Beyond Degrassi

Part 2: Change is Sometimes a Very Subtle Thing

"I can't believe I've made it through the second quarter! The work itself was harder than the mid-terms, don't you think?" She paused, but not with enough time for him to really answer her, "Well anyway, you've got me for one whole night, so where are you taking me?" Paige looked over at Robert. He told her they were going to have a real night out together, and he knew just the place. They were driving through the downtown area.

"It's a nightclub called Elixir, I always have a great time here. Plus, since your 19 now, I thought you'd like to celebrate the end of mid-terms with a few drinks." Robert winked at the girl he desperately wanted to be his girlfriend. She was incredibly difficult to pull away from her work, but the times he was able to made it completely worth the effort.

"Now Robert, you aren't trying to get me drunk are you?" Paige teased, as she twirled a strand of her hair around her finger, and gave him a sweet and innocent smirk. She wouldn't be drinking, never again would she drink with a guy she didn't truly trust.

"Of course not," he shrugged, "But if you want to get a little tipsy, the bill is all on me babe."

They pulled into a parking garage and walked hand in hand into Elixir Night Club. Paige thought this was a rather strange choice of dates, considering how the man seemed to be hopelessly interested in her. She didn't think any of her mannerisms made her seem like a Night Club type.

They sat in a booth and he ordered them a round of drinks. Only after he had ordered did she inform him that she wasn't really a drinker. He looked worried about his choice to bring her to a club. It was an adorable expression, so she put an arm around him and kissed his cheek seductively. His eyes widened and he shifted his weight in the bench.

"What? I don't need to drink to see how handsome you are." She whispered into his ear, and poked his nose playfully with her finger. He laughed, and his charming smile spread back across his face. She giggled.

"Hey" A familiar voice said loudly from behind Paige. She pulled away from Robert right before he had made his move to kiss her. The owner of the familiar voice was none-other than Alex. Paige blinked hard, afraid she was loosing her mind. Alex casually dropped down into the booth right next to Paige, with a beer in one hand. "I wondered how long it would be until I just happened to run into you." she said.

Paige stared at her ex, confused and now far more shocked than Robert had just been. It was really Alex, here in Kingston, and venomous as ever. "Alex!" Paige gasped, she felt her mouth moving but no other words were coming out. Butterflies filled her stomach, her head spun with the sudden rush. Her face reddened and she couldn't decide whether she was furious or ecstatic.

Alex set her dark eyes coldly on Robert, letting her intimidation techniques run wild, "Hey Rich boy, you a teacher or a student? I know she likes the teacher type and all."

"I'm a student, my name is Robert." He smiled kindly at Alex despite her glare, "So you're an old friend of Paige's? I think she's mentioned you, Alex, great to meet you." He offered his hand for her to shake. She ignored the gesture completely.

"Right, an old friend. Good to know I was at least mention worthy." Alex said with a slight sneer.

"Ah... Alex, Robert is just a friend." Paige tried to explain with desperation in her voice. Paige didn;t want Alex to think she was over her, because she wasn't. She didn't want Alex to be angry, she hated when Alex was angry. Alex just scoffed at her desperate explanation. She didn't believe her, and why should she? She suddenly wondered why Alex was here at all. Alex didn't want to move to Kingston, that was supposedly why they had broken up. Paige sat up a little straighter, "What are you doing here?"

"Drinking, having a good time." Alex chuckled and gestured at her beer as she hopped back out of the booth. "I'll let you get back to your date with Mr. Preppy Pants. See ya around."

"Alex, wait!" Paige scooted out after her, "Not why are you in a bar. That seems enough like you, actually, but why are you here in Kingston? That is so... not you."

Alex smiled a smile of irony and looked at the ground for a moment. Paige waited for an answer, she wanted so much to hear the three little words that made her heart just melt. Alex pulled Paige close and spoke into her ear, "I told you I needed to do things on my own time line, I needed to figure out what I wanted. I couldn't stop thinking about you. So here I am, a love-struck fool." Alex's tone said more than her words, she had seen Paige kiss Robert, she stepped away from Paige "Don't let an ex, oh, I mean old friend, dropping by ruin your date."

Paige watched her slink away into the dance floor. Those were not the three little words, though all three of them were in what she said. Alex was in Kingston, a 'love-struck fool'. Paige wanted to scream, she wanted to cry. She wanted to hit rewind, and re-do the last half hour of her life. The waitress brought over the two drinks Robert had ordered. She grabbed hers and downed it. Then she took his and downed it as well.

"I thought you said you didn't drink?" He asked, more than a little concerned. Paige leaned on the table, already feeling the poison she just forced into her body. Robert couldn't help but ask about the strange girl, "Why did she say that ex thing? What did she mean by that?"

She put her head in her hands, frustrated and dizzy. "Alex wasn't just a friend, Robert. That's my ex-girlfriend, from high school. I don't know why she is here" Paige said almost too quietly for him to make out in the loud night club.

"Ex-girlfriend? That's something, I guess I'm clueless when it comes to girls." He smiled weakly. He'd never thought of Paige as that experimental. Either way, though, he could tell the whole encounter had been an emotional hurricane for her.

"I'll be right back." Paige said before she wobbled out to the dance floor. Robert watched her go, he assumed she was going to go find Alex and clear up whatever was going on. Jay took up a seat next to Robert as soon as Paige had disappeared into the crowd of people.

"She's something, isn't she?" He smirked at Robert, and handed him a new drink.

"Excuse me?" Robert asked, taking the offered drink from the employee.

"She didn't tell you she went the gay-way then, eh?" He patted Robert on the back, and leaned in real close "It's all good, who knows, maybe you can make it work to your advantage. You and her are already rather intimate, eh? I hear she's hot stuff in bed."

"Who the hell do you think you are, sir?" Robert scrunched his eyebrows together and frowned at Jay. Robert knew the guy worked here, he had seen him before. He had no idea the sleazy bastard had been that close to his future girlfriend.

"Oh." Jay feigned an oops face, "Well, I figured she had been with you longer than just tonight."

"What's that suppose to mean?" Robert was getting angrier and angrier by the moment. If this guy was another one of Paige's ex's he wasn't sure he could handle it. The guy gave him nothing but bad vibes, and yet he couldn't help buy believe what he was saying to him.

"It's just, you know man, Paige is one of those 'easy' girls. I just would have figured, if she was into you..." Jay shrugged as if it was just common knowledge. He looked at his watch "Wow, look man I gotta get back to work, but good luck with the relationship an all that"

He snickered as he walked away from the table. He had been prepared for this exact situation, and he felt it had gone better than smooth, it was almost perfectly played out. Robert and Paige were soon to be history.

Paige didn't find Alex on the dance floor. She went to the bar and had a couple more drinks, she asked a few people if they had seen Alex in the last few minutes. No one had. The bar tender knew Alex's name by description.

"Oh yeah, Alex. She's in here most nights, at least the night's her boyfriend works." The Bartender explained, "She's probably wandering around here somewhere."

"Wait, did you say boyfriend?" Paige interrupted what the man was saying. She felt betrayed, and heart broken. Alex had a boyfriend, and she was giving Paige shit about kissing Robert? She didn't wait for the answer. She couldn't. She would be happy if she never heard anyone ever say "Alex" and "boyfriend" in correlation ever again. She marched, at least she tried to march, over to Robert. He looked less than amused by her overt tipsy behavior. "I want to go." She demanded

He didn't talk to her on the way to the car, and she sure as hell didn't mind. Her head was spinning for more than one reason. He still didn't talk to her on the ride to her dorm, and she hardly even noticed. Alex was in Kingston, and she was here with a boyfriend. It seemed like some kind of cruel joke.

"I had no idea you were a dyke and a slut." Robert said sarcastically as they pulled up to her dormitory. "I guess that just shows what you wanted out of a guy like me. You could have just said no, rather than leading me on like this."

"I'm not a Dyke or a slut! And I do like you!" Paige exclaimed as she drunkenly opened the car door. She was on the edge of tears, as she clambered out of the car "I can't even begin to process what just happened back there, but I was not leading you on, I have a past just like everyone else does. So Alex is part of my past, I'm sorry I didn't tell you more about her. So sue me."

"Sue you? No, Paige. Break-up with you, yes. Good bye." He leaned over and pulled the passenger door shut.

"Break up with me? I wasn't even going out with you!" Paige yelled out at his car, as it sped away. She thought about throwing a shoe at his back window, for good measure but he was gone by the time she got the shoe off.

She stumbled up to her room and sobbed into her pillow for a bit. She thought she had missed the Degrassi drama, but she was wrong. This was horrible, and she couldn't stop replaying the scene at the night club in her head. Alex was here. Alex had no other reason to be in Kingston, she couldn't of been lying about that. But, then why did she have a boyfriend? A boyfriend, not even a girlfriend. Alex had said she was sure of it, that she was a lesbian. That what Paige made her feel no man could ever make her feel. Was that all just lies?

At the Jay Alex headquarters...

Alex walked in the door, finally. Jay had been up waiting for her to come home most of the night. He was out of work and home by 2:30, and now it was starting to get light outside. She looked wrecked.

"I'm sorry Lex" He stood to greet her, comfort her, console her... anything he could so. He hated seeing her like this.

"It's no big deal. It's not like she would have waited for me, it's not like I asked her to wait for me." Alex tried not to cry, she had spent most of the night walking and trying to get over Paige. "I broke up with her, it's all my fault. I can't do anything right, I don't even know why I listened to you. Why did I come here? Who the fuck am I kidding?" Tears escaped her eyes, despite her effort to keep them back.

"Don't say that Lexi, you're doing a great job over at the parlor, Sparx says you're great." Jay tried to pull her into a hug, but she pulled away from him, so he continued to console her with words "And with Paige, I don't think it's all that bad. I talked to the guy she was with."

"You what?" Alex's tears stopped instantly as her anger flashed back onto her face, she just knew he had tried something. Another bad Jay plan. "You didn't say anything to him did you?"

"Well... maybe a few little things, no big deal though, I did it for you" he explained, a little taken-back by her reproach.

"For me? What exactly did you 'do' for me?"

"Hey, I didn't think you'd get so mad about it. Jeez. I told the guy Paige was into girls, and I guess I might of made him think she was a bit of a tramp, but it's all for the better. He was furious, you should have seen it Lex. I bet you Paige is completely single again already. I took care of it."

Alex slapped him, as hard as she could. He stumbled back from the impact.

"How could you?" she screamed at him in his stunned state, "Paige is bi, and she is not a tramp. I don't want anyone to think that! You could ruin her life at University! You're such a fucking idiot!"

Jay rubbed his face where she had slapped him. He could feel his temper boiling, but he took a deep breath. He wouldn't act like Chad, despite Alex acting like her mother. He had so many things he wanted to scream back at her, but he would be better than that. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a fancy black leather wallet, without a word he slammed it down onto the kitchen counter. He walked away, went into his bed room and slammed the door.

Alex picked up the wallet, she knew who's wallet it was before she opened it. Inside she found credit cards, and ID, a few membership cards. He had several hundred dollars in his fancy Rich boy wallet. Alex felt sick, she hated Robert B. Porter. She wasn't angry Jay had hurt him, but she couldn't stand the idea of Paige being hurt by Jay's thoughtless actions. She took the money out of the wallet and threw the rest of it in the trash. The rich boy wouldn't miss it, she was sure.

A/N: I just edited this chapter, it wasn't working quite right for me before. Also, I realize the summary says Emma/Jay and I haven't followed up on that yet. I think it will still be a couple chapters before I throw Emma in the mix. I'd like any Emma suggestions anyone has, they may or may not help me out... thanks everyone who is reading my story, even all of you who don't review. '