8. A New Life in LA

Light shone through the curtains in Wesley's living-room. Lilah lazily opened her eyes and wondered how her hotel could have changed the curtains in 12 hours without her noticing, until she suddenly remembered she was no longer at the Kingsley Hotel, but at Wesley's place. As she thought back to the previous night, and how much she had showed of herself, Lilah found she could use a drink. Although it might be a little too early for that. She glanced at the clock on the wall and learned it was barely 6 AM. Too early for whiskey, or vodka, or anything like that. Coffee would have to do, then.

Everyone else was presumably still asleep. Lilah got up and entered the small kitchen, longing for a cup of strong coffee. She found it in the second cabinet and ran a hand through her hair as she waited till the coffeemaker was finished. She'd slept with her clothes on, because the rest of her stuff was still at the hotel. She'd pick those up later.

'Morning, Lilah.', Wesley greeted her as he entered the kitchen. Lilah hadn't heard him coming in at all.

'Morning. I never expected you to be a morning person.'

'I'm not. I couldn't sleep, that's all.', Wesley said.

'And does that happen to have anything to do with the fact that you've got someone on your couch Angel doesn't exactly approve of?', Lilah inquired, pouring herself coffee, and offering to Wesley.

He nodded, in need of some strong coffee also, after a sleepless night spent pondering about pretty much everything that was going on right now. 'Angel has nothing to say about who does or does not sleep on my couch.', he defended himself.

'I expected that reply.', Lilah said with a half grin, handing him his coffee.

He took it from her. 'Thank you. So have you got any plans for today?'

'Just picking up my stuff from the hotel, and working. I want to finish most of my cases off in New York and otherwise find someone who will be able to do so, so that I can start my new job fully determined. If there's some time left, I'm of course going to look for a place to live.'

'There's no rush, though. You and Gaby can stay here for as long as you like..', Wesley assured her.

'So she's going to move in with me? Is that what you mean?', Lilah questioned. She had expected Wesley to want to have Gabrielle live with him. How could he want his only daughter to live with 'the bitch from hell'? A mother like her?

'I'd love to have her live with me, Lilah... But I think you and her have things to figure out. You must understand that relationship between a mother and a daughter is a very valuable thing. ', Wesley said. He'd seen Lilah's humanity now, and knew there should be a possibility for her to have a normal, or as normal as could be, relationship with their daughter, and even though they both didn't seem to see that opportunity yet, he believed that someday they would, and that was enough reason for him.

'I know that's important, but I'm not the mothering type, you should have known that by now.'

'Still, you both deserve a chance. She can be with me every other week, then she'd live with both of us..', Wesley suggested.

'Fine.. but don't expect too much of it.', Lilah said , exiting the kitchen and sitting down on the couch in the living-room cross-legged, and moving the blankets away so Wesley could sit down too.

He rather remained standing. 'I won't. Now something else. I've been looking around, completely and only out of simple curiosity, for well-known high schools in Los Angeles. I thought that maybe there was a small, small possibility that Gabrielle would stay here.', Wesley admitted, not good at showing some emotions of his own, either.

Lilah noticed and let a small smile curl around her lips. 'And?'

'I have come across a rather good one. Might be worth it for you to check it out. It's called the Jon F. Kennedy High School, they teach with a remarkable skill and about 76 per cent of their students attends university after graduating. ', he continued, excited over the good quality and results of the school's ex-students. It could have been a school for him, had he lived in California when he was younger.

'That sounds good. I'll check it out later on.. if I have time.', Lilah added, knowing almost for sure that she wouldn't have time. It was going to be a busy day with lots of things to take care of. She wanted to start over in LA 100 fresh without leaving a mess behind in New York. Lilah hated to leave a mess behind.

Wesley let out a sigh, she didn't even have to say anything, he could read from her face she would be way too busy. For him, it wouldn't have mattered, but he knew with Lilah work was just more important than anything. Or so 'she' though. He'd seen last night that was just a role, though Lilah had yet to realise it. She was so grown into her role that she barely saw the difference between that Lilah, and the real Lilah. She would, though. Wesley would show her, of course with help from their daughter.

Two weeks had passed and Gabrielle got accepted into the John F. Kennedy school. At first she had hated the thought of actually having to get a life here. She missed Lisa, her best friend. But it was, however, a fact that Gaby loved school, no matter in which city she was. She could start right after the summer holidays, so she wouldn't get stared at as much as when she would have barged in in the middle of the semester.

Or so she hoped.

Today was the first school day, and here Gaby was, waiting till the principal would see her... It would take a while, or so she'd been told. Gabrielle couldn't admit she wasn't nervous. Even she got freaked out by a new school. She sighed deep and checked her hair and make-up in the mirror on the wall opposite. She'd tied her brown hair in a ponytail, and was wearing a chique jeans with a black casual T-shirt. Black was safe for every occasion, her mother had told her. And of course it had gladly been confirmed by Angel.

Tic-tac... the large wooden clock on the wall was driving Gaby insane, she felt every 'tic' as a loud bam in her head.

Since she would be sitting her e for a while, she let her mind wander back to what had happened in the past two weeks. She and Lilah were still staying at her father's place, her mother had not yet found something matching her high expectations. Gabrielle wondered if she ever would. Not that she minded, though. Living with her father was better than she'd expected. Lilah was hardly ever at home at day, so father and daughter had had all the time to get to know each other better. Gaby had heard all about her father's past ,including the not-so-nice details that involved broom closets and whatsoever. Of course they were shocking to her, but they also helped Gaby understand him better. And he understood her. During those two weeks, a potential close father-daughter relationship was born. Gabrielle smiled, and knew she'd made the right choice coming to Los Angeles.

'The principal will see you now.', the woman behind the reception desk said suddenly, out of nowhere. Gabrielle nodded, stood up and swallowed, and walked into the office of the principal, Mr. Stones. She smiled her I'm-your-potential-best-student-smile.

'Gabrielle Morgan? ', the principal asked. He looked as if the summer holidays hadn't nearly lasted long enough for him. It could also be the temperature, though. The man was wearing a suit while it was like 80 degrees here in the office.

'Yes, that's me.', Gaby nodded, sitting down as he gave her permission to do so with a nod. There was a silence when the principal looked up and opened her file.

'Ah, you're the girl from New York. I remember talking to your father on the phone. He sounded like a fine gentleman. British? '

'Yes, he was born in London.'

'A fine city. I see here your parents are separated. Is that the reason why you moved here?'

Gaby didn't see why this was his business, but she showed she had some manners and answered very politely. 'Not exactly. I came here to meet my father during the summer holidays, and now my mother moved here because she was offered a job.', she explained.

'I see. So I understand you live with your mother?'

'No. Well, yes... Sort of... at the moment...', she glanced at the principal's puzzled face and simplified her answer. 'I live with both my parents.'

'Of course, you see that often with children whose parents have split up. I suppose you spend the weekends with your father?'

Gaby wanted to say that her 'separated' parents lived together in the same apartment, but that would only give the slightly nosy man more to talk about, so she simply said: 'Something like that, yes.'

The answer seemed to satisfy him, and he seemed to, finally, know enough about her private life for now. 'Let's take a look at your results on the previous school..' he flipped some pages in her file and found what he was looking for. 'A straight A student, I see. We don't see that around so often anymore those days.', Mr. Stones said. 'But of course the educational level on our school is quite a bit higher than on the average high school.', he continued.

Gabrielle raised a perfect eyebrow. She seriously doubted what the man was saying. Lilah had made sure she'd gotten the best education she could get back in Yew York, but who cared if this man was just a tad too full of himself and his school. That made her wonder what kind of teens would go to school here, anyway. Normal ones? Or only the super-smart-nerdy-kind? In either case, would she fit in?

'I'll do my best, Mr. Stones.', Gaby promised him with a self confidant smile.

'And that's all you can do. Here is your schedule, and an information booklet that includes the rules of the school.', he said, handing the papers to her. 'Miss Morgan, I wish you all the best of luck, and I hope to see you again sometime. But not too often, right?', he added with a wink.

Gabrielle took the papers from him and forced a smile. For some reason, she didn't really like this man. 'Not too often.', she repeated, and walked out of his office, heading for the first lesson that, according to the schedule, was mathematics. It was said to be in room 217, so Gaby climbed the marble stairs until she reached the second floor. There she went looking for classroom 217. Fortunately, she found it rather quickly. Gabrielle was slightly nervous, but didn't show it, of course. On the outside she looked as cool as could be.

She knocked on the classroom-door shortly and entered. As expected, all eyes were on her immediately. Good thing she didn't blush that easily.

'Hello.. I'm..-', she didn't get a chance to finish her sentence, the quite good-looking ( for his age) teacher interrupted her. 'You're the new student! Gabrielle Morgan, right? Come on in.'

Gaby slowly entered, glad she didn't have to explain herself.

'You can sit over there, next to Stephanie. ', the teacher pointed, and she gladly obliged, carefully avoiding the still gaping students. Fortunately this Stephanie didn't seem too impressed with her presence, and Gabrielle was totally okay with that. She didn't like all those questions, which was why she hardly asked any herself.

'Hey.', Stephanie whispered.

'Hey.', Gaby whispered back, keeping an eye on the teacher who had returned to writing equations on the blackboard.

'Mr. Simons told us you were coming, but still, you can't prevent the staring.', Stephanie said with a half grin. She looked like a nice girl, her black hair was quite obviously dyed, but it looked good on her anyway. She was dressed rather casually in a jeans and a dark green sweater. The only thing remarkable about her were the big attention-drawing jewellery. She wore a ring with a huge stone in the colour of her sweater, and an, also green, amulet. They suited her appearance, though Gabrielle found her looking slightly, just slightly, mystical.

Both girls giggled at Stephanie's last comment.

'We're working on equations and simplifying them and stuff. You know how those work?'

'Yea, I had those in New York.', Gaby replied.

When Mr. Simons finished explaining and told them the work they had to do both girls started doing it, meanwhile busy chatting about anything more interesting than boring equations. It was the start of a new friendship.

'Hey, Gabrielle! Come sit with us!', Stephanie called out. It was lunch time, and she was sitting in the school-cafeteria with a to Gaby still unfamiliar, yet really good-looking boy. Gabrielle was carrying a tray with hopefully edible food. She felt like everyone was staring at her, so she was glad she knew at least one person. She walked over and sat down by the two other teenagers.

'This is Nick.', Stephanie introduced the boy. 'He slept with pretty much every girl in this school, so let me warn you for him. Except me, though. Because I don't want him, and I'm not his type, anyway. ', she explained, receiving glares from Nick, which she ignored. 'Not that he thinks I'm unattractive. The dude thinks I'm hot! ', she joked. 'No, kidding. We're just friends.'

'Best friends.', Nick added, simply frowning at his friend's warnings to Gabrielle. He was used to her being like that, anyway. He kind of liked Stephanie's sincerity. She was so different from the other girls who were often really fake. He held his hand out to Gabrielle. 'Nick Montgomery. '

Gaby shook his hand. 'I'm Gabrielle Morgan.'

'I know. Everyone's pretty much talking about you.', he laughed. Gaby started to fork her food and tried eating some. 'Good to know, but was expected. In New York a new student was old news in a second, but this school is like 10 times as small. '

'I bet.', Stephanie laughed. 'Do you miss it?'

'New York? It's okay, I miss my best friend, but it's not so much different from LA. I always tend to think that no matter in which city you are, there are always hysterical people running around and there are always people who want to be your friend, and people who, well, don't.'

'Yup. Just like in every school there are bitches.', Stephanie agreed, eyeing the most popular, and most annoying, girls of the school coming closer.

'Something like that. Eh, if you girls don't mind, I'm going to sit with my friends from the football team now. Catch ya later, Steph. See ya, Gabrielle.', Nick said, and off he was.

'He's like that sometimes. He wants to be my friend, and he is.. but he just puts too much value in popularity. He doesn't like to be seen with a freak like me.', Stephanie explained with a laugh, though deep in her eyes slight pain could be noticed.

'Why do they call you a freak?', Gaby inquired.

'Cause , you know, I do stuff..'

'Stuff?'

'You know... stuff... Like, witchcraft?', Stephanie said.

'Oh.', Gabrielle replied, nodding.

'I probably am a freak, but who cares? I think there are more things between heaven and earth than people like to believe. What do you think, Gabrielle?', Stephanie asked with a serious look on her face.

'I think you might be right.'

Later that after noon Gabrielle walked up the steps to her father's apartment. They had a key made for her the week before, so she had no problems entering when both parents were at work.

'I'm home!', she called out, taking off her coat and putting her bag down. Of course, she didn't expect to find Lilah here, but she hoped Wesley was there. She'd liked to tell someone about her first school day experiences.

'Hello Gabrielle.', her father, apparently not at work, greeted his daughter. He made a rather nervous impression to her, she wondered why. 'How was your day?', he inquired.

'It was quite good, actually.' Before she had a chance to say more Wesley had interrupted her again. 'Good. Good to hear. Gabrielle, I want you to meet someone..'. He took her hand, and led her into the living-room, where Gaby faced a rather old-looking man.

'Gabrielle, meet Roger Wyndam-Pryce. Your grandfather.'