A/N: The other story is currently on a hiatus as I have lost any desire to continue to write for such a horrible piece of work. I currently despise the plotline I chose and have decided to create a new one. I'm hoping I don't fall out of love with this one too. Here's hoping.

Disclaimer: Nothing is mine.

"I'm sorry."

Those are the first words she tells him as he opens his apartment door at 3:30 in the morning. He doesn't understand what's going on. It's been months since he's last seen her presence and weeks since he's last heard her voice. He sullenly thinks it must be some kind of dream, a cruel game his unconscious mind is playing on him. He's been tortured by thoughts of her for so long now though that he's become almost numb to it and his shock is suddenly replaced by an unsettling longing in the pit of his stomach.

He closes his eyes.

Wake up, wake up, wake up.

But when he reopens them, she's still standing in front of him with her hair in a hairsprayed mess of curls and her cheeks immersed with black specked rivers. "I shouldn't have come," she whispers to the floor but does not move.

He wants to tell her that she's right and she should go back home and just leave, leave, leave. But he begins to wonder if she really is wrong and if she really has ever had a home since leaving Stars Hollow and if she really should just stay, stay, stay. He finds his answer in the way she's carrying herself; her arms wrapped tightly around her torso and her shoulders slumped in a manner that he does not recognize as one she usually dons.

But he does not know anything about usually any more. Not with her. He did once. But those memories had faded long ago with his youth.

He looks at her closely and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that she has been broken again. But instead of her monthly phone call of pleas ('I needed to hear your voice. Read to me. Please. Help me forget. Please, please, please.), he's been introduced to a new form of suffering. Unable to say a word, all he does is step aside as he grants her access into her own personal sanctuary.

She pulls her knit, knee-length, button-down sweater tighter around her and when she looks up at him with surprise, he half expects her to run back to the blonde jackass that inevitably brought her to this point of breaking. But with a shaky breath, she enters his apartment and breathes in the smell of cinnamon and old books and…Jess.

"I'm sorry," she says again, averting her eyes, always averting her eyes. He idly wonders if she's ashamed of herself for coming to him in her times of distress, as if it's wrong to want to be near him.

And it is wrong. He knows this and she knows this and neither one has the heart to say it out loud.

He doesn't respond and instead makes a subtle gesture indicating that she may sit on the couch if she pleases. She does and she sits all the while watching him with lazy eyes as he takes listless strides to his kitchen. He pulls out a mug from the top right cupboard and places it on the island behind him. He turns his back to her again, searching the cupboard once more but this time he fights his way to the back of the cabinet.

He is making her coffee.

There's a tightening in his chest that he refuses to comprehend as he realizes that he has just admitted to keeping a secret stash of her sacred elixir in his cupboards. He sees her smirk sadly, possibly making the recognition that he has never had an affinity for coffee. And yet he still keeps some hidden away after all of these years for secret moments like these; moments that were not supposed to take place except for in the back if his mind; moments that have never happened before now.

"I like your place," she says dumbly from where she sits, unsure of how to go about this and not liking the silence that he's been offering. But her voice is unrecognizable to her and all he does is nod his comprehension.

He wants to ask her why she's here; why she's tormenting him like she must love to do. But all that comes out is, "Do you need a place to stay tonight?" because he can't be the one to ask the questions she desperately wants him to ask.

Her reply is weak. "Yes."

His is solid. "Okay." And he brings her the warm cup of coffee he grew to perfect years ago at a diner he thought he'd never miss.

He sits down on the other end of his couch, mindful of how her hands can't seem to stop shaking. He wants to reach out and steady them as she sets the cup down on the coffee table, but knows that he cannot. It isn't his place any more and maybe it never was. Either way, now it's the man's that drove her here. He wonders what could have happened to bring her here, out of all places, why here? He knows her phone calls are because she's lost and confused in a world that was never meant for her, but does not understand how her appearance has any significance.

He thought it had been a silent agreement that they were never supposed to let this happen. Did she not get it?

No. No, she does not and no, he doesn't want her to. He understands that he is no savior, but for now he sees nothing wrong with pretending. He finds it funny how after six years, their roles have been reversed. Only she did save him and in turn he had destroyed her.

The silence consumes him and it becomes too much now that he notices the hushed tears staining her skin. "I'll go make the bed," he tells her as he stands.

"I didn't bring any clothes." Help me. Again, she never makes eye contact and her voice is small and soft and childlike. He's not sure he likes it.

"You can borrow some." I'm trying. His replies are short, always short and he vaguely remembers a time when banter would last hours with her. "Go get yourself washed up," he says as he nods in the general direction of his bathroom.

She complies willingly and he swears she looks so defeated but it's her and she can't be. Not her, never her, no, no, no. "The clothes?" she asks before she completely closes the door behind her.

"I'll knock."

She nods before she disappears and he tries to keep his breaths even because this cannot be happening and he does not know what to do and Jess Mariano always knows what to do and if he doesn't then he makes up some bullshit that passes for honesty but right now he's at a loss and breathe, Jess.

Inhale. Exhale.

Again, again, again.

There you go.

He has made the bed and has an old wife beater tank and a pair of boxers in his hands for her to change into. He knocks has he promised he would and he hears something clatter to the tile floor of his bathroom. He refuses to call out her name, unwilling to show concern this early on.

The door opens and she is standing there and her blue eyes just don't sparkle like they used to.

"What happened?" he asks, unsure if he's referring to the dissolved shimmer in her eyes or the commotion caused seconds ago.

"You scared me," she answers quietly, again looking to the floor. "I dropped your brush." He didn't even know he owned one.

"Sorry." He clears his throat, "Here," and hands her the small pile of clothes. He swears he sees a flash of worry in her lifeless eyes, but the flash is gone as quick as it appeared and he begins to think his mind is playing tricks on him. Maybe this entire scenario is one big mindfuck and he shakes his head to rid himself of it.

But when he focuses again, he is still here and she is still in his bathroom and all of it is still very, very real.

When he hears her emerge from the bathroom, he is making a bed out of his couch. He refuses to share a bed with her as it would only rip away at the already deteriorating insides of his chest. But when he glances up at her, he's pretty sure his attempt to hold himself together has been proven futile. Piece by piece, he can feel his insides splintering into nothing, but his face betrays what every fiber of his being is screaming.

His expression never falters in it's stoicism and he hopes she cannot see the way his hands clench and his knuckles turn white.

The newly exposed porcelain skin is marred by ugly splotches of blacks and blues and purples and his lungs constrict in his chest as he thinks of how this could have happened. He wants to go to her, to hold her, to hug her tightly to him, to tell her its okay, I'm here, you're here, you're okay now, I promise, always.

But he does not and he know he cannot because she is not his and she hasn't been for far too long.

He swallows thickly, harshly.

"Goodnight, Jess," she whispers to him, finally making the eye contact he had wished for. But the wish quickly becomes a curse when he sees the subtle expression of fix me please, I'm begging you, I'll do anything in her dull eyes.

"Night." I can't, I'm sorry, I don't know how, you shouldn't have come to me.

She turns to enter his bedroom and he wonders how many more marks are infused into skin he cannot see. And he wonders if she wonders what he's thinking. She does but decides not to comment on it, feeling too tired now to have the conversation she wished he would've brought up.

But verbal thoughts are not his forte and they both know this and he wishes he could tell her that he's sorry.

"Jess?" he hears her call as he turns off the light and makes himself comfortable on his couch.

"Yeah."

"It's okay."

He almost laughs at this. It should be him telling her this and not her telling him this. But because of his fucking ego and the goddamn walls he puts around himself, he wouldn't let himself utter those words earlier. She wants him to understand that she knows he is doing what he can and can't do much with their current situation. To do so would be a form of suicide and she understands, she does, she does, she does.

But she doesn't know that he has already been plagued by thoughts of coming to her rescue and it kills him more and more every time he realizes that he cannot.

He does not have the strength and he fears that he never will.