AUTHOR: The Corrupter
RATING: PG-13 (for word usage?)
CHARACTERS / PAIRING: That's funny...
SUMMARY: Post-ep thoughts for "Run Away, Little Boy" (and damn! I think I finally get the significance of the ep title. Hrmph). The title pretty much speaks for itself.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This came to me while I was alone in my lab, pretending to work on my class projects. It was written in less than an hour, and made me crack up because I was actually channeling my Alex, trying to be evil funny. Oh well. I think it lost a lot of that when I revised and edited. It's more angst now, which I'm sure you'd all enjoy much more. Strangely enough (and I'll probably get my membership as a Fecta revoked for admitting this), I haven't actually watched the entire ep, but I have seen the farewell scene about a dozen times. Sigh. Anyway, wasn't going to actually post it, but April and Meg got a kick out of it, and I just wanted to join the rush of post-ep Trory fics that will undoubtedly come out of this episode. Gawd, it's been so long... Tristan, come back!!!
DISCLAIMER: Tristan and spineless Rory (girl should have jumped him when he didn't make a move), unfortunately, belong to WB, GG, Amy SP.

I sit and stare.

It’s the only thing I can do now. No. That’s not the entire truth. I can also think.

Sit. Stare. Think.

And ultimately berate myself for being such a fool. Such an incredibly stupid ass.

Everything had been at my fingertips. Within my grasp. Everything. Even Rory. That look, that smile, that warmth that had infused me as I turned to face my father and my punishment, not knowing that I was already experiencing something far worse... it was all there. It might have taken a little more time, a little more patience, but I could just about taste the edges of what I had spent the past year trying to accomplish. It wasn’t so much victory, at least not anymore -- I mean, I’m here now, stuck on this goddamned plane, miles away from her, staring out into a blue infinity that reminds me of the same thing in her eyes -- but the bittersweet taste of “too little, too late.” My life has become a cliché.

I should have been smarter. I should have been more alert. I should have been patient. I should have been many things. But at this moment, I can’t help thinking that instead of staring glumly at the broken tray table in front of me, I could be standing across from her, reveling in her newfound concern for me, her anxious attention, her sudden interest – all chaste so far, but bordering on something more.

Only I wasn’t. And I’m not.

So much potential, lost. It must be exactly what my father is thinking right now as he sits beside me, commanding the flight attendants to fulfill his first-class elitist whims. I’m supposed to be like that. Ask and I shall receive. Take what I want. All those horrible ideas of entitlement that I gleefully practiced to reckless abandon. The irony is... I’m not, not anymore, and I never was. So where the hell did it all go wrong? I’m sure the question that’s clawing my heart out and grating in my head is also angrily surfacing in his. Only his answer probably ends with something along the lines of “what a shame.”

What a shame indeed.

So where did it all go wrong?

Probably the moment she walked into my life and showed me exactly what an ass she thought I was. No... That’s not entirely correct. It probably started before that, with the faint inklings of desire to be something more than what my parents and our tiny social circle had consigned for me. Perhaps the prickling started out as that annoying sensation of an itch located just under the surface of the skin that I couldn’t quite relieve no matter how hard I tried. I had been able to ignore it for the better part of my 16 years, pretending the incessant need to scratch didn’t permeate my every thought. Surprisingly, that constant need had been easily tempered by the sheer force of willpower, the ability to pretend that the person I currently was reigned superior to the one hidden in the recesses of my heart. Over the years, I foolishly thought the itch had gone away, and it probably had. So what changed? Most likely, it wasn’t until the day she walked into my life, turning it upside down, that the incessant itching had become a rash.

I’m an ass with a rash. And that ass part doesn’t even have to be entirely true. It’s all about perception, and that’s what I am to her. Was to her. Until maybe about five minutes before I left her standing alone with a huge wistful grin on her face as she watched me leave her life for good, probably forever. Or maybe not. Maybe that smile wasn’t affectionate but a joyous celebration of the removal of my speck of dust from her earthly reality.

Not that Rory is a rash. She’s not. Although if I were to compare her with some sort of disease... and really, all this obsessing about her, isn’t it pretty much some kind of disorder? It would be more along the lines of a cancer. She planted the seeds, awakened whatever dormant abnormalities – freakish, really, when compared to the norms of my social circles – that might have accidentally been written into my genetic code, and then stepped back to watch as it metastasized through my body, forcing me to strip off my pathetically and obscenely overconfident shell. To want to be someone I’m not used to being. Even as my body fights it, snippets of that sentient being peek through. Startling her. Startling me. And although the normally obnoxious and spoiled brat kept fighting for domination, it was that light and goodness that had ultimately said farewell to her in that darkened Shakespearian gym.

It’s a tragedy, really. It took my departure to show the both of us what could have been. What should have been all along.

Hindsight is 20/20, which means it’s absolutely worth crap where I’m concerned. Sure, if I were omniscient, I would have seen that my means of dealing with her rejection, not once or twice but many times, would ultimately be my downfall. But I was powerless to do anything about it. I hate rejection. I can’t deal with it. I don’t have the means to make myself immune to it. Looking back now, I realize that I wasn’t supposed to be immune. I was supposed to learn from my mistakes. So what happened? Stupid choices were made. Stupid acquaintances formed. Stupid pranks carried out without any forethought. Stupid.

I must have the learning curve of a ten-foot pole. Which was exactly what Rory wouldn’t even lower herself to touching me with... once upon a time. And when she tried to break through the barriers, I pushed her away. It’s like Forrest Gump said: Stupid is as stupid does. Or something like that. She’d probably be pleased I used a movie reference, but I probably messed it up anyway. It’s the story of our relationship; she’s pure and right, and I’m an idiot. I’m like some kind of autistic savant, only I’m pretty sure the savant part doesn’t apply.

When she reached out, I should have reached back. But like I said. Hindsight.

In the end, I think it was the unexpected concern that did me in. She expressed her apprehension about the predicaments I had gotten myself into, practically pleaded with me to revert back to that cunning sneak I used to be and to stop hanging out with my two new friends, or losers, or whatever. I should have melted at her distress and let her talk me into doing whatever she wanted of me. Only perhaps it was the cloying concern that revolted me, made me unable to fully comprehend what she was doing and convinced me that she didn’t mean any of it. Or maybe it was just seeing how alarmed she was that made me want to push back. To show her. Deny her. Reject her. Sever her control. Like she had done to me so many times before. To simply inform her that it was also a case of “too little, too late” for her.

What can I say? I’m a class act.

I should be proud of her; she tried to manipulate me into taking her advice about ditching those other losers by playing to my ego and praising my intelligence. But she should have known better. I may or may not be a bigger ass because of all the things that have occurred between us, but one thing remains constant. When I’m in her presence, sometimes the brain stops functioning in spite of itself.

And sometimes I forget to breathe. It happened once before at Madeline’s party, about a tenth of a second before my lips gloriously touched hers and didn’t end until she ran from me. It happened again, just hours ago, under completely different circumstances. When I stood before her, matter-of-factly revealing that I would kiss her goodbye if her boyfriend wasn’t staring at us, and her eyes had lit up before falling into a pensive expression of regret... I had to will my heart to slow down and to remember to breathe. She had fidgeted uncomfortably, visibly struggling to either accept my inexplicable gentlemanly behavior, or to damn her boyfriend’s presence. The conflict was so incredibly shocking to me that I wanted nothing more than to pull her into my arms and never let go. After all, if Dean had tackled me at that point, what else could my parents do to me? Send me to military school? Oops, been there, done that.

In the end, I stayed the gentleman, fighting the urge to engulf her within my embrace, and left her smiling shyly but broadly at our little inside joke. It should mean something that anytime she hears the name “Mary” again, she’ll automatically think of me. And it does warm me. But for some reason, I’m still stuck in the past, tearing myself apart by dwelling on what could have been.

Regrets... Hypotheticals... What ifs. What if I had let her cajole me back to being that repulsive sap that spent all his time staring idiotically and longingly in her direction? What if I had confronted her instead of taking out my frustrations on a family safe? What if I had simply hugged her goodbye, if only to feel her next to me for the first and last time, and leaving her with the knowledge that I could be substantial? What if I had just thrown caution to the wind and kissed her anyway, leaving her utterly breathless and punctuating all that should have been between us? For some reason, I have a feeling she wouldn’t have run screaming from me if I had. What if I hadn’t left rehearsals early that night, or hadn’t gotten caught? What if. Maybe I would have gotten to kiss her again, in front of all our friends and family, even if only ensconced in the safety and fantasy of a play. Maybe we could have been something else. Confidantes. Real friends. More.

Maybe. But maybes, like hindsight, are also worth crap. It doesn’t change the fact that I’m still sitting here, on my way to military school, away from her. I’m not scared. No, nothing can compare to how I felt the day after I kissed her at Madeline’s party and watched her run frantically out the door. I’m not even worried. Nothing about military school can frighten me more than knowing that I might have had a chance at something – anything -- with Rory, and I foolishly let it slip away. The thought itself is enough to make my stomach clench.

Empty. Regret. Remorse. It’s how I feel now, and I can’t do anything about it. Not yet. Right now, all I can do is this.

Sit. Stare. Think.

Who knows, maybe in a year or two, I’ll be back. Maybe Dean will no longer be in the picture. Maybe we can pick up where I stupidly left off. Maybe Rory likes a man in a military uniform...

And now, there’s one more thing I can do.

Hope.