a zara+jax story: independently gone bats, part 3/4 (F/f soon)

I am gonna go bats, truly, if I don't stop trying to edit. Just remember, Jax IS a therapist after all--her pretentious streak isn't my fault

~~~~~~~~~~

"...So I let Hailey and Caroline show me off and all that shit to their friends when we first got there," Z rolled her eyes.

"Finally I escaped and went over to any empty table so I could observe and, ya know, 'assess' the scene for a while."

"Hailey and Caroline were playing volleyball--kickin' ass I might add--and taking sips of their beers every so often."

"No one was drinking drinking really, except for the little frat picios crowd. A few other guys were trying to out-macho each other around the barbeque--what the hell is that about anyway, males and their charcoal obsession?"

"A mystery of the universe," Jax agreed.
Tay could serve up some fine bar-b-q chicken though...among other things...

"Go on, Zara," Jax snapped herself back to the matter at hand.

"Right...so everyone else was pretty much just hanging out, milling around--that's a big-ass house and yard Danny boy's got--talking, flirting, laughing, whatever..."

"Hmm, mmm," Jax prompted with a small smile.

"So, at some point, I went to get another diet coke..."

Z continued, her voice starting to get agitated. "And I hear a song come on that sounded remarkably like the one my floor music last year was mixed from."

Uh, oh, Jax thought.

"Sure enough, there are your 'overgrown scheming' zoccolas over at the stereo grinning like fucking fools," Z confirmed her intuition.

"I swear to goddess, I wished looks could kill at that moment," Z grumbled, a stronger statement actually, if you knew her, even if in exaggeration, than any crudeness she might spew forth.

"And THEN--then they fucking DARED me Jax!"


Jax had to admit that was a low blow.

Hailey and Caroline were blown away by the choreography and her all-around performance when they came to watch her clean up at East/West.
They knew Zara loved this routine too--yet likely did not get that it additionally meant something deeper to her or why.

Jax knew they had only the best of intentions, but they did not know Z well enough to understand the sorts of things that might "trigger" her.
Jax didn't even want to think about where those drunken and/or me-most-macho 'men' were during this...

Nor did Hailey and Caroline realize that the best way to bond with Z was surely not dragging her to a party, or any other unknown social situation--
Which is what all this lunacy was about in the first place.
And around it goes...
*SIGH*


"I just KNOW this was their revenge for me wearing shorts under that godforsaken skirt," Z continued grousing.

*sigh*..."So I 'get on stage' and 'go Shameless.'"

~~~~~
i cannot name this
i cannot explain this
and i really don't want to
just call me shameless
i can't even slow this down
let alone stop this
and i keep looking around
but i cannot top this

if i had any sense
i guess i'd fear this
i guess i'd keep it down
so no one would hear this
i guess i'd shut my mouth
and rethink a minute
but i can't shut it now
'cuz there's something in it...
~~~~~

"Everyone was all into it, it was kinda crazy...And despite myself, I'm hamming it up."
"Dammit, I hate that," Zara muttered.

Yes, Jax took note, there again one of the major themes in her life.
The little attention Z did receive from her family as a child was generally not of a positive kind.
Moreover, because of who her father and uncle were--and especially due to the circumstances of the former's death--she also knew what it was to be an unwilling focus of the media's harsh glare.
Therefore--with the exception of when she was competing, when she is so in her element--Z still habitually sought to avoid all kinds of 'attention.'
Yet when she did find herself in the spotlight--a frequent event despite her efforts to the contrary--it was as if she were born for it.
Just another contradiction in "being Zara"...

"So I finish. I promise Hailey and Caroline that they will get theirs...Hey," Z looked at Jax. "You are gonna help me plot their payback, right?"

"Of course," Jax replied, swallowing a grin. "But not right now, little one," she said with a raised eyebrow.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. Was just making sure," Z suppressed her own devious smile.

"Um, yeah...so I went inside. Grabbed a big bag of ice, because of course my ankles hurt like figlios di puttanas; found a bathroom to put myself and my sanity back together while I iced--"

"Please don't tell me you did all the tumbling too Zara?!"

"Dude, I'm good, but I'm not that good! Grass is no spring floor...I just threw a couple fulls is all."

Jax looked up towards the ceiling, shaking her head. "Just"...on dirt and grass. With her perpetual 'nagging' ankle problems..."Just!"

"ANYways...so, I stayed in there as long as possible, until Hailey sent Caroline to come break down the door or something I guess...pretty sure she'd had another drink or two. I mean, she wasn't wasted or anything, but when Caroline is all gushy and touchy-feely, you know she's at least got a nice buzz going."

Z paused to catch her breath and then sighed.
"Fuck, I SO should have called you right then..."

"Uh, huh. But what did you do instead?"

Z was getting increasingly fidgety as she approached the actual point of the story.

*SIGH* "Instead, I went back outside, trying to invoke my invisibility super power. Finally got my damn soda..."

"And then this girl came up behind me, and she goes, 'Hey, good taste in music!' So of course I turn around and was like, 'Oh, you're an Ani fan?!' And she was and she listens to all the same stuff I do, Throwing Muses even..."

Z was biting her lip hard enough to go right through it.
Jax just looked at her and waited.

"The thing is...I dunno, it was weird, like..." Z sighed. "Like, some kind of instant connection thing...maybe because she's kinda fucked up too?...But ok, so, we sat there for a while and kept talking, about all sortsa shit and...and the conversation was so easy--I mean, I didn't want to run away once--like how bizarre is that?!...and..." she trailed off.

And Jax had a strong hunch why.
Along with this rare experience, one Z didn't often allow herself, of *gasp* genuine social comfort and enjoyment...Jax would place bets the immediate attraction she'd felt was not solely platonic.
But for so many reasons--the question of sexual orientation hardly even among them--Jax knew that anything sexuality-related was something Zara would go nowhere near at this point.
Nor was she objectively ready to-- there were a good number of other "issues" she needed to come more fully to terms with before she would be.

"Ok. So what then?"

"Soooo...so she said she was going to go get another wine cooler and did I want one...And not like I would give a shit anyway, but it wasn't in any 'pressuring' way..."

"But Jax I swear, I didn't even connect that 'Yeah, thanks' was like, an odd response! I was in some kind of psycho-fog or something, I dunno."

"And Hailey and Caroline were where at this point?"

"They were outside too and I was definitely in both of their lines' of sight. But I was mostly sitting with my back to both of 'em...Neither are to blame, Jax, really. It wasn't their fault."

Jax didn't respond except to prompt, "What happened next, Z?"

"Well...she came back pretty fast...She'd just grabbed a whole four-pack...She was only 15 I think, but I got the feeling she was pretty much already an alcoholic...Anyway, so we kept talking...And I was drinkin' one..." She let out a shaky sigh.

Jax sighed too. "And?"

"So I finished the bottle...and I don't know, I was still like fucking catatonic...I just mindlessly opened another one, and I was almost done it, when BAM--reason suddenly made an appearance and said 'Holy Socmel!? Have you lost your cotton-pickin' mind?!?"

Z was staring intensely at her feet.
"...And that's when I finally made an escape and called you...and--"

Jax took over.
"And when I arrived you got in the car looking SO guilty, as if you'd just killed someone, and you tried to tell me--scratch that, LIE to me, and quite disrespectfully so--that absolutely 'nothing' had happened, you were just 'tired.'"

For the most part Jax simply ignored Zara's "mouth."
There were a few well specified exceptions however; suffice to say, she did not appreciate being the direct and deliberate target of Z's lingual creativity.

"I know. I know, Jax. I get it. And I am so, so sorry. I really--"

Jax cut her off again.
"Do you get it Zara? Do you really get it?"

Zara realized this was now the time where she shut up. For a good while...


"Because, let's see. One, although I do again apologize for embarrassing you yesterday--you sure as hell did not 'behave.'"

"And then Zara, yet again, you had the gall--and with that attitude no less--to even think you could lie to me about it. And let me be clear Z, THAT--as usual--is really what you will be disciplined for."

Z still stared at her feet, wishing they would take her somewhere on the other side of the equator--and stat.

Jax was full-steam ahead by now.
Her tone was actually very calm, and would remain so.
However, she surely was not mincing words either.
Not that she ever did.

"But there are plenty more things wrong with this picture as well. Beginning with--you are thirteen Zara. Sometimes a very 'old,' ageless really, thirteen I realize, but still 13. Now, as Hailey and Caroline can tell you, although it's hardly news to you I'm pretty sure--neither Tay nor I were ever naive enough to think we can actually stop our kids from doing certain things, that like it or not, if kids are going to do, they are going to do. And a large percentage of teens drink. Which I do not condone--HOWEVER, one cannot demand the kind of honesty from our children that we do without ensuring to provide an atmosphere in which you guys genuinely feel that you can be that honest. So we set very firm ground rules--and lost a lot of sleep--but we did know we could trust them; that they were smart enough to stay safe; and if they did find themselves in any sort of trouble, they would come to us immediately."

"But I also happen to know neither Hailey nor Caroline ever drank when they were 13 Zara--that is really beyond the pale."

And Z continued her close examination of those feet.
Jax could also see however, by the almost crushed expression on Z's face and a few stray tears, that she was not just hearing, but also listening her. Therefore, she kept going (and going).

"Yet, even then Z, we both know that for you, it's almost beside the point. We'd be here all night if I listed every damn reason, but before we get to the LOOMING question, there is one more that I need to ask."

"Which is: Just how many meds are you on that say right on the bottle, 'You should not drink alcohol while taking this medication?' In addition, there is the matter of your size, little one--which, may I remind you--is significantly smaller than the average 13-year-old even. How you were only minorly intoxicated I have no idea, but if you had suffered a drug-interaction, it could have been that much more serious. Did you even think about any of that, Zara?"

"No, I didn't think so," Jax sighed when Z shook her head.

She pulled Zara to lie back against her chest, and settled her arms around the little waist.
She waited several moments before speaking again.

"That's mostly why I got so angry this afternoon, lovey. I was really, really SCARED--imagining all the things that could have happened to you," Jax said, her voice cracking slightly as a few tears of her own fell.

"I'm sorry," Z whispered.

Jax gave her a tight squeeze and sighed, "I know you are baby, I know."

She took a few moments to gather herself for the next portion of her monologue...


- posted by unquiet @ 7:22 AM

oh no don't you put me in that box you know what you can do with those locks bet your life i'll come crawling out again you'll have to deal with me then you'll hear me in the wind...