It was another busy morning in the diner and Luke was not in the best mood. Though it was not unusual for Luke to be cranky, his attitude was much worse today and the customers had realized it was in their best interest not to provoke him. Last night Luke had gotten in a fight with his nephew, and though that was a pretty normal occurrence, this had been different. They had gotten into an argument after Jess had come home around 2:30 in the morning. It had somehow ended up with Luke telling Jess that he regretted taking him in. Jess had stopped yelling at that point. He had looked at Luke with hurt evident in his eyes. Luke had tried to apologize, but Jess simply ignored him and went to sleep. He realized it was past time for Jess to be heading to school, so he yelled to Caesar to watch the diner for a few minutes while he made his way up the stairs to his apartment. He opened the door to see his nephew was still asleep. Rolling his eyes, he made his way over to Jess' bed, carefully avoiding the piles of books. He stopped when he heard a muffled noise come from his nephew. Jess began tossing and turning, thrashing around. Luke was stunned. He had no idea what he was supposed to do. Were you supposed to wake up someone having a nightmare, or would that make it worse? Luke was torn from his thoughts when a deafening scream escaped his nephew. Jess shot up in his bed with a wild look in his eyes. Luke crouched down in front of his nephew.
"Jess! Jess, it's okay, it was a nightmare. You're Okay."
Slowly, Jess seemed to focus on his uncle. He sighed heavily and turned away from Luke, avoiding eye contact. Luke definitely noticed that and was hurt that Jess didn't feel comfortable enough with him to show his emotions. But, then again, Jess didn't show his emotions to anyone. He always wore this mask of indifference. Now, Luke might not know much about his nephew, but even he realized it was a mask. He knew this like he knew the sun would rise again tomorrow. Occasionally, Jess' mask would falter, just long enough for you to get a glimpse of what was underneath.
Luke came back to reality when he heard Jess ask him, "Why are you looking at me like that?" To be honest, Luke hadn't even noticed he was staring at his nephew.
"Oh, um, no reason….are you okay, Jess?"
"I'm fine." Jess quickly got out of bed. He rummaged through his drawers, picked out some clothes, and headed for the bathroom. Luke was still rooted to the ground. He was worried about his nephew, there was no doubt about that. He was shocked from seeing Jess so… well not Jess. Jess always had this wall around him. Seeing that wall not there…it was difficult to take in. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Luke began to head downstairs. He stopped in the doorway and turned back around and walked to the bathroom. He knocked on the door.
"What?" came Jess' angry response.
"You don't have to work in the diner today, if - if you're not feeling up to it." Luke waited at the door for a minute before realizing Jess was not going to respond. So, he continued on back to his awaiting customers.
"Luke, you know, you're not supposed to keep your customers waiting," the all too chipper Lorelai
Gilmore quipped. "Especially the pretty ones."
"Coffee?"
"Yes, please!" Luke grabbed a mug and filled it before slamming it down onto the counter, nearly shattering the mug.
"Um, I know you're not usually all smiles and giggles, but isn't this a little much, even for you?"
"Sorry. I'm just in a bad mood."
"Well, yeah, I can see that." Luke only grunted in response.
"What'd he do?"
Luke looked up at the unexpected question. "What?"
"What did he do?" Lorelai asked a little slower this time.
"Who?" Luke asked, confused.
"Jess. What did Jess do?"
Luke half laughed, though it came out sounding vicious. "Why do you assume Jess did something?"
"Uh, because you're in a terrible mood and he's Jess."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"Well, he's known for putting you in a bad mood, that's all."
"Yeah, he has a way of doing that."
"So?"
"So what?"
"So, he did do something?"
"Not.. Not exactly. I mean not really." Lorelai just stared. "We got in a fight last night."
"About what?"
"He came home at two in the morning and we got into it. I… I told him I regret taking him in."
"Oh Luke."
Jess pushed through the curtain suddenly and Luke's jaw nearly dropped to the floor when he saw his nephew standing there, blood streaming down his face.