Sixty Ways to Ditch a Bag-Boy

Disclaimer: I am not Amy Sherman-Palladino. I don't want to make money or fame, I just want to play with some characters that aren't mine, because I appreciate what she's done with them.

Author's Note: This would be my version of the anti-Dean manifesto, I think. From plenty of Season 1 and 2 re-runs and long talks with my mother about Why Dean Sucks, along with a healthy dislike of the contrived Season 4/5 plotline. (Not all of it was contrived. What was bothered me.) And--I should probably say--I wasn't planning on making this linear, but since I'm watching Season 2 for the first time, the muse is striking linearly. So, the last one hijacked "Run Away, Little Boy" and this one hijacks "A-Tisket, A-Tasket." Enjoy.

2: Make a Run for the Nearest Battered Women's Shelter

"Don't go." She looks at him, pleading, upset and frustrated that once again, he's angry at her. It doesn't feel like that long since they got back together, and lately it seems like all of it since their second anniversary (on the sixth, rather than the twenty-second) has been fighting.

She doesn't want him to be angry at her. She likes it much better when he's smiling, when he looks adorably young and has dimples. But she's sure that this time at least--though often she simply has a denial problem larger than that longest of rivers--it's not her fault, and she's almost angry at Dean for turning it back on her.

"Look, Dean, it's a picnic; it's lunch. We'll sit; we'll eat; it's over," she argues, trying to make him see how unreasonable he's being. It's not like she wanted to eat lunch with the local hoodlum of only a few months. She much prefers the old hoodlum, the Stars Hollow brand hoodlum, the one that incites girls to shoplifting corn starch and "free" soda. She wishes he would get that.

But he's not understanding, he's saying "I don't want you to go" as if those words will make all the difference. He sounds like he's three, and she almost hates him for it. She does hate him for making a scene here, in front of the whole town--in front of Jess, playing it exactly how Jess planned it. She hates him for making her the bad guy for being honorable. And--as selfish as it is--she hates how he's dragging her down in the muck in front of people who think she's perfect. She isn't perfect, but she sure as hell isn't like this.

"Dean," she finds herself pleading, and now she hates herself for being weak, for trying to make him not hate her when it's him that's being unreasonable. And she knows she's being ungrammatical, but what's the sense of grammar when--"this isn't my fault! I didn't ask him to do that, I didn't tell him to do that. Dean, you're my boyfriend! I would never do anything to hurt you."

She finds it all spilling out, and she sounds pleading, but inside she's growing angry. She prays something'll catch in his clueless head, because she doesn't really want to know what will come out of her mouth next.

"Yeah? You're doing it right now," Dean says back to her, and his tone is meant to cut. He turns to walk away.

And she finds herself snapping.

"Why do you always do that?" she bites out, and he whirls back.

"What?" She has heard this tone-of-voice before, the one that sounds like rocks crashing individually, brutally, from a thousand-foot cliff.

"Why do you always do that? Why do you always make it my fault? Why do you have to be the martyr? Why is it always about me?" He is even angrier now, and his face has the set of crushing rocks too, but she doesn't care.

"You don't get it either, do you, Dean? You're the one that's always mad at me for not spending enough time with you. Why is that? Huh? How come when you have to hang out with Todd or play some football or do some science project all I get is to be disappointed but when I have to do my homework or work on my resume or take care of Lane or my mom, it's a personal affront? I have a life, Dean! I'm not just here as some sort of sick American version of Remedios. I don't die on command, Dean, and you're sure no Colonel Aureliano!"

She hears Jess's appreciative cough in the background, and allows herself a small smile for having enough presence of mind to work Latin American literature into an argument.

Dean, on the other hand, is looking at her cluelessly, his anger somewhat dimmed by his puzzlement. "What the hell are you on, Rory?" he asks, and the half-sigh in it has some affection.

But Rory won't hear any of it. "I'm not your personal play-toy, Dean," she hisses. "I'm tired of it."

And his anger flares up again. "Excuse me? Who are you making yourself the saint? Oh yeah, Saint Rory, the one who tries to wiggle out of letting her boyfriend come watch her at her play rehearsal when he just wants to be with her for a little bit. Saint Rory who brushes her boyfriend off so she can go over her stupid lists again, because she has to get into Harvard. You know what? I thought if you were going to be my girlfriend, you might actually want to be with me. I thought you might love me. But I guess I was wrong."

And she deflates, because he hasn't seen it again. She sighs, and listens to the sounds of Stars Hollow for a moment, and begins again in a quiet tone. "I do want to be with you, Dean. But that's not the point of loving you." She grows impatient again for a second and stamps her foot. "Loving you is supposed to be about--I dunno, doing what's best for you or something. Even when it's hard or sucks or whatever, it's supposed to be about not being selfish. And loving me is supposed to be like that too. You're supposed to see what's best for me and not let you get in the way. Or--I don't know, but it's not supposed to be like this, Dean! It's not supposed to be guilting me into letting you do a sultan-Nazi Indiana Jones exchange."

"I do like you," Rory whispers, the tears beginning unexpectedly to tilt down the sides of her nose. "I do want to be with you. And that's why I'm crying, and why this hurts."

Dean is beginning to see what's happening here, and he doesn't like it at all. He opens his mouth, but the fury and the attraction war with each other and leave him to gape like a fish. He makes a strangled sound, but Rory cuts him off, quietly, examining the hands that she is twisting quietly together.

"I don't think we should be together anymore."

Dean finds his voice. "Aw, come on, Rory, jeez. I didn't mean it that way."

"This isn't healthy, Dean. I'm sorry; I like you a lot. But we can't do this anymore." She half turns away from him, so she won't have to look at the rage any more, and so he won't see how her heart is breaking.

"Fine," Dean snaps, cracking instantly back into the dominating stranger. The person who doesn't understand her at all. The person that was never her boyfriend. "Be that way, Rory. But don't come crying to me when you realize you were just imitating Lorelai."

She gasps, angry again. "Fine!" she yells, and turns completely away from him. She doesn't watch as he stalks off.

As Rory calms down and the tears begin leaking out again, she hears the town return to its auction. She's not sure how much they've overheard, but she's grateful that they're pretending it didn't happen right in front of them. Miss Patty and Babette will want all the dish later, but now they're staring in some other direction, seemingly fascinated by their fellow townspeople and Taylor's insistent auctioneering.

She sighs angrily, kneads the tears out of her eyes with her fists. She startles when Jess appears by her shoulder, smirking approvingly. "So then, shall we?" he asks, as if none of this has fazed him. As if none of what she's yelled has been of any significance.

Suddenly, she thinks he feels exactly like Dean, exactly as selfish and self-absorbed. So she winds back and slaps him firmly across the face. He reels for a moment, and she realizes that if Lorelai hadn't been surrounded by the crowd--if everyone hadn't been so studiously ignoring her--someone would have tackled Jess to the ground by now. She feels a little guilty.

"Fine," she sighs. "Let's go." And--perhaps she needs a little comfort now, and perhaps she deserves a little--she grabs his hand.