Two Week Stay-cation // (Logan, Veronica, ensemble) G
Title: Two Week Stay-cation -+- Chapter Three of --?-
Author: cloud_forest
Pairing/Characters: Logan/Veronica, Aaron, Lynne, Lilly, Keith, and Lianne
Word Count: 4,898
Rating: G (this part)
Summary: Set pre-series, at the end of the school year before Lilly dies. Keith and Lianne go on vacation, and decide to have Veronica stay at Logan's while they're gone. During her stay with the Echolls, Veronica and Logan start to... notice each other.
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: So I walk up to Rob Thomas one day, and I’m all “dude, I write VM fanfiction… can I like, have VM?”, and he’s all “bitch you’d better get a lawyer! That shit’s mine!” and I’m all “cool your jets dude, I’m kidding”. Pshaw. [/weirdness]
Author’s Note: To anyone who, like me, doesn’t play a lot of X-Box, just fyi: Soul Calibur is a two-person fighting game, pretty much the same as Mortal Kombat.
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{ Week One || Day Three ~ Sunday }
“Knock, knock.”
Veronica looked up from her book and saw Logan standing in the doorway, knuckles resting on the frame where he’d tapped along with his words.
“Hey,” she met him with a smile, not in the mood for her usual approach of hostility, no matter how insincere it usually was. Curled up in one of the chairs, she was bathed in a healthy solution of sunlight.
“What’s up?” Digging his hands into his pockets, he wandered into the main room and flopped onto the couch.
“Nothin’ much. Just a bit of reading. I love how sunny it is in here,” she looked around at the walls of windows surrounding her.
“So it’s working out pretty good?”
“Honestly? If this place were a little bigger I’d probably make an attempt at convincing my parents to move in,” she joked. “Backup seems to like it too,” she added after both of them noticed him entering the room, emerging from a two-hour nap. He approached Logan, movements lethargic. Even his tail wagged at half its usual tempo.
“You mean it’s up to his exacting standards?”
“Most definitely. In fact, he likes it so much here, he made his mark on that couch just a few hours ago.”
“What?!” Logan yelped, ripping his hand away from where it was scratching at the pooch’s ears and jumping up.
Veronica was already crippled by laughter, watching as he smoothed his hands over every crease of his clothing, looking for any pungent wet spots. “Logan,” she choked out. “I’m kidding. My dog is probably better house-trained than some of your friends,” she got out between giggles.
“Wow, Veronica. Funny. Say, are you looking forward to your eighth birthday this summer?”
“Oh, shut up. We both know you’d try the same thing on me if you had the chance.”
Unable to come up with a retort that wouldn’t be a total lie, he rolled his eyes and returned to the couch. After nosing his hands a couple of times, Backup convinced the teen to resume his attentive scratching. “So, do you have anything in mind for dinner tonight?”
“Like what?” Veronica looked at him with a wrinkled forehead. She thought he was familiar with the layout of this place, and its total lack of anything resembling a kitchen. Except for the sink at the bar. Perhaps she could make boiled water with a side-order of ice cubes.
He shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe you and Lilly made plans or something…”
“Nope. I be flyin’ solo t’night, Captain.” Pirate talk? Since when did she do that? Mental note, Veronica thought to herself. Don’t do that.
“All right, well, I came out here to let you know that Sunday is family dinner night, so you won’t have to fend for yourself like last night.”
“Hm, that sounds nice.”
“Yeah,” he scoffed. “You say that now…”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Veronica was perplexed by his attitude. Something that was happening even more often now that she was living with him. He never seemed all that… thrilled when it came to family activities.
“Nothing.” He waved the comment off.
Despite his nonchalance, it was obvious to her that he meant anything but nothing. Still, she knew he wasn’t the type to open up under pressure, so she let it slide. “Any idea what we’re having?”
“I dunno. Our chef hasn’t come in yet, and he usually plans whatever it is he’s making when he gets here.”
“You guys have your own chef?” Even though she should have expected it, she was still surprised.
“Yeah, but don’t let my parents know you know that. Make sure you tell my Dad how great his cooking is.”
“All right…” she said slowly. Rich people were freaking weird sometimes.
“Anyway, the news has been delivered, so my job is done here.” Giving Backup one last good head-rub, Logan stood up and started toward the door. “Dinner will be at seven.” He spun around on his heel to face her as he spoke, but used his momentum to finish the turn and swagger out of the pool house.
“I can’t wait…” Veronica called behind him, somewhat sarcastic. She sat there for a moment after he left, still confused by some of what he’d said during their short exchange, and the ways in which he’d said it.
Why did he find it funny that she’d imagine a family dinner with the Echolls to be pleasant? From what she understood, Aaron and Lynne had a marriage that was in many ways parallel to the ones they portrayed on-screen. They loved each other like a pair of twenty-somethings who were still excited by all the facets of their relationship. They adored, and were adored by, their children. Within the walls of their shopping-mall-sized estate lived a family that was lucky enough to possess both wealth and love.
Was there something more to the brief snapshots she garnered from Entertainment Tonight and the tabloids? When Lilly told her about the sort of things that went on when she visited, did she omit certain details?
A chilled breeze skittered over her skin, conjuring a design of goosebumps along its path. The shiver that echoed down her spine yanked her from the thoughtful daze, and she returned her book to a readable position.
Why did she let herself coast down those paranoid highways of thought? Sometimes she was almost frightened by the efficiency with which her mind was able to concoct such conspiracies.
Of course Logan was going to have a sour response to her suggestion that spending time with his family would be nice. Every teenager at Neptune High was experiencing that typical allergic reaction to their parents. It was practically programmed into their DNA.
So she decided to shut down that annoying little voice tucked in the deep recesses of her brain that liked so much to wonder about the hidden sordid lives that populated the 09er district. For the next two hours, she was just going to read her book and relax. Then, as instructed, at seven o’clock she’d join her hosts for dinner and enjoy watching Logan squirm under his state of parent-induced agitation.
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“That might’ve been the best caesar salad I’ve ever eaten,” Veronica scraped the remaining swirls of salad dressing from the bottom of her plate and licked the thick droplet off her fork. “Please tell me that recipe is available to the public.”
Lynne laughed. “I’m afraid not. Sorry. But, let that just be an incentive for you to join us for dinner some other time after you’ve gone.”
“Oh, trust me, I’ll be back for more of that. Whether you want me here or not.” Her comment earned a chuckle from everyone except Logan, who just gave her an unenthused ‘oh, yay’ look from his seat beside her. She kicked his foot under the table. He glared, and then returned fire.
“So Veronica, have you made any plans for summer vacation yet?”
Aaron’s question forced an early cease-fire between the two teens, and she turned her attention to the movie star. “Um, no. Not yet. But Lilly and I might go to L.A. for a few days. I mean, I know it’s not very far from here, but we think it’ll be fun to just get out of Neptune and hang out in a hotel room.”
“You should do that,” Lynne chimed in with enthusiasm. “Sounds like it would be a lot of fun. Sort of a mix between a real vacation and a road trip.”
“That’s what we were thinking too,” Veronica agreed. “Since we’d be driving there, we could stay at a different hotel each night if we wanted. Kind of migrate through the city.”
The saccharine chatter went on for a few moments, and every so often she would catch a glimpse of Logan observing her with amusement. He probably enjoyed having someone else around to occupy his parents. She tried very hard to steer the conversation towards him, hoping to remove the pins that were keeping the edges of his mouth turned upward and extinguish the mocking glint in his eyes. Aaron and Lynne didn’t cooperate though, repeatedly tailoring their questions specifically for her.
They were interrupted though when the main course was served. Aaron and Lynne began discussing how wonderful everything looked, and how they really should take a trip to this country and to that country so they could experience each one’s unique culinary prowess.
When Veronica’s plate was set down before her, she took one look at her meal… and was horrified. Whatever was staring back at her definitely didn’t fit the definition of food. Even a cockroach would probably plug its nose and sprint for the fire escape if it stumbled upon this dish.
A mound of grainy yellow and green stuff was pasted to the plate. On top were chunks of what looked like some type of meat drowning in a viscous fluid the colour of milky coffee. Orbiting the terrifying concoction was a log cabin of green beans with three tangerine slices for a roof. Drizzled between them was an outline of red glaze, which she assumed- and hoped -was perhaps a raspberry or strawberry sauce. What it was doing on her dinner plate was a mystery… although it was hardly the most prominent question surrounding this strange diorama.
Picking up her fork, she propelled it toward her meal with the tentative hand of a surgical intern who was about to make her first cut. Then she poked it. Nothing extraordinary happened, except the yellow and green stuff was displaced, and with it so was the meaty substance. She pulled back, and probed the food impostor again with her pronged instrument, this time retrieving some of the granular bits and bringing them in for a closer inspection.
Rule number one, if you have to look at it under a microscope to figure out what it is, you probably shouldn’t eat it, suggested a little voice in her head.
Logan noticed her strange behaviour, and she felt his elbow in her side a minute or two into her inspection. She jerked a bit, whipping her fork down to the surface of her plate and looking over at him.
He was grinning. “They don’t serve food like this around the Mars table very often, do they?” he asked, inhaling a bite of food from his own plate.
Veronica stole a quick glance at his parents to make sure they were still absorbed in their own conversation before responding. “I’m not sure if I’m supposed to eat this, or make a science project out of it.”
He laughed in agreement, nodding as he grabbed another forkful.
“What is it, anyway?”
“I dunno. I’m pretty sure this is pork,” he said, pointing at the substance she’d suspected to be meat. “The junk underneath it though is anybody’s guess. But it’s good.”
“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, unconvinced.
“I guess that doesn’t make it any more appetizing, does it?” The question sounded funny coming from someone who’d already plowed through three-quarters of the same stuff that she hadn’t yet touched to her lips.
“Not really,” she admitted, already wondering how she was going to explain to the Echolls why she was finished dinner without having touched her entrée.
Logan must’ve heard her thoughts, and surprisingly, taken pity on her. “Here,” he said, nudging her again. She turned to look at him, but before she could ask what he was doing, he was already executing a plan to help her out of her dilemma. “No actually, I don’t know where my parents got that painting from,” he said in a raised voice, looking over his parents’ shoulders to a framed landscape at the edge of the room.
Veronica followed his line of sight only because she was wondering what he was talking about.
Aaron and Lynne looked up from their conversation after noticing their son’s inquiring tone. “What’s that honey?”
“That painting. The one with the big flowery field. Veronica was wondering where you bought it.”
When the two adults turned to address the artwork he was referring to, Logan grabbed Veronica’s plate and switched it with his.
“I don’t know…” Aaron was mumbling in the background while Veronica realized what had just happened. Sitting before her now were just the entrails of the evening’s main course. Enough was gone that she could be excused from the table without anyone wondering how she could be full.
“I think it was from a gallery in San Diego, but I’d have to check. Was there a reason you wanted to know?”
“Oh… um, no,” she said with a one-armed shrug. “I just… think it’s nice.”
“Well you have excellent taste,” Lynne chirped. After a few more exchanged pleasantries, she and Aaron resumed their conversation, leaving the two teenagers free.
“Thank you so much,” she half-whispered to her accomplice.
“No problem. Less for you, more for me,” he said with glee, breaking ground on his second dinner.
Veronica, meanwhile, did two things. First, she thanked the gods of nature for bestowing such ravenous hunger upon teenage boys. Second, though glad she wouldn’t have to choke back the mutant food that had been offered to her, she wondered how she was going to survive the rest of the night on nothing but a salad.
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Woops! This chapter was too long for one post. Follow this link to the Conclusion of Chapter Three...