Just Coffee
Title: Just Coffee
Author: Diane
Pairing: Logan/Veronica
Rating: Teen Rated
Disclaimer: I don’t own a thing!
Spoilers/Warnings: Everything up to and including 3x12 so if you haven’t seen last night’s episode, you may want to give this a miss.
Summary: She still wasn’t sleeping properly and it was taking all of her willpower to stay awake during the day. Come nightfall, she would once again be wide awake thanks to the disturbing nightmares she was currently having.
Author’s Note: Just a short post-episode fic that I was inspired to write after watching it. A very big thank you goes to Sherry for all of her help and for beta-ing this for me. *hugs*
“What, you just deleted them, huh?”
Veronica tensed at hearing his voice but kept her eyes straight ahead, her eyes fixed on the ocean before her and a lone surfer she had spotted several minutes ago and whose progress she was tracking.
“Nothing to say… Why am I not surprised?” Logan stood watching her from his position a foot or so away. She looked so tiny sitting there in a dark green hooded sweatshirt and faded blue jeans, her knees brought in close to her chest and her chin resting on top of them. Closing the gap, he sat on the sand beside her, making sure not to get too close. He couldn’t take her shifting away from him.
“What do you want?” she asked, her voice swallowed by the sound of the ocean coupled with the wind which suddenly seemed to pick up and grow stronger.
“To talk. I mean, every time I call you I get your voicemail and I’m guessing you’re just deleting my messages so I figured it was time to find you and do it face to face.”
“How did you know I was here?”
He shrugged his shoulders despite her still not looking his way. “Wild guess,” he finally answered.
“So you didn’t call and ask my dad?”
“Yeah, ‘cause he would’ve been so willing to help me there. C’mon, Veronica, you know he wouldn’t tell me something he knew you wouldn’t want me to know.”
Veronica released a tired sigh. She still wasn’t sleeping properly and it was taking all of her willpower to stay awake during the day. Come nightfall, she would once again be wide awake thanks to the disturbing nightmares she was currently having. “What do you want, Logan?”
“I want you to forgive me,” he whispered before adding in a slightly louder voice, “but I’m guessing this is yet another of those times when I don’t get what I want.”
“I-I wish I could,” she returned, surprising herself by admitting that to him. “You don’t know how much I want to… And I know that we were broken up at the time and it shouldn’t matter but it does.” She took a deep breath before finally turning her head to look at him. “If it was with anyone else… But it was her and I just can’t help thinking…” Her words trailed off as she debated whether or not to give voice to them.
“Can’t help thinking what?” Logan prompted a moment later when she still hadn’t said anything. As he looked at her, he saw the dark circles under her eyes and the redness in them which gave solid proof to just how badly all this was affecting her.
“I can’t help thinking that you deliberately went with her to…to get back at me for all the times I’ve hurt you and that the two of you were having a good laugh behind my back.”
He quickly shook his head. “No, no, I promise you it was nothing like that. I swear. I was so wasted that night and--”
“No!” Veronica interrupted. “I don’t want to hear it, okay. Being wasted isn’t an excuse.”
“Yes, it is! Do you really think I’d go with her if I was stone cold sober? I was wasted and I was lonely… Dick had dumped me for God knows who and I was alone. I was missing you like crazy and you don’t know how many times I picked up the phone to call you but I knew I had no right to, not when I was the one to end things.”
Shifting on the sand, Logan copied Veronica’s position, brought his knees up and rested his chin on them as he stared out at the water. His voice became quiet once again as he continued. “I should have just gone back to my hotel room and got drunk alone, again, but I didn’t. I sat at the bar and the next thing I know I’m drinking with Ma—her and I know you won’t believe me but I can’t even remember everything about that night.”
She released a laugh which held no trace of humour. “I’d say she remembers enough for the both of you and was more than happy to drop hints.”
“I wish I could take it back, Veronica. You don’t know how much I wish I could go back and change it all but I can’t. All I can do is keep telling you that I had no hidden agenda when I went with her. I wasn’t trying to get back at you or hurt you in any way.”
Deep down inside, she knew he was probably telling the truth but she couldn’t get rid of that little niggle in her head, the one that was no doubt creating those vivid images that burned behind her eyelids and caused them to run through her mind like a dirty movie, making her feel like everything between her and Logan had been a lie.
Logan’s fingers itched with the need to touch her, to prove to her that she was the only one he wanted, that there was no one else. Her previous statement about this being something she would never get past reverberated inside his head and he knew that it didn’t matter what he said or how he tried to explain what had happened in Aspen, she was never going to be able to forgive him. Just the thought of that made him want to throw up.
Veronica’s eyes were once more staring out at sea but she felt him move from beside her and she forced herself not to look over at him. She remembered the preacher’s words to his daughter a few days ago regarding forgiveness and she wished she could apply them to all that had happened. While her car had survived intact, Veronica couldn’t say the same for her relationship with Logan and she really wished it could be the other way around. Maybe she should’ve let Weevil crush it after all.
Closing her eyes for a moment, Veronica waited for the usual image to pop up, the one where she was entwined with Logan but it didn’t come. Instead, she saw the smug look on her face, the look of someone who had managed to get one over on her and she squeezed her hands into fists. No! No way was she going to let her win.
Turning her head, she saw Logan several feet away from her, walking away, his head lowered and his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. Digging her cell phone out of her messenger bag which was laying by her feet, she pressed the speed-dial for his phone and impatiently waited for it to connect. She could hear the faint sound of the ringtone he had selected for her and she watched him pause mid-step as he pulled his phone out of his pocket and answered the call, keeping his back to her as he did.
“Veronica?”
The tentative sound of his voice, almost as if he didn’t believe it was really her calling him, made her want to cry and she suddenly realised that this was hurting him just as much as it was her. “Um…” Her mind suddenly went blank and she had no clue as to what to say to him.
“Wrong number, right?”
“N-No, I’ve got the right number.” She paused for a moment before saying the first thing that popped into her head. “Do you, um, want to get some coffee?”
“I, uh…”
“Because I’m going to go get some and I figured that, uh, if you wanted some, too, that we could go together and--”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” she replied, more positively than she was feeling.
“Okay, I’d like that.”
“It’s just coffee,” she blurted out and then wished she’d softened the words slightly before speaking them.
“Just coffee,” he agreed. He was still standing where he had stopped and he slowly turned and looked over to where she had been sitting. He bit back a sound of surprise when he saw her standing before him. Damn, she was definitely stealthy. They shared a small smile as they both disconnected the call and put their phones away.
“This doesn’t mean…” Veronica’s words trailed off but he knew exactly what she meant and he nodded.
“I know.”
They walked side by side towards their respective cars, their fingers occasionally brushing but she didn’t move away, much to Logan’s relief. Just coffee—not much, but it was a start.
Fin