A/N: So, we all enjoyed the Literati date, huh? Very cool. Thanks for all the amazing feedback. Now, time for some townies... and more Lit, obviously ;)

(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)

Chapter 11

"So, you're saying you absolutely don't remember me?"

"No, Kirk. I absolutely don't remember anything about you from before the accident," Jess confirmed for what felt the 147th time.

"You don't remember my last name?"

"Nope."

"How I take my coffee?"

"No, Kirk."

"How about Lulu? My girlfriend Lulu? You must remember her."

"Kirk, how many more times? Amnesia! Total memory loss for anything that requires context. Geez, if I don't remember Luke or Rory or even my own name when I woke up, why would I remember you or your girlfriend?"

Kirk stared at him a long while, then shook his head.

"No, I can't believe anybody would forget Lulu," he said definitely, getting up and leaving in what appeared to disgust.

"Was he dropped on his head as a kid?" Jess asked Luke, more than a little seriously.

"No, he's just stupid."

"That works too."

"Poor Kirk." Miss Patty chuckled from the end of the counter. "He doesn't mean any harm, he's just not what you'd call the brightest bulb is all."

"That's more than obvious." Jess rolled his eyes. "You need anything else, Miss Patty?"

"Well, honey, what is it that you're offering?"

"He's nineteen, Patty," Luke reminded her with a look.

"That's legal, right?"

"Aww, geez," said Jess, though he was smirking all the same as he took the coffee pot out around the counter to top up cups for a while.

"He seems happy," Lane noted as she rushed back with dirty dishes for the kitchen.

"Yeah, I guess he does," Luke agreed. "It's weird, he was never this happy before the memory loss, at least he didn't seem to be."

"Well, from what I know from Rory, Jess had a lot of bad memories that he's probably better off without."

"Makes sense," Miss Patty considered. "Although, I'm not so sure I'd be willing to part with any of my memories, good or bad. Not that I suppose anyone really gets a choice."

"You know that guy Taylor keeps asking me questions. Says he's trying to catch me out," said Jess as he returned to the counter. "Apparently I could be faking the amnesia as a prank."

"He said that?" asked Lane, eyes wide.

"I'll kill him," said Luke, moving to step out from behind the counter.

Jess' hand on his should stopped him.

"Easy, Uncle Luke. It doesn't matter to me."

"Well it matters to me. How dare he insinuate that my nephew would lie about a serious condition like that?"

"Hey, from what I hear about how I used to be, it's probably not a stretch to believe I'd try it."

Luke had no answer to that and when Jess looked to Lane and Miss Patty for a response they were both very quiet also. If that didn't prove his point, nothing ever would. With a sigh, Jess went over to the coffee machine and put on a fresh pot. He was paying attention to nothing but the task at hand, until he heard Luke ask Rory how she was doing.

"Oh, I'm okay, I guess," she said, swallowing hard as Jess turned around to look at her. "It's way harder on Grandpa than it ever is on me, but everybody's feeling sad, obviously."

Jess didn't even have to ask Luke if he could take his break now, his uncle just nodded his head the moment he looked at him and that was that. They both knew that Rory was hurting. It was only yesterday that they heard from Lorelai about the death of their namesake, Richard's mother, Lorelai 'Trix' Gilmore. Though Jess was pretty sure Rory didn't know her great grandmother all that well, she was too good a person not to be feeling pretty bad right now, if only in sympathy for her mother and grandparents.

"C'mon," said Jess, taking a hold of Rory's hand and leading her to the stairs.

They headed up to the apartment in silence, and when they got there, it still didn't seem as if Rory much wanted to talk. Jess offered her a soda just so he had something to do in fetching it.

"Thanks," said Rory, messing with the can between her hands without actually opening in.

"You wanna sit?" Jess offered.

Rory shrugged and then perched in on the end of his bed. "It's so dumb. I really only met Gran a couple of times, but... well, she's still part of my family, and now she's gone."

"I'd sympathise but I don't even remember the family I do have so..."

"Oh, Jess, I'm sorry," said Rory helplessly, tears filling her eyes.

"Hey, don't do that," he urged her, crouching down in front of her, taking the soda away so he could hold onto her hands. "You don't have to feel bad for me. You have enough to be sad about already."

"I know, except I don't, not really. There are people way worse off than me. She was my great grandmother who I barely knew, at least I still have Grandma and Grandpa and Mom, plus Luke and you, my dad, Lane..."

"If you're gonna name everybody you ever met, we might be here a while," said Jess with a half a smile.

He was glad to see that Rory found a little humour in it too. He watched her looking down at their joined hands a while, wondering what else he could say to help. Luke had already told Jess that he had no grandparents himself. Apparently, there was a vague chance he had memories of his Grandpa William before the accident, but Grandma Rose was gone long before Jess' birth. Jimmy's parents were never on the scene. Even if he had his memories, Jess was pretty sure he would have no idea how to handle this situation.

"I just keep thinking," said Rory very suddenly, "how stupidly short life can be."

"I thought your great grandma was... well, old," said Jess, frowning some.

"Oh, she was, I guess. I don't know exactly but... well, her dying has just made me think about everybody I love and how awful it would be to lose them. I know the crash was bad, with you losing your memory and all, but it could've been worse, Jess. You could've-"

"But I didn't," he said quickly. "Rory, don't do that."

"Why not?" she countered, looking up to meet his eyes. "Jess, just about the only good thing that comes from somebody dying is that it helps those left behind to put their lives into perspective. Sure, Gran was older, but you don't have to be any special age to die. I would hate for anything to happen to you without you knowing... knowing that... well, I love you."

Jess hadn't quite been ready for that one. One minute he was trying to think of anything to say that wasn't stupid in order to comfort his grieving girlfriend and the next she declared that she loved him. There was an obvious response to that and yet his brain was having trouble forming words, never mind his mouth.

"You don't have to say it back. That's not why I-"

Rory couldn't say any more either as Jess moved to sit beside her, taking her in his arms and pulling her into a pretty serious kiss. Her arms reached out to pull him closer as they got lost in the moment a little while. When Jess pulled back a few moments later, he kept Rory close, their foreheads pressed together still.

"Rory, I love you," he told her. "And I'm not just saying it because you did, and I still don't remember what happened with us before, but... but I think the one thing I was sure about from the moment I woke up and saw you is that you were important in my life. Now I know for sure, it's because I love you."

There were tears in her eyes all over again but at least she was smiling now. When she moved him to kiss him, Jess certainly wasn't going to argue at all. Nothing felt better than being close to Rory, in any form at all. He had re-learnt that one pretty damn fast. Before long, kissing turned to full make-out as clothes started to come off. Just her jacket and his over-shirt at first, but then suddenly Rory seemed eager to go further and Jess felt himself freeze up.

"Rory," he said, backing up just a little bit. "I don't..."

Her eyes were the widest he'd even seen them when he dared to look. This probably wasn't how this usually went, though of course Jess couldn't remember at all. Teenage guys were supposed to be the ones who always wanted sex and teenage girls were usually the ones saying, 'not yet.' That much Jess did know, if only from a bunch of the movies he'd watched these past few weeks. That was probably how it was with him and Rory before. Damn, did he ever feel like a heel for the look on her face right now.

"Wow. Um, I'm sorry," she said, jumping up from the end of the bed like she'd been burnt. "I didn't... I'm sorry," she repeated, reaching for her jacket.

Jess' hand on her arm stopped her in her tracks.

"Rory, don't. I'm the one who's sorry," he assured her. "Trust me, I'll probably be regretting this for weeks, I just... It's not that I don't want to be with you, you know that, right?"

"I should," she considered, smiling in spite of herself. "Before, when we dated, you... well, you made it pretty clear that was a direction you wanted to head in. I was the one that wasn't sure. Not that I wasn't sure about you, because even though we never said it, I was almost certain I loved you and you loved me, but... you know, a girl's first time and everything, she should be sure."

She was blushing profusely as she explained and Jess wouldn't have been at all surprised if he was doing the same, if not during her explanation than definitely during his own which followed swiftly behind.

"Yeah, well, as far as my memory goes, it'd be a first for me too," he reminded her. "For me, I've only known you a few weeks, and we've only been on one date."

"Huh," she said, shaking her head. "I really hadn't thought of it that way. So, you're not a 'do it on the second date' kind of guy," she realised, sitting back down beside him, wearing a smirk a mile wide.

"I guess not," Jess agreed, smiling too because it was tough not to.

All their embarrassment was turning into humour, which wasn't a bad thing as far as he could tell. It was certainly diffusing an awkward situation.

"I mean, maybe I was," he considered then. "You realise how weird it is to not even remember if... if you ever had sex?"

"Oh, I'm pretty sure you have," said Rory, turning away and tucking her hair behind her ear in some nervous gesture. "I couldn't tell you any specifics, but I highly doubt you're lacking in experience."

"Doesn't really help when I don't remember," he noted. "You're not mad at me, right?"

"Why would I be mad?"

"I don't know." Jess shrugged. "You wanted to... and it's not like I didn't, or I don't, I just-"

"I get it," she assured him. "More than you know," she promised, leaning in to kiss his cheek. "Honestly, it was probably pretty misguided anyway. If we did, it would be because I'm all griefy and weird today. Not for the right reasons."

Jess nodded that he understood, glad that she was being cool about this. One of them ought to be. Honestly, he felt so stupid. What man of any age or any level of experience turned down a beautiful woman like Rory when they were offering to have sex with him? If only he had some frame of reference for anything in his life, Jess might've felt better, but there was so much missing.

"Could you do me a favour?" he asked her, picking up her hand in his again.

"I won't tell anyone about this," she promised.

"Okay." Jess smirked. "Do me two favours?" he tried again, turning to meet her eyes. "Tell me something about us. One thing from before. A good memory."

Rory took a moment to think and then she smiled.

"The bridge," she said at last. "You remember I told you it was our spot? Well, there's a reason why. See, Stars Hollow has this traditional thing called the Bid-A-Basket. All the women in town make up a lunch in a pretty basket and all the men bid on them, then the guy how wins the basket gets to have lunch with the girl who made the lunch. Anyway, the first year you were here, you came along to the event and... well, actually, you outbid my boyfriend for my basket."

"Seriously?"

"Very seriously. Dean was every kind of mad and I knew I should've been too, but honestly? I was kind of thrilled about it. He was a nice guy, but you? I don't know, Jess, there was always something about you," she told him, looking down at their hands as she entwined their fingers together. "Anyway, you took me and my basket to the bridge and we sat down and ate and talked. You told me how much you loved Hemingway, I told you how I read The Fountainhead when I was ten. Then we got into the Beats and the Russians and... we just talked and talked. I think I knew then that eventually you and me were supposed to be together."

Jess smiled at the memory, even though he didn't have it for himself anymore. The way Rory described it, he could picture it well enough, and even if he didn't have the event to recall, he was pretty sure the feelings attached to it were alive and well inside of him yet.

"Thanks, Rory," he said eventually, his free hand at her cheek, as he leaned in to kiss her one more time.

To Be Continued...