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chapter three: very first day

a/n:

why is this beginning three chapters when it could've been like one? idk.

tw(s) — angst, mentions of underage drinking, the ducks are being mean but not intentionally

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"Hi, is this English eleven?"

Rory, the self-appointed sacrificial lamb, stands in front of her friends and in the doorway of the room with a tight smile pulling at her lips. All of them were standing around and looking at each other, waiting for someone else to bite the bullet, and she wasn't going to let them spend the entire forty minutes lingering in the hallway like idiots, so, before the first bell rang and made them late, she opted to poke the bear.

The bear in question being a hard-faced middle-aged woman.

"Yes." The teacher snaps. "You're late."

"I know. We're very sorry—— it's our first day and we didn't know where to go——"

"I don't care. Go and sit. Your next lateness will earn you all an after-school detention."

Rory stops talking. Her smile gets even tighter.

How were they going to give her detention on a campus she lives on?

The Ducks fill in the remaining empty seats and Averman takes the one next to her with a smile. She smiles back, a little softer and a little more genuinely this time, and pulls a notebook from her bag. It's larger than standard, a five-subject or something, and it's heavy in her hands. She writes her name, school year, and what class it was for on the inside of the front cover.

"I am Mrs. Fitzgerald." The mean woman says, writing her name on the board in chalk as she speaks. "Every Wednesday, you'll have a real quiz. Every Friday, you'll have an exam, and anytime I feel like it you'll have a pop quiz or exam."

All around the room, the mouths of kids who have and haven't been in attendance for three years hang open. Rory's doesn't.

She opts to just stare at the woman with wide eyes and furrowed brows.

Of course, she's used to a heavy workload—— at her previous school, anything below a ninety average was considered grounds for punishment—— but this is something else entirely.

A test every week?

How were the Goldbergs and the Fultons of the world going to keep up?

"Don't look so surprised. You knew what you signed up for."

Did they? Did they really?

"A class rubric is going to be passed around now."

Mrs. Fitzgerald places a stack of papers on one desk and the kid takes one before handing the rest back.

This was going to be a long forty minutes.

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When it comes to history, Rory is very particular.

'Particular' meaning that it's her favorite subject, but she has never liked a single teacher she's had for it. Not since she was in elementary, anyway. They just never knew how to teach it in a way that made it interesting for everyone. And it's not like she has high hopes for this school after everything she's seen, but she silently hopes for one good thing.

The teacher shuts the door with a bang on his way in, cutting all conversation short.

"It's been said that the present is to the past like a dwarf on the shoulders of a giant. If the dwarf holds his seat he can, indeed, see further—— but, beware, if the dwarf should grow careless and forget his place..."

He slams his book down on Rory's desk, making her jump.

"History is the giant. Get ready for the ride."

He then turns on his heel and starts talking about what his class is going to be like.

"It really isn't that deep." Someone whispers behind her.

She's too busy resting her head on her fist and staring at their teacher in awe to respond.

Is he nuts? Yes.

Is he speaking her language? Also, yes.

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"C'mon, you have to eat something."

Rory huffs at her boyfriend as she pushes the food around on her plate with a fork.

She had phys ed right before lunch and, between having to change in front of all of those girls and having to run the mile, there are plenty of reasons for her to no longer have an appetite.

"Yeah." Russ cuts in. "And this food is so damn good—— much better than my old school's, anyway."

"That's because they need to keep the cake eaters happy."

Both Rory and Adam look up at Averman at the same time, earning peels of laughter from their friends.

All the laughter halts when Kenny comes and sits without any food, though.

"Where's your foot, Ken?" She asks.

"That dick stole it." He points.

They follow his finger. A few tables down, right by the door, the varsity kids are making a very big deal out of eating the lunch they stole from him. Rory sighs softly.

"Ignore him, man. He's just some rich asshole who thinks he's entitled to everything even if he works for nothing." Guy gestures with a can of soda as he speaks. "They're all the same."

At the other end of the table, Rory says nothing. Her breath hitches sharply on the inhale and her eyes flick up to get the briefest glimpse of the others nodding along in agreement with what he's saying, but she doesn't say a word.

(They hate you, a voice in the back of her mind says, they just don't know it yet.)

"Hey, uh, Kenny, you can have mine..." She slides the plate over to him.

(If they insist that you aren't anything like the other rich kids, then why does that comment hurt so bad?)

"Rory, what——"

"The scholarship comes with three free meals a day but I, uh, have plenty of money to buy some more."

None I ever had to work for, though, she thinks acerbically.

Not giving him any room to argue or anyone to comment on how rich she is, Rory gets up with her wallet and makes her way back to the line. Skipping meals is something she hasn't done since she was thirteen and, after how extensive her therapy was, she'd rather not start doing it again. So, even if she isn't at all hungry, even less so after bearing witness to that conversation, she lets herself look at all of her options now that most people have gone to their seats.

The only warning she gets of what's to come is a shadow that looms over her.

"I would stay away from that if I was you."

Exhaling deeply, she glances back at the varsity captain over her shoulder. He grins down at her.

"What?"

"The chicken. I don't know about you, but I don't trust just anyone to cook chicken."

She slowly puts down the chicken she was going to get and grabs a different meat option instead.

"See, I'm not such a bad guy."

"Your friend just stole my friend's lunch." Rory says, looking up at him with a flat expression. "I think that basically checks most boxes."

"Hey, hey. Cole is barely an acquaintance."

"You're not helping your case. In fact, you're making yourself out to be more of an asshole."

She resists the urge to cringe after she says it. Whatever he might want to do, she reasons, he won't do it in front of this many people.

The payback would come later.

He doesn't get visibly angry, though. He just keeps smiling.

That makes her more nervous.

At least anger is predictable.

"I guess you're right, huh?" He asks, an amused lilt to his voice. "But, hey, if I'm an asshole for keeping a guy I don't like around, then what are you for dating one, Lorelei?"

She blanches, wincing, slightly, at the use of her full name.

"Or, is it Rory? Rachel talks a lot."

Oh, thanks a lot, Rachel.

"It's nothing to you." Rory says, her voice wavering despite her attempt to sound strong. "And I do like him."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah. That's the difference between us, Rick. I don't string people along for the hell of it."

"Y'know. You're speaking a little confidently for a girl who's just met me."

"I don't have to have known you my whole life to know exactly who you are."

He gets dangerously close to her ear, then, and she'll hate herself later for the way her stomach jumps. "What you don't know about me could fill a book, Rory."

Rory grips the edges of her tray harder. She goes to hand her card over to the lunch lady, but Rick beats her, handing out some folded bills between two fingers.

"But, you'll realize that soon enough." He's still whispering in her ear. "'Cause now you owe me."

Rory snatches her tray up and storms back to their table, her face redder than she'd care to admit. Averman's already staring at her and clenching his utensils tightly.

"Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." She huffs as she sits. "I hate that guy."

"Me too." He says, gritting his teeth slightly.

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They have Chemistry after lunch. Rory, who took Chemistry already and has an Anatomy class with seniors later in the day, does homework in the library until they're done.

She's greeted first by Charlie, who shows her the syllabus excitedly. The rest of them follow after, greeting her with excited rambling about liquid nitrogen and future experiments where they'll get to light metal powders and salts on fire, and she doesn't have the heart to tell them that they're going to have to suffer through a whole host of math based science before they even get to that. (Or that the flame test lab is just a demonstration of how fireworks work.)

Almost all of them, she finds out, got to pick each other as lab partners, the only exception to the rule being Les and Goldberg, who disrupted their teacher so many times that he separated them for the rest of the year.

Goldberg got stuck with some nerdy kid that he whines about for a moment but Averman, who is miraculously not one of the crowd, was placed with a girl that none of them recognized.

Before Rory can ask them any further questions, though, the topic of conversation finally makes his way out of his classroom.

Beside him is a mousy brunette with a soft smile.

"Who was that?" Rory questions him after he's said goodbye and draped an arm around her waist.

"She's my lab partner. Her name is Augustine. She's the principal's daughter."

Rory nods. "She looks sweet."

"She is. I should introduce you two." He grins. "She's a total nerd, just like you."

She scoffs and elbows him in the side, gently. Averman laughs.

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"I have to go." Averman murmurs between the kisses she presses onto his lips, his face cradled in her hands. "Gotta earn my keep."

School ended about an hour ago and he spent that entire hour holding her on her bed, petting her hair, and getting all the details he'd missed over the past few months.

Or, at least, all the details she felt like he needed to know.

(There was a lot of stuff she didn't tell him for his own sake.)

"I know." Rory says back, still pressing soft kisses to his lips.

Averman's melted to the floor and became a little puddle that used to be an annoying, somewhat funny redheaded boy. His hands slowly move from her waist to the doorway.

"I mean it, baby." He smiles. "I have to be at the theater in like forty-five."

Humming softly, she presses another quick kiss to his lips before she steps back, flashing him a grin.

"Alright, you can go now."

"I'll see you at Banks', right?"

"Yeah." She nods. "I'm going to cram everybody into my car. Julie says she can get me there just fine."

A brief look of doubt crosses Averman's face but he doesn't say anything disparaging.

"Just be careful, alright?"

"I always am."

"And, please, feel free to save all those kisses for the party."

She rolls her eyes fondly as he turns and starts to walk down the hallway.

"You wish! I might email you the trig answers, though!"

"You're the bomb, princess!"

Rory smiles and leans on the doorway until she can't see him anymore.

Luis and Kenny, eventually, take the spot on her bed that the couple previously occupied. Kenny whines about his homework and Luis looks over some photos from her vacation, making the odd joke about her in a bikini until she stops doing her trigonometry homework and snatches the photos out of his hands.

Rachel comes back from whatever she was doing thirty minutes before they're set to go to Adam's.

"Oh, hey," Rachel says, glancing at the boys, "Are you going to introduce me?"

"Hey, Rach. This is Luis Mendoza and that's Ken Wu—— they're my friends and teammates."

The black-haired girl nods, wiping some sweat from her forehead.

"I'm Rachel, Rory's roommate." She turns toward the bathroom. "It was nice meeting you guys!"

As soon as the door is closed, Rory reaches over to slap Luis on the chest. He immediately stops staring at where Rachel once was to look at her, offended.

"Ow!"

"Stop it." She hisses. "She's the varsity captain's sister, dumbass."

He nods absentmindedly and she sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose.

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Despite Adam's best efforts, Rory just couldn't find herself enjoying the party.

It felt more like a get-together for the original Ducks to reminisce on their last than it did a thing for all of them. She stood a few feet away from them, a drink in hand as she watched the faces of her fellow not-so-new kids as Averman waxed poetically about their first championship game for probably the fifth or sixth time since they first became a team that actually got along. Even without the accidental reminders of their alienation, Rory surmised, she probably wouldn't have had any fun. With Dean and Jesse gone, and Bombay's abandonment still a bitter taste in her mouth, and Guy's comment from earlier that day suddenly heavy on her mind, she didn't do much more than sip on a tequila heavy drink Luis made for her and smile a tight smile as Averman failed at several games of water pong.

Or, at least, she doesn't do anything until, on a trip back from the bathroom, she finds Charlie sitting by himself on the couch.

"Hey..."

He spares her a glance as she sits next to him but says nothing. Instead of starting an interrogation,
she settles into her seat, so close to him that their arms touch and the warmth he exudes sinks into her bones.

"How are you feeling?" Rory asks after granting him a moment to brood, turning until her whole body is facing him.

Charlie lifts his shoulders in a shrug. "I'm fine."

"Mhm. I totally believe that." She nods, her eyebrows pinched in a sardonically sympathetic way that makes him roll his eyes at her. "You've been sitting here and moping this entire party. I've never seen you so down. There's obviously something wrong."

(He doesn't comment on the fact that she was moping, too.)

"You know what's wrong."

Something about how monotonously he says it that catches her off guard. He punctuates the following silence with a sip from his can of pop.

"What? Bombay?"

Charlie doesn't respond.

"Oh, Charlie..."

He sniffs but yet again says nothing. Rory shifts closer and rests her head on his shoulder, her arms snaking around his midsection.

"You're going to be okay, Charlie."

"How do you know that?"

"Because you're just like me." She says softly. "People have walked out of our lives before, and people will walk out of our lives later, but we'll always be able to move on. Wanna know why?"

Charlie's arm finally, after he relaxes in her hold, loops around her back.

"Why?"

"Because kids like us want love but don't need it. We're like plants that grow on rocks. It's our superpower."

He stares at her for a moment before tears well up in his eyes. With a sniffle, he pulls her closer to his side and rests his head on hers.

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a/n:

word count — 2680

shout out to alan ruck on succession for delivering the most heartbreaking line of all television history and inspiring that convo between rory and charlie!

what do we think about augustine? or, ig, what do we think about that tiny interaction about her (because we haven't fully met her yet)?

me bc I know so much you don't know:

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