Pairing - Tristan and Rory...
Disclaimer - I wish I owned them, but unfortunately I don't. They belong to Dorothy Parker Drank Here Productions and Hofflund/Polone in association with Warner Bros. Television. I'm merely borrowing them. Although I would love to steal Tristan away...
Feedback - Please? And thank you!
A/N - Bah. Writers block. Sorry (in advance) if this chapter sucks.
She could hear her heart pounding in her ears. The only other sound in the deserted hallway as the squeaky thumping of Jess' shoes as he continued to walk down the hall.
He looked the same as the last time she saw him, albeit he gained a tan from wherever he came back from. He looked both pensive and sullen, as his eyes kept flickering towards a spot to the left of Rory's shoulder. She didn't even realize that Tristan was standing behind her, his hand clamped down protectively on her shoulder.
It seemed like an eternity before he was finally standing a few feet away from her, and she finally found her voice.
"You're back."
Rory didn't even know why she felt the need to state the obvious. But she was proud of the fact that she kept her voice calm and controlled, something she never thought would be possible when she thought back to how she felt over the past summer.
"I'm back," Jess agreed. His eyes were still locked in an steely gaze with Tristan, while Rory became aware of his presence behind her.
"Could you give us a couple of minutes?" Rory asked Tristan quietly, turning her head slightly to face him.
"I'll meet you in the parking lot," he replied, releasing the grip on her shoulder. He shot one last angry look at Jess, before walking down the corridor. Rory watched as he disappeared around the corner, before turning to face Jess again.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, with a sigh. He shrugged. "Fine, be that way. Why come all the way down to my school of all places, if you don't even have anything to say to me?"
"You're my girlfriend. It seemed like the thing to do," he responded despondently. Rory let out a bitter laugh.
"Girlfriend? You still think of me as your girlfriend after everything that has happened?" she asked incredulously.
"We didn't technically break up," Jess pointed out, as he suddenly seemed deeply fascinated with the floor.
"You leaving for three months without saying goodbye pretty much implies a break up," Rory retorted. Her anger subsided somewhat, as the words she had imagined herself saying to him over the summer were on the verge of spilling out.
"You know I could have loved you," she began quietly, as his head snapped up. "If you just trusted me enough to tell me that you were failing, I would have gladly helped you out. I would have taken time out of my schedule to help you with your homework or some extra credit assignment. I would have done the whole girlfriend bit." Rory said, her voice gaining strength as she talked. "But you didn't trust me Jess. And that's why things turned out like this. And I don't think I'll ever be able to go back to where we used to be... We could be friends," she offered lamely.
"Friends?" he repeated. "We could never just be friends, Rory."
"That's all I have to offer," she shrugged. "Things changed when you were gone... My feelings for you..." her voice drifted off, as she searched for the words. "They don't even begin to compare to what I feel for Tristan," she finished in a whisper.
"You know, I just can't really picture you two together," Tristan said, as Rory approached him in the parking lot. He was leaning against the trunk of his Jaguar, which was the only car left sitting in the parking lot.
"It wasn't one of my finer moments," Rory admitted, as she took a seat on the trunk. "But for awhile things were good... Really good... Until he decided to leave without saying goodbye..." she said, her voice trailing off.
"So I'm a little bit curious," Tristan said, trying to keep the conversation somewhat upbeat. "How did you end up together anyways?"
A faint smile formed on Rory's lips as she thought back to how she met him. She hadn't realized it before, but the burden that she ignored for the past few months was finally lifted. She had just gotten the closure she needed from Jess.
"He came live with his uncle Luke. He was from New York, so naturally everyone in Stars Hollow thought he was trouble," she said, with a short laugh. "And I guess to a certain extent he was. But he was just different. I don't know how to explain it, but he just... He made me see things differently."
" Like your feelings for Dean?" Tristan asked darkly.
"Yes. I... I," she trailed off, not really knowing how to approach the Dean subject with him. After a moment, she spoke up again. "So how did you and Evelyn end up together?"
"You know, it's kind of an embarrassing story, to tell you the truth," Tristan said, as he let out a chuckle at the memory.
"You know that just makes me all the more curious," Rory replied, not realizing that her mouth was twisting into the fake wistful smile that occurred whenever Tristan talked about Evelyn. She didn't even know why she felt the need to ask him that question in the first place. There was just some sort of sick side of her that needed to know everything. Some part of her that just craved all the angst.
"She sort of started out as my roommate in the dorms," Tristan admitted. "Somewhere along the way, they made a mistake when I registered, and they had me down as Trista DuGrey," he explained. Rory laughed as Tristan scowled. "It's not that funny," he said. "It took about a week to sort out."
"Anyways," he continued. "Even though we knew each other somewhat from the country club, we had never really gotten to know each other since our families have had this long standing feud over business spanning three generations," he explained, rolling his eyes. "So it turned out we had a lot in common and we became pretty good friends. I always knew she wanted more, but..." he trailed off. "I wasn't the long term commitment guy. I never was. Plus there was all those unresolved feelings I had for -" Tristan abruptly stopped what he was saying, and looked down at the ground.
She felt the blood rush to her ears. She knew what he was going to say. The unresolved feelings that he had for her. It was the first time since he came back to Hartford that he actually acknowledged his feelings for her.
"We should probably get going," Tristan began, as he walked over to the passenger side of his car and opened it for Rory. "I don't want to make you late for dinner with your grandparents -"
"Stop," Rory interrupted him. She got off her seat, and closed the door he had just opened for her. "We can't do this any longer. I can't do this any longer."
She looked into his questioning eyes, knowing that it was time to lay it all out into the open.
"How long do you expect me to ignore everything you wrote in that letter?"
"Longer than this," Tristan admitted. He felt his body sag in defeat. Tristan didn't want to answer her now. He wanted to go home, lie down on his comfy bed, and think everything through before he answered her. But he knew that was not an option at the moment. He tried to distract her by opening the door she had just closed.
"I need to know how you feel about me now," Rory pressed. She was being relentless, not letting the opportunity pass her by like it had before. She slammed the car door shut once again..
"It's complicated," he replied, growing frustrated at his inability to explain his own feelings. He tried one more time to get her to drop things, by opening his car door again.
"Then uncomplicate it for me," Rory persisted. She shut the door again, this time holding her hand firmly against it.
"Do you think this is easy for me?" Tristan snapped. "It would've been much more easier to get through this if I thought I still hated you." Rory was taken aback slightly, her blue eyes wide open in shock.
"So where do your feelings stand for me now?" she asked quietly. Tristan took a deep breath, as he thought about how he would respond.
"The letter pretty much described how I felt about you at the time," he began. "But when I got away from you, from here... When I really thought about it, it was more like I liked the dream that I built of you, if that makes any sense," he paused, struggling to find the right words to say. "The thing was, we never even really knew each other well enough to form the basis for a relationship. I had resorted to third grade tactics, and you basically ignored me."
"You could have told me how you really felt," Rory pointed out.
"Why, so you could of had the satisfaction of shooting me down?" Tristan retorted.
"Why do you naturally assume these things?" she asked him, staring pointedly at Tristan. He shrugged.
"Look, I know there's something between us, no matter how hard we choose to ignore it. There's always going to be this insane chemistry between us, maybe a deeper connection if we ever got the chance to know each other better than this," Tristan stated.
"If we could just start over, maybe start out as friends - ," Rory suggested.
"We can never be just friends," Tristan interrupted. "The other thing about us, Rory, is that we're constantly straddling the thin line between love and hate. There's no middle ground between us."
His words came out harsher than he intended, and the look on Rory's face reflected that. As his words slowly sunk into her, a distant look formed in her eyes. She avoided his gaze by staring down at her shoes.
Tristan closed his eyes, and exhaled, knowing that even if she couldn't admit it, she knew that it was true. When he opened his eyes, she was staring up at him, her eyes wide open, her face reading like an open book. She was vulnerable and hurting, and there was nothing he could do to change that. He knew what she wanted to hear, and that wasn't it.
"Maybe it'd be better if we ended our little arrangement," Tristan said quietly.
"It's only been a day," Rory protested.
"But look at all that's happened in today - people are beginning to think the worst about you because you're with me, Paris is upset with you, she almost caught me talking to Evelyn, and your ex-boyfriend showed up," Tristan pointed out.
"But what about your father?" Rory interjected.
"I'll make something up," he shrugged.
"It doesn't have to be like this," she pleaded, her voice wavering slightly.
"I know," he said simply. "But the longer we continue this charade, the more I question whether or not I could trust myself with you," he whispered, his voice barely audible.
"And Evelyn doesn't deserve that."