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Second Impressions
AUTHOR: The Corrupter
Tradition.
Honor.
Tristan yawned, covering it neatly with a quick swipe of his hand. He had heard it before.
Discipline.
Excellence.
“Flatulence,” the boy sitting beside him snorted under his breath.
Tristan didn’t even crack a smile. He had also heard this before.
Dedication.
“The five pillars of our hallowed halls,” the deep booming voice droned on.
“The five pillars of crap,” the same taunting boy corrected, muttering simultaneously, to the amusement of the boy sitting on the other side of him. That boy snickered, but did not dare look at the ruddy-faced blonde boy who had uttered the blasphemous words.
Tristan rolled his eyes, bored. The blonde-haired boy shifted discreetly in his seat and eyed Tristan out of the corner of his eye, giving him a mocking look. As if to demand that Tristan be amused. Which he was… only slightly, but had decided long ago not to encourage the other boy in such childish matters. Instead, Tristan leaned back against the hardness of the pew and let the edge of his lips twitch in wry acknowledgement of his friend’s antics.
The assembly continued for another half hour, mainly for the benefit of those who had not heard the same routine repeated a million times before and for those overenthusiastic parents who had rushed to the school, intent on picking up their beloved sons for the holiday break. Where were his parents? Tristan didn’t care, and it didn’t matter. On his list of current concerns, seeing his parents again during the break was the last thing on his mind; there were other, more pressing matters to be dealt with first. As soon as the gathering ended, Tristan stood and stretched, duly impressed by the way the student population seemed to flow magically in a wave of black and white. There was something to be said about the image conveyed by their old-fashioned uniforms.
He pulled on his waistcoat, the black jacket flowing out behind him, the tail ending right above the back of his knees. Sighing impatiently, he waited for his row to start filing out of the chapel. He ran a distracted hand through his tousled hair and tugged at his collar. There was a time when he had thought Chilton’s uniforms were a pain. They were nothing compared to what he had to endure now. Even if it did manage to give him impressive airs, Tristan couldn’t help but feel silly. He was sporting tails, for goodness sakes. And not for the first time since he had been handed the ensemble, he couldn’t help but compare his current situation with being stuck at one of his mother’s stupid formal parties. Sighing again, he glanced down at his shiny black leather shoes, polished until his own reflection shone back at him. There was that mocking smile he thought he had banished a year ago; its return an ominous foreshadowing of what was to come. He glared at it, and his normal reflection returned: a slightly disgruntled teenager dressed in a formal uniform of black tailcoat, black vest and starched white shirt. Tugging at the stiff collar again, he gave a little impatient stamp of his feet. What he wouldn’t give now for the practically informal attire of Chilton blue blazer and constricting tie.
His friend, also waiting to leave, turned to him. “Portentousness; Provocation; Prevarication; Pomposity; Vasillation… Those are the real pillars,” he noted, wryly, leaning towards Tristan.
Tristan paid him no heed, lowering his head to pick at a nonexistent errant strand on his starched white shirt. “One problem, Kensington…” he began, adding a dramatic yawn, still flicking at his shirt, “Your last pillar doesn’t start with a P.”
“Oh, bugger off. I prefer the V. I could have used Veracity. Or perhaps added Hypocrisy… Mendaciousness… Disingenuousness… and… Perseverance.” The friend’s head bobbed up and down, as if lost in thought. Only the twinkling eyes belied that.
Tristan had heard this rant before. There was nothing new here. Now Tristan’s blue eyes glanced up to meet his friend’s laughing hazel eyes. The liberal use of a large vocabulary had set him off, making him more agitated than he had been earlier that morning. Something nagged at the corner of his brain. Coming out of his friend’s smirking lips, the words sounded pretentious, strained. Coming out of another’s… Tristan’s thoughts snapped back to the immediate present. It was no use yearning for the past, for what could have been, for what should have been. “You’re just showing off now.”
“Well, what else am I supposed to do? You Yanks stole our language.” The hazel eyes glittered good-humoredly.
Tristan rolled his eyes. “I’m not even going to get into another debate with you.” The first few months after he had arrived, he had immediately befriended the cocky boy standing before him. The English boy had no qualms about teasing the equally overconfident American boy who had just come fresh off the plane. And Tristan had surprised himself by how easily he had reverted back to his usual charming self. His thoughts lingering on the past, however, it had taken Tristan some time to adjust to his new life, even though he was the one who had decided on it – his own method of self-imposed exile. Once Tristan had been able to hurdle his mental blocks, the two boys had become fast friends and Tristan had been able to forget all the past pains, hurts, and wounds. If only for a little while. After all, the space was nice; the distance was great; and time… well, time still kept on ticking.
The two boys reached the end of the pew and broke out of formation, immediately heading outside into the crisp afternoon. Their friends, eager to make plans for their holiday break, instantaneously surrounded Kensington. Tristan, however, lingered long enough to exchange a few words before rushing back to their boarding house. They would have to make their plans without him; he had other things to think about. And a million things to do before he left later that evening.
Simon Kensington’s tall, slender figure inclined against the open door, eyes taking in the scene before him. The room he shared with Tristan was undergoing a state of controlled chaos. Tristan had slipped out of his black tailcoat, leaving his black pullover vest and collared white shirt on. His black trousers were unusually creased from the physical, but mostly mental, exertion of packing for his trip. Simon’s mouth quirked into a lively grin as he watched Tristan struggle with his suitcase.
“Well, isn’t this interesting,” he drawled.
Tristan didn’t bother to turn around. He was on edge and it showed. Absently pushing up his rolled sleeves, he glared at his suitcase and gave a deep, exhausted huff. He had been running on adrenaline the whole week, in anticipation of the event that would occur in just hours.
“What are you talking about now?”
“This disordered, rumpled look suits you,” Simon observed, the teasing note evident in his tone. Tristan had always been immaculately impeccable in his appearance. The change amused Simon. He stopped just short of making an observation about the nervousness Tristan was exuding at the moment. Tristan hadn’t gone into details when discussing his holiday plans, but Simon had an idea what it would entail.
“The amount of noise that comes out of your mouth…” Tristan gave his head a pathetic shake, not bothering to finish his thought. He stared disdainfully at his suitcase. As he did so, his eyes flickered past the full-length mirror in the corner of the room, startled by his disheveled appearance. Was he that agitated? What had happened to the cool, composed, and in control Tristan DuGrey? No wonder his roommate was making fun of him.
“You’ve never been this excited with the prospect of going home.” Simon unfolded himself gracefully from the doorway and strolled leisurely towards his bed, sitting down on the edge of it.
Home. It was almost a foreign concept to Tristan. For over a year, “home” had been London. Eton. Anywhere but where she was. It was exactly the way he had wanted it. Their family manor in Hartford had stood empty for that time, except for the occasional social and business visits his parents indulged in while he was secluded at school, across the vastness of the Atlantic Ocean.
“I’m not excited,” Tristan mumbled, unconvincingly. He avoided meeting his friend’s eyes.
“No?” His roommate raised a brow, puzzled. “Then why are your hands shaking?” He had the courtesy to suppress the triumphant grin, tempering it into a casual, offhand smile.
“It’s cold,” Tristan explained, breezily. In fact, there was a slight draft coming into the room through the open door.
“But of course,” Simon agreed, dismissively. “Actually,” he mused out loud, “I don’t believe you’ve ever been home since you arrived here.”
Tristan threw him a sharp look, indignation emanating off him in waves. “What are you talking about? I go home every break, just like you.”
“Sure, your father’s London house,” Simon refuted easily. “I’m referring to your going back to whence you came from… the States… Connecticut… a little hamlet called Hartford.” He watched Tristan carefully for a reaction to the mention of his old life.
There was none. “I went back last Christmas,” Tristan reminded, attempting for bored exasperation.
“To visit family,” Simon prompted.
That elicited a bewildered glance from Tristan. “Who else would I visit?” he asked, incredulously. He lowered his voice, realizing that his friend’s nosy questions were beginning to grate on him. He was anxious enough without his friend’s less than innocuous questions. There was a pattern to the interrogation now, and Tristan had played the game much too long not to know exactly where it was headed.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Simon started, innocently. “Your old friends… Weren’t you the royal highness of your old school?”
Tristan tackled the problem of his overflowing suitcase once again, waving a hand absently, evasively. “They never change. And they wouldn’t care anyway.”
“Lovely.” Simon pursed his lips. Tristan was using his suitcase as a distraction, attempting to dissuade him from continuing and ruining his concentration regarding his packing. Simon was not readily deterred. He waited a significant beat. “But you’re going to visit the girl this time, right?” As if they had shared many late night discussions about “the girl” in question. As if there was a girl to be discussed.
Tristan’s head snapped up so quickly that Simon was certain he had given himself whiplash. There was the faintest glimmer of anger and anxiety in Tristan’s blue eyes, before they faded to feigned confusion. “What girl?” he sniped, annoyed.
Simon was not fooled. “The girl that’s making you so excited.” He waited a second. “And so incredibly nervous.” He chuckled gleefully. It was so easy to throw the normally unflappable Tristan off-balance now. It was his duty as Tristan’s roommate to take advantage of such a rare and momentous opportunity.
Instead of renouncing the existence of such a girl, Tristan only denied the sentiment. “I’m not nervous,” he snapped, biting down on his lip. He was so unbelievably nervous, making him abnormally jumpy. If any of his friends from Chilton could see him now… they wouldn’t even recognize him. With some dismay, he idly wondered where that Tristan had disappeared to the past few weeks.
Simon shrugged. “This is the fifth time you’ve repacked your bags,” he noted, wryly.
“There’s no girl,” Tristan muttered, trying for jaded nonchalance. The slight strain in his voice betrayed him.
“Of course there is, DuGrey,” his friend contradicted cheerfully.
Tristan frowned, wishing there was some way he could get his roommate to shut up. He didn’t want to think about any girls until after he got off the plane, feet safely on Hartford ground. And even then… Tristan wasn’t scared, but he was worried. It had been so long. So incredibly long. It was supposed to be enough. Distance. Time. Space. But if the old saying was true and absence did indeed make the heart grow fonder… he was in trouble. Thoughts he had been able to squash over the past year, had somehow managed to assault his senses in the most inopportune time, catching him completely off-guard and threatening to drive him insane.
He rolled his eyes, annoyed. “You didn’t fall off the trellis the other night when you snuck out, did you? Perhaps a head trauma…” he let his voice trail off, wearily.
Simon chuckled, ignoring the blatant change of topic. If anything, he could be just as stubborn as his friend. “I’m talking about the girl you’ve been pining for the past two years. The one you crossed the Atlantic to avoid. The one whose name you scream in the middle of the night.” Simon pretended to swoon; his body wracked with laughter at catching Tristan’s irritated, yet mortified, expression. “Don’t look so shocked,” he tsked, in mid-chuckle. “You talk in your sleep.” A lie, but it managed to evoke the reaction that Simon had been waiting diligently for. A flash of alarm, then irrefutable distress.
Tristan frowned, unsure whether to believe him. He hesitated for a brief moment before disputing the allegation. “You’re full of it,” he challenged. But he had waited too long to respond, lending more credibility and weight to the accusation that Simon had thrown at him.
The grin widened across Simon’s face. “But you admit there’s a girl, right?” he urged, needling Tristan. When Tristan didn’t answer, he clarified his question. “The girl whose picture you keep in your wallet.” He arched a brow and waited for a reaction or denial.
He didn’t have to wait long. “There’s no picture…” Tristan’s mouth shut hastily, his exasperated words still hanging in the air.
Simon chuckled again, pleased. He stood up and casually stood in front of Tristan. “The one you keep up here, in that bloated head of yours.” With a finger, he tapped carelessly at the side of Tristan’s head.
Swatting it away as if it were a pestering fly, Tristan groaned, letting his friend know just how wrong he was. “I’m not pining for any girl,” he insisted again, his voice surprisingly neutral. Startling calm. Anyone else would have believed him.
But not Simon. Never Simon. “Come on,” Simon prompted, bouncing back towards his bed. “She’s got to be gorgeous. I mean, the daughter of a viscount was interested in you, and you couldn’t make it last more than a few dates.” He flopped down on his bed, his lean frame stretched out languorously, head propped up by two pillows.
Tristan folded a shirt and placed it inside his suitcase. “Amelia was nice.”
“Nice?” Simon echoed, as if the word were foreign to him. He squinted his hazel eyes at Tristan, suspiciously. “I’d like to see what this girl in your head looks like, DuGrey. If Amelia’s merely nice…”
“Rory.”
The name blurted out with such passion and undisguised adoration made Simon pause in his teasing. He sat up quickly, sensing the importance of Tristan voluntarily parting with the girl’s name. “Her name’s Rory?” he asked, dubiously, though letting the name slide off his tongue with the same respect that Tristan’s expression seemed to deem it. Rory. Tristan DuGrey had a Rory. This was news to Simon, who had never heard the name of any girls from Tristan’s past life pass through his lips. Not willingly, at least. And yet, Simon had always known that there was a girl – memories buried in the recesses of Tristan’s complex brain, he had not been given access to.
“Yeah.” Confirmation with a touch of defeat. Tristan was dismayed to hear the longing still present in his voice. Especially after all this time.
Simon’s interest was piqued. “So what does she look like? Gorgeous, I bet.” He nodded to himself, conjuring up his own mental picture of what a Rory should look like.
“No, she’s…” Tristan stopped, envisioning Rory in his mind. He hadn’t seen her in two years, but she had been branded into his memory. Ingrained in a place that he could not erase even if he wanted to do so. How could he explain Rory’s beauty? It wasn’t conventional in any sense. In the time he had known her, he had been hard-pressed to believably convince any of his friends just how wonderful she was. Why she deserved his attention and why he had tripped over his own feet just to get to her. If he couldn’t even explain the reasons behind his inexplicable feelings towards her to people who did know her, how could he explain it to someone who had never met her? “Look, I haven’t seen her since before I came here,” he evaded the question. It was a moot point. Everything about her had been hardwired into his system, indelibly imprinted to the foundation that made up one Tristan DuGrey. “And I probably won’t see her when I get home. We don’t hang out in the same social circles. Besides, she’s got a boyfriend.” The inevitable reminder of Dean made his stomach turn, adding to the nausea he was already experiencing due to the anxiety his anticipation of returning home was causing him. There was no way for him to know whether Dean still existed in Rory’s world, but it didn’t matter. Tristan only knew that the possibility of it was far greater than his own chances of being allowed admittance back into Rory’s life.
Simon deliberated whether to joke about the look of consternation that had overcome Tristan’s countenance. A moment ago, Tristan had positively glowed, unearthing those precious memories of Rory. Now, he looked detached and miserable. “And? I don’t believe that’s stopped you before,” he pressed, trying to instill some encouragement into his friend.
Tristan shook his head, desperately wanting to change the subject. “It doesn’t matter,” he muttered, returning to his bags.
Simon stared at him, perplexed. “You Americans are a strange bunch. Why don’t you tell her how you feel? A little charm and seduction never hurt anyone. And you’re a… good-looking… well, you’re not a hideous-looking… guy.” The hesitation in his tease was meant to amuse Tristan, but Tristan didn’t even roll his eyes.
“It’s been two years. I’m over her.” There was such finality to his words. His eyes, on the other hand, told a different story. Things had never been resolved between the two. Things were far from over.
Short silence on Simon’s part. “Your statement is contradicted by the excitement evident on your face,” he said, blandly, though he was grinning. Tristan reminded him of himself, and Simon knew the boy would not disappoint when he set his mind to something. And presently, that something was Rory. Always had been.
Tristan let out an exasperated sigh. “I’m excited because I’m finally leaving you behind. I won’t have to wake up seeing your ugly face everyday,” he retorted, briskly. Grabbing his pillow, he aimed for his roommate’s face.
Simon caught it deftly and smirked. “Now, DuGrey, that’s no way to express love for your roommate.”
He stepped off the plane, clutching his knapsack and coat. The first thing that greeted him in the drafty terminal was the cold air. The second thing that assaulted him was the sight of the familiar form of his parents’ driver, standing yards back from the gate, holding a sign with his name written in thick black magic marker. As if they had forgotten what he looked like. Tristan grimaced, annoyed. His feet stopped moving and he stood, glowering petulantly at the driver from the across the waiting area. After twelve hours of being confined in a plane, he was exhausted, barely able to keep his eyes open. He hadn’t been able to sleep during the cross-Atlantic flight, and the prospect of seeing Rory again had made him restless and sick to his stomach. Sighing deeply, his eyes fluttered closed for a brief second, allowing him to tap into whatever energy reserves he had left. He couldn’t very well turn around and reboard the plane, demanding they return him back to his chosen form of isolation. Then again, his body also didn’t seem willing to move towards the direction where Rory waited. Eton and blissful ignorance. Rory and the potential reawakening of old wounds. Something had to give. Without warning, and perhaps slightly heartened by the comfortable feeling of familiarity that the bustling Hartford airport generated within him, Tristan took a deep cleansing breath and started across the great divide.
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