A/N: Oh dear, this is so, so short. Honestly, I didn't want to make it long and sappy, because I just can't see Jess acting like that. Especially when he's doing something that may be considered sentimental.

Standard disclaimers apply.

Somehow you have managed to get under my skin

More than anyone ever did

- Automatic Loveletter

Then I Will Never Live Freely Without Your Trace

After a brush with death in an alley, Jess goes into a sketchy tattoo parlor and gets a small tattoo on the inside of his left wrist.

To be completely honest, he never thought he would actually get a tattoo. He knows that he could never pull off the large, intimidating tattoos that cover limbs, despite having the perfect, stereotypical attitude and personality. Tattoos in general just seem like a mistake; eventually you'll end up regretting them.

But after he was placed at knife point in the middle of a deserted alley at night, being demanded to hand over all the cash in his pockets, he just lied on the ground for a while, images and thoughts flashing in his mind, thinking about what would've happened if he had died. Would Luke have been upset? Probably, despite the fact that they parted on less than stellar terms.

Liz probably wouldn't have realized that her son stopped calling her every few months, still (and always) in a stupor of some sorts.

And Rory.

Would she have still hated him? Or would her hate have died along with him? And she never would've known the truth of it all, and that's what bothers him the most about the idea of a premature death.

So he now has Dodger in-scripted on his skin for the rest of his life. Besides, if he does end up dying before seeing her again, when the police recover the body, there will be something left behind for Rory to see. She'll know that he did care about her more than anyone else in his fucked up life.

Of course, a few days later he calls Liz and finds out that Luke stole his car. So now he has an incentive to come back to Stars Hallow and possibly see Rory. So he does end up regretting the tattoo.

But now it becomes a reminder; physical proof that goodness, she, exists and actually affected him.

A/N: I hope this was somewhat interesting.

Please review!

MissGoalie