VM fic: One Flew Over the Echolls Nest

Title: One Flew Over the Echolls Nest
Author: Wynn
Rating: R for strong language and adult themes
Pairing/Characters: Logan, Veronica, Duncan, hints of L/V
Spoilers: Season One
Summary: Thirty-five hours in a box with four walls and no alcohol and Logan thinks he’s slowly going insane.

AN: A fic experiment from me. Choppy, angsty, angry, snarky, and occasionally sweet Logan in a mental institution fic. Feedback is a wonderful and much appreciated thing.


Thirty-five hours since the last. Since the really fucked up one where his dad fucked Veronica and killed Duncan and Lilly videotaped the whole thing to show at his birthday party.

Thirty-five hours in a box with four walls and no alcohol and Logan thinks he’s slowly going insane.
…………

He has no flowers. No get well cards.

He has a lawsuit from a paparazzo he threw a bedpan at his second day there.

He’s not sure why. The bedpan was empty.
…………

She comes on a Wednesday. She comes alone. She lays her head down next to his and sighs quietly into his pillow.

He throws a bedpan at her too for ruining his life.
…………

“And how are we today, Logan?”

“We are doing just fine. Thanks a bunch for asking.”

“Logan?”

“Yes, Lydia? Oh. I’m sorry. Dr. Thompson.”

“I want to help you, Logan.”

“And I want to jump off a bridge and die. Start helping.”
…………

There’s a phone in his room. He picks it up and calls and listens to her breathe. He’d listen to her heart beat if she’d let him.
…………

She comes again. He doesn’t know what day it is. They sit outside and he smokes a cigarette he won off the alkie down the hall in the daily poker game.

“Duncan told me you won’t see him.”

“Duncan told you right.”

“Why?”

He takes a drag, flicks the butt into the flower pot next to his feet. “I don’t hate Duncan,” he says and looks at her to let the implication sink in.

It doesn’t take long. It never does with her.

She smiles at him and it’s the one he thinks he loves the best. The glass one with the cracks at the edges. Hard and smooth and totally transparent. He can look right through it and see the nerve he’s struck.
…………

Open wide and see what’s inside.

A bridge and a bed and Veronica.
…………

Logan gets three pills a day. Clozapine, Lithium, and Valporate. Handed to him in a plastic cup by a blank faced orderly. He threw the cup back the first two times, threw the pills up the next three. Now they watch him swallow and keep him occupied with poker until the drugs hit his blood stream.

One pill, two pill, red pill, blue pill.

Overmedicate the pain away, fill his blood with chemicals to drown out the memories. But memories don’t drown. He finds this out the hard way.
…………

“Let’s talk about Lilly.”

“Let’s not.”

“Is there a particular reason you don’t want to talk about Lilly?”

“A particular reason? Are you fucking kidding me?”

“No.”

“Of course not. You lost your sense of humor when you got the Ph.D.”

“We could talk about Veronica instead.”

“Is that supposed to be an improvement over the first?”

“Do you need it to be an improvement?”

“I don’t need it to be anything.”

“Do you want it to be?”
…………

Lilly fucked his father. He loved her and she fucked his father.

He hates Veronica. He hates her and she threw his father into prison.

Ironic, possibly.

The story of his life, he thinks.
…………

“Tell me the last time you were happy.”

You learned that from Lilly.

No. Lilly learned it from me.

“I don’t remember.”
…………

She comes again. Logan refuses to see her.
…………

She almost died. His father almost killed her.

She almost died. Her father had to save her.

She almost died. Logan saved no one, not even himself.
…………

She comes again. This time with Duncan. He watches them through the window arguing down in the courtyard. They never argued before. They never had anything to argue about. Now they have him.

He thinks he should feel special.

He wants them to go away.

Duncan shakes his head and storms off and Logan watches Veronica. She sits on the bench where he sat when he told her he hated her. She sits with her head in her hands. She sits for a moment, only a moment, and then she’s up and pacing, her eyes on the flower pot.

The orderly tells Logan he has a visitor. He doesn’t say anything. He already knows.

The orderly goes. Eventually.

Veronica kicks the flower pot. Eventually.
…………

“You had some visitors today.”

“Wow, you’re observant. Someone had their Wheaties this morning.”

“Duncan and Veronica. They came to see you, but you didn’t see them. Why?”

“I was washing my hair.”

“Logan.”

“Christ. What is your fucking problem? Can’t you take a hint? I don’t want to talk about it.”

“We could talk about your father instead.”

“Go fuck yourself. I’m tired of you fucking with me.”
…………

How many times? How many times did they fuck? How many times did they walk right past him and know what they were doing behind his back?

How many times did he not see the truth right in front of his face?
…………

He calls, she answers, and he listens. In and out. In and out. In and out. Over and over and over again until he’s committed the sound to memory.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“For what?”

“For not seeing,” he says and then he hangs up.
…………

She comes again. They sit on two hard plastic chairs and watch the orderlies go by.

“Logan…” she says and her voice catches on the o. He closes his eyes and tries to block it out.

“Don’t,” he says. “Just… don’t.”
…………

He hates her for trying to be strong.

He hates her for trying.

He hates her.

He hates.

He.
…………

“What would you like to talk about today, Logan?”

“You’re giving me a choice?”

“You’ve always had a choice. You just have to make a decision.”

“Or what?”

“I think you already know.”
…………

Another day, another dream. Logan fucked Duncan and killed Veronica and Lilly videotaped the whole thing to show at his funeral.

They locked him in a freezer and tossed him in the ocean and he floated off the edge of the world and into the sun.
…………

“I don’t want you to come anymore.”

“Anymore? This is the first time that you’ve seen me.”

“You shouldn’t come.”

“Why not?”

“Because.”

“Because?”

“Yeah. Because.”

“O-kay.”

“Stop fucking laughing, Duncan. It’s not funny.”

“It is funny. You sound like you did when we were five.”

“You don’t understand. You never understood.”

“What?”

“Everything. Lilly. Veronica. Me. You never understood.”

“No, Logan. You never understood.”
…………

“Are you going to tell me not to come, too?”

“No. You wouldn’t listen to me if I did.”
…………

Open wide and see what’s inside.

A boat and a bottle and Veronica.
…………

“What do you want out of life, Logan?”

“To not have to answer any more questions.”

“Do you want to finish high school? Go to college? Get married someday?”

“I want to win the World Series and go to Disneyland.”

“I wanted to be an artist. A painter, actually.”

“Really.”

“Are you shocked by that?”

“No. Yes. What made you change your mind?”

“My sister. She died when I was thirteen. Suicide. When I knew there was something wrong, it was too late. I couldn’t help her. I didn’t know how to help her.”

“So you’re working your guilt issues out with me? Nice.”

“I worked through my guilt issues a long time ago, Logan. Now I just want to help.”
…………

He should have been there. He should have been there with her and not off drinking her away. He should have been there to save her. He should have been.
…………

He calls, she answers, and he says, “I don’t hate you.”

“I know.”

“You don’t have to sound so fucking smug about it.”

“And you didn’t have to be an asshole to me that day either, but you were.”

“Yeah, I guess I kind of was.”

“Yeah, I guess you really were.”

“So… are you coming tomorrow?”
…………

“Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Do you feel guilty for not having seen what was going on with your sister?”

“Every day. But I was young and in over my head, so I’ve learned how to forgive myself, too.”

“How?”

“By realizing that what happened wasn’t my fault.”
…………

She comes and he’s waiting for her with a deck of cards. They sit in the lobby and she creams him in consecutive games of poker, rummy, war, and go fish.

The bruise on her cheek matches her eyes. She has scars on her hands from the fire and a smile on her face that looks like sunshine in the morning. Logan knows this is the one he loves the best. The one that lights her face up so bright it blinds him.

Logan knows this is the one he loves.
…………

Forty-six hours since the last. Since the less fucked up one where his father fucked Lilly and didn’t kill Veronica and the only thing that was videotaped were the two people that used to mean the most to Logan fucking him over.

Forty-six hours in a box with four walls and no alcohol and Logan thinks he might be all right. He might just be all right after all.
…………

the end