A/N: Woohoo! Sorry for the long wait. I have 4 day weekends this semester, so as long as you good people nag me, I should be able to keep a steadier pace. Onward to the BoLo goodness!
Last time on Shooting Star, our intrepid succubus had just made it to Toronto. In the meantime, mysterious Lauren, going by the stage name Patsy Sewer, alludes to her past as she falls asleep in her car.
Chapter 2: To New Beginnings
Lauren adjusted the aviators perched on the bridge of her nose and slid her arm onto the open car window. At 10 am, the air still held the morning crispness but under the warmth of the sun she decided to forgo her usual leather jacket. She toyed with the bottom of the steering wheel with the tips of her heavily-ringed fingers before hooking a spoke with her index and whipping the car to the right in a cacophony of screeching tires and blaring horns.
"Crazy bitch! Get of the road!" snarled a man from his ostentatious black Benz.
Lauren stuck one lazy middle finger out at her new acquaintance. "Here's to you, Mr. Pencil-Dick."
There was a nagging tug behind her ribcage. Wanderlust had always been a constant in her life; yet, this morning, when she set out behind the wheel of her car, she found herself driving with an unknown sense of purpose. Soon, she had realized she was halfway to Jude's recording space.
She would never let Jude know, but the time they had spent together was the closest Lauren had ever come to "hanging" with a friend. She didn't need Jude – she was doing just fine without anybody – but maybe Jude the Prude could actually use her guidance.
Lauren turned down an alleyway and, noticing some movement in the peripheries of her vision, screeched to a halt. There was a figure hunched by the mouth of the alleyway, but deep enough in to be unnoticeable to passersby. Lauren watched the figure with a small frown as the girl lifted her head. She met the most intense blue eyes that made her heart hammer in her chest. Her gaze startled away, then returned to her subject quickly. She must have been seeing things, for this time, she was met by a pair of deep brown eyes that made her stomach clench uncomfortably. Her breath caught like a stone in the back of her throat.
The girl, who appeared close to Lauren in age, kept their gazes fixed as her mouth considered a few words, before settling on a low, "Hey."
Lauren gulped a few times before finding her voice. "Hi."
The girl slowly came to her feet, sweeping her curtain of brown hair behind her ear. "I... I really don't usually do this. It's just –" she paused, shaking her head. "You know what? Never mind."
She began to walk away when Lauren snapped from her stupor and grabbed the girl by the sleeve.
"No. Please, tell me," Lauren said with a softness that Patsy had never felt.
"I... well, I was wondering if you had any extra food?" Her gaze dropped to her feet. "I'm not really sure what to do; I've honestly never done this before. God, I'm just so hungry."
Lauren's expression was inscrutable as the girl spoke, and the gaunt girl began to panic as Lauren remained silent. The girl shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't –"
"Yeah, sure."
The girl started. "Wait, what?"
But Lauren had already bent over through the driver's side window to rummage around for her backpack. She couldn't help but notice that as Lauren bent over, the short plaid skirt rode up and revealed the creamy skin of her upper thighs. Her gaze was predatory and longing when Lauren turned to face her once more. Upon noticing the look, Lauren flushed uncomfortably, but felt the edges of her lips turn up in a small smirk. Was she just...
The girl snapped out of her haze. "Hm. What?"
Lauren chuckled softly and unzipped her bag, reaching in and pulling out her bounty from last night. "Weenies?"
Despite her embarrassment, the girl smiled brightly at Lauren, who was suddenly much happier about her decision to share. She stepped forward and carefully picked a handful of mini-hotdogs from Lauren's outstretched hand. The girl's free hand then reached out and gently stroked Lauren's wrist. A wave of pleasure passed through Lauren's body and she felt as if hot water ran through her nerves. Her breath hitched and before she could stop herself, Lauren whispered, "Who are you?"
She could see her freeze for a moment, eyes wide like a caged animal. Lauren flipped her hand over and ran her thumb across the girl's knuckles.
"Bo." The piercing syllable broke the tense silence. "I'm Bo. Who are you?"
Patsy. She was going to say Patsy; she should have said it. It was what she had replied to that question for the last 3 years. But instead, she said, "Lauren."
"Well, it was nice to meet you, Lauren. Thanks for the weenies."
Lauren took a step back and bumped into the car. "It's no problem. I'll see you around, then?"
"Yeah," Bo said as she retired to her spot by the wall. "See you."
She was in a daze when she finally pulled up to Jude's recording studio. Lauren's thoughts were so clouded by her encounter that she absentmindedly stopped halfway up the stairs. She couldn't manage a concrete though; rather, she was overwhelmed by a haze of dark eyes and an ache that nestled in her ribcage. Her vision only cleared once some other mangy punk staggered up the stairs, eyes her as he passed. She gave him a tight-lipped smirk and said, "Bite me, asswipe."
"Fuck off, lesbo."
"Ooo," she cooed, "You wound me."
She made her way up the rest of the stairs to the second floor, pushing open the industrial door to Jude's practice space. Today, her usual swagger was more of a slump. She let her heavy boots announce her presence as she walked over to thee couch and plopped down. Jude looked up from her guitar with a slight raise of her eyebrows. She stilled her hand against the strings and waited in silence.
"Well?" Jude's husky voice broke was jarring in the empty air. "Are you going to at least say hi?"
Lauren looked up at Jude and gave her a small nod. "Oh. Hey," she said, her voice low and soft.
Jude adjusted the guitar in her lap and gently propped it against the side of her squishy chair. She leaned forward and rested her chin in her palm as she watched Lauren pick at the long threads of the sofa. She slapped her hands to her knees and pursed her lips. "Okay, then. If you're not going to talk, I suppose I can talk at you instead." Her gaze bounced around the room, from the hole in the wall thanks to Spiederman to the lurid red White Stripes poster that Patsy had plastered, askew, by the makeshift recording booth. "Things have been... off... with Jamie recently and I really don't know what to do. I mean, ever since the whole thing with Tommy, everything's been so different, you know? It was always me and Jamie and Kat, dreaming of making it big some day." She shook her bangs out and ran a hand across her forehead. "The plan was for me to be the rockstar, and Jamie the big time manager, and then Kat would be my personal stylist, with her own fashion line. But that was just a dream. We were just kids. And now that it's actually happening, I just, don't know how I'm supposed to act anymore, because it's not how we dreamed it. Life doesn't work out like that. Even though we're all on the way to these big dreams, we're so fucking disconnected. It's, I, I feel like I'm racing into this future we had planned out, and I'm pulling ahead of them, but somehow I feel like I'm the one that's been left behind. And after years of somehow being the loser in school, all of the sudden the people who would have, who should, hate me, now adore me? Or they say they do? I never dreamed I would have one guy fighting over me, let alone this mess, but now I just want to go back being invisible and righting stupid little songs in my stupid room with Kat and Jamie."
Lauren let out a low whistle. "Well you did say you were gonna talk."
"What about you, Pats? Do you miss high school?"
She chuckled gruffly. "Wouldn't know. I never went." At Jude's curious gaze, she explained, "I was home schooled."
Jude's expression softened. She stopped fidgeting. "Oh. Were your parents teachers?"
That produced a guffaw from Lauren. "Nah, the only thing I learned from Mama was how to turn the laundry machine on."
"And your dad?"
"No one likes a smart-ass," she intoned in an affected deep voice.
"Oh." Jude pursed her lips. "When was the last time you got the chance to see them? I forgot to ask - are you from Toronto?"
Lauren crossed her arms over her chest and set her jaw. "When I came over, I wasn't expecting the fucking Spanish Inquisition."
"Look, Patsy, I'm sorry." Jude stood softly and set herself down on the arm of the sofa. "I just realized that you know so much about me and, well, maybe I should listen for a change."
Lauren uncrossed her legs and scooted her hips forward in her seat, maximizing her careless slouch. "You sure talk a lot for somebody who's listening." She sighed, and ran her fingers vigorously back and forth through her dark locks before smoothing it back behind her ears. "No, I'm not from Toronto – and don't even ask, I'm not going to tell you where. All you need to know is that I'm from Hicksville, just close enough to suburbia to hate its fucking guts. I haven't seen my – them – in three years now."
Jude takes a breath, but she just can't help herself. "Why–"
"Well the last time I saw them they said 'don't fucking come back here again' so I haven't fucking gone back."
Tentatively, Jude placed a hand on Lauren's shoulder and gave it a small squeeze. Unconsciously, Lauren's head lolled toward the comforting contact, which even surprised Lauren.
"Hey, I'm sorry for complaining about the shit-uation with my parents so much. I shouldn't–"
"Life isn't a competition between whose sucks worst. Bad situations are bad, not quantifiable."
Jude let out a small huff of laughter.
"What?" Lauren said with a wide eyed smirk.
"Quantifiable? Just when I think I'm getting to know you, you become more of a mystery to me."
A/N: Hi guys! Hope you liked this chapter. I know that Lauren might seem really AU to you guys right now, but just pretend it's the beginning of season 4 and we're finally getting to know the real her... I'm attempting to use this AU as a way to explore the darker roots of Lauren's character that even exists in the canon. Next chapter plans include Kenzi and some succu-games. Let me know what you think!