AN: So I should be typing on one of my stories, but I have had this idea floating in my head ever since I heard this song again after like five years. So here is this story that I am making totally off the top of my head so it most likely sucks and tell me so at the end. And lastly the song is Carlene by Phil Vassar.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, not the song nor the characters or really anything.
Mary
I was lousy at math, failed historian
Carlene was the valedictorian
I was the quarter back in the back of classes
She was the whiz kid in horned rim glasses
Tristan pulled into the parking lot at Chilton for the first time in seven years. He hadn't been there since he was sent away to military school. And everything flooded back to him. All the memories. The classes, the extra activities after school, the girls, even more to the one girl he had pined after and never had. Miss Lorelai Leigh Gilmore. Who knows if she is that still. She most likely had made a name change by now. Tristan had thought about her from time to time. The English assignment he had bailed on because he was sent to military school.
Military school. Military school may have been the best thing that ever happened to him. He finally made something of himself and finally straightened up. Yes, it had be hell, and a small bit of heaven. It had been for the best.
But now he was on his old haunting ground. The school he once owned. And now it wasn't as scaring, it wasn't as cool, it was just a place he was standing on and a time he had been just a child that now he was reentering the gate no longer a petty boy.
He walked down the halls remembering every test he had failed just because he didn't want to try. He usually knew the stuff, he just didn't apply himself. Like his Mary. She was always at the front scribbling away on her paper, going to get an A and could care less that he was in the back doodling on his paper.
It's been a long time since I've been around
Since I stepped foot on my old stomping ground
I ended up by the old school yard
When this red head pulled up in a blue sports car
She said, "I bet you don't remember, I guess it's been forever."
It took a second to put it all together and I said.
Tristan walked by the old football stadium. He had spent a lot of time there fooling around. It was his usual place to slip out to if he wanted to skip class for a smoke. Yes, he had been a boy that knew nothing about the outside world. And he sent up a silent prayer that he was no longer that kid and that he had gotten out. Tristan walked past the courtyard and he remember the day Rory proclaimed her hate for him just before getting back together with her boyfriend. And for a second time that day he wondered what ever happened to his Mary.
He came out to the parking lot again. He hit the unlock on his keyless entry to his car as he neared it. He was just opening the door when someone pulled up beside him. It was a young woman who looked oddly familiar, but Tristan just couldn't place. But she was beautiful with a curtain of chocolate hair flowing down just past her shoulders and piercing blue eyes.
"Who would have ever guessed you'd ever come back around here," She said. So she knew him. Tristan would play along pretending to know who she was just until it came to him. He knew it would in a matter of moments. "I can tell you can't remember, it has been a long time, but it will come to you." Ok she had him. How?
"How do you know I don't know who you are when you obviously know who I am?" Tristan asked.
"It is a reporter instinct kicking in. And I have an excellent read of people even if they left minutes before my shining performance," She said with a smile, and Tristan recognized the warm smile, just not the name.
'Shining performance', and 'reporter instinct', now he should have this. "I know I should have this by now, just give me one more minute," Tristan said cruising the names of people he had known in Hartford. Wait, 'left minutes before my shining performance.' It kicked in. This was his Mary. "Ah, so you knew I didn't know who you were by how I addressed you, Mary," Tristan said with a smug grin.
"So you caught me. So Tristan DuGrey is finally going to grace us with his presence again," Rory laughed.
Ooh la la la la la
Looking good Carlene
Woh my my my my my
Times been good to you
If you know what I mean
Girl you glitter like Hollywood
Good god Carlene
You sure are lookin good
"Well, maybe not the same as before. You need to remember I made it through Military school, and I am still alive."
"Oh it must have been so hard," Rory said sarcastically.
"Like you have no idea, until you get in good with the commanders, then it is a cake walk."
"How long did that take?"
"Until I graduated," Tristan smirked and Rory laughed. It warmed his soul to hear her laugh. "And what about you miss 4.0 Harvard bound. You are lookin' pretty good."
"Eh, Harvard became Yale, and now I am a reporter just as I wanted."
"That's it? Nothing about your probably fabulous life you must be living. You shined like a star here, well at least academically and you have nothing else to add to the dazzling life of Rory Gilmore?"
"Well, it is not as glamorous as you are making it. It is just me and Blondie, my dog before and go say something about that."
"You have a dog?"
"More surprising my mom has a dog and it hasn't died yet from her not taking care of it."
"And what crazy name did she come up with?"
"Paul Anka, like the singer."
"Of course something your mother would do, if she is anything like the stories people tell of her."
"She's crazy and that is all you need to keep in mind."
She said hop in let's go for a spin
Tell me whatcha been doing boy and where you been
I said I write songs, you probably didn't know, but I
Finally got a couple out on country radio
She said, "What a switch, ain't life funny, I've got a PHD,
Now I'm modeling for money."
Imagine little miss 4.0 just smiling for the camera on the cover of Vogue
I said you've come a long way since graduation
Let me say without hesitation
You've surpassed everyone's expectations
"Come on," Rory said, "Hop in, see how bad my Corolla is compared to you BMW. Tell me what you are up to."
Tristan was amazed at her forwardness. This wasn't the Mary he had left behind, not that he would ever dare to imagine she would remain the exact same. Tristan opened the door and got in. "Well, the seats are very different."
Rory rolled her eyes, "What have you been doing?"
"I'm an architect, don't laugh, and I like to write on the side. The writing is more of a hobby to spend endless hours doing nothing and to put off work. But I like my job, I'm working my way up the company, business degree helped there."
"So you majored in business where?"
"I double majored in business and architecture with minors in engineering and writing at Drexel University"
"Oooh, Mr. Double Major."
"Shut up, what about you."
"I told you. Yale, journalism, reporter for the New York Times."
"How did you get there?"
"Knew the boss."
"The Huntzbergers? They do go to Yale, what was the son's name? Logan I think. So I am guessing you ran into him."
"Knew him, hated him, dated him, loved him, dumped him, but kept my job."
"Wow, the school Mary dated a Huntzberger."
"And Paris was my roommate and hated him all the way."
"Sounds like Paris."
"She's not as intense anymore. She's working on her doctorate at Johns Hopkins."
"Doctor?"
"And she hates sick people."
"I'm staying away from that. So after Logan what happened in that department?"
"That is when I got Blondie."
"Ah, good reason for a dog, maybe I should get one."
"Of course, I remember it was an all boys military school, that stopped you for a while."
"There was a girl's academy down the road, many big bashes in the middle."
"Maybe it didn't stop your rampage."
"It did, and thank heavens it did."
"Not proud of your playboy ways anymore?" Rory looked at him almost surprised.
"There is a time to grow up and leave childish ways behind, and I found it at military school," Tristan said looking out the window so he would have to hold her gaze; it was still intimidating to him.
Ooh la la la la la
Looking good Carlene
Woh my my my my my
Times been good to you
If you know what I mean
Girl you glitter like Hollywood
Good god Carlene
You sure are lookin good
"Ok, I have to stop and obey my coffee addiction, want anything?" Rory said pulling up to a Starbucks.
"I am perfect as is, I just be sitting here," Tristan said leaning back the seat.
"You think very highly of yourself calling yourself perfect," Rory joked as she climbed out.
Tristan watched her walk inside. She was definitely a different Mary than the one he had left all those years ago. And yet she was the same. She was still smart and witting and beautiful. But now she was more confident with herself. She was more comfortable in her skin. It was almost sexy and she knew it, or at least she knew she looked good and wasn't embarrassed about it as she would have been back at Chilton. Chilton, she would have never told him to get in or be as open about her love life. That had been part of her Stars Hollow life that she kept secret and away from everyone there. But then again Logan Huntzberger wasn't exactly Stars Hollow, so it would have been something she's shy away from.
She stepped back into the car a few minutes later and drove off again. "So Mary where are we going?" Tristan asked, they had been aimlessly driving it seemed.
"Driving in circles until I am satisfied in seeing you again after so long," she said and surprised Tristan with such an answer.
"Ok, then why were you are the school? I always had the impression you hated the place," Tristan had been wondering that since he had got in the car.
"You mean was I looking for cute young guys to pick up and take and do unspeakable things?" Rory raised an eyebrow at him and he laughed. "No, I was there to do what I am suspecting you did and walk around the old daunting place I use to attend. I just wanted to go back and see if it was still scary. Never got to that when I saw a familiar blonde walking to a BMW."
"It's no so scary anymore to me now," Tristan said, he wasn't sure what else to say.
"You were scared of it?" Rory looked at him as she rolled up to a stoplight.
"Behind the mask, just a little bit. I was thinking what if I don't make it and my parents can't pull the stings to get me into wherever they were going to make me go. But then I got out when I was sent to military school and I got to where I wanted to be and that place ended up being Drexel. First it was going to be Stanford or USC or somewhere out west, but one of my friends in military school was going to Drexel and ended up there too."
"You shouldn't have made it such a one-way ticket. I think a lot of people would have liked to see you again after you left, at least once more."
"You included?" Tristan went out on a limb, and he was sure it was going to bend and break.
"No one else ever annoyed me the way you did."
"You don't like giving direct answers."
"I don't, not at all. It makes it too easy and then everything becomes boring." Rory pulled into the parking lot again that day and pulled up beside Tristan's car again. "And now I think I am satisfied by the answers you have given me."
I said I hope to see you again someday
She said another ten years is too long to wait
Pick me up at my Momma's at eight
"Sick of me already?" Tristan pulled out one of his famous smirks that he hadn't used in a long time. "Kidding, it was good to see you, Mary."
"Good to see you too Bible boy."
"Well maybe we will have the luck of running into each other again someday."
"Seven years is too long to wait. Come by Stars Hollow Friday at seven, Taylor is doing the Movie in the Gazebo night again. I think we are watching the Yearling for the umpteenth time."
"Really?" Tristan said very surprised at that.
"And you might find out the address of my New York apartment," Rory added before driving off.
Tristan watched the rear of her car leave the parking lot and drive down the road until she turned and was totally got.
What happened just then? Had she just told him to come to Stars Hollow? Had she alluded to her New York apartment? And him knowing where it was? What did that entail? Well one thing was for sure, he was going to Stars Hollow Friday. Lord he was in for a ride.
Tristan stepped into his car and looked once more at the school. No, things were not the same at Chilton as they were seven years ago when he had left a mere child. And yes, some things were exactly the same. He, Tristan DuGrey, was still pining for his Mary, Rory Gilmore.
And I said.
Ooh la la la la la
Looking good Carlene
Woh my my my my my
Times been good to you
If you know what I mean
Ooh la la la la la
Looking good Carlene
Woh my my my my my
Times been good to you
If you know what I mean
Ooh la la la la la
Looking good Carlene
Woh my my my my my
Times been good to you
If you know what I mean
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AN: And there it was in all its glory. I hope that you liked it and please leave me a review if you want to, if not, I really don't care, I am just glad I got this out of my head.