Unfinished Business

Layla (Paureen)

Maureen looked up from her book.

There she was again. Little miss perfect, with her long blonde hair and her pretty eyes and her fancy clothes.

Pattie. Layla. Patricia Ann Boyd.

Just her name made Mo crazy, in a not entirely bad way. Which she hated. Almost as much as she hated her.

She was just out there, at the opposite side of the courtyard, with her equally annoyingly pretty friends and her stupid boyfriends and her stupid perfect face beaming from all the attention.

While Maureen usually sulked at the corners of buildings and stared from the sidelines, Pattie filled entire rooms with her presence and light. Even right now, in an open space, she had everyone's attention, and she knew it. They all knew it.

God, how Mo despised her. Her and her vapid demeanor and her ugly teeth and her bigger than god's ego. She hated her perfectly painted nails that showed how little effort she put in anything and her exquisite makeup and hair that never got messed up because she barely even moved.

Anything Layla asked for, she got. Either her sister or her best friends or her boyfriend or her other boyfriend got it for her, did it for her, said it for her.

Maureen hated how much she wanted her. Her life, she means. How badly she wanted to be her.

How much she wanted to be as tall, as pretty, as fancy and loved and wanted and cared for and desired as Pattie is.

All she gets is a lame drummer who fancies her sometimes and that's when he's out of the ER. Richie's truly the only person in the world who cares about her, and Mo hates him half the time anyways.

Pattie gets two guitarists throwing hands for a simple flick of her wrist, a glimpse of her smile. She just has to twirl her stupid hair on her little finger to get George and Eric on their knees for her.

Gosh, Maureen hates hates *hates* HATES her.

It makes her stomach turn, makes her day turn sour, just having to look at her. What would she give to have a song written about herself.

She remembers vaguely, trying to awkwardly approach George Harrison just once. Richie and him were friends, sort of, so it wasn't hard. But all he talked about was Pattie, Pattie this and Pattie that, and despite the fact that she got into his bed, he never thought of her twice as anything more than a fling, a one night stand. Meaningless

At some point, she even bleached her hair blonde, figuring it might help for anything. The ending result made her feel sick. Not that it was badly executed, no, she knew very well how to work her dyes and peroxides. But just how much she resembled *her*, how little remained of herself. The blonde mane with that stupid part lightened her somber features and made her seem rosier at the cheeks. It sickened her. A couple weeks later, she dyed it even darker than her usual brunette, and never looked back.

The perfect little super model is currently looking at her, and Maureen wants to disappear. Wants to run away, wants the Earth to swallow her, wants anyone to deflect her, wants Richie to show up and give her an excuse to leave without seeming a coward.

Because she isn't. She's a lot of things, spiteful and jealous and superficial and a bitch, but not a coward. So she stares back, dead into Patricia Ann Boyd's big blue eyes, and quietly challenges her to say anything, do anything.

For a few seconds, none of them look away. Then Pattie flusters and gives in, pretending it's one of her friends who distracted her and not her own fear that made her break the contact.

Maureen revels in her small victory, pathetic as it might be. That's another thing she is. Downright pathetic, giving so much of her time and energy to a girl who's never done anything worse than just be generally better than her in all aspects.