Life, Love, & Lies

Forty-six

"You know, this is the first time I've been back here where the city actually feels like home." LoLo smiles at Anja as she reenters the sitting room area of their suite at the Plaza hotel.

"And ve ahre not efen at zee apartment anymore." Anja laughs.

"Ya, but I finally came back feeling like both parts of me are me. That I am all of my parts and all of my past." LoLo sighs, sitting down beside Anja and setting the stack of bound papers across their laps.

"Imprisonet wizhout bars, zhe official biography of Felicity Abernazy." Anja reads off the cover, smiling softly as she looks up to meet LoLo's eyes. "You let him write it, Schnucki?"

"It's done." She nods, "He's waiting for me to edit this version to make sure everything is accurate and I am okay with it all, and then it's going to publishers for a bid." LoLo nods, "I've read the first five chapters, Anja it's amazing. Zach has so much talent in writing, and he has done my story justice so far. I've only had to correct a date or two or mixed up facts, and even those are only one or two very minute things."

"I am proud of you."

"Me too. You know what this means though don't you, Anja? For you."

"Vhat?"

"You get to go home again." LoLo grins, "As soon as Zach goes live with the book idea you get to go back to Frankfurt. I'm paying your way and you are going to spend as much time there as you want. I am insisting, you need to see your family again."

"Schnucki." Anja's eyes wet instantly as she pulls LoLo into a hug.

"I know, I'm family too. But you have been separated from your parents and siblings for far too long. I want to do this for you, and I want to do it as soon as I can. I'm grown, I'm looking to buy my own place in LA to pursue my photography full time with and without Pier 6. I'm ready to face the music, the world, my family's past, head on and head high." LoLo hugs Anja tightly, "I'm sorry it took me so long to get here."

"I cannot vait to meet Zach, I vill be tanking him for long time for helping my Lyssie." Anja pulls back, cupping LoLo's cheeks with her hands. "And tank you, Schnucki, for senting me home. For sinking of me so fast."

"You are the only family I have, Anja. Of course I thought of you. I've been thinking of you through all of this, I did it for me, but I did it for you too. Being in Germany over the summer I was thinking about you a lot, and about how much I didn't want to go back to Germany without you, I wanted to take you home so badly."

"I vas blesset zhe day you came to me, Felicity." Anja shakes her head.

"Or cursed, I mean we've been living a lie and in hiding for the last five and a half years." LoLo chuckles humorlessly.

"Yes, but you is a blessing, Schnucki. I am happy to have you."

"I'm grateful I have you too, Anja. If you want to read Zach's story you can. And I may need to discuss some of it with you. I told him I would read it all before I head back to LA."

"I vill reat it vhen it is for sale. But you can ask me for help." Anja insists.

'Thank you, Anja. I actually need to go fire a couple lawyers and get info on the whole identity thing so I know what it would take to make us our true selves again."

"You is firing zhem alreaty?"

"It's time." LoLo nods, "I need to head downtown to meet with them soon, enjoy a few hours back home. Go get coffee, or visit your old favorite places in the city. We are so close to being free, Anja, so close."

"Goot luck, Schnucki." Anja offers, shifting so LoLo can stand up again.

***

"Lauren." Spencer startles her slightly as he greets her, but she recovers quickly, offerings smile.

"Hi, thanks for meeting me while I'm here in the city this week." She picks herself up, following him into the office.

"What can I help you with, Lauren?"  Spencer asks as he sits behind his large desk.

"Well, since my dad has passed and now that I'm done with working the tour I felt it was the right time to come get some things in order here. Without the case open and with my twenty-third birthday coming up I am starting to think it's time to take my life back into my own hands."

"You know you can't reveal yourself as Felicity right?" He turns sharply to give her his full attention.

"Legally? Or just for safety?" She asks so quickly that she can see the shock register in his eyes, she had never asked that question before in all the years of threatening.

"For safety. I mean, legally you are Lauren Anderson, but there is documentation that shows that Felicity Abernathy became Lauren Anderson. Why?"

"I'm almost twenty-three, I want to understand the parameters of who I am, and especially if I take the burden of being my legal representation off you, I need to know what is all included in who I am." She shrugs.

"You're firing me?"

"I live in the opposite corner of the country, and the case is through, I'm grown, I have no need for you to continue to be part of my life. I may have the means, but I don't have the reason to continue to pay you to do nothing for me."

"Well thank you for such a kind dismissal." He tries to laugh off his offense.

"I am grateful, Spencer. You have helped me a great deal over the last nearly six years, and mom for years before that. But where my life is going now there is no need to keep a lawyer in New York. This part of my life is the past, and it will stay my past. I've gone through the family possessions and distributed them as I saw fit, I've sold the penthouse, I have no real life in New York anymore. My life is in LA now."

"I will get all your information together and send it to you then, if this is what you are really choosing. I think it is the wrong choice. I think you are in over your head, and my door is open for you to return if need be."

"I need to do this for me, Spencer. I am firing Mark as well. He works for a man who is dead, and I have been paying him to do so for too long now. I am an adult and I am taking control of my life . Thank you for doing your best to watch out for me up until this point. If you could have all my documents sent over by tomorrow I would really appreciate it."

"I will have it done, Miss Anderson." His voice has gone cool, as if he is actually hurt by her firing him from a job he isn't actually doing anymore.

"Thank you." She nods, standing quickly.

"Lauren, I mean it, if you need anything you can always call me back to work for you. I would do it."

"I appreciate that, Spencer. But it's time for me to figure my own life out, like a normal adult." She turns halfway to look at him as she addresses him before twisting the knob and exiting the room, pulling her phone out as she goes.

Zach Thompson

One lawyer fired,
and I managed to
double check that it
isn't illegal for me
to share my identity
with the world. One
more to go. It's
almost time to make
a mess.

Better get reading
then, I need the
book to cause the
mess.

Working on it. I
love it so far, and
I mean that.

Thanks LoLo.
Enjoy your time
in New York.

—------------------
Lawyers are fired, the book is coming along, what is next?

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I love you guys!!!

~M =)