J'adore
I had been taking French lessons for five years before I met her. My father always told me that foreign language skills were essential in maintaining a successful business, and as always, the business was put at first priority in my life. Pensez! Pensez! My elderly, top-of-the-line tutor had spoken firmly—not yelled, or even raised his voice—at me. And think I did. Often, in fact. Not the usual every day, fleeting decisions everyone is required to make to stay in existence. But long hours in the library, hidden back in a corner.
It was in the library where I first noticed her, really noticed her. She had been sitting at a table catty corner from where I was—she hadn't seen me of course, otherwise she would have moved immediately—with her head bent over her Latin textbook, chestnut strands against newly printed-on paper. Her focused expression, her determination to succeed in a world where she wasn't meant to, made my stomach turn.
My stomach does not flutter or flit. No girl is worth more than the business! My father repeatedly drilled into my head. So no girl was. And no girl made a difference to me—not Summer, not Paris, not Louise, not Madelyn. Mary Gilmore most certainly did not change that. She made me think, rethink my life. Mary—no, Rory—Gilmore changed me although she did not change that.
Commencer. I began to pursue her. I pursued her by the only way I knew how to, teasing and taunting until she would blush and push me away even more. That just gave me more reason to go on. "Leave me alone," she would say icily, but I knew that she was secretly begging and pleading by the scared look in her pretty blue eyes. I wouldn't. If I left her alone it would admit that she was something that I couldn't have. And Tristan Dugrey was never told no.
She could be summed up in one word: fragile. Oh, she pretended to be tough. She pretended her smarts and cold wit could protect her from all the men in the world that were out to get her. She pretended she wasn't hurt every time Paris, Louise, and Madelyn snubbed her. She pretended she wasn't interested in me. But the thing with pretending was that it just covered up the real world. Why else would Rory choose big, strong Dean as her boyfriend? It wasn't like he was smarter than me, more attractive than me. I could easily have been as good as, better of a protector than Dean. If she had only given me a chance.
If she had only said yes, instead of no.
1/8/08