A/N: Another Mac chapter, her first day "back" in high school. This is by far the longest chapter (so far). This story is going to start earning it's "AU" classification as I start twisting episode plots and later on combining season 1 & 2 events, plus adding a lot of original stuff, too. Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favorites. I love hearing from you all! I hope you keep enjoying this story, as it's wicked-fun to write! As always, thank you so much to my beta-cainc3-for all her hardwork and great ideas for this "forever long" chapter! Enjoy!

Obligatory disclaimer-Nope, I don't own a darn thing in the Veronica Mars 'verse! Bummer...It's all on Rob Thomas and his gang!

Chapter 6—Driving Cadillac's in her dreams

During her freshman year at Hearst College, Mac would occasionally wake up in the dark, pre-dawn hours panicked at the thought that she'd forgotten to study for a Trig test for Mr. Myers, or turn in an English paper to Mrs. Murphy. Then, as her heartbeat slowly ticked back down to normal range, she'd realize high school was over, she was in college now. Of course that would cause another panic attack trying to remember if she was up on all her college course work, too, but the fear was less intense by then.

So, when Mac woke up, sweat raining down her face, in that space between Sunday night and Monday morning, she hoped her fears that she was ill-prepared for a test or perhaps a term paper were unfounded. Then, the strange space-time continuum existence she'd been dwelling in the past couple days caught up to her and instead of her heart-beat slowing down, it felt like it increased ten-fold. She was mere hours away from going back to Neptune High. That was one redux she'd never wanted.

She'd lobbied hard during their Sunday dinner—which was evidently a sacred Sinclair tradition—to get one more day of rest, but her mom ('Mom2') put the kibosh on that plan. 'Dad2' wasn't any help in that department, either, he seemed to live by the motto 'happy wife, happy home.' Their argument, and by their it was actually 'Mom2's' argument, was that the doctor only ordered a couple days of rest, and that's exactly what she got. She admitted defeat when 'Mom2' brought her A game—the first law of physics, bodies at rest vs bodies in motion, it was important for her healing that she fall into the motion side of things now.

Science was one master Mac always bowed down to.

After her early-morning/late-night freak out, she managed to fall back to sleep pretty quickly, catching another four hours until the shrill beeping of the alarm clock invaded her dreams of a time-traveling kitten that looked a lot like Fritz. She punched the off button, resisting the urge to send the offending alarm flying. She didn't like mornings in normal circumstances, and obviously the whole concept of reliving her high school days wasn't even in the same zip code as normal.

With a feeling of dread, Mac very reluctantly got out of bed, and walked slowly to the massive walk-in closet at the opposite end of her bedroom. She looked around the vast space that she hadn't really explored yet because a major chunk of her time was spent resting, recovering and trying to make some kind of sense of this new normal, but by now she was starting to accept that was an impossible feat.

There were a lot of pink and purple shirts, skirts, dresses and pants. It was a relief to see some less-colorful options sprinkled around as well. She selected a pair of black cotton pants; but as a concession she did pair it with a shimmery purple shirt and black ballet flats. She brought her school outfit in the bathroom with her and prepared to take a quick shower.

First though, Mac took off the white gauze bandage covering her stitches, and studied it in the mirror. It was the first time she'd really had a chance to study it, 'Mom2' had been playing nursemaid the whole weekend, changing her bandage, dotting ointment on, and generally keeping her on a tight pain pill schedule. The cut was tiny; there were only four stitches, she was happy to see it wasn't nearly as Frankenstein looking as she'd feared, though it was a little red and puffy around the edges. Her discharge instructions had said she could remove the bandage and shower after forty-eight hours. In preparation she took off the pink fuzzy kitten pajamas that had been her weekend uniform, and turned on the water.

She was expecting the water to take awhile to heat up, like it did at the Mackenzie's house, but it was instantly hot. Looking around, Mac also noticed that there were four nozzles all strategically placed in different heights and locations of the Grecian tiled shower. Her entire closet growing up could easily fit in the shower stall with room to spare. The water beating down on her sore, stiff body felt fantastic. She adjusted her position slightly so one of the jets aimed for the small of her back, and angled her head so only her hair got wet, but not her cut. Idly, she wondered how many gallons the water heater handled.

Maybe she could hide in here all day? It would be an appalling waste of water, but perhaps a better alternative than reliving a time she had never labeled as her glory days.

As appealing as wasting time was, she knew she had to suck it up and get moving. Mac grabbed the expensive bottle of designer shampoo and lathered up. The water rained purple as the remains of her temporary dye washed out.

The hot water was showing no signs of running low when Mac reluctantly dragged ass out of the blissful shower and started the process of getting ready for school.

After putting on her clothes, Mac dried her hair with the hair dryer she found in one of the drawers. After it was fully dry she grabbed the tube of purple hair dye she'd found on her dryer quest. She painted on three prominent chunks of purple with the supplied wand; while it was drying she turned her focus to applying a thin layer of make-up. She was always a fan of the natural look in real life, so she saw no reason to change that philosophy for this one. There wasn't a rule that '09'ers had to apply their make up with a garden trowel, was there?

Before heading downstairs, she took one last glance in the mirror to make sure the cut was obscured by her hair, it was.

When she reached the kitchen, there was a bowl of vegan-friendly cereal and the jug of soy milk already waiting for her on the table located in the connected sunroom.

As she was attempting to eat her breakfast over the lump in her throat, it occurred to her that once she got to school she had no idea where she needed to be. She banged her hand hard on the table. Frak!

Lucille looked up sharply from the island where she was stirring some kind of batter.

"Sorry," Mac muttered contritely.

"Is everything alright, doll?"She asked, in her lilting voice.

"Yeah," she replied back, unconvincingly. "My head hurts and I feel like I'm forgetting something. I feel like I'm not ready to get back into my real life," she bit back the ironic smile that wanted to burst out. It was closer to honest than most of the other things that had come out of her mouth the past 48 hours, not that anyone but her could recognize the truth in that innocuous sentence.

"Oh, is that all?" Lucille replied, with gentle humor. "I can't help with the second part, but I can help with the headache." She stood on her tip-toes and grabbed a bottle of Ibuprofen from the cabinet above the sink. She brought the bottle and a small glass of water over to Mac, and set it down next to her cereal bowl.

"Thanks," Mac replied, gratefully palming two orange pills. Unfortunately, now that she was being unceremoniously shoved back into her new real-world, the good drugs from the weekend were no longer an option; after all, she didn't want to be a zombie for school. She mentally snickered at that image.

Mac managed to force down a few more spoonfuls of cereal. A glance at the clock on the opposite wall let her know that it was time to stop stalling.

On her way out the door, 'Mom2' kissed her good-bye, and then handed her a $20 bill, explaining it was for lunch. She'd forgot all about the little '09'er habit of ordering take-out, because the thought of plebian cafeteria food like the '02'ers ingested was enough to make them purge. Back in high school (the first time) the most she ever got from her mom was $5, but mostly she brown bagged it due to the lunch line's limited selection of vegan options. Her favorite part of bringing her lunch to school was the bag of homemade melt-in-your mouth vegan cinnamon spiced cookies that Natalie always seemed to have on hand.

Mac had her hand on the handle of the door that led to the garage when 'Mom2' hollered at her to grab one of the jackets on the hooks that lined the wall of the mud room. Biting her lip, but nodding, Mac reached over and grabbed the first coat she saw that seemed to be at least roughly her size. It was a purple satin jacket with the initials SE weaved together in silver embroidery, it seemed a bit too much like a bowling jacket for her taste, but she assumed it might have been related to the family business because she vaguely recalled seeing a similar logo in her fact-finding mission the previous evening. There were actually several identical coats on the rack, of varying sizes—everyone in the family seemed to own at least two of them.

She also saw two backpacks by the door hanging from another hook. She took an educated guess that bright pink backpack was Lauren's, while the purple one was hers. The set of keys in the front pocket lent further evidence that her assumption was probably correct.

She was going on purple overload.

Throwing one more wave at 'Mom2', she took a deep breath opened the door and went down the three steps that lead into the attached garage. She tried not to feel like she was going to an execution—hers. The third bay housed a bright red Cadillac CTS, it looked brand new. It was a definite upgrade from her first car, or even her second car, the much beloved Beetle convertible.

She got in the car and took a quick glance around the interior, trying to get familiar with the landscape. She felt like an imposter, like at any second she'd be arrested for committing fraud, which was absurd because that was a full 180 degrees from the actual truth—that she was the one who was meant to be Madison Sinclair version 1.0.

Mac raised the garage door and started the car. She slowly and carefully backed out of the long driveway, onto Shady Springs Ct.

Less than ten minutes later she pulled into the parking lot of Neptune High School. She suddenly felt body-slammed by a wicked case of déjà vu. However, the feeling faded quickly when she meandered around the driveway headed toward Parking Lot B, where the '09'ers tended to park. It was adjacent to lot A, the unofficial '02'er designation, where she used to park back in her real high school days. Rumor had it; there were more security cameras mounted in lot B than lot A. However, the main perk of B was that it was a lot closer to the back entrance.

She was right behind a car that looked achingly familiar. It was going slowly, already pushed beyond its limits as soon as the key was put in the ignition. The car in question was a cream colored 1970s relic that lost the classic moniker due to the fact it barely ran. Here she was driving a sporty Cadillac while the car she'd had when she first learned to drive was now being driven by someone that was not her.

Mac turned her blinker on and made the turn into lot B while the new Cindy continued straight, towards lot A, her designated area. It caused a push-pull deep inside, relief that she was no longer driving that death-trap, but it was still strange having no associations to that piece of antiquated automotive engineering.

Finding a spot in the center of the vast lot, Mac parked. She felt like a stranger in a strange land and figured why the hell not enjoy some of the '09'er perks while she could. She had to admit she loved the way the luxurious, fully-loaded Caddy handled the curves on the way over. She had a sudden longing to take off, play hooky and drive along the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) to see how that bad boy handled those curves along the twisty cliffs that carved out the coast.

With faux-bravado Mac grabbed her backpack and exited the car, using the key fob to lock it. As she traversed the short distance to the back entrance of Neptune High, Mac searched the lot for familiar faces.

One of the first things to catch her eye was a big yellow X-terra SUV—it was hard to miss. Its owner, Logan Echolls, was nowhere to be seen though. The second thing to catch her eye was the yellow Jeep parked next to Logan's SUV. She also knew exactly which rich asshole owned that ride as well—the guy whose calls she'd been dodging all weekend. Less than ten minutes into a day that didn't bear repeating anyway, she didn't think she was prepared to deal with the high school version of Dick Casablancas, not yet at any rate. Or, perhaps, ever.

The guy in question was leaning into his Jeep, presumably to grab his backpack. Mac walked by quickly, holding her breath, hoping he wouldn't spot her. She managed to make it into the building without anyone calling her name—Madison, that is. It was still hard to think of herself by that name, here or in any dimension really. She gritted her teeth as she crossed the threshold and lied to herself, saying it probably wouldn't be nearly as bad going back to high school as she feared.

Bullshit, she thought, even she didn't believe her own propaganda.

As soon as entered the white washed hallway of the high school she realized the first wrinkle in the whole plan—she didn't have the faintest idea where her homeroom was, nor any of her other classes. Then there was the locker issue. Yup, lots of flaws in this plan! She dodged classmates as she headed to the reception desk by the principal's office.

When she got there she saw the back of some tall, lanky guy bending over the open file cabinet drawer, taking something out, or maybe putting something else in.

Mac cleared her throat, and without even turning around the guy called out "Just a sec, then I'll be right with you."

She recognized the voice right away, with its perfect blend of snark and humor, though he wasn't being either of those things at the moment. She had always liked the timbre of his voice. They'd grown closer since Veronica left for Stanford; she'd actually poached several of Vee's leftovers.

"Thanks Wallace," she replied automatically. He slammed the drawer he'd been rifling though, and then turned around to look at her, surprised that she knew his name, evidently.

"Um, okay. So how can I help you, girl in my English Class?" He didn't seem to know her real name.

"I misplaced my schedule," she said, trying to sound nonchalant.

"That's not really something that tends to be necessary by November, or, you know, after two days," Wallace replied, raising his eyebrow. He was now leaning over the counter, tapping his fingers. "I can help you with seventh period though, Mrs. Murphy's American Lit class."

"Okay, well, now I just need to know the preceding six classes," she said, leaning it as though imparting a secret to him. "Some things are a little fuzzy since…Well, since my accident," She pointed to the cut on her head.

His eye's followed her finger and his gaze lingered on the cut. His eyes got wide. "Okay, I can print another copy for you. Do you need anything else?"

"Perhaps my locker combo? Thank you."

"No problem. I heard a cheerleader went down on Friday. I didn't know you were the cheerleader in question." Wallace replied. He went over to the computer terminal at the end of the counter, and asked her name, since he seemed to have been under the impression it was 'girl in my English class'. She told him and watched as he typed in a couple commands to retrieve the required information.

"I'm gossip for the rumor mill these days, huh? Yes, I'm guilty as charged. However, we prefer pep squad to cheerleader."

"See, you don't strike me as Pep Squad material," Wallace said as he focused in on her purple streaks. The printer made a whirring sound.

"Tell that to my mom, evidently the Ivy League likes a little pep in their students, it makes them well-rounded, besides I'm a pep-squader with a deep soul." Mac said, smirking.

"I thought that was an oxy-moron."

"Are you calling me a moron?" Mac teasingly asked. It felt normal joking with Wallace. She needed normal.

"Touché," Wallace said, smiling back, showing his even, white teeth. He walked back over to the printer to retrieve the schedule and locker information, and handed it to Mac. "There you go, Madison."

"Thanks."

"No problem. I'm here sixth period, Monday through Friday if you need anything else. That's my usual shift; I guess you'd call it, though this is hardly a paying gig. Anyway, I'm just here now to finish up some filing for Ms. James."

"She must really trust you," Mac said. She knew Wallace made a lot of unsanctioned copies from student files during their high school years in a Watson to Veronica's Sherlock type of capacity.

"She was unable to find anyone else to dump her work onto," he corrected.

Just then the warning bell rang, putting an abrupt end to Mac's reconnection with Wallace.

They waved, and headed off in different directions.

A glance at her schedule showed that Mrs. Murphy was her homeroom teacher as well as 7th period American Lit. Mac was kind of curious why it wasn't an AP class; there was a broad mix of AP and regular track classes on her schedule, maybe to give a boost to her grades in this dimension? Well, with the Sinclair net worth she wouldn't have had to bust her tail to be a scholarship kid-that had to take a load off.

She had just entered Mrs. Murphy's classroom when the final bell rang. She grabbed the first empty seat she saw, and slumped down. Who did she usually talk to? What did they talk about?

As those thoughts swirled through her head, she studied the other students in her homeroom and tried to listen in to their rumblings of conversation. Snatches here and there reached her ears. What really made her sit up and concentrate though was some guy, she didn't remember at all, talking with this kid named Adam who always reminded her of Fivel in An American Tail. They were swapping bragging rights on their test scores, but it was the score itself that caught her attention. She didn't think it was academic bragging. She hoped not, at least.

"69, dude, so beat that," the first guy said.

"63, so suck it," rodent boy replied back.

The only situation where a 63 beat a 69 that she could think of was the Purity Test, which was, bar none, her finest hour in her Mac life. It was the turning point where she realized that she had the ability to elevate her economic status by using her God given talents, it was a confidence builder to be sure. So what if her God given talents erred a bit on the gray side of things, sometimes the ends—a new car—justified the means.

"The purity test?" she was asking incredulously before she could stop herself. She felt her cheeks heat up. What possible motivation or need would she have had to circulate the Purity Test as a'09'er?

"Yes, that's right. It was sent to our email accounts last week," mouse boy responded. "What rock do you call home these days?"

"Oh, yeah," she said, weakly. "I remember it now."

"What did you get, Madison?" Some guy in the back row yelled out, she thought his name was Kevin Powell.

"I didn't take it," she said, shaking her head. She didn't need to, of course.

"I don't believe that for a nanosecond," a girl who Mac unfortunately remembered quite well, Pam, hollered from the back, where she was sitting next to Kevin. "Everyone took it."

Internally she groaned, maybe a little externally too, but Pam was one person she was looking forward to avoiding for life. As a '09'er, she honestly believed she was above rules set forth for everyone else, she deemed everyone else her inferior in every way.

"I bet she's just covering because she got a 39," a girl with long blonde hair sitting next to Pam hypothesized in a whiny voice. It was the girl who looked like rich airhead number 1 on "The Simple Life," it was eerie, they could be twins.

Pam laughed and leaned over the aisle to lightly punch the Airhead-doppelgänger on the arm. "Good one, Cait."

"I don't need a stupid test to tell me what percentage good girl I am, and what percentage wild woman," she retorted.

"Yep, definitely at 39," Pam reiterated.

"Like I said, I didn't take it," Mac repeated through gritted teeth. "If you don't believe me, why don't you buy my results?"

"You never did give us the address of your rock," Fivel's human counterpart called out. "The link to the storefront where you could buy other peoples' results was shut down ten hours after it went up."

"Hey, give her a break, she got hurt last week," some guy called out as he shut the door to the classroom.

Mac glanced over at her defender, and saw the newcomer in question was Dick Casablancas of all frakking people. She gave him a weak smile, and then turned her attention to her nails to avoid the probing gaze he was giving her. She was thankful to see that the chairs surrounding her were all taken.

"How nice of you to join us, Mr. Casablancas, there's a chair in the front row with your name on it," Mrs. Murphy said, and then pointed to a seat directly in front of her desk.

He smirked and flopped down in the chair the teacher pointed to, stretching his legs in front of him and crossing his arms. "We meet again. I can't help noticing how you invent these reasons to keep me close, I, for one, am flattered, I like a woman with experience, but see my girlfriend is the jealous type." It was just his patented brand of Casablancas cockiness. He turned around to look at her as he said it, though the statement was directed towards the teacher. What really pissed her off was the look of heat he flashed her when he said the last bit, and how his undressing her with his eyes expression made her tingle in places she didn't fucking want to tingle. It must just have been emotional inter-dimensional transference when she was dropped into this life, what else could it be? She definitely wasn't interested in Dick in her real life.

They were just pseudo friends who could occasionally have real conversations, ones that actually had substance. It didn't go beyond that, Mac was certain of that fact.

Mrs. Murphy started launching into the business of the day, including reading some boring memo straight from Principal Clemmons' desk; she made a point of mentioning that he was newly appointed to that position. Mac vaguely remembered the events that lead up to the leadership change from back in the day. She wasn't one to be sent to the principal's office so it didn't affect her all that much either way, save for occasionally fixing his computer, and going to AlternaProm with Butters, Mr. Clemmons' son.

Next, the teacher queued up the television for the school-wide announcements. Meg Manning was one of the anchors. Mac tried to hide the tears that blurred her vision. She wasn't close to Meg, but still, she was a sweet person that didn't deserve to die so young, though really who did deserve it? Sometime when her thoughts ran along that track one name came to mind, other times she didn't even think that person deserved death.

Meg looked so alive—well, because she was in this plane of existence—reading off the audition dates for the fall musical. Her co-anchor covered sports scores and other Pirate going ons.

Five minutes later the bell rang and Mac quickly made her way out the door. She heard someone behind her calling out her name, but she tossed a vague wave over her shoulder and quickened her pace as she headed down the west corridor to her first period class.

Her first three periods were in the same classroom—it was a computer sciences class everyone had nicknamed Future Hackers of America. That now familiar feeling of déjà vu stole over her again, this was the same class she had in the original 2004. Her love and respect for computers and the power they gave her was so embedded in her soul that it wasn't a shock that it would travel on her from one dimension to the other. For someone who felt largely powerless in her day-to-day life, it was nice to have one domain to rule over—life might not be her bitch, but computers certainly were.

She liked Mr. Matthews, he was in his late 20's and not yet totally-jaded by governmental regulations dictating how he ran his classroom. He had geeky good looks with wavy brown hair just beginning to creep backwards, and he wore black framed glasses, lending him a professorial air that was at odds with his laid-back, jokey ways of explaining hard concepts without dumbing anything down.

He had always seemed so much older the first time around; of course she was so much younger then, too.

She was one of three girls in the class of fifteen. It was funny but with all the rapport she'd built up with these people, she hadn't thought about most of them in years. Her silvery lining thought that this was one facet of her new life that didn't require a script was quickly shattered though when Mr. Matthews asked her how the second report chronicling her teaching gig at the Senior Center was coming along. She vaguely remembered 'Mom2' mentioning something about those classes in the ER after the accident Friday, but since it didn't make sense to her at the time she had shoved it out of her mind. "Um, fine."

"Great. I want to see it on my desk Thursday by the end of the day."

The class around her started grumbling. Mr. Matthew's held up his hand like a traffic cop, everyone quit complaining. "I'm giving Madison a one day extension because of her injury; I figure she lost a day or two this weekend while she recovered."

"Thank you," Mac replied, feeling her cheeks heat up. She looked down at her desk, as she heard her classmates mutter about Pirate Points and the whole '09'er red carpet treatment bullshit. It wasn't anything different than what used to come out of her mouth when she saw the 'Richy Riches' getting treated white-gloved, while her corner of Neptune was given the picked-over crumbs. However, now, she was on the opposite side of the economic divide.

Everyone quickly got over the one little bit of inequity though, and the three hour class went by quickly. One of the best perks though, was that it was three blissful hours of not having to see Dick.

Soon enough though, the bell rang and it was time for fourth period.

AP Physics with Mr. Humphrey, she'd had Mr. Orr the first time around. She ignored the first half of the lecture on String Theory 101, but when the topic of dimensions came up she sat up and listened hard. However, by the time lunch came around she still didn't have an answer, concrete—or even theoretical—that would bring her that much closer to her old Mac-life.

She pushed through the crush of students in the hallway. Mac was just passing by the administration desk when a blonde woman sitting on one of the chairs set up near-by as a make-shift reception area caught her eye.

It was her mom, 'Mom1,' the one who raised her. She could have sworn she could smell lavender, that spicy sweet scent that clung to her mom. Natalie didn't look happy, anger evident in her expression and the tight set of her shoulders. Her legs were crossed.

Mac made her way to the support column just to the right of the offices, and leaned against it. She reached back to remove her backpack, retrieving her cell from its murky depths, and slung the pack back onto her shoulder. Mac held the phone up as though she were checking a text but not high enough to obscure her view. The crowd had thinned out, most people were now either in the cafeteria grabbing a meal or just taking their seat for their fifth period class.

Mr. Clemmons opened the door to his office, a tall blond girl standing beside him.

"Cindy," Mac heard him say sternly; "Sit back down in your chair. I'm going to bring your mom back inside. We are far from done here." Then he addressed her mom. "Mrs. Mackenzie, will you please join us?"

Mrs. Mackenzie—that's exactly who she was to Mac in this dimension; yet she could never just think of the woman who raised her, loved her, who held her during those blurry, catatonic post-Cassidy, post-Neptune Grand days, who always knew how to make her laugh and when to just let her cry it out—as Mrs. Mackenzie. Those arms that were supposed to comfort her were comforting Madison these days.

Natalie nodded and rose; she made her way inside the inner sanctum. The firm shutting of the door put an end to Mac's spying. If only she'd planted one of Veronica's bugs in that room!

Mentally, Mac plotted out a lunch strategy, skipping wasn't going to be an option being that her stomach was already stepping up its growling that had started near the end of her computer class. She figured she could grab a side salad from the cafeteria and find a spot near the stadium, as far from the quad as geographically possible. An open text book would scare people away from making small talk with her—hopefully. She didn't want to be around anyone else. She had always wanted to know what walking in Madison Sinclair's $550 Manolo Blahnik's would be like, but she'd never examined the fine print, the one that said the cost was losing ties to the Mackenzies. She'd never stopped to truly grasp the idea of Madison wearing her scuffy black Doc Martens, which she'd got on sale, a year ago, for $19.99, either. There was a give and take for both of them.

Shoulders hunched in, feeling dejected and wishing for an invisibility cloak; Mac weaved her way over to the cafeteria to grab a salad and a Coke. She paid for her purchases, and then pushed open the double doors leading out into the Quad.

Mac stepped into the sunshine and blinked several times before sneezing as she looked up into the sun. Her eyes adjusted to the bright sun and she continued on her way. She passed a table of '09'ers, their usual spot, and she bit her bottom lip in hopes it would stop the snark that threatened to escape.

Of course right when she looked up it was into Dick's eyes.

He was holding court, surrounded by Meg Manning, the guy she was with at the time…Carter?, and Pam, the bitch queen. Everyone seemed to be comparing Purity Test scores. He stopped mid joke about Snow White getting a 'higher' (read: lower) score than Meg's boyfriend, and smiled at her. It was quick, but there was no doubt to whom it was intended for. She nodded, though really it was an acknowledgment rather than a greeting. She kept going, ignoring Pam's loud stage whisper about who pissed in Madison's Wheaties.

Mac made her way to the grassy knoll next to the football stadium.

Unceremoniously dumping her backpack on the grass, Mac flopped down beside it. She made quick work of her salad, enjoying the slight breeze that periodically kicked up. This was a great spot for an impromptu picnic, she had discovered it her senior year of high school when Cassidy had briefly broken things off. The field was her version of a thinking tree, she supposed. After finishing her meager lunch, Mac laid the empty bowl and soda can off to the side, and scooted over so she was lying down. She tucked the bag under her head as a pillow. Looking up at the blue sky, she watched the wispy clouds morph into shapes as they meandered by.

A shadow, thrown across her face, intruded upon her conscious attempts to block out any thoughts of lavender fields and cinnamon spiced cookies as a cure for all ills. She groaned internally, dragging her eyes reluctantly to the left, seeing that the shadow maker was indeed who she feared it was. She was certain her lack of enthusiasm was broadcast clearly across her face, but couldn't find the strength to care about her breech of manners. She crossed her arms over her chest, though whether as a shield or more of an impatient gesture she wasn't entirely sure, probably an equal measure of both.

"Whatcha doing?" he finally asked with schooled casualness, running a hand over his rumpled blond hair.

"Enjoying some solitude."

"Mind if I join you?"

"Yes," Mac replied automatically. She felt bad though, for a nanosecond at least, at the flash of hurt that flitted across Dick's face until he quickly shut down his vulnerability. "I'm not feeling very well right now, my head hurts." It wasn't a lie.

"I'm sure it does, that's a pretty nasty looking cut. Okay, well, see you in Mrs. Murphy's class then," he said, shrugging. "Feel better," he said as an afterthought, because it usually was with him. He turned around and left.

As she followed him with her eyes, Mac tried to talk herself into believing she was just imagining the dejected look on his face, that it was just projection from the present, she wasn't entirely sure how successful she was in selling that idea to herself though.

Figuring it was probably getting close to 6th period anyway; she laid there for about five more minutes and then, giving up the idea of much-needed reflection time, sat up again. Mac gathered her belongings and the trash from her picnic.

After throwing away her dishes in the trashcan by the back entrance, she went back into the school. She'd passed the quad again, and couldn't help noticing Dick hadn't rejoined his friends at the table, but she didn't wonder about his whereabouts beyond that. Pam, who was still in the same seat, shot her a questioning look, more like a glare really, but she kept on going. She never cared about what Pam thought of her back then, why would she start now?

Mac went back into the cavernous building and headed towards her locker in the east hallway. She passed the front reception area and noticed Wallace at the desk in deep conversation with Ms. James. She hoped he got the scoop on "Cindy," she just couldn't imagine a scenario where Madison—by any name—would have the skills involved in rewriting code to set up shop selling the test results, even if that enterprise got shut down quickly.

However, just as she was about to engage, or more like interrogate, Wallace for intel, the bell rang. Fortunately, they had seventh period together, and bonus, he'd make a good Dick buffer, too. Happy with that silver lining, Mac made her way to Trig.

Math was definitely an area she had a lot of confidence in, so it was an hour Mac had been looking forward to. She had been called upon several times, and each time she'd easily been able to come up with the correct answer. She liked numbers and formulas, the utter predictability of them, whenever you paired X with Y, you always got Z, no exception, and nothing unexpected would come along to muck things up. That was the same reason she liked computers better than most people—they, like numbers, didn't disappoint you, they never left you huddled naked in a hotel room terrified, completely alone and vulnerable. There wasn't much she felt she could count on this world, numbers –including those of binary variety, made the short list.

All that math predictability euphoria died a quick death at the sound of the bell ringing.

It was time for seventh period, her last class, and then she'd be able to say she survived her first day of her junior year in high school—for the second time!

It wasn't a long walk to Mrs. Murphy's classroom, and Mac was one of the first people to arrive. She selected a desk in the middle of the 3rd row, thinking it would fill up quickly, most likely before Dick had time to show up and plop his too good looking, surfer physique into the chair next to her.

Wallace came in next, and took the chair on her right. Mac smiled at him and said a quick prayer to the gossip Gods, hoping she'd get a juicy story soon about her other self. He was right in the middle of explaining the little bit of info he'd gleaned both from Clemmons' incident reports for "Cindy's" file and from talking with Ms. James.

She breathed a sigh of relief when Kevin Powell, from homeroom, plopped down on her other side. She didn't care who sat there, as long as it wasn't a certain blonde surfer—though being Southern California, that in and of itself was hardly in short supply.

Wallace was still explaining the sordid details of "Cindy's" part in the Purity Test leakage scandal, as it had trickled down to him at least. She'd taken on an accomplice to compensate for the code skills she lacked; she had her own talents however that she had played up to her advantage. The leer on Wallace's face made it clear that "Cindy's" programming was on a more carnal nature than numeric.

Curiosity claimed her, however, so she broke down and asked who the well-compensated accomplice was.

"Some computer geek from France, that used to work for the district," Kevin interjected quickly, before Wallace could reply. He didn't try to hide his eavesdropping.

"Use to work?" Mac asked. In her old life, she'd always liked Renny DeMouy, and by liked she meant he had a nice ass, broad shoulders and sexy smile which she enjoyed watching as much as she liked getting paid to play with computers—it was a 50/50 operation.

"They fired his ass, probably sent him back to Paris," again, it was Kevin who interjected.

The whole thing sounded hinky to her, Remy was hardly the criminal mastermind type, though he was easily manipulated by the fairer sex, and "Cindy" excelled in oral persuasion. However, before she could come up with some theories on the how's and why's of this dimension's purity test scandal, she felt hot breath on her neck. She whipped her head around as fast as the dull throbbing souvenir from her concussion would allow, and glared at the heavy breather.

It was Dick, naturally. He'd sat behind her and was leaning as close to her as the attached table arm would allow. He was unfazed.

"It's called personal space, Dick," she snapped, hitting the k hard.

"You didn't seem to mind me in your personal space last weekend," he said under his breath.

"I don't recall that," she said, truthfully. "Besides, I mind it now."

"Generally it takes more than a concussion to forget about me," he responded with an air of overconfidence.

Mac made sure he could see her eye roll before she chanced a glance over at Wallace who had taken his beaten up copy of Catcher in the Rye out of his bag and was busy pretending he wasn't eavesdropping on their conversation.

She was so happy when Mrs. Murphy came through the door just then and breezed to the front of the room. She proceeded to write out the Catcher in the Rye in big caps on the top of the white board, and then she wrote out the word theme and waited for everyone to start listing them. When the influx of volunteers never happened, Mrs. Murphy started recruiting victims including Mac. She volunteered "alienation" as an overriding theme. It was one thing in there that she always related to, being raised in the wrong family, not really finding that connection. The bitch of it was that this new life wasn't making her feel like she fit in either. It was still early in this mixed up universe, she reminded herself.

Phoniness and loneliness were also mentioned as concepts within the book worth exploring. Despite some of the people in her class trying to drag it down, Mac was happy to see that the time still went by quickly. Dick apparently enjoyed stirring up their teacher; he turned in an A+ caliber performance on that. Whenever he was asked about Holden Caulfield, Dick kept making Garden State allusions instead. Mac was surprised when the bell rang and Dick still hadn't gotten sent out of class; she would have suspected bribery, but she'd not seen money changing hands the entire class time.

Mac hurriedly packed up her books, and tried to make it out the door before the big blonde surfer dude who didn't seem to get the hint that she wasn't ready to deal with him, in this universe at least. He made acting dumb an art form, however, Mac knew it was just an act. In high school—originally—she had actually bought into that persona, but the past two years had proven there was a lot more buried not quite as deep as she'd expected. Mac also had to admit she was not ready to face how Dick had treated his brother.

She had just made it to the threshold when she felt a hand squeeze her arm, firmly but not painfully. She slowly turned her head around and huffed out a breath when she saw Dick was the hand's owner. "What?" she snapped out, thinking the ruder she was the faster he'd calculate that X and Y equaled she needed some space—every guy's least favorite phrase.

"I was just going to say good-bye, have a good night." Dick wore his best injured-party expression. He kept his hand on her arm, gently nudging her on.

"Good night."

He stopped in the middle of the hall and just looked at her, it was probably only fifteen seconds of appraisal but felt deeper than that. "Look, Madi, I know you're still pissed, you can carry a grudge like no one else. The way I see it, though, is even you can't carry a grudge forever," Dick said, his cocky façade coating his words.

"Yeah, just keep on thinking that," Mac said. She matched his self-assured tone. She was about to turn on her heels and head the other direction when she saw a ghost. The bile rose and snaked around her stomach as she watched the very much alive Cassidy coming up to his older brother, wearing his signature smirky smile.

"Hey bro," Dick said in greeting. "How was Chem? Still gene slicing the perfect bionic woman? Cause we all know science is the only way you'll get a chick to bang you."

"Gene splicing, dorkwad," Cassidy automatically corrected. "That's just the first in a long line of what's wrong in that sentence."

While the Casablancas brothers teased and prodded each other in the middle of the hallway, Mac felt planted to the spot. She wanted to move, needed to move actually, but her feet felt heavy, matching her thoughts pound for pound. In retrospect, she should have been prepared to see ghosts of people now long dead, she chastised herself. Meg was only one of several Neptune High classmates gone but not gone from this plane of existence—that should have warned her there'd be more ghosts to cross her path. However, in the dank recesses of her mind, Mac knew that she'd never be prepared to see Cassidy, now that she knew what he did, what he was capable of in any reality.

The only real question left in the desolate desert of her mind, all other thoughts were sucked out at the first glimpse of Cassidy, was did knowing the potential path and fates of so many classmates obligate her to try to change the course of things? Could that be why the cosmic rewind button had been tripped? Would she really be able to change things? Probably not, but she knew she had to try, but it could wait for a time when her stomach wasn't losing the war it was engaged in with nausea and the remains of her meager lunch.

Cassidy had, by then, seen her and called out a cool greeting her way before getting back to his girl-bot discussion with Dick. Mac gave the briefest of waves in his direction before clamping a hand over her mouth and heading towards the bathroom. She barely registered Dick calling her name as she sidestepped groups of people still congregating in the hallways before leaving school grounds for the day. She kept her fast paced sprint down the hall and into the girl's rest room across from Mr. C's desk in the office area.

Sweat was starting to bead across her forehead as she ran into the bathroom, pushing past two girls, in too much of a hurry to look at them. She burst into the first stall, lifted the lid and just made it in time to empty her stomach. Cassidy's name ran an endless loop through her mind, as she knelt down in front of the toilet and threw up. She kept memories of graduation night, being naked and alone, put on lock down though.

After she was finished, Mac flushed the toilet, and stood up on shaky legs. She ran the back of her hand across her mouth, hoping to hide the evidence. From the other side of the stall door, Mac heard one of the girls softly saying they had what they needed and to check back in three days, then there was a reply she couldn't really make out and the sound of the door opening and shutting.

Thinking the coast was now clear; Mac left the privacy of her stall. She saw she'd miscalculated when she saw a short blond at the sink washing her hands. She recognized the style of the hair, the determined set of the shoulders—Veronica. She had obviously just finished making another business transaction in her "office."

The sick feeling was still lingering despite the release, and seeing Veronica standing there in her innocence, not yet knowing who was responsible for the big, bold, black line the rape caused in her life, made Mac's eyes tear up. She blinked them back and stood next to her friend at the sink and turned on the tap. She bent her head down, hoping to stay off the radar of the great Veronica Mars. That was just a fantasy.

"Are you okay? Uh, d'uh. Of course you're not," Veronica back-pedaled.

"I'm fine, well, not fine, but better now," Mac said. She looked up and their eyes met in the mirror.

"Do you need anything? Water, perhaps?" Veronica asked. Mac wasn't surprised, her friend had a soft side that was ingrained, life had done its best to beat that out of her but it was still riding piggy back on her recombinant DNA.

"Thanks, I'm okay. I'll grab a soda for the road." She turned off the tap and shook her dripping hands over the sink.

"Look, this is obviously not my business," Veronica started, "but…Anyways, I just wanted to offer my services. I think you're very brave going it alone."

Mac looked at her for a long minute, and then cocked her head. Suddenly it struck her what she was referring to. She gave a sharp, surprised bark of laughter.

"I'm not doing anything alone."

"Oh, well, good, I just, well…Dick is your boyfriend, right?" She turned to her left and grabbed two paper towels from the dispenser, keeping one and handing Mac the other one.

Mac smiled her thanks and then just shrugged. Hell if she knew the dating status between her and Dick.

"I just assumed…"

"I know what you assumed, but it's not true. I'm not pregnant. I guess I was fighting some kind of germ off. "

Veronica replied back "okay," so softly Mac wasn't sure at first she'd said anything. Was that the first thing that sprung to mind when a '09'er was leaning over a toilet puking, especially a'09'er dating Dick. She could understand that thought pattern, but fortunately Veronica wasn't a gossip in any form, that was how rumors got started. Honestly though, this might be one situation where someone thinking she was pregnant was a better story than the actual truth—she got overwhelmed by seeing her dead, psycho, murdering, rapist ex-boyfriend still alive and interacting with his drunken, grieving brother—who was neither drunk nor grieving at the moment either.

Together they walked out of the bathroom, stopping just briefly at the soda machine near the entrance to the west wing so Mac could grab a Coke to settle her stomach.

They headed toward the back exit to where the student parking areas were located. Conversation was full of stops and starts, the tentative views of two people getting to know each other better, she assumed they knew each other in passing from pep squad, but it seemed they obviously weren't close in this life. The fact was, it was just nice reconnecting with Veronica, who she hardly saw anymore in any dimension.

They parted ways at the entrance to parking lot B, Mac heading to the Cadillac while Veronica went off towards lot A and her rusting black Le Baron.

She'd survived her first day back at Neptune High—somewhat, at least.

TBC…

***Reviews are always appreciated! Thanks!