A/N: Oh man...hi! I'll keep this little intro short. I haven't posted on here in ages. I haven't written anything for Daria in even longer. But the show still has such a special place in my heart, and I've been rewatching it lately. I'm at a different place in my life than I was when I wrote my other Daria fics (most of which have been taken down out of embarrassment from bad writing), but something was just driving me to write this. I can't help but still love the Daria/Trent pairing, and I'm excited to write about them once again.

Daria doeesn't belong to me!

Jet lag was a hell of a thing. Daria had greeted her family one by one: her mother exclaiming excitedly that she looked so grown up!, her father asking how college was going, and Quinn giving her a smothering hug. She was too tired to make chitchat for too long, so she used the jet lag excuse to escape to her room. It was so empty, it was almost eerie. Her dorm had become cluttered with most of her things now, after three years of college.

Tired but not wanting to sleep, she pulled her clunky laptop out of her suitcase and set it on her desk where her old desktop used to be. Once connected to the internet, she opened a document in one window and her instant messenger in another. Three friends online: Jane, Trent, and Aunt Amy. She instantly clicked to Jane's name; if she was online, she had made it home.

Hey, Daria typed.

hey there! you home or what? Jane asked.

Home again, home again. You?

hell yea. wanna come over? or should i go there?

Come here, but be sneaky. My parents are a bit happy go lucky about me being home.

some things never change. see ya in a sec

Jane's screen name went from the online section to the offline. Daria closed her messenger and went back to her document, staring at it for awhile. She had stopped in the middle of a sentence last time she had written-which had been almost a week ago. She worried that once she lost ideas for this story, they would never come back. She scowled at her screen for a few seconds until she heard footsteps coming up the stairs.

"Hi," she opened the door for Jane, inviting her into her empty room.

"God, I missed you," she smiled.

"You saw me a few days ago," she chuckled, returning to her computer chair while Jane made herself comfortable on her floor.

"Yeah, but I get snark withdrawals when I don't have anyone to...snark with," she replied. "Maybe you should get that checked out," Daria said, looking toward her screen for a moment.

"Whatcha working on?"

"Umm...nothing special," she shrugged.

"Ooh, is it a steamy erotica?" Jane teased. "Now I know why you never talk about your writing."

"Yeah right."

"Hey, those Melody Powers stories could get pretty spicy at times," she retorted. "Then again, she usually murdered the guy after all the action…"

"A girl has needs, you know," she minimized the document, sick of looking at the blinking cursor.

"What's this one about? My girl Melody?"

"No, sorry. It's...I don't know, it's hard to explain. I don't even know where it's going," she sighed, closing her laptop.

"Ah. Stuck in a rut, huh? An artist's struggle."

"I'm no artist," she held up a hand.

"Oh, shut up, yes you are. Just because I work with paint and you work with words doesn't mean you're not an artist."

She grumbled a 'thanks' in response. "It's just frustrating when I lose all inspiration like this. Especially after weeks of hard work."

"Your hard work is still there, you can come back to it. Maybe you need a drink."

"Hey, I know I'm 21 and all, but I'm not drinking in the middle of the day. Not yet anyway."

"Fine. A coffee?"

She knew that wouldn't help her jet lag (the caffeine would just give her a bigger crash), but nodded anyway. "Yeah, sounds okay. I've got a headache, so I don't wanna stay out too long."

"You're getting boring in your old age. What happened to wild, young, and free Daria?" Jane nudged her.

"She's taking a nap, or something," she said. She slung her bag over her shoulder, grabbing her dog-eared notebook along with it. "Now boring Daria gets time to play."

"Good thing I like her, too," Jane half-smiled and lead her down the stairs. "Can we take my car?"

"You mean Trent's?"

"Hey, just because he drives it to work doesn't mean it's strictly his."

"What's he doing nowadays?" she asked, slipping out the door of her house and walking with Jane to the Lane residence.

"Working at a music shop and giving people advice on what guitars to buy, tuning them...music stuff, you know. He does the occasional show here and there too."

"Solo shows?"

"Yeah. Doing his own thing. Such is the Lane way, you know?" she pulled Daria into the house to grab his car keys. "He asked about you whenever he called."

Daria bit the inside of her cheek. "That's nice of him," she mused, feeling a bit guilty about not keeping in touch with Trent over the past few years, aside from summers, and even then, he was, as Jane said, doing his own thing. "He could've called me."

"Mind if I invite him to coffee with us? He still likes to hibernate in his room," she said, grabbing the keys off a counter.

"Sure. Glad he hasn't changed too much," she smiled softly but fondly.

"I'll yell at him," Jane replied, leaning over the staircase. "Trent! We're going for coffee and you're coming!"

"Who's we?" he asked, "Oh, hey Daria. Long time no see, right?"

She nodded. "Yeah. I hear you're pretty busy nowadays."

"Hey, ever since Janey left, I had to find someone to talk to other than Jesse and Nick. So...work helps, I think."

"Wow, I never expected you to say those words," she chuckled into her palm.

"At least I get to do what I like, you know? Working with music all day."

"I couldn't imagine you doing anything else," Daria said honestly. "Um, sorry Spiral never took off."

"Yeah, we all just kinda grew apart, y'know? It's a weird thing," he admitted, turning down the radio a few notches and watching Jane drive.

"Yeah...growing apart happens. Sometimes it's for the best," she replied, "I still think of my friends in Highland. Er, sort of friends. But we never talk anymore."

"Highland?"

"Where I used to live before Lawndale. It was in Texas," she replied.

"Hey Daria," Jane chimed, "Think we'll ever grow apart?"

"Sorry, Lane, that's one of your dreams that just won't come true," she said sardonically. They pulled up to the little cafe, which was thankfully not crowded during the midday. Daria was thankful for a little place of solace in Lawndale. It reminded her of the cafes in Boston-it was like a piece of the town had followed her home. They found a table by the window, pulling out her notebook.

"Hey, I'll get us some coffee, okay?" Trent said. Daia started fishing through her wallet, but she felt a hand lay gently on her wrist.

"My treat," Trent insisted. "I just got my paycheck."

"And you're spending it on coffee?" she glanced down. His hand hadn't left his spot on hers.

"I haven't seen you in ages. Just let me have this one thing," he smiled. Crush or no crush, Daria couldn't help but think he had a nice smile.

"Fine, I guess," she sighed, slipping her hand away reluctantly.

"Hmm, for some reason I feel like you would willingly accept people paying for you," Jane said as Trent made his way to the cashier. "Have you forgotten that you don't have a conscience?"

"Oops," she said, swinging her feet under the table. "All that college and studying has made me forget to maintain my carefully crafted persona."

"Oh, stop," Jane kicked her lightly. "It's cute you let my brother pay. Reminds me of the good old days."

"Good old days? You mean when I sixteen?"

"Yeah, and your face turned bright red every time he looked in your direction," she smiled dryly.

Daria scowled a little. "Do you know how long ago that was?"

"Long enough for me to tease you about it," she said. "Besides, you've had boyfriends since then. It's not like you're still head over heels for him."

She gulped. Maybe not head over heels. But still...nevermind, that wasn't important. "Boyfriends? I've been on a few dates, I guess."

"Yeah, you're just picky with guys," she said. Trent came back with a tray of coffee cups. "Who's picky with guys?" he asked.

"Me, I guess," Daria picked up the hot cup, blowing on it slightly.

"You must get asked out a lot, huh?"

She wrinkled her nose. "Can we change the subject? You both know a conversation about my…love life is one of the most boring you could possibly have."

"Says who?" Trent asked, reaching for a cream packet.

"Says me. I don't make much of a romantic partner," Daria stirred her drink absentmindedly.

"What's in the notebook?" Jane asked, gesturing to the book sticking out of her bag.

"Oh, um, writing stuff," she shrugged. She couldn't even really describe what was in that notebook-it was full of little doodles imagining what her characters would look like, lines of dialogue she wanted to include at some point, ideas she had thought of in the wee hours of the morning and scribbled down before flopping back down in bed.

"Oh, that story you're working on?"

"It's more of a book at this point, actually," she said.

"Hey, that's cool," Trent said.

"Yeah, maybe you'll let me actually read something of yours this time?" Jane suggested with an eyebrow raise.

"Once it gets out of its rough draft stage. Its very rough draft stage."

"Okay, but I wanna read it at least before it becomes a best seller. Then I can say I knew Daria Morgendorffer before she got big," she insisted.

"Deal," she drained her coffee. "If it ever gets done," she had tried to write books before, but had always gotten stuck, and they sat, half-finished on her hard drive. She was beginning to worry that she would never do anything better than a few short stories.

After an hour or so, they left, going back to Jane's house. "I'm gonna take a shower," Jane said. "You gonna stick around tonight?"

"Yeah, probably," Daria said. "Mind if I do?"

"Now that's just a stupid question," she said, then sauntered off to the bathroom. Daria made her way down the stairs, wondering if anything was in the fridge. She heard a soft guitar coming from the living room. That was always a familiar sound in this house.

She peeked into the living room. "Hey there," she said.

"Hi, Daria," he said, looking up from his sheet music and patting a seat next to him on the couch. "How're you feeling?"

"Tired. Been a long day," she said. It was true-she had been up since the early morning for her flight, and now her eyes were drooping, threatening to refuse to stay open.

"So tell me more about this book you've been writing."

"It's nothing special. Realistic fiction," she replied. "No blood or guts."

"Hm. Any romance?" he asked with a teasing quirk of his brow.

"Maybe," she said, leaving it at that. She couldn't construct long, eloquent sentences right now.

After a few, long, quiet moments, Trent asked, "What's on your mind?"

"You," she said honestly. Ever since Jane's comment at the coffeeshop about her being 'picky', she had been perhaps a little too wrapped up in the past.

"Me? Well, that's kind of you," he chuckled. "What about me?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. Lots."

"Don't waste time thinking about me," he said.

"Don't talk about yourself like that," she replied, very quietly. "I'm going to think about you as much as I want to, Trent," they hadn't talked like this in ages. She felt another sting of guilt about not keeping in touch. They could've grown apart so quickly. And though she prided herself on being realistic (growing apart did happen and was likely to happen), she didn't want to grow apart. Not with him.

"I missed you, Daria," he said, strumming a nice sounding chord a few times.

"Really?" she asked, sinking into the couch and closing her eyes.

"Yeah. A lot."

He said some other things, but his voice and his guitar blended into one as she fell asleep.

A/N: I stayed up until midnight finishing my first chapter and I have rehearsal at 9 AM (still a theatre kid after all these years). Nonetheless, thank you so much for reading! Reviews are highly appreciated.

-Lulamae