Illogical
Disclaimer: Lyrics are from "Human Behavior" by Bjork. I own nothing GG. Please don't tell me you don't know that.
A/N: Originally posted at the TwoP ficathon, as "Human Behavior" for the soundtrack challenge—the ficathon and other challenges can be found at: geocities[dot]com[slash]ficathon2004.
To Lee, for beta-ing, and of course for informing me that I need to stop it with the asterisks, lol. To Christie, because we never know what we're saying and it's so much fun. Hee. Make no sense and keep talking!
----------
There's definitely, definitely no logic
To human behavior…
----------
It's not much.
It's wood, just wood, and metal—do the nails count?
She swears the wood breathes. –No, he corrects himself. She swore the wood breathed. It's important, to remember that. Correct the tenses, ease into it, and everything he can't remember (for his own sanity) will fade into the background. It'll disappear, gone forever, not even a shadow left, and he'll be glad.
He won't be able to be glad if he doesn't remember. What a juxtaposition.
She loves that word.
She loved that word.
But who would honestly think she'd change her opinions on things after him? (It takes a lot to be worth that.) After him… He's a phase, for everyone. For some it's a month, for the rare few (one), it was years. It's been two days often enough in his life.
Maybe it helped, this thing, this breathing wood (and metal). It's a constant, so it brings people back, and it keeps people here. He wonders whether he was the reason she stayed as long as she did, or if he was the reason she left so soon.
Or both.
"When I was little," she says, "I used to think I'd know everything someday."
He stares at her, smirking. "Is it still possible for me to graduate?"
She's quiet for a moment. He said the wrong thing, again. But then she brightens and makes a face back at him. "No. I mean…what the universe expands into. How big the world is. That kind of stuff."
"We know how big the world is," he points out. It's awkward, replying to this, because every comment he makes has this tinge of wrongness that plays in his ears when he says it. He's not the one to have this conversation with, and he's getting more lost by the moment. In himself, maybe? Or in her? In that complex maze of confusing passageways that is her mind: tangents and ramblings, whispers and smiles, tears and laughter, jokes and references and scoldings.
And books, always books, so he can survive in this maze.
He finds his way slowly, because after some thinking (or less thinking), eventually, it becomes right, becomes logical, and he understands.
"Jess," she groans, reaching down toward the water to dip her hand in it. He thinks she's going to splash him and is glad—he knows what to do in response to that.
But she doesn't.
"Like right here," she continues. He nods. "This bridge? It's like…it's like this tiny molecule in all of that." She waves her hand around. "But we're here all the time, practically obsessed with it, you know? Isn't that cool?"
He doesn't get a chance to speak before she's off again, and he realizes too late that the feeling passing over him is relief. "And like…like you."
This is dangerous ground.
"It's like…"
He waits. She shakes her head, blushing.
"I can't explain it."
That is the fucking worst sentence in the entire world.
He wonders what she means.
What she means by writing a letter to Luke, even, no matter how short and insignificant it was. To Luke, and not to him.
(Hello, captain obvious.)
Especially what she means by writing a letter that refers to him, when she knew, must have known, that it would be quoted aloud in the diner.
Refers to him? Is he crazy? She reads like he does; she uses—used—uses references in more than just half-drunk, crazy-in-love conversations with him.
Conversations in the past.
What she means? No, what she meant. Maybe he has some mental block against past tense. And hey, that would explain a lot of things. Why he doesn't look back and care about mistakes he made, or—
Or why he can say he doesn't care about those things, never cared, without (much) guilt.
He's pathetic, but what's worse is how her unimportant (emphasize that) words continue to replay themselves in his ears.
"No artful dodgers here, and no real diners…"
Real diners. He rolls his eyes. Real diners. Where is she, now?
He doesn't even know, but how would he?
"…but bookstores, at least. Hope you're doing well, how's Caesar?"
Uh huh. Caesar's fine.
In his actual thoughts, he doesn't think 'so am I.' That's hidden in the deep, secret part of his mind. One of the thoughts he'd never in a million years admit that he actually thought. But despite that, despite everything, it's there.
And it's not true.
"Love, Rory."
I love you.
That's another of those thoughts, those hidden ones. It's a newcomer there, adjusting, getting used to knowing (a thought knowing—she rubbed off on him too much) that he doesn't think it, doesn't think it, doesn't think it.
Except, of course, he does.
His least favorite four-letter word is continually floating through his mind, torturing him, bringing with it pictures of wood (and metal) and water, honey brown hair, bright smiles and blue eyes. Bringing back sensations of her hands, and her taste, and her. Luke has now been unofficially assigned the job of pouring all the coffee.
He is nothing less than a compulsive liar.
Liar, liar, liar…
Why is it that thinking that always brings about dreams with houses burning down? Liar. Fire. It rhymes?
He wakes up with his head in her lap, and he sits up so fast the world spins before him. "Rory?"
She shrugs and meets his eyes. And he knows.
"Luke told you."
Another noncommittal shrug. Just because she's back, it doesn't mean it's all forgiven. A beat, in his mind, and then he realizes. Just because she thinks it's true, it doesn't mean she knows he's sorry.
"How did Luke know?" he asks her.
"He said you were here yesterday. He said you hated swans." She pauses. "He said Dean's been being annoyed by the same group of tourists for several days, and it was almost getting amusing, watching. I guessed."
He smirks, then stops himself. He still has a part in this too; there are still lines to be recited.
"I'm sorry."
"Why'd you say that? Why'd you tell me you got into a fight?" She turns away, then back. "God, Jess…"
"And you would have believed me, right?"
"Of course I would have," she answers, hurt.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." Pause again. "I would have wanted to."
"Well."
"Well," she repeats, and once again the puzzle pieces of their relationship click into place.
If he thinks that by sending the letter, she was trying to talk to him, trying to get him to respond…
Then she has not only influenced him far too much, made him read too much into things, but she's grasping melting ice. This is not to happen, it never will. Because if it were supposed to, it wouldn't have this many breaks in the thread; this many problems, conflicts, obstacles.
The way life works is damn confusing.
It doesn't make sense that waking up with her next to him (and not seeing her smile) ripped something in him, even if he isn't sure what. It doesn't make sense that two people with things as strong as words, wood, and metal holding them together could break apart so easily.
It's that extra element in all of it, probably. That twist that makes unsentimental people drive to airports too late, just to watch planes leave and know they won't be coming back. That bend in the path that makes you stop and stare and wonder what just happened, although you were there, and thinking clearly, the whole time. That knot in the cable that suddenly blocks all communicating functions of the brain when the person you love tells you it's not working, her dream is coming true and now she's leaving.
And she doesn't sound sorry (not really).
That stops any possibility of speaking for minutes after she's gone, and it keeps you from going where you know you might find her for fear of doing just that.
It's so obvious that there are problems, too many problems. Some kind of ache that tells her she wants more. Wants something else.
She watches the news at night and dreams the childish dream of disappearing through the screen, falling onto the other side, being enveloped with a new world. Except it isn't a fairytale castle—it's a tough life, it's traveling, it's leaving and moving and seeing horrible sights more often than delightful ones. So much more often.
But still, she wants it, and it's scary.
Maybe she doesn't want it. She isn't sure she really wants it.
Maybe she just doesn't want this any longer.
She thinks, when she sees him, that there are problems there too, obviously problems.
And she kisses him, and it's still right, and it isn't him, and that kills her.
He's right, and she's wrong, and when she slides her hand down his arm, she can almost feel the splinters, the way she does when they go to the bridge these days. They (she and Jess) frequent it, maybe, but no one else does, and it slowly begins to fall into disrepair.
She can't stand the thought of Taylor deciding to tear it down.
Or worse, rebuild it.
Theirs is not a high-tech place; it's not supposed to be. They didn't need chemistry to get along; they used English, and it worked, worked so well, up until now.
He doesn't move. He's gotten good at it, staying still, perfectly still.
Planes roar above his head, and he can't help wondering if maybe, maybe, maybe she is on one of them.
Which is impossible.
She's not there, she's not here.
He remembers an angry night, fifteen years old, out on the street, having told Liz he was getting an apartment. (Of course, it didn't happen.) Everything looked dirtier that night, and even with all the billboards, advertisements, office buildings, lit-up signs—the possibilities out there seemed much more unreachable than they usually did.
And he'd picked up a brochure, found on the ground, talking about property rights. He doesn't remember the details anymore, but it involved how much area above and below the ground you own, if you own the land…
Down, it went pretty far, but up, not as much. (Or more?) If he's right, remembering, most commercial planes never even come through Stars Hollow.
He gives up.
Concentrating on insignificant details is her form of avoidance, not his. And after months, the effectiveness wears off.
His hands grip the wood at the edge, and he stares into the water, willing himself to forget any of this exists. His finger runs over a nail in the railing, and suddenly—not just wood, wood and metal.
No.
Yes.
No.
He runs through everything in his mind, everything that happened between them, like a storyboard, a movie. He's tempted to edit, take out the scenes (the fights) he doesn't like. Increase the current of their stares across the diner, all those years ago, back at the beginning. Move the characters to different places—make Her Running Away into Her Stepping Forward, Kissing Him.
But he resists, and he watches it all play behind his eyes.
Suddenly, it's not just the passionate kisses that are highlighted. Not just her eyes, staring right at him, blazing through any flimsy wall he was trying to keep up. Not just her hand on his shoulder, his arm around her back.
But also those awful moments.
No, no, no.
The ones that show him it could have been, it was right, it was definitely supposed to be.
Her dreams, her (and his) opportunities, the combination of wanting two things at once and choosing the new one, the important one…
What she's doing now, what's happening now, it is—supposed to be—more.
Damn.
"It's not you," she tells him.
"Yeah. That's your line. What movie was it last night?"
"Jess!"
"Yeah," he says, and it doesn't make sense, it isn't a response, but he doesn't know what else to say.
A breeze catches her hair and brushes it behind her shoulders, and it shines, and she's standing straight up and moving awkwardly, twisting her hands together, uncertain.
"I guess…" she starts. "We can't do anything about it, and it's just the way it is, so…"
"I got it."
"No, Jess, that isn't it. I mean…God, I don't know what I mean!"
He nods. "Right. Rory, it's okay." He stops. "I forgot to teach you anything."
"Teach me?"
"Repeat after me: Hola, coma estas."
"Adios, no te olvidarme." I won't forget you.
Yeah right, she will. But it's what's supposed to happen, no use fighting it. She's leaving for the same reason they came together, so long ago. It wasn't a choice. No, it was. It wasn't. It was.
Something.
They couldn't be in the same town and not have it happen.
Plus there was more holding them together than most: wood, and metal.
Humanity is far too hard to understand, and he thinks maybe he should just separate himself from it all. He doesn't belong here. (There.)
Or he does.
And so far from thinking nothing is ever right, as everyone thinks he does, he's had a far too perfect picture of the world. Of how it should be, how it would be, someday.
He was wrong.
The hell with logic.