Title: Before I Sleep, part 2
Author: evie_0
Pairing/Characters: Veronica, Logan, Keith, Lucas(OMC)
Word Count: 3,926
Rating: NC-17
Summary: This is a kind of AU of my story Living Without Her.
Future fic: in this version of events, Veronica tells her dad and Wallace that she has cancer a lot earlier, and they manage convince her to tell Logan about their son too. (I suck at summaries, and no, I didn't just spoil the original story)
-This chapter deals with Veronica trying to explain her decisions to Lucas, and also a bit of Logan/Lucas father/son bonding.
Spoilers: Pretty much safe if you've seen 2x22, with a slight knowledge of early s3
Warnings: Angst
Disclaimer: Not at all mine
A/N: I realize it might be a little odd to do an AU of my own fic, but this story wouldn't leave me alone. Betaed by the always wonderful![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
earth2mars (thanks so much sweetie!) any mistakes are mine.
Thanks to everyone who read and commented on the first chapter, and I hope you like this part too! :)
Chapter One is here
Veronica stares blankly at the television screen, her eyes barely seeing the moving images before her, her mind replaying the past 24 hours events in constant repeat.
All she’s heard from Logan was a strained conversation where he asked her for permission to spend time with Lucas, they managed to be civil, but all the previous day’s anger was simmering barely restrained below the surface.
Lucas meanwhile has basically avoided meeting her eye, any conversation between them is pretty much mono-syllabic and awkward.
The two of them are sitting in silence in the living room, TV on but barely acknowledged and Rocky, their malamute/rottweiler cross that they got from the pound two years ago, sitting at their feet and wagging her tail, blissfully unaware of the that fills the room.
Keith went to bed an hour ago, citing old age but the expression of concern on his face as he left the room betrayed the flimsy excuse.
“So… how’s school, sweetie? Got any girls after you?” Veronica asks, breaking the silence, her tone aiming for jovial but not quite making it.
Lucas just turns his head and stares at her, his expression blank but his eyes full of hurt and anger, looking so much like the way Logan’s had the day before that it makes her breath catch for an instant.
“Sorry,” she amends, “I just… I don’t know… you know?” she asks, holding her hands out helplessly.
Lucas continues to stare down at the floor for a long moment, and when he finally speaks his voice is slightly broken and he won’t meet her eye, “Mom? Why didn’t you tell him… Logan, about me?”
Veronica feels as though all of the air is being sucked from the room, as though she is drowning and flailing, she has been waiting for this question for almost seventeen years now and yet she can’t think of a single answer.
“I’m sorry.” She whispers, because the only other things that come into her mind are irrelevant excuses and justifications that she is starting to realize hold no worth anymore.
“Mom,” he says thickly, trying to fight the tears forming in his eyes, “I don’t need you to apologize, I just need to know why.”
She searches her mind for the answers she knows he deserves, but all thoughts have fled and she comes up empty. She stares at him helplessly, tears filling her eyes at the sight of the child she swore to always protect in so much pain, pain that she caused.
“I don’t know why, sweetie,” she admits, her voice breaking, “I just… I just don’t know. I was… I was really proud, you know? And I didn’t want to go to him, because I knew that he would want to marry me or something… just out of obligation… And I didn’t want our lives to be like that, for any of us…” her voice trails off as her mind drifts back to months and years of loneliness and fear of the future, choices she chose wrong and people she pushed away, “I’m sorry, ok? It was the wrong decision. I know that now… I probably knew it then, it just got so much harder to take back the more time that went by. And I just… didn’t want to deal with it. I’m sorry,” she sobs, trying to hold her expression together, “I know that’s selfish, and I know that it’s hurt you, but I just didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to do this, I just… I’m sorry, ok?” she pleads, “I was wrong. And I never wanted to hurt you, I never meant to hurt you… either of you.”
They sit in silence for a long time, the two of them lost in their thoughts and imaginations.
Lucas looks at her questioningly, his eyes earnest for answers and any information, “How long were you two together?”
“We were together… God, I don’t know, it was so on and off all the time. I guess it was over like, five years or so… but we could just never made it work, things just always made everything fall apart, we always made everything fall apart. There was just too much history, too many things we couldn’t leave in the past…” The memories wash over her as she speaks, images flashing in her mind of kisses and arguments, a time spent with so much passion. And then she thinks of the way he looked the day before, after all these years without him she didn’t expect her reaction to seeing him again to feel like this. She actually sort of thought that after all this time of seeing his face in Lucas that her senses would be slightly dulled when it came to Logan, but that ghost of a flicker still exists, is still haunting her. It isn’t quite like how she used to feel around him, but the feelings are still there. Maybe, she thinks, after how much emotion existed between the two of them, it will always be impossible to see him and feel nothing.
“I’m sorry that you had to find out like this, that this was how the two of you met. But I just, I don’t know, Wallace told me… I thought… I wanted you to have someone…” she looks at him as tears begin to trickle from her eyes and her voice drops to a whisper, “…When I’m gone.”
Lucas stares at her, new pain etched into his features and tears filling his beautiful eyes, and her heart breaks a little more as he slowly shatters before her.
He was supposed to have the normal adolescence that was stolen from her, he wasn’t supposed to come from school to find her lying passed out on the kitchen floor with blood running from her nose, he wasn’t supposed to hold his mother’s hair back as the drugs that kept her alive killed her stomach, he wasn’t supposed to watch her slowly wither away. His life was supposed to be filled with happiness and fun, not days spent watching his mother lying in a hospital bed with drugs running through her veins, drugs that are killing her to keep her alive.
She had it all planned, after all this time it’s almost enough to make her laugh, shouldn’t she know better than anyone that making plans only leads to disappointment? But in spite of all that, she had still thought that maybe this time things could be different, that maybe this time the plans she made would be good enough, strong enough to survive, but once again all that she is left with broken memories of a future that she got to taste but never touch.
As she looks at him she can feel the panic rising, bubbling up through her body and trying to escape through her mouth. She tries to clamp it all down, her hand flies involuntarily to her mouth as she tries to hold the fear that is quickly spreading throughout her body in prickling waves from spilling out her mouth and flowing out into the world. Because no, no, no, no, no, no I can’t leave my baby all alone, I don’t want to die. I don’t want to leave him, I can’t leave him, I can’t… I don’t want to die. The anger and the fear are battling for control of her body, her mind, it’s all taking over and this is not how she wanted to live (not how she wanted to die.) And she can’t panic now, he can’t see her like this, she has tried so hard to keep this calm, to be in control for him, but right now it is taking every ounce of self-control that she has to keep from screaming. Not words, not questions, just let fear and anger and desires un-realized come pouring from her mouth in one long non-syllable wail from the depths of her soul.
She is almost shaking with the effort that it’s taking to hold herself together, shivers spreading from the pit of her stomach and her head pounding and fading at the same time. Her thoughts are flying past too fast to even recognize, and she can hear Lucas’ voice faintly in the background, can see him blurrily from the corner of her vision, but the energy to focus her attention to him eludes her. She suddenly notices how erratic her breathing has become, a rattling, jarring noise coming from her chest as she struggles to inhale oxygen past the pressure in her chest. The light is fading slightly from her eyes, but its getting harder to register it. She feels something soft beneath her hands and vaguely realizes that her fingers have wound themselves into Lucas’ hand, her fingernails clutching into his flesh as she struggles to stay afloat. His voice sounds so far away, almost like he’s underwater, but she can hear the hint of panic in his tone even if she can’t make out his words. She tries to speak, but what comes out is barely a whisper, tries to smile calmly, but all that comes are tears. Lucas takes her hand and wraps his free arm around her shoulders, pressing her face against his shoulder as he whispers soothingly to her. His arms are shaky but solid as he holds her, and his voice breaks but he never stops rocking her gently.
“I’m sorry, baby,” she whispers when the world’s spinning slowly returns to normal, “I’m so sorry, I’m sorry…” The hushed whispers tumble from her lips like a mantra, oblivious to his constant shushing.
“Its fine mom,” he whispers in a slightly tear-stained voice, the words cracking as his throat threatens to close, “It’s okay, everything is gonna be okay.” The last part is spoken almost like a half prayer as he holds her tightly, the child becoming the parent. They both know that it’s a lie, a comforting blanket of denial that they wrap around each other tightly, but it’s the only thing that can keep their feet from slipping across the edge and into the abyss.
* * * * * *
Logan takes a final deep breath (at least his tenth by now) as he prepares to knock on the door. He almost turns away, but then after a brief hesitation he lifts his fist and taps against the door. Within five seconds of his knock he hears footsteps rushing toward the door, and then silence as whoever stands on the other side of the door hesitates before finally opening the door, and then just like that, in an almost mirror of two days before, Logan finds himself faced with a strange reflection of himself.
“Hi.” he says nervously, awkwardly.
Lucas half smiles at him anxiously, “Hi.” He replies, giving a sort of twitchy wave and then flushing slightly and ducking his head a little.
They stand before each other while an uncomfortable silence settles around them as the seconds tick by. Logan is just about to speak, break the silence when all of a sudden a large black flash suddenly bursts through the door and launches at his chest.
“Oomph!”
The sound escapes Logan’s mouth as he stumbles back across the porch, his back hitting the low railing just as Lucas half shouts, “Rocky! Down!” He crosses the porch quickly and grabs a hold of the beast’s collar and drags her away from Logan, “Bad girl!” he admonishes as he pushes her back towards the door.
“Christ,” Logan mutters as he regains his balance, “What the hell was that?”
Lucas grins up at him from where he sits hunkered down beside the slightly fluffy black and brown demon, “This is Rocky. She’s normally a good girl, aren’t you, monster?” he says affectionately as he scratches at her ears. “She just gets excited around new people. Sorry.”
Logan crouches down beside him and holds a hand out toward the dog which she sniffs and then begins licking earnestly, he laughs and pats her affectionately, “It’s fine. She gorgeous,” he adds, “but isn’t Rocky kind of a uh, masculine name?”
Lucas laughs, “Yeah, well, blame Mom.”
And at the very mention of her, the air suddenly fills with discomfort and awkwardness again. Lucas stands up stiffly and gestures toward the car, “So, uh, should we go?”
“Yeah, right. You’re all ready?” Logan asks, and at Lucas’ nod he stands and follows the younger man down the steps.
They are silent in the car, the music on the radio providing a very thin distraction. Logan feels the boy’s eyes on him, but whenever he turns to meet his eyes they are swiftly turned away, a faint flush blooming on the younger man’s cheeks.
During his brief surreptitious glances, Logan finds himself appraising the boy. It’s almost scary, like seeing a slightly blurred image of his seventeen year-old self in his son’s face. It feels a little strange, but it creates some sort of bond in his heart as he memorizes in an instant each curve and line that exist in his face. As he looks at Lucas, even though he has only known him, known of him, for less than 48 hours he feels as though the two of them are connected in some strange, almost intrinsic way.
When they finally arrive at the café they find a table and sit down in silence, both of them trying desperately to find a way to break the silence which seems more and more suffocating as each second ticks slowly past. When the waiter comes to take their order Logan almost jumps at the sound. They order nervously, and smile at each self-consciously before settling back into averted gazes and surreptitious glances.
“So what do you do?” Lucas asks finally, breaking the awkward silence that has settled around the two of them like a heavy cloud.
Logan looks across the table at him with no small amount of surprise, “I’m uh, I’m a lawyer. A public defender actually, I mostly work with kids. It’s pretty messed up, but I sort of… I don’t know, I guess I’m still making up for my misspent youth.” he says with a wry smile, “What about you? Do you have any ideas about what you’d like to do?”
“I don’t really know,” Lucas admits. “Mom got me into photography when I was younger, and I love that… but I don’t really know if I want to make that my career. Sometimes I think it could be pretty cool though, you know? The world is just… I don’t know how to explain it, it’s almost like I can show the rest of the world how I see things when I take a picture.”
He looks so earnest that Logan can’t help but respond to his obvious passion in the boy’s face, “It sounds great; I’d love to see some of your pictures sometime if you wouldn’t mind.”
Lucas smiles shyly at him, “That’d be great.” He says, ducking his head a little as Logan grins in response.
Lucas sits in silence for a long moment as he tries to build up the strength to ask his next question, “What was my mom like in high-school?” He suddenly asks, his words tumbling over themselves.
Logan looks at Lucas, slightly startled; so far aside from the slight mention of her name, the topic of Veronica has been out of bounds all afternoon. Logan tries to search his mind for any memory of Veronica that isn’t overpowered by the current haze of ‘evil heartless bitch’ that clouds his mind at the thought of her.
“Your mom? God… she was… Before Lilly died, she was like, just all sweetness and light, for lack of a better term. She just sort of had this… innocence, I guess, she was just so happy… we were all so happy. We lived in almost like this bubble or something… and then Lilly… well, Veronica’s told you about Lilly.” Logan looks away as he speaks, lost in memories of nights of champagne and games, and of children who never really understood the true meaning of loss.
“And then after Lilly… She was a fighter, your mom, she never really gave up, she always had to fight back, always had to… dig at everything… everyone, until she uncovered every secret. And it paid off, she found out who killed Lilly… Found out everything... But… I don’t know…” His voice trails off as he realizes that Veronica’s son probably doesn’t need to listen to every feeling of betrayal that Logan has ever experienced at the hands of Veronica Mars.
Lucas just looks at him and nods, his expression corresponding his complete understanding of all facets of his mother’s personality. He looks away then, studying the ground as the wheels in his mind turn, and he’s silent for so Logan starts to worry a little, just before he is about to speak though Lucas suddenly looks at him, “Aaron Echolls was your dad, wasn’t he?”
Logan flinches slightly at the words, even after all these years those words still feel like a prison, still a yoke he is trying to throw off. His eyes flick towards Lucas, and he sees no morbid curiosity in the boy’s face, just sympathy and a sort of understanding.
“Yeah. Dear old dad.” Logan replies with a sardonic twist to his mouth.
Lucas simply looks at him, meets his eye and for the first time he is the one to hold the contact, “I’m sorry.” he says, his expression so lacking in guile that it seems almost foreign to Logan.
“My mom… she used to talk about you sometimes… Like, she never said you were… my dad or anything. But she used to tell me stories sometimes, and you were in them. I used to… I don’t know, even before all of this, I used to sort of wonder about you,” Lucas tries to meet his eyes, fighting the slight flush that is blossoming on his cheeks, “Just… I don’t really even know… Just the way that she talked about you, you always seemed like someone that I kind of wanted to meet. Maybe not quite like this,” he adds with a ghost of a smile, “But… I just sort of wanted to tell you… Finding out that you were… my dad… it wasn’t exactly a disappointment.”
Logan looks over at him, and for some inexplicable reason he feels torn between grinning like an idiot and dragging the poor boy into a bear hug, or just giving in to the tears burning in the back of his throat. He clears his throat and smiles weakly at him, “Thanks.” He says. He knows that one word is inadequate, but from the smile Lucas shoots at him before returning his attention to the plate the waiter has just placed in front of him, he feels as though maybe it managed to say everything he couldn’t.
“I, uh, I had a good time today.” Logan says turning to Lucas as he pulls the car up into Veronica’s driveway.
“Yeah, me too.” Lucas agrees, grinning over at him unexpectedly, and that smile – the way that it lights up his entire face from the inside – almost breaks Logan’s heart.
Lucas jumps out of the car and waves as he begins loping up the front path. Watching him walk away, Logan suddenly feels overcome by a wave of panic that as soon as Lucas leaves his sight he’s never going to see him again.
Logan steps out of the car quickly and Lucas stops and half turns back to him expectantly. Logan clears his throat nervously, glancing down at the ground before looking back up at Lucas, “We should… Would you like to do this again sometime?”
He feels almost as nervous as a gawky adolescent asking a girl out on a date for the first time, he feels completely ridiculous, not exactly his favorite feeling but unfortunately a rather familiar one. He stares at the kid (his son!) expectantly while he waits for an answer, a long moment in which he is sure the answer is going to be a resounding no, after all, why should this kid really want to have anything to do with him? Look at the family Logan came from, why on earth would anyone want to acknowledge that gene pool? But Lucas surprises him when the corners of his mouth twitch slightly and grow into a smile.
“Yeah… I’d like that.” Lucas replies with a small shy smile before ducking his head as he turns and continues up the front steps. Logan stands and watches until he disappears into the house, with the door shut behind him. He feels the oddest mixture of pride and panic as he watches him, he just seems so strong and together, so much more than Logan or Veronica ever seemed to be. And Logan feels so compelled to stand until he is safely inside the house, as though now that he has found him, his son could disappear like smoke in the blink of an eye. It feels almost strange to be so attached, so attuned, to a person he has only just met, but in Lucas he can see all the things he ever wanted to be, he feels as though he has always known him. Looking at his son - this person that he played no real part in creating, but whom he sees himself in so clearly - Logan feels the broken edge of his soul finally start to become complete.
* * * * * *
It is on their third afternoon together that Lucas lets it slip, the two of them are sitting on park bench watching Rocky eagerly dive about after the Frisbee that Lucas is half-heartedly throwing to her,
The pauses between the two of them are beginning to approach almost comfortable, and the words are starting to flow lightly and easy. Logan keeps on finding himself losing track of the conversation just because he keeps on being distracted by the glow on Lucas’ face as he talks about his love of photography, just the passion that seems to light up the boy’s eyes as he speaks.
“I was gonna go into this program, sort of like a summer camp. But then, you know, when mom got sick that all sort of fell apart…” Lucas’ voice fades away as he draws in a slightly hectic breath and darts a quick glance at Logan’s face to gauge his reaction.
Logan feels slightly numb at first; the words just bounce straight off his head before rebounding and sinking in. It’s a perfectly innocuous phrase; after all people get colds, get the flu, constantly. But something about the boy’s tone and the way that he suddenly looks away after speaking, sends a chill racing along Logan’s arms as an all too familiar sickening feeling rolls over him in waves. He feels as though he’s free falling in deep water, sinking deeper through the heavy darkness as he watches the light fade away above him with no power to stop it.
“Your mom’s sick?” He asks, a little freaked out by how calm and relaxed his voice sounds even to his own ears. It sounds sort of far away though, as though he’s listening to himself through a tunnel. “How sick?.. What do you mean?”
Lucas simply looks at him, his eyes shining brightly with unshed and unnoticed tears and speaks in a voice brittle with long held and hidden agony, “Mom has cancer… She’s uh, she’s dying.”
Chapter Three
.
Author: evie_0
Pairing/Characters: Veronica, Logan, Keith, Lucas(OMC)
Word Count: 3,926
Rating: NC-17
Summary: This is a kind of AU of my story Living Without Her.
Future fic: in this version of events, Veronica tells her dad and Wallace that she has cancer a lot earlier, and they manage convince her to tell Logan about their son too. (I suck at summaries, and no, I didn't just spoil the original story)
-This chapter deals with Veronica trying to explain her decisions to Lucas, and also a bit of Logan/Lucas father/son bonding.
Spoilers: Pretty much safe if you've seen 2x22, with a slight knowledge of early s3
Warnings: Angst
Disclaimer: Not at all mine
A/N: I realize it might be a little odd to do an AU of my own fic, but this story wouldn't leave me alone. Betaed by the always wonderful
earth2mars (thanks so much sweetie!) any mistakes are mine.Thanks to everyone who read and commented on the first chapter, and I hope you like this part too! :)
Chapter One is here
Veronica stares blankly at the television screen, her eyes barely seeing the moving images before her, her mind replaying the past 24 hours events in constant repeat.
All she’s heard from Logan was a strained conversation where he asked her for permission to spend time with Lucas, they managed to be civil, but all the previous day’s anger was simmering barely restrained below the surface.
Lucas meanwhile has basically avoided meeting her eye, any conversation between them is pretty much mono-syllabic and awkward.
The two of them are sitting in silence in the living room, TV on but barely acknowledged and Rocky, their malamute/rottweiler cross that they got from the pound two years ago, sitting at their feet and wagging her tail, blissfully unaware of the that fills the room.
Keith went to bed an hour ago, citing old age but the expression of concern on his face as he left the room betrayed the flimsy excuse.
“So… how’s school, sweetie? Got any girls after you?” Veronica asks, breaking the silence, her tone aiming for jovial but not quite making it.
Lucas just turns his head and stares at her, his expression blank but his eyes full of hurt and anger, looking so much like the way Logan’s had the day before that it makes her breath catch for an instant.
“Sorry,” she amends, “I just… I don’t know… you know?” she asks, holding her hands out helplessly.
Lucas continues to stare down at the floor for a long moment, and when he finally speaks his voice is slightly broken and he won’t meet her eye, “Mom? Why didn’t you tell him… Logan, about me?”
Veronica feels as though all of the air is being sucked from the room, as though she is drowning and flailing, she has been waiting for this question for almost seventeen years now and yet she can’t think of a single answer.
“I’m sorry.” She whispers, because the only other things that come into her mind are irrelevant excuses and justifications that she is starting to realize hold no worth anymore.
“Mom,” he says thickly, trying to fight the tears forming in his eyes, “I don’t need you to apologize, I just need to know why.”
She searches her mind for the answers she knows he deserves, but all thoughts have fled and she comes up empty. She stares at him helplessly, tears filling her eyes at the sight of the child she swore to always protect in so much pain, pain that she caused.
“I don’t know why, sweetie,” she admits, her voice breaking, “I just… I just don’t know. I was… I was really proud, you know? And I didn’t want to go to him, because I knew that he would want to marry me or something… just out of obligation… And I didn’t want our lives to be like that, for any of us…” her voice trails off as her mind drifts back to months and years of loneliness and fear of the future, choices she chose wrong and people she pushed away, “I’m sorry, ok? It was the wrong decision. I know that now… I probably knew it then, it just got so much harder to take back the more time that went by. And I just… didn’t want to deal with it. I’m sorry,” she sobs, trying to hold her expression together, “I know that’s selfish, and I know that it’s hurt you, but I just didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to do this, I just… I’m sorry, ok?” she pleads, “I was wrong. And I never wanted to hurt you, I never meant to hurt you… either of you.”
They sit in silence for a long time, the two of them lost in their thoughts and imaginations.
Lucas looks at her questioningly, his eyes earnest for answers and any information, “How long were you two together?”
“We were together… God, I don’t know, it was so on and off all the time. I guess it was over like, five years or so… but we could just never made it work, things just always made everything fall apart, we always made everything fall apart. There was just too much history, too many things we couldn’t leave in the past…” The memories wash over her as she speaks, images flashing in her mind of kisses and arguments, a time spent with so much passion. And then she thinks of the way he looked the day before, after all these years without him she didn’t expect her reaction to seeing him again to feel like this. She actually sort of thought that after all this time of seeing his face in Lucas that her senses would be slightly dulled when it came to Logan, but that ghost of a flicker still exists, is still haunting her. It isn’t quite like how she used to feel around him, but the feelings are still there. Maybe, she thinks, after how much emotion existed between the two of them, it will always be impossible to see him and feel nothing.
“I’m sorry that you had to find out like this, that this was how the two of you met. But I just, I don’t know, Wallace told me… I thought… I wanted you to have someone…” she looks at him as tears begin to trickle from her eyes and her voice drops to a whisper, “…When I’m gone.”
Lucas stares at her, new pain etched into his features and tears filling his beautiful eyes, and her heart breaks a little more as he slowly shatters before her.
He was supposed to have the normal adolescence that was stolen from her, he wasn’t supposed to come from school to find her lying passed out on the kitchen floor with blood running from her nose, he wasn’t supposed to hold his mother’s hair back as the drugs that kept her alive killed her stomach, he wasn’t supposed to watch her slowly wither away. His life was supposed to be filled with happiness and fun, not days spent watching his mother lying in a hospital bed with drugs running through her veins, drugs that are killing her to keep her alive.
She had it all planned, after all this time it’s almost enough to make her laugh, shouldn’t she know better than anyone that making plans only leads to disappointment? But in spite of all that, she had still thought that maybe this time things could be different, that maybe this time the plans she made would be good enough, strong enough to survive, but once again all that she is left with broken memories of a future that she got to taste but never touch.
As she looks at him she can feel the panic rising, bubbling up through her body and trying to escape through her mouth. She tries to clamp it all down, her hand flies involuntarily to her mouth as she tries to hold the fear that is quickly spreading throughout her body in prickling waves from spilling out her mouth and flowing out into the world. Because no, no, no, no, no, no I can’t leave my baby all alone, I don’t want to die. I don’t want to leave him, I can’t leave him, I can’t… I don’t want to die. The anger and the fear are battling for control of her body, her mind, it’s all taking over and this is not how she wanted to live (not how she wanted to die.) And she can’t panic now, he can’t see her like this, she has tried so hard to keep this calm, to be in control for him, but right now it is taking every ounce of self-control that she has to keep from screaming. Not words, not questions, just let fear and anger and desires un-realized come pouring from her mouth in one long non-syllable wail from the depths of her soul.
She is almost shaking with the effort that it’s taking to hold herself together, shivers spreading from the pit of her stomach and her head pounding and fading at the same time. Her thoughts are flying past too fast to even recognize, and she can hear Lucas’ voice faintly in the background, can see him blurrily from the corner of her vision, but the energy to focus her attention to him eludes her. She suddenly notices how erratic her breathing has become, a rattling, jarring noise coming from her chest as she struggles to inhale oxygen past the pressure in her chest. The light is fading slightly from her eyes, but its getting harder to register it. She feels something soft beneath her hands and vaguely realizes that her fingers have wound themselves into Lucas’ hand, her fingernails clutching into his flesh as she struggles to stay afloat. His voice sounds so far away, almost like he’s underwater, but she can hear the hint of panic in his tone even if she can’t make out his words. She tries to speak, but what comes out is barely a whisper, tries to smile calmly, but all that comes are tears. Lucas takes her hand and wraps his free arm around her shoulders, pressing her face against his shoulder as he whispers soothingly to her. His arms are shaky but solid as he holds her, and his voice breaks but he never stops rocking her gently.
“I’m sorry, baby,” she whispers when the world’s spinning slowly returns to normal, “I’m so sorry, I’m sorry…” The hushed whispers tumble from her lips like a mantra, oblivious to his constant shushing.
“Its fine mom,” he whispers in a slightly tear-stained voice, the words cracking as his throat threatens to close, “It’s okay, everything is gonna be okay.” The last part is spoken almost like a half prayer as he holds her tightly, the child becoming the parent. They both know that it’s a lie, a comforting blanket of denial that they wrap around each other tightly, but it’s the only thing that can keep their feet from slipping across the edge and into the abyss.
Logan takes a final deep breath (at least his tenth by now) as he prepares to knock on the door. He almost turns away, but then after a brief hesitation he lifts his fist and taps against the door. Within five seconds of his knock he hears footsteps rushing toward the door, and then silence as whoever stands on the other side of the door hesitates before finally opening the door, and then just like that, in an almost mirror of two days before, Logan finds himself faced with a strange reflection of himself.
“Hi.” he says nervously, awkwardly.
Lucas half smiles at him anxiously, “Hi.” He replies, giving a sort of twitchy wave and then flushing slightly and ducking his head a little.
They stand before each other while an uncomfortable silence settles around them as the seconds tick by. Logan is just about to speak, break the silence when all of a sudden a large black flash suddenly bursts through the door and launches at his chest.
“Oomph!”
The sound escapes Logan’s mouth as he stumbles back across the porch, his back hitting the low railing just as Lucas half shouts, “Rocky! Down!” He crosses the porch quickly and grabs a hold of the beast’s collar and drags her away from Logan, “Bad girl!” he admonishes as he pushes her back towards the door.
“Christ,” Logan mutters as he regains his balance, “What the hell was that?”
Lucas grins up at him from where he sits hunkered down beside the slightly fluffy black and brown demon, “This is Rocky. She’s normally a good girl, aren’t you, monster?” he says affectionately as he scratches at her ears. “She just gets excited around new people. Sorry.”
Logan crouches down beside him and holds a hand out toward the dog which she sniffs and then begins licking earnestly, he laughs and pats her affectionately, “It’s fine. She gorgeous,” he adds, “but isn’t Rocky kind of a uh, masculine name?”
Lucas laughs, “Yeah, well, blame Mom.”
And at the very mention of her, the air suddenly fills with discomfort and awkwardness again. Lucas stands up stiffly and gestures toward the car, “So, uh, should we go?”
“Yeah, right. You’re all ready?” Logan asks, and at Lucas’ nod he stands and follows the younger man down the steps.
They are silent in the car, the music on the radio providing a very thin distraction. Logan feels the boy’s eyes on him, but whenever he turns to meet his eyes they are swiftly turned away, a faint flush blooming on the younger man’s cheeks.
During his brief surreptitious glances, Logan finds himself appraising the boy. It’s almost scary, like seeing a slightly blurred image of his seventeen year-old self in his son’s face. It feels a little strange, but it creates some sort of bond in his heart as he memorizes in an instant each curve and line that exist in his face. As he looks at Lucas, even though he has only known him, known of him, for less than 48 hours he feels as though the two of them are connected in some strange, almost intrinsic way.
When they finally arrive at the café they find a table and sit down in silence, both of them trying desperately to find a way to break the silence which seems more and more suffocating as each second ticks slowly past. When the waiter comes to take their order Logan almost jumps at the sound. They order nervously, and smile at each self-consciously before settling back into averted gazes and surreptitious glances.
“So what do you do?” Lucas asks finally, breaking the awkward silence that has settled around the two of them like a heavy cloud.
Logan looks across the table at him with no small amount of surprise, “I’m uh, I’m a lawyer. A public defender actually, I mostly work with kids. It’s pretty messed up, but I sort of… I don’t know, I guess I’m still making up for my misspent youth.” he says with a wry smile, “What about you? Do you have any ideas about what you’d like to do?”
“I don’t really know,” Lucas admits. “Mom got me into photography when I was younger, and I love that… but I don’t really know if I want to make that my career. Sometimes I think it could be pretty cool though, you know? The world is just… I don’t know how to explain it, it’s almost like I can show the rest of the world how I see things when I take a picture.”
He looks so earnest that Logan can’t help but respond to his obvious passion in the boy’s face, “It sounds great; I’d love to see some of your pictures sometime if you wouldn’t mind.”
Lucas smiles shyly at him, “That’d be great.” He says, ducking his head a little as Logan grins in response.
Lucas sits in silence for a long moment as he tries to build up the strength to ask his next question, “What was my mom like in high-school?” He suddenly asks, his words tumbling over themselves.
Logan looks at Lucas, slightly startled; so far aside from the slight mention of her name, the topic of Veronica has been out of bounds all afternoon. Logan tries to search his mind for any memory of Veronica that isn’t overpowered by the current haze of ‘evil heartless bitch’ that clouds his mind at the thought of her.
“Your mom? God… she was… Before Lilly died, she was like, just all sweetness and light, for lack of a better term. She just sort of had this… innocence, I guess, she was just so happy… we were all so happy. We lived in almost like this bubble or something… and then Lilly… well, Veronica’s told you about Lilly.” Logan looks away as he speaks, lost in memories of nights of champagne and games, and of children who never really understood the true meaning of loss.
“And then after Lilly… She was a fighter, your mom, she never really gave up, she always had to fight back, always had to… dig at everything… everyone, until she uncovered every secret. And it paid off, she found out who killed Lilly… Found out everything... But… I don’t know…” His voice trails off as he realizes that Veronica’s son probably doesn’t need to listen to every feeling of betrayal that Logan has ever experienced at the hands of Veronica Mars.
Lucas just looks at him and nods, his expression corresponding his complete understanding of all facets of his mother’s personality. He looks away then, studying the ground as the wheels in his mind turn, and he’s silent for so Logan starts to worry a little, just before he is about to speak though Lucas suddenly looks at him, “Aaron Echolls was your dad, wasn’t he?”
Logan flinches slightly at the words, even after all these years those words still feel like a prison, still a yoke he is trying to throw off. His eyes flick towards Lucas, and he sees no morbid curiosity in the boy’s face, just sympathy and a sort of understanding.
“Yeah. Dear old dad.” Logan replies with a sardonic twist to his mouth.
Lucas simply looks at him, meets his eye and for the first time he is the one to hold the contact, “I’m sorry.” he says, his expression so lacking in guile that it seems almost foreign to Logan.
“My mom… she used to talk about you sometimes… Like, she never said you were… my dad or anything. But she used to tell me stories sometimes, and you were in them. I used to… I don’t know, even before all of this, I used to sort of wonder about you,” Lucas tries to meet his eyes, fighting the slight flush that is blossoming on his cheeks, “Just… I don’t really even know… Just the way that she talked about you, you always seemed like someone that I kind of wanted to meet. Maybe not quite like this,” he adds with a ghost of a smile, “But… I just sort of wanted to tell you… Finding out that you were… my dad… it wasn’t exactly a disappointment.”
Logan looks over at him, and for some inexplicable reason he feels torn between grinning like an idiot and dragging the poor boy into a bear hug, or just giving in to the tears burning in the back of his throat. He clears his throat and smiles weakly at him, “Thanks.” He says. He knows that one word is inadequate, but from the smile Lucas shoots at him before returning his attention to the plate the waiter has just placed in front of him, he feels as though maybe it managed to say everything he couldn’t.
“I, uh, I had a good time today.” Logan says turning to Lucas as he pulls the car up into Veronica’s driveway.
“Yeah, me too.” Lucas agrees, grinning over at him unexpectedly, and that smile – the way that it lights up his entire face from the inside – almost breaks Logan’s heart.
Lucas jumps out of the car and waves as he begins loping up the front path. Watching him walk away, Logan suddenly feels overcome by a wave of panic that as soon as Lucas leaves his sight he’s never going to see him again.
Logan steps out of the car quickly and Lucas stops and half turns back to him expectantly. Logan clears his throat nervously, glancing down at the ground before looking back up at Lucas, “We should… Would you like to do this again sometime?”
He feels almost as nervous as a gawky adolescent asking a girl out on a date for the first time, he feels completely ridiculous, not exactly his favorite feeling but unfortunately a rather familiar one. He stares at the kid (his son!) expectantly while he waits for an answer, a long moment in which he is sure the answer is going to be a resounding no, after all, why should this kid really want to have anything to do with him? Look at the family Logan came from, why on earth would anyone want to acknowledge that gene pool? But Lucas surprises him when the corners of his mouth twitch slightly and grow into a smile.
“Yeah… I’d like that.” Lucas replies with a small shy smile before ducking his head as he turns and continues up the front steps. Logan stands and watches until he disappears into the house, with the door shut behind him. He feels the oddest mixture of pride and panic as he watches him, he just seems so strong and together, so much more than Logan or Veronica ever seemed to be. And Logan feels so compelled to stand until he is safely inside the house, as though now that he has found him, his son could disappear like smoke in the blink of an eye. It feels almost strange to be so attached, so attuned, to a person he has only just met, but in Lucas he can see all the things he ever wanted to be, he feels as though he has always known him. Looking at his son - this person that he played no real part in creating, but whom he sees himself in so clearly - Logan feels the broken edge of his soul finally start to become complete.
It is on their third afternoon together that Lucas lets it slip, the two of them are sitting on park bench watching Rocky eagerly dive about after the Frisbee that Lucas is half-heartedly throwing to her,
The pauses between the two of them are beginning to approach almost comfortable, and the words are starting to flow lightly and easy. Logan keeps on finding himself losing track of the conversation just because he keeps on being distracted by the glow on Lucas’ face as he talks about his love of photography, just the passion that seems to light up the boy’s eyes as he speaks.
“I was gonna go into this program, sort of like a summer camp. But then, you know, when mom got sick that all sort of fell apart…” Lucas’ voice fades away as he draws in a slightly hectic breath and darts a quick glance at Logan’s face to gauge his reaction.
Logan feels slightly numb at first; the words just bounce straight off his head before rebounding and sinking in. It’s a perfectly innocuous phrase; after all people get colds, get the flu, constantly. But something about the boy’s tone and the way that he suddenly looks away after speaking, sends a chill racing along Logan’s arms as an all too familiar sickening feeling rolls over him in waves. He feels as though he’s free falling in deep water, sinking deeper through the heavy darkness as he watches the light fade away above him with no power to stop it.
“Your mom’s sick?” He asks, a little freaked out by how calm and relaxed his voice sounds even to his own ears. It sounds sort of far away though, as though he’s listening to himself through a tunnel. “How sick?.. What do you mean?”
Lucas simply looks at him, his eyes shining brightly with unshed and unnoticed tears and speaks in a voice brittle with long held and hidden agony, “Mom has cancer… She’s uh, she’s dying.”
Chapter Three
.
Current Mood: 
creative
creativeCurrent Music: Samson - Regina Spektor
23 comments | Leave a comment