"It's boring, huh" Kate asked suddenly, looking up from the textbook she had been reading.

"It's economics, it's meant to be boring" Rory replied, briefly glancing up from her notes.

"Come on, let's have a break, five minutes. I'm in desperate need of caffeine" Kate informed her closing her book.

"Fine, but only five minutes, I'm setting my watch" Rory relented, following Kate as she quickly got up from the table they had somehow managed to land in the library. A place, which for the first time in their time at Yale, was busier then the campus bar.

The two made their way to a nearby coffee stand and ordered extra large lattes.

"Ok, I can't stand it anymore" Kate squealed as they sat down on a nearby bench.

"Can't stand what" Rory shot back somewhat confused.

"I've been really good. After our trip to the beach I respected your privacy, you said you didn't want to talk about it and I left it alone. But now I hear from Jake, that some old flame of yours turned up, and there was a fight? What the hell is going on" Kate continued, rambling on almost incoherently.

"Oh that"

"Yes that!"

"Well, that was just Jess"

"Oh yeah, that explains everything" Kate shot back.

"It was nothing, he turned up unexpectedly, I was surprised to see him, and now we're fine" Rory returned calmly.

"And Tristan?"

"What about Tristan" Rory replied, feigning innocence.

Kate just stared at her in return.

"Ok, maybe something kind of happened…"

Kate interrupted her excitedly, "I want details".

"Nothing like that. It was just a moment, and maybe something could have happened…"

"Did you want it to?"

"No, its Tristan he's just so…"

"Hot, Charming, into you" Kate supplied grinning.

"He's not into me" Rory replied exasperated.

Once again Kate stared at Rory.

"Don't do that" Rory stated.

"Do what"

"Look at me like I'm Jessica Simpson" Rory finished.

"Hey, I'm not saying you couldn't tell the difference between tuna and chicken, but when it comes to guys, I'm sorry to say, you are clueless" Kate stated leaning back in her chair.

"Fine, maybe he does have some sort of weird attraction to me, but that doesn't matter. I just don't get him, I…" Rory started before Kate interrupted her.

"Ok, ok, you don't have to explain yourself, but just hear me out, and believe me this comes from personal experience. Sometimes we spend so much time convincing ourselves that someone is wrong for us; we ignore how we really feel. Look I know you all thought that Jake and I were right for each other, and people would tell me that he felt something for me, but I just wasn't able to process it. It was because I had never really seen myself with him, and then that night at the beach I just let go. I put all practicality and rationality aside and just went with how I feltl and well you know how that turned out"

Rory sat their silently and processed Kate's words.

"But there's so much baggage between us, you don't even know the half of it" Rory replied quietly.

"No one ever said love was easy" Kate answered wistfully

"Hey, believe me I know that" Rory shot back, getting up to head back to the library.

"And either is fiscal policy" Kate added, groaning as she followed behind.

****

Rory hopped into bed and slipped on her Discman. She was wiped out from a day devoted entirely to the pursuit of cramming useless facts and dates into her brain. The only upside to this was she had barely thought about anything guy related since her chat with Kate.

She pressed play and realised that without meaning to she had slipped in a mix CD. A CD Lane had made the night Dave had kissed her after Thanksgiving dinner. And subsequently it was filled with love songs Lane Kim style. There were no ballads here, it was a totally boy band free zone. There was the necessary Ash, XTC, and Velvet Underground followed by a more diverse range. Rory's mind began to wander as she grew increasingly mopey during Mazzy Star, even more so during Jeff Buckley and slightly more upbeat to the sounds of Joseph Arthur. As track 10 started she immediately recognised it as Longwave, Tristan's favourite band. Her mind flew back to that night at the beach house, Tristan's looking at her directly before his drunken outburst. As with most memories things were unclear, she saw a look there, a gesture here. She though of that night in bed, when she had woken up just before dawn as the light had begun seeping through the shades. She had glanced over at Tristan's sleeping face, it was so peaceful and quiet and she had really looked at him for the first time. It pained her to say it, but from their first meeting there had always been something about him that intimidated her. She was always on her guard, always waiting for his next attack or comment. At that moment she thought she had caught a glimpse of the real Tristan, the one Paris had hinted at, the one that was there when they were together on the beach and on the piano bench. The Tristan that despite her best efforts she thought of at times like this, in bed just before she drifted of to sleep. The time reserved for the person who made something in you stir. The part of you that you suppressed for almost the other 23 hours of the day.

Rory shock herself out of her train of thought, and tried to discount her previous musing. This wasn't logical. She was creating a fantasy Tristan. One opposed to the real one who constantly hurt her, who had probably never sustained or wanted for a relationship or even friendship based on something real. Who probably didn't even truly like her, despite what others believed. Who was just messing with her for fun or as a challenge?

Rory sat up unable to sleep; her mind at this point was going a million miles an hour.

She got up from bed and sat down at her laptop. As she accessed her email, she vowed to get her mind to focus on something rational, like her exams or her assignment for the paper. Anything except for whatever it was, that was going on between her and Tristan. And she had to acknowledge that something was going on.

After delating the junk mail that generally cluttered her inbox. Rory haphazardly clicked on her contacts list. Staring up at her was a list of al the people she knew and loved. Even her mom had an address, although she rarely checked it. Perhaps luckily Jess refused to join in the email revolution and didn't even have an account, although he admitted that he had used the internet once or twice. She scanned the list and contemplated emailing Dean, but changed her mind when she attempted to mentally compose what she would say. Hi Dean, so how's marriage? Oh by the way why didn't Luke want me to go to your wedding? It was precisely for this reason email was a faulted way in which to communicate. People wrote down things they couldn't say in person and the message was immediately relayed to the other person without anyway in which to stop or change it.

Rory clicked on Tristan name. In the brief time they had tried to be friends she had obtained his email address which was simply tbdugray@yale.net.edu. She paused to ponder what the b stood for. Presumably his middle name as her assigned email had been llgilmore@yale.net.edu.

Once again her mind had wandered back to Tristan. She decided the only solution to this constant roadblock was to do something about it. She opened up a new page and started her email by simply writing "Hey", then stopping. What was she doing? What was she going to say to him and as she had reasoned earlier, if she had something to say, she should be able to do it face to face.

Rory got up from the computer, put on her slippers and gown and made her way upstairs. The dorms were eerily quiet. No one was partying this week. They had either collapsed from exhaustion or were tied up studying, jacked up on caffeine and vending machine available snack foods.

She arrived outside Tristan's suite and raised her hand to knock on the door before lowering it. Again what was she doing? Not only was everybody probably asleep and would not appreciate the interruption. But what was she going to say "Hey Tristan, just thought I'd stop by in the middle of the night, let's hang out". Or "I couldn't sleep because I've been thinking about you". This was ridiculous; she turned to leave but was stopped by the sound of the door opening.

"Rory" a voice called.

Rory slowly turned around to see Jake standing in the doorway rubbing his eyes.

"Ah...Hi" she replied softly.

"What are you doing here? I just got up to get a glass of water and I thought I heard someone at the door" he continued sounding confused.

"Oh you know, I was just going for a walk around the halls" Rory replied unconvincingly.

"Uh huh…see I was thinking you might be here to see someone" Jake smirked.

"No…I um just needed some exercise, and um... your hallway has the good candy machine, it doesn't take your money every second time like ours…" she began before Jake interrupted her.

"He's not here" Jake said softly.

"Who?" Rory said feigning innocence.

Jake just looked at her condescendingly.

Rory shrugged her shoulders, "Fine, maybe I was looking for who you think I was, but if he's not here then it doesn't matter does it" she continued staring Jake down, " and you don't have to tell him that I was here, right?"

"If that's what you want" Jake stated giving up.

"It is" Rory replied confidently "So um where is he?" she continued nonchalantly.

"I actually don't know" Jake replied with a somewhat concerned edge to his voice.

Rory took in that information bid Jake goodnight and headed back down to her room. Her heart was beating rapidly as she digested how close she had come to making a fool of her self. She had almost barged in on Tristan in the middle of the night to. At the same time she almost felt disappointed by the fact she hadn't seen him. Despite her protestations to the contrary, she had missed him. She hadn't so much as walked by him in the weeks since their encounter in the hallway and the Jess fiasco.

As she made her way into her room, the thought of were Tristan was entered her consciousness. Was he out partying during study week? Did he go home for the weekend? Was he with someone…Rory's thoughts trailed off as she got back into bed. If he was with some one else would that bother her? Why should she care? It's not like she wanted him to be with her, or did she.

To be continued…