Full Summary: Long before Logan met Rory at Yale, he was lifelong friends with Beatrice Astor, whose family owned the Martha's Vineyard home next to the Huntzbergers'. In the summer before their first year of college, Logan and Bea experience a pivotal change in their relationship, moving from friends to lovers. At the end of the summer, they part ways for their respective colleges (Logan at Yale, Bea cross country at Stanford) and completely lose touch. Four years later, Bea and Logan meet again during their senior year of college, when she suddenly transfers to Yale and is shocked to discover her friend now has a steady girlfriend.
Friends to Lovers alternates between chapters set in the past as Bea and Logan's summer romance developed and the present day at Yale with Bea, Logan, and familiar characters like Colin, Finn, and even Jess. The chapters also feature different points of view from different characters. Overall, it's a story of enduring friendship and lasting love, as well as an exploration of the privilege, wealth, and luxury of the social elite of which the Huntzbergers and Astors are part. The story charts the moments in the characters' lives when they hold tight to those ties—or attempt to break through them.
Author's Note at the end!
Chapter One
Setting: 2005, Yale, Bea's Perspective
"Logan Huntzberger, is that you?"
Bea brandished this rhetorical question while simultaneously reaching out to grab the shoulder of the guy passing by.
She stood back a couple feet, equally amused by and self-critical of her choice of suspenseful theatrics.
She'd seen Logan walking across the courtyard with a group of other students from her position at the coffee cart and had waited, a step behind the cart, hoping to surprise him. For all he knew, she was in California, and he could have hardly guessed that she was lurking behind a coffee cart in Connecticut.
But, if she was being honest with herself, her initial choice to hide behind the coffee cart while he approached was less a premediated attempt to shock her friend, and more a reflexive reaction prompted by a sudden onslaught of doubts. Why hadn't she told him she was transferring to Yale when it was decided months ago? Why hadn't she called him when she got to campus a few days ago? And the ultimate question: what if he wasn't happy to see her?
From the safe vantage point that the coffee cart granted her, she'd convinced herself at this point that she might not say anything when he passed by. If she remained a silent onlooker, she could simply wait to greet him over a far more natural email or phone call.
However, when he'd neared her vicinity, she had reacted instinctively, pulling the not-so-subtle call out, surprise shoulder tap trick, for better or for worse.
Logan spun around quickly at her touch and the sound of his name, with a purely puzzled look that soon morphed into one of recognition with lingering confusion as his eyes met hers.
"Bea!" He exclaimed, opening his arms widely in greeting. She found herself enveloped in a hug shortly thereafter.
"What are you doing at Yale?" Logan continued in a stunned tone. Bea pondered the appropriate answer to his question as her cheek rested against the prickly wool of his sweater. The courtyards of Yale, under the close eyes of two of his friends who were definitely gawking at her, didn't seem like the place to disclose the tell-all version of her fleeing Yale narrative.
She took a step back from the hug, which seemed like the fitting thing to do given the public setting, as she responded. "Oh… well, I, uh, transferred! I go here now."
She looked at him closely to gauge how her response would be received. Was she paranoid, or did Logan now look totally alarmed?
Bea's worries started to creep up again. Why hadn't she warned him? Then again, she asked defensively, now—why did she need to warn him?
Their relationship, if it could even be called that, had happened years ago! They'd barely talked since, largely due to the fact that Bea never came back to New England on school breaks, fully intending to avoid her family. Not seeing Logan had been an unfortunate consequence.
However, when they'd parted ways, they'd wanted a clean break. After all, anything resembling a long distance, cross country relationship at the beginning of their first years in college had been less than desirable to them. Maintaining physical distance between them had helped to enforce that agreement.
As the years had stretched on in almost total absence and silence, Bea had admittedly felt an increasing desire to see Logan again. When she'd spent time reminiscing about their past, the memories she turned to were less often their childhood summers, and far more often those intimate summer months together. How could she pretend that those months hadn't been some of the most pivotal of her life? Whether she was considering it in terms of their romance, or their friendship, they had developed a connection that summer that was beyond simple classification. For that reason, even miles and miles away, she'd felt a close tie to Logan still.
Yet, standing in front of him now, looking at his aghast gape—still on his face!—she had to question everything she had expected of this moment. When she'd imagined this meeting, she'd hoped her reception would be a bit more welcoming and her appearance a bit less frightening.
For godsake, I'm one of his oldest friends! She thought indignantly. I don't deserve to be treated like some evil ghost of girlfriends past coming to haunt him at Yale.
Her warring thoughts were interrupted as another hand appeared on Logan's shoulder, mirroring Bea's own movements from a minute earlier. A girl Bea recognized from being near her in line at the coffee cart was now at Logan's side.
"Okay, I have to admit, I was reluctant when you wanted me to visit you on campus, but did I ever miss this coffee cart! Here's your coffee." She held out a cup to Logan, who remained frozen, still staring at Bea.
A few perceptibly long seconds passed, then Logan seemed to adapt, taking the cup from the girl in one hand, while gesturing toward her with the other. "This is my girlfriend, Rory."
Frantic thoughts ran through Bea's head. Girlfriend? Logan had a girlfriend? And Bea had surprised him, all while his girlfriend was feet away, probably wondering who the strange girl in a lingering hug with her boyfriend was? Oh, this is hell!
After a long pause that gave Bea and Rory slightly too much time to look at each other curiously, Logan added, "Rory, this is my—err—my old family friend—Bea—Beatrice Astor."
Even when he was younger, Logan had been a smooth talker, bribing their respective siblings when they wanted something or getting them out of trouble with their parents more times than she could count. He'd been far more composed than your average kid (or teenager), so seeing him this flustered would have been immensely funny to her in nearly any other context. At the moment, though, she was too on edge, lacking the ability to appreciate the potential humor of his awkward pauses and nervous glances.
Logan's two groupies, on the other hand, had no issues finding entertainment in this scene. They'd quickly caught on to the unspoken nuances of the scene and filled in the gaps Logan's halted introduction sentences had entailed.
"You know, Colin, Logan's conquests have had plenty of unfortunate run-ins with each other, but I've never seen one this dreadfully tense before! The damsels are in distress and the hero of our story has gone mute."
"Finn, I feel as though I've been asleep since Logan and Rory have been going steady—and this showdown is like a bucket of refreshing ice water on my head to jolt me awake!"
"But, wait, we've ignored the very lady of whom we speak! We must properly present ourselves to Ms. Beatrice Astor."
Following this declaration, both came forward, pushing past Logan and Rory, and presented themselves, one opting for a playful bow, the other for a dramatically low curtesy, both with flippant hand motions.
Observing their overexaggerated actions and grand declarations, Bea had the impression this was a time-tested routine and not their first boisterous performance for a girl. She knew these boys liked to be seen and heard by as many onlookers as possible. After all, she'd met plenty of their type in her years of private school and Ivy League education. What young men like Finn and Colin lacked in actual self-confidence, they made up for in their conviction that others eagerly enjoyed their displays of wealth and wit.
They continued, matching their movements with grandiose and overly-personal introductions.
"Bea, it's a pleasure to meet you. If you're Logan's old friend, then I think you could be my new friend." The one called Colin said suggestively, complete with a saucy wink and shove to his companion's shoulder in competition for center stage.
The one called Finn returned the shove, replying, "If you're Logan's old friend, and Colin's new friend, you can be my even newer friend, love!"
As Bea resisted a simultaneous urge to laugh and roll her eyes, she had to admit to herself that Colin and Finn's attention grab was a saving grace of sorts—their chattering actually diffused much of the nervous energies from the awkwardness of the so-called conquests run-in.
Logan finally intercepted the theatrics, stepping forward and pushing Colin and Finn backward. "Gents, gents, please, give Bea some space! Don't overcrowd the newcomer, you might send her running all the way back to Stanford with those poor manners."
Now that sounded more like Logan, Bea thought reflexively. Finn and Colin's show seemed to have given him time to recover his bearings as well, allowing for the return of his natural charisma. Hearing this lighthearted tone reminded her of the hundreds of conversations they had spent bantering back and forth about any topic under the sun.
"We doth protest, Logan. The manners you just witnessed were on par with the highest rules of etiquette across the continent, nay, the globe."
In a better mood already, Bea instinctively quipped in response to the group, "Sparkling manners might impress my mother, as you know, Logan, but me, not so much. It's going to take more than that to send me packing back to California."
"You mean to say we bowed and curtsied for naught, then?" Finn responded, dejected.
Bea started to catch on why Logan might keep these two around: pure entertainment.
She replied, teasing, "It wasn't totally for naught. The next time I need a good laugh, I'll remember this scene."
"If it's merriment you want, you should stop by our party on Friday night, lass." Colin said, suddenly dipping into the Scottish-variety of formalities.
"I'll check my social calendar and see if I can fit you in," Bea said sarcastically, sensing that anything sincere was the antithesis of Colin and Finn's M.O.
"Pleasure. Now we really must be going, loves and Logan." Finn declared to the group with mock urgency, checking what must have been an imaginary watch on his wrist. "We have academics, and what not."
Colin and Finn sauntered away, and, judging by their slow pace and overall lethargic demeanor, she very much doubted they were urgently on their way to attend actual classes. If she had to guess, she would assume they had simply grown tired of the spectacle before them.
Bea knew that her stage exit could also be arranged with this same pretext of "academics, and what not." She looked again toward Rory and Logan's direction, fixing her eyes approximately at the midway point between their heads, hoping to achieve the semblance of eye contact while avoiding the actual thing.
"I should be going too, I have a class soon. It was nice to meet you, Rory." With this, Bea did finally again meet Rory's eyes.
"Nice to meet you too, Bea." Rory responded with a small, slightly inquisitive smile.
"We'll see you Friday, Bea."
She quickly looked to Logan with an eyebrow raised.
Four years ago, she would have immediately challenged him for assuming that she planned to go to the social outing. She would've suggested he'd challenged her independence and free will, while being secretly touched by the fact that he felt like he knew her and used their familiarity as a way to predict her decisions. Four years ago, she'd simply jumped for any context to enter a verbal sparring match with him on the grounds that it providing an excellent outlet for their flirting.
Today, however, she had no idea how to interact with Logan. Sexual tension had been replaced with regular, ordinary tension. She had so many questions, but lacked the ability to broach any of them in this moment.
"See you then… maybe." Was her acquiescing yet slightly defiant response, followed by a wave and her exit from the courtyard.
She sighed a breath of relief once she turned the corner, although she continued to feel a new weight of uncertainty on her shoulders as she walked back to her apartment. She'd counted on Logan, as old friend, to help her balance all of the new in her life—the new home, new school, new life.
But had she counted on him being single? A small voice asked in her head.
There was no easy answer to this question, besides acknowledging the fact that, no matter what she might have expected, she was shocked that he had a girlfriend. Though she had purposefully cut ties from their social world, putting literal distance between her and her family by going to California, she'd still stayed fairly up to date on gossip. Logan was not the type to settle down, from the anecdotes she'd heard.
Truthfully, that was part of what had made parting ways and being away from him easier, viewing that their summer together had been an anomaly. It was easier to believe they'd had something that wouldn't have existed in the real world; a fleeting feasibility possible only in their Martha's Vineyard bubble created by the specific factors of that summer, of bother them being alone, with only each other as lifelines.
Like any other time she found herself undeniably nostalgic for their last summer together, her mind drifted toward the night that began the summer and the new chapter in their friendship.
A/N: Hello! Thanks for reading :) Just a few notes to clarify a couple things. First, the events of this story are taking place during the start of Season 6. If I've done my research/math correctly, the year is 2005! Rory is in her semester off from Yale, and Logan is at the start of his senior year (because he graduates at the end of Season 6). In the show, Doyle mentions Logan took a year off for yacht-sailing, which is why it is four years later (not three) when Bea meets him again. She also had a year off, but more on that in a later chapter! Second, if it wasn't clear from the summary, this is mostly a story about Logan and my original character, Bea! Rory is a secondary character, and so I want to be clear early on - if you're a diehard Logan/Rory fan, this might not be the perfect fic for you! In fact, (minor spoiler alert) if you're a Rory/Jess fan, I plan to have a bit of that occur in later chapters! Last but not least, I was on the fence about the rating. This chapter was pretty general/teen audience, but these are relationships between adults after all, so but future chapters might go up to more Mature.