A/N: As Jess said in his post-script, sorry that the letter is so crappy. I wanted it to be less than Rory's was but I'd had the idea of Jess leaving her a message in a note for a while now and it was only when I sat down to write this chapter that I realised just how damn difficult it is to hide a message with that many vowels! See if you can spot it before you read the end of the chapter...good luck...
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Absence makes the heart grow fonder
My hand is trembling. I honestly can't believe that he replied to that stupid letter. I didn't plan it, I rambled on like a crazy person and I told him that I loved him. Well, not in so many words but the inferences were there!
Oh god, that's why he's replied. He's written to tell me that he doesn't want anything to do with me…Wait a minute…What the hell am I sitting here worrying about it for? It's right in front of me, I should just open the damn thing and get it over with!
Here goes.
~*~
Dear Rory,
I'm not sure what to say in answer to your letter. Flowing prose was never really my forte, despite the whole writer thing, but I'll give it a go anyway.
Love? Are you sure? I mean, it's been years. You could be happily shacked up with that blonde prick. You don't need me ruining your life any more than I've already done.
Or are you just messing with my head again? I don't need that, Rory. If you meant what you said, I need to know for real. Prove it.
Very well done for reading the Hemingway, by the way. I never thought you'd manage it. That stolen phone call seems like it happened a lifetime ago. I stole that bracelet. I just thought you should know.
Everything's changed, though, Rory. We're older, supposedly wiser. Is this really the way you want to go?
You're so different from me, even though we've got so much in common it never seemed to be enough.
Oh, I've thought about it, sure. I never really got over you, you know. It sounds pathetic to admit that but it has to be said.
Underneath all of this, well, bravado, for want of a better word, I'm still not sure if I want to go through all the crap again.
There's a lot of water under the bridge with us but I don't know if our history is a good base to start a fresh relationship on.
Ok, so, I guess I need to stop being bitter about this now.
Oh, and I don't need an answer to this letter.
Jess
~*~
I'm almost in tears as I reach the end. He doesn't want me. It was so full of hate! I didn't know that I'd been such a heartless bitch to him. So I look back at the page and try to read it again, hoping that I've missed something and there's a p.s. at the bottom.
p.s. turn over.
So I nearly rip the page as I frantically turn it over, but who cares, right?
p.s. Sorry that was such a crappy letter. I found out the hard way that it's really difficult to leave a hidden message with so many vowels! Read the first letter of every paragraph. Sorry it's not keepsake-worthy…Oh, and open your door…
I actually did tear the paper slightly this time. Hidden message? Seriously? It's so unlike him.
I. L.O.V.E. Y.O.U. T.O.O.
It's the sweetest thing I've ever read and now I can see the Jess I knew and loved…love. In this message, for my eyes only, there's the Jess who looked up the distance from Stars Hollow to Yale. 22.8 miles. There's the Jess who wrecked a snowman just so I could win a stupid competition. It's so overdone! There's the Jess who stole my copy of "Howl", just so he could enlighten me with his thoughts. I just wanted to put some notes in the margins for you.
So there I am, walking over to my door, just like his letter told me to. From the other side, I can smell fresh coffee wafting towards my nose-the burnt scent of my life's elixir-and I can tell that it's paint-stripper strong. Perfect.
I open the door and there he is, smirking and holding an extra-large to go cup. And I realise that my memory hasn't been doing him justice. He's even more perfect than I remember him. But they do say that absence makes the heart grow fonder. Even if it's only been a few weeks. He smiles, that rare dazzling smile.
I'm home.
