"Jess, I'm sorry. I don't love you." With a handful of words, Rory Gilmore had shattered Jess Mariano's life irrevocably. She had stood there in her dorm room, and denied that there was anything between them.
"Please just tell me why, Rory." Jess pleaded, leaning on the frame of the door to Rory's dorm suite for support.
"I can't." Rory said, in a low voice. "Please understand. I can't lie to you." He nodded, but all willpower to leave the room-to close the wound he masochistically kept tearing open-left him. He was frozen to the spot where he stood. He tried to take a step back, away from Rory, but couldn't.
"Why?" he asked her, plaintively. If he could not find the strength to leave, he had to know the reason why. "I can't let you go. I can't get you out of my head."
"Jess, I need someone...I need someone who won't run away at the first sign of trouble."
"Rory..." he exhaled her name, tears coming to his eyes. Her words were like a blow in the solar-plexus. "I'm so sorry I did that to you."
"It's not simple." Rory said. After a pause, she began to explain. "In comparative religions class last semester, we were tracing the origins of Judaism. In Genesis 49, Jacob is describing the character of his twelve sons. His firstborn, Reuben, he called "unstable as water." Every time something came into Reuben's head, he acted on it. He was impulsive. All I could think about was how you were unstable as water; ever changing. It was nice for a while after Dean, because he was predictable and safe. You were mysterious and a little dangerous.
"But soon, I grew worried about where you were and why you were vague on plans. You showed up at my grandmother's house with an unexplained black eye, and I had to force the truth out of you later that night. You were unreliable. When you bolted out of town right before graduation, you hurt me. When you called me on my graduation day, you didn't say a word!
"Then, you show up in town and tell me you love me, after a year. A year! Then you disappear again. Now you show up tonight and expect me to drop everything and run away with you? How do I know if by the time I go with you, you will have changed your mind again? It isn't fair to me."
"Rory, I understand."
"No, you don't understand what that did to me. I tried to be happy in Europe, with my mom. I really tried. But you were around every corner. I imagined traveling the world with you. I imagined kissing you at the top of the Eiffel tower, just like in all good romance movies. Then I remembered that you left. You weren't going to be waiting for me when I came home."
"I know that, Rory." Jess nodded. He spoke quietly, guardedly. "But why can't I leave? I don't understand what's keeping me here. Standing here is killing me, and I don't even know why. I want to leave. I want to disappear and never hurt over you ever again. My mind keeps replaying every day we spent together and wonders why we couldn't make it work.
"I want to be with you because it kills me to be apart from you. I do okay when I'm not with you, but I feel right when I'm with you."
"Jess." Rory spoke his name, and his heart melted. "I can't. Why can't you understand that? Please, just leave."
"Rory."
"Leave."
"I'm sorry I ran. I couldn't deal."
"With what?" she asked. He remained silent, and she took one step away from him.
"Not being good enough for you." Jess's words stopped her in her tracks.
"What?"
"I flunked out of high school. You go to Yale. See the gap?"
"How does that make me your superior? You've read more books than I may ever read, you remember everything about them, and you make great margin notes. Why does it matter that I graduated high school and you didn't? That doesn't make you not good enough for me."
"It does." Jess insisted.
"What's the real reason?"
"What?" her question caught him off guard.
"What is the real reason why you bolted? The reason you gave isn't your real reason."
It annoyed Jess that Rory could see right through him.
"Was it because of your dad?"
"I had to get to know him." Jess didn't even acknowledge that it was the reason. "I had to figure out if I had anything in common with him. It turned out that I didn't. Then, it was just easier to move on, and not hurt you any more than I already had."
"So what do you call coming back into town unannounced, showing up at the festival, saying that you love me, and then bolting again?"
"I'm sorry that I did that. It wasn't right. I just didn't want to stand there like an idiot if you didn't feel the same way."
"And now you show up out of the blue and want me to run away with you?"
"That wasn't fair, either." Jess conceded. "I just don't know how to make a fresh start in the same old place. I just keep moving. It hurts less that way."
"So you went from New York to Stars Hollow, back and forth, then to California, and then to New York again. New York pops up a lot if you can't get a fresh start."
"New York doesn't count unless I went back to the same place over and over, which I didn't."
"New starts in old places might be a little painful and maybe embarrassing," Rory nodded, "but it also proves that you're strong enough and mature enough to risk it."
"Everyone in Stars Hollow will always see me as Luke's troublemaking nephew, who corrupted the town princess and made everyone's life more difficult."
"Maybe if you came back, lost the leather jacket and surly look on your face, they'd see what I see."
"What's that?"
"A guy who loves me, who is amazingly smart, and hides behind his tough-guy image instead of allowing the world to see how caring and sweet he can be."
"So I should lose the out of control hair?"
"Do not touch a curl on that beautiful head of hair." Rory smiled, tousling it.
"I just might have to cut it now." Jess pretended to grimace.
"Does this mean that you'll give Stars Hollow another chance?"
"Will Stars Hollow give me one?"
"They will if you stick with me." Rory smiled. "But Jess, seriously, do you promise to do that? Stick with me?"
"Rory," Jess enveloped her into his arms and felt more tied down to the earth than he'd felt in a long time. He liked the feeling, he discovered. "I promise. I never want to lose you again."