Chapter 3

~~Early December 1999~~

"Liz are you gonna do this? I mean look at this, they want you to apply for
the Spring Semester. Isn't that great?!" Nikolas said, walking over to Liz
who sat peeling red nailpolish from her fingertips. He held the letter from
the Art Academy out in front of her. Liz made no move to take the paper from
Nikolas' hand.

"I already have a school that I just adore," Liz said flattly, looking up
from her chore of nail polish peeling for a mere fraction of a second. The
sarcasm in her voice was unmistakeable.

Nikolas knelt down in front of Liz, trying to get her attention. He pushed
her chin up with his forefinger.

"Excuse you," Liz said annoyed, blowing a strand of hair out of her face as
she looked up.

Nikolas simply ignored her and continued talking. "Liz, don't you get it?
This is your second chance."

"My second chance for what Nikolas?" Liz said, rising and walking over to
stand in front of her window.

Last night she had dreamt about him coming through that very same window. The
dream ended with him leaving, calling her sweetie and telling her that he
loved her too, while she begged him to stay. How she wished she had begged
him to stay. He would have. He would have listened and he would have stayed.

"It's your chance to get your life back on track," Nikolas said waking her
from her reverie. "It's your chance to do what you were meant to do Liz, to
paint."

Suddenly Liz was laughing. "That's what you think I was meant to do...paint?
Have you seen any of my paintings lately Nikolas? The term 'suck' does not
quite describe..."

"Eliza -....Liz," Nikolas said, correcting hiself before his almost fatal
mistake. "I doubt that any of your work...sucks. You prob - "

"Take a look in the closet," Liz demanded, cutting him off.

"Huh?" Nikolas asked.

"I said, take a look in the closet."

Nikolas walked over to the closet and pulled open the white slated doors. He
looked down towards the floor. Lieing amidst a pile of shoes he could
scaresly make out what looked like three different canvases. The first canvas
depicted a rose. A dead rose. A rose that only Elizabeth knew to be her one
and only souvenire from the 'No Name.' The second canvas was simply a red
heart on a black background, but the heart had a crack splitting it in two
right down the middle. The last painting, intrigued Nikolas. This one was
definitely different from the rest. It was dark, but light at the same time.
Hopeful, yet hauntingly mysterious. It was a representation of the docks, but
it was so foggy you could barely tell it was the docks. Nikolas could make
out the outline of a man as well. Her use of color and light was fantastic.
The painting was breathtaking.

"What's this one about?" Nikolas asked, holding it up. "It most definitely
does NOT suck."

Liz looked closely at the painting, and then at Nikolas. She knew exactly
what it was about, but she didn't know if she wanted to share that with
Nikolas. It was personal. "It's just about a dream I had," Liz wispered.
"Just some dream."

Nikolas walked over to where she now sat on her bed. "Do you wanna tell me
about it?" asked Nikolas, hoping against hope that he didn't already know
what it was about, who the partially invisible man on the docks was.

Liz stared blankly at him. "I thought you wanted to know about my paintings,
now you wanna know about my dreams too?" She knew she was being rude, when
Nikolas was only trying to help, but she was too much of a brat to care.

"I'm sorry. I just want you to talk to me," Nikolas wispered looking down.
"In case you haven't noticed...Liz I'd pretty much sit here and listen to
anything you have to say. I'm not going anywhere Liz." Nikolas reached up
hesitantly, cupping her cheek in his hand. "I'm here."

Nikolas slowly began to narrow the space between them, stroking her cheek and
coming dangerously close to her lips. Suddenly, Elizabeth gasped, shaking her
head free of Nikolas' grasp and rose swiftly from the bed.

"What are you doing?!" She asked, not quite sure herself of exaclty what his
intentions had been. Did he actually think that she'd let him kiss her? She
suddenly felt ill. It wasn't so much the thought of kissing Nikolas. It was
the thought of kissing anyone. "You - you can't do that," she stammered,
backing further and further away from him. "Don't ever do that."

"I'm sorry," Nikolas said quickly. "I love you Eliz - "

"No! You don't love me!" Elizabeth screamed. "You can't. Don't you see
Nikolas? You - you only think you love. It's just because we spend so much
time together - "

"I DO love you!" Nikolas interrupted.

"Well Stop it! I don't want you to," Liz screamed once again. "I don't want
you to," she said, her body suddenly giving out under her own weight as she
sunk to the floor. She began to sob silently.

Nikolas ran to her side, taking her into an embrace. "Liz..."

"Don't you see Nikolas...you can't love someone that's in love with someone
else."

Nikolas brushed a piece of hair out of Liz's tearstained face. "Liz," he
began. "he's not coming back."

Liz smiled through her tears and shook her head, "But he is...Nikolas he
always does. He comes back every night. Every night he sleeps on my floor, on
my uncle Tom's mat," she said sniffling. "He promised me Nikolas. He promised
me we'd be together forever."

Nikolas sighed and rubbed her back, bringing her closer to him. 'She's losing
it,' he thought.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lucky banged away at the keyboard, trying desperately to gain access to the
web. To something, anything. He had already failed numerous times, but there
was no way he was giving up, especially after he'd just lost yet another
round of chess.

He could count on his fingers the number of times he'd actually been able to
say 'Check mate.' Of course he had gotton substantially better at the game,
but it was still Faison's game and he was no longer feeling generous enough
to give out answers to questions that were not earned by a win.

One thing Faison had become very generous with however, were his surveillance
tapes of Elizabeth. He was constantly making some remark about the 'growing
feelings' between she and Nikolas. He was constantly trying to make Lucky
crazy with jealousy. Lucky knew that Faison was doing it on purpose, he knew
he was being very selective about what he was showing him. Lucky NEVER got to
see Elizabeth by herself. It was always with Nikolas. Lucky reminded himself
often that it was all part of the plan. Faison knew that the more hope he
took away from Lucky, the less he would try and escape. It was engineered to
break him and he was not going to allow himself to be broken. There was no
way that his angel would fall for Nikolas and there was no way that his
brother would make a move on Elizabeth.

Chapter 4

Another day
Staring out of my window
Thinkin' 'bout tomorrow
Wishin' things would break

Lucky sighed and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his wrists. He'd been
typing away at the computer for so long that they hurt. He took a deep breath
and leaned forward once again, trying desperately to get his eyes to focus.
He couldn't give up now, especially now that he'd finally thought of the
perfect plan. He'd been wracking his brain of how to convince his dad that he
was alive. Sure, he had to figure out away of getting into contact with him
first, but Lucky figured that the truly difficult part would be getting him
to realize that it wasn't some sick joke.

The plan wasn't full proof. Before Lucky could do anything, he'd have to gain
access to his fathers's computer system at the club. Lucky had set it up only
a week prior to "dieing." The question now was, had his dad even bothered to
use it? It was designed to help Luke with the bookeeping and inventory, but
Lucky knew that Luke had always been reluctant to take the leap into the 21st
century. He hoped against hope that his father was no longer doing the books
by hand.

If by some miracle, Luke was actually using the system, Lucky would proceed
with his plan. He'd enter their code. The code that only the Spencer's knew.
The code that had helped them pull off their greatest of schemes. The code
that they lived by when they had faked him mother's death. He'd alter it a
bit, indicating his name instead of Laura's, but his father would recognize
it nonetheless.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I hear they say
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Well I must have the heart of a lion
Sifting through loves' remains...

Audrey gently placed her hands on her grand daughter's shoulders and spoke
softly into her ear from behind. "Do you think...my dear, that you would like
to accompany me to the hospital tonight?"

Liz continued to stare out of the living room window, lost in some far off
place. A place that had once been magical. "No offense Gram, but I think
listening to Dr. Quartermaine read the Christmas story to a bunch of rugrats
is the last thing I need right now."

Audrey smiled weakly and rubbed Liz shoulders. How did this girl mangage to
get through each day, carrying the weight of the world on them? She
remembered vividly how much Liz enjoyed the Christmas party at GH last year.
She remembered the glow on her face. The look of complete contentment, as she
stood, wrapped in Lucky's arms. That was all gone now. They had disappeared
with Lucky. What was left was a girl on the verge of womanhood who drifted
through her days, desperately clinging to memories, while shunning anything
that reminded her of the past. She was a walking contradiction yes, but who
could blame her?

Sometimes I tell myself
I'm better off without you
Then I have to face the emptiness I feel inside without you
And find a way to make it through another day.

"Ok dear," Audrey sighed, wrapping her arms further around Liz's shoulders.
"But promise me you won't spend the entire night staring out of this window."

Liz simply nodded.  The only thing she had to be grateful for was the fact
that Nikolas had decided to spend the evening with his family. He had invited
her, but when she declined, he'd actually had enough sense to leave her
alone. 'Could he know what tonight is?' she thought.

"Dear," Audrey continued. "The world is full of wonderful things...they're
out there for the taking. All you have to do is go out and find them. They
are in no short supply Elizabeth. They never run out."

With that Audrey was gone, leaving Liz alone with her thoughts on Christmas
Eve. 'Wonderful things?' she thought. 'There is nothing wonderful left in
this world for me. My wonderful left. My wonderful died.' She thought,
fingering the tiny gold band on her left finger.

********* "You just said you love me."
 
"I know. You don't have to say it back. I mean you don't even have to...love
me back. You can just consider this an ordinary best friends ring. Um...I
just thought you oughtta know."

"Lucky I thought you already knew. I am in love with you. I have been all
along."******

Elizabeth woke from her daydream and walked over to the hall closet, grabbing
her winter coat, and quickly bypassing the happy eyes of a moose that stared
back at her.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It was a vacant lot now. The space that had once held a bike shop and above a
boy that was made of gold. She walked slowly through the snow, not bothering
to pick up her feet. It was so deep it nearly covered them. She was in it
now, if the building were still standing she'd be near the staircase. She
stopped suddenly, looking up into the star filled sky. The snow began to fall
again. Lightly this time, as the flakes descended upon her cheeks, melting
into her tears. She sat down then, in the middle of a snow covered, vacant
lot. "I love you Lucky," she said, wispering as if he were right next to her.
She was alone in the world, but together with him in her heart.
-----------------------------
Song lyrics to "Just Another Day" By Buckshot LeFonque