Story 10: A request to make…

"Oh hello, that's a surprise!" His uncle sounded positively surprised which made Jess smile. Despite the fact their phone calls came more and more regularly, they still hadn't found a proper routine. Hearing his uncle was good, though.

"Hello, Luke. How are things?" It was a lame beginning for a conversation, but he couldn't just get to the point. What he wanted to tell him was pretty big.

"Fine. How are you?" Lame question deserved a lame answer.

"Okay." The problem with calling Luke was the fact neither of them was known to be remarkably chatty which made the calls a little bit awkward. They'd always gotten along just fine when seeing each other.

'Unless you annoyed him to no end,' his conscience reminded him promptly.

He still felt like he was disappointing his uncle on a daily basis despite the fact he had a steady job and finally had started to work at a place he truly cherished.

Truncheon Books was without doubt the best thing that could happen to a mere high-school drop-out whose main interest was literature and who hated boundaries in general.

He still hadn't talked to his uncle about it. Luke only knew he was living in Philadelphia at the moment. Today he had finally found the guts to tell him about it… That and he had a request to make.

"Is there a special reason for calling me?" They never were much for small-talk. Either called the other when they had something to tell, positive or negative. For example had Luke called when he'd finally gotten together with Lorelai and Jess had called him when he settled in Philadelphia (though he had never told him of his deeply embarrassing last encounter with Rory).

"Actually… Yes. Do you have a moment, because this might take a while?"

Luke's sure he could only assume for the noise of Luke obviously moving a kitchen chair to sit on it a little bit more comfortably muffled his voice.

"Well… a lot happened since our last call. I've moved again." He waited to listen to Luke's reaction and was quite sure to have heard a muffled sigh, "I'm living now above a publishing house in Locust Street. I've gotten a job there. It's nothing big, just a couple of guys with a small press publishing about three books and a magazine a month. It's fun though."

His uncle was silent for a moment. Jess knew that the world he was now talking about was foreign to the older man. Nevertheless, he obviously had heard the content tone of his nephew: "That sounds very good, Jess. Tell me about those guys. How did you meet them?"

Without knowing it, he just asked the one question that would make the following conversation a lot easier.

"Funny you should ask… Well, while I was travelling this past year, I started to…" He didn't know how to say it, "Do you remember that time when I came back to Stars Hollow to get my car?" Hearing his uncle wince made him realized that he looked about as fondly back to that day as he did, "you asked me whether I wrote the great American novel… I didn't at the time and what I've got now definitely isn't On the Road either, but I did it. Thanks to those guys there is a published novel on the market with my name on it."

Silence. Jess felt a jolt. He hadn't expected Luke to be proud or happy for him, but the lack of reaction hurt more than he'd anticipated.

"Anyway," he continued trying to keep his voice steady albeit he simply wanted to hang up. He hadn't told anybody about this… He had wanted Luke to be the first to know. He had just hoped… Before thinking about this more thoroughly, he said, "A couple of weeks ago I finally finished it, but it was just written in a notebook and in order to present that to a publishing house it needed to be written with a computer. Therefore I bought a laptop and started to type it. I was in a little place that sold coffee and typed when someone accidently bumped my table and my notebook fell down. The guy – whose name was Matthew, I later found out – picked it up and was in the middle of apologizing when he started to read it. The other guy next to him – Chris – asked him what was up, but Matthew was quite engrossed in my notes." He smiled at the memory, "About one hour later my book was already as good as printed. Another three hours of conversation later, I had a job at Truncheon Books. There's Matthew, a nice guy who's older than me but very shy and quite nervous sometimes, so it's me taking care of him." the 'He reminded me of Mark although lacking the smarts in math' he managed to bite back "and Chris as I've already said. He's cool and well read. He takes care of the artists – because he's deeply into the art scene – while Matthew's the guy taking care of the poets. Apart from them there are Sam – who graduated from Harvard in journalism. He's mainly responsible for the magazine we put out, but he doesn't live in Truncheon the way Chris and Matthew do for he also works at some newspaper – and Jill – actually Julius, but he decided that Jill fit him better – who's an artist himself and helps with the artistic aspects of the books and magazines we print. There was also Marcus, but I never met the guy for he moved back home to Chicago around the time I arrived in Philadelphia. They weren't looking for a replacement, but when they met me they kind of thought I would fit into that strange group and so… I'm here."

He wanted a reaction. He didn't care what his uncle would say – actually he cared a great deal, but that was unimportant for the moment – he simply wanted him to say anything.

"You wrote a book?"

"Just a short novel," Jess said immediately. He was sitting on his mattress in his room fidgeting a little nervously until he couldn't bare it anymore and stood up, "It's not a Kerouac or anything, but yeah, I started to write."

"Jess, that is amazing! I am very proud of you."

Jess' heart swelled at the words and he had trouble breathing.

Nobody in his entire life had ever said that they were proud of him. Hearing it caused his eyes to moisten despite the fact he desperately tried to avoid it.

"Thanks," he said roughly.

"Wow…" His uncle exclaimed causing him to chuckle a little. Now he had the courage to say what he'd planned to.

"I have a request to make." The nervousness was back the moment he opened his mouth.

"Yes?"

"The book's author-distributed which means I'll be travelling around in order to beg independent bookstores to put it in stock. I'll be in Hartford for a few days and I would like to show the book to Rory, so if you could just tell me where she is…"

"Jess," his uncle sounded exasperated and Jess closed his eyes. He had anticipated that reaction.

"I know, Luke. It's over… She made that perfectly clear." Speaking it aloud was much more painful than one would think after not having seen her in over a year. Merely hearing her name caused his heart to skip a beat. It was quite frustrating, but he had to do this. She had to see that he finally found something he could do passionately, she had to know that he couldn't have done it without her.

"I don't fell comfortable…" Luke started.

"Do you really think she pines after me, Luke? Our last encounter was…" Terrible? Hell? The most embarrassing moment of my life? "Let's just say that it was the definite end of our relationship and that was more than a year ago. She moved on. I moved on." Well, the later was blatant lie, but he was sure of the former.

"She lives in Hartford at the moment at her grandparent's place." Jess furrowed his eyebrows at that.

"Why?"

He literally heard Luke squirm.

"Lorelai and her… They are having problems at the moment."

Jess was immediately worried at that revelation. He wasn't the biggest fan of Lorelai and he knew she wasn't his, but he knew Rory well enough to realize that a fight with her mother would not only depress her but had the power to destroy her.

"Thanks for the warning," was all he could think of saying. Then he added: "Thanks for telling me."

"You're welcome."

Almost two years later he stood in front of Luke's Diner. They'd seen each other regularly about once every half a year, once at Truncheon, then when Luke had visited him shortly after Lorelai and him had broken up. Later when Doula was born and he had sneaked into town to visit his little sister and uncle and now he stood in front of the infamous diner all over again.

He was nervous because he had a request to make once again. He looked inside and was relieved to see that there weren't many customers inside and he didn't know any of those who were there.

Hesitantly he stepped inside and waited for his uncle to notice him. Luke looked up from the counter and smiled when he recognized his nephew. He came forward and hugged him affectionately. Their hugs had become part of their ways of saying goodbye and only rarely it was a form of greeting the other as well. Jess secretly cherished the moment for Luke was still the only male belonging to the older generation whom he allowed to come closer than five feet. Jimmy would be alright as well, but that guy was even more hesitant with physical contact than he was. T.J. he couldn't even bear to be in the same room with.

"Jess. That is one great surprise. How are you doing?"

"Fine, thanks. And judging by that goofy smile of yours, you guys made up." His uncle looked truly happy and though he sounded annoyed, it was in fact wonderful to see the man look so cheerful. If there was one person in the world that deserved happiness it was Luke.

"You know that already." The smile still refused to leave his expression.

Indeed he did. His uncle had called him not long after the reconciliation.

"What are you doing here?" That caused Jess to gulp a little. It was now or never.

"I have a request to make."

"I've heard that one before," Luke simply said.

"Can I talk to you alone, please?" Jess was unable to meet his eyes. In moments like this he felt like a small boy. Luke looked worried and gestured him to go upstairs.

Once the door closed behind them Jess walked around in the old apartment. It was obvious that his former "room" had become April's which was alright to a certain point. His eyes widened a little when he saw his old copy of Peter Pan standing on one of the bookshelves.

"I've been looking for that everywhere," he exclaimed walking over and started to closely examine the book to make sure it's condition was still good.

"What can I do for you, Jess?"

"I've just wondered if I could stay here for a month." He had expected an angry expression on his uncle's face, immediate rejection and a part of him happiness. What he hadn't expected was obvious worry.

"But I thought things were alright with you in Philadelphia, Jess. Did something happen?"

Jess smiled at that: "Things are better than alright, Luke. No reason to be concerned. Truncheon's got a great reputation in Philadelphia's art scene and it starts to spread even further plus the Subsect will be printed in a second edition, this time there will be a bigger amount of books because of an increasing amount of interested bookstores. I am here because I took a month off in order to finish my second novel. I'll do some editing too, but the good thing about the internet is that I don't have to stay at Truncheon to do that. I would just like to spend some quiet weeks here if that is possible."

"Congratulations, Jess! That is amazing. Of course you can stay here. I'm looking forward to it actually." He looked truly happy about it.

Jess avoided his uncle's eyes when he continued: "I remember your conditions concerning staying here." His words were almost whispered. He was ashamed of the kind of person he was during his two years in Stars Hollow.

"Jess…," he softly grabbed Jess' left shoulder forcing him to look up, "that was different. You've found your way and that's more than good enough. It's great."

Wordlessly Jess opened his bag, extracted an envelope from it and handed it over. A little confused Luke took and opened it.

"High School Equivalency Diploma," Luke read aloud and then stared at Jess, "You did your GED."

Jess looked at him with a very serious expression: "I am a man of my word, Luke. I promised that things would change when I came back here for my Senior year, but I disappointed you… So, I did the next best thing. I took some classes in night school and took the test. I should have done it years ago…" He wanted to say more, but was interrupted when the strong man embraced him once again using much more force than usual.

"Jess, I am so proud of you," he beamed at his nephew when he finally released him from his painfully strong hug.

Then suddenly, he looked sad and Jess was about to ask what was wrong when Luke spoke up: "The graduation ceremony is already over when you got the diploma, isn't it."

Jess only nodded. That had been weeks ago. He had thought about inviting family, but decided against it because he should have graduated years ago. That didn't mean it hadn't hurt when except for Chris, Matt, Jill and Sam nobody else had come.

"Keep reading." He said.

Luke's attention flipped back to the papers before him: "…score of 780 of 800… highest score in the city of Philadelphia… Jess, that is… Mr Mariano we are pleased to inform you… scholarship… Community College of Philadelphia… Jess!... Creative Writing Academic Certificate… three semesters…"

Luke looked up, his mouth was wide open.

"It's close enough to Locust Street so I can stay with the guys and I'll only be taking that course which means I'll keep working at the place. There's a lot I can do at Truncheon and the good thing is that college is being paid for, so…"

Once again he was forced into a bone-crushing hug. When he was released he saw that his uncle's eyes had started to moisten. He forgot to breath for a moment.

"You are a great kid, Jess. Don't you ever dare to forget that!" The man smiled wildly and looked incredibly proud.

It couldn't possibly be him to cause Luke looking at him like that. He had gotten used to that pleased, softened expression on his uncle's face, but he had never seen him so proud.

Jess couldn't help but return the smile.

"You are more than just welcome to stay here as long as you like, son…nephew." They both realized the slip of the tongue and Jess had the urge to cry suppressing it only by biting his lower lip.

In moments like this Jess was just grateful that neither of them were men of many words for sometimes silence was golden. There were no words needed to acknowledge that despite the fact they were nephew and uncle by blood, they definitely were more than that by heart.

Thanks for all those who reviewed. I'm a little sad to see how many readers I've lost, but I will not punish those who decided to review :-)

I won't have any internet connection tomorrow which is why you will not get another update before Sunday.

Only two more chapters to go... Thanks for sticking with me for so long!

Next Chapter: Yet another request...