A/N: Thank you very much to all those people who had reviewed the previous chapter; I love to hear what all of you have to say. It's what keeps me going. ).

Regarding a review that I had gotten about Rory being out of character, I just want to say that in my story, it's been years since she have had a serious relationship, and the reason why she is the way she is now is because her heart is still in the past, and well, this story is about her figuring that out. Rory's older now, and she's changed. When she goes away for a long period of time to do her job, she gets lonely, and thus she has Wallace.

I understand where you're coming from though, and I appreciate what you had to say. Thanks for taking notice. :)

Anyway, enjoy this chapter! There'll be a link for the photoshopped picture at the end.

R&R!

STAND STILL, LOOK PRETTY

CHAPTER 2

A LONG TIME COMING

Rory returned to her small room after a very exciting, life-threatening news day. It was not breaking news; it had been a small riot compared to the previous ones that she had voluntarily been in the middle of. But for some reason, it was the one that had her thinking about her death.

Every time she went out with her microphone to stand in what hell must surely look like, she knew that she was in danger. But no matter how scared she was, or no matter how bad the situation was, she had focused, letting her thoughts go nowhere but to the story at hand. And even though she had been injured more than once, the reality of what she was doing never grabbed her like it did today.

She had run after Wallace, trusting the tall man to lead her to the riot, to where the danger was, no questions asked. And when she had burst into the scene, seeing her camera man and everyone else ready in position waiting for her and feeling rather than seeing Wallace took out his tape recorder beside her, fear totally grabbed her by the neck.

She had stood, rooted to the spot, her eyes drinking everything in. She had felt Wallace started to run towards the disarray and without thinking, she had grabbed his hand, willing him to stop.

He had turned, his eyes questioning as it met hers. It had turned to worry when he saw how big with fear her blue eyes were. When Rory saw the concern starting to fill his handsome face, she shook her head to get a grip on herself. Turning to look at her crew, she saw that their expressions mirrored Wallace's.

Rory had never hesitated.

Grimacing, she had pushed Wallace's hand away and ran into the destructive scene, trusting everyone else to do their job behind her.

Rory had then turned to face the camera and in that instant, she became what she was, Rory Gilmore, a journalist, an international correspondent.

Rummaging through her first aid kit to look for band-aids for her minor cuts, Rory deliberately ignored the three letters sitting on her table. She knew that the presence of those letters were what caused her to perform so poorly at her job today and she would put off looking at those letters for as long as she could.

Stand still, look pretty, she thought to herself. How ironic.

She left the letters as they were and went about doing what she needed to do before she got ready for bed. People knocked on her door, but she didn't answer them. She had too much in her mind to tolerate being pestered with their sympathy. She needed to be alone for a bit, to mull things over.

Turning the tap on, Rory slowly undressed, taking care for her minor yet scathing cuts, and contemplated.

She was everything she had ever hoped to be. She graduated Chilton and Yale, went on a one year campaign trail and went to many different foreign places that enabled her to become her role model. Everything she had worked for, she got. Everything.

And yet, Rory could not explain the feeling of something missing in her life. Never since she had started her job, had she ever given this missing part a thought before.

Never until she received those three letters.

Dean, Jess and Logan.

It was strange for her to think that the three of them actually watched her on the news… that they could still see her, see what she had been up to all these years that she had been away from them. She, for one, couldn't, nor had she bothered to look them up. There was too much baggage between them and Rory didn't want to dig up old memories that now would only serve to bring pain into her heart.

Rory was sure that she had gotten over them, or rather, had managed to never think about them anymore, but it didn't change the fact that she never had a serious relationship after those three. She had always justified it by saying to herself that it was because her job didn't allow such a commitment, that it would just put an enormous strain on the relationship. But now she wasn't so sure.

Standing in the midst of the riot that day, she had thought to herself, if she died there, how could she ever make things right? What was there to be made right, she didn't even know herself, but Rory just knew that if she didn't see those three men again, whatever she had achieved until that point would mean nothing. If she died, she would die thinking that she was a failure.

Rory had her dream job, but no, she hadn't gotten everything.

She continued to wash herself, hissing as the cold water ran through her bruised body. She heard the door to her room open and knew that it must be Wallace; he was the only one she had given a key to. She could hear him hum the tune to Walking on Sunshine, his favourite song. The humming grew louder and Rory knew he was getting closer. Soon enough, he entered the bathroom and his eyes tightened when he saw the cuts adorning her pale body.

He grabbed her towel hanging by the door as she rinsed her body for one last time. He came closer and wrapped the towel around her petite body, hugging her from behind. Even though the pain of her cuts multiplied, she felt comforted by his presence and savored the moment.

"You're okay?" Wallace softly whispered above her ear.

He was a head taller than her and she leaned her wet head on his shoulder.

"I'm fine," she replied just as softly.

He was a close companion. But she didn't love him. Not in the way she had loved the other three.

Freeing herself from his embrace, Rory walked out of the bathroom and started dressing herself for bed. Wallace watched from the bathroom door saying nothing, but his eyes spoke volumes.

Rory ignored the love that she saw in him; he knew that she didn't love him the way he loved her and he accepted it. She had made it clear since the very first day they had decided to be more than friends that what they had was not a relationship. It was physical and nothing more; she expected nothing and hoped that he did not either. And truly at first, everything was exactly just that. But somewhere along the way, he had faltered and had fallen in love with her. But Wallace being Wallace, honored their agreement and never asked for anything more. He knew who Rory Gilmore was; a bold, hard-working woman who never gets attached. He knew, but he did not or could not stop loving her.

"We can go home, Rory," Wallace said, breaking the silence once Rory was dry and dressed.

Rory eyed the letters once more and nodded.

"Good."

She walked over to her table and ran her fingers over the three letters.

"Rory…"

Feeling the pain in his voice, Rory had no choice but to turn and look at him across the room. She knew the reason for his sadness. Once they were back in America, they would be going to opposite ends of the continent. What they had, whatever it was to Wallace, would be over the moment they stepped on American soil and judging from the look on his face, he was not ready to let her go.

"Wallace, you knew what we were from the beginning," Rory said bluntly.

"I know," he replied.

Rory waited for him to say more but he didn't.

"Wallace, I-,"

"We leave tomorrow morning," Wallace butted in. He knew that what she had wanted to say was not what he wanted to hear from her.

He came nearer and kissed her gently on the forehead before leaving; his mouth lingered a while on her skin, making the best of what time he had left. She looked up, meeting his eyes and kissed him lightly on the lips. He wanted more, but that was all she was willing to give.

She pulled away from him and begged with her eyes for him to understand.

"It had been good, Wallace."

He pulled back as if his face had been slapped and stared at her, looking like she had shot his heart into a million pieces.

"Goodnight Rory," he managed to get out and hurriedly left her room.

She hated herself, but there was nothing she could give him. She might have loved him, but whatever feeling she might have had for him was nothing compared to the emotion that she was feeling as she held the three letters in her hands.

Sitting on her bed, Rory opened the letter one by one.

She was going home.

It was a long time coming.

A/N: So, how was it? Enjoyed it? Hated it? Well I won't know unless you tell me, so go on, and click those review buttons. I've noticed that there are a few of you out there who had put my story on alert notice, but did not review it… well, why don't you? I'll be more than happy if you pop in to say something about the story. Not that I don't appreciate you putting it on alert, but it'll be even better if I know what you guys think. So, make this writer even happier:)

It looks like the link is not coming up here, so look for it at my profile page okay? I'll put it up there instead.