Chapter Twenty-Two:
Where Did You Sleep Last Night?

Luke Spencer felt more than a little sore as he walked into his club. He'd had things to do today, Damnit. It was a weekend, and on weekends, he actually leaned towards being busy. He did not like having to spend the day skulking around after his low life niece who hung out in way too many places he'd frequented himself at one time or another. He'd run into people he hadn't seen in years, who were still in the same damn place he'd left them. It made him feel slick with a film of smug. He wanted a shower.

Ducking behind he bar, Luke has already marked his trajectory towards the back office, when he heard a voice over his shoulder.

"So you decided to make an appearance."

Luke stopped and turned to the source of the voice. He frowned. "Yeah, I do that from time to time. What are you doing here? I thought you had plans tonight."

Lucky, leaning against the bar, hunched his shoulders, and gave his father a long, steady look.

"We might have a family crisis brewing. Thought you'd want the heads up."

Luke let out a groan and shook his head violently. "No. No, no, no. I don't want to hear about it. I don't want to know, I got enough damn problems as it is." His eyes met his son's, and he visibly deflated. "Is it serious?"

"I dunno. Mom's gonna think it is."

Luke made a face. "Nikolas."

"Yeah."

"God Almighty," Luke muttered under his breath. "What the hell is that kid up to now -- NO!" He put a hand up, holding Lucky off before he'd even gotten a word off. "Am I going to need a drink?"

"Wouldn't be the worst idea you've ever had."

Luke shook his head. "Unbelievable. First Barbara, now this."

Lucky straightened up. "What's wrong with Aunt Bobbie?"

"Oh," Luke grumped, reaching under the bar for his personal stash of scotch whisky. "She's had me out running all over town cause Sweet Caroline didn't make it home last night."

Luke heard the sound come out of Lucky before he raised his head. He looked up to see Lucky bend his head, burying his face in his hands.

"Cowboy?" Luke looked at the boy with concern, and after a moment, Lucky came up for air.

"Dad," his voice was heavy. "I think I might have a lead for you."

Bobbie Spencer spun the stiff drink, as prescribed by her brother, on the counter top and started to count to one hundred for the third time.

The Quartermaines had not called, and she had forced herself not to call them. There was no way she was admitting to them that she'd lost track of her daughter, or that it concerned her. They'd be all over that like white on rice. A year may have passed since the trial, but Bobbie still got a predatory vibe from the family... like the fact that Carly had any rights at all was a loss in their books. Bobbie's fingers tightened around her glass. Nothing made her tense like the Quartermaines.

But... she exhaled carefully, bringing herself back to earth. The Quartermaines hadn't called, so Carly must have shown up and that meant everything was as it should be.

Except it wasn't, because they had a ritual and Carly had abandoned it without warning or explanation. That sort of behavior was high on Bobbie's list of warning signs.

Bobbie lifted her glass to her lips and took a small sip. She'd never been anything close to the drinker her brother was. When she was younger, she'd been able to put it away, sure... but now it was something she associated with another era and the smell of the alcohol was making her melancholy, seducing her with thoughts of times long past and the way those threads wove so neatly into her current situation.

Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it... Barbara Jean Spencer had learned that one. So she was hard pressed to explain to herself why she was being forced to watch a daughter she had not even raised herself, play out the same cycles she'd been sunk into when she was Carly's age and younger.

It made it difficult to watch, since she knew exactly how this cycle broke. Nothing she or anyone else could say or do would solve Carly's problems. She'd have to come to her own conclusions, her own epiphanies. That couldn't be forced.

The frustrating part was how far Carly had come since Michael was born. The first year was pretty rocky, Bobbie had to admit that. And things had gotten downright ugly when she had lost Jason to Robin. But once AJ threatened Carly's custody of Michael, she'd gone from borderline nutcase to fiercely protective mother like a Porsche going from zero to sixty. She'd attacked the holes in her life savagely, pulling together the loose ends and creating some facsimile of a normal existence. But even while she was at her best as a mother, her defensiveness, her anger, and her complete lack of judgment on all things Jason had fought against her in ways the Quartermaines could never have. She had sabotaged herself repeatedly, and as the walls had started to close in, Carly had retreated into familiar territory -- playing games, trying to manipulate court appointed social workers, and finally, descending into hysteria. It had ripped Bobbie apart to watch, unable to provide any real help. She still held that anger tightly, certain that she would never -- ever -- forgive the legion of people responsible for hurting her child that badly. A logical part of her brain understood it, but it was continually shouted down by a primal desire to protect her own.

The fact was, this experience had bound her to Carly like nothing else. She'd lost Lucas once, after all... and she knew that, had things been different and she had let herself believe when she had first held her baby daughter in her arms, that they would have some sort of future together and THEN had the child pulled from her arms... that young, that isolated... it would have pushed her to a place even Luke and Ruby wouldn't have been able to reach her. Even having known from the beginning that her baby would belong to someone else, that experience had come closer to alienating her from her family than anything since.

Bobbie felt tears sting her eyes, as she nursed the old feelings of isolation. She and Carly had always been too much alike. It was the only reason they'd been able to overcome everything. And it was the source of most of the their disagreements. Bobbie gave a pensive sigh. In the end, Carly had become more her daughter than she could have imagined.

There was a sound in the hallway -- the door being opened -- and Bobbie snapped out of her reverie. She rose to her feet and was already halfway across the living room when Carly appeared in the doorway. Bobbie stopped in her tracks, at her daughter's unexpected appearance. Her hair was windblown, face free of make up, and she was wearing this strangely familiar dress that was, without a doubt, completely unlike anything Bobbie had seen on her before. Bobbie felt the alarms start going off in her head again.

Carly gave her a small, tentative smile.

"Mama...?"

Bobbie flew across the room, enveloping Carly in her arms. Something was wrong. Carly only pulled that name and when the waters were getting rough.

"Oh, baby," Bobbie soothed, mother instincts winning out over annoyance and hurt feelings. "You're Ok!"

Carly leaned against her mother, closing her eyes. She hadn't predicted this reaction. She'd expected to be met by Bobbie in full Medusa mode, all cold eyes and hissing sounds. She was grateful for the surprise. At this exact moment anxiety molecules were breeding in her blood stream. She'd played scenario after scenario in her head and all of them had filled her with a sickening sense of dread. Somehow, the last twenty-four hours made an excess of sense when Nikolas was around... absolutely none when he wasn't. She didn't even know how to begin to explain this to Bobbie.

"I..." she swallowed hard and squeezed her mother in return, before pulling back. "I had to... go early," she shifted her weight, stepping out of her mother's arms. Bobbie's relieved expression descended into a frown.

"Carly," her voice was tinged with disapproval, "I know you didn't come home last night."

Carly turned away from Bobbie's scrutinizing gaze, and started across the living room. Here goes nothing.

"Well, I..." she stopped dead, and turned back from her projected path towards the kitchen. "Wait. What makes you think I didn't come home last night?"

Bobbie touched the tip of her tongue to the apex of her upper lip, and then decided to jump right in.

"I was worried, you didn't open the door --"

"You used the key!" Carly's eyes widened in surprise. "Oh my GOD!"

Bobbie crossed her arms, and cocked her head to one side. "Carly, come on."

It was the head-cocking that did it. That stern 'This is your mother speaking' tone. Like she was Lucas. Like she was someone Bobbie had the right to make demands on. It hit several buttons for Carly at once, her mouth curled into a viscous smile.

"You're not about to lecture me for invading my privacy, are you?"

"No," Bobbie pulled in her breath. "I'm about to lecture you for scaring me out of my wits!"

"Oh, here it comes," Carly turned away, and started into the kitchen. This was a great way to put off the inevitable, and Carly felt like the little devil on her shoulder was taking over. "You overreact, and somehow it's all my fault."

"Overreact?" Bobbie's sputtered a moment, before bolting after Carly. "OVERREACT?"

Carly had entered the kitchen and was pulling open the door to the refrigerator.

"Do you have any orange juice? I'm dying of thirst."

"You consider THAT an overreaction?" Bobbie's hands found her hips, and she leaned forward, the picture of righteous indignation. "Do you want me to haul out a list of the reasons I have to worry about you?"

Carly let out an exaggerated sigh. "Actually, I want something to drink."

Bobbie ignored her. "I'm willing to. Volume one, item A: You have NEVER gone to the Quartermaines by yourself -- you don't drive, for starters, and you don't trust them any further than you can throw them!"

Carly spun around, facing her mother, her face flushing hot at her words. "You don't give me credit for much of anything, do you? I mean, I change my plans, and you call in the national guard. Yeah -- I think that's an overreaction."

Bobbie closed her eyes, doing a quick count to ten. No. No -- this wasn't going to get them anywhere.

"I haven't called out anyone -- will you just sit down, and we can talk about this..."

"Rationally?" Carly cocked her head to one side. "Why? What is there to talk about? I actually do something on my own -- that's supposed to be a good thing, by the way -- and that requires a sit-down talk? I don't think so."

Bobbie pulled in a fortifying breath. This was not going well. She tried to continue as calmly as she could. "Carly, we both know there's more going on here."

Carly smirked, and slammed the fridge door, as she turned back to her mother. "Oh, you have no idea."

"Carly, I don't want to do this with you right now."

Carly looked at Bobbie, her eyes flashing. "Oh, come on, Mama. This is the part you love -- admit it! You're acting like I gave you a condition because I stayed out all night. Well, guess what? I'm an adult. Sometimes adults don't punch timeclocks when they come in at night."

"CARLY!" Bobbie yelled in frustration. "God, will you just be honest with me! You didn't come home last night. At all."

Carly leaned her shoulders back against the fridge. "Something you wouldn't even know about if you bothered to trust me for five seconds."

Bobbie's eyes popped. "Trust you? Oh, I trust you, Carly. Believe me, in the last few years, I've figured out just what I can trust..." She stopped, pressing her lips together.

"What's that, Mama? Trust me to do what? Screw up?"

Bobbie turned her head, fixing her eyes on the corner of the room. "You're putting words in my mouth."

"No, I think I'm relieving you of the burden of finishing that sentence."

Bobbie put a hand to her forehead. "Dear God, Carly, what do you want me to say? Looking at the last year, what do you want me to do? Pretend I'm not scared?" She shook her head. "I can't do that."

"No," Carly laughed humorlessly. "You really really can't, can you?"

"Carly --"

"No, I think I've had enough for the moment," Carly pushed past her mother and started across the living room. "I'm going to my room."

"Perfect," Bobbie threw up her hands, her frustration bubbling over again. "Fine, Carly. You're an adult. It's your 'right' to go sulk in your room, if you want to."

Carly turned back on her heel, her eyes flashing. "Do you REALLY want to know where I was last night, Bobbie? Do you think that's going to make you feel any better?"

"Yes!" Bobbie shot back. "Right now? ANYTHING is going to make me feel better!"

Carly put her hands on her hips and tossed her hair over her shoulder. "Ok, you asked for it. You want the real dirt?"

Bobbie met her daughter's gaze evenly. "Desperately." Her voice was tinged with wry anger. Carly leaned in closer, her eyes widening.

"Opium dens." Carly formed the words with exaggerated precision. "Massage parlors and crack houses! I was taking wooden nickels, walking under ladders, and for an encore I sold the family cow for some magic beans!"

"Oh, for God's sake, Carly."

"And THEN I went and tracked down the starting line of the PCU football team, and had my deviant way with them. THAT you'd believe, huh? Or... What? That I was walking the streets and selling my body for --" her brain caught up to her mouth just as the words were tumbling out. "money..." Oh, god. What did just say? "I..."

Bobbie was just staring at her.

"I didn't --"

"I don't care what you were doing," Bobbie's voice was cold with anger. Inside, she felt like she'd just been hit in the gut. "And I have forgiven you worse things than I ever thought I'd be capable of -- if you want to start digging up ancient history --"

"That's not what I meant --"

"But I'm not standing here to be judged by you and your skewed sense of morality--"

"Skewed?"

"I am doing my best, Carly!" Bobbie's hands gripped the edge of the counter that separated the living room from the kitchen. "I swear to God, I'm just trying to get by right now, and the last thing I need is you giving me a laundry list of my failings."

Carly's back went up immediately.

"That is NOT what I'm doing!"

"Well then what ARE you doing!" Bobbie leaned forward, her voice carrying more than a trace of desperation.

Carly threw her head back and yelled up at the ceiling. "I'm TRYING to live my life!" She looked back at her mother, her eyes a little too bright. "That's what I'm trying to do. And I know what you've done for me -- I didn't say that I didn't for a second! But that doesn't give you a right to know every damn move I make! It doesn't give you the right to use a key on my apartment and go through my stuff just because I don't come to breakfast in the morning!"

"I'm your mother --"

"Oh, really?" Carly laughed bitterly. "You REALLY want to get into the dirty, Bobbie? That's a good place to start!"

"Hey, listen, daughter of mine," Bobbie spit back, "Neither of us will come of out that smelling like a rose!"

"Yeah, well." Carly folded her arms across her chest. "The apple doesn't fall that far from the whore house."

Bobbie's head went back like she'd just been slapped. "You... You're UNBELIEVABLE."

Carly closed her eyes. See, this was why she shouldn't fight with people. She lost all sense, took a wrong turn, and ran smack into a bad idea.

"Listen, you want to run off to your room, Carly -- be my guest. Because you are acting like a child --"

"And you're acting like a hypocrite."

"Well," Bobbie sighed, "That's a mother's prerogative, isn't it?"

Carly gave her mother an expression of contempt and nodded at the half finished glass of scotch on the counter top. "Finish your drink." She spun around again, and started out of the room. "And don't worry. Next time I decide to breathe, I'll be sure to let you know."

"Oh, GOD!" Bobbie screamed in frustration. "Carly, so help me!"

Carly paused in the doorway. Her heart was pounding so hard in her chest she could hardly get her breath. She really felt like she wanted to be sick. All the emotional upheaval she'd already had today, and now this? No thanks.

"Why don't you just give me an ultimatum and be done with it?" She asked, leaning against the door jam. "It's what you want to do. Right? Tell me to follow the rules like a good girl, and don't give Mommy any lip."

Bobbie closed her eyes, trying to regroup. Why did she let Carly pull her into these games? They hadn't had a real knock down, drag out fight like this in ages. But today, on a day when she's feeling completely burned out, Carly picks a fight. Perfect. She tried to speak again, forcing her words to be as careful and plain as possible.

"As long as you're living under my roof --" Bobbie couldn't believe those words were coming out of her mouth. Dear God, she was turning into a cliche. Carly was turning her into a cliche -- and not even a good one!

"MAYBE," her daughter's voice interrupted her, "I shouldn't be living under your roof at all!"

Her mother's eyes popped open.

"MAYBE --" Bobbie started to shoot back, and then caught herself. Oh, god... she was playing right into her hands. "Maybe," her body deflated against the kitchen counter, "You should just realize that you scared me out of my wits, and that I'm not exactly rational at the moment." She straightened up and looked at her daughter, her brown furrowed. "Maybe you should consider that I lay awake every night of my life, no matter how exhausted I am, and worry about you. I toss, I turn, I even bite my nails -- because I'm worried that someone out there is trying to hurt you. And Carly?" Bobbie pulled in a breath. "More often than not, that person is you."

Carly stared at her mother. Her limbs felt completely weak. She wanted to walk back into the room, but she didn't feel like she had the strength.

"That's what you really think."

"What I think..." Bobbie gave up, and dug both hands into her hair, holding her head. "I think you scared the life out of me this morning. I think you didn't answer the door, and I lost my mind. I think I thought you were in a ditch someplace, and..." She forced herself to look up and meet her daughter's gaze. "I think that there isn't anything in this world that scares me like losing you again."

There was a long silence, while Carly absorbed that. Oh... Hell. She felt, suddenly, like dirt. How was it her mother was so damn good at turning a good fight on her like that? And why was it she could hit the buttons to turn her into a raving maniac, and then turn right around and turn her into a terrified little girl?

Mothers. God's way of keeping you in permanent check.

Carly felt the shaking start in her legs, and it spread like a virus -- gripping her hands, making it's way up her torso, to her shoulders, and grabbing her by the throat.

"You know where I just was?" Carly's voice trembled. Bobbie was leaning against the counter, her eyes closed. She looked like she was working really hard at keeping her grip on this conversation.

"No, Carly. I really don't."

"You should."

Bobbie raised her head. Carly was looking at her, like an injured child. Her whole body was shaking violently, but what got her was the violent quiver in her bottom lip. She was about to burst into tears.

"You were with Michael," Bobbie's voice was quiet.

"Damn straight."

The strain in her daughter's voice took the edge off her words completely. Bobbie abandoned her post behind the counter, and hurried across the room to her daughter.

"Oh, Sweetie --"

"I never miss seeing him," Carly had lost the battle with tears. They were streaming down her face, with reserves pooling in her eyes, ready for a second wave. "You know I never miss seeing him, no matter what's going on. And you know --"

"Honey," Bobbie cut Carly off by pulling her into another hug. Carly gripped her mother fiercely, and buried her head against her mother's shoulder.

"I've had a really bad week," she moaned against the knit of Bobbie's sweater.

Bobbie laughed, finding twisted humor in the statement. "I know, baby. I know. You just scared me so much."

"I didn't mean to."

Bobbie nodded. She pulled back, her hands on her daughter's shoulders, and forced Carly too look up at her.

"Carly, I know that this has been hard on you. And I know that you weren't ready to talk to me about it. But... I'm sorry, I don't know what else to do! I don't know how to help you."

Carly nodded, her body still shaking like a leaf.

"I think maybe, if I sit down..."

Bobbie nodded, acquiescing to her request and pushing her gently towards the couch. At least when Carly was like this, she knew how to handle her. She might have wanted to shake the life out of her a minute earlier, but... Well, welcome to the Spencer Family. Where everything turns on a dime.

Carly sank down onto the soft pillows of her mother's sofa gratefully. She was so off-track. How had she let everything get this far gone? She was supposed to be explaining something. She was supposed to be telling her mother all about the wonderful man she'd... met. That was a good start, wasn't it? Met a swell guy, Mom. You'll love him. Hell, you already do... She was brought back to earth by the soft touch of her mother's hand on shoulder. She looked over at Bobbie and smiled weakly.

"I'm sorry I scared you."

"I probably let my imagination run away with me," Bobbie admitted, gently tugging on the curl at the end of her daughter's hair. "I just... I thought you might do something... Drastic."

Carly felt herself go cold. Hmmm... Define drastic, Mom.

"I'm Ok."

Bobbie smoothed her daughter's hair, once. Twice. "I know."

Carly took a deep breath. "But... I didn't come home last night, either."

A look of vexation flitted across Bobbie's face, but was quickly banished.

"Well, I knew that, too."

"I..." a gulp of air. "I was.... With someone."

Bobbie's hand stilled on the back of her daughter's head. She stared hard at her wrist.

"Um hum," her voice was higher in pitch than it should have.

"I was with --" Carly's words were cut off by the sound of the front door of the Brownstone slamming with so much violence that it pitched Carly immediately to her feet. She was in the middle of the room by the time the echo faded, with no idea how she'd landed there.

"BARBARA!"

All the blood in Carly's body rushed to her head. Oh, she thought. You have GOT to be kidding me.

Luke appeared in the doorway his eyes zeroing in on Carly immediately. He pointed a long finger at her, as if he was some Victorian detective in a bad play, discovering his murderer in the sitting room. "YOU!"

"Oh, God," the words escaped Carly's lips like a prayer, nothing else offering itself to her. One look at her uncle, and she knew the jig -- if that's what this was -- was up. Her back was now officially against the wall. She swallowed hard as Luke walked into the room.

"You wanna tell me just what the hell you think you're doing with Nikolas Cassadine?"