?" Larry asked, confused.
Gordo paused the video and explained Larry the whole thing about Lizzie and Andie, how they became friends and how Andie got away from her. He also told him about how he found out that Andie and Kate were behind the scheme.
"Well, in some way, I guess it was a little obvious that Kate was behind everything but, why did we go for the tapes, then?"
"We needed the proof. We couldn't just go to tell the vice-principal what I heard; he simply wouldn't have believed it."
"Good point. Play the video."
Gordo did so, and they say that the real Lizzie meeting Tudge and talking to him.
"That's what I told you! That there were 'two Lizzies'"
"Let's watch the other video." Gordo said, pausing the recording.
Gordo played the video of the Principal's office corridor. Indeed, it was Lizzie who was there, setting a trap by greasing the floor.
"That's Lizzie…" Miranda said, opening her mouth.
"It isn't she." Gordo and Larry said. "Look at the hour."
The security tapes had the hour registered in the bottom left corner. In both recordings, the hour was 8:42 pm. But in one, Lizzie walked by the lockers corridor, and in the other, Lizzie was greasing the floor in front of Principal's office.
"Here we have the proof! The girl at the Principal Office is Andie! Lizzie couldn't split herself in two! That moron Adams is going to realize that Lizzie is innocent and that someone impersonated her!" Miranda exclaimed, full of bliss.
"There's something else we need to see." Gordo said. He played again the video in which 'Lizzie' met Larry, and zoomed it. He wanted to recognize Andie's face, but he couldn't since the images were taken form behind. But between the blonde hairs, he could see a lock of dark hair.
"See, a lock of dark hair. I'm pretty sure Lizzie doesn't have any."
"Well, now we have to convince the vice principal to watch the tapes… Of course, it will seem suspicious; for sure the guards will tell him what happened tonight."
"That's true, but we have to try. That's the only plan we've got. The only thing we can do now is to hope to be lucky."
"Well, that's the way we'll do this." Larry agreed. "So, we'll meet tomorrow at school."
Larry and Miranda said goodbye to Gordo and they left. When Gordo got to his room, Roberta was waiting for him.
"Mom? What are you doing here?"
She answered calmly: "I just wanted to tell you that I'm proud of you. Although what you did was very dangerous and imprudent. But I see that you're determined when it comes to help your friends, and of course, the girl you love."
"How do moms to know everything?"
"Mom, I-I-I-just… How did you…? Have you been spyi…?"
She hugged him. "Don't worry, David. I'm sure nothing bad is going to happen, and that Lizzie will return to school."
"Thanks, mom… but…"
"Shush." She said, making a gesture, the she left the room. Gordo would never have expected that. Why didn't she get angry? Why didn't she, if she knew what he and his friends had done?"
"Mom's reactions could be confusing sometimes." He thought.
Anyway, he had to sleep. He had a beautiful dream, in which Lizzie sang lullaby songs for him.
"Good night, Gordo." Lizzie's image said, tenderly.
"Good night, Lizzie." He responded. And he smiled.
- - - - - - - - -
