A/N - Hey all, thanks for sticking in there with me, Holidays, three kids and the craziness that can be my life derailed my writing. I had half this chapter written and no time to finish it. So thanks for your continued reading and support. I am trying to publish a few more this week. I just rewatched the last time we saw Jess and Rory together at Truncheon and I am reminded of how broken Jess looked when Rory told him she loved Logan. Hopefully we can fix that. See you in the reviews!

Chapter 21

Jess stayed at the Gazette thinking for a bit after Rory left. He couldn't believe he yelled at her like that. He already has discarded the idea of Logan being the father but he didn't think his response to it being the reality would be so strong. He was upset with himself. Upset with Rory, for letting this happen. You blew it again Jess! His self deprecating thoughts ran through his head.

He felt the urge to run, like he always did when things got rough, he wanted to run. He also wanted to clarify things with Rory but he wasn't sure if she was ready for that right now. But he wasn't the same as before and he couldn't just disappear without explanation or reason. He had gotten Rory to tell him she was pregnant and who the father was, that was his goal. But it did not happen in the way he imagined it. He thought of the kisses they had shared and what he had denied himself and sighed. What else was new? Because of Rory he had sacrificed many things. Not only the physical, but the psychological as well. As he sat there thinking of what he could have done better and how he could have taken the emotion out of the whole thing, he decided to explain things in the best way he knew how. To write. Rory had left her computer logged on, the dinosaur, so he sat down and typed.

"Dear Rory,

I am sorry for yelling at you today. It was never my intention. You know that Logan was never my favorite person, and even I didn't realize I held so much rancor for him after all these years. I am also upset with myself that I threw Dean in your face. If you can believe it or not, we had a very cordial conversation and he told me what happened with you two when you were at Yale. I still stand by my words. But maybe this is a better way to say it.

Rory, you are an amazing woman. It is obvious that you will have men falling at your feet. And I can speak from experience that you are not an easy one to get over. Any man who has been lucky enough to have you, even for a while, would recognize what a woman you are and not want to lose you. You are smart, you are funny, you are witty, you know movies and books and can hold junk food with the best of them, you are a great friend. And on top of all that you are the most beautiful woman I have ever known. Men stick around in the hope that one day you will be theirs again. It is not your fault that they choose to stay, only that in your kindness you never say go, or we are done. You leave them feeling like tomorrow might happen.

Maybe that was the way to have told you what I did. But of course the Jess that I have tried to better, reared his ugly head tonight, he said what I meant but in a way that I know is ineffective and hurtful. So, I am writing this letter to clarify what I feel. I know you are angry with me and that I have very little right to say anything over how you run your life. Just know that you are a very important person to me, I care that you do well in life and what happens to you. You will always have a place in my life, and whatever I can do to make up for that serious indiscretion, let me know. I would hate for another four years to pass without seeing you. First and foremost we are friends. Please keep being the wonderful person you are. I know you will make a wonderful mother, and I stand by that Logan doesn't deserve you. Here is my contact information. Cell: 267-555-2506 You can still find me at Truncheon, same address as always, in the book.

Don't hesitate to call, I truly don't want to lose touch again. It has been an amazing couple of days. I am glad we had them. Once again, I am sorry for being an ass.

Yours Always,

Jess."

He quickly printed the letter and placed it on her desk under a paperweight. With a look back at the office, he walked out, locking the door lock from the inside, he didn't have a key for the deadbolts outside. He doubted it mattered since the only hoodlum the town had ever known was him.

He walked away from the Gazette back to Luke's, went upstairs, packed his stuff and let Cesar know he was on his way out. He hated leaving her there but he knew that Rory being Rory, needed to figure out her own stuff. Any interference would not be taken well. He left with a heavy heart. He figured he would give her a few months. If she hadn't contacted him by then he would call her. He had taken her number from her info on the desk of the Gazette.

When he walked into Truncheon after parking behind the building, his friends accosted him.

"What are you doing back early?"

"What did you do to Paige?"

"Who's the girl?"

His head spun at the questions. They knew very little about Rory, they had seen her the one time she showed up, but they knew what it had done to him, the depression and tailspin he had gone into. They didn't complain, it resulted in his second book, but they also knew the funk he came back in any time he spent more than a minute in that small town he called "home."

Jess stared at his friends with a look of confusion. "Hold on… who's what girl? Who said anything about a girl?"

Matthew looked at him knowingly, "'the girl' the one girl that you write about, that you talk about in your sleep, that you brood over after every visit to that town of yours. The one who was here that one time, years ago, right after the first book. Brown hair, blue eyes. That one."

Jess looked at Matthew like a stranger, he had tried his best to be vague and noncommittal about everything relating to Stars Hollow and Rory, he thought he had hidden it well, he had apparently been wrong.

He tried to side step the question. "What about Paige? What did you say?"

Matthew's face fell, "she came and picked up everything she had around the shop and the apartment, I let her in, I know you are the only one who lives up there now, but she was insistent. She said you were never going to get over your ghosts, and that she had actually seen the ghost. Dark brown hair, blue eyes. And that she knew it was never going to be what she wanted, so she was checking out. I honestly think she is the only girl who has ever seen their competition with you. The others have had no idea why you wouldn't commit, just that every time you come back from there you are all quiet and disconnected for weeks. We don't complain, we can count on some good production when you get back but man, its time to come clean. Who is she, what's the deal?"

Jess realized that despite all of his casualness about his love life, relationships and ghosts, as they called him, he was only deceiving himself if he thought that his friends and colleagues of so many years didn't realize what was going on with him, she was in his writing, his dreams, in the middle of every relationship he had ever had. She was it for him, he just didn't know if he was it for her, especially now. All he could do was get out one word in a whisper. The one he had never said, not even to them, her name.

"Rory"