Nowhere Man
-By Yo-yo
Disclaimer:C chappie #1.
A/N:I'm sorry, I realized at some point I started writing Tristan's voice in the present, so I'm trying to transition this smoothly and accommodate this in my old chapters. They won't be changed very much, only the tenses will be changed and sorry if it's a little confusing. As I was changing the tenses I realized how confusing it really was. So much past and present is wrapped in this fic that even in sentences I have mixed tenses. Sorry if this really annoys you, I'm trying. Also for those of you who have read my Strawberry Fields, I've decided that before I start a new chapter I am going to re-write the old ones. I am in love with the style in which I have written Nowhere Man, and since these are two parts of the same story, I have decided to update SF, so probably look for a new chapter of that fic in say, middle of Feb. and with that new chapter, read the old ones; they'll be changed around a little.
-Yo-yo
A Hard Day's Night:
"'Sir," I swaggered into the dining room. "Sorry to use your first name; but I've been doing some heavy drinking…"
'I stumbled onto the chair closest to him and laughter swelled from me as I looked up at him and covered my mouth.
"'Oops!" I laughed again. "I meant, I've been doing some heavy thinking, and I've come to the decision that it's you," I pointed, "that should be grounded.
"'I mean you've taught me everything that I know. And if it hadn't been for your lousy negotiating skills, I would have never had to get rid of Miss McIntire in my most creative way." I grinned and nudged him a little. "I mean, if you could have just closed the deal, I mean that in the literal sense, not what you've done with your secretary on I'm guessing every piece of furniture in this mansion. If you could have- wait, what was I talking about? Oh yea, closing the deal, which Lacey-wait, not her name… it was Hailey? Well, she has relayed some high opinions of you I may add. If you had-"
"And then I woke up here," I shake my head, turning to Jan who sits beside me mimicking me.
"You're dumb, you know that?"
"Yea, I've been called that a few times in my day," I nod. "But I have a theory."
"A theory as to why you're an idiot?"
"I think I am genetically predisposed to it, Gramps." I drink more coffee.
"What are you trying to say?"
"That no matter how far you've transcended the title of disappointment, I'm sure your parents saw you as so when you were my age too. All DuGrey men are pre-disposed to the fuck-up gene."
"Tristan, watch your language. And the key is to fight the stereotypes, not let your predisposition become a crutch…and excuse."
"I'm trying Gramps."
"Obviously not well enough," he stands up and deposits his mug into the sink. "Now go put on your coat and shovel the driveway."
"What?"
"You're still getting punished. You did the offense, and now you must pay the price for your stupidity."
"But Gramps, I saved the Gilmore girl's life, shouldn't I get something for that?"
"Oh yea, about that, our dinner next Thursday will be changed to Friday. Emily and Richard have invited us to dinner to thank you for your chivalry."
I groan, that sounds more like a punishment rather than a reward.
A few hours later- you have no idea how long his driveway is- I am dressing for dinner. I am down the stairs from my room when I hear the doorbell ring and I hear His voice.
"What are you doing here?" the first words from my lips.
"I'm here for dinner and to finish that talk we never got to last night."
"Don't expect to win father of the year just because you punished me," I walk past Him into the dining room where Janlan sits.
"Father, I don't understand how you deal with this boy." He mutters taking His seat across from me.
"He's much more agreeable when he isn't forced into something against his will. Quite like you when you were his age." Janlan replied, opening his napkin across his lap, not looking up.
"So you're here to negotiate, what the hell do you want?" I seethe.
He shakes His head, a smile on His face.
"No young man, that's something you need to understand. It is not I who needs to negotiate; you have nothing that I want. It is you who needs to show some skill and finesse. It is you who needs to convince me of what you need. It is you who needs to rob me of my shirt, as they say, with little consciousness to me.
"You believe that I am an oaf. You infer that I could not bargain with McIntire. You insist that I am ignorant for my professional position. Well this is your time to prove me wrong. This is your time to show me how superior you are, how inferior I compare to your 'greatness'. Well here is your chance.
"But just remember this; it is DuGrey blood, my blood that makes you the way that you are. It is me that has shaped every aspect of your life. Your understanding of this world, the way you are perceived, the way that you deal with dilemmas, it is under my tutelage, the characteristics that you inherited from me that have created you into the man that you are. The way you walk, talk, smirk and scrutinized the people around you is my cunning you have been given. It is my negotiating skills that you know, it is I that taught you to be cut throat. So no matter how this comes out, everything you know, you learned from me."
"I see you're taking a leaf from my book, hiding in plain sight," I sigh, sitting beside her on the couch.
She'd found my hiding place in the sitting room by the main entrance and is currently curled up with a notebook.
"Studying, I have a chemistry test today," she glances up before her eyes dive back into her notes.
She always does that, I notice.
Like I hide in the sitting room, she hides behind written words. Every time that I see her around this place her eyes are in books, notebooks and newspapers. She walks around this place engrossed in anything except her peers (excluding Lane of course, her new best friend). I never see her interacting with anyone, never putting herself out there. She's always occupied…
Talk about hiding in plain sight.
"Yea, I studied for that last night," I rest my feet on an Ethan Allen catalog table. "If you want, I can test you?"
"That's alright," she mutters. "I view studying as a solitary activity."
"Oh, I guess I should go then."
I stand up.
"No," she puts down her book and looks at me. "I'm only skimming over my notes. It's my first test, ya' see, I don't want to fuck it up. Headmaster Charleston already gave me a lecture when I got in. I don't want to let anyone down. "
"…Letting anyone down?" I hear her words, but I do not understand. "Who could you possibly be letting down?"
"Everyone, my mom, my grandparents…"
"That's everyone?"
"Everyone that matters," she shrugs her shoulders, her eyes still on me, and a curious look on her face.
"How could you possibly be letting them down? They adore you. I've seen the way your mother looks at you, how much she cares for you. She goes searching for you when she doesn't find you in your bed in the morning. She could never be disappointed in you. And your grandparents… from what Emily told me on New Years Eve, you're the answer to her prayers. She loves you."
She is reading me like one of her books, I know.
At that moment, as her blue eyes peruse my face, I am notebook paper. Words sloppily scrawled all over my face, but she is not to be distracted by the trivial. She knows what she is looking for. She can read between the lines. She can see what is not there. Those eyes dissect me in a way very few people have cared to attempt.
"If I tell you something, will you promise not to tell anyone?"
A promise.
I have only known her for a few days, and already I am keeping her secrets.
I nod.
"I know that there are a lot of rumors going around about my Mom: about how she didn't get along with her parents and how she got pregnant and ran away. And that stuff is true. The fact that we've never lived in one place, never owned a house, and have never been stable is due in part to my mother's rocky relationship with her parents.
"My mom has always worked. She's always fed me. She's always been really good at taking care of me. But I want to go to Harvard, and this is my best shot. And she doesn't have the type of money to put me through a place like this.
"My grandparents are paying for Chilton. And my mother is sacrificing her own disdain for her parents so that I can get my dream. Look Tristan, I'm not who you think I am. This time I can't let her down after she's given up so much for me. And I can't let my grandparents down after they've tried so hard to get me in here."
"That's noble…"
She looks away, but I can still hear her mutter,
"It's not nobility, it is atonement."
A few moments of silence fall between us, before she turns back with a grin.
"So what has you 'hiding in plain sight'?"
I take her change of subject in stride.
From what I've seen of her so far, Rory Gilmore is direct when she wants to be. She is also hidden when she needs to be.
"I didn't attend the party this weekend."
"And why's that? I thought you were all for it Friday?"
"I was all for it- can you not repeat any of this conversation to anyone else please?"
She nods.
She has only known me for a few days, and already she is keeping my secrets.
"I was grounded."
She gasps, covering her mouth with her hands, her face contorted in a comical "o".
"So what?" she laughs.
"I've never been grounded before. And I've never missed a party before."
"How can you have never been grounded before?"
I know she can read me.
"You're friends have been bugging you about the party?"
And I am right.
She looks at me, and she knows. She knows what to ask, she knows what I will not answer.
"The whole fucking school's bugging me about it," I sigh sitting back again.
"What are you going to tell them… you're going to have to say something?"
She's right.
"I dunno…"a smile begins to crawl up my face as wheels begin to turn in my brain. "I could always say I was occupied."
"Occupied with what?" she laughs, "Chores?"
I turn to her,
"I could have been showing the new Mary around our city. I could tell them I was having 'a hard day's night, and I've been workin' like a dog,'" I move closer. "That wouldn't totally be lying."
"No way," she laughs her eyes on mine now. "I will not be your alibi, especially for reasons so crass. You need an excuse, look for one more willing. I hear Rita Terlington would kill to work you like a dog."
Her brow is cocked and her lips are turned upward. If I'd known her better, I'd think she was flirting with me.
"Mary Mary, quite contrary, what gossip have you been hearing about me?" I lean close to her ear, my breath tickling her skin.
"Nothing really, just your family's got an excess of silver bells and cockle shells, and that you keep pretty maids all in a row."
Okay, I was wrong. I don't really know her. But she is flirting with me.
Our faces are so close. I can feel myself drawing closer… just another inch and my lips are on her skin. Just another inch and she'll be-
"I need to finish looking over my notes." She shifts away from me, her eyes moving back to her discarded notebook.
"Yea," I move away, my voice coming out much too husky for my liking. I clear my throat. "Any you 'view studying as a solitary activity.'"
"Yea," she sighed, not looking up.
"Okay then, I'll leave you to your-"
I pick up a random magazine and totally ignore her.
Our silence stretches until the bell rang. We don't look at one another as we grab our bags and head to class.
"Hey man, where were you Saturday night?"
It is Daniel and Austin.
"There was a girl," I lie easily, my eyes scanning the mass of students looking for her.
We have not spoken since our day in hiding earlier this week. We slid into our roles of strangers easily. She didn't even bat an eyelash when I called her Mary. She'd gotten used to it. It was an automatic response now,
"It's Rory." She says.
It's also been a week since the accident. I notice the way she stiffly sits in her seat. I have noticed the way she winces slightly when she bends wrongly.
I had to do it, I know it was risky, with our masks of strangers placed for the students of Chilton, but I can't watch it anymore. I need to know.
And there she is, coming out of French, a little late. She always waited for everyone else to leave. Her eyes hidden within the pages of her book, looking up just in time too see the last of her peers ebb out of the classroom before she grabs her things and leaves.
She hides when she needs to.
She goes to her locker. She opens it, and a note trickles to the floor. She leans down to read it, her hair falling in her face, shielding her eyes from me as she reads the words I can remember writing.
So how's your back? I forgot to ask…
Her eyes find mine, even through the throng of students our gazes hold. She smiles a little, giving me a little nod before mouthing,
"Sore."
I nod towards her, and we turn away together. She goes back to her books, and I return to Austin's anecdote about a freshman who didn't know how to give proper head.
TBC…
A/N:What? Rory and Tristan flirting? Omg! I'm as surprised as you are. When I wrote this I had no idea this was going to happen. It's funny… I love when characters have a mind of their own. It makes my job so much more exciting. Okay. Now that this chapter is written, please review. I was checking my stats, and so many people read, but they don't review and that sucks. B/c I want your criticism, so please. Help a starving artist (I'm really starving; I'm in college and can't afford anything except Oodles of Noodles)! Just press Go! and write something. It doesn't have to be an epic. Be critical, tell me my mistakes, I know there are tons, every time I read this fic I find more. Just give me something!
-w/ luv, Yo-yo