September first, 1998

9

"Wait, so, you're my dad? But I thought you'd said... but you... okay what the fuck?

"Jenna! Don't ever use that language!"

"To be fair Veronica, this is very much a what the fuck situation, I think she can swear just this once" JD said casually, earning a deadly glare from Veronica.

"Oh, I'll get to you in a second" she warned, causing JD to put both his hands up in the air as if he was being arrested. This made Jenna laugh, which caused Veronica to glare at him even harder, putting him into his place.

"Jenna, I'm so sorry, but I haven't been lying to you, until last night I really did think he was dead! You have to believe me" she begged.

"I don't know what to believe anymore mom! Until five seconds ago my dad was dead, and now we're eating pancakes together, and no one thought to tell me anything!"

"Well if you hadn't run away last night we wouldn't be having this problem young lady!" Veronica yelled.

"Woah, woah, it's not the kids fault" JD stepped in, trying to defend his daughter.

"No, you're right JD" Veronica turned to him angrily "this is your fault. If you hadn't pretended to blow your self up, or if you had just done it properly, we wouldn't be in this mess!"

"Okay I don't like this go back to blaming the kid"

"You tried to blow yourself up!" Jenna shrieked.

"Oh shit" her parents both replied in unison, looking at each other panicked.

"Okay!" JD stepped in "we need to stop yelling at each other, not because we're not mad, but because we keep telling the kid things she shouldn't know, and there are many things she doesn't need to know" he gave Veronica a knowing look, as they both understood how important it was that Jenna never found out about the murders. As if on cue, Heather Chandler appeared next to Jenna, sitting nonchalantly beside her at the breakfast counter to taunt Veronica.

"Well, I see things are going well in the trench coat household" she giggled, infuriating Veronica even more.

"JD, I can see her again" Veronica whispered hoping Jenna couldn't hear, or at least understand. JD seemed to know what she meant, but Jenna had no clue.

"Can someone please just tell me the truth" Jenna sighed, tired of the emotional cartwheels her brain had been doing in the past five minutes. Heather turned to Jenna and tutted, although of course she couldn't be heard.

"Sorry sweetie, your parents aren't too good at telling the truth" she scoffed.

JD looked at Veronica calmly. He knew it wasn't his place to tell Jenna anything Veronica didn't want him to, so she was the one to had to think of some sort of valid explanation. He nodded slightly as a form of encouragement, and offered her a kind of pathetic, but still hopeful smile. Veronica sighed and closed her eyes for a second while she tried to think of a story that was far enough away from the truth that it didn't incriminate either of them, but also truthful enough that she wasn't blatantly lying to Jenna.

"Okay" she began, much calmer than before "JD, well you're dad, moved to Sherwood Ohio back in senior year. We started dating. Things were good, but while we were together, we had some, disagreements, and there quite a few bumps in the relationship." At this, Heather coughed dramatically.

"I'll say! Thanks to you, I'll be hogging up drain cleaner for eternity!"

"Anyway, so we broke up. At the time, I didn't know that I was pregnant with you. You're dad had tried to take me back by saying that we were meant to be one, but I said no. Anyway, he then got into an, accident, and everyone thought he had died. It turns out he hadn't died, but he had instead moved away like he usually did, leaving me to think he was dead so we could move on with our lives. Then of course I found out I was pregnant with you, so I raised you by myself, and until last night I thought he was dead. That's all you need to know."

To be fair, she hadn't really lied, except for the fact that the bomb JD pretended to blow himself up with was no accident. She had, however, left out about 90% of the truth.

"Okay, so, what happens now?" Jenna asked, looking up at both of her parents.

"Well," JD started, proud with how Veronica had dealt with the situation, "I need to get ready for work, you need to get ready for school, and your mom needs to get ready altogether" Jenna giggled at this, and for once Veronica didn't care enough to say otherwise.

"If you want Veronica, I can take Jenna to school, gives you some time to relax," JD offered after Jenna had ran back up the stairs to put on her uniform. Veronica sighed and leant against him, both physically and emotionally exhausted.

"I think she'd enjoy that, thanks" she replied, grateful for the opportunity to get some more rest. She had work later that day too, so at least she had something to distract herself with.

"Hey Veronica?" JD sighed "what does happen now?"

"I'm not sure" she admitted. JD smiled, holding onto her tightly as if they'd both just collapse.

"Our love is God."