Chapter Nine

Rory

As the five of us sat in the living room, me, Paris, Jess, Jaime, and a two ton elephant in the shape of Awkwardness, for about fifteen minutes, I started to grow tired of the silence and decided to throw the damned elephant out by starting some sort of conversation that will last longer than, "Good trip?"  "Yeah."

"So, Jaime."

He looked up, almost relieved to find out that we all hadn't suddenly gone mute and deaf within the last few minutes, "Yeah."

"Um, have you met Jess?"

Jess looked at me with a questioning expression and then proceeded to turn to Jaime.  Jaime then offered his hand for a shake, which Jess reluctantly accepted.  Lord, why this boy was so against meeting people is beyond me.

"No, I haven't."

He gave him a tart smile, "Well, now you have."

I threw a glare at his rudeness.  He returned with a pompous smirk.  Suddenly the reason things were so weird occurred to me.  Paris was quiet as a soap dish next to me.  Paris was supposed to entertain Jaime, not me, not Jess.

"Paris?"

"What?" she snapped.  I instantly drew back at her snippiness.  What was wrong with this picture?

She suddenly let out a sigh, mixed with a sort of glare at Jaime and stood, almost knocking me over. 

"I have to get out of here," she simply said, and headed for the door.  I turned in my seat and Jaime half-stood in his.  "Paris!" we both yelled.  But it was useless as the door had already slammed in our faces.

Jess suddenly got up, "I think I know what's going on."

What?  How could he know what was going on?!  I don't know what's going on, and from the looks of Jaime over here, he doesn't have the slightest idea, either.

And why in the world is Jess even here?!

Before I could ask him, the door slammed shut for a second time.  Jaime and I looked at each other, confused to our cores about the situation.

Without another second's delay, we leapt to our feet and followed them out the door.

Opening it seemed to be the first mistake, as once the division was lifted from our view; we saw the scariest thing alive.

Paris and Jess were outside the hall, kissing.

I pulled a limp finger out and managed to utter a, "Meugh…" and made a second mistake.

The hallway whizzed around and around as the floor rushed up to greet me.

***

There are some things that are utterly inexplicable, like Physics and the meaning of life, or how I enjoyed Rockstar even with Jennifer Aniston in it.  But Jess kissing Paris was in another category altogether. 

I wasn't saying that it was impossible, because that would be incredibly mean of me, but that happening right after Jess almost…

Well, he didn't exactly want to kiss me, perse, as I'm painfully aware that he was the one who pulled away just as I was about to…

A hand suddenly grabbed me on the shoulder and I flipped.  I screamed bloody murder, clutching my heart.

"Woah, woah!" Joe exclaimed over my blood-curdling shriek, his hands in front of him in defense.  "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Where the hell am I?" I lunged awake, looking around.  When I realized that I was in my room, I instantly relaxed.  Then I realized that Joe was in it.  And we were alone.

"What are you doing here?"

He sat on the edge of my bed, looking at his hands.  I inched away from him, pulling my covers over myself.

"I came to see you and your room mate said you passed out, so I ventured inside your abode and crossed the threshold.  I mean, crossed the threshold and ventured inside your abode," he gave a small laugh, "Obviously, English has not been one of the majors I've taken."

I pursed my lips at him, "Well, maybe you can try next year."

He gave me a nod which suggested that he'd certainly entertain the idea and rubbed his chin.

I squinted an eye at him, "Grandma said she never told you to do anything to me."

Hm.  That sounded at tad dirty.  And from the looks of it, Joe thought so as well.  A smirk danced in front if his features and I kicked him off the bed at the perverse path this whole thing was swerving to.  Eugh.

"Gah!" he cried out as he landed with a thump.  "Okay, okay, I lied!  Jesus!"

"Why would you do that?"

He swung his arm over the edge of my bed once again and haggardly pulled himself up.  "I need something from you."

Oh, God, he "needed" "something" from me.  I clutched the covers tighter around myself and opened my mouth to give way to another wail.

But I was suddenly hit with a balled-up shirt in the face.  "Hey!"

"Shut up and let me explain, dammit!"

"Do you even know Sherry?!"

"No, not personally."

"Tristan?!"

"Jesus Christ, will you calm down?!" he yelled at my hysteria.  He boosted himself up in the bed and crawled closer.  I kicked him once again and he rolled off and onto the floor.

"I need a favour and I didn't think you'd help me if you didn't trust me right away!"

"Well, mentioning Sherry certainly isn't the way to go!"

"But you trusted me, right?!"

This time I wanted to kick myself because I knew what he said was true.  I did trust him once he mentioned all the people I knew.  I frowned at him, "What do you want from me?"

"I need you to act like my girlfriend for a while."

My eyes widened and I let out an amused, "Hah!"  Joe, however, took it as some kind of offense and crossed his arms over his chest.

Oh, he was serious.  Good Lord.

Jess

I opened the door and was once again greeted by Paris Freaking Gellar.  I groaned and once again cleared the way for her to enter.  Once again.  If she was ten years older, I'd totally feel like Benjamin Braddock.

"I, uh, I wanted to thank you for doing that thing earlier for me.  It was very nice of you."

I frowned, "Paris, you paid me to do that."

"That's right, and I want to pay you back again by inviting you to dinner with me tomorrow night."

The invitation itself seemed odd because really, why pay for something with dinner if you've already paid the initial cost?

"Jaime's going to be there, isn't he?"

Paris cleared her throat and gave me what seemed like… her face was scrunched up in a very weird manner and her nose was in a funny shape, along with her unnaturally twisted mouth and…

"Are you trying to look innocent?"

Her face quickly relaxed and gave way to a roll of her eyes and a frustrated growl, "I could never pull that off."

I sat there in silent amusement at the lengths this girl was going for just to slap her boyfriend in the face.  It made me wonder how much dysfunctional love she possessed for Jaime and why she was doing this at all.  Paris was now looking at me expectantly, her hands once again on the dangerous paper crane project which belonged to my non-existent room mate (which had seemingly grown and multiplied over the past week).

"What did Jaime ever do to you anyway?"

The question seemed to be some sort of green light for Paris as she sat down and spoke.  "Nothing particularly serious.  He called one night to tell me he missed me."

"The nerve."

It seemed that my retort remained unappreciated.  "Then we got talking a bit more and we started talking about… us."

I walked over to the kitchen, which was facing the sofa she was sitting on and nodded for her to continue.  "Still don't see the importance of you paying me to kiss you--,"

"He proposed to me, okay?"

Jesus Christ Almighty.