Disclaimer: "New Girl"? "Flashdance"? Not mine, no how, no way. :o)

Author's note: This is a sequel to "Worm Holes and Doors to Enlightenment", but stands alone as well. Based on the "New Girl" pilot, I wanted to fanwank a few things that were bothering me:

We're shown Jess watching Dirty Dancing and crying hysterically, and Nick says that "It's been a week of this madness". And then the next thing we know, in the bar, he's talking about how Jess deals with her heartbreak through singing and rainbows and unicorns. So which is it? I wanted to flesh things with her out a little more, to explain this discrepency. :o)

Also wanted to lay more of a foundation to explain why Schmidt was willing to leave the Wild Wild West Auction for her, and why, for heaven's sake, Nick was willing to give up a night with CAROLINE for her.

Anyway, I had fun writing this, and spending a little more time with the characters. I hope you have fun reading it, too. :o)

The morning she asked if he was going to kill her, Nick had already done so, in his head, about five times already.

But that's getting ahead of the story. Let's back up.

They had shared a moment. A moment in which he'd thought they'd kinda made a connection. He'd almost been fooled into believing that their new roommate was not, in fact, completely insane, AND he'd arrogantly allowed himself to believe that the next day, when they all woke up, things would be different.

And at first, they were.

MONDAY

He couldn't have told you what woke him up first, Jess's singing, the sound of pots and pans banging, or the smell of bacon and eggs. He smiled a little smugly, patted himself on the back for how effective his little talk with her the night before had been, and hauled himself up out of bed with way more speed and enthusiasm than usual.

But he was careful to saunter casually into the kitchen, and to react to her trilled, "GOOOOOD morning, NIIIICK!" as if it were the total norm.

"What will it be for you, Mr. Miller? Are you a bacon man?"

"Do I possess a penis, Miss Day?"

"So is that a 'yes' to bacon?"

"Does the Pope wear a funny hat?"

"Could we keep communicating in question form all day?"

"Do you really feel like you're up to it?"

"The question is, do you?"

"Do you have anything else to do between now and 6 p.m. when I have to go to work?"

"OH SHOOT!" She dropped their little game as fast as she'd picked it up, and looked at her watch. "Gotta fly dudes! You'll have to grab your seconds on your own!" She jabbed a triangle of toast between her teeth, gathered up a ridiculous number of sacks, bags, and satchels, waved jauntily towards her roommates with the one little pinky finger that she had left free, and disappeared out the door in a flit of plaid.

When Nick turned back towards Coach and Schmidt, they were sitting frozen over their cooling breakfasts, jaws dropped, and eyes full of questions.

"Dude, what happened last night?"

"You said you'd talked, but you didn't tell us you were a damn wizard!"

He brushed off their shock and awe with affected modesty, mumbling only, "Ehhhh, I took care of it, you know? I took care of it, that's all. It's over. That's all you need to know."

Coach resumed jabbing at his eggs with his usual misplaced display of aggression. "Unreal, man. Truly impressive."

"I was so shocked I didn't even think to ask whether or not she seasoned the griddle first." Schmidt held up a dripping fork. "French toast, man. French toast that I did not make. Has this ever happened in this apartment, in like, HISTORY?" He stuck the fork in his mouth, and closed his eyes assessingly. "Not bad. Not bad at all. Missing the korjinte cinnamon, but she can be taught..."

Coach polished off his plate, and pushed away from the table with a palm slap that made the salt and pepper shakers jump in alarm. "This is all you, Nick. All you. We owe you, man."

"Indeed, Nick. You are, in fact, da man. And I say that completely non-ironically."

Nick continued to deflect their admiration and gratitude as they all headed their separate ways, but a smug glow of self-congratulation kept him company the rest of the day.

Until about twelve hours later.

He was wiping down the bar when the cryptic texts started coming in:

"You took care of it, huh. Nice work."

"In case you're wondering, IT'S NOT OVER."

"But you being da man...THAT is over."

And when he finally walked in the loft late that night, his ominous suspicions were confirmed.

Because darn if she wasn't camped out on the darn couch again, in front of the same damn movie, as if she'd never left.

And although Nick had never before had much of an opinion one way or the other about Patrick Swayze, right now he hated him with the kind of passionate scorn that he usually reserved for vegans and Knicks fans.

He wasted no time wading into the mopey scene in front of him. "Jess, what the hell?"

Her "little" voice was back again when she answered, "Whaaaat?"

"We talked about this! Didn't we talk about this?"

"What?"

"Moving on? Getting better? You were doing so good this morning, Jess! What happened to this morning?"

"This morning...I cooked breakfast this morning."

Oh gawd, it was like talking to the feeble-minded again. "Yes. Yes, you did, Jess."

"And then I went to work..."

"Yeeeees..."

"And I did really good Nick! I did! Things were better, and...and I was better...and..."

"What happened?"

"I don't know. Somewhere between school and home I just started thinking about riding naked in the back of that taxi, and how long ago that was, and how young I was then..."

"...you do realize you're making no sense..."

"..and I just..." She suddenly showed a flare of spirit. "I just needed to watch Dirty Dancing again, okay Nick! It makes me feel better. I don't know why. We all have that thing that comforts us, you know? You have your beer, I have my movie. Is that so wrong?"

He opened his mouth to respond, but nothing came out. His beer. Yeah, he self-medicated with beer. He was aware. But for this little damp twit of a girl who'd barely even seemed to stop gazing at her own navel since she'd arrived, to not only notice but to have the nerve to point it out...

He just reeled away and stalked towards his room. Whether she heard him say "Screw you, psycho," before slamming his door, he never knew.