Other Things Do…
Sequel to: Some Things Never Change
Part 1/1
By: Holly Ann Leighton
Disclaimer: I don't own anything from Dawson's Creek, the WB, or any other affiliates of the show and it's production. Now that sounded neat and sophisticated, right? :)
Category: D/J
Rating: PG-13
Distribution: AdultCreekFic, Capeside Diaries, Capeside Pals, fanfiction.net, and my own personal site. Anywhere else, ask and ye shall receive.
Dedication: All the great people on the DC lists (DJTSA, AdultCreekFic, WBWednesdayNight, and Capeside Pals) that read the first story and convinced me to write another section of it.
Thanks To: Daizy Lee for beta reading this and giving me her seal of approval, lol. Jerry D. for the commentary he wrote about Love Ending and Beginning again, it inspired many ideas in me. :)
Summary & Notes: This takes place two weeks after Some Things Never Change. To read this part, go to my website at: http://www.geocities.com/hollyann95/mystories.html
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She's back. I knew the day was going to come, but nothing could prepare me for that first sight of Joey Potter after four months of not seeing her. It must have been bad luck or fate's funny way of showing some unspoken sign for me to be walking around Capeside near the docks as Pacey's boat, True Love, docked at the port. I saw Pacey jump off the boat, tie it up, and reach out his hand for Joey to climb off.
That was the first moment that I saw her. Her hair was blowing from the sea breezes that blew and as she reached up to tuck the loose strands behind her ear; I saw how brown her skin was from the impact the sun had had over the months. She looked beautiful and most importantly, happy. She had this smile on her face that I had never quite seen before with her. It was relaxed and…natural, not forced or with any hint of hidden distress which it normally had when anyone looked at her. I felt the first jabs of sharp pain go through my heart as Pacey wrapped his arms around her and they hugged tightly. They looked like two young people in love, possibly how Joey and I had looked when we had first been in love; I'm not sure, but I can hope that we looked that happy together at one time. I never thought for a second to go up and talk to either one of them as I turned around and walked back to my house. Sure, I wanted to be the better man and swallow my pride. One part of me thought it would be so easy to just walk up to them and ask how their summer had been, to act as if nothing were different between us. The only problem is that now my two best friends are in love with each other.
The other part of me, however, still feels the anger, betrayal, and pain of dealing with everything that I have dealt with these past months and I just struggle within myself, as if it there were a tug a war game going on inside of my head. I'm never sure which part of me wins because I keep changing my mind time after time. For this one moment though, I let my anger win. I let it consume me as I go home and lay down in my bed, staring at the closed window in my room. Joey's window, the one that has been unused for so long, that it's hard to remember what it's like to see her come through it. I would give anything to have that happen though. At this point, I just want her to be honest with me even if it means that she tells me that she and Pacey are in love. I still want to believe that she won't say that, but deep down inside I know that's exactly what's going to happen at some point. I'd rather have the envitable happen so that I can figure out how to deal with it, because I know I won't be able to until I hear it from her mouth. I still just want to believe that this is all just an awful screenplay that was never ready to be put to film and yet it did, and it gets rerun over and over again.
I already know that I'm going to talk to her sooner or later though. Probably even before school starts because she is going to go to her house and see what I have done. I can't believe that I took the time and energy to work on my unfinished project, but I did and I finished it.
I finally went back to her house and finished her white picket fence. Yeah, I know what that sounds like, it sounds like I went and did it to either rub it in face that she didn't choose me or that I'm wallowing in my feelings for her and felt like that would make me closer to her. It was neither of those things though. I guess at first I had other motives that weren't all that kind, but as I went out everyday in the hot sun for about three weeks and worked on the fence, I found that the harder I worked, the better I felt inside about myself. It had nothing to do with Joey and everything to do with how I saw myself. I actually went and finished the very thing that Joey wanted in her life, while she was off finding love with Pacey. How strange does that seem? I can't question that; it seems that everything in my life has not been as normal as I always mapped it out to be. As each part of the fence went up, though, I could feel my anger and hurt for Joey diminish slowly. Sure, I could still feel everything; otherwise I wouldn't have had the reaction that I did when I saw the two of them together. Finishing that fence, however, was my way of a peace offering to Joey. I'm still not sure what I mean by that statement though, but at least me being able to say that has to count for something. I don't know what I'm going to do about the rocky relationship I have with Pacey, if you can even call it that now, but at least I can try with Joey first and then work my way to the next person. So, I guess the next thing I'm going to do now is go to Joey's house and just wait for her to get there. I need to see for myself what her reaction will be to my work on her fence. Will she be happy? Relieved? Sad? Angry? I really don't know at this point. I have to know where I stand though, especially where we stand together.
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I've been sitting here in front of Joey's house for over an hour. I can't figure out why it's taking her so long to get home because I thought she would want to see Bessie, Alex, and Bodie, but maybe she's just not really ready to face the harsh reality yet. I could understand that feeling after being on a boat with Pacey for four months. It must have become like a safe haven from the world and everyone, especially Joey, needs one of those in their lives at some point.
To pass the time, while waiting, I stare out into the sky like I've done a lot during the summer. In fact, I get so absorbed in watching the clouds that I barely hear the car door sound as Joey hops out of Pacey's truck. As Pacey drives away, I stand up and start to walk towards Joey. Starting to walk to her is the key phrase, because the minute her eyes met with the fence and then looked up to find me there, I froze in place. She walked up to me so that we were inches from each other and I tried to speak…but no words would come out.
"Hi, Dawson." She says softly as she looks back at the fence to stare.
"Joey, hey, I just came over to umm…welcome you back to Capeside."
"Thanks."
"Well, I guess I'll be going now, good to see you again, Jo, see you in school." I turn to leave because I don't know what else to say. I only know that I can't say anything else while she continues to stare at the fence.
"Wait! Did you finish building the fence for me?"
I turn around slowly and notice that she's now staring at me and no longer the fence. "What?"
"I mean…after the way we left things. I sort of thought that when I came back, we wouldn't be talking, let alone me walking up to my house and finding that white picket fence done…"
I look up into her face as I wait to see what else she wants to say.
She went silent for a moment before talking again-
"Dawson, there's something I need to tell you…Pacey and I, well we may have come back together on the boat, but we didn't actually come back together, if you understand what I'm saying. Don't get me wrong, we tried the romance thing for awhile, but it just didn't work for us. We spent most of the vacation, talking and making our friendship stronger. I didn't really know what to expect when I came back…I didn't expect this though."
"Your telling me that you and Pacey aren't together anymore?"
"Yes, I am, but…I want you to know that we can't get back together. Not now and I don't know when, if ever. We can't put this friendship through anymore than it's been already been through."
"I agree."
Joey paused for a second as she heard what he said and spoke- "You agree?"
"Yeah, I do. I think it's time we really started fresh, which means that we need some new traditions, Joey. I think we should go to the…"
Before I could finish my sentence I was interrupted as Bessie and Bodie stepped outside of the house. Alex slowly stumbled down the front steps as they ran up to Joey and hugged her furiously.
"Joey! Thank god you're home, Jo. We've missed you so much!"
They all started crying and talking as they escorted Joey up into the house. She turned around briefly to see me mouth "Meet me at the beach at 5pm." I decided that she needed some time to spend with her family right now, the two of us had plenty of time to say all the things that needed to be said.
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I finally got the idea while talking to Joey about what we needed to do to change our friendship around. The thing about our friendship has always been that everything always stays the same. Tradition is important to me and I'm sure Joey too and things never changed between us until we revealed our romantic feelings to one another. Even after that, we always tried to keep the friendship the same and I think that's what went wrong with us. The fact is that over the past years, we have grown so much that we've outgrown many of the same things that we've done together. We just didn't want to take the time and risk to change the other aspects in our life that were the same. Now is the time though; I feel it as I sit here waiting for Joey on the beach. I brought a blanket and cooler of food for us to eat dinner while we start a new tradition…of watching the sunset. Sounds corny, I know, but here in Capeside, there aren't that many different things to try and every other place has too many romantic feelings for us- the docks, the Ruins, and the theater. In any case, as I see Joey approach, I can tell that my choose is surprising to her.
"Okay, you want to tell me what's going on here?"
"I told you we needed a new tradition, so here it is…the beach and watching the sunset."
"Your kidding, right? I mean the beach, Dawson, isn't that kind of corny?"
I laugh as I realize how well we think alike, yet again. "Yeah, I guess it is, but we needed something new and something different to do, so this was the only thing I could think of."
"This was all you could think of, Dawson, my middle name is imagination, Leery? Why do I find that hard to believe?"
"Your right, it is, but…over the summer I started to realize that not everything in this world has to have a lot of thought put into it. Most things do, but not everything. Sometimes the simplest things are the nicest."
"So while I explored the coast and found myself this summer, you, Dawson Leery, grew up as a person, huh? I just have one question for you then."
"What's that?"
"How long are we going to sit here and watch the sunset before we carry everything back to your room to lay down and watch a movie?"
I smile slightly as I look up at her, her eyes twinkling and her face looking beautiful as she stands in the sun's ray with the wind blowing her hair across her face. I feel that pang of regret that I can't pull her to me and have us act like a couple again like we used to be able to do. I quickly chase the thought away as, to answer her question, I grab the blanket, she grabs the food and we walk side by side, not holding hands, back to my house. And yes, we ended up watching movies, but now things are different because we alternate to watch some of the ones that Joey likes. Sure, the day will never come when I like those artificial romantic movies that she likes, but we've changed our style some, which is the important thing. The other difference is that Joey also doesn't spend the night anymore at my house. The first couple of nights it was weird, but in a way, it was alright, because now when she leaves to go home she calls me from her house and sometimes we simply say goodnight or we talk for awhile about all kinds of different things. So, I guess even though I don't have Joey back in my life as my girlfriend, my soul mate, I have her back as the most important part in my life-my best friend again. Things aren't so bad considering all the worries I had before she came home. I would like things to be different between us, but… in the end, some things never change and other things do. What I'm starting to realize is, that doesn't mean that we lose something in our lives always, but instead it possibly adds something more to them.