Nashville Skyline Rag
By Missy

SERIES: Souvenirs
SUBTITLE: Nashville Skyline Rag
FOLLOWS: Souvenirs, Fire With Fire, Bury That Jewel,
High Sierra, Walking Lonely, Blues Along The Way, Balloons Land, Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans, Somewhere Sails, Baby, It's You, So...
PART: 1 of 1
AUTHOR: Missy
EMAIL: lasfic@yahoo.com
RATING: PG, Gen
PAIRING(s): L/L

DISTRIBUTION: To LW, Kai, Myself and FG so far; any other archives are welcome to ask, but disclaimers must be included, my email left intact. send a URL, and provide full disclaimers as well as credit me fully. Please inform me if you are going to submit my work to any sort of search engine. Please do not submit my work to a search engine that picks out random sets of words and uses them as key words, such as "Google"

Please contact me in order for this story to be placed on an archive, or if you want know of a friend who would enjoy my works, please email me their address and I will mail them the stories, expressly for the purpose of link trading. MiSTiers are welcomed! Please do inform me that you'd like to do the MiSTing, however, and send me a copy of the finished product. I'd also love to archive any MiSTings that are made of my work!
CATEGORY: Drama
FEEDBACK: PLEASE?!
SETTING IN TIMELINE: California
SPOILLER/SUMMARY: Lenny and Laverne finally make it to Tennessee.
NOTES: twelfth fic in a shared universe.

****

He was wearing his best blue shirt this morning. Laverne only noticed this fleetingly, comparing it to her worn plaid shirt as she leaned against his drooping arm.

They were less than a minute from his sister's house, and already butterflies danced in her stomach. She remembered Angie well; a tall, blonde girl that all of the boys loved. Especially Fonzie. She realized with a blush that Angie had been her once-upon-a-time rival.

Well, that would have to be another mark between them. Surely, the girl could forget, as Laverne had done so long ago.

"Vernie...we're here."

Laverne slowed her breathing, looking at the house before her. It proved to be a modest, white ranch. Its smallness instantly concerned her, though, of course, nothing disturbed Lenny. He grabbed his guitar and took her two suitcases, leaving her to trail behind him up the stairs.

The doorbell chimed the first few notes to 'Doe Ri Mi', and Laverne tried to straighten her stance as the door swung open.

"Lenny!" A blonde woman shrieked, throwing her arms around his neck. Laverne noticed her glittering blouse and short black skirt; the force of her motion nearly sent her out of her heels. After holding on to Lenny for as long as possible, She turned and squinted in the sunlight. "Laverne DeFazio?"

"Yeah." Laverne said bashfully.

"I don't believe it! The last time I saw ya, you was in a training bra."

She awkwardly crossed her free arm over her breasts as she shook Angie's hand.

"Lenny wrote ahead and told me all about the two of you being together, so I opened up the guest room. The kids'll be able to stay in their own rooms, and Hector and me..."

"Hector?"

"Vernie, I told ya Angie married Hector last year."

"Hector Kestenbaum?" Laverne carefully tried to conceal her nerves.

"Yep; he's off at the garage. I'm gonna go meet him at a bar in town. I hope you're gonna come with us."

"Eh, no; I'm kinda tired from driving so long." Lenny lied.

"You sure?"

He nodded. "But hey, when there's an open mic night, I'm gonna go."

"It's okay; someone needs to be home when Chris and Cathy come home."

"Their kids." Lenny said. "One each from another relationship." He noticed his sister's frown.

"I swear, Lenny, don't you tell your girlfriends anything about your family?"

"Don't you got a husband to catch?"

"Pretty sneaky." She retorted, accepting another kiss from him. "I'll see you by six, and I'll bring home dinner, okay?"

Laverne found herself waving goodbye to Lenny's sister.

"You know which one's the guest bedroom?"

Lenny shook his head, as Laverne slipped into an open easy chair with a groan.

***

That night, they lay in an ungenerous bed, which had once been Chris and Cathy's in turn, the hushed shouts of Hector Kestenbaum's kids still ringing in their ears.

Laverne could nearly make out the moon through the tiny slit of a window. It seemed to be the same moon she'd had in California and this comforted her with absurd grace.

Lenny had curled himself around her, tangling them up in a quilt with patches of printed moons and stars.

"Hector Kestenbaum had kids before me." She said, quietly.

"You'll catch up." He pointed out.

"We'll catch up."

He grinned sleepily. "I wasn't gonna say that."

But now that it lay between them, she didn't mind it.

She nudged his arm over her hips. Elsewhere, the sound of whining fiddles mellowed, two children turning over in beds, and the sound of lovers lungs inflating.

To herself, Laverne muttered, "And now the real journey begins."

FIN


To "So..."
To "Through The Looking Glass"










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