DON'T RUN AWAY LITTLE BOY

I was standing in the doorway that separated the hallway from the grand hall. Paris came storming at me, fight face on. 'I knew he was going to do this, but no one wanted to listen to me,' she ranted. 'It was all, let's make Tristin Romeo, he's hot.'
Calculating as I was, I came up with a solution for the problem she was obviously springing on me. 'What about Brad?' I suggested.
She shook her head in denial and frustration. 'Brad transferred schools,' she said at the exact moment that Tristin came walking up to us. My heart made a slide jump at the sight of him. I bit my lip and tried to hide what had just happened.
Luckily Tristin got no chance to pay attention to me, because Paris immediately transferred her rant from me to him. 'Where have you been? You have to get dressed, we're on in ten minutes.'
Cool as always, Tristin gave the exact answer Paris didn't want to hear, 'can't.' Now why would he say that? I wondered
Paris's eyes got so bit, they could've literally fallen out of their sockets 'What?' she nearly screamed.
'Actually, my dad had me pulled out of school,' Tristin explained. How did that happen? What did he do now? 'He,' he went on, but Paris was already walking away. He turned to me. 'And is she unhappy.' He shrugged.
'What do you mean he had you pulled out of school?' I asked immediately. 'What happened?'
'Can we not talk about this here?' Tristin asked. 'It's kinda noisy here to be honest.' He looked into the room next to us, where Henry's group was performing their piece of the play at the moment and where Dean was looking at us with a very accusing look.
I looked up at Tristin and back at Dean, pondering over what my best move was at the moment.
'Take it or leave it Gilmore,' Tristin said. 'You're up in a few and if we don't go now, you'll never hear the whole story,' he teased.
'Fine,' I said, curiosity winning me over.

'Alright.' A cocky grin appeared on his face as he turned around and started walking.

'Lose the grin,' I warned him before I stalked after him, hoping Dean wouldn't follow us.

A few hallways further, Tristin stopped and turned around. I stopped a few paces from him, to keep a big enough space between us. 'So?' I urged him on. 'What happened?'
'Nothing. Just ticked the old man off, that's all,' he said.
'Oh really,' I said. 'That's your big story? What did you do?'

He didn't respond. 'Tristin, come on, tell me,' I said, encouraging him to talk to me.
He sighed and looked down. 'I got in some trouble.'
'Trouble involving?'
'Involving Duncan and Bowman, and Bowman's dad's safe.'
'Oh no.' This did not sound good.
'I mean, Bowman had a key. It was supposed to be no big deal. And the crazy silent alarm kicked in,' Tristin explained.
'You broke into Bowman's dad's safe?' I couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could he have been this stupid?
'Yes.' He looked at the floor with such intensity I nearly wanted to see what was there.
'Stupid,' I murmured
'Yes.' He nodded slightly and bit his lip. He looked adorable, not that I cared.
Quickly, I got my focus back. I came up with a plan. 'Well, okay, you can apologize and you can put back the money and you can explain that, I don't know, you were going through something,' I suggested.
He snorted. 'I was, I was going through his safe.' He looked up at me again with just his eyes, but I could still see the small smile that had formed on his face.
I shook my head in disbelieve. 'Why would you do this?'
He shrugged. 'I don't know. I guess that's something I can ponder at military school.'
Surprise hit me and it took me a moment to speak. 'Military school?' I was never going to see him again. Now, I know I was supposed to feel happy about that, but a big part of me felt the exact opposite.

'The police are letting our parents handle it, and in my case that means military school in North Carolina.' He turned his face up and met my eyes straight on. I'd never noticed before, how beautiful his eyes actually were.
I looked away self-consciously. 'I don't know what to say.'
'Well, I imagine you're overwhelmed with the relief in knowing that soon I will be gone.'
Apparently, that wasn't true. 'I'm so sorry,' I whispered.
'Well, I'm a big boy. I can handle it.' He acted like he didn't care, but I knew better.
'There's nothing you can,' I tried one more time, but I was interrupted by his father.
'Tristin, come on,' I heard the man say a few halls away from us.

He smiled sadly at me. 'I gotta go.'

'So I hear,' I said.

He took a step towards me. I knew I should step away from him, but my feet wouldn't move. I just looked up at him as he came closer and leaned in until his lips touched my cheek. He pulled back slowly, his cheek brushing mine. I felt his sigh of regret flutter over my face.

Before I could stop myself I took his face into my hands and guided his lips to mine. He gasped in surprise as I kissed him. For a moment, I was afraid he'd pull away, but then I felt his arms slip around me and his lips pushing back against mine.

We kissed with an urgency that I'd never felt when I kissed Dean. Tristin kept pulling me closer to him, even when there was absolutely no more space between us anymore.

It felt like we had been kissing for ages when we finally pulled apart, still not really wanting to let go of each other. Somewhere along the way, tears had started to run down my face.

'We do have a thing with kissing and crying, don't we?' He brushed away my tears with his thumbs.

'Stop it,' I said mockingly.

He smiled at me. 'Take care of yourself, Mary.' He kissed my forehead softly before he walked passed me.

I turned around as I watched him go. 'The name is Rory,' I whispered after him.