Chapter Text
Mac swept into the Mars apartment, coat stretched protectively around her laptop case. “I hate these afternoon storms. Isn’t it supposed to never rain in southern California?” She tossed her soaked jacket back out in a heap on the balcony, but squared the case on the side table with care. Veronica grinned, appreciating the ritual. If there was one consolation prize- besides increased odds of survival- for her new case-free mocha-slinging lifestyle, it was the chance to have friends instead of clients. To learn their quirks, and not just their secrets.
"You can't trust pop meteorology nowadays." Veronica shook her head with exaggerated sadness, then looked down as Backup beeped. “Either you picked up imitations from that parrot, or you’re lying on my phone.” He shifted to rest his chin on her thigh, and she saw the screen flash from just under his beefy shoulder. “There, the less unsettling answer. Although it could have come in handy, I guess.”
Shaking water onto Mac as he came through, Wallace dodged her half-hearted smack and rubbed his hands together, saying, “So! What’s today’s safe, wholesome entertainment? Croquet? Ninja turtle reruns? V?”
She barely heard him, staring down at the message on her phone. Duncan says your jackass is going after the community pool tonight. Going after - of course. She closed her eyes, remembered herself in pink, headed to summer school with a bag lunch for a boy like it was 1952. She shouldn’t have needed it spelled out for her, wouldn’t have, before Normal Living and –and- whatever she and Logan were, had slowed her down. The toadies with their gas cans had barely registered over her awareness of his bicep by her cheek, his fingers light on the tendons of her wrist. Her mind on his mouth instead of the weak lie coming out of it: stupid.
She'd let the pause go on too long, her friends were waiting, but her chest was too tight, she couldn't pull in the breath to speak. Get it together, Mars. Shake it off, make a Donatello crack, pretend it's not happening. Act normal. But she was tired of it already, the sunny facade, even when she wanted to stay curled up inside it forever.
Looking up, finally, she pressed her lips together hard before answering, "today’s entertainment is…me freaking out about my boyfriend?"
There wasn’t impatience or contempt on their faces, though Wallace drawled "break out the popcorn!" just as Mac said, "hmm, a niche film." Veronica smiled a little and held out her phone, her hand not quite steady.
Wallace blocked Mac’s grab for the phone and read it aloud with her crowded over his elbow, his eyebrows knitting together as he took it in. "Logan stop eating his Wheaties, again?"
"Meg sent it." She said quietly. "I should be grateful. She's barely talked to me since school let out."
Mac's eyes were still on the screen. "So much for character arcs."
"Excuse me?"
"Oh, you know, someone hurts an 09er, he takes it out on innocent people. Summer sequels are the worst." Mac's voice had been teasing, earlier, but this had a bitter edge.
Veronica studied her, hesitating between defensiveness and concern. "And where do the MacKenzie's swim?"
"The NCC - that has to be the one. We haven't been all summer, since Ryan broke his arm. It's been driving him crazy," she paused, then added, "he gets his cast off next week. I'll be physically dragging him out at closing time every day."
Assuming it was still there. Veronica thought about...she couldn't piece it together. Hot air and the smell of gasoline; Logan's hand in her hair and hers holding tight to his collar; finding shards of glass in both, after. Mac's resentful eyes, and Wallace's worried ones. Mrs. James saying 'white knight syndrome' and her dad saying, ‘you can't save 'em all, sweetheart.’ Like that ever stopped them from trying.
She could call him. Expose his secret, read him the riot act, and listen to his bullshit town-at-war excuses. Try to stand by him, until he and Weevil exhausted their rage or somebody else died. She could plead with him to be safe while he begged her to stay out of it, like a normal girlfriend, at least normal for the kind of Spaghetti Western they seemed to be enacting.
Or she could dump him, and work on the kind of normal her dad wanted for her, shifts at Java the Hut and bland, high-achieving guys who only used gas cans when they helped little old ladies mow their lawns. Let Logan spiral into arson and booze and whatever sexcapades came with the full Casablancas Friendship Experience. Her stomach turned over at the thought.
Or…or they could catch him, they way she’d caught card cheats and secret societies: make a scene, force a resolution, see where the bodies landed. Why should she choose, if she could make him do it? She eyed Mac, who was still frowning at the phone. Even if he wouldn’t stop, he could damn well look his collateral damage in the face.
A plan unrolled in her mind: vague, still, but rapidly developing. It wasn’t a safe idea, particularly. But Logan Echolls wasn’t the only one in Neptune with a reckless streak. Smiling, Veronica turned to her friends. "Still looking for some drama?"
Mac looked up sharply at her tone, her face transformed in an instant from sullen to intrigued. Wallace held on to his concern for a couple of seconds, but then cracked, shaking his head at them even as he grinned. "After the last couple of weeks? It better be Shakespearean."
“You know, I think we might be able to manage that?” she said, and smirked back, catching her bottom lip with her teeth as her mind whirred. They needed access, a member list, a timetable. Abruptly remembering Meg, she grabbed her phone back to type out: Thanks for the tip. Want to help stage a very showy intervention? “Especially if we can recruit some drama queens.”