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chapter eight: but she's looking at you

a/n:

julie is such a lesbian when i write her and idk what to do with that, so have the briefest glimpse of julie's gay panic!

rory's escapism is actually something that can be so personal...

tw(s) -- rory is oblivious, jesse calls goldberg fat, and oliver is a dick.

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"You listen to an awful lot of Beatles music, Ror." Connie says instead of a greeting as she breaches the threshold of the lounge.

Their conversation coming to a pause, both girls look up at her.

"Good morning to you, too, Con." Julie all but snarks.

Rory, meanwhile, turns off the radio (which was, ironically enough, playing a song from Abbey Road) and cocks an eyebrow at the other brunette.

"Do I?"

"Yes." Connie, who worships at the altar of Madonna, huffs as she flops into the space beside Julie. "You do."

"Ignore her. I think the Beatles are cool."

Connie rolls her eyes but makes no move to shrug the arm Julie slings around her shoulder off.

As it's the morning before their game with Italy, Rory and Julie had planned to get an early breakfast because they weren't sure they'd have enough time to eat after their class that day. Connie, who isn't a morning person and is apparently in a bit of a spat with her boyfriend, saw no need to rush. Half an hour into her extensive morning routine, her roommates fled the room in search of freedom, each bringing something to keep them entertained as they served the rest of their sentence.

Julie's item of choice was her Gameboy, which now sits in her lap, the tune of the newer Donkey Kong games coming from it.

Rory's was her grandmother's copy of the Hobbit. She resumes her tenth reread of the book as the conversation resumes.

"You're so British, and you're not even British." Connie continues, but her words have no malice. "Do you, like, eat beans on toast?"

Julie snorts.

"Totally. With a side of jellied eels and mushy peas."

The corners of her lips pull up into a smile.

"No, but on a serious note, a full English? Pasties? Scotch eggs? It's not all entirely unappealing, you know-- I even had treacle tart instead of cake at a birthday, once."

"Yeah, I'm good."

"More for me, then."

Julie stretches and yawns, "Alright, alright. Are you good to go?"

"I think so." Connie picks at her cuticles and frowns. "Man, I've broken, like, three nails since we got here-- there must be something in the water here because this never happens to me, and I play rough."

"It might be 'cause you eat like crap." Julie pulls her arm from around Connie as the brunette elbows her in the side.

"Oh! That reminds me!" Rory swings her legs off the couch and sits up so fast that Julie shifts back. "My dad gave me some extra cash to get a mani, but I was gonna turn it into a mani-pedi... Would you girls want to come with me?"

Connie's face lights up into a big smile. Julie fails to hide a grimace.

"Of course!"

"You spend a lot of money." Julie says, sounding vaguely pained. "Please, stop spending money on me."

"Oh, come on, Jules. Let me spoil you. You deserve it."

A nervous smile warbles onto the blonde's face as the two of them descend upon her like vultures.

Rory puts a hand on her knee to squeeze it and smiles with her teeth, Connie rests her chin on Julie's shoulder and whispers a drawn-out please, and Julie, who has a spine most of the time, feels all of her resolve turn to jelly.

"Well, I guess things have been kind of annoying recently..."

Connie squeals excitedly and wraps her arms around Julie, startling the blonde.

Their plans set, the girls leave the lounge with the intention of finally going to eat breakfast. However, they barely make it to the elevator before Connie is throwing her head back and groaning.

"What?"

"I forgot my bracelet." She says as if they're supposed to know what she means. As the two of them share a glance, she heaves a sigh. "My bracelet? The one that I wear all the time? Guy gave it to me when we were kids, and I threw it somewhere in the room after our fight last night, and now I'm not wearing it."

A beat of silence.

"I thought you two were fighting?" Julie's face wrinkles with confusion.

Rory, with her eyebrows furrowed, nods in agreement.

"We are! But that doesn't mean I can just show up to breakfast without it! It'd break his heart!"

Connie heaves another miffed sound as the two of them still appear to be lost.

"Just-- I know I've been holding you up, but can you help me find it? Please?"

Rory opens her mouth to respond but her stomach growls loudly. Her face burns slightly as Julie claps her on the shoulder.

"You go eat, I'll go help her tear our room apart to find the bracelet, and we'll meet you there. Okay?"

"Okay."

She departs for the elevator to the chorus of Connie's repeated thank you's.

Rory leans back against the wall after she clicks the button for the right floor and opens her book back up to the page she was on.

The Hobbit is, if she were to have to narrow it down, probably her favorite book of all time. She's read it so many times that she's burned through a few copies, reading until the spines cracked and the pages warped, and she knows it so well that she recited the entire first chapter for extra credit in her drama class last year. (The only copy that is still intact is the one she has now. All of Mary's vintage copies of books are kept on a shelf in the study, only used by Rory when she needs comfort most.)

She just finds it oddly soothing to imagine life as a round-bellied hobbit who lives in a hobbit hole and eats whatever it wants, as much as it wants.

A hobbit has no worries in life except for big people and meddlesome wizards that seek partners for their adventures.

Wouldn't anyone want to live a life like that?

Before the door closes entirely, a tattooed arm sticks through the gap, and Dean and Fulton step on.

"Hey." She chirps. "You're late to breakfast."

"So are you." Fulton presses a button until the doors close.

Dean simply looms over her and invades her personal space as he tries to read upside down.

"You've always got your nose in a book."

"Yeah, and if you did, too, you'd be in trouble a lot less often."

"Where's the fun in that?" He pulls away and leans on the wall next to her.

"So..." Fulton interrupts her attempt to continue reading. "Jesse said you and Averman snuck out."

Dean nudges her in the ribs with his elbow. "Look at you, breaking the rules."

Add that to the list of things she has to do: teach Luis how to stop, expand Averman's appetite, and make sure people know how to keep a secret before doing anything with them.

"Yeah, we did. So what?"

"So what?" Fulton echoes incredulously.

"You and Averman, huh?" Dean interjects, arms crossed over his chest. "Didn't see that coming."

Rory's brows pinch together. "It's not like that-- we just went to hang out because I wanted a Slurpee."

The two of them blink at her.

"You're kidding right?"

"Dude, he's, like, obsessed with you."

"Why does everyone keep saying that?" She scoffs, putting the book down. "He doesn't have a thing for me. I think I would know if he had a thing for me."

Fulton takes a step toward her and leans so his face is closer to hers. "So, let me get this straight, alright? The dork attaches himself to your hip, needs your attention like some kind of dog, and sneaks out after curfew to get you a goddamn slurpee, but you think it isn't like that?"

"Not to mention the fact that the kid's always touching you." Dean shrugs his shoulders when she looks at him.

"I just-- that's-- Isn't that what, like, guy friends do?"

Dean tilts his head. "Have you ever been friends with a guy who wasn't your ex?"

"I'm friends with you, aren't I?"

He doesn't appear to have a response to that.

"Jesus Christ, you and Banksie are, like, the dumbest smart people I know."

"Look, I just came here to play hockey and smile for the cameras--"

(She pauses as she realizes that she and Adam are definitely more similar than she thinks.)

"Look, later, during the game, look at him after you score a goal."

Rory nods very slowly.

They leave her alone for the rest of the ride, which is all of two or three minutes, and she sighs in relief when the door finally opens. Bidding the two enforcers goodbye, she all but rushes to join Averman at a table

A thousand questions sit on the tip of her tongue but her cowardice gets the best of her.

Besides, he's sitting with Jesse, Dwayne, and Goldberg, and they're in the middle of a conversation.

"Hey, can I sit here?"

She gets scattered responses from them and the conversation only pauses as she slides into the seat next to the redhead, confusion marring her features when he flinches.

"Say, Rory," The cowboy smiles gently at her as she turns to him with a cocked brow, "we're thinking of goin' to Beverly Hills, later..."

"Yeah." Jesse adds with a tentative glance in Averman's direction. "You should come along."

Rory contemplates it for a moment. "Hm, when's later? I've got plans with the girls for after the game, and some interview tomorrow morning, so I don't want to be out late."

"An interview? Why's anybody interviewing you?"

"'Cause, she's ten times more interesting than some fat kid from Philadelphia?" Jesse poses the rhetorical question with a sardonic tone and then takes a sip from his juice box.

"Hey. Leave him alone." Rory says almost immediately, her hackles raised. "But to answer your question, Greg, because my dad asked them to."

Jesse raises his hands complaisantly and mutters something about her being too nice as Goldberg nods. She can tell he still doesn't quite get it.

"Anyway, if we wait 'till you do that thing with the girls, will you come?" Dwayne brings her attention back to him with his hopeful attitude.

"Uh, sure! You guys will never survive the Hills without me, anyway."

Goldberg starts to complain about what she said, but she ignores him in favor of returning to her book. She might not be the smartest when it comes to people but she knows that it isn't worth the energy to argue with him. He's one of those people who just won't ever admit that they aren't as great as they think they are.

Les slides his plate over to her and stares pointedly until she starts to eat from it.

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Rory was never good on defense.

If it were up to her to help the goalie, every team she was on would be shit out of luck. Goals would be scored, and games would be lost, and she'd find herself, more often than not, doing laps around the ice after practices.

She has, however, always made up for it in her offensive abilities.

And, most importantly, her ability to score a damn goal.

Rory, puck underfoot, travels across the ice at a decent speed.

She hears the crowd start to react as some Italian player that's twice her size comes at her from her right. Immediately, she takes a risky shot on goal, not getting to see the outcome because she's crouching to avoid the hit that's coming her way.

The hit never lands, though.

Between her quick change of position and the force he had behind his check, he goes over her back.

Her eyes get wide as she stands up. Holy shit.

Rory doesn't get to dwell on that for more than a moment, though, because, as her heartbeat fades from her ears, she hears the goal sound that's been playing.

Her eyes flit up to the digital scoreboard.

The puck that she'd shot so haphazardly went in.

They're up six to two.

Throughout the past two periods, she's scored three of six goals.

A hat trick.

"Oh, god." She breathes, spinning in place as the game stops around her and the hats come flying over the boards. "Oh, my god."

Charlie, screaming her name so loudly that his voice is cracking, reaches her. Adam is right after him, and Guy and Connie are after him.

Fulton's words echo through her mind.

While everyone in the room is busy looking at her, she turns to the bench to see if Averman is cheering for her.

He is. Possibly louder than everyone else.

And, for whatever reason, that's all that matters.

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Team USA beats Team Italy in a shutout, seven to zero.

After agreeing to make an appearance when they donate the hats, answering a few questions for the press, and taking a much-needed shower, Rory, with her wet hair pulled up behind her head and her muscles aching, exits the locker room. Excitement buzzes under her skin, tingling in her fingertips and fluttering in her guts as she quickly surveys her surroundings for her father.

She doesn't have to look very hard to find him.

Oliver stands down the hall by the locker rooms with Don Tibbles and her coach. The three of them seem to be in the throes of something, their shoulders tense as they rapidly exchange hushed words.

Bombay puts an end to it when he sees her. "Hey, Myrtle. Do you need anything?"

The tension immediately leaves Oliver's shoulders and he turns to face her, a grin on his face.

"Hey, Dad, did you see it? Did you see what I did?" She practically bounces on the balls of her feet, accidentally ignoring Bombay and making a point to not acknowledge Tibbles' presence.

Tibbles doesn't sense the cold shoulder.

"Yes, of course-- "

"I wasn't talking to you." Her expression and voice both fall flat just briefly enough to get her point across.

Oliver barely suppresses a laugh and her coach, with his hands on his hips, lifts both brows.

"I did see you, poppet." With the hand that isn't on his cane, he reaches forward to affectionately brush a hair behind her ear.

"Do you think Pops saw?"

Oliver shrugs. "Who cares what that bag of bones did or didn't see? You got a hat trick. You should be celebrating."

Both her heart and her smile fall ever so slightly, but she refuses to let him take this from her.

(It matters a great deal to Rory what Elijah Myrtle thinks.)

The locker room door opens behind her.

"I am going to celebrate." She hums. "The girls and I are getting our nails done, and then I'm going to Beverly Hills."

Oliver nods succinctly. "If you see that sister of mine, tell her I said hello."

"I will."

"Hey, Rory!" Averman's voice carries down the hall. "Connie says hurry up."

"Tell her I'm coming!"

Oliver's expression sours significantly at the sight of the redhead.

"I'll see you later?"

"Yes. I'll see you later."

Before her father's mood can bring her down any further, Rory waves at her coach and shoots Tibbles a dirty look before she walks down the hall. Averman holds her bags out to her when she reaches him and she takes them, grabbing his shoulder to keep him from turning to glance at the man who's likely glaring at both of their retreating forms.

"Y'know, I don't think he likes me very much."

"Don't worry about it. I don't even think he likes himself too much."

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a/n:

the ducks are all so weirdly affectionate with one another that rory is so confused when they tell her that les likes her, and that's so fucking funny to me.

connie deserves to be girly and annoying and high maintenance and not be called a bitch, so if i see you complaining in the comments I will kick your ass.

also, we get more grandpa myrtle next chapter. just more myrtles in general. and rory being a rich queen. it's gonna be great!

comments and votes are super appreciated! they let me know that you guys like my writing and I cannot stress how much they motivate me to continue! thank you