A/N this is an excerpt from Rory's journal. Set a week after the break up confrontation scene. Only a few chapters to go I know I want Tristan and Rory together to but I don't want it rushed because Rory isn't like that. So just bear with me. Suggestions are appreciated!

I sat in my room my finished homework scattered around me the only light is the small glass lamp on my night stand. Mom had a meeting tonight and Ihad spent the night doing landry and doing my massive amounts of homework. I packed my bag for school and placed it by the door returning to my orginal postion. Sitting in my pj's ready for bed. My mind was unable to focus on anything besides the weeks past events. I leaned my back against the oaken headboard and sighed. The silence in the house was deafing. Grabbing my journal of the stand and opening it to the next available page and began to write :

Hey it's me again,

I've been post Dean for a week now. It hurts giving him up, and letting the "us" go but I feel so much lighter almost like a giant weight has been lifted. If I didn't have Tristan here I don't know what I would have done. He's been my strength and my shoulder to cry on. He makes this whole situation less bleak. He reminds me that I'm strong enough to endure this. And I know I will get over this. I haven't cried over it since that night and slowly but surely I'm healing. Thanks to mom and mine's late night movie marathons and gallons of Luke's coffee. It's starting to hurt less and less. I truly proud of myself for being able to deal with the enormity of what had happened in the past weeks.

I see Dean occasionally In Doose's or in the square. It hurts a little but not unbearably so. We nod at one another and smile occasionally. It may take some time but hopefully eventually we'll be able to carry on conversations and if we really work at it become friends again. But not now, theirs to much sordid thoughts and silent accusations between us. We need time for the wounds to heel and time to smooth over the ruff edges before we try to become friends. I truly wanted, no at this point I needed to believe that we would be able to over come this and be friends.

I really cared for him and I do wish that I had loved him...(life would have been so much simpler ifI had)In a warped way I did, just not the way he wanted me too. He was a great first boy friend and we had some genuinely great moments but...then other times, he was just so damned possessive, he suffocated me. And I needed a way out. After we broke up the first time, our spark fizzled out neither of us was able to admit it but it was gone all the same. Dean was so afraid of losing me that he pulled me so close I began to push away from him. Stepping back, now and giving the relationship a long hard look made me see how unhealthy the whole situation really was. It felt good, therapeutic to be able to analyze what had happened between us.

We both clung to each other because we were to afraid to move on. Me became security blankets for one another. I understand now that I clung to Dean so tightly because he was safe. Ordinary and constant I like things I can count on because their so rare in my life. I mean my Dad has never been a constant fixture in my life, even when I really needed him he just kind of slipped in and out of my life and I became so distrusting that when Dean left I freaked I needed that constant however unhealthy it was. So I told him I loved him to make him stay because I honestly thought that constant meant love.

The scariest thing about all of this is my growing feelings for Tristan. I never, not matter what was going on, got these tingly heart wenching cliché feelings when Dean kissed me, let alone just touch me. When he places a simple hand on my arm I come completely unglued. I'm ashamed that I can get over Dean so quickly and move on to the next guy. But, I think that me and Dean had been over long before I broke up with him we were just desperately holding on to something that no longer existed.

I had never thought of cheating but when we stood their on the porch steps after the poetry reading, his fingers grazing my cheek. The snow falling all around us. Staring unwaveringly into those intoxicating ocean blue vortex like eyes. I wanted so bad to kiss him and be kissed by him. I know now that if he I wouldn't have stopped him. I would have kissed back without hesitation. That's when I knew, it was truly the end of my relationship with Dean. Because you don't feel that way with friends. And I don't think that thinking of other guys in those terms when your in a relationship is really the thing that a girl in love should do.

I'm just glad it's over all of it now I can start to look forward instead of just looking back and crying over it. Time will heal all wounds and soon I'll be back to normal just a little wiser because I don't think that you ever stay the same after a relationship ends you grow up a little, cry a little, go forward a little more cautiously, all the while picking up and moving on. I'm ready to move on now looking back right now is just to painful. So moving forward slowly but surely I'm looking to my future.

Thanks for listening

Rory

I closed the journal then. Finally contented. Writing it down made it tangible more concrete. It put me at ease to finally have all of my jumbling feelings down. Sighing warmly and stretching thinking for the first time in the whole ordeal that things would be ok. That I would be ok. My first genuine smile in an eternity crossed my lips as I shut the lamp off and snuggled into the blankets. Excited with the thoughts of what the following days would bring.

A/N Please tell me what you think I'm dying to know. Reviews make my world go round and ObsessiveGilmore sorry, to disappoint but I've never actually seen that movie that confrontation Tristan growing up was my own creation. I wanted ya'll to see how much being around Rory changes Tristan and how he has grown up over the course of our story. And thanks LoVe23 Homcoming was awesome. LoL! PLEASE REVIEW!