Little Secrets

Tristian rolls his eyes as Rory makes her way over as he stands by his locker, pretending to look for something. He purposefully ignores her for the first few minutes, but when she shows no signs of leaving him alone, he turns to face her. “What do you want?”

“You’re a jerk.” Rory states, simply.

“And you just hate that you’re a little turned on by that, don’t you Mary?” Tristian smirks.

“I know about you and Dean.” Rory says, regretting to words the moment they’ve left her mouth.

Tristian’s smirk stays in place, but his jaw tightens the moment he realises what she’s said. He slams his locker shut and looks down at her, a threatening air suddenly surrounding him. “I was nice enough not to damage your ex-boyfriend’s face at the party. What more do you want from me?” He turns and walks away, wishing Brad would appear so he could take his anger out on him again.

Refusing to be so easily ignored, Rory tries to keep up. “I could say it a little louder if you want…”

He stops and pushes her against the lockers, giving her a warning look. “You say a word to anybody about anything and I swear…” Never one for threats, especially to girls, Tristian backs off. “Just stay out of it.”

Relieved to see a small amount of regret in his eyes, Rory doesn’t give up. “Why would you say that to him? You know full well he could do a lot more damage to you with words than you can to him.”

Tristian looks around worriedly, scared someone is going to hear Rory’s rants. “What do you want me to say? Sorry? ‘Cause I’m not.”

“Yeah.” Rory looks at him with pity. “Keep telling yourself that. Maybe it’ll fix things between you and Dean.”

“Did he ask you to do this?” Tristian demands.

“No. He hasn’t spoken to anybody about it.” Rory tells him. “You really hurt him. Which doesn’t surprise me in the slightest, I might add, but I think Dean actually…” She stops, realising she’s saying too much. As much as she wants Tristian to understand what he’s done, she knows her interfering has its limits. “Just stop being such a jerk and apologise to him. You owe him that much.” She walks away before Tristian can, hoping that her words will have had some kind of impact on the arrogant boy’s conscience.

And they have. Tristian hovers in the hallway, wondering if it’s as easy as Rory makes it sound. He feels a weight lifted off his shoulders as he psyches himself up to do just that. An apology? How hard can it be? Just a few words and things can get back to the way they were. Easy.

*~*~*~*

Crouching down in the aisle, Dean makes a note on his clipboard of how many boxes of cereal are on the shelf, before standing up to stretch his legs. He looks down over the list, so lost in monotonous thought, he doesn’t realise Tristian is standing behind him, waiting to be noticed.

“Busy?” He asks, impatiently announcing his presence.

Dean doesn’t turn round. He doesn’t so much as acknowledge Tristian’s existence. Just begins counting the next item on his list as if he hasn’t heard anything.

“Ooookay, you’re ignoring me. I deserve that.” Tristian sighs. “I just came here to apologise for being a dick at the party. Won’t happen again.” He pointlessly waits for Dean to respond. “So, you want to do something tonight? Can’t do it at my place, I’ve been banned from seeing you since my parents heard the rumours. How about the lake?”

Dean finally turns and looks at Tristian sarcastically. “Well, seeing as you apologised, I’d be happy to sneak off somewhere private and have sex with you.” He rolls his eyes and returns to his work. “You are unbelievable, you know that?”

Tristian groans and throws up his hands. “What do you want me to do? I said sorry!”

Dean notices a customer starting down their aisle and quickly grabs Tristian by the arm and drags him out back. “This was a huge mistake. I can’t believe I ignored my common sense and let this thing start in the first place. I don’t even know what I see in you…you don’t give a shit about anyone but yourself. And I’m not gonna be like those girls you date for five minutes before moving onto the next. What happened at the party was just the last straw.”

“Is this about Brad? Because, seriously, Brad?” Tristian scoffs.

“Listen to me!” Dean shouts, frustrated. “I actually thought I liked you. Then you turned out to be exactly who I thought you were. I went to that party with Brad because he asked me. I’m not into him, nothing happened between us. Can you say the same about the girl you were with?”

Tristian snorts in reply. “Jealous?”

“This is exactly what I’m talking about.” Dean shakes his head. “Go back to your mansion and your five-minute girlfriends.” He turns to head back into the store.

“I don’t want them.” Tristian blurts out, desperately. He panics when Dean stops to listen, not knowing what to say. “I’ll stop seeing them if you want.”

“It’s not enough.” Dean says, hopelessly. “You’re just not ready to have a relationship and I’m not going to stick around to be used when you feel like it and attacked when you need to prove how ‘straight’ you are.”

“So you’re ending it?” Tristian’s never been dumped before. He really doesn’t like it. “Because I made one mistake? Just tell me how to fix it!”

“I don’t think you can. You can’t change, I should have realised that.” Dean shrugs. “My mistake.” He walks off, leaving Tristian utterly confused and feeling worse than before.

He just stares at the door, wondering if maybe Dean will change his mind and walk back in, an apologetic smile on his face and promises of a night of make-up sex.

It doesn’t happen.

*~*~*~*

“You said that to him?!” Rory gasps, as they sit beside each other on the couch, eating junk food. “Well, he deserves it. I’m glad you stood up for yourself.”

Dean, however, isn’t so happy about it. “Am I a total idiot for even contemplating a relationship with him in the first place? I actually believed it would lead to something serious. Is that pathetic or what?”

Rory smiles sympathetically. “I don’t think he meant to hurt you at the party. He hit Brad because he was jealous, that much was obvious. The rest was just to make himself look good in front of his friends.”

Dean nods. “Maybe. But why should I have to put up with that? He took a girl to the party…I didn’t give her a black eye. I didn’t call him any names or reveal his big secret. He’s the one who said our relationship was purely…you know.” Dean cuts off awkwardly. “I just can’t settle for that anymore.”

“Did you tell him that?” Rory asks him.

“Not exactly.” Dean admits. “It’s hard talking about anything serious with him! I never know whether he’s going to laugh in my face. I thought after the first time we…did it…that it’d be over. He’s the one who keep coming back. After a while I just assumed it was because it meant something more.”

“Dean, you should really think about telling him how you feel.” Rory insists. “It probably won’t make a difference, but at least you’ll know for sure you and Tristian were never meant to happen.”

Dean closes his eyes, desperately wishing he could just erase these stupid feelings and get on with his life. “I hate feeling like this. I can’t believe I actually miss him. Wasn’t so long ago I hated his guts, now I just…” He breaks off frustrated. “And I thought things with you were complicated.”

Rory smiles and nudges him, playfully. “You could always switch teams again…?”

“You make it sound so easy.” Dean snorts. “No, I just need to sort things out with Tristian and maybe let things die down for a while. It can’t hurt forever, right?”

Rory thinks of her own pain at losing Dean and attempts to give him a reassuring smile. “Yeah…of course.”

*~*~*~*