Brooklyn, September, 2012

10. Teenage Dreams

"I feel like a nun, Gilmore."

"Nuns don't have babies, Paris."

"See? The pregnancies have made me dumber, I can't even come up with a good analogy for my state. Get me another one of these, I want to celebrate the end of my breastfeeding days by killing whatever brain cells I have left. Great choice of venue, by the way. You can tell how seedy it is by looking at these dumb cocktail umbrellas. The last time anyone used one was in 1988."

"You said Doyle wasn't comfortable with you getting hit on by hot musicians in a hip place, so I chose this one. It's actually one of my favorite drinking spots."

Paris huffed and ordered another round. "Yes, it has that quirky vibe. It's like a piece of Stars Hollow in the middle of Brooklyn."

"Exactly!"

The waiter brought their drinks, and Paris slurped slowly from her straw. "So, how's your love life?"

"See, the nun analogy would befit my situation better: nothing, nada."

"C'mon, give me something to work with. Let me live vicariously through you."

"Paris, I'm telling you: my love life's DOA."

"Please, don't do that."

Rory grinned. "Do what?"

"You know I hated it."

"Hate what?"

"That song, that fucking song. Ugh, I can't stop singing it in my head now!"

Rory smirked. "I could fix that for you, you know?"

"Don't, I swear I won't ask about your love life again."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. You'll be the one picking conversation topics from now on. For a year. I promise."

"So you would willingly forego conversation rights for a year just to avoid hearing my impersonation of Gangnam Style?"

"You're an absolute bitch. You know that the mere mention of the title has me singing that thing in my head for two days. You're dead, Gilmore. I'm going to get love info out of you if that's the only thing I do tonight. After I pee, that is."

Paris left for the bathroom, and Rory laughed before having a sip of her fruity nameless drink.

"You know, I was actually looking forward to hearing you sing that."

Startled, her drink almost came out of her nose when Rory heard Jess' voice.

"How long have you been listening to us?"

Jess leaned on the bar with a dazzling smirk. "Enough to know that you would actually sing to avoid Paris prying on you." Rory blushed, half excitedly and half annoyed at Jess spying on her. "Please, don't be mad. I saw you two across the bar and came to say hi, but hesitated about how to make myself known without seeming like I was listening to your private conversation, and ended up failing miserably."

Rory mellowed. "It's good to see you, Jess."

Jess smiled and gave Rory a hug. "You too, Ror. It's been too long."

Rory was flustered. She had been thinking about Jess recently. She had done that at regular intervals in her life since the Philadelphia incident, as she called it in her mind, but since she read one of his short stories in The New Yorker and saw the picture that accompanied it, Jess had featured in her daydreams. She suddenly realized she had missed him more than she allowed herself to accept. At one stage in her late teens Rory had thought that all her love interests in the future would arise the same feelings in her that Jess had, but somehow life had moved on, and Rory had met many men, and still, nobody had come close to making her feel the trepidation she had felt when he kissed her. Real men lately didn't even manage to make her feel a fraction of what imaginary Jess could do to her.

"Congrats on the short story you got published in The New Yorker, Jess. I loved it."

Rory could swear Jess was blushing. "Wow, thanks. I'm still over the moon about it."

Rory smiled. "As you should be."

Paris interrupted them by sitting loudly on her stool. "Hey, it's mom's day out, so please choose another girl to flirt with. I need her undivided attention."

Jess laughed. "Nice to see you too, Paris. I gather congratulations are in order?"

Paris frowned, confused, and then seemed to soften. "Wow, if it isn't Jack Kerouak!" Paris stood and hugged Jess. Rory couldn't believe her eyes, and Paris must have seen her surprise, because she addressed Rory next. "What? For some reason I was always fond of the mac'n'cheese guy." Rory wished the Earth could swallow her. On a second thought, she wished it could swallow Paris. "So, Jess, are you joining us for a drink?"

Jess hesitated. "Well, I'd be in the way, I gathered it's your first night off in a while, Paris."

"Oh, you're fine. I just thought you were some dumbass macho trying to flirt with Rory here, but since you are an old friend, that's fine for me." Paris gave the quickest of meaningful glances to Rory before looking back at Jess, who was checking his phone.

"I'm actually meeting someone here in… ten minutes, so I won't bother you for long."

Paris frowned. "Girlfriend?"

"More like girl-friend."

"Right. So, fuck friend."

Rory could tell Jess was as uncomfortable as she was, so she tried to cover up for Paris' lack of tact. "How's Truncheon going, Jess?"

Visibly relieved, Jess smiled. "It won't retire me, that's for sure, but we're surviving. Which is a lot given the current situation."

"Please, recommend me some of your authors."

Jess seemed very pleased. "Oh, definitely check Johanna Smith if you haven't. I'd say you'll love her style. And Jonathan Harper. I'll send you my favorites."

Rory beamed. "Oh, don't worry! I want to get them myself. Support your business."

"We're not Random House – they might not be so easy to find."

Rory smiled at Jess, and since he was looking at her straight in the eye with his sexy smirk, she took her time before replying. "I think I'll manage."

Jess nodded, and then broke contact with Rory's gaze. "My friend's here. I'll leave you girls to your celebration." He hugged Paris and then Rory, and she could have sworn he took the chance to smell her hair. "It was great to see you. Don't be a stranger for so long."

Rory nodded, and was surprised to feel so sad for the encounter to end. "You too, Jess."

He nodded and went to the other side of the bar, where a beautiful girl with long blonde hair and a rocker chick vibe greeted him with a peck in the mouth.

Paris gagged. "Oh my God. She looks like young Debbie Harry."

Rory felt a knot tighten in her stomach. "I was thinking more like Michele Pfeiffer, but thanks."

"We should go, Gilmore. I don't want them to ruin our night."

"Yeah, well… a bit late for that. But yeah, exit's closer to us, so it's our move."

"I didn't know the Geneva Conventions had mapped out who should make the exit in these situations."

Rory felt defeated. "No, but they should, if only for humanitarian reasons."

September, 2013

"Are you seriously dating that guy, Gilmore?"

Rory and Paris had been drinking neat Scotch for a couple hours in a bar near Paris'. Rory had asked her to join her. 2013 had been pretty shitty year so far, and to top it off, the last piece she had written had already been rejected by several newspapers. She needed a night of unapologetic self-pitying and some good ol' Paris ass-kicking in return. The problem was, Paris was focusing in her love life, whereas Rory would have much preferred to review her career.

"Why the surprise?"

"I don't know. He never looked very interesting to me."

"Well, he is. I've been single and celibate for a year: he's very kind, and, honestly, it's just nice to have someone dependable to go out with."

Paris laughed. "Dependable? What about sex?"

Rory didn't like where the conversation was headed. "What about it?"

"OK, tell me to my face: would you rather go out with Mr. Bland than, say, be fucked senseless by someone you actually look forward to see naked?"

"Where in hell did you become so shallow, Paris?"

"In marriage, that's where. If I were you, Gilmore, I'd be fucking every hot guy in the neighbourhood. Say: what ever happened to mac'n'cheese guy?"

"To Jess?"

"Yes, walking sex, that one. Why aren't you fucking him instead?"

"Ummm, because… history?"

"Oh, right, he was a teenager and did dumb shit. Welcome to the world: teenagers suck."

"Why the sudden fixation? Why not bring back, say, Dean?"

"So you want to replace bland with blander? Way to go, Gilmore."

"Hey, why aren't you fucking Tristan Dugray, then?"

Paris face soured. "Well, I would if I could."

Rory couldn't tell why, but the conversation was making her very uncomfortable. "Seriously, tell me – why bring back Jess?"

"I don't know, I guess I'm drunk and bored. When we met him last year, I was confident that something would happen soon between you."

"He was with someone, remember?"

Paris gave Rory an evil look. "Oh, so that's why. You were scared."

"Scared? I was decent."

"So if she hadn't been around you would have liked him to join us for the night, right? And then perhaps he would have walked you home, and then…"

Rory was annoyed. Yes, she would have liked that. Yes, it pained her that she had spent the next couple months daydreaming about having sex with Jess, only to come to the same conclusion once and again: that theirs was a doomed connection, as if their attraction was only as big as the Universe forces that were constantly pushing them away. "I don't want to talk about this any longer. The Jess ship sailed long ago. I'm in the Paul cruise now."

"A pity, Gilmore. I had put my hopes on you to prove me that long lost teenage love could still find its way back to adulthood."

Rory finished her drink, and it left a sour taste in her mouth. "Those are teenage dreams, fit for films and novels. Life doesn't work like that."

Paris sighed. "I wonder if it should, sometimes."