it's getting harder and harder to breathe

[logan_echolls]

I was invited, but you never would have guessed it. Dick was off somewhere trying to score with a freshman and the Beav was probably already throwing up an hour into this whole thing (none of us ever expected him to hold his liquor well). Yeah, I was invited to this whole bash - the one Dick called the total blowout before things totally sucked ass

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[logan_echolls]

She smiles when I pass her the jacket to put over top of her no-sleeved dress and it's a small smile that I haven't seen from much of anyone lately. At least one girl in Neptune can keep up a form of good cheer. It's even almost refreshing if our conversation didn't sound like it had the long awkward pauses of a first date. But, it's one of those things where you don't indulge in what you've heard about the other rather than just find out for yourself.

"Well, if you'd remembered a sweater it would counteract this whole giving you my coat thing," I commented with small smile curving up on my lips. I could almost feel this genuinely which was a difference of anything else the past few... hell we could go with years if I hadn't had that small fling (whatever.) with Veronica.

I know I'm bordering on a tone that means I'm flirting with Meg, but I'm not even sure if that's it. Maybe this is all just something to smile for a while. Screw old lovers. Or potential lovers. Who even knows what Meg's relationship with Duncan was like. All I know is that there's love and there's loss and I've had nothing else in between. I've smiled for at least a brief moment around Meg which is more than anything I've really had in a while as far as happiness.

She didn't care about the rumour mill, but that's possibly because it didn't exactly involve her right now. Maybe she would care later, but she didn't care enough to stop standing around me. She does know more than most people what it's like to be in the spotlight. I mean, I'd even heard the crap that'd gone on for that purity test. It seemed meaningless, but it obviously did something to her.

"I think that's more of one of those things I'd already almost forgotten about," I said to her. Yeah, but I didn't have anyone dump me over false answers. "Though possibly we should just be questioning the general lack of intelligence behind our classmates," I pointed out again with a small smirk.

Maybe I caught her off guard by the whole not wanting to be alone and actually asking her to come with me where ever we were going to go, but the whole thing is that we don't exactly need them to have any semblance of a good time. That's pretty much the point.

"We could just go out to get a bite," I offered with a shrug towards her. And the whole thing was weird. I knew that. Just by the surprised tones we got from each other. "Look, I don't really know you that much, Meg, but... I'm sure we could have a hell of a lot more fun than anyone back in there," I replied, motioning towards the house. "I plan on proving it."

[xmeg_manningx]

"And then you would have missed out on your little moment of chivalry. Very true." I smiled back at the small smile spreading on Logan's face. "So it's a good thing I forgot my sweater then, is it?" I asked, playing with my cross lightly between my fingers.

Was he flirting with me? Or was he just making an effort to be nice to what I'm thinking is the first person to show him the same courtesy in weeks? And does it really make a difference? Last I checked we were both single, and flirting's pretty much harmless.

"Not everyone was quite so lucky as to have the reason their reputation was trashed broadcast on the school news." I comment, again keeping my voice light. If I can make it through college without my parents looking at me the way they have a tendency to look at Lizzie again, I'll consider that a victory. "But you're right... or maybe we should just enroll the entire school in some sort of seminar on how not to treat people? Or would that just give them more ideas?" I teased.

"Okay." I nodded with a smile after he explained where the invitation had come from. I wasn't exactly sure why he was wanting to prove to me the two of us could have more fun than everyone at the party. And apparently it had seemed as out of the blue to him, and he's the one that suggested it in the first place. "Do I look like I'm having a problem being seen with you?" I added, "Now, do I need to question the transportation again?"

I still wasn't exactly sure why Logan was suddenly interested in spending time with me... but salvaging the evening, or at least attempting, seemed like a good plan, somehow.

[logan_echolls]

"Yeah, it's good," I agreed after a small moment of pause. I'm not sure if she's really noticed, but there wasn't anyone else who had witnessed that fight and came out to even see virtually if I was okay like she had. There's also not a large amount of girls lining up to call me or think of me in any way chivalrous. Meg might possibly be the first.

She smiles back, mirroring my own smile, as she plays with a small cross strung around her neck. I'm not sure I've even seen her without the cross in the entire time I've known her. I'm just noticing this now. I can't help but think we're maybe entirely opposites - and yet I'm placed higher above then the louts in the house possibly because I didn't start that whole thing.

I'm also beginning to think she'd smile or seem this pleasant through anything. Even when she's talking about the fact that her name was trashed across the school news' broadcast her voice is light and soft instead of growing bitter towards the student populace that did this crap to her. I think it's total bullshit. If she's angry towards it, I'd rather see the anger slip out of her. I makes it more real. Just, not everyone can handle real.

Or maybe she looks on the upside which is almost completely unfamiliar to me. The upside always had been expressing that rage not turning it into a joke that wasn't cutting them down in return.

I can't help it, my lips quirk into a wider smile. "We can take my car. I'll drive you back after we're done."

"Are you always this... uplifting?" I ask, searching for a word to really describe what she's doing. She was hurt at one point but it's not like she's lingering and it couldn't seem any more further than what I had always done. It had always been easier to hold close to that pain and relish in it. No one else would do it for me so I did it for myself. Gratification and the need for something - anything - to be real, even if I had to confirm it myself.

[xmeg_manningx]

"Nice to know." I smiled softly. Apparently even the guys everyone else had completely wrote off could have little moments of consideration for others. Which was also nice to know. I could practically see his confusion as to why I was even out here with him right now, but the way I figure it, if I ever had the entire school turn on me in some lasting way I'd want someone to take a chance on being nice to me. Pretty simple concept, this whole treat others how you want to be treated thing.

"Works for me." I smile back as he says we'll take his car. Like mine wasn't perfectly safe where it was?

"Right, because being bitter and twisted and plotting revenge is the healthy way to deal?" I countered when he questioned my attitude, "The way I see it, whatever's happened? It happened. It's done. I can't erase it. I don't get a do-over. The one thing I can control is how I choose to deal. I can either dwell on the hurt and the pain, or I can move on and try to be happy." I explained. "Doesn't mean I've forgotten... just that I'm not letting it run my life." I'd have gone crazy a long time ago otherwise. Not that anybody even had the slightest inkling - I'd perfected the not letting the pain twist me up inside by the time I was in middle school. Again with things being easier if I continued to be the perfect daughter. Popular, pretty, perfect grades. All part of the Meg Manning image that everybody knows and loves.

"I just put all the negative energy into other things, I guess." I shrugged. "So, lead the way?"

[logan_echolls]

"Well, hey, who am I to judge," I replied, lifting my hands in a small surrender as she countered my questioning of her uplifting positive attitude. So, maybe she indulged in it even in the least, but I didn't know that. Overall, Meg Manning seemed to be bubbly what ever the world chose to bring her down with this week. "All I'm saying is that it can't hurt to indulge within yourself sometimes." Yeah, I was precisely the one who shouldn't be giving advice. I knew that.

"I didn't realize plotting revenge was so unhealthy. I'll have to... uh, cross that off my to do list," I joked lightly towards her as I stuffed my hands in my pockets, showing her the way to the XTerra. It was like drawing lines. She was light and I was dark. She was verging on opposing me entirely.

Maybe it was healthier the way that she did things, but I couldn't seem to wrap my mind around how she could ever do that. Give up rather than deal it out and ride along with the pain. Of course, she probably hasn't had any sort of life changing things. You know, the usual: cold, uncaring father figure; murder; deceit; sex, lies and videotape. For all that I knew the purity test could be the worst thing that had ever happened to Meg.

I opened the passenger side door for her before I went around to get into the driver's seat. No sense in not completing this whole chivalrous act for her.

[xmeg_manningx]

"To each their own, right?" I smiled at his small surrender. "Just because it works for me doesn't necessarily mean it works for everybody." There was a difference in dealing with the pain privately, and then trying to move past it than not dealing with it entirely. Which is probably what he thinks I do. But I really didn't have to justify my behaviour to him.

All I knew was that I was fairly sure I was a happier person than my sister was, so something must be working. I never felt the need to act out to get attention from people the way she does though. Being friendly generally always worked.

"Might be something worth a half a second's consideration." I laughed softly as we walked to his SUV. Of course, on the grand scale, he had a lot more reasons to be bitter and hateful than I did. But mine were pretty big in their own way. Whatever. This wasn't about who's life was worse, or who had the most reason to lash out at the world. We were talking about how to then deal with all that garbage.

I smiled as he opened the passenger door for me. "Thanks, Logan." I said, as I climbed in and got settled, amused that he was actually keeping up the chivalry thing for the most part. Probably because I made the comment in the first place. But either way, I wasn't complaining.

"So, where are we headed?" I asked smiling. I was trying to figure out how we'd managed to never really spend any time together before tonight. Being at the same functions didn't really count. We'd known each other since the sixth grade, you'd figure there'd be something there. I guess that proves how fractured even the elite in our school is. All the little subgroups within it.

[logan_echolls]

Yeah, she possibly has to be the most understanding person in Neptune too. For a moment, she almost reminds me of Veronica before everything with Lilly went down - before Lilly died, before Duncan dumped her, even before last year. The whole optimism trying-to-help-everyone-else sort of clues me in. I think maybe that could possibly be why Duncan started dating her. Hey, this year is all about us trying to capture the normal that we had but lost.

We were never normal. Not ever.

I wasn't trying to attempt to recapture something that was never there. I lingered over the loss of the two closest people in my life because after Veronica and Duncan there wasn't anyone left. There wasn't anyone I wanted to be close to ever again. Not if it all turned out like that - playing out the outside and watching them in. It hurt more than I could have ever expected.

"I'll keep it in mind," I told her. Everyone else... everything else was just some sort of filler. Something that you never desired, but kept you going.

I wasn't having fun, but I wasn't about to say that. She knew why. She probably heard some way around that a couple weeks ago Veronica had just dumped me like I was nothing to her before retreating to Duncan's arms around the time of her birthday. It was like there was something in me that was hard to digest.

Still, Meg's small smiles, the conversation... it's something - It's not nothing.

"Um, you're not horribly opposed and/or allergic to some foods, are you?" I asked, since I hadn't any idea where we were going yet. I pulled at the seat belt and hooked myself in. "Pasta, burger, slushie sugar-high preference?" I offered with a small grin when it came to even mentioning the liquid sugar.

[xmeg_manningx]

I knew I really didn't know Logan very well at all. I knew what Duncan told me the times he'd talk about his past, but that was about it. Still... there's something in his eyes before he says he'll keep in mind crossing off the revenge from his to-do list. It's practically screaming that he's thinking about Veronica getting back with Duncan. He's probably wondering why I'm not more pissed off at Duncan, too, even though he has no idea how far things went with the two of us. The things I did in some stupid attempt to keep him with me when it had been clear even before that - Duncan Kane was, and possibly always would be completely in love with Veronica Mars.

That hurt, but I know it's not her fault. She was still with Logan, very publicly so, when he dumped me. It wasn't hard to see why Logan would feel hurt and betrayed.

"I'm not picky. Though from the look on your face, I'd say your feeling partial to the slushie." I smirked, "Though, don't ask me where to get one of those that isn't the movie theatre or a convenience store, since I'm at a total loss."

"And Logan?" I start gently, not even sure I should be verbalizing this, "I know what it feels like... seeing them together. It was pretty obvious the night he found out about you and Veronica that he was still - saying he lost it wouldn't be an exaggeration." I told him. "So if you ever want to talk about it or commiserate or anything... there is somebody who understands. I know it's not quite the same, but you aren't the only one they hurt."

Yeah, probably should have just skipped offering the shoulder to lean on to him, given we barely knew each other, but he seemed like he could use someone who was willing to act like he mattered even remotely right now. Who knows, maybe the shared misery can lead to friendship of some kind? Wouldn't be the worst thing to happen. I'm sure the school rumour mill would love that. Head cheerleader befriending accused murderer. Because of course we're only our stereotypes.

"Now that I've totally sucked all the tiniest scraps of fun out of the evening, you sure you still want to hang around me?" I asked with a weak smile.

[logan_echolls]

There was something about seeing your best friend (or the guy who was recently your best friend) and your, also recent, ex-girlfriend share kisses. Of course, I'm sure this is exactly how Duncan might have felt in any way a few months ago when my dad threw that surprise party. Yeah, surprise. I was with Veronica at that time and Duncan was the first one who chose to walk out on me. He was the only one I thought never would. I don't know what was worse: seeing them together or the fact that both were now a current existent non-existent in my life.

Things had been falling apart with us after Lilly died. I mean, Duncan's Duncan, but he closed off more than anyone else after losing his sister - and I got that because I lost her too. Lilly, at one point, had meant the world. Our entire world was just gone.

Even though the last year seems like a blur, I can pin it down to one event that made us lose each other so completely. When mom died everything just crumbled a little more. He couldn't indulge in some useless search for someone who wasn't there - not like Veronica did. And I had believed... I had actually believed she was still alive when the thing is that she died well before she ever took a dive off the Coronado bridge.

Veronica was suddenly the one who was there and I took it. I can't even remember how things changed in between the two of us.

"A week or two ago, something like that, I was passing by the coffee shop that Veronica works at and there he was with her. I mean, I'd heard about them before this whole thing... how can you not, right? ... and they both looked happier than I had seen them in probably years," I exhaled softly. "I should be happy for that, right?" It wasn't a question I wanted answered. "Happy for them. In reality it just really sucks." I have my best friend hating me for things my father did and my girlfriend who just wanted him all along. Yeah, thank god they were happy.

I shrugged off my words with a small wave like I was dismissing the whole thing. "I'm sure this isn't exactly how you saw your evening going." Commiserating over slurpies, yeah. That was probably just thrilling to her.