08-Jun-2004
Title: The Worst Thing
Author: Sol
Chapter: 08/??
Rating: NC-17, pretty much
Warnings: violence, language, adult situations
Pairings: 1+2, 1+R, 2+3, 3+4; 4x0C; more developing
Archived: Sweetlysour & GW Addiction
Crits & comments welcome. Brace yourself for impact.
I woke up the next morning to the smell of coffee. I managed to sit up with a stifled groan. My head was pounding, and my lower back was definitely feeling the after-effects of being up close and personal with a damn baseball bat.
"Didn't know how you like your coffee," Jamie said, and I smiled, rubbing my eyes.
"However you drink it is fine with me," I told him, and then looked up to see someone else entirely grinning at me. "Uh... "
The man was stockier, with Jamie's midnight-black hair, but blue eyes. He hadn't shaved, and he was wearing an old University sweatshirt. "Did you want it?" He held out the coffee cup again, and I took it, still feeling confused. "I'm Ted," the man said, sitting down on the edge of the coffee table. He looked me over and whistled. "Jamie wasn't kidding. You got a number done on you."
"Three guys," I mumbled around the mug. The coffee was strong, and a little bitter, but it hit the back of my throat with a sharp tang. "Wiss, and Block, and the ringleader didn't introduce himself."
"That would be Jack," he told me. "Big guy on this block, I suppose. Little guy in the real scheme of things, but... you took all three on?"
"Wasn't like I went looking for them," I grumbled. "They started it."
"They're not big on college students. Some college boy scared the shit outta Jack's little brother few months ago," Ted told me, and I know I flushed. Ted raised his eyebrows, and I made a point of staring down into my coffee. "No fucking way," he said, and leaned back, laughing. "Well, Jamie said you were a spitfire."
"A... what?" I gave him a puzzled look, then glanced past him. "Where's Jamie?"
"Work." Ted got up, and started straightening up some of the magazines on the end tables. "He didn't leave til I got here, said you shouldn't be left alone." He was casual saying it, but he gave me a sharp glance.
"I... just a rough night, I guess," I said. I took another sip of the coffee, hissing through my teeth. I gave the mug a pointed look. "Well, I'm awake *now*."
"Jamie's recipe," Ted said. "Got classes, then?"
"Yeah." I threw off the blanket and stood up, gingerly, then looked at the blanket crumpled on the sofa. Leaning over carefully, I dragged it towards me, and began folding it. Jamie had... well, he'd done something and I hadn't even asked, or explained. "I'm in his debt," I told Ted, and I wasn't sure why I said it.
"Never between friends," Ted told me. He took the blanket from me. "I'll fold that. You just get on to classes."
"Thanks." I limped to the table, where my coat was laying over one of the chairs. I checked the gun at the back of my jeans, sliding the holster around to the front, and pulled on my coat. "Do you have paper and a pen?"
"On the countertop," Ted said, over his shoulder. He'd finished folding the blanket and was laying it across the back of the sofa.
I found the paper and pen, and quickly scribbled out a note for Jamie. Call me, I wrote, and put down my phone number. I didn't know what I'd say if he did, but I didn't feel right just leaving.
The days passed, the nights were long, and I started to feel like I was finding my feet. Jamie and I met several times, on my nights off, just out for coffee, about once a week. I walked him home, or he'd walk me home, but when I invited him in, he'd laugh and say he had work the next morning. Finally, the fourth time we'd gotten together, I asked him. We were standing on the steps of my apartment building, and for once there were no junkies to keep us company. The early spring streets were deserted at midnight, and I watched Jamie's lips and leaned into him. He leaned back, his eyes drifting away from mine.
"I don't understand." All we'd done since then was kiss, and he'd stop just as I was starting to feel that low surge in my gut, the one I'd been craving since the first time he'd kissed me.
"I figured," he said, and smiled down at me. He stepped away, zipping his leather jacket up. "Slow is better, Cat."
"Slow... " I shook my head. "Now, wait a minute-"
Jamie chuckled. "Man, just don't realize, do you? You're seductive... if a guy can be that, you are." He tapped me on the forehead, and I frowned, really not sure what he meant. "But you're driving for something, and I tried to hang on for the ride. It didn't work. It could, if you're willing to let *me* drive."
With a wave, he turned around, walking off down the street. I watched him go, but for once, I truly watched him, and tried to see past the random images I'd collected: his laugh, his gray eyes, the way his hair turned brilliant blue- black in the streetlights. He was lanky, with long legs and well-shaped calves, powerful thighs. His shoulders were strong, just right above a barrel chest. His hands, swinging at his sides, were square and powerful, with short fingers that were callused and hard from days of labor.
When I closed my eyes against the midnight breeze and tried to imagine his face, I couldn't. If he was in front of me, I could see him, and that was enough. But when he walked away, I found myself clutching at images, and they ran away from me like rain down the gutters.
We didn't speak of it again, but I found myself unable to say no when Jamie had free time on my evenings off. I saw Lola mostly in the mornings, and some nights after work would swing by her place, but I never spent the night. My life was boiling down to studio, class, studio, Lola, studio, work, studio, Jamie. Sometimes I wondered if it was right to see Lola in the afternoon and Jamie in the evening. Most of the time I just ignored it, and marked my days by the lectures I got from Professor Zimm about my pathetic attempts at abstracts, or the teasing I got in 2-D that so far I'd only managed perspective and couldn't do shading to save my life.
Twice I'd gone by the clinic, dutifully given blood, and after a vicious glare from Nurse Jackson had been sent on my way with a clean bill of health. Spring took its time coming to the city, and a few times I'd been worried I was developing another cough, but the accompaniment of a few sneezes and a headache meant it was really a cold, Felicia told me.
When midterms came, I was in studio most of the time, trying to finish the composition I planned to send Wufei. It was mostly an abstract, done in colors and lines, though it had started out as a movement sketch for life drawing. I just kept going over the canvas, adding more colors and more lines, then began drawing in angles and brackets and notes as though turning the now-distant figure into an engineering sketch. My life-drawing professor loathed it.
Three days after exams, the rain was coming down in a steady drizzle, and I managed to bribe Felicia and Lola into helping me carry a huge art supply purchase back to my apartment. Everything was wrapped up in garbage bags to protect it from the rain, though we were soaked.
Lola shook her head, but her red hair remained plastered to her face. "Someone get this hair out of my face," she fussed, hefting the bag in her arms. "I do it, I'll drop these sketchpads."
Felicia poked Lola in the side of the head, laughed, and wiped Lola's hair back. "Better?"
"Much." Lola glanced over at me, and grinned. "Okay. I've decided. Bruno's."
"Shit, Lola," Felicia looked past Lola at me. "No way. That place is expensive," and she drew out the last word, rolling her eyes.
"Bruno's?" I shrugged. I'd just drawn another ten thousand credits from my main account, mostly for art supplies and maybe pay rent up through the summer. There were some classes I wanted to take over the summer session at the Art Institute - when they let in people who weren't enrolled there full time - and it was a good chance I'd have to cut back on my working hours. I could spare a few hundred credits. It was about time I did something for Felicia and Lola, after all the time they'd put up with me. I grinned slyly, enjoying Lola's stunned reaction. "I'll make a reservation. But you might want to dry off before we go."
"Holy... " Felicia choked, then narrowed her eyes. "Cat... "
"I knew it! He's selling his body on the street!" Lola kicked me in the ankle, and I pretended to limp, for her benefit. She continued to tease me, prying for information in that roundabout way of hers, and we traipsed up the stairs to my apartment, leaving a trail of dirty city water behind us. "I hear it's decent money. Bet you get what, twenty credits a night?"
"At least forty," I informed her and winked. I stuck my key in the top bolt lock. The tumbler didn't click. It wasn't locked. Pulling back, I stepped away from the door, and set down my bags. "You two," I said, in a soft, stern voice, "stay here."
"Ca-"
I shot one glance at Lola, and she closed her mouth with a snap. Felicia nodded nervously, hovering by Lola. I put my hand on the doorknob, and turned it, pushing the door open.
The first thing I saw, as always, was Wufei's scroll. The second thing I saw was Victoria, one of my eldest sisters. She was also the head of the board of directors for Winner International Conglomerate. I tensed, then relaxed into formal mode, feeling the old drawing-room manners descend upon me like a cloak, shutting me off. I brought my art supplies in, setting them by the door, and turned to find Felicia and Lola had followed me in.
"Quatre," Victoria sighed. She was standing by the window, holding back the blanket. She let it drop, and it swung a little before becoming still. She looked annoyed, and I was immediately on my guard.
"Felicia, Lola, put the stuff down and leave *now*," I said, in cold tones. Victoria couldn't be visiting without warning unless it was something bad, and it stunned me, in some small private place, to realize it wasn't that I didn't want my friends to know who I was. That didn't matter, suddenly. I just didn't want to expose them to the nasty undercurrents that could something flow through my family's business.
Victoria tossed her blonde hair over her shoulder, and for that moment, I could only stare. She stood straight, and tall, her expensive red heels leading from delicate ankles to slender, tanned legs, into a short but well-fitted red suit. Italian, I guessed, or possibly British, given the contrasting trim and almost business-like cut. The diamond earrings in her ears caught the light and glittered reflections across the two girls, who were looking from Victoria to me. Felicia looked annoyed, while Lola looked...
Scared, I realized, and it was as though there was no air in the room, and the rain beating against the windows had flooded and I was moving through water. Felicia was a few inches shorter than Victoria, her dark skin beaded and slick from the rain. There was a scar on Felicia's jaw that I'd never noticed before, and her braids were tangled, the paint flecking off the metal beads. Her jacket was worn at the cuffs, her jeans tattered and a little too long for her.
Lola, beside her and a little behind her, was a paltry knock-off of Victoria's elegance, wearing an L1 fashion that tried to pass some cheap fabric off as nubby silk. The green jacket was wet-streaked, the patched jeans no fashionable but simply make-do. Lola's hair was crimson-dark with the rain. Her eyes were huge, flicking back and forth between Victoria's patient observation and my silent waiting.
Victoria opened her mouth, and I cut her off.
"Fel, Lola, I said-"
"Yeah," Felicia replied, grabbing Lola by the arm. They backed up, looking at my sister and me as though either of us might spring any moment. Lola grabbed the doorknob and pulled the door shut behind them.
"Victoria," I managed, in a pleasantly cool tone. "I don't recall inviting you for tea."
"I was in town," she said, crossing her arms and planting her feet. Even with her heels, I topped her by an inch or two, but her cold blue eyes could pin a butterfly to a Gundam at eighty paces. "However, I was not in town on pleasure, but because of this." She pulled out a piece of paper, and handed it to me. "Care to explain?"
I unfolded it, scanning quickly. It was a printout of my grades from my midterms. Two As, a B-minus, one B, and a B-plus. I shrugged. Fact was, I was rather proud of even passing two of those art midterms. "I'm taking classes that are a real challenge."
"One semester, it was all engineering, and we could let that go. But now art classes? And I find out you've signed up for three more over the summer." Victoria snatched the paper back from my hands, tucking it away in some hidden pocket in her stylish suit. "This is not acceptable, little brother."
I decided to ignore that jibe. "How'd you get in?"
"Your landlady was quite amenable once she found out who was really living under her roof."
Fuck.
"Quatre, what are you doing? Do you want to ruin everything? Come back to L4. You can take business classes at the university there. There's certainly no need to... " She glanced at the door and then around the room. "... Live in a place like this." I knew she meant more than just the physical surroundings.
"I don't want to study business," I said, crossing my arms. "I like art."
"I'd encourage you, but you only got B's," she pointed out. "So I'm not even sure it's worth your time as a hobby. But WIC--"
"--Is doing just fine without me," I interrupted. "You came all this way to tell me to take business classes? There's seven of you, and twenty-two more where you came from. You can do it without me."
"Don't you give a damn?" Victoria threw up her arms, striding across the room to lift the blanket and stare out at the rain for a long moment. She dropped it again with a sigh. "Quatre, this isn't where you belong."
"Maybe not. But I don't think I belong behind a desk, either."
"We can send you into the field--"
"--I don't want to spend my days on construction sites. Or resource satellites."
"Quatre, you're the heir. You can't just walk away from this!" Victoria put her hands on her hips, and for a second I was reminded of my father, yelling at me about the decision I'd made. "This is your family. Your past and your future!"
"I don't want it!"
She stopped cold, shocked, and her surprise melted into a deep frown. "You have friends on L4, people who've asked about you. You have a life there, and in Sanq. Do you really want to walk away from all of that?"
"I'm not walking away," I retorted, and leaned against the wall, my arms still crossed. "I'm just going to school."
"You fail to uphold your part of the inheritance, and you won't be doing that much longer," she spat. "Your trust fund is reliant on your participation as the scion of the company."
"So keep my names on the documents for three years, and--"
"--And then what? If you hate it now, how am I to be certain you won't still have that attitude in three years?" She tossed her head, glaring at me.
I shrugged. She was right. "You can't be. I'm not."
"Do you really want this life?" Victoria shook her head. "This isn't how you were raised. Look at the people you're spending your time with... like Lola Renault, from the South Side, unemployed father, mother whereabouts unknown for the past eighteen years."
"You've been following me?" I narrowed my eyes, tensing.
She ignored me, and went for the deeper wound. "Felicia Carter, from MO- 099854... Fancy that. Does she know, Quatre?"
"No," I admitted, sullenly, and narrowed my eyes at her, adding a threatening tone to my voice. "And if you breathe a word, I'll--"
"What? Throw me out like you do drunkards at that club?" Victoria's expression was somewhere between defiant and hurt. "What happened to you? You were a sweet kid, raised well, with everything you could possibly want and one day you woke up and decided to go against everything our family believes in--"
"I believed in peace more."
"--You cannot achieve peace through war, Quatre!"
That was it. I was shouting, too. "You cannot achieve peace by rolling over and letting them walk all over you! That's not peace, that's tyranny!"
"There are better ways than murder!" Victoria was shaking. "But you left that behind and came back to us. Why do you have to do this again? Why can't you just--"
I took my voice up to a deafening battle cry. "I don't *like* being me!"
Victoria's mouth opened, and nothing came out.
"I don't *like* those simpering assholes who only want our money," I snapped, pushing past Victoria to rip off my soaked jacket and throw it on the cracked folding chair. "I don't *like* the endless days of pushing papers and boring meetings and rearranging numbers just so we have more fucking money." I yanked my shirt over my head and threw it at my laundry bag. "I don't *like* smiling and laughing at stupid-ass jokes by morons who are only interested in whether I'm going to marry their daughter." I grabbed a dry shirt from my second-hand dresser and pulled it over my head, tugging it down with sharp jerks. "And I don't fucking *like* being told I have no choice but to do all that!"
"Quatre," Victoria said, after a long pause. She studied her fingernails, and sighed, dropping her hand. "This is our family. We all do our part."
"Why? Why do I have to be stuck in that? Iria got to be a damn doctor! Tarla's a school teacher! Mina's a journalist. I'm not asking for a lot. I just want a chance to be somebody other than goddamn fucking *Quatre Raberba Winner*!"
"You can't!" Victoria spun to face me, her hands in fists. "You can't. You will never be able to walk away from it. And how dare you suggest that you'd want to? Iria, Tarla, Mina, all of us play a role in the company, have jobs we do that help in some way. Who the hell are you to say you can leave it behind?"
"I'm me, damn it, and I want to choose what I get to do and be in this life, for once--"
"You got your ONCE and it's time to grow up!"
I recoiled instinctively at the force of her cry, unable to come up with a response.
"You killed, and murdered, and slaughtered *thousands*," Victoria spat, her voice low and venomous. "We forgave you, somehow. But the war's over. You don't have that excuse anymore. You're an adult, now, and you have *responsibilities*. You can shirk the guilt of your past but you can't walk away-"
"Don't *ever* assume I have shirked any guilt for my actions," I informed her, as coldly as I could manage. I let my mask shift, into the battle stillness I'd worn for so long. "You can't possibly comprehend what--"
"--Don't you dare," Victoria cried, but her fury was icy, not the blistering rage she'd held earlier. "I had friends, good friends, who died on that satellite. You *owe* me. You *owe* all of us. We've protected you and kept you safe. Even our father knew in the end--"
"--Don't talk to me about that," I snarled. "You weren't there. You don't know."
"I know he gave his life for the company, and his beliefs, and his--"
I saw absolute, total blood red, in ways I hadn't since I was fifteen. "He gave his life for a damn stupid ideal! He chose the grand gesture rather than the hard fight! His death was *pointless*!"
Victoria backhanded me.
I couldn't even put a hand to my face, though my skin stung. The diamond on her finger had sliced my cheek, and blood trickled down. I kept my eyes on the floor. If I moved, I'd deck her, and we both knew it. I wasn't some little fifteen-year old anymore, with a big Gundam but powerless otherwise.
"Quatre," Victoria breathed into the silence. "You are my brother and as such I will love you, but I will not allow you to wreck our company or our family one more time. Either you return and take up your rightful place, or I begin disinheritance procedures. The terms of your trust are simple. If you are not with the company as its head, you are not part of it, and you are not part of this family."
I raised my head at that. She couldn't have knocked the air from me more thoroughly than if she'd thrown a punch to my stomach.
"I will send someone to get you in four hours," Victoria informed me, her voice falling into the boardroom patterns I knew so well. "If you are not out front waiting, then I will assume your choice is another betrayal. And this one, little brother, won't be forgiven. You won't get a second chance."
"I don't want to lose my family," I said, very quietly. "But I just want a chance to--"
"You're out of chances," Victoria replied, and I blinked, suddenly aware of the weariness emanating from her, tinged with heartbreak. "My job is to make sure that our family continues, with every possible success. You risked that once, and I won't let you do it again. I'm sorry, Quatre." She sighed, and when she closed her eyes, I could see the fine wrinkles around her eyes, the lines at the edge of her mouth, pressed in a strong crimson line.
"Victoria," I whispered.
"Four hours," she said, and left.
I stared at the closed door for several long breaths, not moving, and not really sure what to do. I was startled out of my numbness by a soft tapping at the door. Frowning, and a little curious as to whether I'd fallen into such shock that four hours had passed so quickly, I didn't even bother to reach for my gun. I simply opened the door.
Felicia got me in the jaw.
"Goddamnit," I yelped, stumbling backwards, a hand to my jaw. "What is it with people smacking the shit out of me today?"
"Because you *are* a shit, Quatre Raberba Winner!" Felicia stood in my doorway; vibrating in fury, but no, I only felt exasperation from her, strangely. I took a breath, focusing, and worked my jaw. It wasn't broken, but she had a vicious right hook.
"Felicia," I said, and didn't let go of my jaw.
"Asshole!"
I sighed. "Yes. Fine. I'm an asshole."
"Do something about it, then!"
"Like what? Run back to my family and wear my expensive Italian suits and--"
Felicia shut me up with another punch, but this one I managed to dodge. "Would you *stop* that?"
"You, Cat," she said, stabbing a finger at me. She halted, then frowned. "Quatre! Were you our friend, or not?"
"Was I... " I blinked, and all I could do was stop and give it serious thought. I frowned a little, staring down at my hand, and the blood on it from my cheek. When I answered her, I was completely serious. "I think so. I'm... sometimes I'm not sure."
"Not sure? What the hell do we need to do, rent out a billboard that says, we like Cat?" Her braids flew around her as she waved her hands in the air, and followed up the sarcasm with an aggravated sound.
"Actually, yeah... maybe," I said, still speaking in a quiet, serious tone. "I'm... I think I'm rather slow that way, sometimes. I'm just used to people who want something from me."
"People always will," Felicia told me, and poked her finger in my chest. "But just because we wanted your friendship back doesn't mean we're in the same category as money-leeching mooches."
"I never said you were," I protested.
"But you thought we might be," she replied, her expression fierce. "You never gave us the chance to show you that we wouldn't be... Fuck, Ca--Quatre, I should smack you again for good measure! It might knock something loose!"
"Please, don't." I raised my hands in surrender. "I've had my quota."
Felicia sagged, stepping away from me. Her entire body radiated hurt, and confusion, and sorrow. Her whisper sent trickles of ice through my veins. "Quatre... you were that Gundam pilot."
I couldn't answer. I only nodded.
"I won't tell anyone," she promised me. "But... I don't think I'll be hanging out with you for a little bit. It's a lot to process. I could... I could forgive some distant person for doing that, if that makes sense. It was easier to forgive something that wasn't there. But to know you knew, and you never said anything--"
"That's unfair," I snapped, hitting my breaking point. "I carry my own guilt. What did you expect me to do? Get down on my knees and beg forgiveness?"
"No!" Felicia spun. "I'd like my childhood back!"
"At least you HAD one!"
We stared at each other for a long time. Felicia broke the silence with bitter laughter. "I don't know why you fired on civilians. I don't know why you did any of what you did. And it would be so much easier to hate you if you really were an asshole."
I dropped my head. "Yeah."
"And you are, a lot of the time," she continued. I raised my head, surprised and hurt, but she didn't turn around. She was staring at the pictures on my walls; her hands hung by her side, her shoulders slumped. "It's like... you freeze us out, and you discount us. There are little things you do, that I know... we all know... you don't realize you do. When the coffee's not just right, or the silverware at the diner isn't spotless, or someone laughs too loud... you get this look, y'know?"
"No," I whispered. "I didn't know."
"It's like... we're not measuring up, somehow, but... the rest of the time, you do care. And I... I can tell you do but it's like you're doing your damnedest not to admit it. So I figured you had your own demons, and... " She shook her head, and the beads on her braids rattled. "I think you should go see Lola. I don't think you'll be able to salvage it, but you owe her an apology anyway."
"Lola... " I felt ill. "Both of you heard--"
"She left, as soon as she heard your name," Felicia said. She squared her shoulders, and walked to my door. I felt like it was Trowa, again, telling me goodbye and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it because everything that had been done, I'd done it, and it was too late now. "I'm sorry, Quatre," Felicia whispered, and shut the door behind her.
"Me, too," I told the empty room.
It took ten minutes of staring at my art supplies before I roused myself. Grabbing my wet coat, I headed out into the rain, bound for Lola's boarding house. It took a few minutes of pacing before I realized I had no idea what I'd say. Giving up, and deciding to deal with another bruise on my jaw if it helped, I knocked on the door.
Lola opened the door, and immediately stepped back to slam it. I caught the door with my shoulder.
"Please, Lola, I want--"
"No!" Lola sobbed, shaking her head, and backed up into the house's living room. "I don't want to hear it. Just go away and you can keep enjoying the joke. Don't ruin it now."
"It's probably already ruined," I admitted, closing the door gently behind me. "But I owe you an apology--"
"You owe me a fuckload, you asshole!" Lola said hoarsely. She choked, and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and tears were caught on her lashes. "Laughing at us, all that time. Just pretending like you're one of us. Why? What the hell kinda asshole gets his jollies pretending to be *poor*?"
"The kind that didn't know any better," I whispered.
I didn't move, and she began prowling the crammed living room, around the two mismatched sofas, the coffee table held up on one end by cement blocks, and coming back around again. Her arms were wrapped tightly around her body, and she hunched over, speaking in a low voice.
"Chip and Lisa have had a bet since middle of last semester," she said, almost conversationally. "I told him it's a family resemblance, y'know, maybe cousins or something. Chip started checking up on things... in October, Quatre Winner didn't attend the annual Preventers Ball. And his company changed their tune in November, to say he... you... weren't on an extended project, but had taken a leave of absence. And in December, he... you... didn't attend Relena Darlian's annual Holiday Gathering, which apparently was whispered quite loudly on the gossip circuits. Illness, or perhaps he got someone pregnant, even a few rumors he was actually the thirtieth daughter and was pregnant himself."
I snorted.
Lola sighed. "Y'know... or maybe you don't, asshole, that I trusted you. I feel like a fool. I *hate* being taken for a fool. I kept telling them, I trusted you. You said you weren't Quatre. I believed you." Her low, almost hypnotic voice hurt even more than if she'd been screaming, but I couldn't say a thing. Lola stopped by the window, and scrubbed at the grime with the sleeve of her damp shirt. "I told them I trusted you to tell me the truth... "
"Lola... "
"You didn't. You lied to me, along with everyone else. I can handle you lying to the world at large, but you don't fuck me on a daily basis and lie to my face like that. I won't take that. So you can go and enjoy your little joke and go back to your life of caviar and private jets and pretty people and just forget this ever happened." She straightened, and rubbed at the window a few more times, then slowly stopped. Her shoulders were shaking, but she didn't turn around. "Because I'm going to be doing my best to forget, too."
I didn't know what to say. I didn't see how I could fix it, and an apology wouldn't do anything. It wouldn't bring back Felicia's childhood home, and it wouldn't repair Lola's trust in me. The only thing I could do was be honest.
"I'm staying in school," I told her. "I understand you won't want to see me again, but I thought I'd let you know. I'm staying... and I won't be pretending. In three hours, I won't be on my front step and I won't be picked up by a cab and I won't be going home and... " I took a deep breath. "I won't be rich anymore. Not even close. So... I won't be pretending."
Lola didn't turn around. She sniffled a few times.
"I guess that doesn't make much of a difference," I said, wishing she'd say something, anything. "But I didn't tell you because I... I liked the fact that you didn't look at me like... the girl in the clinic."
"The what?" Lola's murmur was almost lost in the sounds of a truck passing on the street.
"At the clinic, when I went about that cough. The girl was bitchy, but when she found out my real name, she turned friendly and helpful and... it made me sick. I just liked the fact that you... and everyone else here... saw me as me. Not some pansy in the gossip column with money to burn. I didn't want to tell you, and see you--"
"I'm not two-faced," Lola replied, stiffly. "I wouldn't do that."
"If you'd known I was Quatre Winner," I asked in a defeated tone, "if you'd known from the start, would you ever have even *talked* to me?"
She didn't say anything.
"Yeah," I told her. "I didn't think so, either. Lola... " I hesitated, still hoping, but she remained at the window, staring out. "I'm sorry," I said.
Outside, it was storming again, and the rain was salty on my tongue as I walked home.
End Part 8
*sigh*
(:./sol/worst8)
