Authors note: It's set at the end of season 3 I guess, they're in their last week of school and got the summer holidays to spend their last weeks together. Fairly steady relationship, sleeping with each other, love each other. Both might seem out of character but this is how I'm writing it. Songs which you might not have picked up on are Three Marlena's by The Wallflowers, Media by John Butler Trio, Welcome to the Cruel World by Ben Harper and Diamonds are on the Inside by Ben Harper.
Summary: Road trip baby.
Disclaimer: Don't own nothing. Includin the songs.
LAST CHAPTER! CAN U BELIEVE IT?!?!?!? And sorry if there aren't trains going from Hartford to NYC, THAT'S THE WAY IM WRITIN IT! Also really really sorry if its too cheesy, tell me and and Ill write another ending.
As always, PLEASE review.
Let's go somewhere far together
She rolled over and sighed. It was the next morning and she wanted to cry. She woke up in her bed and her warm blanket and pillows and she was happy; because she had missed her bed so much. But then she looked around and she saw her bedroom and she smelt the smell of her house which was so familiar to her and she wanted to cry. Because she was back here. And she didn't want to back here. She buried herself in pillow and took a deep breath in. The pillow smelt of her perfume and her mum's perfume but most all it smelt like her favourite pillow in the whole world. Actually it was her second favourite pillow in the world. Her favourite one was Jess's. His smelt like him and his aftershave. It was dark blue with white stripes and had a blood stain on it, from when he rescued his mum from a drunken brawl who was left with a gash on her head and feel asleep on his bed, bleeding slightly. She knew that pillow inside and out. She tried to remember when the last time was when she saw that pillow. It was the night before they went on their trip, oh it seemed ages ago. She remembered what they talked about.
"Oh Jess this trip will be great."
"It will be the best baby."
"We'll see city lights, deserts, mountains, beaches; it's going to be all so beautiful."
She paused. Then she spoke.
"And looking across the city lights,"
"She'd thought they'd be a good pair."
"Now he could make a living selling cars."
"Maybe she could work there."
"She's going to pick a star in the night."
"And pray to make it all right."
Jess sighed.
"Promise you won't laugh?"'
"Why would I laugh?"
"Just promise Rory."
"Okay."
"That song makes me sad."
"What?"
"It makes me sad."
"Oh Jess."
"I don't know why really."
"It's not really a sad song."
"It's like Jack and Diane in a way."
"Yes…oh does that song make you sad too?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"It makes my mum sad."
"Oh?"
"Yes. She says that she and Dad were just like that. Sitting there, loving each other, wanting to run away together. Then it all stuffed up. She said all kids are like that. Then they grow up and it stuffs up."
"And they weren't even happy when they were supposed to be happy."
"No… oh Jess it does make sad now."
He paused. She could tell he felt uncomfortable; it wasn't often that he told her when things made him sad. Not matter how times she asked whether things made him sad, he always lied and said that, no, it didn't. So she started singing the song again, softly, singing their favourite bit in the whole song. She knew he would quietly join in and still feel the sadness that was sometimes in him, but he would know that she felt it too. That she cared about him. That someone cared about him.
"Man, I think I'm gonna buy myself a Rolls."
"Maybe a Chevrolet."
"One where I can pull that top down."
"Just let my radio play."
"Now I'm heading out on that highway."
"I'm going right out of state."
"Now I ain't lookin' back until I'm gone,"
"Right through heaven's gates."
She sighed, bringing herself back to present time. It was now later on in day, and she and Jess were at the train station in Hartford. Luke and her mother were somewhere in the background but all she saw was Jess. His train to New York left in an hour. Their relationship ended in an hour. Jess pulled her over to a coffee shop and they sat down, both exhausted from nothing they could explain. She pulled a copy of Instyle from the magazine rack behind her and flipped through it, scared to look at Jess's face. She stopped on a page about hair.
"Do you think I should get my hair cut?"
"Your hair cut?"
"Yeah. Ooh, like Kelly Osbourne maybe!"
"No."
"No?"
"No."
"But, if I'm Kelly Osbourne and you're Johnny Knoxville, then we'll both be MTV people. Ooh, we'll be MTV's controversial couple!"
"He would never leave his wife."
"He's married?"
"With a kid."
"Wow. Hi, I'm Mrs Johnny Knoxville…imagine his poor wife having to say that."
Jess nodded and picked at his nails.
"So…you're going to Columbia."
"Yep."
"Cool…"
"Sure is."
Silence crept up again.
"What about Italy?"
"You don't think I don't want to go?"
"Oh…then why don't you?"
"It's not that easy."
"No. Not for us anyway."
"No, it is easy for you."
"What?"
"If you went up to your Grandma today and said that you want to go to Italy but you don't have the money, she'd pay for your trip in a microsecond."
"No she wouldn't!"
"No, she would."
She tucked her hair behind her ears, in frustration.
"Well, you told me you don't want money anyway Jess, so you're contradicting yourself."
"I don't want money."
"It sounds like you do."
"Well I don't. I want to go on the trip. That's all I want."
"That's all you want?"
"That's all I want."
"If God came on this earth and promised to give you anything in the whole world right now, right this second, you'd just ask to go on the trip."
"Yes."
"Oh…I thought that maybe you would ask to stay with me…stupid I guess."
"It wasn't stupid Ror. You never have been stupid."
"I wanted to stay together. Obviously that was stupid."
"Sometimes you just need to know when time's up."
She stood in anger.
"Maybe, I just, just gotta go to the ladies. Yeah, that's what I gotta do…"
She rushed off the bathrooms.
She sat on the toilet lid, not really needing to go and sighed in frustration and tried really hard to hold her tears in. She counted the graffiti on the bathroom door to take her mind off it.
She heard the bathroom door opened and she saw a pair of large feet in adaidas flip flops walk past her stall. Her heart skipped a beat. Those feet belong to Jess.
He stood in front of her door and said,
"Rory?"
"I don't wanna talk."
"Ror, come out of there."
"Jess, I don't want to believe you!"
"About what?"
"About everything! And the only reason I don't want to believe is because you're lying."
"Well what you believe is up to you."
"But what am I to believe in between the truth and lies?
"Rory I'm sick of playing this game."
"No you're not supposed to say that," she whispered, her voice breaking with the threat of tears. "You're supposed to say don't believe the lies, read between the lines."
"Rory. This game of pretending is over. The game of avoiding an issue by saying song lyrics like you just did then is over."
"I wasn't avoiding an issue; I just…just like John Butler Trio okay? I just wanted to sing one of their songs."
"Oh Rory."
"No, it is so stupid! You moving to New York and me moving to Boston and those two cities not really being that far apart but at the same time being worlds away."
"Well that's life baby."
"I don't like life anymore."
"I never did like it."
She opened the door to her Jess and his eyes, which always seemed sad except when he was around her. And now he was leaving and she felt sick, because now he would seem sad all the time.
She hugged him.
"Come on. Lets go sit on uncomfy chairs and watch tv and wait for my train."
She slipped her hand in his and they walked out.
His train was ten minutes away and they should've been on the platform, waiting for it. But their eyes were glued to the television, which had tale after tale of the war in Iraq. When she heard the story of the American solider blowing up a tent full of his friends, her stomach jumped.
"Oh Jess, why do things like happen?"
His voice was hollow and his eyes had taken him somewhere darker from here.
"I don't know. War is so bad baby. It makes everyone everywhere fucked up. Doesn't matter what side you're on, doesn't matter who you're against, it just makes you fucked up."
She sighed.
"Welcome to the cruel world."
"I'm already quite acquainted with it."
They stood up and numbingly walked down the stairs to the train platform where Luke and her mum were waiting. With each step she plodded down, she counted all the times Jess made her feel happy. 1 – plod – when he laughs along with me, 2 – plod – when he knows when I'm upset and plays Ben Harper to cheer me up, 3 – plod – when he listens to all the stupid things I say….
Looking down at all stairs and all the things that made Jess so good to her, she turned to him in fear.
"Jess, don't leave!"
"Rory."
"Don't leave, don't leave, don't leave! You're want I want! Please don't leave."
"Make sure the fortune that you seek is the fortune that you need."
"Now you're avoiding the issue with songs!"
"Rory." He grabbed her and they stood on the long long stair case that all big train stations seem to have, with a hundred and one steps and the people swirled around them, getting angry at the two teenagers who stopped the flow of traffic and interrupted their busy and important lives.
"Rory, look at me."
"No."
"This is it."
And it sunk in.
They got to the bottom where Jess's train was waiting already. He hugged Luke very briefly and they said little, but Luke was trying to not to cry and Jess was trying look everywhere except at Luke.
Then he hugged Rory. She kissed him passionately. They kissed for the last time.
They didn't say anything. They had exhausted all conversations.
Jess got on the train.
She watched through the train windows, as Jess waved through the window, though not very happily. She blew kisses to him. The train started to pull away.
She started to run after the train, just like in the movies. Then suddenly, she made up her mind.
She jumped through the last door and onto the train, her heat going a mile a minute.
She heard her mum scream behind her.
She ran through all the carriages, one, two, three, four, five, until finally she got in carriage in which Jess was in.
She jumped onto top of him and smothered him with kisses.
He stared at her in shock.
"What are you doing here?"
"Going to New York."
"What?"
"Going to New York. With you. And then we'll go to the airport and I'll buy two tickets to Italy. I've got a bit of money you know."
"You don't want to do this."
Rory smiled.
"You make me happy. And I make you smile. And maybe we don't know what will happen. Maybe we'll break up in a week. Or maybe you'll push me off the train right now. But Jess, I look at the world and it does seem cruel. It's cruel and it makes you so sad. So maybe if somehow in this cruel world, somehow I can be happy and you can smile, maybe somehow we're just perfect."
He looked at her and she held her breath, in fear he would tell her to get off him and go right back to her mother. But he smiled faintly.
"Our odds and ends in life will even out our minds hey?"
"Oh Jess, that's exactly right."
She grinned so big and leaned into his arms.
He kissed her cheek.
"What about your life back there?" he whispered, pointing out the window to the disappearing Hartford.
She smiled.
"Baby let's just runaway, never look back."
And the people cried to the greatest poet of all time,
"Write us a poem about the war. Make it real and make it raw.
Write us a poem abut the war. Make it beautiful and make it true."
And the poet turned to them with anger in his eyes.
And this was all he said.
War is bad
War makes people sad
And that's all anyone needs to know.
- An extract from 'The Voice of the Seventies: When will we look back and listen?'