A/N: Ahh, the penultimate chapter... Sad face... On the bright side, these last two chapters are gonna be long as hell. Gotta wrap up all the loose ends!
Eight and a Half
By Imagine Backstory
Chapter Twenty-Nine - Cribs & Crabapples
Jess
About a month went by, and suddenly we were celebrating the Fourth of July. I couldn't believe it was summer already. I guess the month went by so fast because so much was going on at once; the Cafe was as busy as ever and Rory's belly was getting bigger every day. The closure of the Philly Truncheon had happened faster than expected and Matt and Chris were now on the full-time staff at the Manhattan Truncheon. Renovations were going on as we were in the process of converting half the upstairs office space into an apartment for the two of them, since they couldn't afford a two-bedroom apartment in Manhattan (really, who could nowadays?). For now, they were staying at my place in Brooklyn, and I was practically living with Rory in the meantime.
Speaking of the Gilmore girl, things between us had been, well, weird, to say the least. Since our fight at Lorelai and Luke's wedding we'd been very delicate with each-other. Perfectly polite, but always remaining at the surface of our emotions around each-other. It wasn't anything I was used to as far as Rory was concerned. Even when I got moody and quiet, there was always an underlying sense of understanding between us. That had pretty much disappeared lately, and it was causing me more anxiety than I was willing to admit. I told myself it was just because we were so busy and she was so pregnant and we knew everything was going to change soon and were trying to grasp every last bit of normalcy as we knew it. But I knew once the renos were done and things settled a bit, we'd have to have a good long talk and figure everything out.
There was a sense of urgency to everything now. As though suddenly Rory and I were moving too slowly, when in fact it felt like the opposite most of the time. Part of me just wanted to jump all the way in; move in with her, start buying baby furniture, pop the question, set a date. The other part of me was terrified of all those things and inwardly cringed every time I thought about them. It just felt like I was being forced into that life, and while the thought of that life was appealing sometimes, it also clashed so heavily with what I'd stood for in my now thirty years on this earth. Anti-marriage, anti-kids, anti-white-pickett-fence-happily-ever-after. And now there I was, the family guy. Making giant leaps instead of steps into my adulthood. It was about time, and yet there was also not enough time.
I thought about phoning Luke up and talking through all this shit with him. Somehow, I figured he would understand my feelings more than Rory would. Luke himself had been terrified of commitment once; I wondered if perhaps I got that more from my mother's side than I'd initially thought; I'd always held Jimmy responsible for my fight or flight instincts. But Luke had overcome it, and now was happily married with a wife and children. And, hell, if a guy like Luke could do it, so could I.
I ducked under the plastic covering from the renovation area upstairs and padded down into the Cafe. We weren't quite ready to open for the day yet, and Rory was behind the bar setting up cash. Beautiful sunlight radiated into the place, casting a warm glow around her, and for a moment I stopped on the stairs and just looked at her. When I looked at her sometimes, all my worries just melted away. Because there she was. And despite how scared shitless I was of everything, I had her. And we were on this ridiculous roller coaster together. How could I panic when that was the case?
She sensed me looking and glanced up, blowing her thick bangs out of her face. Her long hair was piled on top of her hair in a messy bun, and she was swaying back and forth absently, no doubt because her feet were hurting again. "What?" she asked, stopping her movements with the money. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
I shrugged. "I love you," I said simply.
She smiled and blushed simultaneously. Before she could say anything, Matt and Chris came thundering down the stairs, nearly bowling me over in the process. "I told you we'd need more than two cans of paint," Matt whined as they grabbed their keys and headed for the door.
"Yeah, yeah," barked Chris. "We're heading to home depot. You guys need anything?"
I blinked, realizing he was addressing Rory and me. "Do we need anything from Home Depot?" I repeated, pretending to think hard. "Huh, let me think..." But then I actually did think. "Yeah, actually, let me come with you guys."
I felt Rory give me a quizzical look, but I was already grabbing my own keys and sunglasses from the shelf in the kitchen. "Be back soon, Ror," I called as I followed the guys out the door. "Love you!"
We took my car because Matt's was a piece of junk. Not that my car was much better mechanically, but at least She was pretty.
God, Manhattan was gorgeous in the summertime. It was hot, but not so hot that you felt like you were slowly dying inside a furnace each time you stepped outside. That would come later in the summer, around the beginning of August. But for now, it was just...perfect. I rolled down all the windows in the car and let the fresh air in, content in the moment to be in my car, in Manhattan, in the summer, with my buddies.
When we got to Home Depot Matt and Chris went off to get their paint, while I headed for the furniture section. I'd gotten the strangest impulse to look at cribs. I have no idea why, but there I was, walking among the baby beds, pretending I had the slightest idea of what to look for. They were all around the same size, but made out of different woods and finished differently, I guess. I had no idea what kind Rory would want. I didn't want to buy one right now, obviously, without her, but I wanted to get a head start for when she was ready to look, so I wouldn't be totally clueless if she asked my opinion.
I was running my hand along a particularly nice oak crib when I heard my name being called. "Jess!"
I looked up, shocked to see Isabel bolting happily towards me. I almost didn't recognize her; her normally platinum hair had been dyed a warm chestnut brown, and she was dressed in jean shorts and a Distillers t-shirt. She launched herself into my arms with a peal of laughter. "Oh my god!" she cried, stepping back and holding me at arm's length to look at me. "How are you?!"
"I'm good, I'm-w-what are you doing here?" I asked, stumbling over my words in both my excitement to see her and panic at where she'd found me. I almost tried to hide the crib behind me, but that was ridiculous. We were surrounded by them.
Justin came up behind Isabel, pushing the bright orange cart full of wood and paint and other construction paraphernalia. "We're redoing our kitchen," Justin explained, nodding at me in greeting.
"Oh, no way," I replied, glancing into their cart. "I'm here with Matt and Chris; they're getting stuff to reno the office above the Cafe, make it an apartment for themselves."
Isabel blinked and shook her head, holding her arms out towards me. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, back up. Matt and Chris are here?"
"Yeah, they came to help with the Cafe," I replied. "We closed the Philly branch. We needed them here and work in Philly was slowing down."
"Well, I'll be damned." Isabel planted her hands on her hips and looked at me, her tongue sticking out slightly. "Look at you, Mr. Staff-Man."
I shrugged. "It was necessary. Had to hire three people to do the job you did on your own."
She rolled her eyes and tapped me with her hand. "Oh, stop. You're making me blush." Her eyes finally fell to the particular furniture around us, and her brow furrowed with suspicion. "Why are we in the baby furniture section?"
"I told you, Matt and Chris are building their apartment," I replied cheekily. "They gotta sleep somewhere."
Isabel laughed her familiar bell-like laugh. It made me miss her even though she was standing right in front of me. "Seriously," she said when she was done. "Why are you looking at cribs?"
I just shrugged. "So how's the show going?"
"Oh my god," Isabel cried, ignoring my sad attempt at changing the subject, her eyes going wide as plates. "Are you gonna be a daddy?"
"Well-"
She squealed and hugged me again, bouncing up and down like a freaking school girl. "Jess! Are you serious?"
"I didn't say anything-"
"You're gonna be a daddy aren't you? Oh my god! Wait-who's pregnant? Jess, who?!"
"Will you shut up," I grunted, instinctively glancing around in case Matt and Chris were nearby. The last thing I needed was more of their incessant ridicule. "It's Rory."
"Oh, you naughty thing," Isabel said with a wink. "You're with her a few months and you manage to knock her up. Tsk tsk tsk. I always had a feeling your swimmers would be strong."
I grimaced at the comment. "Well, your feelings were mistaken. I didn't do the knocking up."
"What?" her smile fell.
"It's her ex's. She got pregnant before they split up."
"Oh. Talk about your modern family, huh?" she asked, trying to stay positive, as Isabel frequently did. "How's that going?"
I shrugged. "Probably as good as it could possibly be, I think. I'm gonna be there for Rory, and help her raise it and shit, I guess."
"Well, if you're happy, I will be happy for you." It was almost a question, the way she phrased it.
I grinned. "Yeah, I'm happy, Iz. A little freaked out. But happy."
"Good," she said, returning the smile. She hugged me again. "Well, congratu-fucking-lations, Daddy."
"Will you stop."
"Yo, Jess!" I turned around to see Matt and Chris headed for the registers, paint cans in hand. "Let's go!"
Isabel squealed again and sprinted towards them. I exchanged a friendly eye-roll with Justin before we followed her over, enduring her excited hugs and chatter with her old friends. It was a Philly reunion in New York, I realized. Sans Nora, of course. But even so, it was enough to make my heart swell with pleasant nostalgia.
As we all exited the store together, I pulled Isabel aside before she headed to her own vehicle. "Don't say anything about the you-know-what to Nora, okay, Iz?" I asked quietly. "If she's gonna find out, it should be from me. And that's a big if," I added pointedly.
Isabel nodded in understanding. "Actually, I haven't spoken to Nora in a few months," she said. "We kind of...drifted apart after she left Truncheon."
"Did you have a fight?" I asked, concerned.
She shrugged. "No. But that's just what happens sometimes, I guess."
"Well, don't let that happen here," I replied, hugging her again. "Don't be a goddamn stranger. You come by when you can. And I'm gonna come see your show, I promise."
"You'd better," she laughed, and waved as she headed to her car with Justin.
Maybe it's because I'd spent so much time with Isabel over the years, and she'd seen me through a lot of shit, but seeing her had a calming effect on me. Everything with Rory, with the baby, was going to be fine. We'd talk, we'd figure it out, just like I'd said from the get-go. I had this gut feeling that we were it, we were endgame, and we would always make things work. Maybe I'd needed Isabel's optimism, her support. All I knew was that I felt a lot better about everything as I got into my Comet and headed back to the Cafe.
Rory
I'd just made the perfect pot of herbal tea when my phone rang. Tea, of course, was no real substitute for coffee, but it was supposedly better for the baby than decaf, and I actually found it rather soothing to drink at night. Jess had sent me home early from the Cafe after he'd caught me one too many times looking uncomfortable on my feet. It was true, my feet did ache most of the time, but I felt bad leaving work early, even though the four guys who now worked there were perfectly capable of handling it without me.
I hated feeling so useless.
"Hello?" I said into my phone as I gingerly set my mug of tea down on the night table and eased myself onto my bed.
"Hey, Rory," same the familiar lilting voice on the other end of the line. "It's James."
I silently cursed myself for not checking called ID before answering. "Hi."
"Sorry to just call out of the blue," he said. "I just wondered if you're free to chat?"
"About what?" I asked innocently, sipping my tea. It was too freaking hot and I hissed as it burned my lip.
He sighed. "You know what, Rory. It's not fair for you to just cut me off. I want to have this conversation with you."
"Aren't you paying out the wazoo for this long distance call?"
"Don't worry about that."
I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. "I don't see what there is to talk about," I said quietly. "I'm here, you're there. I've got a lot of people helping me here, so I'm not totally on my own."
"I guess I just want to know what your plan is. Where are you going to live for instance?"
"Why do you care?"
"Because that's my kid, Rory," he said firmly. "It's my business to care. Even if I can't be there, I want a say in how he or she grows up."
"Well, you don't," I snapped. "I've got it all under control. I've found a new place to live that's big enough for all of us."
"All of us?" James asked. "Who's all of us?"
"Me, the baby, and Jess."
"Jess."
"Yeah. Jess."
"The same bloke who broke us up?"
"I do not hold him responsible for our break up."
"Are you with him?"
I sighed. "Yes, James. Jess and I are together. And soon we'll be living together."
"Really."
"Really, really."
"Well, uh..." He paused to collect a breath. "Forgive me, Rory, I'm trying here."
"I know," I said softly.
"So...what's going to happen? If you're going to be living together... I'm assuming he's going to help raise the baby?"
"We haven't discussed at length what his involvement will be."
"Well, is the kid gonna call him daddy?" James' voice was starting to crack, and I hated how awful it made me feel.
I shrugged, and risked another sip of my tea. "I don't know." I paused, listening to James' breath on the other end of the line. "It's a boy," I told him quietly.
"A boy?" His tone brightened considerably at that. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah, the doctor told me at my last ultrasound," I said, smiling as I absentmindedly rubbed my belly.
James chuckled lightly. "Well, I'll be damned."
"I know," I said. "It makes it so much more real, knowing the sex."
"I'll say." He took another deep breath and let out an audible exhale. "Look, Rory. I don't want to cause any trouble. I just want to be involved. I don't want to be forgotten, or pushed aside. And I really...don't want that child growing up thinking Jess is his real father. Please...that would kill me."
"I think that would be hard on him, too," I replied. "As I said...we haven't discussed it fully. But I will let you know what we decide."
"It should be the other way around," James muttered painfully.
"Well...that's not how it's going to be. I'm sorry." I bit my lip. "You won't be forgotten, James. I'll make sure he knows about you, I promise. But I can't promise anything else right now. Not until I've talked to Jess."
"I guess that's fair. Thank you, Rory."
"You're welcome."
"I should go."
"Okay."
"Call me whenever you want. And let me know, you know, if there's anything I can do. Oh, and let me know when you're in labour, alright? I want to know what's happening."
"Alright." I nodded, even though he couldn't see. "Bye, James."
"Take care."
I hung up, feeling suddenly like a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. Had I needed that validation from James in order to have this conversation with Jess? Now that I knew more about where James stood on the whole thing, I felt less guilty about getting Jess involved.
James had raised a valid point. Would the baby call Jess his father? How do you explain to a child that the primary father-figure in his life wasn't actually his father? It was so complicated...yet it wasn't fair to the baby or to Jess or to James if we played this any other way. The kid had a right to know the truth.
I pushed those thoughts aside for now, deciding it was much too early to think about them since the kid wouldn't be old enough to understand for several years.
I waited impatiently for Jess to return home, sitting cross-legged on my bed and attempting some soft prenatal yoga stretches to ease my aching back and feet. I had just found my groove when he walked in the door. "Hey," he said gently as he ditched his bag and leapt onto the bed next to me. "I got you a present." He reached into his back pocket and removed a small booklet of paint colours all attached to a metal ring.
"Paint colours," I said with a small laugh, flipping through the colourful charts. "What I've always wanted."
"Picked it up at Home Depot," he said, lying down and resting his head on my knee. "Figured now that we know it's a boy, we can start looking at colours."
"Colours for what?" I asked, running my fingers through the soft dark curls on his head.
He shrugged. "I don't even know."
I laughed. "I got something for you, too," I said, reaching over to my night table and dropping something in his lap.
He picked it up, turning it over in his fingers, then glanced up at me quizzically. "A key...to your heart?"
"As if you need that," I said sarcastically, grinning.
"I already have a key to your apartment," he pointed out.
"I know. It's not a key to my apartment." I bent down to kiss him gently. "It's your key to our house."
He scrambled up into a seated position and looked at me with wide eyes. "What did you just say?"
"My mom and Luke and my grandparents bought me a Brownstone," I explained, pregnancy hormones making my eyes fill with tears. I laughed through a sob. "And I want you to move in with me there."
Jess looked so incredibly stunned. He looked at the tiny brass key in his hand, turning it over as if it were the most precious diamond on the planet. When he looked back at me, he had the hugest smile on his face. He grasped the back of my neck and pulled me to him, kissing me deeply on the mouth before moving in for a hug, crushing me to him as best as he could with my belly in the way. When he pulled back, he said, "This is amazing."
"I know."
"Your family bought you a freaking house? In Manhattan? It is in Manhattan, right?"
"Yes!" I cried, touching his cheek excitedly. "It's near Greenwich Village. It's beautiful, Jess."
"How did they...but...what?" He was stumbling over his words, he was so shocked. "How did they do this?"
I shrugged. "I don't know. But they did. And my lease is up next month, so we could be living there as early as August."
"I can't believe this."
"Me neither!"
"It's amazing, Ror."
"I know!"
He hugged me again, kissing my hair delightedly. "Guess we need to finish those renos ASAP, huh?" he asked with a laugh. "I gotta get my shit outta my place in Brooklyn."
"We still have a month," I pointed out.
Jess' hand had fallen onto my belly, and he quieted for a moment, just feeling the swell there thoughtfully. "I guess we need to have a talk now, huh?"
"Yes, we do," I agreed, taking his hands in mine. "I just spoke with James on the phone."
He frowned. "You did?"
"Don't get all freaked out, it was actually a very productive conversation. I explained to him that we're going to be living together and I promised him I won't completely push him out of the kid's life. I owe him that much, I think."
"Sounds fair," Jess muttered, kissing my knuckles. "What else did you talk about?"
"Not much, really. I didn't want to say anything more without talking to you, first."
"Alright." He got up from the bed and went to the fridge to get himself a beer. "Want a soda?"
"I'm good," I said, holding up my mug of tea.
He stalled in the kitchen for a bit, taking his time fetching the bottle opener and cracking the beer, no doubt using this time to collect his thoughts. I watched him from afar appreciatively, loving the way his hair stood up at the top of his head and the way his dark dress shirt clung to his torso. He was slowly gaining back the weight he'd lost since he and Nora had split up. I let my eyes wander down to his butt as he turned to put the bottle opener away, and I let out an involuntary giggle.
"What?" he asked, half turning to look at me, one eyebrow raised. "What's so funny?"
"Just checkin' out your butt," I admitted with another giggle.
"Ah." He turned back around fully as he shut the drawer, but not before I saw the smirk on his face. He came back to the bed with his beer and planted a big kiss on my temple. "Something funny about my butt?" he murmured in my ear.
I shook my head. "No. It is no laughing matter. I apologize for my indiscretion."
"That's what I thought," he said through a big grin, kissing me again. He repositioned himself on the bed so he was facing me, and took the first sip of his beer. "Alright. Here we go."
"Yep."
"The talk."
"That's right."
"Should I start?"
"I think that would be wise."
"Okay." He took a deep breath, his fingers drumming on his beer bottle. "Well, I guess we should start by discussing what my role is going to be in all this. With the baby," he added, as if he needed to specify. "I mean, am I gonna be his dad, or...?"
I bit my lip. "James doesn't want that."
Jess nodded a few times, his eyes wandering as he pondered this. "Right. Fair enough." He grimaced. "I think that would kind of suck for me, anyway. That would be hard, for me, if the kid, you know. Called me Dad and stuff."
"You could be like what Luke sorta was to me," I suggested. "A father figure, someone who loved me, someone who always had my back... Just, you know, without fifteen years of built-up sexual tension with my mom."
His nose wrinkled and he recoiled away from me. "Ew. Don't even joke about that."
"Don't say ew," I scolded, mocking offence. "My mother is a very beautiful woman."
"Yeah, sure, but she's still your mom," Jess retorted, then shook his head. "I'm not even going to continue this conversation."
"Whatever. Be like Luke. Oh, and also preferably without some punk nephew who shows up and causes all sorts of trouble, stealing gnomes, girlfriends, and hearts alike."
"Ah, but then the kid's life would be so boring."
"No nephews," I said in a warning tone, but we were both smiling too much to pull it off.
Jess was nodding again, and shook his head with a smile. "Alright. So I'll be a live-in Luke. Without all that other stuff."
"And the kid will call you Jess."
"When he's able to talk."
"Yes. And when he's old enough, we'll tell him about James."
"But what about other kids?" Jess asked. "You know how nosy and curious kids are. What if they ask him at school, or if other parents find out? He'll be really confused and it's only gonna make things awkward."
I shrugged helplessly. "We'll have to deal with that when it happens. There's not much we can do about it. How we choose to raise him is no one's business but ours. And James'," I tacked on regretfully.
"And is James gonna be around?"
"We agreed to establish contact between him and the kid when he's old enough. But I don't think he'll be around much in the physical sense, no. It's hard with him living in Ireland now."
"Okay." Jess nodded again. "So, one day at a time, then."
"One day at a time."
"What about names?"
"What?"
"Aren't you gonna name him?"
I smiled. "I already have."
Jess' eyes lit up, but he tried to conceal his excitement. "Tell me."
"No."
"Oh, come on. Don't be like that."
"I wanna see him, first. He has to look like the name I have in mind."
"He's gonna come out looking like a crab apple, you're not gonna be able to name him based on that."
"Hey. Don't insult my unborn baby."
"It's a fact, Ror. Babies are freaking ugly when they're first born."
"Mean."
"But true."
I sighed. "I think that's enough for today."
"I agree." He reached out again and rubbed my belly, a private smile on his face. "Can we go see the house?" he asked quietly, looking up at me with warm brown eyes. He looked so uninhibited in that moment; how could I deny him anything?
Jess
The Brownstone was beautiful. Picture-perfect, classic New York, on Bedford Street. Halfway between the ocean and Washington Square Park. A wrought-iron railing lined the staircase to the front door, and potted plants and flowers decorated the window. The street was lined with huge, old trees that formed a sort of tunnel of leaves and blocked out a lot of the noise from nearby busy streets.
Rory and I stood in front of it, staring at the warm-toned building in front of us, and I reached out and took her hand. Her free hand was resting, as it so often did nowadays, on top of her baby bump. She looked at me sidelong, a twinkle of excitement alight in her impossibly blue eyes, and her smile only grew as I reached into my pocket to remove the key she had given me.
I stepped up to the front door and placed the key in the lock. She followed behind me, one hand on the small of my back as I turned the key and heard the bolt slide open. "Ready?" I asked her, looking at her over my shoulder.
"Ready," she replied with a sure nod.
I turned the knob, and pushed the door open.
The inside was just as amazing as the outside. Small, but cozy. It was empty for now, void of furniture and such, but it was already homey and inviting. The floors were made up of old, thick wooden planks, and they creaked wonderfully underfoot, and the walls were a cream colour. The whole place had an overall feeling of character, like a heritage building. The kitchen even had one of those wood-burning stoves in the corner. Pipes were exposed at the ceilings and large wooden beams were visible support.
It was three levels: kitchen, living room, laundry room and half bath on the ground floor, master bedroom with ensuite on the second floor, and then a third bedroom on the top floor, which had a charming vaulted ceiling and a dormer window.
"It's perfect," I said as I wrapped my arms around Rory from behind, resting my chin on her shoulder. We stood in what would be the baby's room on the top floor, and as she twisted in my arms to kiss me, I'd never felt more at home.
A/N: One more chapter, guys! Please review; your reviews have been so awesome and helpful lately! And let me know your ideas for names for the baby ;)
