She typed quickly and passionately, her heart pouring through her hands onto the computer screen. The screen blurred as tears formed in her eyes and spilled clumsily down her face. She blinked them out of her view and continued with her writings, bitterly laughing to herself at the fact that he had once again evoked tears from her.
She was mid-sentence when a knock came to her door. She wiped her face and got to her feet, both annoyed because she was interrupted and glad for the break.
When she opened the door, she saw the last person she would have expected to see standing before her. She stood, holding the door open, staring wide-eyed at the person that stared back at her. His face was dark and tired-looking, but his eyes shone through and were bright as always.
She swallowed hard and realized that she had been holding her breath.
"Hey."
It was a simple word; she heard it hundreds of times every day. But coming from him, it stood before hundreds of words she knew he wanted to say, but at the same time didn't know, because she never knew what he was thinking.
"I was just thinking about you." She said it so quietly it was almost a whisper.
"Really?" He didn't phrase it like a question, and somehow he didn't sound surprised in the least.
"Do you… do you want to come in?" She stepped aside and opened the door wider.
He walked into her dorm and took a seat on her couch.
"It's been a long time, Jess," she said.
He shrugged. It had been three years.
The weight of the awkwardness filled the room, and Rory felt the walls would surely burst from the pressure. She decided to ask what desperately wanted to know.
"Why did you come here?"
He looked at her, and his calm gaze filled her with anguish.
"I wanted to see you," he said. His gaze may have been calm, but his voice was unsteady. She had never heard it like that before. He had always been so cool and composed, no matter what the situation.
He wanted to see her. He wanted to see her. He drove from God-knows-where to see her.
She gulped and felt tears welling up. She took a deep breath and tried to compose herself.
He glanced around the room and his eyes fell on her open laptop, with pages of writing. He nodded to the screen. "What are you writing?"
She could tell he was trying to change the subject; trying to take the pressure off the topic that he didn't want to touch.
"A story," she said, watching him as he moved towards her computer.
She didn't care if he read it.
"About what?" he asked.
"You," she said. "And me. And… love."
He stopped and turned around, meeting her eyes with his deep stare.
"I thought you didn't care about me anymore," he said.
"Jess, about what happened -"
"I don't want to talk about the past," he said sharply. "What's done is done, and there's no use talking about it. It was three fucking years ago. Leave it alone. Look, I got it. I understood that you didn't want to be with me. I don't even know what possessed me to come here today. It was stupid; I know that. It was a long time ago, I know, but I guess a part of me never really let go. And I just wanted to see you one last time."
She walked over to him and took his hand, pulling him against her. Her face was wet with tears and as she pressed her face against his. He wrapped his arms around her waist and held her tightly to him, savouring the moment and wishing it could last forever.
"Jess…" she whispered. "I've been thinking about you a lot lately,"
"Don't start," he said, pulling back. "Rory, I have to go,"
"Please don't go," she said, detesting the plea in her own voice.
She didn't understand. Why was he leaving? All she wanted was for him to stay.
He let go of her. She fell to the couch.
He was at the door. She sat, crying, begging, pleading for him to stay just a moment longer, disgusted with herself.
He turned around. "Your story, the one about me and you…"
"Yeah?" she managed to choke out.
"Does it have a happy ending?"
Rory woke up with a cry. She was in her dorm, facedown on the coffee table, and she was alone. The room was dark, and on the table was a small pool of water. She glanced around and saw the computer in front of her, with a topic in a blank Word document but no writing.
She racked her brain for memories of the night, and remembered putting her head down to rest on the coffee table.
She remembered a dream of some sort, but the details were hazy. The more she tried to remember, the more evaded her, like trying to hold water but having it drip faster and faster through her cupped hands swirling down a drain to be lost forever.
She was typing. Someone at the door. Someone from a long time ago, the person she was writing about…
She struggled to remember the details, and wondered why there was a pool of water on the table.
Suddenly she remembered. The person was Jess. He came, she cried. She must have cried in her sleep as well, and produced a small pool or tears.
But why had she been writing about Jess?
She glanced on the computer screen and saw the topic of the essay she had been about to start.
Love.
She looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was only eleven. She went into her room and dug into the depth of her bedside drawer, searching for a small piece of paper…
She found it and picked up the phone, taking in a deep breath. She dialled the number and he answered.
"Hello?"
"Jess. It's Rory. Look, I know we haven't talked in what… three years? But I was just thinking about you and wondering how you were…"