Hey guys, I'm hoping to finish this story within the month - so for the readers that began when I started this story two million years ago - there is a finish line in the distance! Just Review to remind me to work on it!

"So, this is Stars Hollow." He watched the streets go by through his window. I knew he was probably imagining that the "mansions" of Stars Hollows were where his gardener and valet lived. I almost didn't want him to see my home, because he'd make some type of quip about my Mother being a maid, or that this was all "bag boy", Dean, could afford.

People stared at his car as it strolled down main street with the sleek, velvety quality that cars like his have. Only cars of these qualities can truly be blackNice cars like his don't go through Stars Hollow unless someone got a rent-a-car for Prom, and even then it's rare. Passerbyer's eyes got even bigger as they realized I was in the car. I knew Dean would be hearing about this within a matter of hours.

We rolled slowly by Babette and Patty. They didn't waste a minute to stare, they quickly looked at each other and took off in opposite directions.

Make that a matter of minutes.

"Quaint. Charming. Cute." Tristan read the words off an advertisement of an apartment for rent. "Those words describe a residence?"

"Sorry, all the HUGE, EXPENSIVE, LOOK-AT-ME-I'M-WEALTHY apartments already have tenents." I parried with a snort.

He pulled onto my street, going much slower than I'd ever seen him go before. He always peeled out of the parking lot like he had the police after him. The taillights tatooing a burnt red into the air, the sound of burning rubber screaming a duet with the laughter of whichever excited gir was currently in the passenger seat. But right now he was going, I checked the speed-o-meter, a mere 10 miles per hour on a street that was obviously a 25 mph zone. I didn't comment.

I watched from my window as he gently pulled onto my driveway. He glanced at me in this look that was so...quiet. He shrugged a shoulder. "See you at rehearsal tomorrow, Julie?"

I smirked at his use of my character name and glanced up at the sky. It had finished raining. "Yes Dallas, you shall."

"Can I walk you up?"

"Then I'd be pressured to invite you in, and you'd be pressured to accept, and I'm sure you wouldn't want that." I smiled lightly.

"We wouldn't want that." He popped the lock from his side. "Have a lovely day, Rory." He said it gallantly.

"What a gentleman." I reached for the door handle. But I didn't open it. I waited for his response.

He obliged. "Now all I need is a cane and glass of bourban and I can be a class-act, rich 80 year gold."

She opened the door, paused a beat, studying the gleaming oak interior of the door handle. "Don't offer me a ride again Tris, I'll say no. This was special circumstance"

"Then I'll have to ask Mother Nature for rain again." I tilted his head teasingly.

"DuGrey, not even you are that charming."

Our conversation had become a balance. Who would tip first? Who would break the plastic, platonic silence first? Something had changed in this short car ride and we both knew it. The questions were simple and float in every meeting in every heart in every person.

1) Do I really like him?
2) Does he like me, or will I embarrass myself?
3) Can this even go anywhere?
4) Do I care if it does?

I looked at the way her hair fell, and how perfect she looked in the passenger seat of my car.

1) yes
2) hell if I know
3) I don't even care, I just want to try
4) more than anything.

She smiled slightly, waiting for my remark to her tease. She had opened the door and the clean air, purified by the rain, swept it. It's a familiar scent from the first grade, the rain on the blacktop mixed with freshly cut glass and cloud dilluted sunlight. It was a scent memory I knew would stick. I focused on her face a moment, hoping for a vivid visual memory as well. A light film of chapstick was about the only make-up she was wearing, but it was the perfect way that suited her. Her hair was parted lazily, thick with product-free shine.

I laughed to myself. I probably think more about how she looks than she does!

"Thank you for the ride, Tris." She slid out of the car easily, with more grace than a the thousand debutants and the two thousand drunks I've seen exit this car. She didn't look back as she walked around the puddles to her door, let herself in, and closed the door behind her.

I had tried to slam the door a little bit, be less of the demure females that plagued him at every ball and party he probably goes to in the circles he ran around in, but the door closed as only expensive cars can - with a soft, feathery click.

I couldn't turn around as I walked away, I was blushing too hard and there was no way I was going to let him see that.

His looks towards the end of the ride had been too meaningful. It wasn't the Tristan that I've always been used to. The teasing, laughing, arrogant prick whose words are laced with double meanings and his smiles curved with knowledge and secrets no admirerer will ever touch.

I watched him through the opaque, vellum quality of our front window curtains. He was idling in the driveway. I couldn't see his face well enough to know if anything was going to happen. I waited for him to leave, but for some reason - part of me begged for him to have a flat tire or need an oil change.

The car backed up smoothly and he turned onto the road without a second glance at his rearview mirror. He sped out so quickly that I realized he was a much more competant driver than he'd let on. His slow driving to my house had all been stalling.

For some reason, the idea gave me a soft, private thrill.

Mom wasn't home from work yet, we usually arrived home about the same time on rehearsal days- but his driving had been scads faster than the bus.

I laughed at my use of the word "scads", bringing me back - again - to the image of Tristan sidling up gently in his car and asking if I needed a ride. My knight in shining sarcasm.

There are certain images that always stick in your mind. Just snapshots, usually at random at not even clearly important. I have one of Dean coming from around a tree, of my Mom - arms full of take out. They aren't important, yet somehow will never leave your mind. That image was now my snapshot of Tristan.

I slipped onto the couch, ready to begin my homework.

Then I groaned.

In my attempt at a collected exit, I had left my backpack in Tristan's car.