Title: Right Where You Want Me
Author: carleymarie
Category: Gilmore Girls
Disclaimer: I own nothing except my thoughts and the MacBook I type them on.
Rating: T
Pairing: Tristan/Rory
Reviews: Greatly appreciated.
Summary: Relationships are complex. AU Trory.
A/N: It has been more than a while since I last penned a fic. I'm trying something a little different. Confusion may be felt while reading, but try to see each new chapter as a piece of a larger puzzle to be understood as the plot progresses. Enjoy!
Chapter One
I hadn't seen him lately. By lately I mean since the end of the school year. My senior year. Our senior year. We weren't friends and weren't enemies. It's hard to say what we were exactly. We only had one class together that final year, but I think that we both made sure to make some sort of contact during it. Whether it be a glance, a smile, or a conversation.
For six months, starting at the end of our junior year and finishing half way into senior year, we would type to each other online. Private moments between us, but whatever would happen during these conversations would not be brought up when we saw each other in real life.
I had thought about him a lot lately. Maybe it was because of that one time I saw him during freshman orientation. During our conversations, it seemed that neither of us thought that we would end up at the same University. I planned on attending Harvard University, and him to go to Princeton. Yet, here we were, both attending Yale University. The same place. One glance to each other, and me shaking my head at him was all that occurred.
Like most of our relationship, we would be together for a short moment of time, as if intersecting over completely opposite paths, and then just as fast, the fleeting moment would pass. We would be on our own separate courses again.
Why would we be on the same path? We didn't come from the same background. We weren't part of the same circle in school. We didn't have any of the same interests. In actuality, we had nothing in common, save attending the same high school, turned University. I think it was that which created a draw for us to each other.
It had been months since that sighting during orientation, and I saw him at the mall. With a girl of course. He was always with another girl. Tristan DuGray was always with a different girl. In the three years I had known him, I don't think that I had ever seen him with the same girl twice. Always beautiful and always a brunette. I wondered if I kept my hair brown because I knew that he liked it. Nothing happened between us when I saw him. I don't even know if he saw me, but as I walked by him I spoke to my friend about another guy because if, on the off chance, he did hear me, and did care, I would want him to know that I wasn't sitting around single. Of course I was sitting around being single, but he didn't need to know that.
I saw him again soon after. In a bookstore. I remembered one of our conversations from our high school days:
"So what did you do today?" Tristan asked.
"I went to the bookstore," I simply replied.
"You're really living on the edge," he responded.
"Oh, I know," I lamely said back. Feeling stupid that I mentioned the bookstore as an exciting place to go on one of my first evenings after finishing school for the summer.
"Wow, that's a good way to bring in summer. Let's buy a book. In case you didn't notice, school just ended Rory. You just finished having to use books. You're suppose to forget about books for three months. Why buy more? At the very least, not start reading the day after an English exam," he said.
"Well those books were for school. These books are ones that I choose for myself," I replied back. Of course, right after I felt like an idiot, letting him think that all I focused on was school.
"It's still reading," he responded.
"I know. You don't read?" I asked back, wanting to know something about him, rather than just having my interests on display.
"Nope. I have many hobbies. Reading is just not one of them," he said back.
He listed his hobbies for me. As promised, none of them included reading. In fact, most weren't even legal.
He was standing in front of a large row of books. The fiction section. One armed stretched, bracing his body on the bookcase, while the other rested on the base of his neck, absentmindedly rubbing the spot where his hairline ended.
Upon first glance, a small smile rose on my face. He looked so casual, yet in deep concentration. Of course, he could have been picking up books for classes, but that is what the University bookstore was for.
I quietly walked up beside him.
"I didn't think you knew what a bookstore was," I said to him, abruptly startling his concentration.
I didn't look at him, only at the bookcase he was looking at, yet I could hear his mouth slowly change from a frown to a smirk.
He turned toward me. "Rory Gilmore," he simply said. His tone even, not giving away any hint of emotion.
I slowly turned my head to look up at him: "Tristan DuGray," I said back with a similar tone.
For a moment, we simply looked at each other. Small smiles on our faces, waiting for the other to say something.
"So, you didn't end up going to Princeton," I finally said, just feeling the need to break the silence.
"Nope. No Harvard either?" he asked.
"Nope," I mimicked back.
Another few moments passed, and he had yet to say anything. I stared up at him again, suddenly getting angry.
I decided to speak, not able to hold in my anger: "Seriously?" I asked.
"Seriously what?" he asked, not understanding why I was angry.
"We haven't—Never mind. Class dismissed," I said, disappointed with the way our conversation was playing out.
I had imagined us seeing each other again, but this was not one of the scenarios that had occurred to me.
I turned on my heel, and began to walk away, wanting to get away from the embarrassment that this conversation had become, but felt a large hand come to rest on my shoulder.
"You look beautiful today," he said.
Just as I wanted out, he had to pull me back in.