Love Sick Fred (Drop Dead Fred Fanfiction)

Chapter Two

With Natalie and Drop Dead Fred inside the house, Mickey had decided to try to spend some quality time catching up with Lizzie, in fact he'd intended to take her out to an early dinner, but so far his plans had met with a cliff – not a speed bump – a cliff.

First he'd dealt with reviving the babysitter, who'd fainted upon the front lawn for all the neighborhood to see. His good deed was met with a severe verbal and physical lashing as the woman seemed to have developed some sort of violent tick whenever Mickey stepped into try and console her. He was so exasperated, Lizzie finally stepped in to grab the back of his shirt to remind him to keep his distance.

Mickey wasn't blind to the smile Lizzie tried to conceal by lowering her head and allowing her hair to cover her face. Her lighthearted spirit was enough to ease his anxiety. He loved how carefree she was! He nearly forgot about the hysterical banshee of a woman before him, who was in such a fit she nearly fainted twice more during the course of her rant.

"She's horrid! Absolutely the most awful, conniving, vicious— "

"You know what?" Mickey interrupted her. "Here." He reached into his pocket and pulled out his checkbook, swiftly writing out a generous check and handing it to the babysitter. "I can't make you stay, and I most certainly can't make up for..." He paused and glanced around his front yard, cringing to himself. "...whatever happened here today... but that's for your trouble and hopefully your guaranteed dismissal of it."

The babysitter scoffed and rolled her eyes in disgust before glancing down at the amount on the check. Her posture instantly improved and she composed herself so fast there was no question about her satisfaction. "Right. You'll never be seeing me again, and your child needs Jesus and a S.W.A.T. team, but no one's gonna know that from me." She winked, tucked the check into her blouse, and walked away.

Lizzie couldn't contain her laughter any longer, especially after watching the ridiculous way the babysitter walked. She lightly shoved Mickey's shoulder as it all came out. "I can't believe you just bribed your babysitter!"

"Yeah, I did , didn't I?" Mickey replied, laughing himself. His laughter, however, lay partly in anxiety. "Well, there goes another one, and all our dinner money."

Lizzie's laughter choked to a stop at that statement. "Our dinner money?" She tensed.

"Yeah. I was thinking I'd take you out some place nice to eat to celebrate."

"Celebrate? Did I win the lottery and no one told me?" She was purposely trying to avoid the subject and didn't know why. She'd been fine pursuing Mickey when Fred had steered her toward him, but something just felt strange about it now. Out of place. Her arms slowly wrapped around herself in a hug.

Mickey chuckled. "No. You're funny, you know that?" Lizzie scrunched up her nose and made a playful face, which caused him to chortle once more. "No, no. See, I was thinking after everything with your mom, Charles, and getting over the Fred thing you might want to go do something nice." He nervously scratched the back of his neck.

Lizzie uncomfortably held herself tighter, for a brief moment recalling the last time she'd done this. When Fred had said goodbye and she'd been left standing there embracing herself, wishing her arms hadn't been left empty...

She shook away the memory and stepped back from Mickey, turning and picking up a baseball Natalie had left in the front yard. She pretended to be occupied with it for a moment as she tried to quell her emotions.

Her silence made Mickey nervous, prompting him to quickly add, "But we can stay in and I can make us a nice dinner."

Lizzie watched, half hypnotized as she tossed the baseball up and down with her hand. "Yeah, sure." Forcing herself to blink, she squeezed the ball, and smiled at Mickey. "Dinner sounds lovely."

"Great," he replied, though the hint of uncertainty shook in his voice. "Then we should go in. I can get this cleaned up later," he said of the mess in the yard.

Lizzie's heart leapt as she thought of going into the house. She wondered if Fred would make an appearance. She began to walk, following Mickey to the front steps, but abruptly stopped, suddenly clutching her head.

"Mickey," she muttered, trying to reach for him and stumbling. She felt all at once weak and filled with a surge of energy, almost as though this force were pulling at her from all directions. The hazy image of Mickey's outstretched hands was the last thing she remembered seeing and the last thing she felt were those very hands slipping through her, actually through her!

Everything went momentarily black and Lizzie found herself reappearing seated on the branch of the large tree within Mickey's front yard. She was ten feet away from where she'd been... How? This couldn't happen. No. This wasn't real. This wasn't—Then why could she feel the tree!?

She kept running her hands over the bark and staring wide-eyed at Mickey, feeling herself grow paler with her panic. She tried to cry to him for help, but Lizzie could only take in short, quickened breaths and everything started to spin.

Mickey, unable to explain what the hell just happened, ran toward the tree when he saw Lizzie begin to sway. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she slid out of the tree and landed in Mickey's waiting arms, unconscious.