Fic: How to be Dead (Lynn, Logan/Veronica) R (1/2)
Title: “How to be Dead”
Author: em2mb
Pairing/Character: Lynn, Logan/Veronica.
Word Count: 13,895
Rating: R
Summary: It’s going to be a hard sell, since everyone who knows her will expect sleeping pills and chardonnay. Lynn Echolls doesn’t jump, but she doesn’t leave it all behind on the Coronado Bridge, either.
Spoilers: Primarily through 2x22, but includes the L/V relationship arch through 3x15.
Warnings: Probably a strong PG-13, but R to be safe. Includes all the usual unsavory fare of Neptune, including mild language, alcoholism, child abuse, and character death.
Author's Notes: The characters might belong to Rob Thomas, but I’ll require their use if my claim is accepted at 100_situations. Named after the Snow Patrol song, simply for the irony that it came on while I was planning a fic on this particular subject. Special thanks to jayiin and lazaefair, the usual partners in crime. More notes below. Prompt: alive.
October 2004
I was doing well, only on my third drink for the day. But then I turned on the TV and watched the corners of my son’s mouth turn up as he announced Aaron would donate half a million to the Neptune soup kitchen. I don’t wait to see what my husband will say. It doesn’t matter how he reacts on screen. It never has. I know what’s coming, and I pour myself another drink without finishing the first.
Aaron, unsurprisingly, does not acknowledge me as he storms into the house. He shuts the door of his office immediately, but Logan comes over to kiss my cheek before retreating to Aaron’s bedroom. I wonder if he knows I no longer share the bed with his father. Logan emerges minutes later and disappears into the office.
I close my eyes. I’m used to the rhythmic slap of leather on bare skin, muffled by the closed door, but I’m not used to the cries that come later. My silent pleas mix with my son’s increasing more vocal ones.
Please stop. Please.
Logan stopped screaming years ago, determined to show his father he wasn’t afraid. But Logan cries out now, and tears sting my eyes.
It goes on. There’s not enough alcohol in the world. Even as the rest of my thoughts swim, I can’t remember why I stayed, why I let this happen.
There’s a thud. I cringe, setting my glass on the table as Aaron throws open the office door angrily. I sway on my feet as I stand.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?” I challenge.
Aaron grabs my arm. “Don’t baby him. He needs to learn his actions have consequences.”
“Baby him?” I’m angry. “That’s it, Aaron, I’m-”
“You’re what, Lynn?” Aaron’s tone is low. “Go in there to help him, and I’ll see that he ends up even worse.”
So I wait, forty-five excruciating minutes until my husband heads for the kitchen. I join him, but not before crushing three sleeping pills into his Mai Tai.
He doesn’t excuse himself for another hour, and by the time I burst into his office, my own buzz is wearing off. I choke back tears as I approach Logan, who is sprawled out on the couch, blood soaking the pristine white fabric.
“Oh, honey,” I say, reaching for him. He wriggles away. He’s still shirtless, orange fabric bunched up around his head. He won’t let me touch him, but he does pull the fabric away to reveal an angry looking cut at his hairline. My hand flies to my mouth. It’s nothing to say for the mangled flesh of his back.
“I’ll be in my room,” Logan says weakly. He sways on his feet as he stands, and I realize he’s been blacked out on the couch this whole time. I nod, trying to figure out what to do to clean up Aaron’s office. The couch will have to be replaced or at least reupholstered, and there’s blood on the corner of my husband’s desk-the obvious source of my son’s head injury and the thud I heard earlier. I go to the hall closet where the maids keep the cleaning supplies.
Later, when Aaron is out cold, I climb the stairs to Logan’s room, where my son is laying facedown on his bed. I slip into his bathroom and return with a cool rag and antiseptic. He buries his face in his pillow as I gently swab at the welts, now encrusted with blood. I can’t imagine how much it stings.
Slightly more, still, than the biting words he throws back at me, I imagine.
“When you were eight-” I start.
“Don’t,” says Logan, breaking in. “Don’t say it. Don’t tell me how he promised to change. He didn’t change, and you should have left when you had a chance.”
I call Logan’s school the next morning to excuse him before going upstairs to wake him, figuring he could use the extra rest. But the woman answering the phone seems confused.
“Do you mean that Logan is going home at some point today, Mrs. Echolls?” she says. “Because your son is already at school, has been all day.”
* * *
January 2005
Neptune is a small town, but the people here like to live large. That’s why two private investigators can make a living in the same area code. Keith Mars may have fallen from grace over the Lilly Kane murder investigation over a year ago, but he’s the PI to go to if you want honest, discreet work. Vinnie Van Lowe has never been reputable. When you step into his office, he pours you booze (he’ll later bill you for it) and lays out the unscrupulous options you might want to pursue.
But somehow, after my third scotch, I manage to throw a curveball at Neptune’s most morally ambiguous.
Van Lowe swings his legs off his desk and leans forward. “You want me to what?”
“I want you to leak the proof of Aaron’s infidelity to the tabloids,” I say. “And for incentive to keep this between you and me, I’ll pay you double and match whatever profit you make reselling your photographs.”
“That’s very generous, Mrs. Echolls,” Van Lowe says, throwing a pen from one hand to the other. He holds up the bottle. “More scotch?”
I push my glass across the desk for him to refill. “It’s hardly generous given your propensity to double cross your client-how many times have I hired you to investigate my husband to no avail?”
Van Lowe smirks. “What can I say, Mrs. Echolls? Pieces just fell into place this time.”
“I suppose they did.” I down my drink and get out my checkbook. “Well, Mr. Van Lowe, do we have a deal or not?”
“We have a deal.”
He offers me his hand, but I refuse to shake on it. Instead, I hastily scribble a check from my personal account. With a curt nod, I let myself out of the office before I have to endure another minute of conversation with the private eye.
My hand is shaking as I turn the key in the ignition of the Viper, but I tell myself it’s nerves over what I’m about to do, not the alcohol. I grope around in my purse for my pills and throw back two before heading back to the mansion, praying that this time Van Lowe doesn’t double-cross me.
I’ve known for years about Aaron’s affairs, but before, the local PI had always proclaimed my husband to be squeaky-clean. Eventually, when I realized my meetings with Van Lowe always ended with Aaron beating Logan in a fit of inexplicable rage, I stopped trying to catch him in the act. It stopped being worth it, and when Mars Investigations opened up shop, I just wasn’t sure I could draw someone I had once consider an ally in on the sordid affair. I remembered Keith dropping Veronica off at our house in his squad car, waving from the driveway, and Keith stopping by after the neighbors would call, worried there’d been a domestic disturbance, his eyes begging me to let him help while Logan and I swore things were just fine.
I putter around the house for a while before checking on Aaron, asking if he’d like anything particular for dinner. He is watching himself in Beyond the Breaking Point, and his only response is a grunt aimed in my direction.
For several days, I wait. And then Logan storms in from school one afternoon, throwing a tabloid at the sofa, where his father is sitting.
“Really, Dad,” he snarls. “When I saw her at the Kane’s summer party, you said I could do better. Clearly, you can’t.”
I say a silent prayer for the stomach wound that prevents Aaron from attacking Logan just then. I’m visibly shaken, but not for the reasons my husband thinks I am. I keep waiting for my plan to backfire. It does, three days in.
I pass out on the couch in the living room overnight, having been determined the night before to overcome my fear with bourbon. I stumble through the house, trying to find my son or my husband or the help, but no one’s around. It finally dawns on me that it’s morning, and Logan’s at school and the housekeeper has the day off. But it doesn’t explain where Aaron is, or change the fact he’s still supposed to be taking it easy.
When he does return, three hours later, it’s to slam the door angrily and shove me down on the couch. He slaps me, hard, and yanks me up by the front of my blouse.
“Thought you were being clever, didn’t you? Van Lowe might not have tipped me off again, but he’s not an honest man. Keith Mars is.”
“You aren’t,” I spit, trying to appear nonchalant. Secretly, I’m terrified.
“Maybe not,” Aaron replies, “but it’s not like you have anything to brag about. Selling your husband’s infidelity to the paper and capitalizing on the empathy? Really, Lynn, I didn’t expect anything so cunning from you.”
“It’s not about the empathy,” I return. “It’s about watching you fall.”
Aaron finally releases me. “I don’t plan to take the fall. I plan on having you do it for me.”
“Excuse me?”
He calmly takes a seat next to me, holding my hand in his. “You got us into this mess, Lynn. You are going to get us out.”
I laugh harshly. “And what makes you think I can even do that?”
“You can’t. Seeing as I’m sure you’ve wasted your creative energy engineering my public humiliation, I plan to do the same. You’ll go along with my plan, of course, and disappear.”
“Disappear?”
Aaron touches my face lightly. “Well, you’ll have to, since they won’t find the body, and we can’t have you cropping up. I don’t really want to see you go, Lynn, and it’s going to be a hard sell, since everyone who knows you will expect sleeping pills and chardonnay. But under the circumstances-an impulse-over dramatic and over the top. You’ll leave a note on your Blackberry.”
“What in God’s name are you on about, Aaron?”
“We’re going to fake your suicide, darling, so I never have to kiss your ridiculous collagen-injected lips for the camera ever again.”
I’m so disturbed by what he’s suggesting that I don’t even register the jab he’s taken at the appearance he helped create. I narrow my eyes. “What makes you think I’ll go along with it? Maybe I want to play the adoring wife that forgives you for your sins.”
“It would be so characteristically spineless of you,” Aaron murmurs. “You’ll go along with it.”
“Never,” I say. “If you want me gone, you’ll actually have to kill me.”
Aaron smirks, tracing my jaw once more. “No. I’ll have to kill Logan.”
His voice is chilling, positively devoid of humanity, telling me he wouldn’t hesitate to rid himself of me at the expense of our son’s life. I can’t imagine how he’d do it. He’s not that cunning, is he? I offer him a challenging look. He leans in, so I can feel his breath on my ear.
“Do you remember the first time you hired Van Lowe to tail me?” Aaron hisses. “Our first summer in Neptune? Do you remember my making you watch me snap his pathetic little arms, or did you finally manage to drink that memory away?”
Seventeen hours later, a part of me is relieved to be slipping into an unmarked black van with a security agent shaking my hand. He’s telling me about the life I will lead as Anne Lester, but all I can think about is the life Logan will continue under Aaron’s roof.
* * *
May 2005
When it finally registers that I can’t go back, I’m so far in the bottle I consider never crawling out again. It turns out that Aaron is very generous in my death, and when I find out just how much he has provided for me, I realize he’s been planning something like this for a very, very long time. He loves me enough to spare me, but not his own son? The notion leaves me reaching for another Jack and Coke.
But passing out in Florence isn’t so different than passing out in Neptune, and after visiting my fourth foreign emergency room in as many weeks, I check myself into rehab.
No one visits for family counseling, and there’s some creativity on my part when I explain how I ended up there, but I feel sober after ninety days.
Sober, and ready to go home.
Only Aaron is waiting for me when I try. It’s my arm he twists and my arm he yanks, but I stand up to him. I tell him he won’t win this one. I tell him I’ll be back.
For Logan.
But while the thug he hired off Jake Kane is making sure I don’t stray from my San Diego hotel room, news breaks in Neptune. I know something has happened when Wiedman leaves me unrestrained and to my own devices. He gets the call and exits an hour before it hits the news.
Aaron murdered Lilly Kane.
It doesn’t register until the next morning, and I’m overcome. My legs collapse underneath me in the hotel lobby as I pass the large flat screen broadcasting crimes worse than infidelity to the whole world. One of the bellboys helps me to a chair and brings me water, but since I’ve changed my hair and makeup and plastic surgeon be damned, I’m done with Botox, it’s easy for me to pass it off as obsessed fan over devastated ex-wife.
God knows I always felt guilty enough around the Kanes, knowing the contributions Logan made to Lilly’s debauchery. I can’t imagine facing them now, but I know I must.
On my way out to my car, I ignore the protests of the staff that perhaps I shouldn’t be driving so soon after collapsing, and for a moment consider the man my husband hired to keep me from doing precisely what I planned to do.
I may have fucked your underage daughter and clubbed her to death to keep our secret safe, but Jake, really, could you give me a few tips about hiring private security?
What’s a few discretions among old friends, after all?
There’s no music on the radio as I drive, only talk of the developing scandal. The sex tapes. The Kane cover-up. And, breaking in, the arrest of the younger Echolls, also for murder.
I almost lose control of my car, but when I manage to steady the BMW, I consider running it into oncoming traffic just the same. The only thing stopping me is the safety rating the salesperson crooned about. The Coronado Bridge sounds better and better, but it’s south and I’m traveling north.
After all, it has to be some kind of misunderstanding-or so I tell myself as I take calming breaths and tell myself I don’t want a Jack and Coke, not really.
Unsurprisingly, Logan makes bail that afternoon, but Aaron is not released. I check into the Camelot and try to figure out how I will approach him. There’s no help guide for mothers who pretend to commit suicide because their abusive ex-husbands threaten to kill their children.
It’s a fairly small market, I know, but I imagine it would help as I walk barefoot along Dog Beach early one morning the week after the news hits. I’ve been out there everyday, there and every other beach my son ever surfed at, hoping the summer swells will lure him out eventually. Today, his XTerra is parked up the beach, but the waves aren’t particularly impressive, and the sky is overcast.
Half a mile down the beach, I finally see a few young men bobbing in the waves, but it doesn’t seem like Logan’s among them. Just the same, I find myself stalling. I pull a hat and sunglasses from my tote as I stroll closer to the water’s edge, unsure how to proceed. Quiet conversation behind me prompts me to refocus my attention.
Logan’s at the beach all right, but not in the surf, and it occurs to me at once I’ve gone about this the wrong way. He looks as bad as he did when Aaron used to finish with him, a fading black eye and yellowed bruises along his jaw.
I realize that this is it. I let the tide lap at my toes for a few more seconds, not caring what the salt water will do to my most recent pedicure. Anything to delay the confrontation that’s sure to come. I finally turn my head, just as the blonde nestled against my son’s chest raises hers.
It’s not Lilly, of course, the girl I had long ago accepted as the one he’d date and marry and grow old with, but another girl I know almost as well. I pray the tabloids aren’t around to see how he tenderly brushes Veronica’s hair back from her face, despite the obvious pain his wince suggests the gesture brings.
“Careful, Logan,” she warns, and I step back in the surf, even though it’s clear they couldn’t care less about me or anyone else on that beach. I know the look on her face, the one my son is returning. It’s the one that makes directors cast actors on sight in dramas with romantic subplots. It’s the one that says fuck the world, the one that excludes everyone but each other. It’s what I had with Aaron once.
I shudder at the thought. Veronica’s eyes glance down to her hand, placed lightly on Logan’s chest, and I imagine a fight on the Coronado Bridge with the PCH bike club meant broken ribs. I watch him tenderly capture her hand in his and kiss her forehead.
Aaron and I had never had that.
“I’ve survived worse, Veronica,” Logan mumbles. I close my eyes, recalling his childhood and the many resultant emergency room visits and bottles of antiseptic.
“I’m sorry,” she says softly. His free hand tangles in her hair.
“It’s not your fault.” Logan sighs. “It’s over, though, right?”
“Right,” Veronica returns uncomfortably. The silence that follows says they don’t need to be told it’s far from over. I close my eyes and take a few more steps into the water. I still don’t think they care about my presence, but I want to be careful just the same. . I can’t bring myself to interrupt this moment. What I came here to do will just have to wait. I face away from them, staring resolutely at the ocean.
“I still can’t believe this is happening,” Logan says hollowly. “Lilly and... Dad.”
Veronica murmurs her agreement. I can tell she’s waiting for him to open up. He doesn’t. “Logan, it’s... it’s okay to be upset.”
Logan chuckles. “I had to talk to Ms. James after she died, too, Veronica. I know it’s okay to be upset.”
I glance over my shoulder. Her hand is snaking up his chest, touching his cheek. “No, Logan. I mean... it’s okay to be upset with Lilly.”
“Are you?”
Veronica hesitates. “A little, yes. I don’t understand how she thought it was okay to do that to you. Or...”
“Or what, Veronica?”
“Logan-I mean, the scars on your back... I noticed them when we were just lounging about the apartment yesterday. You and Lilly...” Veronica falters slightly. “You and Lilly did a lot more than lounge around. How could she not notice?”
“I didn’t let her,” Logan says gruffly. “Or... I don’t know, Veronica. She never mentioned it. She never asked. Maybe she didn’t want to know.”
“How do you ignore something like that?”
“My mom always did.”
I’m suddenly cooler than the water running across my feet. I don’t want to hear this, but I stand, transfixed.
“I had wondered,” Veronica says at last. “I mean, I had wondered if she knew.”
Logan whistles lowly. “Believe me, she knew.” I can hear them shift in the sand, but I can’t bear to look. “She’d sit outside my dad’s office when he’d-when he’d-you know. And she’d clean me up afterwards.”
“Logan-”
“No, she was a good mom, Veronica.” Logan laughs bitterly. “If it weren’t for her taking me to the hospital a bunch of those times, I probably would have died. I was too little, and Dad didn’t understand-God, Veronica, don’t cry, I’m fine.”
I want to cry with her. I want to invent a time machine and take back the last thirteen years, but even that wouldn’t be enough.
“No, Logan, you’re not. Parents aren’t supposed to hit kids! They just aren’t! And-” A sob breaks her off, but after several sucking breaths, she starts again. “And don’t you ever die on me, okay?”
His voice is muffled, as if she’s buried in him. “Okay.”
I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t ever make this right.
“Promise we’ll figure this out together?” he asks finally. When Veronica doesn’t respond, I imagine she’s nodded. “I-you know what’s weird?”
“What?”
“You’re the closest thing to family I have left. No Mom, no Dad, no Lilly, no Duncan, and Trina never counted much for anything anyway. And-” he hesitates “-I think I’m all right with that. My dad’s a bastard, and I can’t have the Kanes. And my mom? I kept, y’know, hoping she would come back, wouldn’t really have jumped... but she did. She did, and she’s a coward for doing so.”
I take off down the beach.
A coward.
I reach my car and grip the steering wheel as I sob, uncaring about the mess the sand is making in the interior. Nothing has changed. And nothing will change because Logan should get what he wants for a change.
And as much as it hurts to admit, he doesn’t want me.
* * *
May 2006
Logan deserves peace, and I deserve a lifetime of suffering, but I can’t let go. Hands trembling as I make the call, I tell myself that he can have peace.
And I can have glimpses of it.
The other end of the phone picks up. “Clarence Wiedman.”
“Hello, Mr. Wiedman,” I say, glad my voice isn’t shaking as well. “This is Anne Lester.”
“Ms. Lester,” he says. He sounds surprised, but he recovers quickly. “If I asked, would you tell me how you got this number?”
“I would like very much to see Logan graduate,” I say. “Perhaps something could be arranged?”
“What makes you think I can do such things?”
“I’m told there isn’t much you can’t do, Mr. Wiedman.”
When he sets his price, it’s much lower than I expected. In fact, it’s much less than I spent tracking him down in the first place. He calls me back within the hour with details.
“Thank you so much,” I say primly. “Should this be a positive experience, I might wish to enlist your services again. Is this a good number at which to reach you?”
“It’s interesting that you should call this number now,” says Wiedman, ending the call with a click.
I don’t dwell on subtleties. I pack up my life in Seattle and head home. I don’t know where I’ll go next, only that I get to see Logan cross the stage. I don’t even care about Aaron’s impending murder trial, at least not until news breaks three days into my stay that he’s been acquitted.
It’s not until I head automatically to the hotel bar that I realize I planned on revealing myself to Logan with the trial finally finished. Obviously, it’s not a possibility now. Scotch in hand, I contemplate whether it’s worth ruining thirteen months sobriety over. I pay the bartender and return to my room without taking a sip.
My empty room is not so empty.
Clarence Wiedman is staring out the window, arms folded across his chest.
I kick the door shut behind me. “Our contract was non negotiable.”
Wiedman turns, arms still crossed. “I’m not here to negotiate, Ms. Lester.”
“Good,” I say. I’m kicking off my heels now. “I’m not missing my son’s graduation.”
“I’m not asking you-”
“Then why are you here?” I interrupt curtly, matching his stance from where I’m perched at the edge of the bed. “Did Aaron send you?”
“To Mr. Echolls, I am no longer available for hire.”
“Good.”
Wiedman studies me for several long moments. Then, he relaxes and brushes past me on his way to the door. Hand on the knob, he looks back over his shoulder. “Enjoy the ceremony.”
“I will,” I say.
And I do.
When Aaron is assassinated and Wiedman appears in my hotel room for the second time, pieces fall into place. They shatter the next morning, of course, when my son’s face is on the news alongside his father’s, but at least this time, he’s helped solve a murder and isn’t accused of one. The footage runs on endless loops in every major market. In the first panel, my husband’s mug shot is juxtaposed with his headshot; in the second, my son is shielding a broken-looking Veronica Mars as they left the Grande the night Cassidy Casablancas jumped.
I realize it’s my chance to come clean to my son, but when I consider approaching him in a café one afternoon, I begin to hyperventilate. I back out of the restaurant and sprint to my car and drive, far away from Neptune.
Two weeks later, Wiedman calls, and I hire him on spot to look after Logan.
* * *
September 2008
I’m in Paris when I get the call. New York is home these days, but I had decided to spend a month abroad while my apartment building was renovated. It’s just past noon here, which means it’s three in the morning back home in California. Dread fills me as I answer my phone.
“There’s been an accident,” Wiedman says.
“What kind of accident?” I ask.
“Rollover.”
I drop my over-priced croissant. “Is Logan all right?”
“He’s in surgery at Neptune Memorial.” He pauses. “The younger Richard Casablancas is dead.”
My heart sinks. “But Logan?”
Wiedman’s crisp tone softens. “You should come, Lynn.” He pauses. “I can have a flight waiting for you at the airport.”
“Please, yes,” I say. I don’t like his tone. I don’t like whatever he isn’t saying. I throw a few Euros down as I race out of the café, nearly forgetting my handbag. I’m still clutching my phone after Wiedman disconnects his end of the call.
I’ve been up for thirty hours when I arrive in Los Angeles, but I rent a car and start driving south. I finally think to check my messages. Three from Wiedman-he says he knows more, but of course, I should wait for him to call. I’m nearing the Neptune exit when he does.
“Logan pulled through all three surgeries,” Wiedman says. My heart thuds against my chest, and I unconsciously accelerate. I have to slam on the brakes to avoid rear-ending the car in front of me.
“Three?”
Wiedman hesitates. “Witnesses say Logan came to pick up Casablancas at a bar, where the two argued. He went to his car. Logan followed him, trying to take away his keys. They were actually fighting in the car when Casablancas took off. He got a few miles down the road, but hit and guardrail and rolled the car into oncoming traffic. A semi struck Casablancas’ SUV.”
I have to pull over when I hyperventilate. I’m surprised Wiedman stays on the line.
“Lynn?” Wiedman’s voice cuts through my sobs. “He pulled through. He’ll need more surgery and physical therapy, but he’ll be all right.”
“Is he alone?”
“Veronica Mars has been at his bedside.”
“You didn’t tell me they had-”
“They hadn’t.”
“Crazy kids.” I’m sniffling now, and I realize there’s no way I can get into the hospital to visit my boy, not without compromising my carefully crafted new identity or risking the wrath of Mars Investigations. “Can you find out when the arrangements for the Casablancas boy are?”
The line is dead before Wiedman responds, but I check myself into a hotel in the next town over from Neptune. When he calls three days later to tell me the funeral isn’t for another two weeks, I hang the black dress I bought the afternoon previous in my closet, and I wait.
Quietly joining the other mourners at the gravesite, I understand the delay. I recognize other faces in the crowd-friends of my son’s from high school-but I don’t see Bettina or Richard Casablancas. It occurs to me that my son is the only family Dick really had after his brother committed suicide; he is sitting somberly in a wheelchair at Veronica’s side, arm in a sling and face heavily bandaged.
I watch him break down after the pastor concludes the graveside service. His entire body shakes, and Veronica kneels in front of him to cradle him in her arms.
I turn to leave, as my flight back is in a few short hours, but it has rained recently, and the grass is soggy. My stiletto sinks in the soft ground, and I nearly trip.
For a second, it feels as if Veronica’s eyes are on me, but to automatically assume she recognized me would be foolish. She just happened to be looking in my direction over my son’s shoulder, and I’m always careful to obscure my face.
Wiedman visits me in New York a month later, after the last of the loose ends have been tied up. Logan is recovering well, he says, walking with the aid of crutches, and staying with Sheriff Mars’ family.
“Are they back together?” I ask.
Wiedman stares out over the city from my balcony. Finally, he nods.
“Good,” I say. “She’s good for him.”
* * *
May 2010
I miss his graduation from Hearst.
I miss his graduation from Hearst.
It’s not for lack of trying. I’m racing towards the auditorium when the doors burst open and graduates spill out, gowns flapping in the wind. I hardly notice when my own hat-I’m willing to admit my disguises aren’t always the most clever-flies off. I’m devastated, checking the times. I’m sure one o’clock is right.
Until I realize I wrote the time down months ago, when I was still living in Chicago. I’ve been back west since the New Year, and I must not have accounted for the change in time zones.
Months of careful planning so I could be here, and the celebratory crowd swims around me.
I’m torn between accepting fate and seeking Logan out. Neither is a good idea, but I keep thinking about the trendy bars I used to frequent and how I could use a scotch right now.
It’s a worse idea. So I take a deep breath, pull my sunglasses down, and tie the scarf I’d been wearing around my neck around my head. I duck out of the crowd, and wonder where my son could possibly be. I know Keith is here (I drove past his squad car twice as I looked for a parking spot), and if I can find him, I’ll find Veronica and Logan.
“Erica! Erica, sweetie, where are you? ERICA!”
I narrow in on the young woman holding a toddler on her hip and yelling. Not that I wish a missing child on anyone, but her screaming is bound to attract the attention of-
“Is everything all right, ma’am?” Keith Mars appears as though he’d been summoned, and I see another, taller figure pushing through the crowd behind him.
“I can’t find my daughter,” the woman says frantically. “She’s five, and I think she saw her dad, and she ran off from me, and-”
“Calm down, ma’am, and tell me what your daughter looks like,” Keith says reassuringly. He extends his hand. “I’m Sheriff Mars.”
The woman nods, biting her lip. I can tell she’s close to tears, but I’m too busy focusing on Logan, who is now standing behind Keith, arm around his girlfriend, gown already off and draped over the other arm. I haven’t seen him since the day in the cemetery nearly two years ago. He’s walking now, perhaps favoring his left side, but Clarence had warned me about my son’s visible limp.
“Is there anything we can do, Dad?” Veronica wants to know.
Keith tucks a stray hair behind his daughter’s ear. “Go enjoy your graduation, sweetie.”
Veronica frowns, obviously wanting to know how she’s supposed to enjoy herself with a child missing, but I watch Keith smile to my son over his daughter’s head, and Logan steers her expertly in the opposite direction. Part of the crowd surges in front of me, and I lose sight of both Keith and Logan for a second. I scramble to keep up, but it’s hard to run in heels at any age, but especially when you’re forty-nine.
I catch them as they cross the quad, hand in hand, Veronica sneaking nervous glances back at the activity.
“Do you think-” I hear her start.
“It’s going to be fine, babe. You know your dad will call you if he needs any help,” Logan says, stopping and catching both her hands in his. I take a seat on a bench a few yards away, thankful for all the other people milling about, the ones keeping me from looking conspicuous. Another woman plops down on the opposite end. She has blonde hair and wears a tired expression, but while she looks familiar, I’m only thankful her presence will further add to my cover.
Veronica makes a face-probably bites her lip-as Logan runs a thumb down her cheek. “I would have helped.”
“I know you would have,” Logan says, “but it is your last day in Neptune, babe.”
My interest piques. Veronica was leaving Neptune?
“I’m coming back, Logan.” Her voice is so soft I can barely hear her, and she looks down, wringing her hands. I watch Logan grab her chin and force her to meet her eyes.
“Promise?”
She hesitates. “I want to, Logan, I really do. But I don’t even know if I’ll make it through the training at Quantico, and even then-”
“You will, babe.” His smile is proud and sad all at once.
“Five months is a long time.”
He kisses her forehead. “Two years is a longer time. I’m not letting go of you that easily.”
“What if I’m not stationed in San Diego?”
“Then I’ll come to you.”
“What about law school?”
Logan runs a hand through his hair, grinning. “I’m already worth millions, Veronica.”
“What if it changes me? What if you don’t like the person I am when I come back?”
“I will.”
“What if-”
“What if you just shut up for a second so I can do what I’ve been meaning to do?” I’m about to step out of the shadows and sacrifice five years of hiding to pop my son when he reaches into his pocket. He grimaces slightly, but drops down on one knee just the same. I suck in my breath.
Logan smiles crookedly as he flips the ring box open. “Veronica Mars, girl detective, badass action figure, future special agent to the FBI, love my life-will you marry me?”
For a second, I’m afraid for my son, afraid of the scared look in Veronica’s eyes, and then she suddenly launches herself in his arms, laughing, kissing him, her swinging tassel catching him in the face.
“Yes,” Veronica says. She’s crying, too, tears streaming mascara down her face. She glances around for a second, then releases him gently. “Of course I will.”
They kiss as he slips the ring on her finger, and the woman next to me sighs.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” she asks, her eyes clouded over.
I nod, glad I have sunglasses to obscure my own tears.
* * *
October 2012
It should be harder, sneaking into the wedding of an FBI agent to the millionaire son of infamous actors, but my Washington driver’s license says I’m Carol Larson, and my invitation is addressed to “Auntie Carol.”
I settle into one of the back pews and silently ask God to overlook the irony of my son getting married in a church. And bless this union, too. They’re good kids.
The music starts. My son follows the minister, looking absolutely dashing. He doesn’t look nervous. I remember videos from my own wedding: Aaron waiting impatiently at the front of the church. I smile wistfully. I should have known then, I really should have.
Clarence had told me, months before, Duncan Kane had returned to the States, but I’m still surprised when he appears at Logan’s side. Logan smiles, but Duncan does not, and I wonder how comfortable the boy on my son’s right side is with the arrangement. There’s no maid-of-honor, and I don’t need to open my program to recognize the silent tribute to Lilly.
I don’t recognize the first members of the wedding party, a young black man leading a dark-haired young woman, hair streaked to match her rich scarlet bridesmaid dress. If I’m not mistaken, though, the next groomsman is Cliff McCormick, Neptune’s drunkest public defender, and he’s leading my former stepdaughter. Cliff stops midway down the aisle, jerking Trina’s arm to get a little wave to someone, and I imagine there’s a story behind his appearance. Logan seems to smile from the front of the church.
I expect another couple, or two, like at my own wedding, but instead, a tiny blonde girl throwing rose petals appeared. Little Lilly Kane seems to smile at every guest as she works her way down the aisle, and if I’d had any doubt about her identity before, my suspicions would have been confirmed when she gave her father a quick hug around the knees before taking her place. Duncan finally smiles.
The music quickens.
Veronica looks gorgeous as she enters on Keith’s arm, not that I would have expected any less. She’s glowing, not unlike me on my wedding day. I’m glowing, too, as she works her way down the aisle. It’s nice knowing it can’t possibly end worse than your own marriage.
As Keith hands off his only daughter, he grabs Logan’s arm and whispers something in his almost son-in-law’s ear that makes Logan’s eyes widen. I imagine he’s reminded Logan he carries a gun, but I can only watch wistfully as the sheriff takes the seat. I’m not the mother of the groom, not really, and I gave up my privilege to such information years ago.
Logan and Veronica share a smile as she takes her place next to him, and before the minister can stop him, I watch my son lift his bride’s veil and kiss her forehead.
“You’re beautiful,” he says.
Veronica laughs. “You’re not bad yourself.”
My tears blur the rest of the ceremony.
* * *
December 2013
I’m floored when I see them. I didn’t know my son could smile so brightly. I didn’t know someone as tiny as Veronica could be so large and so round. I didn’t know Christmas in New York could be so perfect, and it’s my sixth holiday season spent in the city.
Objectively, I’ve known they were living in the city since last fall, when I’d returned from California for their wedding. Clarence hadn’t looked up from the computer when I came in, tossing my keys on the counter, sorting through the mail with one hand, trying to balance takeout in the other.
He’d asked if it were Thai food in one breath, informed me the Academy was transferring Veronica to New York in the next. Through a mouthful of Tiger Claw, Clarence had said Logan planned to finish out the semester at Hearst, and then transfer to NYU.
“There’s eight million people in the city, Lynn,” he’d said. “Pass the soy sauce?”
For several months into the new year, I’d frequent the neighborhoods close to NYU’s campus, hoping against hope I’d catch a glimpse of my son. I saw him only once, hurrying into Vanderbilt Hall, only to feel a hand on my shoulder. Clarence had been behind me, gently reminding I’m supposed to be broken in San Diego Bay.
But somehow the night I go with girlfriends to Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas tree is the same night my son and his very pregnant wife go.
I miss the days when Clarence was contractually obligated to keep me updated on them, hastily excusing myself as Diane and Marilyn drone on about how hard it is to find good holiday help.
They’re both bundled up, Veronica in a bright hat and pea coat, and Logan keeps tugging at his scarf. She’s taking one photo after another as he complains about the snow.
“Come on, Veronica, it’s fucking freezing,” Logan moans, “and you’ve taken a hundred pictures all ready.”
She throws her head back as she laughs, and he pulls back his scarf, leaning into kiss her. She pushes him away, snapping a photo as he makes a face.
“It’s our first-and last-Christmas in New York, Logan,” she says, touching her stomach. Logan immediately covers her hand with his own. “Believe me, if I found out my parents lived in New York before I was born but left before I was old enough to remember the city, I’d kill them for moving. I’m trying to capture a few memories for her.”
“For Wendy.”
Veronica glares at Logan as she raises her camera again. “I’m not naming my daughter after a Peter Pan character just because it was on the first page you opened the baby book to.”
“Second page,” Logan defends. He’s wrapping his arms around her from behind. “You can name the next one.”
“There’s not going to be a next one,” Veronica shoots back. “Remember what I said when I had to give up my exciting field position for a desk job because of my rapidly expanding waistline?”
Logan pulls back, scratching his head. I recognize the gesture of mock confusion, and I realize Veronica’s words are joking. “I believe you said, ‘You don’t have to worry yourself sick about my getting hurt anymore, darling.’”
“I think it was, ‘I’m never having sex with you again, Logan Echolls.’”
“Now, baby, don’t be so harsh,” Logan says. Lifting her camera from her hands, he lets it dangle on the shoulder strap, grabbing her hand. He has to lean in to kiss her, and if I’d had any doubt before about the situation, the way Veronica’s hands cup his cheeks tell me I don’t need to worry.
They certainly aren’t.
I whisper “Wendy Echolls” to myself, and smile.
* * *
May 2014
Clarence pulls the birth announcement up online and leaves the browser open the first week of February, and I imagine there’s some kind of compromise involved with the name: Gwendolyn Echolls. In late March, when Veronica’s maternity leave is over, my suspicion is confirmed.
“They call her Wendy,” Clarence says, coming in from a meeting in California. “But they liked Gwendolyn for Lynn.”
I’m surprised a bit, too.
One of his FBI contacts is working directly with Veronica and has only positive things to say about my daughter-in-law. She’s resourceful and driven, excellent at her desk job but eager to return to field duty. Because Clarence will never identify which of his friends is his pipeline to Veronica, I have a feeling it’s his ex-wife, who is still with the Bureau. But I find it hard to say anything when whoever it is provides pictures Veronica had taken of my son and his own child. I finally chose one of Logan and Wendy wearing matching open-mouthed expressions of glee to frame for my desk.
Clarence and I have lived together for long enough that the late night calls no longer startle me. Usually, it’s Jake Kane, calling in a personal favor or begging security advice, unsure what in which time zone Clarence is currently residing. His loyalty to Kane Software has never wavered, and I don’t question it.
Other times, those late night calls take Clarence away for days, even weeks, and rarely can he tell me where he’s going or why. He always comes back to me, so I don’t question these clandestine operations, either. But when the phone trills piercingly one night, and he returns to my side of the bed, gently brushing my hair from my face, I’m not sure what to expect.
“That was Stacy,” he says, and though he’s just confirmed he’s still in contact with his ex-wife, his tone tells me that the reason to get upset is still to come. I brace myself. “They’ve been investigating a kidnapping that took them to Rio Rancho, where miscommunication left a group of agents without backup. Veronica was shot and taken to a nearby trauma center.”
I’m trying to sit up, but Clarence won’t let me out of the bed. He has a firm grip on my arms. “Is she all right? Does Logan know?”
Clarence nods. “This happened several hours ago, Lynn. He’s trying to get there.”
At once I think of all the things my son probably has to consider, what with the baby at home and all. I close my eyes, thinking of him at Christmas and with his infant daughter. “Is he alone? Is she going to be all right?”
Hesitation. “Stacy didn’t think it looked good.”
I push against Clarence again. His hands on my wrists start to hurt. “I have to go,” I say blindly. “He’s too young to lose her now. He needs someone, Clarence, I have to-”
“Lynn,” Clarence says, “there’s nothing you can do for him. Without walking up to him and admitting you’ve been alive all this time, you can’t offer him any comfort.”
“But-”
“You made your bed, Lynn,” Clarence says. Finally releasing my arms, he leaves ours.
Continue to part two.
Author: em2mb
Pairing/Character: Lynn, Logan/Veronica.
Word Count: 13,895
Rating: R
Summary: It’s going to be a hard sell, since everyone who knows her will expect sleeping pills and chardonnay. Lynn Echolls doesn’t jump, but she doesn’t leave it all behind on the Coronado Bridge, either.
Spoilers: Primarily through 2x22, but includes the L/V relationship arch through 3x15.
Warnings: Probably a strong PG-13, but R to be safe. Includes all the usual unsavory fare of Neptune, including mild language, alcoholism, child abuse, and character death.
Author's Notes: The characters might belong to Rob Thomas, but I’ll require their use if my claim is accepted at 100_situations. Named after the Snow Patrol song, simply for the irony that it came on while I was planning a fic on this particular subject. Special thanks to jayiin and lazaefair, the usual partners in crime. More notes below. Prompt: alive.
October 2004
I was doing well, only on my third drink for the day. But then I turned on the TV and watched the corners of my son’s mouth turn up as he announced Aaron would donate half a million to the Neptune soup kitchen. I don’t wait to see what my husband will say. It doesn’t matter how he reacts on screen. It never has. I know what’s coming, and I pour myself another drink without finishing the first.
Aaron, unsurprisingly, does not acknowledge me as he storms into the house. He shuts the door of his office immediately, but Logan comes over to kiss my cheek before retreating to Aaron’s bedroom. I wonder if he knows I no longer share the bed with his father. Logan emerges minutes later and disappears into the office.
I close my eyes. I’m used to the rhythmic slap of leather on bare skin, muffled by the closed door, but I’m not used to the cries that come later. My silent pleas mix with my son’s increasing more vocal ones.
Please stop. Please.
Logan stopped screaming years ago, determined to show his father he wasn’t afraid. But Logan cries out now, and tears sting my eyes.
It goes on. There’s not enough alcohol in the world. Even as the rest of my thoughts swim, I can’t remember why I stayed, why I let this happen.
There’s a thud. I cringe, setting my glass on the table as Aaron throws open the office door angrily. I sway on my feet as I stand.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?” I challenge.
Aaron grabs my arm. “Don’t baby him. He needs to learn his actions have consequences.”
“Baby him?” I’m angry. “That’s it, Aaron, I’m-”
“You’re what, Lynn?” Aaron’s tone is low. “Go in there to help him, and I’ll see that he ends up even worse.”
So I wait, forty-five excruciating minutes until my husband heads for the kitchen. I join him, but not before crushing three sleeping pills into his Mai Tai.
He doesn’t excuse himself for another hour, and by the time I burst into his office, my own buzz is wearing off. I choke back tears as I approach Logan, who is sprawled out on the couch, blood soaking the pristine white fabric.
“Oh, honey,” I say, reaching for him. He wriggles away. He’s still shirtless, orange fabric bunched up around his head. He won’t let me touch him, but he does pull the fabric away to reveal an angry looking cut at his hairline. My hand flies to my mouth. It’s nothing to say for the mangled flesh of his back.
“I’ll be in my room,” Logan says weakly. He sways on his feet as he stands, and I realize he’s been blacked out on the couch this whole time. I nod, trying to figure out what to do to clean up Aaron’s office. The couch will have to be replaced or at least reupholstered, and there’s blood on the corner of my husband’s desk-the obvious source of my son’s head injury and the thud I heard earlier. I go to the hall closet where the maids keep the cleaning supplies.
Later, when Aaron is out cold, I climb the stairs to Logan’s room, where my son is laying facedown on his bed. I slip into his bathroom and return with a cool rag and antiseptic. He buries his face in his pillow as I gently swab at the welts, now encrusted with blood. I can’t imagine how much it stings.
Slightly more, still, than the biting words he throws back at me, I imagine.
“When you were eight-” I start.
“Don’t,” says Logan, breaking in. “Don’t say it. Don’t tell me how he promised to change. He didn’t change, and you should have left when you had a chance.”
I call Logan’s school the next morning to excuse him before going upstairs to wake him, figuring he could use the extra rest. But the woman answering the phone seems confused.
“Do you mean that Logan is going home at some point today, Mrs. Echolls?” she says. “Because your son is already at school, has been all day.”
* * *
January 2005
Neptune is a small town, but the people here like to live large. That’s why two private investigators can make a living in the same area code. Keith Mars may have fallen from grace over the Lilly Kane murder investigation over a year ago, but he’s the PI to go to if you want honest, discreet work. Vinnie Van Lowe has never been reputable. When you step into his office, he pours you booze (he’ll later bill you for it) and lays out the unscrupulous options you might want to pursue.
But somehow, after my third scotch, I manage to throw a curveball at Neptune’s most morally ambiguous.
Van Lowe swings his legs off his desk and leans forward. “You want me to what?”
“I want you to leak the proof of Aaron’s infidelity to the tabloids,” I say. “And for incentive to keep this between you and me, I’ll pay you double and match whatever profit you make reselling your photographs.”
“That’s very generous, Mrs. Echolls,” Van Lowe says, throwing a pen from one hand to the other. He holds up the bottle. “More scotch?”
I push my glass across the desk for him to refill. “It’s hardly generous given your propensity to double cross your client-how many times have I hired you to investigate my husband to no avail?”
Van Lowe smirks. “What can I say, Mrs. Echolls? Pieces just fell into place this time.”
“I suppose they did.” I down my drink and get out my checkbook. “Well, Mr. Van Lowe, do we have a deal or not?”
“We have a deal.”
He offers me his hand, but I refuse to shake on it. Instead, I hastily scribble a check from my personal account. With a curt nod, I let myself out of the office before I have to endure another minute of conversation with the private eye.
My hand is shaking as I turn the key in the ignition of the Viper, but I tell myself it’s nerves over what I’m about to do, not the alcohol. I grope around in my purse for my pills and throw back two before heading back to the mansion, praying that this time Van Lowe doesn’t double-cross me.
I’ve known for years about Aaron’s affairs, but before, the local PI had always proclaimed my husband to be squeaky-clean. Eventually, when I realized my meetings with Van Lowe always ended with Aaron beating Logan in a fit of inexplicable rage, I stopped trying to catch him in the act. It stopped being worth it, and when Mars Investigations opened up shop, I just wasn’t sure I could draw someone I had once consider an ally in on the sordid affair. I remembered Keith dropping Veronica off at our house in his squad car, waving from the driveway, and Keith stopping by after the neighbors would call, worried there’d been a domestic disturbance, his eyes begging me to let him help while Logan and I swore things were just fine.
I putter around the house for a while before checking on Aaron, asking if he’d like anything particular for dinner. He is watching himself in Beyond the Breaking Point, and his only response is a grunt aimed in my direction.
For several days, I wait. And then Logan storms in from school one afternoon, throwing a tabloid at the sofa, where his father is sitting.
“Really, Dad,” he snarls. “When I saw her at the Kane’s summer party, you said I could do better. Clearly, you can’t.”
I say a silent prayer for the stomach wound that prevents Aaron from attacking Logan just then. I’m visibly shaken, but not for the reasons my husband thinks I am. I keep waiting for my plan to backfire. It does, three days in.
I pass out on the couch in the living room overnight, having been determined the night before to overcome my fear with bourbon. I stumble through the house, trying to find my son or my husband or the help, but no one’s around. It finally dawns on me that it’s morning, and Logan’s at school and the housekeeper has the day off. But it doesn’t explain where Aaron is, or change the fact he’s still supposed to be taking it easy.
When he does return, three hours later, it’s to slam the door angrily and shove me down on the couch. He slaps me, hard, and yanks me up by the front of my blouse.
“Thought you were being clever, didn’t you? Van Lowe might not have tipped me off again, but he’s not an honest man. Keith Mars is.”
“You aren’t,” I spit, trying to appear nonchalant. Secretly, I’m terrified.
“Maybe not,” Aaron replies, “but it’s not like you have anything to brag about. Selling your husband’s infidelity to the paper and capitalizing on the empathy? Really, Lynn, I didn’t expect anything so cunning from you.”
“It’s not about the empathy,” I return. “It’s about watching you fall.”
Aaron finally releases me. “I don’t plan to take the fall. I plan on having you do it for me.”
“Excuse me?”
He calmly takes a seat next to me, holding my hand in his. “You got us into this mess, Lynn. You are going to get us out.”
I laugh harshly. “And what makes you think I can even do that?”
“You can’t. Seeing as I’m sure you’ve wasted your creative energy engineering my public humiliation, I plan to do the same. You’ll go along with my plan, of course, and disappear.”
“Disappear?”
Aaron touches my face lightly. “Well, you’ll have to, since they won’t find the body, and we can’t have you cropping up. I don’t really want to see you go, Lynn, and it’s going to be a hard sell, since everyone who knows you will expect sleeping pills and chardonnay. But under the circumstances-an impulse-over dramatic and over the top. You’ll leave a note on your Blackberry.”
“What in God’s name are you on about, Aaron?”
“We’re going to fake your suicide, darling, so I never have to kiss your ridiculous collagen-injected lips for the camera ever again.”
I’m so disturbed by what he’s suggesting that I don’t even register the jab he’s taken at the appearance he helped create. I narrow my eyes. “What makes you think I’ll go along with it? Maybe I want to play the adoring wife that forgives you for your sins.”
“It would be so characteristically spineless of you,” Aaron murmurs. “You’ll go along with it.”
“Never,” I say. “If you want me gone, you’ll actually have to kill me.”
Aaron smirks, tracing my jaw once more. “No. I’ll have to kill Logan.”
His voice is chilling, positively devoid of humanity, telling me he wouldn’t hesitate to rid himself of me at the expense of our son’s life. I can’t imagine how he’d do it. He’s not that cunning, is he? I offer him a challenging look. He leans in, so I can feel his breath on my ear.
“Do you remember the first time you hired Van Lowe to tail me?” Aaron hisses. “Our first summer in Neptune? Do you remember my making you watch me snap his pathetic little arms, or did you finally manage to drink that memory away?”
Seventeen hours later, a part of me is relieved to be slipping into an unmarked black van with a security agent shaking my hand. He’s telling me about the life I will lead as Anne Lester, but all I can think about is the life Logan will continue under Aaron’s roof.
* * *
May 2005
When it finally registers that I can’t go back, I’m so far in the bottle I consider never crawling out again. It turns out that Aaron is very generous in my death, and when I find out just how much he has provided for me, I realize he’s been planning something like this for a very, very long time. He loves me enough to spare me, but not his own son? The notion leaves me reaching for another Jack and Coke.
But passing out in Florence isn’t so different than passing out in Neptune, and after visiting my fourth foreign emergency room in as many weeks, I check myself into rehab.
No one visits for family counseling, and there’s some creativity on my part when I explain how I ended up there, but I feel sober after ninety days.
Sober, and ready to go home.
Only Aaron is waiting for me when I try. It’s my arm he twists and my arm he yanks, but I stand up to him. I tell him he won’t win this one. I tell him I’ll be back.
For Logan.
But while the thug he hired off Jake Kane is making sure I don’t stray from my San Diego hotel room, news breaks in Neptune. I know something has happened when Wiedman leaves me unrestrained and to my own devices. He gets the call and exits an hour before it hits the news.
Aaron murdered Lilly Kane.
It doesn’t register until the next morning, and I’m overcome. My legs collapse underneath me in the hotel lobby as I pass the large flat screen broadcasting crimes worse than infidelity to the whole world. One of the bellboys helps me to a chair and brings me water, but since I’ve changed my hair and makeup and plastic surgeon be damned, I’m done with Botox, it’s easy for me to pass it off as obsessed fan over devastated ex-wife.
God knows I always felt guilty enough around the Kanes, knowing the contributions Logan made to Lilly’s debauchery. I can’t imagine facing them now, but I know I must.
On my way out to my car, I ignore the protests of the staff that perhaps I shouldn’t be driving so soon after collapsing, and for a moment consider the man my husband hired to keep me from doing precisely what I planned to do.
I may have fucked your underage daughter and clubbed her to death to keep our secret safe, but Jake, really, could you give me a few tips about hiring private security?
What’s a few discretions among old friends, after all?
There’s no music on the radio as I drive, only talk of the developing scandal. The sex tapes. The Kane cover-up. And, breaking in, the arrest of the younger Echolls, also for murder.
I almost lose control of my car, but when I manage to steady the BMW, I consider running it into oncoming traffic just the same. The only thing stopping me is the safety rating the salesperson crooned about. The Coronado Bridge sounds better and better, but it’s south and I’m traveling north.
After all, it has to be some kind of misunderstanding-or so I tell myself as I take calming breaths and tell myself I don’t want a Jack and Coke, not really.
Unsurprisingly, Logan makes bail that afternoon, but Aaron is not released. I check into the Camelot and try to figure out how I will approach him. There’s no help guide for mothers who pretend to commit suicide because their abusive ex-husbands threaten to kill their children.
It’s a fairly small market, I know, but I imagine it would help as I walk barefoot along Dog Beach early one morning the week after the news hits. I’ve been out there everyday, there and every other beach my son ever surfed at, hoping the summer swells will lure him out eventually. Today, his XTerra is parked up the beach, but the waves aren’t particularly impressive, and the sky is overcast.
Half a mile down the beach, I finally see a few young men bobbing in the waves, but it doesn’t seem like Logan’s among them. Just the same, I find myself stalling. I pull a hat and sunglasses from my tote as I stroll closer to the water’s edge, unsure how to proceed. Quiet conversation behind me prompts me to refocus my attention.
Logan’s at the beach all right, but not in the surf, and it occurs to me at once I’ve gone about this the wrong way. He looks as bad as he did when Aaron used to finish with him, a fading black eye and yellowed bruises along his jaw.
I realize that this is it. I let the tide lap at my toes for a few more seconds, not caring what the salt water will do to my most recent pedicure. Anything to delay the confrontation that’s sure to come. I finally turn my head, just as the blonde nestled against my son’s chest raises hers.
It’s not Lilly, of course, the girl I had long ago accepted as the one he’d date and marry and grow old with, but another girl I know almost as well. I pray the tabloids aren’t around to see how he tenderly brushes Veronica’s hair back from her face, despite the obvious pain his wince suggests the gesture brings.
“Careful, Logan,” she warns, and I step back in the surf, even though it’s clear they couldn’t care less about me or anyone else on that beach. I know the look on her face, the one my son is returning. It’s the one that makes directors cast actors on sight in dramas with romantic subplots. It’s the one that says fuck the world, the one that excludes everyone but each other. It’s what I had with Aaron once.
I shudder at the thought. Veronica’s eyes glance down to her hand, placed lightly on Logan’s chest, and I imagine a fight on the Coronado Bridge with the PCH bike club meant broken ribs. I watch him tenderly capture her hand in his and kiss her forehead.
Aaron and I had never had that.
“I’ve survived worse, Veronica,” Logan mumbles. I close my eyes, recalling his childhood and the many resultant emergency room visits and bottles of antiseptic.
“I’m sorry,” she says softly. His free hand tangles in her hair.
“It’s not your fault.” Logan sighs. “It’s over, though, right?”
“Right,” Veronica returns uncomfortably. The silence that follows says they don’t need to be told it’s far from over. I close my eyes and take a few more steps into the water. I still don’t think they care about my presence, but I want to be careful just the same. . I can’t bring myself to interrupt this moment. What I came here to do will just have to wait. I face away from them, staring resolutely at the ocean.
“I still can’t believe this is happening,” Logan says hollowly. “Lilly and... Dad.”
Veronica murmurs her agreement. I can tell she’s waiting for him to open up. He doesn’t. “Logan, it’s... it’s okay to be upset.”
Logan chuckles. “I had to talk to Ms. James after she died, too, Veronica. I know it’s okay to be upset.”
I glance over my shoulder. Her hand is snaking up his chest, touching his cheek. “No, Logan. I mean... it’s okay to be upset with Lilly.”
“Are you?”
Veronica hesitates. “A little, yes. I don’t understand how she thought it was okay to do that to you. Or...”
“Or what, Veronica?”
“Logan-I mean, the scars on your back... I noticed them when we were just lounging about the apartment yesterday. You and Lilly...” Veronica falters slightly. “You and Lilly did a lot more than lounge around. How could she not notice?”
“I didn’t let her,” Logan says gruffly. “Or... I don’t know, Veronica. She never mentioned it. She never asked. Maybe she didn’t want to know.”
“How do you ignore something like that?”
“My mom always did.”
I’m suddenly cooler than the water running across my feet. I don’t want to hear this, but I stand, transfixed.
“I had wondered,” Veronica says at last. “I mean, I had wondered if she knew.”
Logan whistles lowly. “Believe me, she knew.” I can hear them shift in the sand, but I can’t bear to look. “She’d sit outside my dad’s office when he’d-when he’d-you know. And she’d clean me up afterwards.”
“Logan-”
“No, she was a good mom, Veronica.” Logan laughs bitterly. “If it weren’t for her taking me to the hospital a bunch of those times, I probably would have died. I was too little, and Dad didn’t understand-God, Veronica, don’t cry, I’m fine.”
I want to cry with her. I want to invent a time machine and take back the last thirteen years, but even that wouldn’t be enough.
“No, Logan, you’re not. Parents aren’t supposed to hit kids! They just aren’t! And-” A sob breaks her off, but after several sucking breaths, she starts again. “And don’t you ever die on me, okay?”
His voice is muffled, as if she’s buried in him. “Okay.”
I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t ever make this right.
“Promise we’ll figure this out together?” he asks finally. When Veronica doesn’t respond, I imagine she’s nodded. “I-you know what’s weird?”
“What?”
“You’re the closest thing to family I have left. No Mom, no Dad, no Lilly, no Duncan, and Trina never counted much for anything anyway. And-” he hesitates “-I think I’m all right with that. My dad’s a bastard, and I can’t have the Kanes. And my mom? I kept, y’know, hoping she would come back, wouldn’t really have jumped... but she did. She did, and she’s a coward for doing so.”
I take off down the beach.
A coward.
I reach my car and grip the steering wheel as I sob, uncaring about the mess the sand is making in the interior. Nothing has changed. And nothing will change because Logan should get what he wants for a change.
And as much as it hurts to admit, he doesn’t want me.
* * *
May 2006
Logan deserves peace, and I deserve a lifetime of suffering, but I can’t let go. Hands trembling as I make the call, I tell myself that he can have peace.
And I can have glimpses of it.
The other end of the phone picks up. “Clarence Wiedman.”
“Hello, Mr. Wiedman,” I say, glad my voice isn’t shaking as well. “This is Anne Lester.”
“Ms. Lester,” he says. He sounds surprised, but he recovers quickly. “If I asked, would you tell me how you got this number?”
“I would like very much to see Logan graduate,” I say. “Perhaps something could be arranged?”
“What makes you think I can do such things?”
“I’m told there isn’t much you can’t do, Mr. Wiedman.”
When he sets his price, it’s much lower than I expected. In fact, it’s much less than I spent tracking him down in the first place. He calls me back within the hour with details.
“Thank you so much,” I say primly. “Should this be a positive experience, I might wish to enlist your services again. Is this a good number at which to reach you?”
“It’s interesting that you should call this number now,” says Wiedman, ending the call with a click.
I don’t dwell on subtleties. I pack up my life in Seattle and head home. I don’t know where I’ll go next, only that I get to see Logan cross the stage. I don’t even care about Aaron’s impending murder trial, at least not until news breaks three days into my stay that he’s been acquitted.
It’s not until I head automatically to the hotel bar that I realize I planned on revealing myself to Logan with the trial finally finished. Obviously, it’s not a possibility now. Scotch in hand, I contemplate whether it’s worth ruining thirteen months sobriety over. I pay the bartender and return to my room without taking a sip.
My empty room is not so empty.
Clarence Wiedman is staring out the window, arms folded across his chest.
I kick the door shut behind me. “Our contract was non negotiable.”
Wiedman turns, arms still crossed. “I’m not here to negotiate, Ms. Lester.”
“Good,” I say. I’m kicking off my heels now. “I’m not missing my son’s graduation.”
“I’m not asking you-”
“Then why are you here?” I interrupt curtly, matching his stance from where I’m perched at the edge of the bed. “Did Aaron send you?”
“To Mr. Echolls, I am no longer available for hire.”
“Good.”
Wiedman studies me for several long moments. Then, he relaxes and brushes past me on his way to the door. Hand on the knob, he looks back over his shoulder. “Enjoy the ceremony.”
“I will,” I say.
And I do.
When Aaron is assassinated and Wiedman appears in my hotel room for the second time, pieces fall into place. They shatter the next morning, of course, when my son’s face is on the news alongside his father’s, but at least this time, he’s helped solve a murder and isn’t accused of one. The footage runs on endless loops in every major market. In the first panel, my husband’s mug shot is juxtaposed with his headshot; in the second, my son is shielding a broken-looking Veronica Mars as they left the Grande the night Cassidy Casablancas jumped.
I realize it’s my chance to come clean to my son, but when I consider approaching him in a café one afternoon, I begin to hyperventilate. I back out of the restaurant and sprint to my car and drive, far away from Neptune.
Two weeks later, Wiedman calls, and I hire him on spot to look after Logan.
* * *
September 2008
I’m in Paris when I get the call. New York is home these days, but I had decided to spend a month abroad while my apartment building was renovated. It’s just past noon here, which means it’s three in the morning back home in California. Dread fills me as I answer my phone.
“There’s been an accident,” Wiedman says.
“What kind of accident?” I ask.
“Rollover.”
I drop my over-priced croissant. “Is Logan all right?”
“He’s in surgery at Neptune Memorial.” He pauses. “The younger Richard Casablancas is dead.”
My heart sinks. “But Logan?”
Wiedman’s crisp tone softens. “You should come, Lynn.” He pauses. “I can have a flight waiting for you at the airport.”
“Please, yes,” I say. I don’t like his tone. I don’t like whatever he isn’t saying. I throw a few Euros down as I race out of the café, nearly forgetting my handbag. I’m still clutching my phone after Wiedman disconnects his end of the call.
I’ve been up for thirty hours when I arrive in Los Angeles, but I rent a car and start driving south. I finally think to check my messages. Three from Wiedman-he says he knows more, but of course, I should wait for him to call. I’m nearing the Neptune exit when he does.
“Logan pulled through all three surgeries,” Wiedman says. My heart thuds against my chest, and I unconsciously accelerate. I have to slam on the brakes to avoid rear-ending the car in front of me.
“Three?”
Wiedman hesitates. “Witnesses say Logan came to pick up Casablancas at a bar, where the two argued. He went to his car. Logan followed him, trying to take away his keys. They were actually fighting in the car when Casablancas took off. He got a few miles down the road, but hit and guardrail and rolled the car into oncoming traffic. A semi struck Casablancas’ SUV.”
I have to pull over when I hyperventilate. I’m surprised Wiedman stays on the line.
“Lynn?” Wiedman’s voice cuts through my sobs. “He pulled through. He’ll need more surgery and physical therapy, but he’ll be all right.”
“Is he alone?”
“Veronica Mars has been at his bedside.”
“You didn’t tell me they had-”
“They hadn’t.”
“Crazy kids.” I’m sniffling now, and I realize there’s no way I can get into the hospital to visit my boy, not without compromising my carefully crafted new identity or risking the wrath of Mars Investigations. “Can you find out when the arrangements for the Casablancas boy are?”
The line is dead before Wiedman responds, but I check myself into a hotel in the next town over from Neptune. When he calls three days later to tell me the funeral isn’t for another two weeks, I hang the black dress I bought the afternoon previous in my closet, and I wait.
Quietly joining the other mourners at the gravesite, I understand the delay. I recognize other faces in the crowd-friends of my son’s from high school-but I don’t see Bettina or Richard Casablancas. It occurs to me that my son is the only family Dick really had after his brother committed suicide; he is sitting somberly in a wheelchair at Veronica’s side, arm in a sling and face heavily bandaged.
I watch him break down after the pastor concludes the graveside service. His entire body shakes, and Veronica kneels in front of him to cradle him in her arms.
I turn to leave, as my flight back is in a few short hours, but it has rained recently, and the grass is soggy. My stiletto sinks in the soft ground, and I nearly trip.
For a second, it feels as if Veronica’s eyes are on me, but to automatically assume she recognized me would be foolish. She just happened to be looking in my direction over my son’s shoulder, and I’m always careful to obscure my face.
Wiedman visits me in New York a month later, after the last of the loose ends have been tied up. Logan is recovering well, he says, walking with the aid of crutches, and staying with Sheriff Mars’ family.
“Are they back together?” I ask.
Wiedman stares out over the city from my balcony. Finally, he nods.
“Good,” I say. “She’s good for him.”
* * *
May 2010
I miss his graduation from Hearst.
I miss his graduation from Hearst.
It’s not for lack of trying. I’m racing towards the auditorium when the doors burst open and graduates spill out, gowns flapping in the wind. I hardly notice when my own hat-I’m willing to admit my disguises aren’t always the most clever-flies off. I’m devastated, checking the times. I’m sure one o’clock is right.
Until I realize I wrote the time down months ago, when I was still living in Chicago. I’ve been back west since the New Year, and I must not have accounted for the change in time zones.
Months of careful planning so I could be here, and the celebratory crowd swims around me.
I’m torn between accepting fate and seeking Logan out. Neither is a good idea, but I keep thinking about the trendy bars I used to frequent and how I could use a scotch right now.
It’s a worse idea. So I take a deep breath, pull my sunglasses down, and tie the scarf I’d been wearing around my neck around my head. I duck out of the crowd, and wonder where my son could possibly be. I know Keith is here (I drove past his squad car twice as I looked for a parking spot), and if I can find him, I’ll find Veronica and Logan.
“Erica! Erica, sweetie, where are you? ERICA!”
I narrow in on the young woman holding a toddler on her hip and yelling. Not that I wish a missing child on anyone, but her screaming is bound to attract the attention of-
“Is everything all right, ma’am?” Keith Mars appears as though he’d been summoned, and I see another, taller figure pushing through the crowd behind him.
“I can’t find my daughter,” the woman says frantically. “She’s five, and I think she saw her dad, and she ran off from me, and-”
“Calm down, ma’am, and tell me what your daughter looks like,” Keith says reassuringly. He extends his hand. “I’m Sheriff Mars.”
The woman nods, biting her lip. I can tell she’s close to tears, but I’m too busy focusing on Logan, who is now standing behind Keith, arm around his girlfriend, gown already off and draped over the other arm. I haven’t seen him since the day in the cemetery nearly two years ago. He’s walking now, perhaps favoring his left side, but Clarence had warned me about my son’s visible limp.
“Is there anything we can do, Dad?” Veronica wants to know.
Keith tucks a stray hair behind his daughter’s ear. “Go enjoy your graduation, sweetie.”
Veronica frowns, obviously wanting to know how she’s supposed to enjoy herself with a child missing, but I watch Keith smile to my son over his daughter’s head, and Logan steers her expertly in the opposite direction. Part of the crowd surges in front of me, and I lose sight of both Keith and Logan for a second. I scramble to keep up, but it’s hard to run in heels at any age, but especially when you’re forty-nine.
I catch them as they cross the quad, hand in hand, Veronica sneaking nervous glances back at the activity.
“Do you think-” I hear her start.
“It’s going to be fine, babe. You know your dad will call you if he needs any help,” Logan says, stopping and catching both her hands in his. I take a seat on a bench a few yards away, thankful for all the other people milling about, the ones keeping me from looking conspicuous. Another woman plops down on the opposite end. She has blonde hair and wears a tired expression, but while she looks familiar, I’m only thankful her presence will further add to my cover.
Veronica makes a face-probably bites her lip-as Logan runs a thumb down her cheek. “I would have helped.”
“I know you would have,” Logan says, “but it is your last day in Neptune, babe.”
My interest piques. Veronica was leaving Neptune?
“I’m coming back, Logan.” Her voice is so soft I can barely hear her, and she looks down, wringing her hands. I watch Logan grab her chin and force her to meet her eyes.
“Promise?”
She hesitates. “I want to, Logan, I really do. But I don’t even know if I’ll make it through the training at Quantico, and even then-”
“You will, babe.” His smile is proud and sad all at once.
“Five months is a long time.”
He kisses her forehead. “Two years is a longer time. I’m not letting go of you that easily.”
“What if I’m not stationed in San Diego?”
“Then I’ll come to you.”
“What about law school?”
Logan runs a hand through his hair, grinning. “I’m already worth millions, Veronica.”
“What if it changes me? What if you don’t like the person I am when I come back?”
“I will.”
“What if-”
“What if you just shut up for a second so I can do what I’ve been meaning to do?” I’m about to step out of the shadows and sacrifice five years of hiding to pop my son when he reaches into his pocket. He grimaces slightly, but drops down on one knee just the same. I suck in my breath.
Logan smiles crookedly as he flips the ring box open. “Veronica Mars, girl detective, badass action figure, future special agent to the FBI, love my life-will you marry me?”
For a second, I’m afraid for my son, afraid of the scared look in Veronica’s eyes, and then she suddenly launches herself in his arms, laughing, kissing him, her swinging tassel catching him in the face.
“Yes,” Veronica says. She’s crying, too, tears streaming mascara down her face. She glances around for a second, then releases him gently. “Of course I will.”
They kiss as he slips the ring on her finger, and the woman next to me sighs.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” she asks, her eyes clouded over.
I nod, glad I have sunglasses to obscure my own tears.
* * *
October 2012
It should be harder, sneaking into the wedding of an FBI agent to the millionaire son of infamous actors, but my Washington driver’s license says I’m Carol Larson, and my invitation is addressed to “Auntie Carol.”
I settle into one of the back pews and silently ask God to overlook the irony of my son getting married in a church. And bless this union, too. They’re good kids.
The music starts. My son follows the minister, looking absolutely dashing. He doesn’t look nervous. I remember videos from my own wedding: Aaron waiting impatiently at the front of the church. I smile wistfully. I should have known then, I really should have.
Clarence had told me, months before, Duncan Kane had returned to the States, but I’m still surprised when he appears at Logan’s side. Logan smiles, but Duncan does not, and I wonder how comfortable the boy on my son’s right side is with the arrangement. There’s no maid-of-honor, and I don’t need to open my program to recognize the silent tribute to Lilly.
I don’t recognize the first members of the wedding party, a young black man leading a dark-haired young woman, hair streaked to match her rich scarlet bridesmaid dress. If I’m not mistaken, though, the next groomsman is Cliff McCormick, Neptune’s drunkest public defender, and he’s leading my former stepdaughter. Cliff stops midway down the aisle, jerking Trina’s arm to get a little wave to someone, and I imagine there’s a story behind his appearance. Logan seems to smile from the front of the church.
I expect another couple, or two, like at my own wedding, but instead, a tiny blonde girl throwing rose petals appeared. Little Lilly Kane seems to smile at every guest as she works her way down the aisle, and if I’d had any doubt about her identity before, my suspicions would have been confirmed when she gave her father a quick hug around the knees before taking her place. Duncan finally smiles.
The music quickens.
Veronica looks gorgeous as she enters on Keith’s arm, not that I would have expected any less. She’s glowing, not unlike me on my wedding day. I’m glowing, too, as she works her way down the aisle. It’s nice knowing it can’t possibly end worse than your own marriage.
As Keith hands off his only daughter, he grabs Logan’s arm and whispers something in his almost son-in-law’s ear that makes Logan’s eyes widen. I imagine he’s reminded Logan he carries a gun, but I can only watch wistfully as the sheriff takes the seat. I’m not the mother of the groom, not really, and I gave up my privilege to such information years ago.
Logan and Veronica share a smile as she takes her place next to him, and before the minister can stop him, I watch my son lift his bride’s veil and kiss her forehead.
“You’re beautiful,” he says.
Veronica laughs. “You’re not bad yourself.”
My tears blur the rest of the ceremony.
* * *
December 2013
I’m floored when I see them. I didn’t know my son could smile so brightly. I didn’t know someone as tiny as Veronica could be so large and so round. I didn’t know Christmas in New York could be so perfect, and it’s my sixth holiday season spent in the city.
Objectively, I’ve known they were living in the city since last fall, when I’d returned from California for their wedding. Clarence hadn’t looked up from the computer when I came in, tossing my keys on the counter, sorting through the mail with one hand, trying to balance takeout in the other.
He’d asked if it were Thai food in one breath, informed me the Academy was transferring Veronica to New York in the next. Through a mouthful of Tiger Claw, Clarence had said Logan planned to finish out the semester at Hearst, and then transfer to NYU.
“There’s eight million people in the city, Lynn,” he’d said. “Pass the soy sauce?”
For several months into the new year, I’d frequent the neighborhoods close to NYU’s campus, hoping against hope I’d catch a glimpse of my son. I saw him only once, hurrying into Vanderbilt Hall, only to feel a hand on my shoulder. Clarence had been behind me, gently reminding I’m supposed to be broken in San Diego Bay.
But somehow the night I go with girlfriends to Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas tree is the same night my son and his very pregnant wife go.
I miss the days when Clarence was contractually obligated to keep me updated on them, hastily excusing myself as Diane and Marilyn drone on about how hard it is to find good holiday help.
They’re both bundled up, Veronica in a bright hat and pea coat, and Logan keeps tugging at his scarf. She’s taking one photo after another as he complains about the snow.
“Come on, Veronica, it’s fucking freezing,” Logan moans, “and you’ve taken a hundred pictures all ready.”
She throws her head back as she laughs, and he pulls back his scarf, leaning into kiss her. She pushes him away, snapping a photo as he makes a face.
“It’s our first-and last-Christmas in New York, Logan,” she says, touching her stomach. Logan immediately covers her hand with his own. “Believe me, if I found out my parents lived in New York before I was born but left before I was old enough to remember the city, I’d kill them for moving. I’m trying to capture a few memories for her.”
“For Wendy.”
Veronica glares at Logan as she raises her camera again. “I’m not naming my daughter after a Peter Pan character just because it was on the first page you opened the baby book to.”
“Second page,” Logan defends. He’s wrapping his arms around her from behind. “You can name the next one.”
“There’s not going to be a next one,” Veronica shoots back. “Remember what I said when I had to give up my exciting field position for a desk job because of my rapidly expanding waistline?”
Logan pulls back, scratching his head. I recognize the gesture of mock confusion, and I realize Veronica’s words are joking. “I believe you said, ‘You don’t have to worry yourself sick about my getting hurt anymore, darling.’”
“I think it was, ‘I’m never having sex with you again, Logan Echolls.’”
“Now, baby, don’t be so harsh,” Logan says. Lifting her camera from her hands, he lets it dangle on the shoulder strap, grabbing her hand. He has to lean in to kiss her, and if I’d had any doubt before about the situation, the way Veronica’s hands cup his cheeks tell me I don’t need to worry.
They certainly aren’t.
I whisper “Wendy Echolls” to myself, and smile.
* * *
May 2014
Clarence pulls the birth announcement up online and leaves the browser open the first week of February, and I imagine there’s some kind of compromise involved with the name: Gwendolyn Echolls. In late March, when Veronica’s maternity leave is over, my suspicion is confirmed.
“They call her Wendy,” Clarence says, coming in from a meeting in California. “But they liked Gwendolyn for Lynn.”
I’m surprised a bit, too.
One of his FBI contacts is working directly with Veronica and has only positive things to say about my daughter-in-law. She’s resourceful and driven, excellent at her desk job but eager to return to field duty. Because Clarence will never identify which of his friends is his pipeline to Veronica, I have a feeling it’s his ex-wife, who is still with the Bureau. But I find it hard to say anything when whoever it is provides pictures Veronica had taken of my son and his own child. I finally chose one of Logan and Wendy wearing matching open-mouthed expressions of glee to frame for my desk.
Clarence and I have lived together for long enough that the late night calls no longer startle me. Usually, it’s Jake Kane, calling in a personal favor or begging security advice, unsure what in which time zone Clarence is currently residing. His loyalty to Kane Software has never wavered, and I don’t question it.
Other times, those late night calls take Clarence away for days, even weeks, and rarely can he tell me where he’s going or why. He always comes back to me, so I don’t question these clandestine operations, either. But when the phone trills piercingly one night, and he returns to my side of the bed, gently brushing my hair from my face, I’m not sure what to expect.
“That was Stacy,” he says, and though he’s just confirmed he’s still in contact with his ex-wife, his tone tells me that the reason to get upset is still to come. I brace myself. “They’ve been investigating a kidnapping that took them to Rio Rancho, where miscommunication left a group of agents without backup. Veronica was shot and taken to a nearby trauma center.”
I’m trying to sit up, but Clarence won’t let me out of the bed. He has a firm grip on my arms. “Is she all right? Does Logan know?”
Clarence nods. “This happened several hours ago, Lynn. He’s trying to get there.”
At once I think of all the things my son probably has to consider, what with the baby at home and all. I close my eyes, thinking of him at Christmas and with his infant daughter. “Is he alone? Is she going to be all right?”
Hesitation. “Stacy didn’t think it looked good.”
I push against Clarence again. His hands on my wrists start to hurt. “I have to go,” I say blindly. “He’s too young to lose her now. He needs someone, Clarence, I have to-”
“Lynn,” Clarence says, “there’s nothing you can do for him. Without walking up to him and admitting you’ve been alive all this time, you can’t offer him any comfort.”
“But-”
“You made your bed, Lynn,” Clarence says. Finally releasing my arms, he leaves ours.
Continue to part two.