Vignette Summary: Mia and Diego use social media to conduct research for the Hawthorne investigation. Social media usage ends up being a sore spot for both of them but in vastly different ways.

Tags: Dramatic Irony/Angst/Emotional Hurt/Comfort

Word Count: 2,314

Date: Saturday, July 13th, 2013

Time: 10:19 am

Location: Diego's Apartment, Los Tokyo

Last night, the pair finally called a truce. Everything had come to a head last weekend, after Mia acknowledged that she was hesitant to say she loved Diego, and seemed uncertain if she would ever feel comfortable saying it.

Diego was none too pleased with this revelation, but he was at a loss over what to do with this information. If she didn't feel that way, he couldn't force her. He just wished she did.

For most of the week, they didn't talk any more than they had to. Mia didn't hang out in his office like she normally did, they kept to their own devices back at the apartment, and they had several tense and quiet drives to and from the office.

However, yesterday evening, they finally reached a breakthrough in Dahlia's case, while exploring the Ivy University campus, and they were too excited to discuss their discovery to continue icing each other out. Nothing had been resolved, but they decided to push the conflict aside. That was a problem for future Mia and Diego to deal with.

This morning, they were about to finish their planned research into Dahlia's case, investigating the Literature Society and Doug Swallow's social media accounts. They meant to finish it all after they got home last night, but they were too busy making up. They made up in the bedroom, the bathroom, the living room, and the kitchen. They had a lot of making up to do after a week of barely even conversing.

Head clearer and legs weaker in the AM, Mia set up shop at the kitchen island, donning Diego's large heather gray "Property of LTU" hoodie, boxer-style pajama shorts, and a messy bun. She sat down, opened her laptop, and logged onto her social media accounts.

Diego, meanwhile, was also pajama-clad but standing on the other side of the kitchen island. Not active on social media, his job was to supply them both with energy.

"How do you want your coffee this morning?" he asked.

"Hm, surprise me," Mia responded.

"A black americano, coming right up."

"Okay, surprise me with something that has milk, cream, and/or sugar."

Diego smiled. He knew she wouldn't go for that. "How about a mocha?"

"That sounds better, thanks."

Diego got started on her drink. "You find either of the pages yet?"

"I'm on the Literature Society's page right now, scrolling through posts."

"Anything interesting?"

"Nothing so far. I've gone back over two years to before Dahlia was even at Ivy. I'm going to look at their book club event pages instead." Mia opened 14 new tabs in her browser window, one for every book club event from Dahlia's first year at Ivy to the end of her second year. "I found Dahlia."

"Which events?"

"All of them. She's been an attendee ever since she started at Ivy."

Diego carefully slid Mia's mocha latte next to her, a leaf pattern on its surface. He used to design hearts on her drinks but stopped once they became too loaded in meaning.

"And Doug?" he asked.

"Thank you." Mia continued flipping through her tabs. "No sign of him yet." She took a sip of her drink. "This is good. I think I like it better than the one at Café Society, actually."

Diego grinned. That was one of the best compliments she could have given him. "Well, I probably know more about coffee than the college kids working there. It's still my favorite café in the city though."

"It's really cozy in there." Mia took another sip and continued her research. "There's Doug!" She turned around her laptop to show Diego the photo of Doug, seated next to Dahlia on a couch in the student lounge of the arts building.

Diego read the date next to the photo: "March 12, 2013."

"It's just like we thought; they started dating after the trial."

Diego looked more closely at Doug's smiling face as he held the book club book of the month. "Poor bastard. He still has no idea."

"I know. We still have to figure out some way to tell him." Mia turned the laptop around. "He's tagged in these photos, so I'll try his profile next."

"Is Dahlia tagged?"

She shook her head. "No. She's not a member of the Literature Society's page either."

Diego took a swig of his drink. He did have that black Americano. "Damn, she's offline. Makes sense why we couldn't find her before."

"She's sneaky." Mia pulled up Doug's page. "I'm on his profile, but I can't see very much. He has too many privacy settings." She looked at Diego. "Should I message him?"

Diego hemmed and hawed. "Ah, I wouldn't. He doesn't know who we are, so he'll probably ignore it anyway. Besides, it creates a trail directly to us. The less she knows we're researching her, the better."

Mia nodded. "I agree." She sighed. "I can't see much about him on here with his settings. He's in a relationship and he's an Ivy Pharmacology student. We already knew that. And I can see his profile picture. He does work at the Pharmacology Lab as a Technician though. Did we know that?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Maybe we can meet him at his work?"

"That's an idea. When is the lab open in the summer?"

Mia looked up the lab's website. "Same hours as the firm."

"Of course. What are the chances of us getting a few hours off to meet with him?"

"Zero. Especially not with the time we booked off in August."

"Yeah." Diego stroked his jaw, thinking. "I could meet with him before a trial sometime."

"What will you tell Mr. Grossberg?"

"I'm going to the courthouse early to meet with my client."

"Wow, I can't believe you're lying to our boss," Mia teased.

"With the number of hours I've put in, Grossberg can deal with it."

"I'm joking. That's probably the only way. When Doug goes back to school in the fall, he might not work at the lab anymore."

"True. I'll try to meet with him before we go on vacation."

Mia closed out most of her browser tabs. "Well, the investigation is settled, for now."

"I guess. I wonder why Dahlia needs access to poisonous chemicals anyway. Terry and Valerie are dead, and her case was dismissed before it went to trial. If she just does nothing, she'll keep walking free."

"As a precaution, maybe? That seems to be her MO. She killed Valerie to cover up her first crime, and she had Terry kill himself to cover up her second crime."

Diego shook his head in disbelief. "She's insane." He chuckled. "Makes sense given who she's related to."

"Hm," Mia said, unamused, continuing to surf around on her laptop.

"What are you researching now?"

"Nothing. Just checking out my feeds."

"I still can't believe you have social media as an attorney."

"It was useful right now," Mia argued. "We couldn't have looked at all those pages without an account."

"Yeah, you're right," he begrudgingly agreed. "Do you really want judges, cops, prosecutors, and future clients looking at your page though?"

"A lot of them have accounts too." Mia typed into the search bar on one of the sites. "Here's the judge from the Fawles trial."

"That's crazy, but he wasn't the sharpest tool."

"It's more like, he's old but not as old as you."

"Ha ha," he said sarcastically. "Yes, I'm 28 and very old."

"Finally, we're on the same page." Mia smirked at him, and he smiled slightly, despite himself. "I don't post anything weird on there. No drinking or partying or beach photos. And I have strong privacy settings."

"What if a friend of yours took a screenshot of your profile or pictures and shared it?"

"Why would anyone do that?"

"Why are we looking at Doug's page right now?"

"Yeah." Mia saw his point but wasn't convinced. She didn't have anything to hide, and, to her, the pros of social media outweighed the cons. "I think you just want to seem mysterious."

"You discovered my master plan," Diego said dryly.

"Aw, c'mon, my jokes are good too! You didn't even have an account in college?"

"Nope. If I wanted to see my friends, I could always text, call, or email them."

"You have friends?"

"Ouch."

"Sorry," Mia apologized. "I didn't mean it that way. I've just never met your friends. Other than Candace and Paul from the bar, but that's different. They work there."

"I have friends." He shrugged. "I don't know, a lot of them moved away from the city, to the States, or off the mainland. I see them, like, a couple times a year and we just pick up where we left off."

"That's not very often."

"It's enough. I see you every day, Mamá every Sunday, your friends, my clients, and our coworkers. With work as crazy as it is, that's plenty of socializing for me."

"I guess. Maybe it's just from growing up in a tight-knit village, but I get lonely when there aren't many people around."

"I lived at my grandparents' place and then in studios or one-bedroom apartments with Mamá. I like my space and time alone." He took another sip of coffee. He was already on his second. "Except from you," he added. "To tell you the truth though, the only time I was ever tempted to get an account was to look up my dad, but there was no point when I don't even know his name."

"I still can't believe Maria didn't tell you."

"She says that he hasn't concerned himself with us, so I shouldn't concern myself with him. But it's wild to be my age and to have no idea who he is or what he looks like."

"What would you do if you found him?"

"I don't know. Either ask him to backpay 18 years of child support or punch him in the face. I haven't decided."

Mia laughed. "Why not both?"

Diego laughed back. "Very tempting. Need to find the bugger first." He pointed to her laptop. "You ever look up your parents on there?"

"I looked up my mom. No surprise, she wasn't on there. She was never the most tech-savvy, and I doubt she wants anyone to find her while she's in hiding. She's done such a good job of hiding that no one knows where she is."

"And your dad?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Well…" Mia hesitated. "He might be on there."

"Isn't that the point of checking?"

"I'm pretty sure I know where he is anyway."

"Where's that?"

"Back home in Boston. That's where he's from."

"So, that's why you wanted to see Boston. I thought it was because you're wicked smart," Diego said, using a Boston accent for the last two words.

Mia grinned. "He didn't sound like that. Not unless he was trying to make me laugh."

"If you know where he is, just look him up, give him hell, and see what he says."

"Maybe." Mia tapped her fingers on the counter. "I'll get the nerve, any day now."

"Only the Master is allowed to leave for extended periods, right?"

"Yeah."

"So, was he banished too when he left?"

"I see where you're going with this. Yes, he isn't allowed back either. But, while I have called, written, and seen Maya as much as I possibly can, he did absolutely nothing."

"Maybe he did call or write, and your mom and aunt didn't tell you."

"Why are you taking his side?" Mia volleyed back.

Diego held his hands up in surrender. "I'm not. I'm just asking questions. Your village is completely insane, and your aunt sounds like a piece of work, so who knows."

"There was no excuse for him to leave. With Mom, the news ran her name into the ground for weeks. They were incessant. The police and the government stopped using her. The public barely visited the Village for years. The other villagers gossiped constantly about her. They still do. With Dad, nothing happened. He just looked at a ten-year-old and a three-month-old and decided he didn't want them anymore."

Mia was shaking. Despite her anger, she hadn't yelled. She knew if she let her emotions get the best of her, she'd likely start bawling too. It wouldn't have been the first time Diego saw her cry, but to break out in hysterics after what started off as such a pleasant morning felt so embarrassing to her for some reason. That said, her shaking and fidgeting couldn't be controlled.

"Shit," he muttered.

Diego walked to the other side of the kitchen island and slammed the laptop screen shut. He opened his arms, offering Mia a hug, but she didn't look at him. So, he swiveled her barstool, until it faced him, and hugged her while she was still seated. Mia let him do it, but she didn't hug him back.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Your dad's either a piece of shit or a coward. Maybe both. But I think I'd want to know which one it was, so it wasn't hanging over my head."

Mia turned the words over in her head for a moment before standing up and returning the hug. "Thank you." She sniffled. "I probably will reach out someday. It's been 14 years now, so, lord knows, he'll never be the one to do it."

"If he's already taken 14 years, you can take your time."

Mia pulled away from the hug and nodded before wiping her tears with the sleeve of her sweater. Despite her best efforts, a few had escaped.

"This is why I hate social media," Diego joked. "Always causing problems."

Mia giggled.

"Why don't we watch TV?" he asked. "TV has never caused anyone any problems."

Mia smiled feebly and nodded again.