Chapter Text
summer's just beginning, baby
i might learn to hate you, lady
this ain't what i thought it would be
this is the saddest summer ever
SANSA
Sansa sits in the back of the taxi and tries not to cry.
Harry's last text sits there, read nearly a hundred times in the last hour, but she still hasn't been able to respond to it.
Sorry, something came up. No go on the ride xx
And so, in an airport she's never been to before, in a city she's never been to before, she'd finally managed to find a taxi service, for which she is paying an exorbitant fee to bring her to Robb's place.
Not that she hasn't already spent too much money - the plane ticket, a new wardrobe. All so that she could spend the summer with Harry. With a groan, she leans her head back against the headrest and closes her eyes and tries to swallow down her self pity.
She has been in love with Harry since the day they first met, her fifth week at college. She had pledged Zeta Beta Zeta, and Harry was in his third year, a rising star in Omega Chi. She'd had to serenade a group of Omega Chis as part of her hazing, and Harry had been there, brilliant grin on his face while she and the other pledges sang I Say a Little Prayer in front of the fraternity house. Sansa remembers her face feeling hot, knew she was bright red, but she couldn't take her eyes off him. He was everything she pictured Prince Charming to be. Everything her mother had always told her would make the perfect husband.
The next two years had followed suit – ZBZ and Omega Chi interacted frequently, and Sansa's crush had only grown. The problem was, Harry's type is blonde and busty, of which Sansa is neither. Harry flirted with her – he flirted with every girl, but Sansa swears he was always more attentive with her – but nothing romantic had ever happened. Then he graduated and moved across the country for law school, and Sansa had died a little inside. She made sure to keep in touch over the next year, and as summer approached, he had told her – if you're ever in California, hit me up.
And so she had found an internship out in Los Angeles, and contacted her brother Robb to see if she could crash with him for a few months. It all sounded perfect – she'd get to learn the world of west coast fashion, and she would get to be with Harry and something would finally happen between them. She bought a whole new wardrobe to better show off her... well, less than busty assets, though she hasn't had the courage to bleach her hair blonde yet. She will seduce Harry, he will realize he loves her, and they will get married and have a slew of fat, happy babies.
That was the plan, except Harry couldn't even be bothered to pick her up from the airport like he said he would, and Robb is already gone on tour so he isn't even in the state. Sansa opens her eyes again and blinks against the tears that are still there, tries to ignore the lump in her throat. It's fine, she tells herself, wiping at her eyes and finally responding to Harry's text.
No worries! We should meet up soon :)
She stares down at the text she sent, feeling utterly pathetic.
She tries to shake that off. This is fine - it's one minor setback, she's sure something urgent came up and that's why Harry couldn't pick her up from the airport. This is only day one of her summer in California, and she will not let this dim her excitement. She has her internship, a place all to herself because Robb and Theon are on tour for the next few months, and she will see Harry. By the end of the summer, they'll be together, she just knows it.
Robb's got a rented house in what Sansa realizes is a slightly seedier part of Los Angeles than she’d been expecting. She had imagined a glamorous ocean-side mansion, which she understands now was a stupid thing to picture. Sure, Robb is in a band and they're going on tour, but he's not a rock star, and mom and dad cut him off. Before this tour, they were playing in dive bars and at middle school dances. It never felt real in her head that Robb just... gave up everything to pursue his music career. In the movies, they make that sort of thing seem romantic, but the duplex she is currently staring at is anything but.
The taxi driver isn't like in the movies, either – he doesn't get out to chivalrously help her unload her bags, just as he hadn't helped her load them, and so Sansa struggles to get her suitcases out of the trunk and up the cracked sidewalk to the duplex. Robb lives on the bottom floor, and he said he'd leave a key for her in a fake rock, and it takes an embarrassingly long time for her to identify the correct one.
Finally, hot and annoyed and still stinging from Harry blowing her off, she opens the door and drags her luggage through and plops the bags down in the living room. The state of the house doesn't help her mood – the dingy furniture, the dated carpeting, the beige paint. And over it all, a fine layer of dust, because god forbid he ever clean up. How Robb and Theon live like this, she doesn't know.
Her first order of business is water. So far Los Angeles isn't crazy hot - and at least it doesn't have the oppressive humidity that Sansa is so used to in the northeast – but she's never been a very active person, and so just trying to find the key and wrangling her luggage into the house has made her thirsty.
She's filling a glass in the kitchen when there's a noise behind her, and a voice says, “who the fuck are you?”
Sansa drops the glass (except apparently Robb has plastic glassware and so it simply bounces around in the sink, splashing water up and soaking her shirt) and she turns to see a man standing in the living room. The door to the bedroom on the left is open, where it had been closed when she came in.
There is a stranger in Robb's house, and so Sansa does the only thing she can think – she screams.
The man winces, hands coming up to cover his ears, and Sansa takes the opportunity to look wildly around the kitchen, until she sees what she's looking for. She lunges to the right and grabs a knife from the block, then turns back to the stranger, who stands between her and the front door, and holds it out in front of her.
“Stay back,” she warns, brandishing the knife, her heart slamming painfully against her ribs. Her phone is in her purse, which she dropped with the rest of her bags near the front door - behind the intruder.
“Look,” the man says, now holding up his hands as a sign of peace, a wary, guarded look on his face. “I don't know what you're on, but this isn't your house. If you leave now, I won't call the cops or anything.”
“What I'm on?” she asks, though that isn't the important part. “I'm not on anything! This is my brother's place, I'm going to call the cops on you!” Her voice is too high pitched and too wavering to be any real threat, and she wishes more than anything that she were brave like Arya. Arya wouldn't be trembling behind a knife, she'd be kicking this guy out and making sure he stayed out.
The man pauses and frowns. “Robb or Theon?” he asks, and it takes a moment for the names to penetrate through her fear.
“What?”
“Are you Robb or Theon's sister?” he asks, but then he frowns again and his eyes seem to land on her hair. “Robb's,” he answers his own question.
“How do you know Robb,” she asks, voice still shaky, but she doesn't lower her knife. This could be a trap.
“I'm his friend,” the man says with a roll of his eyes. “He's letting me stay here while he's out of town. Didn't mention his sister liked to barge in...”
Sansa feels her eyes bug out as everything starts to boil over: Harry, the taxi, her luggage, the fake rock, the cold water making her shirt stick to her stomach, and now this stranger. “I didn't barge in ,” she nearly loses control of her pitch. “ I'm living here, not you. I don't know who you are, but get out before I stab you!”
“Whoa, calm down.” The man still has his hands up, eyes going a bit wide.
“Calm down?” she repeats, and he winces – she can't tell if it's because he realizes that was a stupid thing to say, or because she nearly screeched it.
“Look, we'll sort this out,” the stranger keeps one hand up, the other slowly reaching for his pocket, and he pulls out his phone. With one hand, he unlocks it and pulls up a contact with a photo that looks suspiciously like her brother's face. He calls it, puts it on speakerphone, then gently sets it down on the counter between them.
“Hey, man,” Robb's voice comes through the speaker, sounding exhausted.
“You just wake up?” the stranger asks casually, and Sansa decides she might actually stab him for not taking this seriously.
“Long night,” Robb yawns. “Even longer cause I met this girl-”
Sansa feels her face twist in horror, and she meets the stranger's eyes in panic.
“Uh, you're on speakerphone,” the stranger cuts in quickly, and Sansa thankfully does not have to hear about some girl Robb had sex with. Ew.
“Are you in public?” Robb laughs, unfazed.
“I'm actually with your sister.”
“Sansa?” Robb's voice perks up, she recognizes his big brother tone. “You made it!”
“So you knew she was coming?” the stranger says.
“Robb, why is there a strange man in your house?” Sansa asks, before Robb can speak.
“You mean Jon?” Robb sounds confused.
Sansa looks up at the stranger and is met with a pair of steely grey eyes, the jaw beneath his dark beard is clenched. He looks equally as unhappy about this turn of events.
“Did you tell both of us we could use your place?” the stranger – Jon – asks, pinching the bridge of his nose and squeezing his eyes shut.
“I told you this,” Robb says.
“Well you didn't tell me!” Sansa cries, only realizing she's still holding the knife as she waves it towards Robb's voice.
“Please don't stab my phone,” Jon sighs.
“Stab?”
“I didn't get anywhere near your phone,” she argues, still brandishing the knife in his general direction.
“I'd prefer if you didn't stab each other.”
“Then maybe you shouldn't have double-booked your house!” Sansa's nearly back at shrieking level again.
“I didn't!” Robb protests. “There's two rooms! Jon's in Theon's, you're in mine. I told you this!”
“You absolutely did not.”
“Yeah, man,” Jon agrees. “You really didn't.”
“Of course I did,” Robb's voice starts sounding a bit tinny, as if he's also put them on speakerphone, and Sansa can just picture him scrolling back through his texts. There's silence for what feels like ages, before Robb comes back on the line, off speakerphone again. “Okay, well, it really isn't a big deal,” he says, sounding a bit cowed. “Jon's really quiet, you'll barely even notice he's there.”
“Oh, and I'm not quiet?” Sansa asks, her pulse pounding with anger and annoyance. When Robb doesn't immediately answer, she scowls at the phone.
“Look, I'm sorry, I swore I told you guys. It really will be fine, you'll get along great, I promise. Oh, shit, look at the time, I've got to-”
“Don't you dare hang up, Robbert Edwyle Stark,” Sansa warns, but Robb is still babbling goodbyes and then the line goes dead.
“Edwyle?” Jon snorts.
“It's a family name,” she seethes, redirecting her anger from the phone back to its owner.
“Well,” Jon says, drawing the word out, “I guess we're roommates for the summer.”
“No,” she says, because she isn't doing this. This was supposed to be her place. This was supposed to be her summer. Harry was supposed to pick her up at the airport. “You're going to find somewhere else to stay.”
“The hell I am,” he laughs, an abrupt, disbelieving rush of air. “I don't know anyone else in this city.”
“Then find a hotel!”
“You think I've got the money for that?” Jon scoffs, completely unimpressed by her demands or the knife she's still holding out.
“Well, you aren't staying here,” she says, though she sounds less certain of it now.
“Yeah, I really am,” he steps forward and takes his phone back. “You can find somewhere else if you want, I'm sure your trust fund can handle it.”
There's no way she'll ever tell him she can't access her trust fund until she's twenty five, or that she's out here living off the small bit she's saved up and her credit card limit, because mom didn't approve of her going so far away and refused to fund her trip.
“Fine,” she finally says, a bit impotently. “Then just... stay out of my way.”
Jon's eyes go wide, as if he can't believe she just said that. Then they narrow. “It sounds like you're the loud one. Should I be expecting nonstop parties? You seem the type.”
“And what type is that?” she asks, voice falling dangerously low now.
Jon's eyes rake over her, lip curling in distaste. “Let's see,” he says, appraising, “trust fund brat who probably doesn't even know how to boil water and gets away with everything by batting her pretty eyes? Thinks she can boss people around just because she's inconvenienced? Do I have that about right?”
Sansa swears she sees red.
“Stay away from me,” she snarls, that's really the only word for it. “You stay on your side, and I'll stay on mine.” With the knife, she gestures a line down the center of the living room.
“Don't think that's gonna work, princess,” he deadpans, and she hates him for how calm he seems when she's ready to either scream or cry. “Unless you're not going to use the bathroom while you're here?”
She realizes then that his side of the living room has doors to the bathroom and one bedroom, with the second bedroom on the opposite side.
“Just-” she starts, unsure what she wants to say, her anger making her lose all rational thought, “stay away from my room, and stay out of my way.”
With that, she turns and jams the knife back into the block, then marches out of the kitchenette and past Jon, refusing to alter her course so that he has to dodge out of her way. Then she grabs her bags and, with the little dignity she has left, drags them into the empty bedroom. It isn't a graceful exit, and she can feel his eyes on her the whole time, until she slams the door closed behind her.
It's only then, standing in Robb's dingy bedroom that he didn't even bother to tidy up, that she finally lets herself cry.
JON
Jon was having a normal day.
He'd had a late night, so he woke up around ten, made himself a breakfast of cereal while sitting in front of the TV and watching reruns of Maury. Then he'd gone back into Theon's room (he'd made sure to completely change the bedding when he got here, just in case), to go through the pictures he took at last night's concert.
And then she burst in, a whirlwind of red hair and waving knives, who had the nerve to go throwing a fit at him, as if he isn't also a victim here.
Honestly, if Robb hadn't set him up with this gig, Jon would be calling him back right now and giving him a piece of his fucking mind. But Robb did get him this job, and he's letting Jon stay rent free in his place, so Jon doesn't. Instead, he channels his annoyance with his new roommate into doing push-ups on the floor of the bedroom, then sit-ups, until his muscles are protesting.
Stay on your side.
Fucking hell, is she five years old? He wouldn't be surprised if he went out later and found she's taped a line down the middle of the living room.
He knows Robb is a trust fund kid from one of those uppity towns in Connecticut, but most of the time Jon forgets (though every once in a while, Robb will say something that makes Jon violently aware he grew up rich). Maybe because Robb gave up the family fortune to live as a starving artist. Robb mentioned once that everyone expected him to follow in his father's footsteps – first to Yale, then Harvard Law, then joining him at whatever big firm he works for in New York. Instead, Robb dropped out of college before his second year. When he did, his parents had cut him off to try and get him back in line, and so he'd ended up responding to Jon's roommate posting. They'd lived together in a dump of an apartment in the city, before Theon convinced him to move to LA last year.
Jon's only been out here for a week, but he already misses New York. Los Angeles is a city he doesn't understand – the open space, how he has to drive if he wants to get anywhere, how everyone he's met so far has some sort of screenplay they're writing. Everything here feels too bright and open. He misses his bodega and the subway and good food that doesn't cost half his rent. He swears he even misses the subway rats.
But all that would have been bearable, because this job Robb found him pays well and will look incredible on his resume and in his portfolio – except now he has to share a living space with some girl who seems designed by the universe to annoy him in every way possible.
He's met girls like her before. He's definitely hooked up with girls like her before – girls who saw a chance to piss off their fathers, or who wanted to try living dangerously. Jon never bothered to clarify that he wasn't actually dangerous. Just a middle class kid working cater-waiter jobs at fancy events to get by while he pursued his real dreams. But he wasn't a part of their social class and he sometimes wore a leather jacket, so that seemed to qualify. And honestly, it didn't matter who he was, not really. They only wanted the thrill. He knows exactly the kind of girl Sansa Stark is.
But this summer is a real chance for him to break into the industry, and he's not going to let some trust fund brat ruin that.
So he'll steer clear of her, fine.
The TV is in the living room, but Jon makes do on his laptop. He doesn't want to risk even trying to use the common area while she's home.
Luckily, she arrived on a Friday, and on the weekends he needs to be out of the house starting mid-afternoon and going late into the night, which means he hasn't been home much to chance running into her. Jon doesn't mind working nights, he's fairly used to it, and now he gets to spend them doing what he loves.
Mom had gotten him his first camera when he was just a kid, some battered old thing from a secondhand store, and he's been in love with photography ever since. He swears the only reason he didn't drop out of high school is because they had a photography class, and he could use the dark room anytime he wanted. Then Photoshop courses at the local community college, that he was able to fund with his mom's help and his tips from waiting. While everyone else he knew was pursuing degrees, Jon was taking any photography job he could get – many of which he'd never put on his resume. It was the experience that mattered, and he rarely turned any down, except for a few underground 'modeling' shoots that seemed just a bit too shady.
But now he gets to work with the legendary Mance Rayder and yeah, okay, he's only on minor assignments because he's new and this is a temp job, but still. He doesn't mind taking concert photos of indie rock bands – it fits in with the rest of his portfolio's aesthetic, and he still gets to put Mance Rayder's name on his resume.
And of course, there's a part of him that hopes Mance likes his work enough to use him back in New York, too. Extend his employment beyond the summer. Something full time, maybe.
On Sunday, he actually has a mid-day gig, and he's back home at a semi-reasonable hour (if ten at night can be considered reasonable), and so Monday morning, he wakes earlier than he has in a while. When he peeks out into the living room, Sansa's door is closed, and he hopes she's left for the day. Not that they've talked about it, but he assumes she has a reason for being in California for the summer, she needs to leave the house at some point.
In the kitchen, he's just sliding a frozen breakfast sandwich into the microwave when a door opens, and he groans internally and prepares himself.
Seems like she's still here.
“Where are the car keys?”
He turns around to see her standing in the middle of the living room in a pair of black slacks with a matching suit jacket over a frilly looking white shirt and heels he doesn't know how she can walk in, her arms crossed over her chest.
“Good morning to you, too,” he says, turning back to watch the timer on the microwave count down.
He hears a slow, annoyed release of breath from her, and he can't help that the corner of his mouth twitches up before he settles his face back to neutral.
“The keys,” she repeats. “I have work and I need to use the car.”
Jon turns to look at her again. “I have the ones to Robb's car. I've been using it, and I plan to use it today, too. You can take Theon's, keys are in the drawer.” He waves over towards the front door, to the wobbly table that sits next to it.
She frowns at him like she thinks he's lying, but after a few seconds, turns and marches over and opens the drawer and pulls out the keys he was not, in fact, lying about.
“Which one is his?” she asks, peeking out the front window at the cars parked along the street. “It doesn't have a beepy thing.” He assumes she means a key fob, so that she could get the lights to flash.
Jon heads for the front door, and she follows him outside and looks to where he points.
“You're joking,” she says in horror, and Jon can't help but grin. The old coupe is an off-white color with an orange stripe down the side, at least thirty years old and nowhere near mint condition. He's pretty sure Theon bought it at a salvage auction and poured just enough money into it to make it run. He's also pretty sure it doesn't have a muffler.
“It suits you,” Jon says, hands in his pockets as he rocks back on his heels, taking what is likely too much enjoyment out of watching her panic.
“I can't drive that,” she says, turning to him, eyes going wide and pleading, but Jon isn't falling for it. This is exactly what he'd been talking about the first day – she's used to getting her way by batting her eyes, and he wouldn't be surprised if her bottom lip started trembling. Maybe if she'd been nice when she arrived, he would consider giving her Robb's car – even though Jon would rather not drive Theon's monstrosity, either.
“Sure you can,” he says as jovially as he can, which makes her face twist back into annoyance when she realizes she isn't going to get her way. With that, he turns and walks back inside, and he hears her following.
“I'm serious, give me Robb's keys.”
“No.” When her mouth pops open to protest, he continues. “I got here first, I've been using his car for a week. There is a second car that is perfectly driveable-” (he thinks it is, at least), “so no need to throw a tantrum about it.”
“A tantrum?” she repeats, voice ratcheting up an octave.
“You should probably head out,” Jon cuts in, looking down at his wrist - at the watch that does not exist there. “You don't want to be late for your first day.”
He expects her to argue, but she stands in the middle of the living room for a few seconds with her eyes squeezed closed, and then she lets out a shrill sound of disgust and actually stomps her foot before turning on her heel and marching back out the front door. He's surprised she doesn't slam it closed.
The microwave beeps and Jon takes his breakfast sandwich to the couch and joyfully eats it in front of the TV, feeling very accomplished for so early in the morning.
SANSA
Sansa has never contemplated murder before, but as she half walks, half runs down three blocks towards the building where Tyrell Publications is located, she's starting to. She had to park that horrid car so far away because she simply could not risk anyone seeing her driving it. She wants to make a good impression on Olenna Tyrell.
But ugh, that asshole. Jon. What a dumb name. Why would Robb even be friends with someone like that?
(Alright, fine, he's friends with Theon so he doesn't have the best track record, but still. At least Theon can be somewhat funny.)
She puts the car and Jon out of her mind and dives headfirst into her new job which... turns out, is mostly just running errands and fetching coffee. And not even for Olenna Tyrell herself.
Sansa knows she should probably be disappointed, but as she runs around the office grabbing papers out of printers and ferrying memos back and forth between floors, she catches glimpses of things that make her giddy with joy – in the elevator, two older men in the most gorgeous suits she's ever seen, talking about publication numbers and projections. In the break room, as she hides behind the coffee machine, three people standing around and talking about the newest fashion trends in Paris and Milan, and what it means for the winter issue.
It's everywhere, and even though she's just a lowly intern, it surrounds her. She closes her eyes and breathes it in and decides that even if everything else goes to hell this summer, it was still worth it.