Zane stumbled down the stairs blurry eyed and cranky. What was the point of being on vacation if you couldn't sleep in because there were people down stairs yelling at each other? He walked in, expecting to come into the middle of a fight between The General and his daughter. Should that happen, he assumed that Andrea would cling to him just to piss her dad off and he wasn't sure he was up for that at the moment.
"Hey Zane." The chipper voice stopped him in the doorway. It was far too early for so much eagerness. "Oops. Someone needs coffee." Andrea said, her blond curls pulled back and bouncing behind her head in a ponytail.
"I'll get it for him." Denny said, uncurling herself from the couch and headed toward the kitchen, squeezing his arm gently as she passed. The sight he was looking at confused him. Glancing at the clock on the cable box, he saw that it was barely eight in the morning. Yet Jo and Andrea were sitting on the floor of the Mansfield's living room, surrounded by what he guessed was twenty large bags. Jo's hair was down and she had on a thick sweater over a pair of what looked like skinny jeans. Zane glanced over to the doorway seeing three pairs of boots that seemed to be thawing, and then he returned his gaze to the living room.
"What is going on?" He finally got out. Jo looked up at him through a curtain of that unbelievable hair of hers and smiled at him.
"It's black Friday you idiot." Andrea said, diving head first into one of the bags that surrounded the two women. Literally, she dunked her head into one of the bags and disappeared up to her shoulders. Jo giggled and Zane really wasn't sure what to do; there was the possibility that Andrea would suffocate, but he couldn't really bring himself to care without his coffee. Her curly head came bursting out of the bag as she shook her head, assumingly to clear something, but Zane couldn't tell what.
"Here Zane." His attention was pulled back to Denny as she handed him a cup of coffee.
"Thank you. Good morning."
"Mom what's for lunch?" Jo snorted at Andrea as Denny rolled her eyes.
"It's eight o'clock in the morning." Zane said.
"We have been up since three." Andrea said, watching Zane for a beat before diving into another bag.
"What are you looking for?" Jo asked, reaching into another bag to remove whatever was in it like a civilized person.
"That sweater I got." Came muffled from the bag that contained Andrea. Zane rolled his eyes and moved to join Denny on the couch. Andrea popped back up like a Jack in the Box and eyed another bag. "I thought it was in one of the blue ones."
"I put it away." Denny said a small smile on her face that reminded Zane of the woman on the floor in front of him. "I got it for you for Christmas, and the only reason I got it today was because you pouted at me. You will get it in a month." The pout returned to her face as she looked around the bags.
"Why were you guys up at three?" Zane asked. Andrea froze, turning to look at him with a completely dumbfounded look on her face.
"It's Black Friday. Doors opened at four thirty." She said slowly.
"You are crazy." He said. He had learned of the tradition of Black Friday when we got to MIT, but he never really saw the need to battle crowds just to get something for less money. That and he usually built all the tech he really needed anyway. "Do you guys really have to leave tonight? Zane didn't even get to see Daddy's computer." Zane nearly spit his coffee out. Before he got a smart ass comment out though, he caught look of Jo's face; he had seen that look and nothing good came after it.
"He would get arrested. He was only allowed to leave Eureka because I came with him." Lupo said. "It would violate his parole." Zane sipped his next sip of coffee slowly; whoever this Lupo was, he was starting to think she was a completely different person than three months ago. The last Lupo would have tased him at the thought of him going anywhere near a General's computer. He glanced at Andrea, whose head was cocked to the side as she looked at her best friend, a look on her face that meant, as Zane had come to learn, that she was thinking.
"Like you would know." Zane stopped again at the growl that left Lupo's lips at Andrea's comment. If she had had a Taser in her hand, Zane probably would have feared for his ass again. But Dre just laughed looking to search through another bag.
"Zane what time is your flight?" Denny said, pulling the conversation into a less growl inducing territory.
"6:15." He answered. "So we should leave around 3:30-ish."
"And we have to return the rental car." Jo said absentmindedly, flipping through some book. He couldn't tell for sure, but it looked like she was blushing again. God he wished she would stop that, it drove his blood to place it shouldn't be when thinking about Lupo.
"I don't understand who leaves Thanksgiving celebrations on Friday."
"That's all the time I was granted leave." Zane answered. While he liked living in Eureka, especially these days when Lupo's heart had grown three sizes, it was nice to be able to sit around and not have the constant fear of something going wrong that could potentially end the world and everyone in it, or the universe or something. Sometimes, scientists running around unchecked made life a tad stressful. He guessed that was why Jo was always so stressed.
"And I want him out of my house."
"Good morning General. Did you have a good night's sleep?" He asked with as much sarcasm as he could get in the question. The General was wearing jeans and a polo shirt, making him look far less intimidating than usual.
"Billy." Denny scolded.
"It's fine Mrs. Mansfield." Zane said tapping into his ability to ignore Mansfield.
"No it's not." All attention in the room was pulled to Andrea. "Zane is my guest, father, and you have been nothing but rude to him since you and Tiny walked through that door. While I understand he doesn't have the cleanest background, it isn't any less dangerous to allow me near your computer and you know that. Just because you can't prove it, doesn't mean you don't know it. You would be nothing but angry with me if I ever treated one of your friends the way you treat Zane on a daily basis."
"My friends aren't felons."
"But your daughter is." She said. "Zane has never killed anyone. He stole some money, big whoop."
"Three million dollars." Zane was ping ponging between the General and his friend and was attempting to think of a way to communicate to Andrea that her father was turning purple.
"Three million dollars is not as bad as someone's life. You bring Angelo over to dinner all the time and I don't think having an assassin at dinner is very pleasing but I keep my mouth shut and I would damn well appreciate if you did the same."
"This is my house."
"Well you're a douche."
"Andrea." Denny scolded. Jo was strategically looking at the floor and all Zane could do was stare. He knew that Andrea and the General usually didn't get along but he didn't expect their fights to be so… well ok, everything Andrea did was loud.
"No mom. I am sick of him on his high horse. You are no better than a felon just because you have the government backing all the law breaking you do."
"I up hold the law." He said. Zane noticed that temple in the General's forehead throbbing as Andrea stood, her arms crossed and eyes glared.
"Tell that to Richardson." With those four words, Mansfield paled, Denny's mouth dropped open and Tim, who had just come down the stairs gasped. Andrea however held her ground. "You think I don't know everything you do at work? You are a bully. You bully people at work, you bully little Fargo, and you bully me in my own home. Just because you are military doesn't make you better than everyone else and I am tired of pretending that you are. At least Zane is honest about things he does."
"Most of the time." Jo muttered, her darks flickering to him. Apparently the Mansfield's didn't hear her, because the General turned abruptly to leave the room, Denny following him down the hallway.
"Maybe we should pack Jo Jo." He said, trying to break the uncomfortable silence that was in the room.
"Jo Jo?" Tim asked, turning to look between himself and Jo. "Jay is this the guy you were talking about?" And the uncomfortable silence was back. Zane waited for Jo to laugh, scoff or make some rude comment. However, she just sat there staring for a moment wide eyed and chewing on that bottom lip of hers.
"Of course not." Andrea stated, curling herself back onto the floor.
"Then you just let some random guy call you JoJo?" Zane was still staring at Jo, waiting to hear the answers. He called her JoJo because he thought it annoyed her. But it didn't really seem to do that so much anymore.
"He is not some random guy." She said finally, tucking her hair behind her ear. "He's a friend and a colleague. Packing, Zane good idea." She said, standing up gracefully and bolting from the room.
"I pity the man who marries her." Tim said. Somewhere on the floor, Andrea snorted.
EE
"You are insane." Jo said, throwing a pillow across the room at her best friend. Andrea had just said something to the extent that Jo and Zane should stop in Vegas and just get married.
"Like you don't want to." The smile Jo received in response to her glare didn't make her feel any better. "Sorry." Andrea conceded.
"Have you ever gone off on your father that way?" She asked, turning back to her duffle bag knowing that Andrea probably didn't want answer the question.
"Not quite." Jo stood and turned, going to sit next to Andrea against the wall.
"Want to talk about it?"
"No. You and Zane are far more important." Jo rolled her eyes, seeing Andrea's shoulder tense up at the memory. Jo knew her best friend almost better than she knew herself. The fight with her father had stressed Andrea out more than she would let on.
"Andrea." The golden eyes turned to the brown ones, a sadness showing through that Jo hadn't seen in a long time. Andrea had been pushing the issues with her father to the back of her mind since they were twelve. That was the last time Jo had seen this sadness in her best friends eyes. "Hey." She said, slipping an arm around Andrea's shoulders. "I know that you guys don't always see eye to eye, but you know that he loves you right?" Andrea shrugged slightly. "He does. I know your dad and I know that he would move mountains if you asked him too." The gold eyes looked at her communicating her doubt. "For a good reason."
"Now that is a great thing to enter a room too." Jo's brown eyes rolled as she looked over at Zane leaning against the door frame.
"Get a life Zane." She said, getting up and walking back to her duffle. She felt Zane move into the room. Jo paused and watched out of the corner of her eye as Zane slid down the wall next to Andrea. He looked over at her for a second before bumping her with his shoulder. Andrea looked over at him.
"Fuck him." Jo turned in time to see a slow smile break over Andrea's face. She leaned in, pecked Zane on the lips and put her head on his shoulder. Zane leaned his cheek against her hair as Andrea locked eyes with Jo.
"You're crazy Jay." Jo breathed in through her nose. Andrea knew that Jo was trying to let Zane go and Andrea was completely against the fact. For a split second, watching Zane know exactly how to calm down her best friend, and seeing his sensitive side made her think that maybe she was crazy. Her eyes blinked over right as Zane looked to her and she froze. Waiting for the snarky comment, Zane smiled slightly before pressing a gentle kiss to the top of Andrea's head. Maybe he was changing.
"Come on Zane. We have to get going."
"Back to Eureka." And all of the crazy scientists she kept in check.
AN- Thank you to everyone who tells me that they love Andrea. I always lose faith in if anyone reads these and when I get those little email reminders I remember why I write them. Andrea will be back, I just have to marathon seasons 4 and 5 to see where it will fit in.