AN: Back again. Had some keyboard issues—the laptop seems to have half-died, got the old plug in keyboard set up. Very annoying.
Her heartbeat quickened more than a little bit, knowing that he was walking past her shower stall. She recognized his shower shoes, a must-have item in the communal shower area, as he walked past her curtained off area. She heard him drop his shower caddy on the tile floor in the next stall, and she realized he was in the process of disrobing, right at this very moment. She'd seen most of his chiseled physique the other day in his room. She could picture his abs rippling as he shirked off his robe and hung it up on the hook. She could almost still feel the warmth radiating off his skin even before she came into contact with it that night he hugged her in his room. It would be even hotter now in the steam-filled bathroom. He might already be damp, beads of sweat building up at the nape of his neck beginning to roll slowly down. . . . She ducked her head under the hot stream of pelting water in her curtained off stall; desperate to drown out all the images she didn't need swimming through her head.
He'd gone out last night, on the double date with Dan and the girls from the floor below them. She'd surmised they'd had a successful evening. She knew they came in late, as she had been up half the night reading, unable to sleep for some strange reason. She'd heard the two guys' voices around 2:30am, as they headed back to their respective rooms. She'd never had a date last until 2:30am that wasn't to be filed under at least a four star rating. It made the worries about the meaning of what tonight would be increase—seeing as she hadn't mentioned their 'date' since the night before last. He mentioned something in passing last night, as he and Dan left to pick up the other girls, that he'd pick her up around seven, but that was all. She just wished he'd gotten home sooner last night.
"Rory?"
She poked her head out of the water flow, shaking the water out of her ears. She had to be full on hallucinating now. Tristan wasn't calling her name from the next shower stall. It was not happening.
"Rory?"
Or maybe it was.
"Tristan?"
"Do you have any extra shampoo I can borrow?"
She hesitated, trying to figure out in what universe this scenario would be considered plausible. Tristan was buck naked in the shower next to her, asking her to hand him her shampoo? This wasn't normal life. This was like the beginning to one of those insane stories in the front of men's magazines.
"How did you even know I was right here?"
"Because no one else I know would have a School House Rock bath towel. Very cute, by the way."
She turned pink in the shower, and not from the hot water that was nearly scalding her skin. She reminded herself that he couldn't see her, and tried to carry on the conversation, such as it was.
"You don't want my shampoo."
"I ran out, I need some. Just hand it over."
"It's girly."
"How can shampoo be girly?"
"It's peach-mango."
"Who puts fruit in shampoo?"
"Girls like to smell pretty!"
She heard him sigh. "If you don't want it, fine."
"No, hand it over," he grumbled.
"I'm all soapy," she protested.
There was no answer for a beat, and she suddenly realized the kinds of mental images, that should he have been successful in keeping at bay until this very moment, that were sure to be flooding his mind now.
"So rinse off, I can wait," he managed. "Or I can just come over there—I'm all wet, but I've yet to work up a lather."
Was he teasing her? If so, it was working. She felt another kind of heat swell up from her core, and she pressed her forehead to the cool tiled back wall of the shower stall.
"Rory?"
"Okay, come and get the shampoo."
"If you insist," she could hear the smile in his voice. She heard his water shut off, and then the scuffling of his shower shoes against the tile outside her shower curtain.
"Where is it?"
"Hang on, it's in here," she said, grabbing the bottle and shoving her hand out the curtain towards him.
He took it from her hand, and she withdrew her hand back behind the curtain quickly. She heard no further movement from him. His feet were clearly still in front of her curtain.
"Did you need something else?"
"I was smelling the shampoo. Is this really going to make my hair smell like a dessert topping?"
"Take it or leave it."
"Fine. You can come visit me when you're done, to get it back."
"Great," she half groaned.
He said nothing in return, but she heard him leave her area, and she was able to let the breath she'd been holding out. She finished rinsing off quickly, and pulled back her curtain slowly, grabbing her towel that had indeed fallen on the floor, alerting him to her whereabouts. She dried off, gathered her shower items, and moved to stand outside his curtain.
"Tristan?"
"Yeah."
"Are you finished with the shampoo?"
"Sure, come on in," he said, and she moved into the first curtained off area. She jumped as his shampoo-covered head stuck out of the next curtain.
"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you. You really are jumpy, aren't you?"
"I just thought you'd hand it to me."
"That's no fun. Come in here and get it," he raised an eyebrow as his lips curved up in a playful grin.
"Tristan!" she admonished him, not in the mood to play around when it came to him being naked. It made her more than uneasy, what with their might-be date this very evening. Not that she had the nerve to clear that matter up right now either.
"You're so tense. I could rub your shoulders, under the hot water—really works wonders."
"I'll pass. Shampoo, please."
"Excuse me, but what is going on behind curtain number three?"
Dan's voice startled both of them, and Rory immediately turned pinker than she had been just seconds before. Tristan held in a laugh at her reaction.
"Nothing, just some neighborly sharing," he offered.
"Well, unless you're exchanging a cup of sugar back there, one of you needs to exit the stall, in a decently covered condition," Dan said, hating to be the stickler, but having no real choice.
"Damn. And here I thought I might wear you down," he winked at her and handed over the shampoo.
She narrowed her eyes at him, and hurried out of the stall, to face an amused Dan. She held up the bottle, to show him of her innocence.
"This isn't what it looks like."
"Look, whatever was going on in there, I can't be encouraging people to think it's kosher to share shower time. This isn't a bathhouse."
"We weren't—I mean, I wouldn't have—he just needed," she tried over and over, nothing sounding quite right.
"Dismissed, Gilmore."
"Thanks," she ducked away to brush her teeth, Tristan's laughter audible from his stall.
XXXX
"Wait, so, you caught showering together?" Lorelai busted out laughing.
"Mom, stop."
"Well, maybe it's just me, but I'm pretty sure any boy that offers to shower with you wants any outing with you to be a date."
"He was going out with someone else, just last night."
"He wasn't showering with her, now was he?"
"It's not allowed. Not that I would even want it to be."
"Hey, don't knock it 'til you've tried it," she said, but suddenly thought better of her comment. "I mean, if you have tried it, I don't want to hear about it—ever—but if you do at some point in the future, preferably then I wouldn't hear about it either."
"Mom, calm down. These are not details I'd share."
"Good."
"So, you seem chipper. Did you talk to Luke about living together?"
"Well, funny you should mention that."
"Why?"
"This morning, Luke had stayed over, and he forgot to bring his toothbrush with him. He was all grumbly 'cause I didn't have a spare, and he complained about the back and forth and the constant need to carry his belongings around with him like a nomad and how it was crazy that we were essentially living in two separate places."
"It is crazy. Why don't you just have doubles—it's much easier to have a toothbrush that you can just leave at the guy's place."
"Gah!-Details, stop."
"Sorry. Go on. What did you say in return?"
"I agreed with him."
"Wait, does that mean—what does that mean?"
"I'm not sure. He got really quiet after I agreed with him. I don't think he expected me to."
"Huh. So, you're both big chickens?"
"It would seem so. He said 'Well, I guess that's a conversation,' then mumbled something about a bread shipment and left. It was really early."
"Someone needs to smack the both of you."
"There's something else. I don't know if I should tell you."
"What?"
"Logan stopped by."
"What, when, why?"
"He's not doing good, kid. He just wanted to talk. He misses you. He wanted advice about how much space to give you, and just wanted to be near things that reminded him of you, I think."
"You told him to back off, right?"
"I told him that if you guys were meant to be together, it would happen, but he needed to let you come to him. That once you set your mind to something, it's unstoppable. That if he really loved you, he'd respect your wishes."
"Thanks."
"He really seems to love you."
"I know."
"So, that's all the news. I promise. No other ex-boyfriend news."
"Good."
"So, your date starts soon?"
"It's not a date. Officially."
"Right. Be sure and mock his fruity hair for me," she added.
"I will. Oh, that's him now. Bye."
"Bye."
Rory hung up quickly and smoothed her dress before opening the door. She let him step inside, and he got his first good look at her dorm room.
"Hey, I just need to pull my shoes on."
"No problem," he said, sitting on the edge of her bed as she opened the closet door to grab her shoes. He noticed her stacks of books that nearly filled the closet and his eyes went large.
"It's like a public library in there," he said, standing up next to her, looking at all the titles.
"Oh, yeah. They go everywhere I do."
"That's one hell of a heavy security blanket," he quipped.
"Okay, enough looking at my closet."
"Don't like me poking about in your room?"
"No, it's just strange."
"As strange as this morning?" he smiled.
"Do we have reservations somewhere?" she dodged his question.
"We do. You look nice, by the way."
"Thanks," she ducked past him, moving to grab her purse. "I wasn't sure if this was—I mean, how fancy a celebration this would be," she covered.
"Hey, a big fancy internship deserves a big fancy celebration, does it not?"
"I'll be a peon. Nothing about my job duties will be fancy."
He shrugged. "But it'll be exciting to you, right? This is what you've always been itching to do?"
The fact that he got it—he got her—made her want to kiss him. It wasn't a romantic inclination, it was bigger than that. She felt drawn to him in an indescribable way. She looked at him, wondering if he knew just how astute his words were.
"Right. Exactly."
"Then, let's go celebrate, Ms. Intern."
She smiled, and took his outstretched hand. Once outside, they immediately stopped at the curb, and he hailed a cab. He opened the door for her, and they climbed in. He gave the address to the driver, and sat back next to her.
"Not close enough to walk?"
"Nope."
"So, did you guys have fun last night?" she hedged, trying to sound breezy.
"Dan did. He and Elisa really hit it off. Though he made a bit of a fool out of himself at the end of the night."
"What happened?" she asked, now more interested as he stressed the fact that Dan had had fun.
"Well, we went for ice cream after the movie, and I told them your ice cream cone story."
She nodded, not seeing what was so wrong with that, unless Dan was a biter too.
"Let's just say he looked like a five year old—he had chocolate ice cream all over his face by the time he was done with his cone."
Rory erupted into giggles at the double meaning, and put her hand on his shoulder to steady herself. "Well, I'm impressed that you braved another cone so quickly—and that you repeated the lore."
"Hey, no, I had mine in a dish."
More giggles. He smiled at her enjoyment. Her unconscious touching of him didn't suck either. She really did look lovely—in a flowing dress that stopped just under her knees, her hair half swept up off her neck. Her laughter just accentuated her beautiful features.
"Well, it sounds like you had fun."
"That's because you didn't have to listen to my date."
"Not a soul mate?"
"Not even close. She didn't know who the Beatles were."
Rory stopped and her mouth dropped open in shock. "What? How is that even possible?"
"I have no idea," he shook his head. "We were talking about the day trips we wanted to make while here in England, and Dan mentioned Liverpool—it just got ugly from there."
"I can imagine," she giggled.
They pulled up outside the restaurant, and made their way in. True to his word, he'd made reservations, as they were whisked immediately to their table. They were on a second floor balcony of some sort. The bottom floor had a band set up, and a large dance floor area. It was more of an upscale club than a restaurant.
He leaned in and filled her in. "You like Interpol? I heard they were doing an impromptu show here tonight."
Her mouth gaped open, for what felt like the billionth time today. "You're kidding."
He shook his head. "Nope."
"This is amazing," she said, looking into his pleased blue eyes.
"Well, let's just make sure my sources are right and we aren't out to be serenaded with some cheesy cover band singing show tunes or something equally horrific."
"You mean it might not be the Beatles?" she deadpanned.
He just laughed, enjoying the way she seemed comfortable, pleased, and ready for anything. They fell into conversation, both with their fruit-scented hair, enjoying the other's company regardless of the amazing music, five-star food, or whatever label one might put on this evening. Right now it was just important to be in each other's company.
