Title: When She Cries

Book: II
Chapter: Eleven
Chapter Title: No Room In My Life

Rating: R.
Coupling: Ultimately: Dallie/Lola, Aggie/Fin, Devon/Ashley, Thalia/Ethan, Paris/Jess, Meggie/Zander, Aurora/Tolly. Now aren’t you glad you’ve spoiled yourself in that way?

Disclaimer: Aye, captain. I hold no deeds to Gilmore Girls. And I don’t own matchbox twenty’s You & I & I.
Author’s Note: To Kait, because she’s great and a very good inspiration sometimes. Love to you, darlin’.

Important Author Pimpage: Want good future fic? Want good second generation fic? Well check out katem-23’s emotionless then. Like, right now.

 

*

 

Yeah well it's a shame/You pander to me/
C'mon stroke on my ego/Well like it's never been broke before yeah by anyone else/
And what doesn't kill you/It makes you linger/And it makes you wonder.

 

 

            Soap Opera Network- Soap Opera rerun. Sonny Corinthros marathon. Did he care? No, he didn’t think so. Though if it were an Alexis Davis marathon, that’d be completely different. Motivated women seemed to be a real turn on for him. Finvarra Connor changed the channel. Comedy Central- South Park. Worth watching? Well, it was as good as anything else on a Saturday night. He looked up from his spot on the couch as Eadon stepped into the apartment.

 

            “You staying here, Donnie?” He asked her as she sat down in the chair closest to the couch.

 

            His younger sister nodded as she slumped down in her chair. “Yes. I hate Lola DuGrey.”

 

            “Gee, I didn’t know that,” Fin replied dryly. “She staying at Rory’s, then?”

 

            “Unfortunately,” Donnie stopped to watch a few moments of the episode playing before wrinkling her nose in disgust. “That is such a guy show.”

 

            “That’s sexist,” Her brother pointed out. “Some girls do enjoy the little fourth graders’ sense of humor.”

 

            “Whatever,” she sighed. “I don’t understand. Rory’s so wonderful, and Lola’s so not.”

 

            “Aren’t you being a little biased, little sister?” Fin asked, not taking his eyes off his screen. “Not to mention the fact you rarely, if ever, see her outside of her mother’s house.”

            “Supportive as ever, big brother,” Donnie muttered. “I keep forgetting about your biasness because you dated her friend.”

 

            He looked over at her. “Not supportive, huh? Are we forgetting who put you through your schooling?”

 

            She rolled her eyes heavenward. “Not that kind of support, Finnie.”

 

            “You’re being a brat,” Fin returned. “I’ll send you to your room without dinner too if you keep it up.”

 

            “You can’t cook.”

 

            “Sure I can.”

 

            “You can’t cook anything edible.”

 

            “That’s completely debatable.”

           

            “Only to you, Fin, only to you.” Eadon leaned down to unlace her boots. “And you’re twenty-seven, shouldn’t you be having more of a life?”

 

            “You’re twenty-two, shouldn’t you as well?” He countered.

 

            “I have work to do tonight,” She defended herself.

 

            Fin looked over at her skeptically. “And I can see you’re accomplishing so much already.”

 

            “Shut up, I’m relaxing myself before I begin to work.”

 

            “Relaxing has a very strong resemblance to procrastination.”

 

            Donnie sighed, “I’m ignoring that, Finvarra. Are you really going to cook?”

 

            “No,” Fin clicked the television off as the episode came to a close. “Are you?”

            “Please, I’m about as good as you are, considering you were the one to teach me.”

 

            He paused to think. “Wanna eat out?”

            Donnie started lacing her boots again. “Sure.”

 

*

 

            Skeeball and pizza. Really, did it get any better than this? Absolutely not. Well, actually, reading a good Abnormal Psych textbook and eating Chinese came before it (oh, and while listening to the Dr. Miya show on the radio…no wonder she never got interested in music- her radio was always tuned to psychiatrist’s radio shows), but it was still a close second.

 

            “You’ve been staring at that board for a while, Mariano,” Melinda Meyer commented after she had finished with the pinball machine, and walked over to the Skeeball machines. “Are you trying to figure out what Skeeball means in Freudian?”

 

            Augusta blinked and looked over at her friend. “I’m throwing balls at holes. In Freudian- that’s a no-brainer.”

 

            “Forget I ask,” Melinda took a sip of her Mountain Dew.

 

            “That makes you squeamish?” Aggie asked, slightly incredulous. “I mean, you’re going to work for Soap Opera Update, you know what that means?”

            Melinda hesitated before answering; you never knew what you were going to get with Augusta Mariano. “Um, no?”

 

            “That you’re actually going to have to watch Soap Operas.”

 

            “Well, duh,” She rolled her eyes before looking down at her watch. “Speaking of which I have a plane to catch tomorrow to get back to school. Not all of us can attend a school an hour away.”

 

            “Oh yeah- lucky me,” Aggie replied dryly. “I’ll call you when I get back to New York.”

 

            Melinda waved before leaving the restaurant. Aggie threw her last ball underhanded and landed in the 1, 000 point hole. Man, she sucked.

 

            “That was pretty bad, Aggie-lass,” a familiar Irish brogue came from over her shoulder, causing her to start.

 

            She turned around, “Has anyone ever told you how attractive stalking isn’t?”

            “Why yes,” Fin replied, “My sister just told me that five seconds before I approached you.”

 

            “Donnie’s very wise, then,” Augusta told him.

 

            “I never really saw you as the Skeeball type,” Fin commented. “Should we analyze this?”

 

            “Uh, no,” Augusta answered as she walked back to her table and grabbed her jacket.

 

            Fin followed. After all, it was only expected of him. “Right, because the only thing you hate more than not being able to define something in a logical, psychological way, is being psychoanalyzed by someone else.”

 

            She pulled her jacket on. “I refuse to listen to this.”

 

            “I see that.”

 

            “So I’m going to go,” Aggie looked over to where Donnie was sitting at the counter. “Hey Donnie.”

 

            “Hey Aggie,” Donnie returned.

 

            “Bye then. Don’t trip over your laces as you run,” Fin warned.

 

            Augusta ignored the comment and left. Really, it was better that way.

 

*

 

            Early Saturday evening, when the sun was hovering above the horizon, did not exactly make Luke’s a busy place, Lola noted as she followed her mother into the nearly empty diner.

           

            “Hey,” Luke greeted them as he filled a customer’s cup at the other end of the counter.

 

            “Hey Luke,” Rory replied as she took a seat at the counter.

 

            Lola slipped off her red leather jacket and placed it on the stool beside her.

 

            Luke walked over to them, ordering pad in hand. “Ready to order?”

 

            Rory nodded, “Coffee, please. Oh, and a burger.”

 

            “One artery clog coming up,” Luke muttered as he turned to Lola. “Lo?”

 

            “Tea. Sugar only,” Lola thought about it for a moment. “Chicken Caesar Salad. Extra croutons. Salad dressing on the side.”

 

            “Is that even on the menu?” Rory asked, looking over at Luke after Lola just shrugged.

 

            “Have I ever mentioned that she’s my favorite Gilmore progeny?” Luke asked before walking into the back.

 

            Dallie walked out from the back with their tea and coffee. “Here you are.”

 

            Rory thanked him. “You staying here this weekend?”

 

            “Yeah,” Dallie replied, pushing up the sleeves of his plaid shirt. “Mama’s having Grandmother over for dinner this weekend, so I volunteered to work at the diner.”

 

            Lola arched an eyebrow at Dallie’s shirt, “Where’s the hat?”

 

            “What hat?”

 

            She leaned over and flicked the sleeve of his shirt. “Well, with the shirt and all I figured Luke must have installed some sort of dress code.”

 

            “Very funny, forgive me while I die with laughter on the inside,” Dallie told her dryly. “Next time I’ll try to go with a more solid colored shirt.”

 

            “Go with the orange, it looked real good on you,” Lola licked her lips before taking a sip of her tea.

 

            Dallie choose to just ignore that. Really, it was better that way. “Your meals will be out shortly.”

            “Thank you—”

 

            Rory cut her off, “You may want to stop right there, Lola.”

 

            Lola just took another sip of her tea as Dallie moved onto the next customer. Now really, that was no fun.

 

To Be Continued…