Title: Saturday, Coffee and Stella
Summary: Ray's being nice, Stella is forlorn and there's a cup of coffee involved.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Warning: None.
It's Saturday, an evening were Mudslide Crush front man felt like escaping the usual noise surrounding him. The noise was getting on his nerves and Ray's been trying to drown it out all week.
He thinks that all he really needs is coffee to bolster him through this temporary melancholy, to replace the high of the stage with something equally as artificial and overprice, but the Starbucks is all but deserted when he walks in and the quiet closes in around him. The sound system dialed to barely a whisper in the background of the hiss of the espresso machine and the clink of cups and plates out the back somewhere.
His order is made without fuss if he doesn't count the barista's flirty attitude or the way she scowls when he ignores her in her sad attempt of catching his attention. He focuses instead on finding an empty sit.
He's reconsidering the option of sitting in the center of the establishment or be for once tries to be inconspicuous and sit in the back corner when he realizes he's been staring at the same girl, sitting alone at a table near the window, for the past few minutes.
The same, all too familiar girl, now that he thinks about it.
To say he didn't expect to see her here is an understatement. By all rights, Stella should be off goofing with the Lemonade heads, all but planning on starting another revolution which pisses Brenigan or hanging out in Dante's. Stella should be surrounded by a crowd of losers and making another speech which moves them all. She should be with her group of ducklings plotting world domination.
There is something inherently wrong with the sight of Stella Yamada sitting at a table near the window by herself, staring blankly down into something that looks suspiciously inedible. Stella Yamada looks defeated, which remind of that Rising Star moment when her band walks out on the stage unable to play.
Ray hesitates, reaching to take his coffee as the barista hands it over, his eyes fixed on Stella's profile, where it's half-turned towards the window.
He shouldn't be bothered by the lead guitarist, the high of the competition between Mudslide Crush and the Lemon heads having long since sunk into something disappointed and a little bitter inside of him. The Mudslide Crush might've win the Rising Star, but the Lemonheads gather as much or more publicity and fame than them.
Ray doubts Stella would even notice if he walked straight past, but there's something in the borderline pathetic, mostly just sad look on Stella's face as she swirls a straw slowly back and forth through her drink, that stops him.
He's starting to think he should be worried about the effect that Stella Yamada has on him.
He closes the gap between them with quick decisive steps before he can think the better of it, raising an eyebrow as he asks, "Shouldn't you be out starting revolution or something that you loser heads seems to do this days?"
Stella's head jerks up, her eyes widening with surprise as she registers just who is standing in front of her. Ray dips his head questioningly towards the seat, watching the hesitation that plays out across Stella's face and waiting through the chewed lip and the eventual nod of Stella's head before he sits, setting his coffee down carefully in front of him.
Stella shrugs, stirring slow figure of eights through her drink with her straw. "What are you doing here?"
Ray shrugs. "Killing time." He leaned on closer to her. "The question is what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at Dante's hanging out with your loser friends?"
"That's not the only thing that I do." Ray did a double take when those words come out without the familiar scathing tone. Something is really wrong when Stella the Spitfire goes absente in their conversation.
"So you decided to get coffee, or well, whatever that is, by yourself," Ray replied, raising both eyebrows at the thing that Stella is stirring. If she offers that to him, he might accuse her of attempted homicide.
"I wanted to try something new," Stella replies defensively, her eyes dipping back towards her drink before her nose wrinkles, in a way that is not at all cute…nope.
Ray can't hold back the snort of laughter, "Pity. That something new looks like it personally insulted you."
Stella narrows her eyes, and looks like she's contemplating if he means that as an insult or just an observation and before a real insult come tumbling out of Ray's mouth, he flashes a smile and nudges his own coffee across the table towards Stella.
The corner of Stella's lips twitches, like she wants to smile, but she draws her hands back and sinks back into her chair, her voice lace with suspicion as she asks, "What's this about, Ray?''
That stings. "You look like you need it more than I do."
Stella frowns, her fingers drumming against the edge of the table as she mutters, "That's not what I meant."
Ray shifts in his seat, wondering why he doesn't just get up and leave. It would undoubtedly be easier in the long run if he just cut his losses and never looked back. Stella, had at least, seemed contented with her peace, even though she looks so forlorn in it.
He settles for, "You looked like you could use the company."
Stella eyes him carefully, like she isn't entirely convinced that Ray wouldn't blame her for, judging by their history together, but after a moment of scrutiny she relaxes in her seat. "Just so you know, we're not friends and I'm still pretty pissed at you." Her words might be scathing, but her tone is soft.
Ray just barely resists the urge to laugh and rolls his eyes instead he nudges his cup a little further across the table. "I never would have guessed."
Stella rolls her eyes in response but she reaches for the cup anyway, pointedly ignoring the smirk that crosses Ray's lips when she takes the first sip and actually sighs with appreciation.
He's amused enough that he almost doesn't catch the curious, mocking tilt of Stella's head as she curls both hands around the cup and asks, "No adoring insults today?"
Ray resists the urge to roll his eyes in return, "You aren't going to let that go, are you?"
Stella shrugs, "I could have gone with spitting lemonade at you."
"Touché." he replies, and he's only half-kidding but she smiles anyway. "So Stella Yamada does have a humor after all."
Stella laughs and says, "Oh, like you can talk, I don't think I'll ever recover from the amount of 'flowery words' you've thrown at us."
"Don't pretend you didn't enjoy it, you like having those bouts with me." Ray retorts, smirking as he leans forward to try and catch Stella's eye. "Besides, those insults were not meant for you, but to your friends."
"Ha! An insult to friend is an insult to me," Stella replies, the easy backslide into something like their old rhythm tapering off into something weighted and awkward when Stella finally looks up, sighs and says softly, "Thank you."
Ray can't help the way those words seem to crawl up his spine sending shivers in his body. He hates the way how this girl could elicit something akin to happiness just by uttering those words. Damn! He's hooked by this siren.
He can't bring himself to let anyone, let Stella of all the people, thank him for being not a jerk for once. So he looks away needing a diversion, eyeing the empty tables around them before asking, "So, why are you here?"
Stella stays quiet, shifting restlessly in her seat and taking another long sip of coffee. Avoiding Ray's eyes until he can't help but ask, "Okay, so I'm going to go out on a limb and say this isn't like you."
"I'm just tired," Stella finally admits, her eyes fixed on the table, a finger drumming absently across the surface of the table and that look is back on her face. The one that had stopped Ray in his tracks with the absurd need to get rid of it, to make her smile again.
"Tired?" Ray asks, finally, unsure what Stella's getting at here. "Of what?"
"Everything," Stella replies quietly. "I'm-"
"Tired of being you?" Ray supplies, watching the way Stella shifts again and takes another long sip of coffee.
"It's not like that," she says once she's set the cup carefully back on the table in front of her, once she's composed herself, "I just want to be normal for once."
Ray watches him stare at his hands and when Stella finally looks up, looks Ray in the eyes, he's struck by how much Stella seems to be holding back. "I thought it would help, you know. The revolution, making new friends and all. But…"
Her hands twist together, her lips twisting and Ray wishes she would just say it, whatever it is. "You knew that I'm not from here originally right?"
Something ugly slithers through him, a weight that settles heavily in the pit of his stomach and he looks away. "Yeah. It's hard to miss the new girl with your kind of attitude."
It feels like a lie. It's hard to miss her because since he saw her walk at Mesa High, he's been kind of enamored.
"I miss Rhode Island," Stella mutters, leaning into the table. "I miss the ice cream truck, that ugly statue in our school, that eccentric guy who sits in front of me in my English class-"
She snaps her mouth shut and Ray watches her carefully, watches her pull back into the shell like all of that emotion can just be tucked away. Pushed aside for another time. Silence envelops their table before Stella broke it.
"One of my friends in there sends me an e-mail," Stella admitted. "And I'd remember my life back then. Where nobody expects me to do something and then blames me afterwards when something goes-"
She trails off, shaking her head and inspecting the lid of her coffee cup like it's something fascinating.
The strangest part is that Ray actually gets it. He's all too aware of how it feels to have somebody depends on you, to have that responsibility on his shoulder. What shocks his most is that it came from Stella, the Stella Yamada, the one that won't back out, the one that makes Patty and Jules seethes with anger, the one that challenge Brenigan, and yeah how could he forgot, the one that spits lemonade on his face.
Sometimes Ray wonders if all of those where just Stella's front. He shook his head at the thought, nuh! This girl's a rebel alright. And that personality had been itched on her and that is who she is. No one can question that.
"Where the heck is Stella Yamada and what have you done to her?"
And the surprise on Stella's face as her head snaps up to look at Ray, like she'd forgotten who she was talking to and is somehow, inexplicably, relieved to realize that it's him catches Ray by surprise. It's strange to realize how much he likes talking to Stella but he's starting to think that maybe Stella likes talking to him as well.
"I don't get it," Stella blurts out, looking away hurriedly like she's been caught doing something she shouldn't. "I feel - I want to be unnoticed for once okay. And it's weird because I've been fighting for that not to happen."
A dam was broken, she spills it all.
"Mo's been up my ass on not having a boyfriend or romantic partner. And normally, I would just pass that up with a roll of my eyes. But that person that sends letter…that was my ex."
And the part of Ray that's been twisted up tight and uncomfortable inside of him, gone ignored and pushed aside over and over again every time he feels that he might like this girl sitting in front of him relishes with vengeance.
He doesn't know how this works, what level of fucked up this is on the scale that he can't bring himself to ask some girl who loathed but him but he'd been crushing for months, for her recognition, for her approval, but that he thinks he might actually forgo his pride to beg for Stella's.
His voice sounds strange even to his own ears, more like a challenge than he'd intended it to as he asks, "And you still wants him?"
Stella's face colors prettily under the intensity of Ray's stare and she looks down again, her fingers clenched tight around the coffee cup as she says, "It's different."
"How?"
It's too much, probably. He doesn't have the right to ask her that. He almost wants to take it back but Ray has never gotten anywhere, playing it safe. He isn't about to start now.
"I was angry, you know," Stella replies, voice begging for something, so Ray waits. "Everything with my leaving, and him not talking to me after that."
There's another story there, Ray figures, one he doesn't know and doesn't want to know. Yeah, jealousy is one of those factors.
"His letter reminded me on why I was so angry with my mom on dragging me here." Stella laughs at herself, shaking her head at how bitter it sounds. And this must be the price of Stella opening up to him, having to understand just what she actually feels, what she really thinks inside that stubborn head of hers.
"I was so angry at her," she continues steadily, "and him. And I feel so lost now that finally, there was a closure to it. My mom's apology and his, and I don't know what to do now. "
Ray noticed that Stella hasn't mentioned the ex-boyfriend's name yet. And honestly, Ray doesn't want to know.
Instead he fixes his eyes low, trying to catch Stella's averted eyes and says, "You're the toughest person I know. And whatever you'll do next, I'm pretty sure that will sets Mesa High's off, especially Brenigan. You're Stella, and you'll find a way to disrupt the order that once had been in Mesa High before you came."
Her lips forms and 'o' shape, like she couldn't believe he just said that, before the determination flickers in her eyes. It looks like fireworks to him.
"I know," Stella replies slowly, determinedly. Her lips twitch, just a little, like the beginning of a smile as she says, "You always make sure of that, even if you didn't intend it to be that way."
And it doesn't really change anything. But there's some kind of promise there, in the way Stella meets his eyes as she says it. Like the fact that Stella is willing to move past this, to forgive him or close to, has changed them somehow.
"Thank you," he says instead, unable to resist the urge to grin when Stella's nose wrinkles, again it is not cute… ok it is, in confusion and clarifies, "For giving me a chance to listen to you, despite…" he left it at that.
Stella ducks her head to hide the smile that curls slow and wide across her lips, a hand rising to that checkered blue backpack and clutches it. "The guys going to think I'm crazy."
The reply of, you deserve better, sits heavily on Ray's tongue but he forces himself to swallow it, because if he does this temporary truce would blow over, instead watching as Stella turns her wrist to check her watch and pulls a face.
"I should probably go," Stella apologizes, taking another long sip of coffee and blinking rapidly against the strength of it. "I'd never hear the end of it if I was late for the Lemonade Mouths Weekend Conference Call."
Ray chuckles. "What kind of lameness is that?"
She stuck her tongue at him in retaliation and stands. And Ray is preoccupied by the amount of skin he can glimpse, her shirt rode up high when she place the empty cup back onto the table. She seems to be debating with herself over something, chewing her lower lip before she finally says, "Thank you for this… for listening. It was really a surprise."
"You too," Ray replies, watching the way Stella continues to hesitate behind her chair, like she wants to say something else. "Though I'm pretty sure you owe me a cup of coffee now."
Stella does her best to hide her smile, the hesitance disappearing as she scoffs, "Maybe we should make it a lemonade."
"Cold, Yamada," Ray retorts, eyebrows rising.
"I…I'll call you," Stella offers and Ray can't help the surge of something in his chest at the way Stella doesn't quite meet his eyes, cheeks flushed with color as she busies herself with pushing her chair neatly back into place. "We could give this friend thing another try."
"You have my number?"
"Well yeah," She laughs sheepishly. "about that."
It dawns on Ray when he catches the guilty looks Stella thrown in his way. He scowls at her. "You're the one who's been giving me prank calls for weeks."
"Sorry?" That tone's not sorry at all.
He scowls, but doesn't hide the smile that forms afterward. Only this girl.
Stella chuckles and waves before turning to make her leave, Ray watching as she winds through the tables towards the doors, his eyes dipping automatically to the rather spectacular sight of her ass in those jeans before his lips curve, amused.
Yeah, he's pretty sure that the friend thing could work. For now, at least. After all, he's still Ray Beech. And Ray gets what he wants. And now that finally he admitted it, he really wants the guitar goddess of Mesa High. Because fuck Rhode Island, this is where she belongs.
End
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When Charlie shouts at Stella to shut up, I felt annoyed. When Brenigan silenced Stella's voice, I was moved. When the band blames Stella in that holding cell I felt bad for her. So, I put armor on the Mesa High's Big Bad Bully, and made him save the day.
And thanks to Ella Lavender for giving me a magnificent review last Saturday for this piece.