A/N: I have been writing this chapter for AAAAAAAAGES, and I hate it guts. I know, it's bad, but I had no choice. If you want a rewrite, it'll take me even damn longer. For the moment, this is your chapter eleven. I'm sorry for the wait. v.v

My Latest Mistake

Chapter Eleven

Wait

Rated T

"How long has she been in there today?" Lorelai asked Luke absently. He felt her hand tighten around his and they shared a moment of pure insecurity that always came with watching Rory for the past few months.

"Hours… I guess," he shrugged with a sigh and looked down to the ground.

"What do the doctors say?" she pressed, eyeing him slightly.

"The same thing they tell everyone," Luke regurgitated, as he had been since Jess had gone under over three months ago.

"Do they think…?" she trailed off, she didn't need to finish the sentence. It was the same thing that everyone had been asking for months.

"He'll make it," Luke grunted, but he had to bite back the emotions behind the words.

"I think so too," she assured him, and he looked at her with shock. In the entire time of her support, she hadn't tossed her cards in either side. "He has to... Anyone would fight for my daughter."

"Huh," he snorted, but wrapped an arm around her shoulder and hugged her tight.

"When he wakes up… do you want to, I don't know…" she seemed to choke on the words, but his strange Gilmore-sense told him precisely what she was saying, as it always did.

"Yeah," he nodded.

"Good," she sniffled, hugging into him tighter.

-gGg-

Rory sat inside the room doing her homework, reading out the teacher's instructions on her page and hearing Jess's comments inside her head. Some of them made her smile, some of them made her frown… but all of them made her wish that he was back again. One of her hands crept up the bed and touched his. She jumped at the contact, not having noticed that she was even making it.

"Hi," she whispered quietly. Even so, her voice echoed in the empty room.

Her only answer was the beeping of the machines that were keeping him alive. A tear squeezed down her cheek, which she attempted to ignore. Since she'd returned from her grandparent's house, she'd already re-enrolled in Yale, got a job in town, and was spending every spare second in Jess's room. The nurses even allowed her to bring in a bed. Everyone was worried, she knew that, but there wasn't anything she could offer them to prove that she wasn't obsessing over this.

The first time that Luke brought up the fact that this entire mess was her fault she hadn't believed him… but now…? Even though she hadn't gotten the chance to see him again… to talk to him, she still knew, somehow, that he could feel her here. If she, her presence, had forced him under, maybe it would bring him back. She was clinging to this fact as much as humanly possible, for no other reason than to talk to him again, to compare notes on books, to make sure that he was still alive. To make sure that her heart wasn't the only one shredded on that night. Tears surged to the surface again and she tried to hold back a sob.

"Yes…" she whispered quietly, placing her head on his chest and allowing the tears to fall.

-gGg-

"Rory?" Luke asked awkwardly, poking the girl's shoulder. She'd fallen asleep on Jess's chest hours ago and he hadn't had the heart to disturb her until now, but if he didn't, she'd miss her first class for the day. Coughing, he nudged her again. "Rory?"

"Huh?" she murmured, lifting her head up jerkily and looking up at Luke with wide eyes. "What?"

"It's past twelve… just wondering if you felt like going to class," he mumbled awkwardly, not knowing what to tell her.

"What?" she shrieked, pulling her books together frantically. He backed away from the whirlwind that was a Gilmore girl in a panic and hid behind one of the gnomes.

"You fell asleep," he supplied, eyeing her carefully as she almost swatted one of Jess's tubes out of him. Her hand stopped in mid-air, freezing in contemplation. She lowered it and looked down at the boy in question. The tension in the room seemed to rush out and was replaced with sadness… a melancholy that wouldn't be healed until Jess rose from his death-like state.

"I did," she agreed lifelessly and placed her hand back on Jess's chest.

"Your class," he nudged, and the panic returned. It was remarkable how that worked… one minute they could be totally stressed, the next second they were placid, and then they were back to being terrified again.

"Thank you!" she shouted as she rushed from the room, a few blank papers flying out of her binder in her hurry. He watched her for a second and then took up her spot beside Jess. If it were up to him, he'd be in the room twenty four hours a day, but Rory had first dibs… not to mention she had a tendency to kick everyone out the second she arrived.

"I have some good news for you," Luke mumbled, then coughed, pondering whether or not Jess would mind if he touched him. Deciding against it, he leaned back in the chair and took off his hat, shaking out his hair a little bit. "Your book's selling great… apparently the world loves tragedy." He sat forward again, the front two chair legs echoing loudly in the room as they slammed onto the ground.

"I gathered your notes for your second book… I guess, I mean, it was the first book you wrote… but you didn't finish it. I found them between your mattresses. Too obvious, I thought that it would be harder… but I sent them into the publishing house, and they're going to send it out as an autobiography – unfinished. They say it's really good, really heartfelt… We're getting our copies next week," Luke sighed, placing his head in his hands and thinking about the future. "They said that you could be a bestseller. They say that… well, said… if you hadn't, uh, if this hadn't happened, that you could have been huge.

"This can't be the end for you, kid… you have too much going for you right now. You have to wake up," Luke begged, grabbing onto Jess's hand and attempting to hold back his emotions. Taking a deep breath, he forced them back and let go of Jess's hand again.

"Lorelai and I… we're going to get married. I want you to be my best man, Jess. I'm not going to get married without you there," Luke admitted admonishingly. "That means that you'd better wake your ass up so that I'm not miserable for the rest of my life."

"Way to lay the guilt on him," Lorelai chirped in from the door.

"Jeez!" Luke jumped, turning around to see her smiling a little bit unsurely.

"I brought you some tea, and some food," she told him, handing him a cup filled with a green-tinted liquid, peppermint. The food was a salad, wilted, soggy and absolutely unappetizing. He looked up at her a bit warily. "It's the thought that counts, isn't it?"

"Of course," he grumbled under his breath and picked at the salad a little bit, trying to see if there was a crisp leaf in the bunch. They sat in silence for awhile, both of them glancing at Jess out of the corner of their eyes and sighing occasionally, obviously unhappy.

"He needs to wake up," Lorelai griped. "I have my dress… and my flowers, and everything's picked out!"

Instead of going along with the normal joking manner that they took on, he merely looked back down at Jess sadly. The salad was turned away, untouched with the exception of his playing. His eyes were downcast, upset.

"What if he doesn't?" he finally voiced, staring at Jess with fear in his eyes.

"What?" Lorelai choked, coughing a little bit to clear out the cheeseburger that had gotten stuck in her throat.

"What if he doesn't wake up?" Luke repeated lifelessly.

"He will," Lorelai stated firmly.

"How do you know?" Luke sighed.

"Because he has to," Lorelai assured him, leaning forward in her chair and grabbed his hand tightly in one of hers.

"But what if he doesn't want to?" Luke half-cried, trying to regain his composure as best he could.

"He wants to," she brushed off.

"How do you know?" he requested again.

"Wouldn't you?" she shrugged.

Silence took over again as he considered it. Things had been going right for Jess just seconds before he'd passed out. His legs were working again and his book was published. The world was shifting back into place, and Rory was there… Rory, Lorelai. His eyes rose up to the blue orbs that were studying him currently and he nodded. Would he want to come back to Lorelai, even if what had happened to Rory and Jess happened to them? Yeah, he'd risk it… he didn't have a choice.

-gGg-

Rory watched as everyone finally vacated from Jess's room. They thought that she was staying at Yale tonight, but her bed had felt empty… alone. It was pathetic, but she couldn't sleep unless she knew that he was there, waiting for her, conscious or not. Not to mention that she'd had another run-in with Logan, and those were always pleasant.

"Hey," she whispered as she drifted into the room, making her way to his side.

"Hey," was answered back groggily, and she froze, her back going ramrod straight and her eyes darting to Jess's prone form on the bed, wondering if it was just an illusion in her mind.

"Hello?" she asked, her voice barely even there. The shock was rattling her system, making her nervous, making her hands sweat.

"What time is it?" he groaned, half asleep. The tubes that were in him rattled a little bit as he attempted to breathe on his own.

"Nurse!" she shrieked at the top of her lungs, slamming on the door and turning around to the edge of Jess's bed and telling him: "It's late," softly.

"What's going on?" he moaned, his head lopping to the side gently, his brown eyes demanding an answer.

"Stuff," she replied, attempting to keep the tears from streaming down her face. She didn't want to scare him… but it had been three months.

"How long was I out?" he muttered, even as his breathing became short and labored, like the machines that used to be taking care of him were now hurting him.

"A while," she evaded in his normal style. "But that doesn't matter anymore, because now you're here, and you're awake. I'm so sorry, Jess… I'm so sorry."

"For what?" he rasped as the nurse squad burst into the room and to his side. Rory was shoved out to make room for them all and she gladly ran into the hallway, pulling out her cell phone as she went. Glancing through the window to watch their progress, she dialed her mother, knowing that Luke was probably with her.

"Hmugh?" Lorelai greeted.

"Jess is awake!" Rory gasped, as if just coming to terms with it herself.

"Woah, what?" Lorelai exclaimed into the phone, and she heard a loud 'smack' in the night, which probably meant that Luke was awake now too.

"Jess, he just woke up," Rory explained breathlessly and watched as the machines were carted out of the room, replaced by another squad of nurses who were helping Jess return to the world.

There was a massive amount of hushed talking on the other end of the phone before Lorelai came back, but Rory had totally forgotten that it was in her hand. Her eyes were drawn to Jess, who was staring at the window in confusion, obviously not understanding what the hell was going on, let alone what all the machines being carted out of the room were for. He was attempting to shove the nurses away, but he was too weak.

"I have to go," Rory whispered, the phone slipping out of her hand and back into her pocket. Their eyes met and she felt a rush through her that she hadn't felt since the day that he'd left… that rush that told her that she had to be there, had to stop him, that it was up to her.

Weaving through the crowd of nurses, she danced up to his bed and took his hand. Their eyes never separated.

"Are you allowed to be in here?" one of the nurses asked her angrily.

"Piss off," Jess growled at her, turning his eyes from hers to deliver a look that Rory had only gained once or twice in her life, mostly when Dean was involved.

The nurse frowned at him but continued on with her work. The world dissipated around them and Rory couldn't help herself from crying a bit more openly.

"You're here," he commented lifelessly.

"I'm here," she agreed numbly.

"Why/" he asked.

"I-I," she stammered, unable to think up a reason that didn't involve the strange rolling feeling in her stomach that caused her to turn into a teenager again at his glance.

"It doesn't matter," he shook off and smiled at her.

"We're giving him a sedative," one of the nurses informed them both.

"But he's been… does he really need it?" Rory protested. "I mean, his uncle hasn't even seen him yet."

"Are you a nurse?" the woman asked impatiently, knowing the arguments that came from this room. "Are you a doctor? Premed perhaps?"

"No," Rory sighed.

"Then let me do my damn job and stop objecting," she bit and injected the sedative into Jess's IV.

"G'night," Jess mumbled, his eyes closing slowly.

"G'night," Rory answered, running her hand through his hair.

"You'll be here when I wake up, right? This isn't some fucked up dream?" he requested quietly, fading out of the world.

"I'm not leaving," she consoled, running her hand through his hair and hugging his hand close to her body, settling into the long wait by his side. School would have to wait, there were more important things right now.