Disclaimer: I don't own anything. *tear* I only have my imagination.

Chapter 3

BEEP

BEEP

BEEP

Abby woke up with a jolt at the sound of Lorelai's alarm clock from upstairs. She felt hot breath on her face and she looked up to find Dean's slumbering features right above her. She could feel his arms wound completely around her, securing her body to his while their legs were entwined.

She tried to wriggle out of his grasp to avoid being caught in such an inappropriate position with a guy who wasn't only not her boyfriend, but her sisters'…this could end badly.

Unfortunately, Dean didn't like the idea of her leaving because he tightened his arms around her and burrowed his face into her neck. Abby was very tempted to just stay but she couldn't risk getting caught. With one last glance at Dean's adorable sleeping face, she rolled off the couch and placed his arms around himself.

Squatting on the floor for a moment to make sure he didn't wake up, Abby watched him breathe in and out. In and out. Once she was convinced he wasn't going to wake up anytime soon she quietly crept up the stairs as quickly as she could. She just shut the door as she heard her mother's door open and Abby heard Lorelai stumble to the bathroom grumbling to herself.

Abby gave her bed one look before mussing up the sheets like she had just emerged from them. Forcing away the weird feelings she was getting, she began getting ready to take a shower.

Lorelai emerged from upstairs to see Dean curled up on the couch gripping a pillow tightly. She smiled at this display as she passed the couch to go to the kitchen to make some of the earth's best substances.

As she was watching it brew Rory came out of her room to make herself breakfast. "Hey babe, why don't you go wake up Sleeping Beauty out there." Lorelai suggested.

Rory laughed on her way to the couch. When she saw Dean sprawled out over the couch she smiled at how cute he looked. He was tightly grasping a pillow and had nestled his face into it. It looked as though he thought it was a real person he was cuddled up with.

She crouched next to the couch and stroked his face. He immediately leaned into her soft touch and let out a sigh. Dean grumbled something incoherent that sounded strangely like, 'Abby'. Rory furrowed her brow but disregarded it. "Dean, hey, you have to get up now."

He groaned a little louder and opened one eye. "Hey there." He smiled lazily at his girlfriend.

Rory smiled back at him and leaned in to greet him in their favorite way. As her lips touched his, however, Rory was met with something she did not see coming: nothing. She felt nothing that she used to, the sparks, butterflies. As she pulled away, she put on a smile anyway, stood up and held out her hand.

Dean grasped her hand and was assisted into a sitting position, from which he got up. The pair of them walked into the kitchen, hand in hand. Lorelai was sitting at the table eating a Pop-Tart and nursing her coffee. "Hey you two." She greeted without looked up.

Rory poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down next to her mother. "You know, a Pop-Tart isn't like an apple."

Lorelai looked up, confused. Rory laughed. "You shouldn't eat one every day."

Lorelai rolled her eyes at her joke. "I think they want to be eaten every day. I'm just trying to be fair to the packages at the back of the box that saw their brother Pop-Tarts get taken away to be consumed. No one wants to eat a depressed Pop-Tart, believe me." She pointed a finger at her daughter. "It is not a pretty thing."

"Mom?" Rory placated.

Lorelai sipped her coffee. "Sweetie, do you realize just how early it is?" she cocked her head to the side. "And! This is only my second cup of coffee." She stated incredulously.

Dean just laughed as he sipped some orange juice.

Lorelai continued drinking her coffee while Rory and Dean read the paper and this is how Abby found them when she came downstairs ten minutes later, her hair still damp from the shower.

Dean's nose was immediately invaded by the scent of apples so he looked up in confusion but found the source flipping her hair over her shoulder as she bent down to look in the fridge. Immediately he remembered what had happened last night with Abby and he felt his cheeks flush.

The bad thing was that he wasn't thinking about how they shouldn't have done it, but more of this morning when Rory kissed him just after waking him up. He felt more butterflies last night holding Abby close to him than this morning when Rory, his girlfriend, touched her lips to his.

Dean shook his head quickly and sighed deeply as these thoughts ran through his head. He shouldn't be thinking like this…it was wrong. Abby then sat down at the table, peeling a banana. Lorelai looked confused.

"Hun, where'd that come from?" she pointed to the banana in her daughter's hand, puzzlement covering her face. "I am pretty positive I didn't buy it."

Abby laughed as she continued to peel the sides down. "I bought a bunch at Doose's the other day. I wanted them and I figured that you wouldn't spontaneously buy them." She took a little bite. Mouth-full she said, "I took matters into my own hands." She smiled, the banana chunk staying as a lump in her cheek. Lorelai scoffed dramatically as she turned away from the table to walk out of the kitchen, no doubt to finish getting ready for the day.

Abby grabbed a section of the newspaper and began to read while taking a bite out of the banana in front of Dean, who was trying to not notice how she was slowly biting into the fruit. Dean blushed as he stared down at his empty glass in his hands. Rory just sat next to him, oblivious to what Abby's actions were. He awkwardly got up to put his glass in the sink and left to go quickly shower before they left for school.

Chilton was just as formidable on the inside as it looked on the outside. Madison walked down a hall to find the Headmaster's office as best she could with the instructions from a student. As she walked down the various hallways, she began to feel flustered. All of these damn hallways look the same! The students were all gawking at her while some avoided making eye contact with her at all. That's probably Paris' doing…hopefully the close resemblance between them won't cause to be too much trouble.

She knew how her cousin was and how abrasive and blunt she is.

Madison walked down another hallway and got déjà vu. She had definitely been down here before. Very annoyed, she looked behind her and back forward gripping the straps of her backpack.

"Hey, I couldn't help but notice you seem like you could be in need of some assistance?" a male voice said behind her.

She whipped her head back around to see a very adorable blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy looking sympathetically at her. "Yes, today's my first day and I'm trying to find the headmaster's office." Madison explained to this kind boy. "And I'm failing miserably." She grimaced, "everything looks the same."

"Well, I could escort you there if you like." He offered generously. "I was actually headed in that direction myself." He smiled down at her warmly.

Madison felt herself grinning despite her frustration in herself. "That would be great. Thank you so much, you have no idea how frustrated I was getting."

Mystery boy chuckled as he led the way down the hall she had just come down. "Actually I do. Everyone once had to feel the icy coldness set into their chest on the first day here." They came to another corridor and he took a left where she had come from the right. "That feeling that you won't be able to navigate the halls or the coursework will be too difficult or the worst: the teacher hates you for some reason unknown to you."

Listening to this guy talk was like hearing someone reading off her own thoughts. Everything he said was something she had thought about/stressed about in the past 48 hours: once she found out she was being shipped to Connecticut.

Madison realized he was still talking. "I was lucky that my big brother went here before me so I had to attend enough of his events and usually he would take me on a tour whenever I came because I didn't want to get lost once I was accepted."

"How did you know you were going to get in?" Madison inquired.

He glanced down at her puzzled face with a serious look. "I don't mean to sound obnoxious and privileged but my family has given a fair amount of money to this school and it was kind of understood that the children would attend." His eyes suddenly twinkled as his face morphed into a seamless smirk, "Don't get me wrong, I worked hard for my grades but I didn't have to if I didn't want to." He turned another corner and Madison found herself in from of a large wooden door with a gold plate with: HEADMASTER CHARLSTON engraved in it. "I like school, so if you ever need help in anything, let me know." He offered with a smile.

Madison chuckled quietly, "Thanks, I may take you up on that. What year are you here?"

"Sophomore."

She was about to ask what his name was but a large group of rowdy boys popped up out of seemingly nowhere and all but attacked her savior.

"Come on man, let's go! We're already late."

"Where have you been, dude?"

"Geez Dugray, did you lost your watch or something, you're never late."

All the boys started asking and talking to him at once so Madison couldn't get a word in. "Thank you again!" she called as he was basically dragged/herded down the hallway.

As he heard her voice he popped his head back up through his friends. "Good luck! I'll see you around!"

Madison watched as one of his friends glanced back at her, smirked and winked, and then grabbed mystery boys neck in a hold, probably pumping him for information. Who was this girl he was with, why was he with her…seriously guys gossip almost as bad as girls some times.

Gathering her courage she knocked on the heavy door and entered once she heard a woman grant her entrance. What she didn't see was a pair of blue eyes on her as she disappeared behind the heavy wooden door.

The warning bell still hadn't rung yet for students to get into their homerooms so Tristan estimated he had about ten minutes before he walked in, tardy as usual. He stood at his locker, figuring out which binders he needed for the first half of the day before he switched at lunch when laughter reached his ears.

It was like he was tuned to hear her, and he could sense when she was coming near him. The control she had over him was ridiculous because he would always be there, hopeful. He disgusted himself but couldn't help it.

He couldn't help it at all; she'll never get out of head. Rory will always be the bar that all other girls have to meet to even have some kind of a chance. But he knew he wouldn't even think of tying himself down for the chance she wanted him. Tristan groaned as he realized how crazy he was for not giving up even though she has stated multiple times her disinterest in him. Not even disinterest, she seems to hate, even loathe him. Not that he could blame her; he was quite annoying in his kindergarten games for attention.

Tristin pressed his forehead into the cool metal of the locker next to his until he heard someone laughing near him. He didn't even have to look up to recognize that pitiful laugh. "Hello Paris."

"When are you going to stop putting yourself through this Tristan?" asked Paris, some rare emotion displaying as her voice caught in her throat as she looked at his dejected body, sagging against the lockers as he turned to look at her. "I hate to say this but you need to get her out of your head." She began to lecture but his attention found its way over to the twins at their lockers, laughing and joking with each other.

"Tristan!" Paris snapped her fingers in front of his face to get his attention. As his eyes looked into hers she could see how much this was actually hurting him, despite his tough outer shell that barely anyone sees through. He may pretend that things just roll off his back but she knew every time Rory talked to him, he stored it inside of him and every time she rejected him, it hurt. "Hey, don't do anything stupid, okay?"

Tristan had already snapped out of his funk, "Don't worry about me Paris. I'm fine." He slammed his locker shut and left his childhood friend worrying about him in the hall before the object of his affection called her over.

"Hey Paris!" Rory and Abby greeted her as she walked to their lockers.

"Hello, are you both ready for the English assignments today?" she rolled her eyes and scoffed before the girls could answer her. "I swear the professors here all gather together and scheme to come up with a way to annoy us the most and apparently making the students act out various scenes from literature is the best they come up with."

"I don't mind them that much, I think they're kind of fun." Abby chimed in. Rory and Paris stared at her, wide-eyed while she looked through her backpack. She finally looked up, noticing the silence. "What?"

Rory sputtered to explain. "Wha-, how? Abs, how can you enjoy acting with teenagers that are lacking any real sense of the characters' motives or anything important?"

"Well, I usually help them decipher the meaning. I like it." She looked to Paris who was still in shock of her statement. "So, yes I'm excited."

"Huh. Well, that's nice for you. New topic now: Rory, how is your giant of a boyfriend these days?" Paris asked conversationally, no ulterior motive like Louise and Madeline would have had.

Rory's face flushed as she immediately thought of this morning when she felt nothing whilst kissing him. "Oh, you know. He's great…um," Rory struggled to keep talking about him. "He slept over last night after the movie night…" She kept talking but Paris tuned her out once she saw Abby shift uncomfortably once Rory mentioned the movie night. Her eyes narrowed as she watched Abby squirm at whatever Rory was saying. Finally, Abby noticed that Paris' curious eyes were scrutinizing her and immediately froze.

They said their goodbyes soon later with Abby looking somewhat fearfully at Paris while Rory chattered on down the hallway.

Madison walked out of the Headmaster's office feeling a little more at ease. None of her classes immediately presented themselves to be overly difficult so she wouldn't be bogged down from the start. She walked into the class she had right before lunch and walked up to the teacher and she told her to sit in the middle row, second to last seat from the back. As she made her way to her new seat, she realized that a large group of boys were congregated around her desk and someone was using the surface as a seat, while they faced the back wall talking with their friends.

"Excuse me, I think you're on my desk." She tentatively said to a boy with unruly brown hair. He craned his neck to look at her.

"Am I?" He hopped down to stand in front of her. "Err, sorry." He turned away and sat on another desk in the back row. Madison sat down but felt her cheeks burn as she heard the boy say something under his breath that erupted laughter from his gang of friends.

Class started soon after, Madison opened up a fresh notebook to take notes diligently when she heard the door open. "Ahhh, Mr. Dugray, thank you for finally gracing us with your presence. I can see you're following directly in your brother's footsteps. Excellent." The teacher said, her words dripping with sarcasm.

Madison looked up and her eyes landed on her mystery guy from this morning handing a note to the teacher who glanced at it briefly, then crumpled it and tossed it into the trash barrel while the boy smiled smugly at her. He turned and began going to his seat but once he started down her row, his eyes found hers and his face broke into a wide grin once seeing her. Madison couldn't help but smile back at him as he continued to come towards her. "Well then, fancy that." He greeted her as he sat in the seat behind her.

Not even five minutes had passed when Madison felt a poke in the middle of her back. She looked back at him questioningly. He said nothing but slipped her a note, complete with dramatic flair as though it was a drug deal.

She exhaled a laugh and accepted the slip of paper and turned back around to focus on the teacher for a moment before opening the note.

Hello again! I hope your first classes weren't too painful for you. By the way, I'm Joey. What's your name, oh new girl that bares a remarkable resemblance to one Chilton's Paris Gellar?

Madison laughed slightly as she read what he wrote. "Miss Perry? Is there something you find humorous about my lecture?" the teacher called her out once seeing she was not paying attention and had laughed while she was talking about early life of Aztecs in Mexico, specifically human sacrifice.

Madison's head jerked up at once and she felt her face flush red with embarrassment. This was not a good first impression she was making. "Um, no. Sorry professor." She mumbled, cheeks a lovely pink shade.

The teacher cleared her throat deliberately. "By the way class, we have a new student! Her name is Madison Perry. Let's all welcome her." She continued her lecture after fixing Madison with a stern look.

"Well, that couldn't have felt good." A whisper in her left ear made her twitch suddenly. "My, my, you are jumpy aren't you?" Without waiting for her to answer, Joey leaned further forward. "So nice to meet you Madison, don't worry, everyone here has been caught by Professor Hardass for something. Consider yourself lucky that it was for something little, and when she hadn't really gotten into the material."

Madison turned her head slightly to look at him, who was basically next to her ear. "Is that supposed to make me feel better, or something?" she whispered.

Joey smirked. "Nah, just trying to explain a bit…okay, I'm gonna sit back now because I have a feeling that I'm going to be bitched out in about twenty seconds. Talk to you at the end of class." With one final grin Joey sat back in his seat right before the teacher looked out into the students to emphasize a point.

Madison stealthily slid a piece of paper behind of onto Joey's desk, much to his surprise and joy.

Good timing. What are you psychic or something?

Joey hastily scribbled back to her and glanced up at the teacher, then reached forward and stuck the paper in between the material of her Chilton sweatervest, and her dress shirt. The paper was resting on her shoulder, concealed from view. When she knew the teacher had her back turned, she pulled out the paper from in-between the fabrics.

That'd be cool, but unfortunately no. It's just happened many times, I have a bit of an intuition to when teachers will think they need to stress a certain point in their notes. Also, if they hadn't creepily made eye contact with every single student recently, that's also a good indicator.

She smiled down at his witty comments and the rest of the class passed without incident. The bell rang and as Madison began packing up she saw Joey stop in front of her desk. Looking up, she saw he was watching her put her books and notebook into her backpack. She blushed slightly because she had a filing system within her backpack so she knows where each subject was.

"You don't have to wait for me, you know." Madison offered.

"No, the new girl can never eat alone on her first day lunch…it's just too sad. And I would love to hear more about you, Madison Perry. I would like to escort you to the lunch table."

Madison giggled slightly but then remembered something. "Oh! But I promised Paris that I'd eat with her my first day." She said, looking slightly disgruntled.

But that didn't stop Joey, "Hey, that's okay! I grew up with her anyway." He furrowed his brow for a second. "Hold on," Madison finished her sorting, got up and began walking to the door. Joey followed along like a little puppy, trying to figure something out. "How do you know her again? And please explain your freakishly cloned appearances."

Madison laughed. "Well, she is my cousin. I moved to Florida when I was six but she always visited every summer, so we stayed close." Joey led the way to the cafeteria, walking at a casual pace that kept up with Madison's quicker stride because he was so much taller than her. "And I guess we look alike just due to random genetic similarities. I can't really divulge my top-secret plan to you, can I?" she smirked.

Joey was intrigued immediately. "Top-secret, huh?" he leaned in closer to her. "I must hear more." He pleaded with his puppy dog eyes.

Madison's heart melted as she looked into his face. "Alright, I'll tell you." She stopped in the hallway and looked around stealthily. "I am actually a clone of Paris from the past. This is what she looked like two whole years ago. My job is to slowly turn everyone into Paris Geller so that education will be revolutionized." She said with wide eyes.

Joey stared at her, his face blank. Then he pressed his lips together tightly, in an effort to keep in the laughter that was clearly trying to get out. Finally he couldn't take it anymore, with her staring at him, completely serious. He burst out laughing in the middle of the hallway and finally Madison couldn't keep a straight face anymore and joined in.

The pair of them continued laughing and walking until they reached the cafeteria doors. As if they read each other's mind, both sobered up at the same moment. Each of them noticing it, they looked quickly at each other, a surprised look on Madison's face, a quirked smile on Joey.

Joey held open the door for Madison and held his arm out in from of her, "After you madam," His blue eyes twinkling.

"Thank you, sir." She walked into the room, Joey right behind her but she spotted Paris sitting at a table with two girls who she noticed as she drew closer were clearly twins. Eager to greet her cousin, Madison walked quickly to her table, a grin on her face.

Paris lost the scowl that had been plaguing her face since her class when she saw Madison making her way through the cafeteria. It quickly found its way back onto her face as she saw how the male population was reacting to her cousin as she flounced by them. Tables of boys were all jesting with each other, nudging elbows and blatantly pointing and eyeing her up and down.

She quickly fixed her face with a smile as Madison reached her. "Hi Paris!" her cousin beamed, a huge smile in place effectively stunning all the males in the vicinity, Joey included. Her smiled faltered as she got to the table and saw Paris looking somewhat hostile. "What's with the face?"

Paris looked away from the adoring boys and focused on her cousin, looking questioning at her. "Sorry Maddie, I was just staring down your infatuated audience." Madison furrowed her brow at her and Paris sighed slightly. "You seem to have made quite the impression on the male population of this school." Madison looked slightly shocked, and disbelieving.

"That's not true, Paris." She said as she sat down across from her. "No one is paying any attention to me." Just to disprove her point, Paris sent a pointed look at Joey who was blatantly staring at Madison. Lucky for him, he noticed it before Madison did and dropped his gaze to the table.

Abby and Rory sat quietly for about a minute while no one said anything, everyone eating. "Well, since we clearly are not going to have introductions, I'm Abby!" she stuck her hand out to Madison across the table.

"And I'm Rory!" She said as she turned and faced Madison in the seat next to her.

"Hi, it's nice to meet you!" Madison shook both their hands as Paris just grumbled to herself, scooping herself more mashed potatoes from her plate.

Joey was beginning to feel a bit left out. "And everybody knows me, isn't that right ladies?" He held his arms out in a wide gesture, grin on his face. His statement got the appropriate and expected responses: Paris rolled her eyes and scoffed, Rory just shook her head with a small smile on her face, and Abby placated him with an exaggerated nod of the head and kind look in her eyes, while Madison giggled slightly and blushed. He winked at her once she chanced a glance at him that sent her back to blushing modestly.

They all continued to enjoy their lunches until Tristan walked into the cafeteria and strolled past their table glancing at Rory, who didn't notice him. Paris of course noticed this interaction between him and most oblivious person ever to walk the Chilton Halls. She felt bad for her pining friend so she decided to do something about it. "So Rory," she leaned forward, towards her. "I couldn't help noticing you were a little evasive this morning when I mentioned Dean…" At the mention of his name both Rory and Abby froze. "Was there any particular reason for that?" Paris probed.

Rory looked up at her and attempted to be blasé about it. "Nah, I was tired this morning. Didn't get a lot of sleep." She said, waving her hand around as if it would help her explain it.

Paris wasn't buying it, however, and everyone else at the table was intrigued with their conversation. "Uh huh, uh huh, I don't believe you." Rory sighed. "Come on, tell me! I know when something is bugging you." She gave her a knowing look.

Rory exhaled loudly. "You do have that obnoxious ability to do so, I suppose. Although, I don't want to talk about it here." She glanced around at other tables nervously. Paris huffed.

"Are you really worried that someone at this table is going to tell your relationship troubles around school? Come on Rory, you can trust us. Also, who is Madison gonna tell? She doesn't know anyone!"

"Thanks Paris!" Madison said sarcastically.

"Well, you know it's true." Turning back to Rory, Paris looked at her expectantly.

Rory took a deep breath. "Fine. This morning…"

Tristan sat across the cafeteria but he had a clear view of the girls' table…plus Joey. Why was he there? Then Tristan remembered how enamored Joey looked when he looked at Paris' hot cousin. Everyone at the table suddenly scooted closer to Rory as she bent lower to say something. What could that be about?!

The bell ended their lunch period not soon enough for Rory as she told everyone about how she is feeling about Dean and her worries. Now she had to deal with a mind-numbingly dull pass/fail class that required no effort at all. It was a stupid class required for juniors to take to get them 'ready for college'. The teacher started right on time and began to lecture on the importance of getting your application in on time. As if Rory would send it in late. She scoffed as the thought passed though her mind.

The classroom door opened to reveal Tristan, looking ridiculously laid back with his hair tousled and his tie loose around his neck with the first couple buttons undone from his collar. Rory couldn't believe he got away with so much. He handed the teacher his note, most likely written by himself and sat himself behind Rory.

"'Sup Mary?" he whispered in her ear causing her to flinch slightly and check the teacher, who was just reading from their slides on the screen. Rory huffed in exasperation. No. Effort.

She turned around to glare at him. "Must you do that? Hasn't it gotten old yet?" Her blue eyes wide.

Tristan just smirked at her, "Not yet." Rory just turned back forward and tried to ignore him. Unfortunately, the teacher didn't seem to have the same idea.

"Class, you will be paired up and required to complete a project by the end of this week about one specific topic. I will be deciding both, so listen up."

Rory groaned and put her head down on her folded arms on her desk. She just waited for it, she knew it was coming. "Dugray and Gilmore. You're topic is 'Choosing the Right Path: Work, Military, or School.'

Her head was still on the desk when she heard him chuckle under his breath. "Looks like you're having the best day ever, Mare!" Rory quickly turned to fix him with a glare but found she couldn't as he was genuinely smiling at her, his blue eyes twinkling impishly.

"Yeah, I guess so…" she finished lamely. Looking down at her notes, she couldn't believe how she felt trapped in her own body and controlled by some foreign power: hormones.

HIHI!! God, I'm sorry I suck so much at this updating thing. I actually did have a good portion of this written back when I updated the last chapter, but I got stuck and I didn't want to just give you what I had then. And then college is continuing to kick my butt. ANYWAY, hope you enjoyed this and as always, please…

REVIEW! I'm interested in what you're thinking.