One of the few positives of being mostly unemployed is that Jess is home a lot more than she used to be. She didn't realize how burned out she was from her years at Coolidge. It was exhausting, always having to be 'on' and trying to please other people, always having to be the responsible one. She knows this is supposed to be her rock bottom, but instead it feels like a much needed reprieve from adulthood. Jess knows that it won't be too long before she's tired of working for minimum wage at a restaurant, and she really does want to go back to teaching eventually. But for now she's enjoying her impromptu sabbatical and the perks of not having to be an adult.
Her shifts at the Casserole Shanty are all over the place, but she's still able to spend most of her days messing around with Winston and the cat they've secretly adopted and are now hiding around the loft. In the evenings she stays up late to hang out with Nick. That usually means sitting beside him and knitting while he reads through case documents with a movie playing in the background, but she likes it. It feels cozy the way it does when two people know each other really well and don't have to say anything to enjoy each other's company. Jess knows she can be a chatterbox, but she's grown to appreciate the way Nick doesn't feel like he has to fill every empty silence between them.
One night they're sitting at the kitchen island and enjoying the free leftovers she brought home for dinner. She's in the middle of her story about how Glue-Eating Harold earned his nickname when Nick's phone rings.
"Sorry," he apologizes and flips the phone over to check the caller ID.
"Don't worry about it," she says with a wave of her hand. Nick smiles in thanks and answers the call.
"Hey, Ma. What are you doing up? Isn't it pretty late there?" Nick pauses to hear her answer and his face falls. "Could you say that again? I don't- I don't think I heard you right."
Jess' brow scrunches up in concern and she mouths "Everything okay?"
Nick doesn't acknowledge her question. He seems too absorbed by whatever his mom is saying on the other line. "Yeah, Ma, I'll-" he pauses to listen to what she says. "No. Don't worry about it. I'll take care of it." Another pause. "Yeah. I'll get a flight out as soon as I can. Yeah. Yeah. I love you too. Bye."
He hangs up the phone and looks down at it in shock, like he's still trying to process whatever just happened.
"Are you alright?" Jess asks gently.
Nick stares at her for a second in confusion and then shakes his head slightly before answering. "Uh, my dad died. Yeah, I guess he had a heart attack. I got to go back to, uh, Chicago and, uh, go to the funeral and everything."
She's so shocked that it takes her almost a full minute to respond. "That's terrible, Nick. Wow, I'm so sorry."
He doesn't say anything back. He just sits in silence and looks blankly at his phone. Jess reaches over and grabs his wrist and Nick's head snaps up to look at her. He looks so different, open and vulnerable in a way she's only ever caught the occasional glimpse of. It shocks her every time. Nick is normally so closed off that these rare moments are even more striking in comparison to the typically tight grip he holds on his emotions.
Acting solely on instinct, Jess leans in towards him as far as she can, given that they're sitting on adjacent sides of the kitchen island. She tentatively wraps her arms around him and he drops his head down onto her shoulder. The sharp corner of the counter digs uncomfortably into her hip, but it helps to dampen the dangerous fluttering of her heart. Now is not the time to let your dumb crush get in the way. This isn't about you; it's about him. Nick's dad just died, she reminds herself. You're supposed to be getting over him, anyway.
The next hours all blur together in a frenzy. Nick seems almost entirely detached emotionally. Every now and then Jess catches him staring blankly into the distance with a vacant look in his eyes. Then after a few seconds he seems to come to, shakes his head to clear his thoughts, and refocuses on whatever's at hand.
There's a red eye flight to Chicago the next day, and the cost of the last minute ticket is nearly half of her last paycheck, but it's worth every penny. Jess manages to get the weekend off after begging her co-worker Jordan to swap out shifts with her. It's a miracle she's able to pull everything together in time, but she manages to swing it, and by Friday evening she's standing outside of the loft with her suitcase as she helps Nick load up Winston's car.
"You don't have to come along," Nick says for the hundredth time as he shoves his beat-up suitcase into the trunk.
Jess frowns down at her shoes and kicks a piece of gravel off the edge of the sidewalk. "I know. But I want to. I want to be there for you."
"I'm fine, Jess. Really," he insists and hoists Schmidt's luggage up off the pavement. "Besides, you didn't even know Walt." Nick keeps using his dad's first name. Jess isn't sure if it's because they weren't close or if it's just a coping mechanism separating him from the reality of the situation. He doesn't talk about his dad a lot, or ever really. She can vaguely recall Nick mentioning Walt once or twice, just a fleeting comment here and there that was never too positive.
"Yeah, but I know you. You're my friend, and your dad just died." Jess takes a step forward and smiles reassuringly at him. "I want to support my friend."
Nick sighs and looks up at her. He looks exhausted, even more so than normal. It's almost like stepping back in time to when he first moved into the loft, from the dark bags under his clouded and distant eyes to the worn frown tugging down the corners of his lips. Jess' chest aches just looking at him. She's not sure what she can do to help. There really isn't much she can do in this situation, but she can be here. He wants to shut the world out and act like he doesn't need it, but if he does, she'll be right there standing by his side and holding his hand. He needs somebody even if he can't ask for it.
"Look, I already bought the ticket and it's too late for me to get a refund." She clicks down the handle of her suitcase and wheels it in front of Nick. "So I'm going."
He stares blankly down at the suitcase before glancing back up at Jess. A faint trace of a smile ghosts over his mouth. "Alright, fine," he says, shaking his head in mock disapproval. "But don't complain when you're bored the whole time."
"I won't." Jess grins at him and leans against the side of the car. She watches as he crams her suitcase into the complicated arrangement in the trunk. "Did you want to pick up Caroline and Abbi or are they going to meet us at the airport?" she asks, trying to casually feel out what the whole situation is.
Whatever slight glimmer of happiness slips off Nick's face and his frown falls back into place. "They're not coming."
"They're not?" Jess frowns.
"No." Nick forcefully shuts the door of the trunk with a solid thud. "I'm going to go get Schmidt and Winston," he mutters before breezing past Jess.
"Nick, wait!" she calls out, but he's already disappeared into the building.
Jess sighs and lets her head drop back onto the car window. She's not trying to be nosy. She's not. But she's worried about Nick, and she doesn't want to watch him stumble back into the same pit of misery he just managed to crawl out of. He's been holding his cards even tighter to his chest lately, and Jess desperately wants to reach out and weedle all the information out of him. It's so hard to keep her distance when he gets like this, and it's endlessly frustrating that no matter how hard to tries to push her away she always finds herself coming back to him.
The car ride to the airport is tense and awkward. Nick stares out the window at the passing streetlamps, clearly avoiding meeting Jess' gaze or even acknowledging her presence. She sits silently in the seat beside him and anxiously twiddles her thumbs. Schmidt makes his best attempt to ease the tension, but it almost makes it worse when every one of his ice breakers falls flat, leaving the car deafeningly silent.
LAX is pretty dead this time of night, so they breeze through security in no time. Jess' ticket has her seated next to Nick, but she fully expects him to swap out with one of the other guys. She doesn't mind. She knows he'll come back around to talk to her when he's ready, and she'll be there for him whenever he does. She pulls her knitting out of her bag and is a few rows into the cabling pattern of her scarf when someone clears their throat beside her.
"Is this seat taken?" Nick jokes, gesturing to the empty seat beside her, a large stack of papers shoved under his arm. He looks at her with a tired and slightly sheepish smile. It's not an apology, not yet at least, and Jess is tempted to give him the same cold shoulder he's been giving her. But then Nick sighs, and that ache in Jess' chest returns in full force.
She returns his smile. "All yours."
"Thanks." He sits down and sets down his haphazardly sorted bundle of folders and notes on the tray table, rifling through for the one he's looking for.
Jess returns to her knitting but keeps an eye on Nick, who's distractedly flipping through some complicated-looking booklet. There's a few moments of silence, and Jess waits for Nick to say something, to acknowledge the elephant in the room. But then again, this is Nick: professional conflict negotiator and certified feelings avoider. It'll be years before he willingly brings it up to her himself.
"Look, Nick," she says, pushing down the anxious energy that's been tying her stomach up in knots ever since he snapped at her. "I'm sorry about earlier, okay? I'm not trying to overreach, I swear." She twists up the end of her yarn around her finger. "I'm just worried about you, with Caroline and Abbi and now your dad...I just want to make sure you're still taking care of yourself."
"Jess," Nick sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Things are... It's fine. Don't worry about it."
She glances to the seats in front of them where Schmidt and Winston are politely pretending that they aren't listening to their conversation. "You're my friend, Nick. I'm gonna worry about it."
He makes his grumpy turtleface and scribbles down a note at the top of one of his papers. "I know you're trying to be supportive, but I have things under control, alright? I got this. You don't have to worry about it. Don't do that thing where you feel sorry for me. I hate when people do that. Just act normal."
Jess frowns. It's not the answer she wants from him. She opens her mouth to start pushing him about it when the in-flight intercom crackles on and interrupts her train of thought.
"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for flying with Delta airlines..."
The flight attendant carries on with his overly-peppy little schtick, and Jess decides to set the issue aside to deal with later. It's like any other night in 4D. They sit in companionable silence as Jess works on her scarf and Nick goes through his paperwork. Jess tries to focus on counting her stitches, but she can't help but let her attention drift over to Nick, who's staring down at his work with his eyebrows furrowed in concentration as he mutters something under his breath. She catches him glancing at her out of the corner of his eye every now and then, looking more than a little overwhelmed with a growing look of panic in his eyes. Nick's hands are trembling slightly and he keeps pulling on the knot of his tie. Jess thinks he just might lose it in the middle of the plane if she doesn't do something.
Jess leans in towards him and bumps their shoulders together. "Hey," she says. "I never finished my glue story."
"Right." He smiles half-heartedly and nods. "He thought eating it would make him sticky."
She laughs at the memory. "Well he'd just seen Spiderman-"
"The bad one or the Tobey Maguire one?"
They end up bickering for an hour over the importance of subtlety in acting until the flight attendant comes around to politely point out that most of the other passengers are trying to sleep. Nick apologizes to the flight attendant and then once he's gone Nick tries to blame Jess for getting both of them chewed out, which starts another whispered argument between them. It's the first time Nick looks somewhat normal since he first got the phone call. She thinks he's grateful for the distraction.
It's absolutely freezing when they get to Chicago. In hindsight the first week of February is a horrible time to visit the Midwest, but it's not like they had much choice in the matter. Jess shivers in her coat as they all stand outside Nick's childhood home. Her boots crunch in the thick layer of snow on the front yard. Winston toes at a chunk of ice with the tip of his shoe while Schmidt looks around with a mild look of distress and rambles on about how the airline lost his luggage.
The house is nice, the kind of run-of-the-mill place that fits in among the others on the little cul-de-sac. Not huge and fancy, but not falling apart either. Jess squints and looks out over the splotchy patches of snow that shimmer in the morning light. There's lopsided snowman propped up against a barren tree, his crooked eyes watching out over the quiet street. She tries to imagine a younger version of Nick growing up here and chasing after a few of the neighborhood kids during a snowy day like today. But it's hard to picture him without the worry lines, deep eye bags, and cloudy aura of stress that sticks to him and makes him look perpetually tired and worn down. It's almost easier to imagine a seven year old with Nick's grumpy frown than it is to imagine a relaxed and carefree Nick.
Nick stares at the house like he's trying to make a decision, his brow furrowed in worry and jaw clenched tight. He's been jittery ever since the plane landed, nervously bouncing his knee up and down during the taxi ride to the house. Jess can feel the anxiety rolling off of him in waves, visible in his death grip on the strap of his duffel bag and the absent look in his eyes. After a few moments he shakes his head, takes a deep breath and gives himself a few slaps on each cheek. "Alright. Let's do this."
He walks up to the house with a determined expression and Schmidt following close behind him. Jess takes a step forward, but falters when she feels Winston tug on the sleeve of her jacket.
"Uh, Jess," Winston clears his throat. "I should warn you. Nick's family? Pretty crazy."
"Oh, right! I always forget that you two grew up together."
He nods. "Just- It can be a lot sometimes. So brace yourself."
Nick's family is loud. Walking into the house is like getting hit in the face by a brick wall of sound. There seems to be at least six different conversations happening all at once, and it throws Jess off guard as she struggles to catch up to what's happening. Nick, on the other hand, joins in effortlessly and switches from topic to topic without a second thought. The chaos seems to temporarily abate the fog of stress dampening his features and Nick actually seems to relax ever so slightly, something close to a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
An older woman with dark hair and the same brown eyes as Nick comes down the stairs. She looks exhausted and wrung-out, but she lights up when she spots Nick standing in the hallway. "Nicky!" she cries and holds out her arms.
He drops his bag to the ground and steps into her embrace. "Hey, Ma."
Mrs. Miller squeezes her son tightly. "Oh. Oh. I miss him, Nicky."
"Yeah, I know, Ma," Nick says gently.
She pulls back to look at him, brushing the nonexistent dust off the front of his white dress shirt. "That bastard was a saint. A saint. The bastard."
"I know. Come here," Nick pulls her into another quick hug. "So what still needs to get done?"
"We need to um, get the groceries," Mrs. Miller ticks off a list on her fingers, seemingly more overwhelmed with each addition. "Plan the funeral, call the paper..."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Nick holds his hands up and shakes his head in disbelief. "Did you say plan the funeral?"
Mrs. Miller wrings her hands together nervously. "That's why you're here, Nicky. You take care of everything."
Nick's brow furrows and he frowns, that panicked look returning to his eyes. Jess turns to Winston and whispers, "Nick takes care of everything?"
Winston nods. "Yeah, with Pop-Pop coming and going, Nick had to step up and be the man of the family. Pretty much takes care of all of them."
Jess looks back over at Nick in disbelief. He grinds himself down to the bone to support Caroline and Abbi, but she hadn't expected that drive to take care of people to go all the way back to his childhood. She's not quite sure how he's managed to make it this far without collapsing under the stress of constantly supporting everyone else in his life. She can't help but wonder if it's only a matter of time until he finally breaks down.
To be fair, she's the exact same way. She cares about people too much and has a hard time saying "no." But losing her teaching job has thrown everything into disarray. Now that the rug has been pulled out from underneath her she's spinning out of control and struggling to figure herself out. She doesn't want Nick to end up the same way. He needs help, even if he struggles to ask for it.
"Um, excuse me." Jess steps up next to Nick and smiles at his mother. "Hi, Mrs. Miller. I'm so sorry for your loss. If there's anything I can do to help, I-"
"Who's this girl?" Mrs. Miller looks over at Nick, a look of confusion on her face.
"Oh, pardon my manners. I'm Jessica-" she holds her hand out for a handshake, but Mrs. Miller just glares at it.
"Winnie and Fat Schmidt I know." She looks over Jess' shoulder to wave at them. "Hey, boys."
"Ma, c'mon," Nick groans. "This is Jess. She's my roommate-"
"Your roommate?" she exclaims and Nick cringes. "What happened to the house? And where's Caroline and Abigail? I need to see my grandbaby."
"They, uh, couldn't make it out," Nick shoves his hands into the pockets of his slacks and stares down at the floor. "Actually, Ma, can I talk to you alone for a sec?"
"Of course, hon." She rests her hand on his arm and guides him towards the kitchen. "What's going on? Did something happen?"
Jess lingers awkwardly in the family room with Winston and Schmidt, scuffing the toe of her boots against the stained carpet and looking at the framed family photo tacked up on the wall by the stair landing. Nick looks like he's about ten or so, gap-toothed and grinning at the camera with his arms squeezed tight around his younger brother. He looks more than a little bit like Abbi, especially in his eyes and in his smile.
Schmidt clears his throat and looks nervously down the hall. "Do you think Nick's alright in there or-"
"DIVORCE?!" Mrs. Miller's shriek echoes out of the kitchen. "What do you mean divorce? Is this why I haven't gotten a Christmas card from you yet?"
"I'm gonna take that as a no," Schmidt jokes, but it falls flat, leaving them standing there in an awkward silence.
Jess had known that Nick and Caroline were no longer together, but Nick has been particularly tight-lipped about the whole situation ever since he moved back into the loft. He's still spending time with Abbi, but he hasn't mentioned anything about seeing Caroline. This is the first time she's heard anything substantial about the whole situation. She had thought it was a little odd that neither of them had come along for the funeral, but now she supposes that it makes sense.
So Nick and Caroline are getting divorced. That's pretty final. It's a big deal. She supposes that it makes sense that Nick wouldn't want to share the nitty-gritty details with them, but she can't help but feel a little betrayed that Nick didn't think he could trust her with such an important event that's going on in his life.
But regardless of the fact that she's only now finding out about it, Jess is happy for him. Well, she happy that he's trying to figure out what's best for him and Caroline. This is really what's best for him in the long run, even if it really sucks in the moment. Jess really hopes that things are alright between him and Caroline. For Abbi's sake.
Mrs. Miller gives Jess the cold shoulder for the rest of the evening and glares icily at her from across the table at dinner. She turns down Jess' offer to help with the dishes with a passive aggressive, "Oh no, honey. You're a guest. You've done enough."
After dinner Jess awkwardly floats in the corner of the kitchen and nurses a mug of tea. Winston's already gone down the street to his mom's home, and Schmidt complained endlessly about jet lag before finally leaving to crash in the guest bedroom. So now Jess has nowhere to go, no one to talk to, and absolutely no clue as to what she's supposed to be doing.
Once the table's been cleared, Nick claims the space and spreads out half a dozen notebooks and piles of paper to start planning out the funeral service. His mother sits down beside him to help, which mostly involves her telling an increasingly stressed-looking Nick the laundry list of what she wants him to figure out in the next two days. The other extended family members periodically float in and out of the dining room to chip in their two cents while Nick does his best to take down notes on a legal pad that's quickly running out of space.
"Your father always wanted to have a funeral just like Elvis had." Mrs. Miller anxiously spins her wedding ring around her finger. "So that's what we're gonna give him."
Nick skeptically looks down at his notes. "A funeral like Elvis had?"
Mrs. Miller nods with conviction. "That means 12 white limos and an Elvis impersonator..."
"Dad's gonna get the funeral you want him to have, okay?" he reaches over to briefly rest his hand on hers and flips over to another page. "So tell me what needs to get done, and I'll just do it."
She smiles sadly and squeezes his hand. "Oh, the eulogy. You- you'll do the eulogy, right?"
"Oh." Nick's eyes widen. He clears his throat nervously. "I don't think I should do it."
"You just say a bunch of nice stuff all in a row," Jamie yells from the living room.
"C'mon, Law School," his cousin chimes in. "You got it."
There's a brief cacophony echoing from the crowded living room as Nick's extended family egg him on. He looks to Jess with panic in his eyes.
"Nick, you have to," she says gently, ignoring the glare that his mother gives her.
He swallows and adds eulogy to the bottom of the list in his scratchy handwriting. "Yeah, okay. Sure. I'll, uh-"
"That's my boy. He takes care of everything." Mrs. Miller pats his hand. There's a short pause as she looks at her son and Nick focuses on sorting out his stack of papers. "You know," she says with an attempted air of nonchalance. "Plenty of couples go through rough patches."
Nick nods absentmindedly and flips back through his pile of scribbles, chewing on his lower lip. He doesn't seem to really register what his mom is saying, too distracted by the sudden influx of responsibilities he has to take care of.
"And divorce is so permanent," she continues, fiddling with her ring again. "Sometimes it's best to take some time to really think through whether it really is the best option. Sharon told me a few months ago that couples counseling really helped her and Keith work through the difficulties they were having."
Nick sighs, his tired eyes falling shut for a moment. "Ma..."
"Well, it's just something to consider," she says shortly as she stands up from the table. The legs of her chair clatter on the tiled floor as she pushes it back quickly. Mrs. Miller gives his shoulder a quick squeeze before leaving him to his work. She passes by Jess on her way out and levels her with a stern look as she nudges her out of the way of the doorframe.
"I'm sorry," Jess says down the empty hallway, still unsure exactly what she's apologizing for or what exactly she did wrong. She's not used to people not getting along with her, and there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason as to why Mrs. Miller is so turned against her. It's incredibly frustrating because she's not here to be a burden. She's here to support Nick. But it's hard to do when Mrs. Miller keeps pushing her away from him.
Nick disappears upstairs to get started on his to-do list, and the house slowly starts to empty out as it gets late. Mrs. Miller gets a quilt and sheet set out of the closet and makes one of the couches in the living room into a bed for Jess, even after Jess insists that she can do it herself. She awkwardly hovers by the fireplace as Mrs. Miller tucks the sheets into the cushions of the couch, a tense silence settling between them.
On the mantle are several photos depicting the various members of the Miller family over the years. A school picture where a messy-haired and gap-toothed Nick has grape juice spilled down the front of his white t-shirt. Another where Nick is standing in a brightly lit stadium in a too-big Cubs jersey grinning and pointing at the baseball field behind him with a huge thumbs-up. A mustachioed-Nick in a cap and gown holding his undergraduate diploma with his parents standing on either side. Nick and Caroline in the hospital holding a tightly-swaddled newborn Abbi, beaming proudly at the camera. There's a two-part frame near the middle with a photo of Nick's parents on their wedding day on one side and Nick and Caroline in a similar pose on the other. Nick looks just like the young Walt in his tuxedo with his hair slicked back, and he smiles at the camera with his arm wrapped around Caroline's waist.
Behind her back, Mrs. Miller clears her throat and Jess spins away from the photos to see that her 'bed' is ready.
"Thank you!" Jess smiles her brightest and cheeriest grin. "And again, thank you so much for letting me stay here. I really appreciate your hospitality. I know this is a tough time for you."
She smiles back, tight-lipped and strained around the edges. "Anything for my Nicky's little friend."
Jess' eyes widen and everything starts to click into place. So that's what this is about. "Oh! Oh, no. No. Um, Nick and I are just friends."
Mrs. Miller narrows her eyes at Jess and scoffs. "Listen, I might not know exactly what you kids get up to out there in liberal California, but the last time I heard from my son he was happily married. Now he comes back home with his little 'roommate' and tells me he's getting divorced. Something about that just doesn't add up."
"WIth all due respect, ma'am," Jess tries to placate her. "There's nothing going on between me and Nick."
"I've got my eye on you, girlie." She gives Jess another shrewd look before nodding and leaving Jess alone in the living room.
Jess sighs and digs her pajamas and toiletries bag out of her suitcase. She slips into the downstairs bathroom to change and get ready for bed. As she walks back to her makeshift sleeping arrangements, Jess notices there's still a light on upstairs. She creeps quietly up the stairs and finds Nick sitting in what looks like a home office as he goes through stacks of paperwork and types long strings of numbers into an old-school calculator.
She gently raps her knuckles on the door. "Hey."
Nick's head pops up from his work and he smiles tiredly at her. "Hey, Jess."
Jess crosses her arms over her chest and leans against the doorframe. She watches as Nick works with a focused intensity, not even looking at the buttons as he types in cost estimates. She's worried about him. That distant look in his eyes is back, and he seems to have bitten off a little more than he can chew. "How's it going?"
"It's going." He takes a sip from a bottle of beer and gestures to the work spread out in front of him. "I'm just trying to figure out the level of Elvis impersonator we can afford. I think a white one's out of reach."
She bites down on her lip nervously. "Is there anything I could do to help?"
He lights up and looks up at her in excitement. "The eulogy."
"Sorry?" Jess' brow furrows. Surely she didn't hear that right.
He shuffles through his stack of papers, a dawning look of relief on his face. "Oh, that would be really helpful 'cause that's been getting in my way a little bit."
Jess frowns. "I didn't really know your dad. At all. I think that's, you know, one task I think maybe is better if you-"
"Look," Nick lets out an exasperated sigh. "I've got to figure out an Elvis theme. You know, Elvis-themed flowers and food and music all in a day. I just-" He pinches the bridge of his nose and exhales heavily. "You asked if there was anything you could do, and there is."
She hesitates, because she really doesn't feel like she's the right choice for this job. She was thinking something more along the lines of picking up milk from the store or printing off programs for the service. But Nick looks so overwhelmed, and she's genuinely worried about what might happen if he gets any closer to the edge. "Okay. I'll do it."
"Yes. Thank you." Nick smiles at her, relieved. "Oh, you are the best."
"Sure, Nick." Jess reluctantly returns his smile. She chews on her lip and looks around the room, trying to sound casual, "You know, about the divorce..."
He groans and rubs at his eyes. Whatever smidge of relief he'd felt disappears and that look of clouded anxiety returns in full force. "Jess, I'm so swamped right now. I really don't have time to get into this with you."
"Yeah but... I'm just wondering if you have time to process all this."
"I'm fine, Jess." Nick takes a long drink of beer. "Just- can we do this sometime later?"
"Fine. I guess I'll just uh- I'll leave you to it then," she stammers awkwardly as Nick turns back to his work. "Um, make sure you get some sleep, alright?"
He waves dismissively at her and turns back to his work. Jess frowns again and closes the door to the office behind her as she leaves the room and goes back downstairs.
Jess tosses and turns on the lumpy couch, her mind still spinning from the chaos of the day. How is she supposed to write a eulogy for someone she's never met? She shouldn't have agreed to it, but it's too late to go back on her promise now. And Nick's probably still tapping away upstairs, frantically trying to pull everything together at the last minute. He doesn't need another thing on his plate. She can figure this out. She's an English teacher; she knows how to write. Tomorrow she'll do her research and just say some generalized pleasantries. No one will know the difference.
The next morning Jess tries her best to squeeze information about Walt out of the extended Miller family, but it's extremely difficult when Mrs. Miller will barely acknowledge her presence. Jamie and Bobby are no help at all. They just press her for information about Nick's divorce, which Jess knows next to nothing about. They also seem to be under the impression that she and Nick are sleeping together and Jess wastes nearly half an hour trying to convince them that isn't the case.
She tries to corner Nick, but he spends all day on the phone, haggling over prices and trying to make last-minute arrangements. In fact, she barely even sees him until that evening when he's pacing back and forth in the living room as he argues over the phone with the funeral home over the cost of the cemetery plot. "$2,000? What if it wasn't six feet under? How much for three feet?" He frowns and listens to whatever is being said on the other end of the call.
Mrs. Miller comes in from the kitchen, wringing her hands together and looking frazzled. "I've gone through half a pack of ciggie gum here. Where are we on the food? We have to have Elvis food."
"Ma, I'm making calls right now." Nick gestures to the phone.
"It's gotta be perfect," she reminds him.
Nick smiles, a frantic look in his eyes. "It's gonna be perfect," he reassures her. "You just gotta let me do it."
"If the food isn't Elvis-themed, does it matter that much?" Jess suggests.
Mrs. Miller turns to face Jess, her face reddening in anger. "You got a problem with Elvis?"
"I don't-" Jess stammers.
"No, she didn't say that," Nick says quickly and switches back to the phone. "I'm gonna have to call you back." He directs his attention back to his Ma. "No, she didn't say that. She didn't say that about Elvis."
"You don't think Elvis is important?" Mrs. Miller fumes.
"She knows Elvis is important, Ma!"
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Miller. He's the King." Jess tries, but Mrs. Miller is already storming out of the living room. Great, another thing she can't do right. Jess watches her go and sighs before turning back to Nick. "Look, Nick. I'm here to help, but I can't write this eulogy."
"Wait, what?" He looks at her in disbelief, an edge of annoyance to his voice. "I asked you to do one thing. I need you to write the eulogy."
"But I didn't know Walt-"
Nick groans and runs a hand over his face. "Nobody wants to hear what I have to say about my dad."
"It doesn't matter what you say," Jess says gently. "You just- you have to say goodbye to him."
"I'm not asking you to do too much. Just write my father's eulogy!" he yells. Jess stares at him in shock. "I need a drink."
Jess chases after him as he stalks off to the kitchen. She lingers just outside the doorway, trying to keep out of Mrs. Miller's line of fire until she has a chance to cool off. It feels more than a little like she's eavesdropping on something she's supposed to stay out of, but Nick's looking dangerously panicky and she's worried about what might happen if she lets him out of her sight for too long.
From where she's standing Jess can see Mrs. Miller's back as she angrily does the dishes, loading them into the dishwasher with a loud clatter of ceramic and silverware. Nick rummages through the fridge and sets two beers out on the counter. The fridge slams shut with a muffled thud. He leans up against the closed door, opens one of the bottles and takes a long drink.
"Nicky." Mrs. Miller frowns and scrubs at a casserole dish. "Can I be honest with you, honey?"
"Of course, Ma."
"I think you're making a mistake."
"Ma..."
"No, listen to me." She sets her dish onto the drying rack and picks out another from the soapy mess in the sink. "You're young. There's still time for you to fix whatever's going on between you and Caroline. And whatever you have with that little Spanish girl might seem new and exciting for now but-"
"Is that why you've been upset with Jess?" Nick sounds exasperated. "Ma, there's nothing there. Nothing." He runs his hand through his hair in disbelief and mutters to himself, "Why don't people understand that?"
"Then what is it? Why are you giving up on Caroline?"
Nick looks down at the tiled floor with a pained expression. "It's not like that-"
"You two have a family together." Mrs. Miller rinses off the second dish and sets it into the dishwasher. "Don't you know what this will do to Abbi? You want her to grow up in a broken home? You're not even going to try for her sake?"
He sighs. "We tried, Ma. And it just wasn't working."
"Well, then try harder," she says firmly. "Miller families don't get divorced. They don't. They make do. They make it work. They don't just throw away years of hard work and commitment for some floozy with weirdly huge eyes. No one ever said marriage was easy." There's a complicated undercurrent to her words, something like remorse or frustration, but not all of it actually seems directed towards Nick. She flips on the garbage disposal and the loud noise rings in the tiny kitchen. "Doesn't family mean anything to you?"
"Ma, family means everything to me. You know that."
"You're not acting like it." She turns to face him, her hands on her hips. "You're giving up on them."
Nick knocks back the rest of his beer and then sets the bottle down on the counter. "You know, Ma, I gotta go check on something."
"Nicky..." Mrs. Miller tries soothingly, but Nick's already storming out of the kitchen. She spots Jess lingering in the doorway as she watches her son leave. The look she gives Jess is less than an inch short of murderous.
"Nick," Jess calls as he pushes past her. "Nick, wait!"
But before she can catch up to him he's already out the door, slamming it shut behind him.
Nick is MIA for the rest of the night and into the next morning. He's not picking up his phone or answering her text messages, not that it stops Jess from calling him every hour in the hope that he'll finally answer. He clearly wants to be alone, but she can't help feeling responsible for him. So instead she just fills up his voicemail with rambling messages.
"Hey, Nick. It's Jess. We've been looking all over for you. We're at the funeral home now and the service is going to start in about an hour, so if you could call me back or show up that'd be super. Okay. Um, thanks, Nick. Call me back."
She hangs up and sets off in search of Schmidt and Winston. She finds them milling around in the gathering area of the funeral home. Schmidt is particularly jumpy and is wearing a truly ridiculous suit, whereas Winston seems to be in an eerie sense of calm.
"Have either of you seen Nick?" she asks, trying to keep her voice down so as not to alarm the other funeral attendees.
"He's not here?" Winson asks in disbelief, and Schmidt looks around the hall frantically.
There's a loud noise behind her, and Jess spins around to see Nick stumbling through the front door, clutching a paper bag covered bottle and towing a large and equally drunk man behind him. "Hey, everybody!" Nick announces. "I brought Elvis! Funeral saved. I found this guy at the bar and he fits into the costume. So for 20 bucks, he's gonna be Elvis."
Oh no. Jess looks over to Winston in panic. He just shrugs and looks over to Nick and 'Elvis' with his eyebrows raised in concern. "How much have you had to drink?"
"One dozen beers," Nick burps. "And I wrote... I did what you asked me to do, Jessica. I wrote the, uh, gigleography."
Jess' brow furrows in confusion. "The what?"
"The gigleography," he slurs. "Urology. Elegy? Eulogish."
"You wrote the eulogy?" she clarifies.
"That's what I've been saying the whole time," he says, as if it's completely obvious. "It's right here." He hands her a post-it note with his messy handwriting
Winston peers over her shoulder and reads the note. "'Walt Miller. Am I right?'"
"Am I right?" he parrots drunkenly. "Am I right?"
"That's terrible," Schmidt chimes in, affronted.
"Googaliogy!" Nick cheers, and takes a swig from the paper bag covered drink in his hand.
"All right, here's what we're gonna do. I'm gonna sober up Nick and-" Jess sighs, "and Elvis. You," she points to Winston. "Go buy us some time. C'mon, Miller." She links her arm with his and drags him off towards the bathroom.
"You're mad at me," Nick tells her, leaning against the tiled wall beside the bathroom sink. "You've got the mad face. Caroline has the same one."
Jess sighs. She's not mad. Annoyed, sure. She's more than a little peeved at the whole situation and how it's slowly spiraling out of control. But she's not angry that Nick got overwhelmed by everything that's going on. "I'm not mad at you, Nick. I have your back. No matter what. No matter how stupid it gets, and you and I both know it can get really, really stupid." She laughs a little.
"I am the stupidest of all the stupid boys," Nick says in agreement.
"No, don't say that." She reaches out and squeezes his arm reassuringly. He smiles at her, sad and tired and still three beers past drunk. It's the first honest, genuine smile she's seen on him in weeks and Jess would be lying if she said it didn't make her heart beat a little faster in her chest.
"'M sorry I didn't write the eulogy, Jess. I just couldn't." He frowns and stares down at the sink. "I didn't like my dad. I didn't have anything to say."
She smiles encouragingly at him. "You just have to say something. It's not for him. It's for you, so he doesn't end up haunting the rest of your life."
Nick nods seriously, his frown deepening. There's a quiet moment, just the two of them in the bathroom where the only sound is the slow drip of the leaky faucet. He looks so vulnerable like this, with his shirt haphazardly untucked, his hair a mess, and his inhibitions lowered enough that he's wearing his heart on his sleeve. She can see the sadness and disappointment in his eyes and it makes her heart hurt.
"Am I giving up?" he asks, his voice soft.
"Oh, Nick," she says with a sigh. "No. You're not."
He looks up at her, clearly unconvinced.
"Nick. You're not giving up. I've seen you. You worked so hard to keep your family together, and you're still there for Abbi and Caroline whenever they need you. You didn't abandon them. You care about them so much. The divorce won't change that."
"Can I tell you something?" Nick asks hesitantly.
"Of course."
He crosses his arms over his chest and drops his gaze back down to the tiled floor, his voice wavering. "I'm afraid, Jess."
"What do you mean?"
"When I die, I don't want Abbi to hate me," he says, his voice barely above a whisper.
"She doesn't hate you."
"Yeah, but one day she might." He shrugs. "I didn't hate my dad when I was her age."
Oh. So that's what this is about. "You're not like your dad, Nick."
"Sure I am," he says bitterly. "I'm giving up on my family and running away. No matter how hard I tried not to follow in his footsteps I ended up just like him anyways. I let them all down because I'm just not good enough. You see me right now? This is pretty much me at my best. I can't do anything right."
"Hey. Listen to me," she says firmly and Nick's head snaps up to look at her. "You are good enough. What you're doing is enough. I know you can't see that in yourself, so I'm going to keep telling you that until you can believe it." Jess fusses with his wrinkled shirt sleeve, just for an excuse to touch him. "You don't have to do this alone. I'm gonna be there, and I'm gonna hold your hand, and I wanted to tell you that last night, but you ran away. You're too hard on yourself, Nick. So whenever you get the idiotic idea that you're somehow not good enough, you come talk to me and I'll knock some sense into you, okay?"
He sniffles briefly and rubs the moisture from his cheek, clearly touched by her speech, before chuckling and shaking his head. "Alright. You're right. You're always right."
"And don't you forget it, Miller."
There's a groaning noise as Elvis, still completely plastered, emerges from the bathroom stall all decked out in the white pleather jumpsuit. He slurs something to Nick before stumbling out into the hallway. Oh God. Jess curses herself for not locking the door and chases off after him.
Out in the hallway she can hear what sounds like Winston wailing in the sanctuary as she runs after Elvis. She manages to corner him in the lobby, where he collapses into a chair and starts drinking out of a flask. Jess snatches it out of his hands, and Elvis promptly passes out a few seconds later. Great. She considers taking a shot herself, because what else could possibly go wrong today?
"This is Elvis?" Mrs. Miller gasps.
Jess cringes and spins around to face her. "No..."
Mrs. Miller twists a paper program in her hands and starts to tear up. "This funeral's going down the toilet. I promised Walter it'd be beautiful and full of life. I promised. I'm sending everyone home." She turns to head back into the sanctuary.
"Wait," Jess chases after her and gently taps her arm. "Mrs. Miller-"
"Are you tapping me on the shoulder, girlie?" She turns to look at Jess with a dangerous gleam in her eyes. "Let me make this perfectly clear: I don't like you. I don't know why you're here. I don't know why you're so obsessed with my son, if this is about money or sex or some kind of green card situation-"
"I promise you, it's not like that at all-"
"I don't care. I love Caroline. Some people have a daughter-in-law, I had a daughter. She's a part of our family. I saw the way she made my Nicky happy. I don't have time to play games with some homewrecker." Mrs. Miller bites out, before turning to walk away.
Against her better judgement, Jess reaches out and taps her on the shoulder once again.
"You tap me twice?"
"Please wait for Nick," she pleads. "It's important."
"Then why is he not here?" Mrs. Miller cries, gesturing to the empty hallway. "No eulogy? No Elvis? I'd rather not have a funeral if it's not gonna honor my husband."
Jess watches her go, a sinking feeling in her chest. She glances over to where Elvis is sprawled out in the chair and sighs, trying to come up with some way to recover this disaster of a day.
Admittedly, this isn't the most embarrassing thing Jess has ever done. But it likely is the most embarrassing thing she's ever done at a funeral, so there's that. The cheap Elvis costume is scratchy on her skin and the greased-up wig keeps coming dangerously close to falling into her eyes. Jess can't quite remember the next set of lyrics and her hands are so sweaty that the cheat sheet she'd written on her palms has smeared off. So she skips to the next chorus and ignores the death glare Mrs. Miller is giving her, like she's planning to turn this into a double funeral.
Jess starts to seriously reconsider whether this scheme was a good idea after all when she looks over to the entrance of the sanctuary where Winston, Schmidt, and Nick are watching the whole mess unfold. Nick has that same smile from the bathroom, but it looks like he's miraculously managed to sober up since then. He's even tucked in his shirt and pulled on his jacket. He's looking at her like with a combination of disbelief and amusement, his eyes soft and a small quirk of a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Jess smiles back at him and repeats the chorus another time.
"Down in Chi-town. In the ghetto. In the ghetto-"
"I'm gonna hit her," Mrs. Miller threatens.
Nick just chuckles and hold his hands up in a calming gesture. "Mom, please. Dad would've liked this. He would've faked a slip-and-fall and sued the funeral home, but he would've liked this." The crowd laughs quietly. Nick smiles again, and Jess can't help but notice that it looks a little more forced than it did just a few seconds ago. He steps up to the podium and lets out a shaky exhale. "Thank you, Jess."
"You're welcome, Mama," she says in her best Elvis voice.
Nick clears his throat nervously, and manages to find a few nice things to say about his father. He trails off about midway through, his thumbs twirling awkwardly as he struggles to come up with what to say next. Jess takes a step toward the podium and gently takes Nick's hand in hers. Nick looks up at her, his eyes staring intensely at hers as a trace of a smile reappears on his face.
"You okay, Mama?" she asks him.
He chuckles and squeezes her hand back. "Yeah, I'm gonna be okay, Mama."
Jess smiles warmly at him. Out of the corner of her eye she can spot Mrs. Miller watching the two of them with a complicated look. She seems skeptical, still wary of Jess' involvement in her son's life. But there's also a shimmer of something like pride or maybe even happiness underneath it all. Jess thinks she's probably reading into it too much. She really did want to make a good impression on Nick's family.
She raises the microphone back up to her mouth and starts singing. "'Cause if there's one thing that she don't need. It's another hungry mouth to feed. In the ghetto-"
Nick shakes his head and chuckles at her antics. But Jess gets him to sing part of the chorus with her, and then it's only a matter of time before everyone else in attendance is singing along. Even Mrs. Miller stands up to show off her own Elvis impression.
Jess chalks the funeral service up as a win.
After the service there's a little get together at the Miller's house, which is filled with people coming in to drop off casseroles and wish their condolences over Walt's passing. Jess had expected it to be somewhat of a somber affair, but it ends up being a lot more vibrant and rambunctious than she expected. Everyone mingles about in the main rooms on the first floor, chatting and laughing while still in the clothes they wore to the funeral. It's odd, but it feels genuine in a way that's incredibly comforting.
A group of kids run amok in the backyard, screaming and hurling snowballs at each other. Jess smiles and watches from the kitchen window as Nick joins in the chaos, leading an incredibly dramatic attack on the icicle-covered swing set that ends with him collapsing to the ground after taking a snowball to the chest.
"He's good with them, isn't he?"
Jess turns to see Mrs. Miller standing beside her, looking out at the picturesque scene with a slight smile.
She nods. "Yeah, he really is."
One of the girls drops a clump of snow onto his face, and Nick sputters and tries to grab at her ankles as she quickly darts away. Mrs. Miller chuckles and shakes her head. "He's always been a family man," she says seriously. "I just don't want him to lose that."
Jess nervously bites down on her lower lip. "He hasn't. He fought hard to keep them all together. He still makes time for both of them."
Mrs. Miller stares her down with a guarded look, trying to discern whether Jess is telling the truth. "Good."
There's another loud series of cheers as Nick stands up and brushes the snow off his coat. The kids swarm around him victoriously and he holds his hands up in surrender as he slowly backs up towards the house and leaves them behind to continue playing while he goes back inside the house. Nick slams the door to the kitchen shut and shrugs off his coat, getting snow all over the floor.
"Hey, Ma, Jess." Nick's wearing a huge grin, and his cheeks are tinted bright red from the cold.
Jess laughs. "Hey. Did you have fun?"
He sheepishly looks down at his shoes, still rubbing his hands together in an attempt to warm them up. "That was just for the kids."
"Uh huh," she says skeptically. "You must be freezing."
Nick shrugs and tugs at the laces of his boots. "I'm fine."
She stares at his bright red fingers and rolls her eyes. Nick could be bleeding out from a gaping wound and still claim to be 'fine'. "You're shivering. Were you even wearing gloves?"
"Jess," he laughs. "I'm fine."
"I'm making you hot chocolate."
"You don't even know where it is."
"I'll figure it out."
"Jess..."
She ignores his protests and switches on the electric kettle sitting on the counter. As she turns to look through the pantry for some hot chocolate mix she spots Mrs. Miller watching the two of them with one eyebrow raised in amusement. "Oh, sorry, Mrs. Miller. I didn't mean to-"
"No, no. Make yourself at home," she smiles at Jess before disappearing off to the living room. It sticks with Jess for a moment, something a little more meaningful lurking under the surface of her words or the glimmer in her eye. But then she refocuses on the task at hand, which is equal parts making sure Nick doesn't have hypothermia while also making fun of him for getting snow all down the back of his shirt.
Later that afternoon Winston and Schmidt load their luggage into the taxi while Jess waits near the the front door of the house for Nick to catch up with them. She shivers in her coat and tries to think of the right thing to say to Nick's mom as they wait awkwardly in the front yard.
"Thank you again, Mrs. Miller-"
"Bonnie," she corrects, and Jess' eyes widen.
"Thank you, Bonnie."
"Don't mention it." She glances towards the house. "And... Thank you for looking out for Nicky. I know how tough his job is, how hard it can be to support a family. I worry about him, out there all alone in California."
Jess nods in agreement, not sure how to respond.
"I'm glad there's someone out there looking after him," Bonnie says with a meaningful look at Jess. She reaches into the pocket of her coat and pulls out a Ziploc baggie filled with Cheetos. "I packed you a snack for the trip."
"Oh," Jess says in surprise. "Thank you."
"Don't you hurt him," Bonnie warns and then gives Jess a final pat on the shoulder. "Have a good flight."
Jess smiles nervously and hurries off to join Winston and Schmidt at the taxi. Bonnie genuinely scares her. But she's not angry at Jess anymore. Or at least Jess doesn't think she is.
Nick sits next to her on the plane again on the flight home. He stuffs his carry-on into the overhead compartment and sits down beside her.
"Hey, Jess?"
"Yeah?"
He sighs and smiles at her. "Thanks for coming."
She grins at him and jokingly elbows him. "Of course."