A/N: I don't own 'Smile Like You Mean It' by The Killers
Smile like you mean it
Smile like you mean it
Looking back at sunsets on the Eastside
We lost track of the time
Dreams aren't what they usesd to be
-The Killers
Rory sat on her bathroom floor the next afternoon, waiting for the dye to set in her hair. Vicky was pacing back and forth nervously, looking over at Rory every few minutes, "I hope I didn't miss any spots."
Her little sister looked up at her, "Yeah, I hope you didn't too."
Vicky grinned sheepishly, turning to look in the mirror. She fixed her messy bun, "So, Rory."
She didn't look up from her book, "Hmm?"
"How do you like Tristan?" Vicky asked, not taking her eyes off of her reflection.
Rory didn't miss a beat, "He's great."
"Yeah. He is." she turned to look at Rory, "You guys listen to the same music."
"Hmm?" she still didn't tear her eyes away from the pages.
"That rock crap that I can't stand. You, Devin, and Tristan all listen to it."
"Really?"
"Yeah. And in his room there are posters of a bunch of the bands you listen to. He has this one signed by some band..." she trailed off, trying to think of the name.
"Shadows Fall." Rory said without thinking, and then her jaw dropped and she clamped her eyes shut. Damnit.
Vicky turned to look at her, "What?"
Rory shook her head, returning to her book, "Nothing."
"No. You just said Shadows Fall."
She looked up at her, "So?"
"How the hell did you know that was it?"
She shrugged, "Tristan told Devin and Devin told me."
Vicky pursed her lips, but turned away from Rory. As far as she could tell, Devin and Tristan had hit it off surprisingly well, even though Tristan and Rory never really said anything to eachother. She stood from her place on the floor, "I'm gonna take a shower and rinse out my hair." she said, turning on the water so that it could warm up.
Vicky looked her sister over uncertainly before opening the bedroom door, "Call me when you're done so I can see how it turned out." she opened the door and left.
Rory sighed, stepping into the shower. She emerged twenty minutes later, glancing at the mirror,
but she couldn't see her reflection on account of the water that had condensed on the mirror,
making it impossible to see herself. She pulled out her hair dryer and turned it on high, flipping her hair under the hot air. Her hair actually dried faster than most people's, and in about ten minutes, she was done. By then the mirror had cleared, and when she saw herself, she screamed.
Devin came bursting through Rory's door, followed closely by Vicky and Tristan. She opened her bathroom door and her brother asked frantically, "Are you okay? What happened? You sound like you're dying or something."
She was speechless, and she pointed to her hair, "It...it.." she stuttered, unable to speak. The brown was a few shades darker than her natural color, but the dye had simply darkened the streaks, instead of taking them out, so now, instead of purple, they were dark blue.
Devin's eyes widened, Vicky's jaw dropped, and Tristan's head went down a few inches, his eyebrows raised. It wasn't that she didn't like it, but she'd expected to have all brown hair, not brown and blue. Her sister inhaled a deep breath before saying quietly, "At least it'll match the uniform."
WEDNESDAY
Rory looked at Chilton through the backseat of the car she was riding in. It was definitely not where she wanted to spend her Sophomore year of high school. They pulled up in front of the entrance and she slid out, followed closely by Vicky as Devin exited from the front. They called by to their mother collectively before making their way to the door. "So what's your locker number?" Devin asked Rory.
She looked down at a slip of paper in her hand, "580. You?"
"974."
"So Rory, you and I have second, third and sixth hour together, and Devin you and I have first, third, and fourth. And then you two have third, and fifth together. But we're all in the same third period. That's okay, because that's probably the best class I have. You'll like the people in it." she promised before being summoned by Summer the bitch. Rory had only met her a few times, but couldn't stand her, and she wasn't too fond of Rory either.
Devin touched Rory's shoulder lightly, "See you in third."
She sighed, rubbing her temple, "Yeah." before making her way down the hall towards the 500 lockers. It was a top locker, meaning she wouldn't have to bend down. That was one plus. The horrible thing that evened out that nice thing? Tristan's locker was to her left. She found this out when he walked up as she was putting her books in. Minding her own business, she was trying to figure out what she needed for her first class when the blonde walked up next to her,
"Hey."
She looked up, a loose strand of hair falling in front of her face. She had it pulled back because she didn't think that it was a good idea for the administration to see the blue on her first day,
"Oh, hey."
He leaned against the locker next to hers, running his fingers over the hair that had fallen from her loose ponytail, "So, what do you think so far?"
Rory blew at the hair in her face, "Well," she looked over at him, "From what I can tell after being here for ten minutes..." she rolled her eyes.
He held his hands up, "Hey, hey, hey, no need to get defensive or bitchy. I was just trying to make normal conversation. It's what civilized people do, you know."
She looked up at Tristan, the corners of her mouth turning into the shadow of a smile, "But you see Dugrey, that would require us to be civilized human beings, which I find highly over-rated and boring."
He laughed lightly, "I knew it."
She turned back to her locker, "So, as charming as I find your company, what are you doing at my locker?"
"Hmm, I could ask you the same thing."
"Oh?"
"Yep." she spun a combination on the locker he'd been leaning on, "And voila. It opens." he smiled charmingly as she closed her locker, "Looks like we're neighbors, Mary."
She rolled her eyes again, surprisingly not disturbed by the his use of her nickname...it was kind of nice, actually. Comfortable. Like it was just...right. "Wonderful." she started down the hall closing his locker as she passed him. Tristan turned, watching her walk down the hall with a lazy smile grazing his lips.
Rory made her way to her homeroom. People looked up as she entered, but she didn't even glance at them, walking straight to the teacher and handing her a note. The woman read it and nodded, "You can sit right there next to Miss Gellar." she motioned to a girl in the second row with straight, dirty blonde hair.
She went to where she was directed, sitting beside the girl, who glanced over at her, but didn't say anything, so she decided to, "Hey, I'm Rory."
The girl looked over, "You're new." it wasn't a question."
She nodded, "Yeah.
"You planning on going out for the Franklin?"
"The what?" Rory asked, shaking her head.
"The Franklin. School newspaper."
"Oh." she shrugged, "Maybe. Writing paper articles isn't something I do very often, so probably not."
The girl nodded, looking at her desk, "Okay...maybe I can work with that. How are your grades?"
"Um, pretty good."
"Are you smart?"
She had to stifle a laugh, "Yeah. I've been told that."
"How old are you?" she asked suspiciously.
"Fourteen."
The girl snorted, "What? How are you fourteen and in tenth grade?"
Rory tilted her head, "I skipped a grade."
The girl's head cocked back, "So you ARE smart."
"Yeah."
She thought for a moment, sticking out her bottom jaw, "Right. Well anyway, I'm Paris Gellar."
"Rory Hayden."
Paris nodded, "Where did you move here from?"
"Boston."
"Ah. What school did you go to?"
"Whitland Prep."
"Really?"
"Yeah." Rory looked out the door and saw Devin walk past, but he didn't look into the room.
The girl nodded, "Did you know that Chilton has the highest testing scores of any school in New England?"
Rory looked over, "Is it really?"
"Yeah. And Whitland Prep in Boston is the second."
"Now that really is interesting."
"Yeah, I know." she must have missed the sarcasm in Rory's voice. There was a buzzing and Paris looked down at her bag, pulling out a vibrating cell phone. She looked down at it and saw that she'd gotten a text message. She read it and rolled her eyes, sighing. "New guy. Of course."
Rory looked up, "Hmm?"
Paris glanced over at her, "Oh, my friend Louise just sent me a message talking about this hot new guy in her class named Devin." Rory had to stifle a laugh as Paris started to type something back to Louise. "I swear. Every year in the second week of school when she new kids come, there's always a hot guy in Louise's class. I'll introduce you to her later." she said, talking partially to herself, but that last part had been for Rory. The bell rang and a few more kids filed in, and Rory groaned as they did. Paris looked up, "What?" she asked, just in time to see Summer shoot Rory a dirty look, which she returned. "Okay..." she said uncertainly.
Rory turned to her, "What?"
"You know Summer? Because while she is a bitch, not many people hate her before they know her."
"I know her."
Paris looked surprised, "You do? How?" Rory opened her mouth to reply, but at that moment, a voice came on from the intercom, so she just sat lower in her seat, trying to ignore her sister's best friend.
After class was out, Paris followed Rory to her locker, "So, how do you know Summer?" she asked.
Rory turned to face her, "She's my sis-" but she was cut off when someone came up behind her.
"Rory!"
She turned, "Hey Devin." she grinned, he looked tired.
"I'm going to kill Vicky." he said quietly, and Paris's eyes narrowed.
Rory laughed, turning to her locker, "And why is that?" she asked, but was cut off when Tristan joined them, grinning.
"It's not funny!" Devin snarled, and that just made him laugh lightly.
"Okay, Tristan, since Devin is obviously not going to answer my question, what did Vicky do?"
He shook his head, "She just kept annoying him. No one's ever met Devin, so she wants them to have this picture of the two of them being so much alike..." he trailed off, laughing.
Rory smiled, "What did she say?"
Devin's nose wrinkled, "She told her friends the story of our great grandparents." Rory did something that wasbetween a laugh and a groan. They were all three named after great grandparents. She was named after Richard's mother, while Vicky was named after Straub's mother, and Devin was named after Francine's father. "And she included them coming over from Ireland and starting their own buisnesses and everything."
Tristan started laughing again, "And then she got onto the topic of Devin being in a band." he shook his head, "she was so proud."
Rory poked him in the side gently, "And did you add that you were the singer?"
Tristan touched his side, "Nope."
Devin's lip curled, "She said I played guitar."
Rory shook her head, "You do play guitar."
Devin sighed, "Yes, I know thank you. But I did not however, play guitar in the band."
"That because you kick ass at base." Tristan said, leaning against the locker.
"Yes he does, and that annoyed you?"
"Yeah, it annoyed me!" he said loudly, frowning because now both Tristan and Rory were laughing at his expense. He noticed Paris over Rory's shoulder and nodded to her, "Hey. I'm Devin."
She nodded, "Paris." This whole time she'd been standing right behind Rory, trying to figure out what was going on, and she was about to ask a few questions, like since when did Vicky Gilmore have a brother and a sister, not to mention a brother and sister in the same grade she was in. What hell were they? Triplets? And why was Rory's last name Hayden? But before she got the chance, Vicky popped up.
"Hey." she smiled, resting her arm on Tristan's side.
He looked down, and Paris saw some of the light leave his eyes, "Hey Vik." Rory snorted, amused. Tristan looked over at her, the corners of his lips turning up, "What?"
She shook her head, "I've never met anyone else who saw the need to shorten an already shortened name."
Tristan smiled, sensing their old banter, "Well now you have Ma-" Devin coughed at the same time as he stepped onTristan's foot, and the name died in his throat.
Vicky looked up at him, while Paris's eyes darted between the four of them suspiciously, "What was that?" Vicky asked.
Tristan shook his head, "Nothing."
"But-"
"It was nothing, Vicky." Tristan kissed her lightly, needing her to stop talking. Rory inhaled a slow, deep breath, closing her eyes before glancing over at Devin. Tristan pulled away from Vicky and she smiled, letting it go for the moment. Summer came up, engaging her in a conversation, and Rory, Devin, and Tristan looked at eachother, all having the same thought. God, what would they do without Devin? That had been a close one.