Finnegan

Estee,

I would, although I'd like a happy ending, please. As Krudski's last line in Dawson's Creek 3/21 puts it: "Don't give up on true love; it always wins in the end."

I'm less keen on a 15th reunion story, unless it's surreal and YA's protagonists are either still young or finding a way to become young again by going back to Rawley. For me, Jake and Hamilton should always be teenagers. Their job isn't to grow up; it's to make us young again. And they should always be at Rawley, "heaven under our feet as well as over our heads," "this place where dreams really do come true," waiting for us to return to Rawley, as the Dean's note to Will in the show's last shot assures us that we can. A stab at a 14th anniversary fanfic in that spirit is "Coming Here Forever."

I'd like another story like "War and Love" even better. "War and Love" conveyed the heart of what Young Americans was about, the essence of what "true love" in the fairy-tale tradition is, by showing that an emotionally wounded and needy but Hamilton and a compulsively compassionate Jake works no less well than the original that your story reversed. What other such instructive reversals might be possible? Perhaps a story in which the townies love truly and the preppies learn from them, instead of vice-versa?

If you haven't seen it, you might like the "Young Americans fanfiction" page of the Rawley Revisited site.

Best regards, Finnegan