Title: When She Cries
Book: III
Chapter: One
Chapter Title: Slipping Through His Hands
Rating: R.
Coupling: Right now? A/F, K/L and D/S.
Disclaimer: Aye, captain. I hold no deeds to Gilmore Girls. And I don’t
own John Mayer’s Neon.
Time Frame: Beginning of their sophomore year of
college. Yeah, that’s right. It’s WSC: The College Years. 2031, to be exact.
Author’s Note: All my reviewers suck, I was going to withhold this for
another week or so but all of your reviews were so sweet and so nice and left
me so giddy that I felt bad about withholding a chapter that has been written
for a few weeks. So be proud of yourselves. Big thanks to pal411, Joan, Emma, Kait
(as always), Lauren, Jamie, Ashley and Blackrose.
*
She's always buzzing just like/Neon/Neon/
Who knows how long/How long/How long/
She can go before she burns away.
In the darkest moments of the night everything sounded louder, everything resonated. So when Lorelai Emily DuGrey heard the clock of the door closing, she nearly jumped. It was quite silly, considering she was the one that had done the closing. She found the lights, and flipped them on with the palm of her hand. There, that was better. She took out her cell phone, dialed the number and waited for someone to pick up.
“Hey,” she nibbled anxiously on the
tip of her thumbnail. “Happy birthday.”
“Thank you,” Dallas Mariano replied,
looking down at the clock on his computer screen. “You’re nearly precise.”
“I am?” Lola would check her watch,
however she had went without one this evening because it didn’t exactly go with
her outfit.
“It’s now 4:17AM,” he informed her,
leaning back in his desk chair. “Rewind life two minutes, and I was born
exactly twenty years ago.”
She forced her hand away from her
mouth. Really, her manicurist was going to kill her for tampering with her
work. “I’m sorry.” Her nose wrinkled. “Did I wake you?”
No, but he had been about to give up
on his paper and go to bed. “No, I was still up.”
My how things had changed, but then
again it was probably to do with something academically. So my how things hadn’t
changed. “I just wanted to, um, wish you a happy birthday since I won’t be in
Hartford tomorrow.” She blinked. “Today. Whatever.”
How odd of Lola. “Thanks.” There was
a short pause. “How’s Princeton?”
“Good. Harvard?”
“Good.” Yeah, this was going to go
down as the most verbose conversation in history.
Lola’s eyes darted towards the door.
It was getting late, well it was late. “So, I’ll see you…later, I
guess.”
“Yeah,” Dallie’s voice felt flat.
There was certain weirdness about not seeing someone you’d seen practically
every day for the first eighteen years of your life. Even if it had stopped
being a continuous thing over a year earlier. “Night, Lo.”
“Night, Cowboy.” It almost sounded like an endearment, the soft
way she said it. Then there was the clicking of the phone being turned off.
Cell phone off, and back in her
pocket, she shut off the lights and left the bathroom.
“I sincerely hope you were making a
phone call in there, and not succumbing to a bout of schizophrenia.” Came the
British-accented voice from the bed.
Lola turned her head and saw
Mackenzie Ambrose sitting crossed legged on the bed, cigarette in hand, ashtray
on lap.
“I don’t think you can suffer from
just a ‘bout’ of schizophrenia, Kenzie,” she pointed out as she picked up her
jacket off the dresser.
He dismissed it with the wave of his
hand, creating a line of smoke with his cigarette. Right, he cared. “You’ll be
in the city on Thursday, right?”
What was Thursday? Right- the
Wilson’s dinner party. “Yes, but not until after three.” She had a morning
class. “So I’ll see you then.”
“Good night Lorelai.” It was four in
the morning. But it was sort of stupid to argue about technicalities like that.
Lola picked up her purse and left
the room. No good-bye kiss- that just wasn’t them, and she preferred it that
way. Turn right after passing two doors, go straight until you hit the
staircase…she should really know this by now. One door, two doors. She turned
the corner…and stopped short. The obstacle in her way was none other than
Kenzie’s nine-year-old daughter, Rachie. Or at least she assumed it was Rachel
Ambrose, since she had never actually met the child. That would have been just
inappropriate.
Well all she could hope for was that
the child was sleep walking. Yes, sleep walking with a glass of water in her hands
and a rather shocked expression on her face. How deluded was Lola? Very,
apparently.
“Hi.” The word, more like syllable
actually, just sort of slipped out of Lola’s mouth.
Rachie’s startled gaze snapped up to
meet Lola’s. “Hi.”
Lola bit her bottom lip. Hard. Now
was she suppose to continue on a conversation for some lame excuse why she was
here at four in the morning, or she could continue on her way and leave like
she should have done three hours ago.
“Good night, then,” She was
practically echoing what Kenzie had said to her a few moments before. Yeah, she
needed to get back to Jersey. Or at least to Aggie and Fin’s apartment.
“Good night,” Rachie watched her
leave before rolling her eyes upward. “Lure-a-lie.” She mimicked her
father’s voice. She had truly thought there really hadn’t been anything worse
than her former stepmother, Simone. So, of course, she just had to be proven
wrong. Ugh.
*
There could be only one person
knocking on the door this late at…er, early in the morning. Finvarra Connor
scratched his arm before answering the door. Ah, he was right. If he didn’t
have such a fondness for the blonde, he’d have let her stay out there. Or not.
It depended on what mood he would have been in. But that really didn’t matter
now, since he had opened the door.
“Morning.” Of course Lola DuGrey
would be all smiles at nearly five in the bloody morning.
“At least you’re smart enough to not
put a ‘good’ before that word,” Fin grumbled. But he was up, so he may as well
stay up. “You hungry?”
“Famished,” she returned dropping
her purse and jacket on a chair, before taking a seat on the kitchen counter.
“What are you making?”
“I was going to cook me up a
steaming plate of coca puffs,” he walked over to the refrigerator and opened
it. “But since you’re here, I could put a little more effort into it. Omelet?”
Lola wrinkled her nose at the
suggestion. “No.”
“Don’t wrinkle your nose at that,
Lo,” he warned her, taking out the carton of milk. “I thought you liked eggs.”
She shrugged. “I did. It may have
been over exposure, but the last few times I’ve had them, it’s tasted…well,
icky.”
“That happened with me and hot dogs
when I was younger,” Fin replied, pouring out two glasses of milk. “I can’t
stand the things now.”
“Eww.”
“Yeah, I could have already guessed
you weren’t a hot dog lass.”
Lola accepted the glass of milk and
took a sip before speaking again. “When is Aggie coming back?”
“She’s going to be in Hartford
another two, three days,” Fin rummaged through the fridge some more. “Then
after that I’m supposed to be in Hartford. It’s a very cruel trick of Fate’s.”
“I’m sure it will get settled soon
enough,” Lola assured him before taking another sip of milk. It was almost kind
of funny the way Fin always served her milk when she came around. If she didn’t
like milk, she’d complain that he was treating her like she was nine, not
nineteen. Almost twenty.
He nodded. “I could reheat some
pizza.”
She considered that, normally she
didn’t eat pizza unless it was home made. But she was hungry. And Fin had this
odd habit of not doing groceries until there was nothing left, and Aggie was
usually too distracted to notice that there was no food. So it was her best
chance. “Do you have ranch sauce?”
“That’s gross,” Fin told her as he
took the pizza out and reheated two slices. “And, yes, against my better
judgment, I will tell you we have ranch sauce.”
Lola rolled her eyes as he set her
plate and front of her, and poured some ranch sauce on an empty space of the
plate for her. “Where’s you’re sense of adventure.” She dipped the pizza slice
in the ranch sauce, and moaned. “Orgasmic.”
He threw a stray pepperoni at her.
“I’m so glad to have you around, Lola. You remind me why I was glad that me
parents only gave me one little sister.”
“Aww,” Lola faked a sniffle. “That’s
so sad, because I was just thinking that I was glad to have you around because
you’re the big brother I always wanted.”
“Bullshit, you love being an only
child.”
She sighed, “I really really do.”
It would figure of course, that she
did. Lord forbid anyone take the spot light off Lorelai Emily DuGrey. Though,
it was doubted that anyone would have it any other way.