Aki- This is more of a Luke chapter, but trust me, we will be getting to Jess and Rory in good time. Also I manage a C2 for amazing oneshots, if thier is one you have written or read that you would like to recommend, drop the title and author in a review or e-mail. (Thier are no restrictions to ships or style except 'no slash'.)
Chapter 9
After you,
Things will never be the same.
But then again,
After you
Everything is still the same.
-Jimmy Wayne, "After You"
Luke noticed Jess had been acting weird. Jess wasn't mad at him, or at last not showing it. Luke knew how Jess acted when Jess was mad at him, he was all too familiar with that. Jess was upset or confused or thinking about something else. Not that it was on the top of Luke's mind, he had too much else to worry about, but Jess had been like that for several days now.
"Refill?" Luke asked one of the customers at the counter. The elderly gentleman nodded and Luke poured, emptying the coffee pot. He stared at for a moment in thought. Wow, even without Lorelai around, the coffee still ran out.
A laughing teenage couple entered the diner. The girl had long reddish brown hair pulled up into a loose ponytail and the brunette boy was in a baggy t-shirt and jeans. And for some reason Luke found unfathomable, they were wearing matching black t-shirts with some band logo on them.
Luke observed them for a moment, it was strange that people could still laugh without Lorelai around.
Luke went over too where the couple was sitting at a small table in the corner to get their orders. The boy whispered something to the girl with a wicked smile on his face and the girl was renewed in her laughter. 'Huh,' Luke thought, 'People can still smile without Lorelai around too.'
"Can I get you anything?" asked Luke in routine way.
"Um," stated the redhead, flipping through the menu. "Can I get a giant stack of chocolate chip pancakes and a coke, large."
The boy wrinkled his nose at her.
"What?" she asked keenly.
"First, that is a gross combination. Second, more caffeine? If you get any hyperer then you will probably die."
"Hyperer isn't a word, and," said the girl dramatically, "Hyperness never hurt anybody."
"Is hyperness a word?" questioned the boy incredulously.
"Yes, it is," replied the girl in a shock of mock seriousness.
"I am so pulling out the scrabble dictionary when I get homeā¦Man, are you okay?" The two teenagers we looking at Luke with concern. His face had paled and his hands were shaking slightly. He shook his head to clear his thoughts.
"I'm fine," he said in hollow voice. He rushed away from the table, threw the order pad to Caesar (more like at Caesar, but whatever) and ran halfway up the staircase to his apartment and sat down on the steps.
He rested his elbows on his denim clad knees and his chin on his fists, thinking.
Without Lorelai, people could still laugh.
Without Lorelai, people could still joke.
Without Lorelai, People still ordered strange and unhealthy amounts of food and other people still got grossed out from it.
Without Lorelai the sun rose and set, the Dragonfly Inn ran, Star's Hollow still stood, and customers still frequented the diner. Lorelai was gone and the apocalypse hadn't come. Without Lorelai life moved on, so why couldn't he?
Luke sat there for a while without moving. Time just wasn't relevant to him anymore. What after may have been hours Caesar poked his head in the stairwell.
"Uh, Luke, my shift's over, so are you going to come down here or do you want me to close early?"
"Oh, um," Luke stumbled over his thoughts and words, "I'll be down in a few minutes, cover me a little longer."
"O-kay."
Jess had lain on the couch reading in Luke's apartment most of the afternoon as Luke's actual hired employees were working. At one point he thought he heard someone coming up the steps, but nothing ever came from it.
Early evening Luke burst into the apartment, but Jess only spared him half a glance before turning back to his book, The Catcher in the Rye. Luke tossed a ring of keys onto Jess's chest, who lifted it up with one finger and raised his eyebrows in a wordless question.
"You're closing," stated Luke shortly before promptly leaving the apartment. A few moments later Jess heard the sound of a car engine starting, which he assumed was Luke's truck, and it fading out as it drove away.
Jess grumbled to himself as he stood up from his rather comfortable position and slammed his book down unceremoniously on the coffee table. It was not long later the last customer left and even though it was a little early than Luke's usually shut down, Jess flipped the sign from opened to close on the front door anyway.
He turned off the lights as to not drawl the attention of townsfolk who might want to get in and started the nightly clean up. He retrieved a rag from the kitchen and wiped off all the table tops and began putting up the chairs. As he did so he heard a knock on the door behind him. Damn it, couldn't anyone in this town read.
Jess turned around to tell whoever was standing at the door, probably Kirk, to go away and get a life, but instead was struck silent by surprise. Rory, a girl who he had barely seen or talked to over the last week, was standing outside. Jess took a few steps forward to see her better. A few strands of her hair were stuck on the wetness of her face, wetness from tears. Her eyes were red and mascara was smeared beneath them.
Jess rushed the door and fumbled with the keys. He finally unlocked it and beckoned her in. "Are you okay?" he asked worriedly.
She shook her head not really looking at him, "No, nothing has been more wrong."
Aki- It is approximately 19 days since Lorelai died
