The night the news broke, Dana had sprawled on her bed, put her earphones in and turned the music up so loud that her tonsils itched. Jess had told her a hundred times that she would go deaf. She didn't care. She glared at the wall to see how long she could avoid blinking and put off the contact of her boiling tears and her skin.
Finn. Her dad. This is what you get for knocking down single mothers in the street, she thought. You can drive right by, you can cover it up with a stack of money, but the stain something like that leaves you with will always surface in the end.
She had fired up her laptop. She knew it was a bad idea. She had wanted to see what the motherfuckers were saying about her dad and by extension, about her. She noted that some kids she hardly knew at her new school, and probably despised anyway, had defriended her on Facebook. Probably at the behest of their stuck-up parents. "Is that the worst you got?", she had scoffed quietly to herself. There were multiple posts on there and on Twitter referring to Langley both directly and indirectly. She'd had plenty of private messages, ranging from "I'm so sorry", to "What the fuck?! Dana?!", "Don't fuck with Osama bin Brody!" and "Call me!". She read none of them. Dana rolled her eyes. So, what happened to innocent until proven guilty?, she had asked herself.
Her dad's face in that fucked up video had popped into her head again. Her own face crumpled. She was just about to slam the cover of her laptop down against the keys when an instant chat box opened on her screen.
Xander.
Dana hadn't spoken to Xander, or, more accurately, Xander hadn't spoken to her since she had broken up with him. He had taken it badly and then Dana heard from a mutual friend that he had taken the news that Dana had started dating Finn even worse. The fact that they now attended different schools made it easy not to have to deal with it but when the hit and run happened she realized how much she missed him. Xander had been great when Dana was dealing with the whole 'Uncle Mike' thing and then the turmoil of her dad's reappearance. Xander was wise, but he also knew when to just take her the hell out of here and get her stoned.
"Hey". The cursor flashed expectantly after the word. Dana wondered whether to answer him, for lots of reasons. She knew that the secret goddamn police from the visit tonight would probably be watching. They could do that kind of thing, right? Even though it was totally wrong.
"Hey". She typed, hovering over the send button, but eventually hitting it hard.
"Tough day?", responded Xander, immediately.
"The worst, actually. I think I'm gonna have to use a sad face (sad face) because there doesn't seem to be an emoticon yet for 'my-dad-is-the-fucking-bogeyman'".
"They might develop one, just for you?". Xander said.
"That would be a great help", she sent.
"Can I see you soon?", he asked.
"I think I might be grounded. But not by my mom this time, I think the CIA might also be involved. But yes, I'd like that". She replied.
She had stared at the drawer of her nightstand for what seemed like hours. She imagined her photo of Brody laying inside it, in the dark, on top of a notebook and various bottles of nail color. She had badly wanted to touch it but she couldn't bring herself to take it out. It didn't need to be in her hand. She knew every line and shadow in the image, the silhouette of the trees off in the background, the exact angle of his shoulders and the bright but slightly pained smile on his face caused by the fact that he had been looking into the sun when the picture was taken and her mom had dawdled far too long in pressing the button. Dana brought two fingers to her lips, pouted, and then reached out and transmitted her kiss to the front of the nightstand drawer.
Now the day after the night before had dawned, Dana lay motionless in bed. No one was ever awake in the Brody household at this time of day, apart from her dad when he had been here. All was silent but somehow Dana could feel that her brother, her mom and Mike were all awake too, laying there stunned, each not wanting to speak to the other and start the day.