A/N- Enjoy! I'm a huge sucker for angst, but I've never attempted angst in the New Girl realm, soooooooo, be gentle.
It goes the way he thought it would. He once watched a documentary about how the more negatively you think, the more likely it is to happen; because you subconsciously work toward it. You work toward the trainwreck. It happens one beautiful Wednesday morning.
Jess is practically melted into his front, cozied up in a blue felt blanket, munching on her dry cereal. He never understands how she goes sans milk every morning. The flavored milk after is the best part. He vaguely registers her giggles at the early morning rerun of Saturday Night Live through his musings. He grins, embracing the fact that he was living his best life, wholeheartedly. Jess lifts her head, eyes wide and hair messy and his heart pulls a little.
"Nick."
"Yeah?"
"Have you, ever-"
He glances at the screen halfway through, the skit playing, is one of a husband and wife teaching their kid the most ridiculous lessons ever. It's only kind of funny. Jess keeps looking at him with a strange shine in her eye, clearing her throat weirdly. Then, the pieces click into place. His throat goes dry as a desert, and he shifts in place, the leather suddenly hot and suffocating. Jess's fingers twitch and she presses her finger to her glasses. Her lips are pressed into a line.
"I know it's really early, like, in the morning, and your brain doesn't start working until 10 am, you know i read that somewhere-"
"Jess!" He barks, unintentionally, shocking himself at how harsh he actually sounds. Jess recoils slightly, but continues in stride, as though used to his unintentional outbursts. She probably took it as annoyance at her rambling, which did tend to get him a little irked.
"Where do you see this going, Nick?" Jess asks, meekly. "I mean, we've been together, for a year. That's amazing, that, um, you're not freaked out yet and stuff, but, you know me. I, uh, I always wanted to -ugh, i can't- i found the ring!" She ends, yelping.
Nick freezes. His heart is pumping blood a mile a minute and all of it is rushing to his ears. He had no idea. He still has Caroline's ring.
Birds chirp, the sofa squeaks. Jess leans forward, hair falling over her bare shoulders as she inspects his face for any kind of reaction.
"Nick? Honey?"
Nick groans, shoving his face into his palms. "Oh god, Jess, listen."
He grabs her hands, her small soft ones fitting in his large calloused ones, and rubs them comfortingly, or so he hopes.
"I love ya. But-"
Her face changes in a split second, blue eyes shimmer with water, and her nose twitches.
"It was Caroline's, wasn't it?" She says, voice barely a whisper. Nick feels about two feet tall when he hears her broken voice.
"I'm so stupid." She mumbles, extracting her hands and wringing her wrists, lower lip wobbling. "Forget I said anything."
"Jess. My ma gave me that ring to give to Caroline, but I just, I couldn't- Jess please look at me." He pleads, quietly. She doesn't look at him. Crosses her legs beneath her and pulls up the blanket. She picks up her cereal bowl and gets up with the intention of going to the kitchen, he guess.
She stops suddenly, turning around.
"Why don't you wanna marry me?" She asks, voice suddenly booming in the quiet loft. All else blurs. He doesn't know how to answer. He's willing himself to speak, but the words won't come out.
"Yeah, okay." Jess says, the resigned look on her face worse than any tears she could cry right now. He closes his eyes, still frozen in place with a lump in his throat, as he hears her bedroom door slam.
Nick doesn't realise when he fell asleep, but he wakes up in a daze around 3pm, head whipping up suddenly. It all feels dream-like, until he feels Jess's absence and then it just hurts like hell. He gets up quickly, practically tripping over himself to get to her bedroom. It's wide open. And empty. Her bed is still there. Along with her dresser, and her basket of vintage handbags. But her closet is empty, leaving a few dresses he'd bought her over the course of the years. Panic sets in, his vision blurring. He's aware of how loud his wheezing is right now, but he can't control the hot, angry tears that fall from his eyes. He fucked up.
That's how it begins.
She goes off the grid. Winston and Schmidt seem to have visited her apparently, but give no details of their encounter. He runs around half of LA, to every person who knows Jess. Some seem oblivious, others withhold the information they know, out of spite. There are punched walls in the loft now. Her room is a mess, due to a fit of anger on his part.
It takes alot of grovelling and apologising to get back into their good books. Schmidt forgives him completely the day he finds him silently sobbing, nursing his first broken knuckle after the first hole in the wall. Winston takes a little longer to crack, but it happens eventually when he confesses how bad he really fucked up.
Later, two months later, is the first time Nick spots her. She looks like a different person. She's standing in front of Clyde's in a barely there yellow number, with all the right cutouts. Her bangs have grown out into wavy side bangs, her hair a little shorter. Red lipped, rosy cheeked Jess, looks him straight in the eye, or so it seems, as a tall figure pushes past him distractedly, making a beeline for Jess. Her features change, lift, her eyes sparkle as she waves, the biggest grin on her face. Sam reaches for her and dips her forward, as their mouths meet. It's like he's a ghost. His heart is banging out of his chest; his head pulsing. He never thought she'd go back to Sam. He's half tempted to knock the lights out of him.
They walk into the bar, his bar, hand in hand. He spots Cece and Sadie through the window, and it's like he's a part of a different world now. A duller one.
He leaves her a voicemail that night.
I still love you.
She sends him one back.
I still do too.
He knows it doesn't mean what he wants it to mean.
A year after that, he's dated a parade already, relapsed with Julia, sent Jess five more voicemails. She always answers back, every the big hearted woman.
Then it happens. The second run in. He meets her at the supermarket. She has a big red coat on, and she's smiling as usual. He almost slips past her, when he drops his box of Froot Loops. She bends down to pick it up, with great difficulty, for some reason, groaning, and their eyes meet. She drops the box again, eyes widening like a deer caught in headlights. Her bangs are grown back out, and as she brushes them off her face, the light catches on her gold band, on her ring finger. His breath catches.
"Nick." She gasps slightly, blinking almost manically.
"So, finally Mrs Sweeney, huh?" He jeers coldly. It seems to be the push she needs to finally get mad at him.
"Better than being Mrs Miller." She spits back. He recoils.
"Whatever."
"You know, I thought we could be mature about this, Nick, but I guess it's just not in your bones." She says. He whips his head to stare at her at that.
"You wanna talk mature, Day? Who left in the middle of the day, never to return, because we hit a bump in the road? Me? No! I think it was you!" He says, inching his face closer to her, daring her. Challenging her.
But, her face only melts. "I was pregnant."
Time stops.
"I lost it, though. I was pregnant. But i lost it, so it's not like, like, I kept it from you or anything. There was nothing to keep." She rambles on, but he only stares. She frowns, waiting, like before, for words that may never come.
"God, this is so typical of-" Jess seems to get a hold of herself as she cuts her words off.
"Goodbye, Nick." She turns on her heel and stomps off, leaving him to contemplate his life in the canned goods aisle.
He never does get her back. He does hear from Winston, about her daily shenanigans, and he bumps into Sam once, who seems to be blissfully unaware of his whole history with Jess, and they get a drink and catch up. He tells Nick about the guy before him, who fucked her up so bad, she was a mess when he ran into her again. With each word, Nick falls further into a never ending abyss. He pays for the drinks.
"Oh, hey, you should come to our anniversary party, Jess said she really misses you." Sam casually says, as he picks up his coat.
"I'll be there." Nick says, brain racing with several different scenarios.
She looks as breathtaking as ever. As furious too, he thinks, as she spots him across the room. He has his scenario planned out. As crazy as it sounds, he's always been the guy holding the wallets, and now it's finally time, to run headfirst into the waters.
Nick corners her, an hour in, three champagne glass in his system. She lets him guide her to an empty conference room next door, because she's just a little tipsy too.
"Jess-"
"Miller. Whatcha doin here, huh? Come to jeer at me some more?" She slurs.
"I'm sorry. For everything."
"Okay."
"Please, Jess, come on, can we put this behind us?" He says, and her face fires up.
"Put what, the fact that you never really loved me? Oh, that's been put behind, Nick, I really don't care anymore!" She yells, her tiny figure shaking in anger.
"I did! What the fuck, Jess? You don't get to tell me what i felt, and what I didn't!" He growls, clenching his fists.
"You didn't want to marry me." She says, matter of factly.
He reels himself back, sucking in a breath. He didn't come here to fight. Well, not with her anyway. For her.
"I was scared, Jess. But I'm not now. "
Her face contorts, looking a little softer.
"What does that mean?"
He reaches for her palms, and drops the box in them.
"Bye, Jess."
He exits the room, heart hammering, finally ready to let go. Jess heaves, watching him leave as she opens the box, slowly, finally letting out a sob. The diamond glints under the harsh white light.
"Bye, Nick." She whispers to herself, slipping the box into her purse and straightening herself, ready to walk back into her world.