Disclaimer: The same applies.

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Cheers

Chapter 22: The Gentlemen's Agreement

"Wow, that's one hell of a story. You sure you're not making any of it up?"

"I swear it's all true."

"Well…" Dave the barman drifted off, continuing to wipe the counter down. Finally, he shrugged and threw down the cloth in his hand. "Oh, what the hell, this round's on me."

His three customers cheered, clinking their mugs on the counter rhythmically as they did so. One of men – the one with the dark curly hair and coffee brown eyes – grinned at the barman. "So Dave, you got any pretzels or something back there?"

"I'm one step ahead of you, Jess." Filling three mugs to the brim with beer, Dave placed the drinks on the counter in front of him, along with an unopened bag of pretzels. "Knock yourself out."

The trio seated at the bar were briefly silenced as they gulped down the contents of their mugs, and Dave leaned his elbows on the counter as he waited for them to finish. Once they were done, he looked at each of them expectantly. "Well?"

Tristan glanced up at him, his brilliant blue eyes vaguely puzzled. "Well what?"

Dave shook his head. Was it just these three, or did all the young people in the area possess short attention spans? "So what happened next? You guys haven't finished telling me the story."

"Oh! Right." Tristan smiled, comprehension dawning on his face. "Well, the wedding's been called off. Rory decided that getting married to Robert wasn't what she wanted after all."

"Amen to that!" Pushing his straight dark hair out of his eyes, Dean raised his mug, and his two companions raucously joined in, cheering as they did so.

Dave couldn't help smiling as he watched the young men. They could be exceedingly funny when they wanted to be, even more so when they were gloriously drunk. Retrieving the now-empty mugs from all three, the barman smiled. "Okay, that's enough for today." Handing each of them cups of strong black coffee, the older man shook his head benignly at the young men.  

"Pretzels! More pretzels!" Jess sang out, causing the other two to join in as well.

"Geez, you kids are going to put me out of business real soon if you don't do something about your obsession with pretzels," Dave grumbled good-naturedly as he presented the men with individual packages. As the three dug into their snacks, Dean grinned crookedly at his companions.

"I don't know about you, but the past few weeks have definitely been interesting for me." Setting down his pretzels, he stared gravely at Tristan and Jess, who were far too engrossed in devouring their snacks to pay attention to him. "Hey! Guys! Hey!" 

"Yeah? What?" Tristan's head snapped around as he peered at Dean curiously. "What'd you say?"

"I said," Dean's voice went up a few notches, "I said the past few weeks have been interesting. Don't you think so?"

"Yeah, of course it has," Jess nodded enthusiastically. "I mean, we stopped Rory from making the biggest mistake of her life, and we kicked some major ass. Oh, and we had some really tasty lobster puffs too. Hey Dave, d'ya have any lobster puffs here?"

"Nope, I just ran out," Dave managed to keep his amusement in check, shrugging regretfully instead.

"Oh, damn," Tristan shook his head mournfully, peering intently into his now-empty snack bag. "I'm out of junk food."

"Here, have some of mine," Jess leaned over and tossed his snacks over to his friend, all but smacking Tristan in the head with the pretzels in the process. "Whoo, that was a close one! You okay, buddy boy?"

"So…" Dave began wiping a couple of freshly cleaned mugs on the counter. "Rory Gilmore's free again, huh?"

"Oh, yeah. She is, isn't she?" Jess examined Dave thoughtfully, watching the bartender slowly making his way through the clean mugs.

"Yeah," Tristan nodded meditatively. "Looks like it. What do you think, Dean?"

"I'd say so," Dean sagely acceded. And for some unknown reason, the three of them exchanged inscrutable, conspiring grins. This wasn't lost on Dave, who had looked up just in time to catch the wordless exchange.

Sensing the stirrings of a challenge between the three friends, he leaned against the counter. "What're you guys going to do now that Rory's free again?"

The three swapped another round of knowing looks before raising their cups of coffee in a toast, grinning as they did so. "Here's to Rory Gilmore," Dean proclaimed, and they clinked their cups together solemnly.

"Here's to all the shit that's happened in the past couple of weeks," Jess added.

It was now Tristan's turn. The other two looked at him quietly as they waited for his contribution. And as always, he didn't disappoint.

"May the best man win."

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The End