Chapter Text
‘My name is Veronica Sawyer and I’m not afraid of death, but I start college tomorrow and I could not be more afraid. I’ve killed people; I’ve fought a wannabe school shooter off only to have him blow himself up on the football field, I poisoned the Queen of the high school, I shot the linebacker for fuck’s sake. Okay, well scratch that, I’m not afraid of dying, but I am afraid of the undead. Specifically, I am afraid of Heather Chandler. ‘ Veronica wrote feverishly in her journal.
Following her foray into the world of Bonnie and Clyde last year ending with a ‘bang!’ Veronica was almost certain she would be able to leave all of her baggage behind in Sherwood, Ohio, where it belonged. About a week ago she had noticed something that threw a monkey wrench in that plan – she thought she saw Heather. Brown had a whole week-long orientation session for all of the lucky freshman so Veronica moved in early. She stepped out of her dorm room pretty late that night to make a trip to the bathroom and found herself staring down the hall, looking at a girl with curly red hair and a floral robe make her way into the bathroom. Veronica’s first instinct was to turn and run the other way. She had done her fair share of dealing with the undead version of her ex-best friend, but something beckoned her into the bathroom.
Stepping into the bathroom, the door making a much-too-loud-for-comfort creak as it shut behind her she called out, “Hello?” And silence. Okay, cool. She made her way into the bathroom, taking care of her business, and walked her way up to the sinks to wash her hands. She had probably just been dreaming or something, Heather wasn’t here. ‘Stupid, stupid, Sawyer.’ She thought to herself. Veronica glanced up to the long mirror above the sinks and froze instantaneously – she was there and standing a foot behind her. She gasped and turned around to face her, fear taking Veronica in a vice-like grasp. “Heather,” She breathed out, unsure of what else to say. A sickening smile crept up the redhead’s face as she crossed her arms and spoke, beginning to creep closer to the other girl, “Miss me?”
Veronica swallowed rather hard a few times in a row to gather her words but still found herself dumbfounded when speaking to her, “You?” Heather brought a hand up to rub at her temple and let out a laugh, “Do you see anyone else in here, Veronica?” She blinked hard; trying to will the specter she was seeing away, “I’m hallucinating”. The Drano covered ghost crept forward until she was a mere few inches away from Veronica and cocked her head to the side, “I’m afraid I’m almost as good as alive, Veronica.”
Then, instead of facing her fears, Veronica bolted. She couldn’t deal with seeing Heather, not now, not when classes were just about to start and she was finally getting a chance to move on with her life. Veronica was supposed to be just a normal stupid college student with an undeclared major and maybe at most some test anxiety. Not a god damned Ghostbuster. Veronica slid back into her room, thanking every god she could that her roommate was still fast asleep. She sighed and crawled back into her bed, attempting to force herself to fall asleep only to have that “being watched” feeling creep up her spine.
Turning around, Veronica found herself face to face with Heather. Biting back a yelp, not wanting to wake her roommate and have her think she was batshit crazy already, Veronica scooted back closer to the wall. Heather spoke in a calm tone, “We need to talk” She floundered for words, it wasn’t like there was anything for them to catch up on – Heather was dead and Veronica spent all summer trying to repent for killing her. Veronica’s whisper then broke the silence, her brain high on the defensive, “About what?”
“You left me behind,” Heather began, a small pout on her ghostly features, “And we have unfinished business.” Veronica wasn’t sure what Heather meant by ‘unfinished business’ and began to tense as she scooted further away from Heather. “I essentially killed the guy who killed you – what do you want?” Veronica mumbled, truly wishing she was just having some sleep-deprived waking nightmare. “Listen, Sawyer, I don’t want to be up in your big Ivy-League face either. I want to rest, I want to just move on and forget that your psycho boyfriend is why I’m not kicking your ass in person for getting into my dream school.” Heather spoke, the same harsh tone she had when she was alive coming back in full-force. Veronica didn’t realize she had wanted to go to Brown – ‘Maybe we could’ve roomed together or something. Maybe.’ Veronica mused before opening her mouth to speak – to apologize for the millionth time - only to have a half-translucent finger press to her lips. Weird. She could feel Heather touching her, which wasn’t at all exactly something she had been able to do to Veronica the last time they had communicated. “Listen whatever the powers-that-be that deal with this whole thing told me that you, unfortunately, are the key to my getting to move on. I don’t particularly enjoy that you’re my unfinished business but it’s something that we have to deal with.”
“Me?” Veronica asked, kind of dumbfounded. There wasn’t much she could do for her, aside of apologize profusely, and there she was essentially begging Veronica to help her. Heather scoffed and closed in closer to the other girl, situating herself on the end of the bed, “Why do I think I followed you all the way out here?” She swallowed hard in an attempt to get a grip on her thoughts. Veronica’s dead best friend was there, she needed her help and she had to do something in order to not be haunted every day for the rest of her life. “What do I need to do?” Veronica murmured, still anxiously eyeing the sleeping form of her roommate, hoping she would stay soundly asleep.
For the first time ever, Veronica saw Heather get nervous. Heather rolled her bottom lip between her teeth and sank into the bed, the weight of her actually leaving an indent on the mattress. “That’s the part I don’t know – they just said I need something from you.” She sucked in an audible breath, straightened herself up more, “You’re stuck with me until we figure that part out Sawyer.” Great. “Can we work on figuring it out starting tomorrow? Not to be a dick or whatever, Heather, but I start classes tomorrow and I’m not exactly dying to sleep through all of them,” Veronica said, maybe a little harsher than necessary, but what Heather going to do? Pull a Poltergeist on her? She had her doubts.
Veronica attempted to lay down but found herself making full contact with Heather on the way down. Heather let out a yelp, “Ow, Jesus, Sawyer!” Veronica sat back up quickly as if she had been stung. She was truly embarrassed that she, one, hadn’t been able to pass through her, and two, that she had literally just thrown her entire body onto the other girl. Veronica had forgotten she could literally touch Heather. Yikes. “I thought ghosts weren’t supposed to be able to get hurt!” Veronica whispered, distressed, while a blush crept up her cheeks. “Well, think next time – Christ,” Heather mumbled, straightening out her spectral appearance. “Look last time I had to deal with you, you were like capital D, dead!” The brunette argued, bracing herself on her arms before she continued, “Can I please lay down so I can go to sleep?” Heather only shifted over, making just enough room for Veronica to lay down next to her and Veronica felt like her face was going to light on fire with embarrassment as she shot Heather a look. “What? It’s not like I have anywhere else to go Veronica.” Heather quickly shot back at Veronica, and well, shit. She was right. Begrudgingly, Veronica laid down next to her, turning her back away from the former Westerburg Queen. This was going to be a long night.
Surprisingly, she had fallen asleep almost instantaneously. When she woke up the next day to the feeling of arms wrapped tightly around her, Veronica’s still groggy brain could not have been more confused with the situation. As she moved to sit up she felt the figure behind her squeeze tighter and mumble something incoherent. Veronica fully sat up, twisting her head around to find Heather Chandler, still dead, but fast asleep and weirdly clingy. Which had meant last night hadn’t just been a nervous meltdown that she was having because classes started today. Oh shit. She had to get to class. Veronica detangled herself from Heather’s arms and climbed over her and began to get ready as fast as possible.
In Veronica’s noisy haste to get ready, Heather stirred, sitting up and stretching, letting out a yawn. Veronica’s roommate had already left, which was a relief so she was able to communicate at full volume, “Good morning, Casper.” Heather scowled as she turned toward Veronica, legs dangling off of her bed. She was harder to see during the day for sure, the light just seemed to shoot through Heather like it was nothing. Veronica’s brows furrowed as she spoke, “Does it, uh, break ghost-code for you to be out during the day?” Heather offered a shrug and she collected her hands in her lap, “Do I look like I know anything about being dead? I don’t even know what I’m supposed to get from you.”
Veronica held her hands up in defense and let out a laugh, “Fair.” She sighed, throwing her messenger bag over her head and turned back to face Heather, “So, do you want to come with me to class or…?” Heather shrugged, adjusting her scrunchie and stood, “It’s not like I have literally anything better to do, Veronica.” We began the walk to class, and Veronica was now very aware that she had a literal specter that no one else could see, just following her around. Classes were fairly dull in all honesty, at least when Veronica could actually pay attention without Heather bitching and running around the room, trying to distract her.
And that brings Veronica back to the present – her live-in ghost ex-best friend harassing her in nearly every single class she had. “Pay attention to me,” Heather groaned, leaning in front of Veronica’s desk in the lecture hall as she attempted to take notes. Some professors really just jumped straight into teaching which was a little stressful for Veronica considering it was only the first week of real classes. She had a statistics assignment due on Wednesday and her creative writing class had two short stories due next week. It wasn’t a lot of homework, or you know, anything super hard but she wasn’t ready for things to kick start this quickly. Veronica pulled her head up from feverishly taking notes to shoot a quick look at Heather who leaned forward, clearly bored. “Come on Veronica,” She groaned, rolling her eyes. Veronica had begun to pretend that she wasn’t there when Heather climbed onto the desk, sitting cross-legged right in her line of sight.
While Heather was slightly translucent, she wasn’t exactly easy to see through. Veronica looked up, trying not to alert any of her other classmates that she was having a silent conversation with the ghost in front of her – or to them talking to absolutely nothing - and gave her absolute best pleading look to Heather. A grin spread across Heather’s face as she grabbed a hold of Veronica’s chin, forcing her to stay looking toward her and spoke, “Much better - but okay, as I was saying I have some ideas about what my unfinished businesses is,” Veronica released a sigh and attempted to feign paying attention to the board at the front of the room. “So, I was thinking that maybe you have to kill yourself,” Heather continued, and Veronica’s eyes shot further open in surprise. What a jackass, did she really think Veronica was going to kill herself for her? Absolutely not! Heather shook her head and moved her hand up to Veronica’s cheek to give it a quick pat and spoke, “Listen, I’m not going to kill you, unlike some people I’m not a murderer and plus it’s only an idea, not a definitive answer, Sawyer.”
Veronica opened her mouth as if to speak, a fury almost taking her over but she then closed it, a scowl sitting on her face as Heather snickered, “Sorry, sore spot?” Everyone began to stand, signaling the fact that class was over and Veronica pulled back and began to walk back to her room, already sick of dealing with Heather’s bullshit. She was just so annoying! If Heather really wanted Veronica to help her why was she being such a bitch? This wasn’t exactly something that was encouraging Veronica to help her out. Veronica felt a presence come up behind her and she tensed up as a hand delicately grabbed at her arm but forced herself to keep walking. She figured it was Heather but then she heard a voice that was, fortunately not Heather.
Veronica turned around to come face to face with a girl who looked a little nervous, “Sorry – hi – uh you dropped this.” She held a notebook out toward her, and Veronica breathed a sigh of relief, “Oh man, I must’ve been spaced out, thank you!” Heather had been messing with her all day and interacting with someone, not Heather Chandler was always a relief. “No, it’s okay! I was the one who grabbed you – that’s my bad.” She said, ducking her head and pushing her hair behind her ear. She was…cute. Maybe it was the fashion sense; a big sweater with some crazy geometric pattern on it. Maybe it was the fact her hair literally glimmered in the sunlight like an actual ray of sunshine with all the golden and orange hues popping out. Maybe it was the fact she seemed as nervous as Veronica did about meeting new people, but she took the leap.
“I’m Veronica Sawyer by the way,” Veronica said offering a hand to her, which she took gladly. The other girl grinned and replied, “Oh, I’m Heather. Heather Kennedy.” Veronica swore to god that her pulse literally stopped in that exact moment. The newly introduced Heather noticed the brief freeze Veronica took and knew that something was up with her and then cocked her head to the side and spoke, “Are you okay…?” Veronica let out a laugh and shook her head; ugh, Veronica had to pretend that wasn’t the creepiest coincidence that she had ever dealt with. Lots of girls were named Heather – no big. “Yeah! It’s just funny, um, I was best friends with a group of girls in high school and they were all named Heather,” Veronica breathed, trying to come up with another excuse, “Just a really funny coincidence, you know?”
Heather seemed to acknowledge that as a good-enough answer and offered a smile, “Oh, weird!” A silence fell between the two girls as life continued to move by them on campus. Veronica was anxious; she just didn’t know how to talk to people, especially when, well, when she was attracted to people. Heather broke the silence quickly, “Would you want to hang out sometime, maybe?” Veronica’s face perked up and replied easily, “Yeah, that’d be great – uh I can give you my room phone number? Maybe we can do something like Wednesday night?”
Heather nodded and pulled out a pen and gently grabbed Veronica’s hand and instead scrawled her own phone number on it. Veronica audibly swallowed and froze as Heather scribbled on her hand. Veronica glanced at the number, she had written “Heather K.” along with her number. The period on the ‘K’ was shaped like a heart rather than a period. And that’s when Veronica swooned, maybe too hard but she managed to wave goodbye to Heather who, in turn, gave her a small shy goodbye and they went their separate ways.
She finally reached her dorm room, thankful that her roommate was boy-obsessed and usually out with her boyfriend so she could mostly have the room to herself. Veronica flopped down on her bed, her arms thrown up above her head and let out a sigh. What a long day. It, unfortunately, was about to get longer, Heather Chandler appeared behind her; something Veronica had just grown accustomed to by this point. With her face buried in a pillow, Veronica groaned and greeted the redhead, “Hello, Heather.” Heather rolled her eyes and sat down on the parallel bed and replied, “Aren’t you happy to see me?” While rolling over to face her Veronica spoke, “Not exactly! I’m not going to kill myself, Heather.”
Veronica pulled herself into a lounging position, resting her elbow on the bed and placing her head in her hand and sighed, “What do you want now? I have a lot of homework to do and I’d just prefer for you to get whatever it is over with before I’m neck-deep in equations.” Heather squinted at Veronica for a second, leaning forward slightly, studying the pen markings on her hand before she replied, “Who’s Heather K?” Veronica hated that almost every single time she got nervous about something that she would blush almost instantaneously. In an attempt to conceal the growing heat on her face she looked away and blurted out, “Uh, some girl I almost left my stats notebook somewhere and she gave it back to me. Asked if I wanted to hang out sometime and so she gave me her number.” Veronica shrugged and forced herself into a sitting position, grabbing the notebook and statistics textbook from her bag so she could begin to work on her homework since Heather wasn’t willing to go ahead and cut to the chase.
“Oh, you like her,” Heather said, realization creeping in her voice. She had been Veronica’s constant shadow for the past week so of course, it was hard to hide anything from her. Veronica sucked in a quick breath and closed her eyes trying to will the awful feeling in the pit of her stomach from bottoming out, “Can you drop it?” The ghost in front of Veronica began to mock her, “You’re such a softie Sawyer - you have a crush on that girl!” Being pretty sure she was already 100% red, Veronica looked up at Heather, giving up the façade of not being totally and completely embarrassed and spoke, “Heather can you literally leave me alone; I don’t have time to deal with you right now.” She shook her head and crossed her arms and had moved toward her, a grin on her stupid ghost-face that Veronica could only perceive as taunting, “So, you’re a dyke right?”
Veronica slammed her pencil down and sighed, exasperated, “Heather can you fuck off?” It wasn’t that she cared about Heather knowing she was attracted to girls – Veronica knew she couldn’t do anything to her about it due to the whole ‘being dead’ thing. Veronica did, however, have the sinking feeling that she just knew that Heather was about to bully her for the literal rest of her life for being into women. Heather didn’t flinch at Veronica’s sudden outburst and instead lifted a brow and spoke clearly, “Veronica, I don’t give a shit who you’re attracted to, I just think it’s interesting that it’s a girl is all.” Bracing herself for the answer Veronica couldn’t stop herself from continuing on and asked, “Why?” Heather looked so confident, which was something Veronica had pretty much always envied about her. She was just so sure of herself; even in death, she was always just right. “If I had known we had something in common I don’t think I would’ve kicked you off the team,” Heather admitted.
A moment passed of Veronica’s brain trying to decipher what Heather had said to her and then the realization hit her like a freight train. “Wait you’re gay?” Veronica blurted out, absolute shock taking her over. Heather remained steely and spoke, “There’s a lot of things about me that you just don’t know.” Veronica, now actually excited pushed her school things off to the side and shook her head, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, no you can’t just be like ‘I’m gay’ and then not want to talk about it – how did you keep it a secret?” Heather rolled her eyes and let out an actual laugh. That was something Veronica had maybe heard once or twice before Heather had died and it was almost freeing to hear it from the other girl. “I’d drive to Cleveland to see girls. It was the closest big city and I didn’t – I couldn’t exactly risk trying to date anyone in Sherwood.”
A smile grew on Veronica’s face and she shook her head and mumbled, “I had no idea.” Heather mirrored the smile, a softer one than the ghost usually carried, “It was hard, but it could’ve been worse. I wasn’t bullied for it or anything and I know Heather and Heather knew.” Veronica rose an eyebrow, “Were they cool about it?” Chandler offered a shrug and leaned back on the bed again, “They never said anything bad about it – Mac caught me making out with a girl once and that’s when I started to go to the city.” The girls carried on for the rest of the night, excitedly talking about what it meant to them to be attracted to women. Veronica admitting that she had never really had the chance to fully explore being into both girls and guys but she knew that college was a good place to finally not have to worry about the repercussions of her actions. The pair talked on and on for hours until Veronica could barely keep her eyes open. Maybe, just maybe, there was more to Heather Chandler than Veronica initially thought. Maybe she’d get to know more about her.