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Rory (she still referred to herself this way, although no one else did) stepped out of the office, briefcase in hand. She looked back up at the tall, imposing building. The building that had been a dream and was now a prison of endless days and endless cups of coffee. Oh she had a good job, a real good job. See what a Yale education can buy? It was well paying, structured and tortuous. It payed cash in return for her soul. Trade a year of your life for a months worth of pay it whispered to her now. Before it had shouted freedom to her, possibilities. She had determined never to be dependent on her husband. But now it was just another iron locked manacle tying her to the prison she called life. It was there, every morning, expectantly, almost humming with the anticipation of her arrival, of her dedication. She was just another high paid corporate drone, tricked into believing that she was thinking for herself and making her own way in the world.
She turned back to the city street, dreading calling a cab, going back home where he would be, already dressed for the function tonight, silently reproaching her because she wasn't ready, because her job was getting in the way. Rory laughed a little, bitterly. She hated her job with such spite that she couldn't stand getting up every morning to go there, but Logan hated it more and so she kept it, and relished the fact that he hated it.
Filled with the sudden spite towards him, Rory started walking down the street. She would get the cab when she felt like it. Of course Rory felt guilty deep down too, he hadn't done anything to deserve this, but that was the way their war went. He always won, but that didn't stop her from fighting. She walked slower and slower, coffee in one hand, briefcase in the other, looking at the shops that lined the street. The traffic noise overwhelmed and soothed her all at once. She stared into the windows, barely even registering what she was seeing, just looking because she could. Because her time was her own and damn it she was going to use it how she wanted.
Her eye suddenly caught on a bookstore, and with a ghost of a smile she went in, barely thinking about what she was doing. The Huntzberger library was one of the most impressive private collections in the world. She had no need for bookstores now, odds are the library had it. But she had lost all pleasure in reading now. It felt like begging for scraps from that family. She felt like she was being fed their ideas every time she picked up one of their books. So she glanced around with some defiance at the books in the shop, browsing now, running her fingers along old favorites that had become her enemies. But here, on neutral ground she could once again lose herself in the idea of them, in the magic of them the way she always had before. She was almost surprised when she reached the back of the store so soon. It was such a tiny shop, how could it have anything new?
Looking at the time she realized that she had to get home unless she was prepared for a battle. A battle that she knew would leave her feeling guilty and wrong, alone in her room tonight in the vacuum of her loveless marriage. Just as she was turning to leave something caught her eye, the name on a small volume, stuck unceremoniously on the shelf. Jess Mariano... a name from a distant past almost forgotten. Could it possibly be Jess? Rory reached out, grasped the book, turned it over to see the picture. The man on the back did bear a striking resemblance to the boy she had known. Rory didn't even look at the title, the price, anything. She brought it to the counter, paid for it with cash, stuck it in her briefcase and caught a cab. She arranged it carefully on the ride home so that Logan would never find it. It was the first time in their marriage that she was keeping anything from him, and damn it, it felt good. She didn't even have to hide it. What would he care what she read? But hiding it felt delicious, a secret safe from his scorn or his indifference.
She didn't have time to think about the book until that night, in bed. She was completely exhausted from the function, although she couldn't even remember what it had been for. Maybe AIDS or starving children or keeping alive the art of playing the harp. She had been disappointingly on time too. Rory got back up and opened the briefcase, sought out the book, and like a girl leapt back into bed. She opened it eagerly, hoping to find in it some hint of her old friend. Memories like that were all she had left now to make her feel alive. But she didn't get past the first few pages. She didn't get past the dedication, because reading it made her heart almost stop. It could have referred to anybody, in fact it probably did refer to someone else, but in that moment Rory was completely and utterly sure that it was about her.
She read the words over and over again:
To the girl I'll always love.
That was all it said, so simple so basic, but Rory had grasped onto the idea of it, the possibilities it presented. She couldn't stop shaking. Jess was part of the past, but so was Rory. And Mrs. Huntzberger was existing less and less too. Yes, everyone called her Mrs. Huntzberger, or Mrs. Logan Huntzberger. She didn't even have her own name anymore. Even Logan didn't call her Rory anymore, he called her Leigh, her middle name. His parents had adopted it as her pet name and it had stuck. So to all their intimate acquaintance she was Leigh Huntzberger. The name was so foreign that Rory could barely identify with it, even after all these years. She always felt like an impostor. She wanted to hear the name Rory again, even from unfriendly lips because at least she would feel like herself. The dedication didn't identify her, but it spoke to her, directly to her, in a way that she hadn't been spoken to in years. And suddenly everything in her snapped and she was packing a suitcase, ready to leave her world to chase the apparition behind a vague dedication. That seemed more real to her than her entire life.
Rory wasn't thinking straight, but she knew enough to know, vaguely, that she was crazy. This was an insane mission that couldn't end well. So she left a note saying that her mom called, that Luke was in the hospital or something like that. It would buy her some time. And in all likelihood she would get the cab, get halfway there and realize how stupid this was, how silly, how impossible and would turn around, go home, tear up the note and go to bed.
So, with a faint idea of how insane she was being she went downstairs and stepped into cab, heart fluttering. She felt so nervous her stomach churned. She wasn't a girl anymore, she was a grown married woman running away because of one line in a book she hadn't even read. In a panic Rory realized that she hadn't even read the back cover. Maybe it was a book about torturing and murdering loved ones... maybe Jess was now crazy and wanted to kill her. Rory laughed a little. With all the things she should have been worried about in that minute that was the least likely possibility. She did pick up the book and flipped to the 'about the author' section. Philadelphia... damn!
This wasn't turning into some spur of the moment easily corrected lapse of judgment. This was flat out abandonment. Nonetheless she went to the airport, whipping out her credit card thoughtlessly to buy the earliest flight to Philadelphia.