A/N Thanks to whoever reviewed as guest. I cannot reply in a PM to a guest review, but thanks for reminding me that I am leaving out the rest of Stars Hollow completely. I hope you like this chapter. WARNING** This chapter is not graphic but does slightly lean toward an M rating.
Chapter 13 - Rory
When Jess left Rory didn't feel the relief she expected to feel. She was grateful that he had come by and appreciated the support he offered. What surprised her the most about his visit was that he didn't seem to expect anything from her. He let her cry, he gave her his shoulder, he even brought her pie and he didn't ask for anything in return. He didn't ask for explanation, he didn't ask any questions about why she was crying or what was going on, he was just there. So instead of the relief she expected to feel when he left, because she didn't have to try and avoid the topic that was the only thing on her mind these days, she felt alone.
One of the things that had kept her going back to Logan time and again was just that, he kept her from feeling lonely. He was there and he would hear her out and sometimes she needed someone who wasn't her mother. Logan wasn't an option anymore. She didn't know what she was going to do about that yet. She figured she was going to have to tell him about the baby but she wasn't sure when. Her visit with Christopher led to the pro con list and she did not want to raise a child with the Hunzberger dynasty having a say. They were worse than the Gilmores.
Rory's thoughts went back to Jess. Even when things had sucked romantically between them he was always a friend and he always had called her on her shit. She was realizing today how important that was. Logan was always there to whisk her away from her problems, her life, if she wanted, and that was nice, but Jess had always made her face her problems. Maybe that is why Logan was easier. He let her live in fantasy land and Jess was reality.
"Jess is real" the whisper escaped her lips.
"Jess is real…" Rory's mind started spinning. Even when she had denied Logan's proposal she had not wanted to deny Logan because she loved him and his spontaneity and their adventures. She loved that she was free when she was with him. But she was having a baby and nothing was more real than being a mother. There was no escaping and jetting off to somewhere to avoid the responsibility.
When Jess came back to her that night at Yale, his proposition was preposterous, run away with him, but it was a true request. He legitimately wanted to start a life with her back then, no matter how crazy it sounded. He was always about being realistic and grounded. His life had not allowed him to have his head in the clouds. He actually reminded her of Lorelai in that way. She had never allowed herself to get too close to Jess. His emotional unavailability scared her even when her attraction to him was immense. After he left without saying goodbye, twice, her faith in him was gone.
She wondered if she had judged him too harshly. Yes, he had left, when he was seventeen and eighteen, but he had changed. She could see that. At the most difficult times in her life, Jess was there. Even though he was dealing with his own screwed up life. When she dropped out of Yale he had proven to be the most level headed of them both. He had gotten his life together, written a book, started a small publishing company. Obviously, he wasn't the same unreliable person he had been. He had tried to tell her that, that he was ready. It had been more than ten years since then. Of course he was grown up. Was she?
Rory let herself think the thoughts she had been shoving aside. She remembered the hug and how she felt in his arms. She felt safe, she felt protected, she felt cared for. In between her sobs, she remembered hearing his words. "It's going to be ok, I'm here, I am always here." It was almost like he knew why she was crying and even though the words were simple, they rang true.
Beyond the comfort she felt in Jess's words, she thought of the comfort she felt in his arms. At one point she felt a tingle run from the top of her head all the way through her feet, it was electric enough that it calmed her. It was the same sensation she felt the first time she kissed him at Sookie's wedding. It made her want to stay and run at the same time. It was something she had never experienced in a relationship before.
She hadn't been with that many guys, five if you counted the one night stand Wookie, she was more of a relationship girl than a hook-up type. The electricity had never been that potent with any of them and those relationships went far beyond a hug or a kiss. It piqued her curiosity more than she wanted to admit. She had always had an attraction to Logan, and he to her, but she realized that it had grown as time progressed. She and Logan had chemistry, the half-naked episode that happened the night of her Grandparents vow renewal was evidence of that. Being caught by your dad at a family event was a bad choice in retrospect. However, the franticness that led to that indiscretion could not hold a candle to what she felt in Jess's arms. Was it the memory of what was before she pondered, but when she thought of what happened just a few minutes ago, she realized it was much more than the memory, it was, as Jess was, a reality.
It struck her as odd, the impact it had on her, it was like an incendiary sensation that Jess left her with. So much that she had to forcefully push back what she felt. She wondered what things could be like with Jess, if she let them be. She had considered it once, before he left Stars Hollow. But she had pushed that feeling way down a long time ago with her disappointment and need to move on, not even acknowledging that it was there.
Rory tried to follow Jess's advice and sleep, she wanted to feel better than the failure she felt like today. She lay there feeling his arm on her back, remembering his scent, musky with a hint of stale smoke, even though she knew he didn't smoke anymore. She thought she would never get to sleep as revved as she felt from their innocent encounter. Yet the emotional exhaustion of the day caught up with her and she fell into a deep sleep.
Rory was in the wings of the stage in Miss Patty's dressed in the Juliet costume she wore for the play from high school. The actual performance was happening. The audience was full of the towns folk. Taylor was in the wings giving cues for people to enter and exit the stage. She could see Kirk beyond the lights running the light and sound board. As she took all of this in, she realized that they were coming up to the wedding scene between Romeo and Juliet. She looked up expecting to see Paris as Romeo, or maybe even Tristan. Instead she saw Jess dressed as Romeo directing his words at Jackson who was Friar Lawrence
FRIAR LAWRENCE
So smile the heavens upon this holy act
That after-hours with sorrow chide us not.
ROMEO
Amen, amen. But come what sorrow can,
It cannot countervail the exchange of joy
That one short minute gives me in her sight.
Do thou but close our hands with holy words,
Then love-devouring death do what he dare;
It is enough I may but call her mine.
Taylor was pushing her onto the stage, apparently she had missed her entrance. Rory walked out onto the stage as Juliet and Romeo /Jess looked at her with a love in his eyes she had never seen. A love that could make you understand why Romeo killed himself when he thought Juliet was dead.
ROMEO
Ah, Juliet, if the measure of thy joy
Be heaped like mine, and that thy skill be more
To blazon it, then sweeten with thy breath
This neighbor air, and let rich music's tongue
Unfold the imagined happiness that both
Receive in either by this dear encounter.
Without even knowing where the words came from she said Juliet's line. The feelings she felt overwhelmed her.
JULIET
Conceit, more rich in matter than in words,
Brags of his substance, not of ornament.
They are but beggars that can count their worth.
But my true love is grown to such excess
I cannot sum up sum of half my wealth.
She felt the words as she declared her love for Romeo and stared into Jess's eyes. She looked around and suddenly was in the death scene. She was laying there playing dead as she heard Jess deliver his line.
ROMEO
And, lips, O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death.
Rory felt Jess lean over and kiss her, she was supposed to be dead, but she couldn't resist kissing him back. She opened her eyes to look into his and realized that they were no longer in Mrs. Patty's, rather they were on the grass outside the old Independence Inn, where she had kissed him the first time at Sookie's wedding. He was leaning over her blocking out the sun. She continued the kiss and buried her hands in his hair pulling him closer. She realized she was no longer in Juliets clothes. She was wearing a knee length skirt and a loose blouse. She pulled him over her as she deepened the kiss. She felt his hands travel up her side under her blouse and she felt like her skin was on fire. She heard her name on his lips. "Rory" escaped as a sigh. Jess's body was covering hers and she could feel every inch of him on her. Her eyes closed again as she let the sensations wash over her.
Rory untangled her fingers from his hair and reached stretched her arm out, expecting to encounter grass. Instead her fingers ran into a pillow, her eyes opened quickly and this time instead of the grass, she found herself on a soft bed, in between crisp white sheets and Jess's dark hair over her. Instead of feeling him on her through her clothes, she realized they no longer had any on. She reveled in the sensation of his skin against hers. He was still over her. He lifted his head and looked at her. And she saw his eyes widen as she felt him enter her. Her eyes closed in pleasure. She could feel tears of joy falling from her eyes. She heard her name being called from his lips over and over again.
"Rory"
"Rory"
"Rory"
As she felt herself rise to meet him, she wanted to see his eyes as she went over the edge. She opened her eyes to look into his.
"Jess" she said breathlessly, feeling her body ready to sail into the abyss.
There he was looking at her with concern. She wanted to take that look of concern away. She reached her hands up to his hair again and pulled him down into a deep kiss. At first he resisted the kiss and then she felt him start to kiss her back. Her hands trailed down his shoulders. Where she expected to find his bare back there was a shirt. It surprised her enough to slow down the climb up to the summit she was about to reach. She shifted and realized she was in clothes again.
Rory finally really opened her eyes. When she did, Jess was there, he had pulled back from her kiss with questions in his eyes. She took in her surroundings. She was in her bed, in her room. Jess was sitting on the edge of the bed and she was under the covers. Realization began to dawn. She had just kissed Jess. A real kiss. She had been dreaming that she was with him and there he was and she just went with it. As the reality of the truth began to become clear, Rory's face began to take on the hue of a cherry. She didn't know what to do, how to respond, what to say, all she managed to do was squeak out a question.
"Jess?"