Spoilers: "Credit Where Credit is Due", "Silence of the Lamb", "Not Pictured", "Versatile Toppings", "Look Who's Stalking", "The Rapes of Graff".
Disclaimer: Mac, Dick, Madison, Lamb, Veronica, Logan, Cassidy, and all characters mentioned here are the property of UPN, Rob Thomas, Stu Segall, and Silver Pictures. No copyright infringement is intended, so please don't sue. If you choose to ignore this and attempt to sue me anyway, be forewarned that you're only going to get about $45, some CD's, a few boxes of EZ-Mac, and and a pair of neon pink stilettos.
Author's Notes: This story has gone through so many different incarnations, but I'm very very happy with the way it ultimately turned out. Playing around with more minor characters was a fun experience for me, so I hope you enjoy this little aberration before I go straight back to writing more WeeVer.
Just to clarify, the parties used are: Lamb's barbeque, as mentioned in "Credit Where Credit is Due"; Madison's birthday party from "Silence of the Lamb"; the graduation party at the Neptune Grand from "Not Pictured"; Dick's New Year's party, as mentioned in "Versatile Toppings"; and the Alterna-Prom from "Look Who's Stalking".
If there's one thing that Madison Sinclair despises, it's being told what to do. From practically the day she was born, she's had the ability to wrap people around her little finger - what Madison wants, Madison gets. Her mother is especially easy to manipulate - all she has to do is pull a "But all the other girls have one!" with a pout and a hint of tears, and Sadie Sinclair is sunk. Her eyes grow wide with an odd combination of fear and guilt, and if Madison were to stop and think about it it might strike her as notable. But as long as she gets the Coach sunglasses she's begging for it doesn't really matter to her how or why.
Mr. Sinclair is more difficult - growing up with four sisters, he often finds it very easy to resist Madison's pouting. Though he puts up a tough front, when it comes to spending money he'll usually break down as soon as she plays the "Don't you want the best for your only daughter?" card. But when he has his mind set on something like spending "family time" together, she resigns herself to the fact that there's no escape. Like now, when she's being dragged to a party at the sheriff's house. It's a Saturday afternoon - she's supposed to be at the beach with Dick and Shelley. Madison starts pouting the minute she rolls out of bed and doesn't speak to her father the entire morning, but still he ushers her out to the car and drives them across town to Sheriff Lamb's barbeque.
The backyard of the decent-sized ranch house on Nottingham Road is filled with middle-aged white guys, and Madison wonders for the thousandth time what she's doing here. She has a sneaking suspicion that it has more to do with her dad presenting a "family man" image than it does with them spending any actual time together. There's a keg under the oak tree in the back corner of the yard, and she looks at it longingly. Being buzzed would make this afternoon go by so much faster.
Arthur starts making his rounds the second they make their entrance, leaving Madison to fend for herself in the sea of potbellies and polyester. Some of them openly ogle her skintight halter and denim miniskirt, a few try to draw her into painfully boring conversations that she's positive are only started because they're trying to suck up to her father, and the rest ignore her completely. Someone hands her a paper plate loaded with the most gigantic, greasy hamburger she's ever seen, smothered in ketchup and relish, and while she's mentally calculating the calorie content, she catches her father's eye from across the backyard. Seeing her talking with - what was his name again? Sam? - he beams. Madison sighs. Being rude to '09ers and outcast dorks is one thing - being rude to her dad's business associates is something else entirely. So she forces herself to answer Sam's lame, unimaginative questions about school and cheerleading while taking tiny bites of the burger.
When Sam finally decides to move along, Madison breathes a huge sigh of relief and begins to slowly make her way over to the keg. She doesn't exactly blend in with this crowd, so trying to be sneaky is pointless - she's just going to pray that nobody cares enough to question her. She's got a cup in one hand and the nozzle in the other when she hears a voice from behind ask:
"You're Arthur's daughter, right? You go to Neptune High School?" The way he stresses those last two words clearly indicate that she should be stepping away from the keg. With a sigh, she drops both the cup and the nozzle and turns around to face one of the most gorgeous guys she's ever seen. How did she miss him until now? She isn't even able to open her mouth to respond, however, before her dad comes striding over.
"Madison, sweetheart!" he exclaims. "I see you've already met the sheriff."
Sheriff Don Lamb. Madison has heard the name hundreds if not thousands of times, but she's never had a face to put with the name until now. And what a face it is - what an entire body it is. Tall, with a swimmer's build, wrapped in jeans and a black T-shirt, both of which are just a bit too snug. Madison feels her lips curl into a smile that's almost predatory. Maybe this won't turn out to be such a bad day after all.
When they end up on the floor of Don's bathroom, her age is apparently no longer an issue. She rides him into three orgasms in a row, their sweat-slicked skin sticking to the cool white tiles. In the car on the way home, Madison is bubbly and cheerful, asking her dad questions and actually telling him what's going on in her life. When they pull into the driveway, she bounds out of the car and inside, but not before giving him a kiss on the cheek and thanking him for bringing her along. Arthur simply stares after his daughter in disbelief.
Madison has a great life - Mac's known that since she met the girl back in grade three. For a few short weeks, they were actually best friends, back when Madison was going by Maddie. They were both slightly pudgy, and had the same untameable brown hair and mouthfull of braces. At recess, they would sit next to each other and play card games while the other girls jumped rope or played hopscotch. Within the first few days they had already given each other cootie shots and friendship bracelets.
Mac's mom, always on the overprotective side, had asked question after question about this new person her daughter was hanging out with, most of which Mac hadn't known the answers to. So one weekend, her parents finally suggested that she invite this friend over for a sleepover. She had raced into class on Friday and breathlessly told Maddie all the details. The very next day, at six o'clock on the dot, Maddie showed up with a big green bow in her hair and an even bigger grin on her face, her arm slung over a Little Mermaid sleeping bag. As Mac was watching her come up the walkway, her mother, standing behind her in the doorframe, let out a strangled noise that sounded half like a gasp and half like she was choking.
"Cindy," she said slowly. "Is Maddie's name Madison Sinclair?" Mac had shrugged.
"I guess," she had said, just as Maddie approached. "And I told you to call me Mac!" Together, she and Maddie raced upstairs to play, leaving their Moms downstairs to talk.
On Monday, Miss Salinger informed the class that Madison Sinclair had transferred to a private elementary school. Mac had cried for days, and her mother had sat with her, rubbing her back and assuring her that everything would be allright.
The next time Mac saw Madison was at the start of junior high. She was no longer pudgy, and her brown hair was sleek and shiny and streaked with blonde. Her braces were gone along with her nickname. She walked down the hall linked arm-in-arm with two willowy blondes that she would later discover to be none other than Lilly Kane and Veronica Mars. Madison never even looked Mac's way.
Sometimes Mac forgets that that period of time ever existed. But with the current revelations that Veronica has uncovered, latley it's all she's been able to think about. She hadn't known that any pictures of them together actually existed, but here in Madison's room she finds one. It's tucked between the pages of an old Sweet Valley High book that's shoved under a jewelery box, and Mac isn't quite sure what makes her even look there, but before she knows it she's pulling it out of hiding and there it is, right in front of her. Two girls in the third grade classroom, sitting side-by-side in identical desks, their arms slung around the other's shoulders. On the back is a caption written in Miss Salinger's handwriting: Mac and Maddie, best friends forever!.
Mac thinks she might cry. But before she has the chance, the door bursts open, and there stands Madison Sinclair herself.
"What are you doing in here?" she demands. "I didn't invite you, none of my friends invited you, and if someone else did they were clearly too stupid to notice that you're a grade-A loser. Now get out of my house." Mac doesn't move. She looks at Madison, with her blonde hair and skimpy clothing and holier-than-thou attitude and wonders if that could have been her, had things happened the way they were supposed to. She thinks of all the things she should tell Madison, but instead all she says is:
"Do you remember this?" She holds up the picture. Madison wrinkles her nose.
"Yeah," she says simply. "So what?"
So what indeed. Mac's life may not be perfect, she knows that. But on most days, she is happy. Or as happy as one can be in high school. Madison is happy - she's got a house full of friends, and parents that care about her even though they aren't biologically linked to her. Mac looks down at the picture once more. Where you come from doesn't always dictate who you become. Smiling, she gently tucks it back into the book, slides the book back under Madison's jewelery box.
"Sorry we crashed your party," she says on her way out. Then she takes Madison around the neck and hugs her tightly. Madison stands for a moment, stunned. Then Mac feels a hand gently pat her back and she knows that Maddie is still in there somewhere.
Neptune parties are not what they used to be. Logan disappeared an hour ago, Madison never showed at all, and Shelley is ignoring him. Even Beaver and Ghost World are probably having a better time than he is right now, Dick muses, and that is just plain wrong. Still, he cracks open a new beer and starts chatting up two sophomores that crashed the party. When Logan finally resurfaces, one of the girls is on the other side of the room with Casey and the other is hanging on Dick's every word. He's leaning in closer when his friend suddenly appears in front of him.
"Dude, what?" Dick asks, but Logan is silent, his mouth opening and closing. His face is drawn and tired. Finally he just puts a hand on Dick's arm.
"You've gotta come with me," he says, and though Dick doesn't have a clue what's going on, he follows Logan into the lobby.
As soon as he gets there, he's bombarded with sounds and sights and complete chaos. Police cruisers are everywhere, their flashing lights intermingling with those of the fire truck and the ambulance. A body bag lies on top of the stretcher as two paramedics lift it into the back of the ambulance. In the corner, Mac is huddled in a chair wrapped in one of the hotel bathrobes, Veronica kneeling at her side and murmuring words of comfort. Dick feels a weight settle in the pit of his stomach and he demands to know what the fuck is going on. Nobody moves. The cops go about doing their job and ignore him, Logan is frozen in place.
"What. Happened?" he repeats, grinding his top row of teeth against the bottom. It's Mac that finally rises and crosses the room towards him, her tiny body nearly disappearing inside the massive robe.
"Cassidy's gone," she says bluntly. "He jumped off of the roof. He's gone." Dick's head is spinning and then there are tears streaming down Mac's cheeks again. She hurtles herself forward, and he has no choice but to enfold her in his arms, her face small and warm as it buries itself in his neck. Veronica has been hanging back, but now she moves forward to approach him.
"There's no easy way to say this, Dick," she murmurs, her own face streaked with mascara and her eyes red. Logan moves beside her and slides his fingers between hers. She squeezes his hand, takes a breath, and blurts out the entire sordid story, but Dick doesn't register anything past the part where his brother was the one that caused the bus crash. That damn thing has been haunting them all year, and all along the culprit was Beaver, who sleeps in the room next to his and won't let him get away with any of his usual shit. Dick wants to argue, to say that there's no way it could be true, but it's coming from Veronica, and if there's one thing he knows, it's that she would never lie about something like this.
He passes Mac back to her and turns around. Without another word, he walks back into the party. He downs three beers and five shots while the guys cheer him on. He dances in crazy circles, fucks both of the sophomores. In the morning, he empties the entire contents of his stomach into Logan's garbage can. He doesn't remember getting from the party to the penthouse, and Logan is nowhere to be found once again. Dick doesn't care. He takes a shower and borrows some of Logan's clothes. Clean and awake, he takes a seat on the couch and loses himself in mindless daytime television. He's not sure how long it is before someone's knocking on the door.
Mac is showered and fully dressed, but her face is the same as it was last night. Dick doesn't know what she's doing here, but he knows that he doesn't want her to go. She's probably the only person that even came close to understanding Beaver, and right now that seems vitally important. Not even his family can claim that much. So he lets her come in, lets her curl up on the couch next to him, lets her lean over and kiss him none-too-gently, lets her undress them both and lower herself into his lap. He knows all the cliches about sex making people feel alive but still he spares a moment to wonder if this is wrong - if he should be wearing black and grieving, if he should tell her that he slept with two girls last night, if he should be responding to his dead brother's girlfriend's insistent kisses, if he should finally stop calling him Beaver. But he pushes the doubts out of his mind almost as fast as they form, because Cassidy Casablancas lost all rights to sympathy when he killed a bus full of people. He doesn't get any say on how Dick lives or grieves.
Dick doesn't think he's going to grieve much at all.
Dick has never quite understood why people celebrate New Years. It's turning a page on a calendar - nothing special about that. All the blathering about getting a fresh start is complete bullshit, because a new year doesn't erase past mistakes. Still, it's an excuse to get drunk and party, so who is he to argue?
His dad and Kendall are...actually, he doesn't know where the fuck they are and he doesn't particularly care because he's having far too much fun. The house is filled with teenagers and alcohol and the music can probably be heard a block away. Half of the guests are outside in the pool, the rest are playing drinking games or sneaking into the upstairs bedrooms to hook up. Dick himself has had too much alcohol to recall the exact amount and has already made out with Stacie Pennington's older sister, whose name he also doesn't remember. A glance at the clock shows that midnight wil be upon them in a little under an hour.
As he's simultaneously looking for Logan and avoiding Stacie, Madison grabs him by the arm and shoves him into one of the house's twelve bathrooms.
"What the hell, dude?" Dick exclaims, because as far as he knows, he and Madison are broken up. Not that that's stopped them before. Sure enough, she locks the door behind them and wastes no time in whipping her sweater over her head. When she moves towards him in the dark, he doesn't put up any sort of protest.
Madison's body is small and warm against his, and Dick lowers them both to the ground as his fingers eagerly find the clasp of her bra, then move to slide up her skirt. Her touch is blisfully familiar - they know each others' bodies by heart and there's a certain beauty to that, even when they're fucking each other roughly on the floor of the guest bathroom, both more than a little intoxicated. Dick crawls on top of her, covering her entire body with his. He cradles her head in his hand to keep it from hitting the hard floor as his tongue trails from her ear to her left nipple.
When he takes the nipple in between his teeth, she digs her fingers into his shoulders, scratching all the way down his back. He grunts and tries to twist away from her sharp little nails, but she just does it again. This time, she draws blood, and Dick can feel it dripping down his skin.
"Ow, fuck!" he cries. In the dark room, he can't see her expression, but she lifts her lips to his neck and sucks, hard, rolling them over so that she's on top. Madison pins Dick's hands to the floor, keeping him motionless as she writhes on top of him. He calls her name several times, but it's like she doesn't even hear him.
It's than that Dick realizes that Madison Sinclair is farther out of his league than he ever imagined.
What Madison wants, Madison gets. And what Madison has wanted since she was in eighth grade is the perfect prom. It would be somewhere elegant and classy, her dress would be something slinky, and she would be on the arm of the hottest guy in school.
But Madison didn't get what she wanted this time, because the entire prom has been squeezed into Logan Echolls' penthouse, and even though it was supposed to be '09ers only, there are stoner guys taking up root on the couch and passing around a bong, and she's pretty sure she even saw Veronica Mars come through the door. She has no date and her dress is a hand-me-down from her cousin because she didn't care enough to buy a new one. Cousin Ashley really needs to rethink her definition of the word "adorable". At this point, Madison isn't even sure why she's here.
Dick is being obnoxious as per usual. Once upon a time, they were happy, but now she wonders what she ever saw in the goofy boy with the surfer hair. She loses count of how many times she tells him to get lost, but he's nothing if not persistent, and who should jump to her defense but Veronica Mars herself? And it's now offical - Madison's night can't get any worse.
Except that it does, because somehow Veronica knows about Don. She does that smug smirk of hers that Madison is really starting to hate, throwing out thinly-veiled metaphors in a knowing tone. Dick is unsurprisingly confused, and Madison does her best to get the hell away from Veronica as fast as she can - not because she's embarrassed, but because she doesn't want to make a scene by wiping that smirk right off of the bitch's face. To hear her jokes and double entendres reduces what Madison and Don have to something trivial and meaningless - made even worse by the fact that he hasn't called her since that blissful weekend spent in total anonymity, holed up in a suite just two floors below where she is right now.
Madison needs air, desperately. The elevator doors slide open just as she steps out of the penthouse, and more '09ers pour into the hallway. Stacey Clinton is one of them, and she tries to get Madison's attention, but Madison ignores the brunette and takes the elevator down to the ground floor.
The lobby is so silent you could hear a pin drop, and Madison collapses into one of the overstuffed leather chairs, taking several deep breaths. For once in her life, things seem to be happening faster than she can handle - she feels like she's losing control. Her eyes drift closed and she sinks further into the chair.
An all-too-familiar voice causes her eyes to snap open and suddenly she registers the fact that Don is across the room, in full uniform, chatting with the receptionist. He's the absolute last person she wants to see right now, and she looks around for any possible escape route, but it's too late - out of the corner of his eye he sees her movement and turns to look her directly in the eye.
Neither of them make any sign that they know each other, and to Madison that's one of the worst things about their relationship - if you can even call it that. Silently, they both enter an elevator bound for the penthouse. A frazzled-looking woman in a business suit tries to get them to hold the door for her, so Don makes motions like he's pushing buttons, but his hand is half a foot away from actually touching the control panel. The doors slide shut and it's just the two of them in the elevator. There's the strong sense of deja-vu permeating the air, but this time Madison feels like she's a completely different person - a scared, lost little girl drowning in layers of pink taffeta. Now she actually is embarassed, because she never wanted him to see her like this.
If Don notices her ridiculous get-up, he doesn't say anything. All he says is:
"No better way to spend a Saturday night than busting underage drinkers." She doesn't know how on earth she's supposed to respond, so she stays silent. She's thinking that she might have been wrong earlier, because this is definetely feeling like the longest elevator ride ever. "I hope the keg is still pretty full," Don is saying. "I was thinking of having another barbeque this weekend." Madison turns to look at him, trying to figure out if he's hinting at anything or if she's just imagining things, but he continues looking straight ahead. After two floors of silence, there's a tinny dinging noise and the car comes to a smooth stop, the doors opening. Don walks straight out towards Logan's door, but before he gets there he turns around.
"Tell your dad he's more than welcome to come. He can even bring a guest if he wants."
Madison knows that it's not love in his eyes when he looks at her, but she knows that it's more than lust. She wishes she could put a name on it, but whatever it is makes her bite back a smile, and suddenly she feels just a little less lost.