Everything is Different Now

A Gilmore Girls Fanfic

Jess takes one look at his bed and knows when he's not wanted.

It's small. Real small. A dinky little air mattress shoved at the foot of Uncle Luke's bed – at the foot of Uncle Luke's bed – that can't fit his whole body, an apartment that can't fit a teenage boy in with the middle-aged bachelor who thinks baseball caps and flannel are high fashion and believes that Jess gives the slightest shit about his little attempts to 'talk' since the bus stop. He's been counting the questions. A real Seneca, ole Uncle Luke. Jess could've used his new enthusiasm to take care of him oh, say, a decade ago.

Exhibit A – the bed.

So he dumps the essentials that he tossed into his bag in the fifteen minutes between Liz telling him she couldn't handle him anymore and her buying him the first bus ticket north for the next day, grabs his Kerouac, and he walks right out of the Luke's apartment, just like he'd walked out on Liz when she'd given him the good news.

"Okay, um, I've got to get back to the diner. I'm gonna close up at ten tonight, so I'd thought-"

Jess knows what Luke thinks. "See you at ten."

"But wait, you need keys-"

"No, I don't."

He doesn't stick around to see Luke's reaction. Once he's outside, staring at the picturesque nuclear family nightmare that is Stars Valley, mothers playing with their little kids, dads, families, nothing but happy faces as far as the eye can see – like a sitcom where the sun always shines – he's already scarred by the experience of it all. The bus, the diner, the annoying chatty lady who accosted him and Luke on the way between them, the pathetic attempt at family. It's sunk into his brain. He's doomed to fail this town's expectations from the moment he set foot in Connecticut. They don't want him, his cigarettes and his music, his taste in lit or his city slick or his uncomfortable childhood trauma that nobody ever wants to deal with; never, but especially not here.

Jess Mariano is in hell.

Hell if Annoying Chatty Lady's daughter isn't cute, though.

Cute, well… Cute doesn't really do it justice for Jess. Intriguing. Captivating, maybe, though captivating comes too close to reeking of sentiment, and Jess is the no-feelings kind of guy, hide his hand, know when to fold 'em, leave your passion for books out of the conversation. It's the eyes, Jess thinks. Rory Gilmore stares at him with those big, innocent blue eyes like he's made the world her apple, like she sees him and doesn't care about what's lying underneath. Polite, sure. Naive as anything. Jess would bet Rory looks at everyone she meets for the first time like that, like a newborn doe in awe of her surroundings. But Jess steps into her room anyway. He can't help it. Rory draws him in.

Maybe he wants to know her.

Maybe there's something for him in Stars Hollow.

He won't allow himself to hope.

Of course, Jess Mariano is nothing if not an asshole, cause he learned a long time ago that if you don't takecontrolof your life (the guidance counselor would love this one) and push 'em away first, somebody's gonna make you the asshole, and that's where it hurts worst every time. The endless string of Liz's boyfriends, teachers, his lovely darling mother. They take the give where it's given. Jess doesn't give anymore. So he lies and he tried to get Rory Gilmore, golden child, to ditch a dinner and take, selfishly, the one damn good thing in this town away for himself. She doesn't bite. Of course she doesn't, and Jess'll laugh about it later, the idea that he thought he could get Rory Gilmore to do a damn thing she didn't want to do.

Rory was so genuine, that first night. Jess wishes later that he could have lingered in her openness, if only so he hadn't had to have worked as hard as he did to earn it back. Jess doesn't register the strangeness of that interaction until Rory takes a step closer as he tries to coax her out on the town with him:

"So we'll walk around," Jess tries, his hand on the windowsill, staring at Rory. "Sit on a bench, stare at our shoes."

"Look, Sooki just made a ton of really great food, and I'm starving," Rory says, then pauses.

She stares back at him, her genuine naive belief that he should want to be at this dinner party fading into… something else. Something Jess had never seen before, at least not directed at him. It's strange. He doesn't understand it, but the furrow in Rory's brow lasts only a second before she takes a step closer, her eyes easing back into their naivete, their simple devotion to these people and this town.

Rory hesitates, still looking at his eyes. Her eyes are so blue. "I know it might not seem like it," she says, her finger darting out to brush the loose fabric of his shirt. He can't feel it; it's electric. "But it'll be fun. Don't you trust me?"

One step doesn't seem important, but Jess knows it's dangerous for him to be any closer to that sweet smile, the openness, Or maybe one step, one question, makes all the difference. Cause one step away, Jess thought her expression meant openness, naivete – but here, with this vantage, he can see the truth behind her eyes; this girl's as guarded and hidden as he is, and Jess nearly went and fell for Rory's little doe-eyed facade.

Jess can't help the little smile he gives her. "I don't even know you," he says wryly.

"Well, don't I look trustworthy?" Rory asks innocently.

No; then, that's why I trust you- That's what flits through Jess' mind before his senses reassert themselves and settle on the right answer: I don't trust anybody. Yes sits on the tip of his tongue. Jess doesn't care enough to sort out the contradictions, so he settles on "Maybe."

Rory lights up, smiles, and lays a thoughtless hand on his arm. They're close enough that it's unintentional. "Okay then, let's eat!" she says happily, and turns away without a second glance.

One thoughtless touch sets Jess' body on fire.

Blinding white flashes behind his eyes. He's dizzy. Then it's done, gone, and he's following Rory into the kitchen before he realizes where his feet are taking him, utterly confused about what just happened. Rory glances back at him over her shoulder and Jess stares back dumbly at her.

"Do you want a soda?"

Yes. Lord, yes. His mouth is bone dry; he's a parched man in the desert dying for a lick of thirst. You can't let her get you that soda, his instincts scream. If he lets her-

"Yeah," Jess croaked, too frazzled to think.

He might accidentally start to care.

Jess stays for dinner. Not because he wants to, not because he can't find a way out of it, but because Rory Gilmore touched him and suddenly his brain is so fried that he can barely string a sentence together, forget deny the little blue-eyed devil a damn thing she'd asked for. That, and she wasn't wrong; Jess is hungry.

The food's pretty damn good. He understands why Sooki is a professional chef.

To make up for the immense damage he's done to his campaign against Luke's "parenting," Jess scowls at his plate, brushes off his dinner companions when they attempt inane and pointless small talk, and vengefully recites Ginsberg's poetry to himself as an antidote to the sappiness of it all.

He pointedly ignores how his thoughts already revolved around the curious and prying attentions of Rory Gilmore.

The next morning, Jess Mariano wakes up and she's a girl.

"Huh."

Jess stares down at her chest, wondering if she's still asleep. Long dark hair falls into her face, the light streaming in through the shutters of the window behind her, and downstairs the diner is already audibly busy; Uncle Luke must have been up for a while. She has breasts now, apparently; that or she's still asleep. The second option is likely, so Jess throws herself down on her pillow and rolls around on her "bed," which is apparently an inflatable raft (not cool, Uncle Luke), until she gets bored and tangled and her face itches from the unfamiliar presence of loose hair. Jess sits back up.

She cups her hands over her chest.

"Huh."

Swinging out of bed, Jess is alarmed at how normal she feels. She's the same height, she's still- still- But she's walking different and looking different, and when she opens her mouth to grunt in confusion, it comes out higher. The ache to smoke feels a little different, lower. There's a notable absence in between her legs. Her shit is different – those are not her clothes. …But they're familiar, somehow. A pair of skinny jeans instead of normal jeans, her usual jackets fitted for size. All her band tees are the same.

Stumbling into the bathroom, Jess clutches to the sink, danger bells starting to go off in her head when she sees the little black makeup bag by the faucet. Uncle Luke doesn't wear makeup. She looks up into the mirror at her brown eyes, and she finds herself staring at a black-haired carbon copy of Elizabeth Danes.

She barely makes it to the toilet before she pukes.

By the time Jess makes it down the stairs, reeling from the force of fighting unfamiliar instincts and battling the urge to scream, she's lost the battle with her clothing and her hair's a mess, loose and wild, the way she likes it (the way she likes it?). She swallowed her terror and pastes on a smile, which is how she knows she's fucked. Shoving her hands into the pockets of her coat, clutching her carton of cigarettes like a lifeline, Jess walks up to Uncle Luke like a man (woman?) on death row. Never a better day to go Orlando on her life. Woolf would've approved.

"Uncle Luke," Jess says tenuously, not that anyone in the town knows her well enough to notice a damn thing.

Luke stands behind the bar, wearing his trademark flannel and backwards cap and aftershave, drying off a mug, and sitting right across from him are Annoying Chatty Lady and Rory fucking Gilmore herself. They're having a pointlessly effervescent conversation about chimpanzees and Uma Thurman over danishes and coffee. All three of them look up at Jess at the same time, and Jess tries really hard not to lose her shit, an intense, confused rage overcoming her at the sight of these people who walk into her life and turn it upside down. Technically she walked into theirs. Semantics.

For once in her life, Jess desperately wants to scream for help. There's teenage rebellion, and then there's waking up in the morning with your dick misplaced, and Jess is firmly on the latter side of that divide.

Rory's brow furrows.

She's expecting a blunt who are you? What Jess gets is Luke's face melting into- affection(?), as Luke grins and claps her on the shoulder, as though the ice were broken between them, drawing her reluctantly toward the Gilmores. "Jess," Luke says warmly, then drops his hand from her shoulder like a hot stone, remembering that he doesn't know how to do affection. Luke's grin turns sheepish, and he scratches the back of his neck. "I wanted to- I just wanted-" Her uncle has a brief aneurysm. "Aw hell, I'm no good with this sappy stuff – look. Last night? Good. After yesterday, I wasn't sure… But you did… And- Yeah. Good. Good stuff, kid." Luke grimaces and pats Jess on the shoulder again, much more awkwardly. Jess cringes away.

Jess stares at Luke dumbly, not sure if her uncle lost a few marbles last night too or if he legitimately doesn't notice the difference between his niece and his nephew. Rory giggles, mostly because Rory seems to think she's supposed to giggle, because she's equally staring at Jess and Luke in bewilderment. Lorelai, on the other hand, gleefully tears into Luke: "Good God, Luke, where did they teach you to make speeches like that, caveman school? One single word and a grunt per feeling? You'd get on great with these chimps, I'm telling you-"

Luke gives Lorelai an annoyed look. "For the last time, I am not a gorilla."

"Well, clearly not, if your niece is any indication. No, I'm thinking… Hmm…" Lorelai taps her chin, then perks up with the answer. "Ding, ding, ding, that's it. Neanderthal. Straight off the steppes of Eurasia. My god, I don't know how I didn't see it sooner, strong and silent types and grunting, the lot of you."

"Hey," Jess and Luke protest at the same time.

Rory's eyes go wide as dinner plates. "Mom," she hisses, tugging on Lorelai's sleeve, staring wide-eyed at Jess.

It takes Jess a second to register what Lorelai said, because at first he thinks it's the vaguely insulting comment about his non-human heritage, but then he realizes that Lorelai called him Luke's niece. As in, Jess Mariano, the niece. Her. No, her. No, her, her, she/her, what the fuck was wrong with her brain?

Jess coughs politely (frantically) to get their attention. "Alright. Not that I'm not loving this little bit, but- um- Uncle Luke?"

Her voice comes out high and weak. Too unsure.

"Yeah?" Luke grunts, not disproving Lorelai's brilliant conjecture.

Nothing. Stone cold nonrecognition. Jess has to ratchet up the stakes, and the only way she knows how to do that in a little self- humiliation, so she pulls a fake smile and makes jazz hands like an ensemble actor on Off-Broadway as she says, "Don't ya notice anything… different about me today?"

Rory's eyes go even wider, and Jess thinks in relief, she knows. She then proceeds to stamp all over her little spark of Rory Gilmore-induce relief with a healthy dose of cynicism and a garnish of Sartre. Luke and Lorelai stare blankly at Jess.

"You've got me there, kid," Luke says.

"Ooh, ooh, I know! Pick me!" Lorelai exclaims.

Jess give Lorelai a deadpan glare. "No."

"Great! I know what you've done and Luke's never gonna guess it because he's a big old smelly man who wouldn't know a tampon if it smacked him in the face ("Hey!"), but I know cause I'm Luke's weird diner friend whose house you ate at last night, and who tried to give you a lecture about not taking your chances for granted before your uncle shot me down, which he should have, aaand you're glaring at me. Right. Really selling myself here." Lorelai puffs herself up, slapping her cheek twice in her Herculean preparation. "It's your hair. You've gone from 'bad girl' to 'this world is my enemy' because you're worried you ruined your cool reputation last night by having a nice and enjoyable dinner with your uncle and his weird friends. Excellent over-compensation, I like it. Also you're not wearing makeup today."

This is wrong on so, so many levels. Lorelai is also, Jess reflect, uncomfortably close to the truth, if she weren't so completely and utterly wrong about everything she just said for the notable reason that she had been a he last night.

"Who are you?" Jess asks Lorelai, because if Lorelai doesn't know Jess is a boy, Jess certainly isn't going to be the one who informs her. Luke facepalms.

At the same time, Rory begins to splutter. "What, Mom- No! What! How is that- How is that- That's what you think is different? Are you- Am I-"

Lorelai settled her cheek on her palm and gazed at Rory with a dare-Jess-say adoring expression. "Oh?" she says, amused. "Care to tell us what's really different, oh sprog o mine?"

Luke fixes Rory an attentive look.

Because she's an absolute shit, Jess crosses her arms under her breasts and smirks at Rory. "I'm listening," she says smugly.

Rory gasps in betrayal at Jess. "Invasion of the Body Snatchers!" she cries, leveling a finger at Jess. "I don't know any of you people!"

"That's what happens when you meet new people, sweetie," Lorelai says.

"Seems a little extreme of a response to no makeup," Luke grumbles.

Lorelai considers this. "She did have nice wings last night," she says. "I can see the betrayal."

"What?" Rory squeaks.

"The hell is a wing?" Jess snaps, at the end of her rope, followed by a: "I did not have nice wings last night!"

"She's right! I mean, he's right!"

"Yeah! I'm right!" Jess realizes she is agreeing with Rory. "No! Wait! What!"

"He?" Luke echoes in utter confusion.

"Aw, you like Jess' makeup? I can show you how to do makeup, baby. You and Mommy are gonna have lots of fun with-"

"Ew, Mom, no! I don't want to be your barbie, how is that-"

"-and I can show you how to do eyeshadow, and we can paint our nails, and talk about boys-"

"I'm dating Dean!"

"-and then we'll dance around the room in flower crowns chanting eldritch hymns to the spring gods-"

"Mom!" Rory shrieks. "I don't wanna be a girly girl! I just want to be a girl! A normal girl! Well, not a normal girl, but a girl, you know, a girl who's always a girl, always has been a girl, definitely doesn't just wake up one morning pretending to be a girl-"

"You don't need makeup to be a girl," Luke says sagely, nodding to himself.

Rory ignored Lorelai's rapid-fire monologue for long enough to flash Luke a grateful smile. "Thanks, Luke."

Jess is a smart cookie. By this point in the conversation, she's figured out that Luke and Lorelai clearly don't remember that yesterday she was a guy and that today she woke up with a set of tits and a snatch, and for some reason, Rory does. She would be grateful that Rory does, but now that she knows that Luke, who has known her her entire life, thinks she's a girl, she's too freaked out by the whole situation to want Rory's anything and starts looking for exit strategies. Lorelai is also clearly clinically insane, and Jess isn't sure she wants a girl who comes with that kind of baggage, no matter how…

"Oberon, Oberon, Oberon!" Lorelai softly chants under her breath, nudging her shoulder affectionately against Rory's, looking up at Uncle Luke with an expression that can only be love, or some twisted facsimile of it. Luke, of course, is oblivious, and has gone back to washing his mugs.

…wholesome her insanity may be.

"What is wrong with you people?" Jess mumbles under her breath, which is apparently enough to catch everyone's attention.

"So!" Lorelai says perkily, oblivious to the bewildered dismay and horror on Rory's face. "Did we get it?"

Jess stares at Lorelai. Her eyes shift to Rory, who stared back at her like the world's gone mad, her eyes flashing, and Jess isn't even ashamed to realize that Rory is the only thing in the universe that keeps her sane in that moment. It's only Rory. Rory is the only person who knows.

Her own uncle doesn't know that Jess Mariano was a boy until the day she met Rory Gilmore.

She can't help it. "No," Jess laughs, backing away from the counter, a very feminine giggle manically splitting her throat. "Nope. Nu-uh. Nada. That'll be a bust on that one, I'm afraid. And look – what's that?" Jess pulls back the fitted sleeve of her jacket and taps her bare wrist. "I'm afraid I've got to go. Later."

She shoves her hands in her pockets and walks away, trying not to break down crying. Behind her, Luke calls, "It was a nice dinner, last night!" Her wild fear turns into disgust, and she scowls herself out of the diner. Fucking family. Why couldn't that have changed overnight?

"Jess!" Rory calls.

Jess walks faster.

"Hey, where are you going?" Lorelai asks Rory as Jess is walking out the door. "We didn't finish our very important debate! You know that when the chimpanzees-"

"Oh my god, Mom! Uma Thurman would be a terrible casting choice for the Jane Goodall biopic we all deserve and you know it!" Rory cries, instantly sucked back into her mother's conversation.

The door slams shut behind her with a jingle. Stalking across the Stars Hollow plaza, Jess almost wishes that Rory would come after her, if only so she would tell her she's not crazy. Almost. But Jess is alone in this brave new world of hers – rural Connecticut – and no wide blue eyes or Rory Gilmores or inexplicable changes of gender without receipts are gonna change that for her.

Male or female, Jessica Mariano has always been alone.

Jess goes through her first day at her new school in a daze, trying real hard not to erupt; not because these people don't deserve her anger, but because she's not sure if, when she does erupt, if it'll come out as rage or tears, and if she gets herself a reputation as a crybaby, she will – and this is in no way an exaggeration – kill Uncle Luke with a beanpole, pack her things, and ditch the East Coast for a nice relaxing sojourn in Venice Beach.

Her teachers all call for 'Jessica Mariano' on their attendance, and every time Jess responds an affirmative, a little part of her dies inside. Worse, she's new, so by the end of the day, half the school is coming up to 'Jessica' to introduce themselves, to which she corrects them with a brusque Jess and storms off. The only person worth stomaching so far has been some petite Korean chick with an ear for punk music, who seemed content enough to babble away Stars Hollow style to Jess once she caught sight of his Tool t-shirt – she hadn't dared to put on any of his other clothes, which had taken a sudden turn for the feminine – as they walked toward gym.

"So I've been working through Mojo – you've got to know Mojo," Lane babbles, "and I've been listening to all this great stuff but my mom; ugh, my mom, you have no idea – she's absolutely crazy so I need to have a fence for all my music. But there's this great new record store out near my friend Rory's school-"

"Rory?" Jess echoes. "Rory Gilmore?"

Lane nods eagerly. "Yup! She's my best friend, the absolute best, best friends for life, signed a blood pact- Wait, you're new, how do you know her?"

Kismet, Jess doesn't snark. Of course she winds up finding Rory's friend tolerable, it seems like Rory Gilmore is quickly shaping up to be the only island of sanity for her in this cute little mess of a life she's wound up in. "Where's the record store?" she asks instead of giving her an answer.

"Oh! Um, it's Recordbreaker Incorporated, 2453 Berlin Turnpike." And just like that, Lane's off again. "Yeah, so I'm sending Rory to the store cause there's no way in hell Mom's gonna let me go anywhere on a Monday night, much less to go buy my devil music, and she's got a whole list – the good stuff, I mean, we're talking Charles Mingus, The Sonics, the Bee Gees – ooh, and MC5, you can not forget the MC5-"

Jess zones out halfway through this discussion, and therefore misses it when they walk right into the girl's locker room for gym class. She freezes in the entryway.

A whole flock of teenage girls mill around the locker room, busy putting on their gym uniforms and deodorizing their shaved armpits. Jess catches as much bra and boob action as she's seen in her entire life, and she's been around the block; stunned, she stands there, then blushes and forces her gaze down to her feet, hurrying after Lane. That's what finally snaps her out of the fugue state she's been in all day. Jess has been so overwhelmed by her new circumstances that she's completely forgotten what her MO was for the first day – set your expectations low, then go lower. Instead here she is, attending dinner parties and going to school. What the hell did turning into a girl do to her, make her some kind of goody-two-shoes?

Jess sneaks another peak at the girls around her, and blushes harder. Shit, she thinks. Does this make me a lesbian?

Ugh.

Was Jessica Mariano honestly considering going to gym class?

Jess does the only rational thing she can do in that situation; she turns around, leaves the girls' locker room, and walks right the hell out of that school building.

Lane looks up from her locker once she finishes changing and frowns at the locker room around her, scratching her head as she surveys her classmates. She sees a lot of people, but a surly girl with long dark hair and a bad attitude isn't one of them. "Huh," she says aloud. "Where did Jess go?"

Jess has been sitting on the bridge for hours.

She's smoked her whole pack, and she feels kind of sick. Her lungs hurt. Part of her wants to go into town and buy another one, but she doesn't really want to smoke more. Instead, Jess hugs her knees to her chest and hides her stinging eyes against them, alternating between hiding her involuntary pathetic crying and staring at the distorted reflection of Liz Danes in the lake, wondering how her mother's found a way to haunt her even after abandoning her altogether.

She hates Stars Hollow. She hates these people and this place and that school and everything, and she hates Rory Gilmore most of all for making her believe, even if it was only for a fleeting second, that maybe she might have a place here at the end of the day. She misses New York. She doesn't think any of her friends will give enough of a shit to stay in contact, and hell, now that she's a girl, Jess is pretty sure that she wouldn't want to stay friends with half of them. She's heard stories – but the guys who'll give a seventeen-year-old weed with no questions asked are a dodgy crowd, and it's not like Jess hasn't had worse men living in her own home. Jess swallows in disgust at the thought of what some of those guys of her mom's might have done to her if she'd grown up a girl.

Is this permanent? Is this real? How is this even possible, will she be a girl for the rest of her life or- or- or?

Jess has been wallowing for hours by the time she's found by the last (and only) person she wants to see.

"You!" Rory cries, storming toward the bridge in the most pretentious plaid-skirt-and-blazer combo that screams rich kid like nothing Jess has ever seen before. Chilton. What a joke.

Scrambling to her feet, Jess furiously wipes at her eyes, trying to paste a cocky smirk over her utterly distraught countenance, and somehow the sight of Rory Gilmore in all her blue-eyed glory hits her even harder than last night. The strange sensations she felt in the locker room are back, but stronger, like they're for real this time. She marvels at the little ball of anger storming toward her. So much rage for such a tiny girl.

"Me," Jess drawls, hands in her pockets. She lets Rory come to her on the bridge, the lake water surrounding them. The emerald trees reflect on the surface.

"You- You've done some kind of black magic on Mom, and on Luke, and on- on- everyone!" Rory exclaims. Jess wonders if she even realizes that she's stomped right back into her space, close enough to jab her finger into her chest. "How- Why? You were a guy yesterday! Like an honest-to-God, short-haired gelled back kind of scruffy looking man! A male! And now you're- you're-" Rory's face goes red like a tomato as she looks at Jess' face; and yet instead of backing away, she takes an aggressive step closer. Jess steps back. Rory looks like she's ready to die and go to sugarplum heaven where the beds are made of candyfloss and men don't turn into women without explanation. "Some kind of witch! You're a witch, Jess Mariano!"

"Gee," Jess snarks, "Guess I'd better check my nose for warts."

"Magic is real!" Rory cries. "Who knows what you'll do next? Turn us all into toads? Can you get me into Harvard?"

Jess can't help the snicker that escapes her. "That's what you would ask for?" she says incredulously. "I could have all my devil powers ready to give you your heart's desire and you want me to get you into Harvard?"

Rory blushes, and takes another step forward. Jess steps back again. "Tell me I'm not crazy!" she demands.

"You're crazy."

"Jess!" Rory's voice sounds desperate, and suddenly the joke isn't funny anymore. Rory looks ready to cry, and her eyes dart wildly around them, searching for something in their surroundings that can confirm that Jess had been a dude twenty four hours ago. She won't find it. As far as Jess can tell, aside from Rory herself, the only living proof of her masculinity is deep in the recesses of her own mind, and Jess'll be the first to agree that the inside of her mind is a terrible place to be. "Please," Rory begs. "Please, please, please, promise me I'm not going crazy, because if Mom and Luke don't remember and I'm in some kind of hallucination, then I'll have to get sent to the loony bin, and I really, really don't wanna get sent to the loony bin because they won't have coffee or froot loops or books, oh god, what if they don't even have Tolstoy? What if they don't have Tolstoy, Jess?"

"I think if you have schizophrenia you're gonna have bigger problems than reading about Vronsky," Jess observes.

"Shut up!" Rory pushes Jess, which is cute, even though she stumbles back a step. That much force wouldn't have budged her yesterday. "Answer me! Were you- Were you a guy yesterday or not?! Because believe me, I have eyes and you were definitely not- not-" Rory trails her gaze down Jess' body, making a vague gesture at her chest, blushing harder. Jess smirks.

"Like what you see?" she asks slyly, and Rory splutters. "I'm telling ya, if I'd known all I had to do to get this kind of reaction out of you was turn into a girl, I'd've done it-"

"You asshole!"

Rory pushes Jess into the lake. The water is warm and muddy, and Jess chokes on it, taking a few seconds to remember how to swim before she can flail her way back to her feet, stunned that Rory had actually gone and pushed her over the edge. Blinking, Jess fingers the soaked ends of her long hair. She picks a weed off the top of her head.

Oh. Jess is mad.

Lithe, she wades to the edge of the bridge and pulls herself back up on the bridge in one fluid motion, pulling her soaked book out of her back pocket and throwing it down onto the wood in disgust. Jess hates getting wet. She reaches up and squeezes out her long hair, twisting it into a single untied ponytail and tossing it over one shoulder like she's done it a thousand times before, and sets in on Rory, who's babbling apologies like there's no tomorrow.

"Shut up."

"-and I'm so, so sorry and I swear I've never pushed anyone into a lake before, I didn't mean it, I was just so mad and you weren't giving me an answer and you looked so- um, so-"

"Do you think I wanted this?" Jess roars, shutting Rory up with a squeak. She's so mad that she almost punches Rory, but she can't punch a girl, and she settles for stamping her foot instead. "I get shipped out to my uncle, to the middle of nowhere, to a school where they recite the pledge of allegiance in six languages, two of which I've never heard of before, away from my home and my friends, and to top it all off the universe decides it'll be a real hoot if suddenly – oh, look, Jess, you're a girl now! I didn't ask for this and I'd be a little grateful if the only damn person who remembered that Jess didn't stand for Jessica oh, I don't know, yesterday wasn't so busy running her own damn mouth that she pushes me into a lake!"

"I'm sorry I called you an asshole," Rory says in a small voice, recoiling from Jess. "I'm not supposed to curse."

Jess pinches the bridge of her nose, growling to herself. "What do you want from me, Rory?" she demands. "Huh? You want me to go and make myself look like a crazy person in front of Luke and your insane mother? You want me to parade around town in a shirt that says BOY on it in bold letters and sing Bruce Springsteen at the top of my lungs. Cause I could do it! I could! You want to help me explain to Lorelai that her memory of me from last night's completely wrong? Do you know how to convince the universe to change me back? What do you want from me, huh? Huh?" Jess stops ranting for long enough to look at Rory, who is very busy staring at Jess' tits, her lips pursed in interest. Her shirt's wet, and apparently wet shirt plus boobs plus an incredibly infuriating little vision of a girl staring at her tits has interesting effects. "Huh."

"Are those…" Rory asks.

"Breasts?" Jess gives little disbelieving laugh, shoving her hands into her pockets, which have an inch of standing water in them. Gross. "Yes, Rory. Those are breasts. Funny little side effect of inexplicably turning into a girl." She considers telling Rory to stop staring at them, but part of her is morbidly curious about what the hell is going through Rory's mind in that moment, so she doesn't.

"Are they real?"

"Guess so."

"Can I touch them?"

Jess smirks. "Don't you have a boyfriend, Casanova?"

Rory goes an interesting shade of fuchsia and wheels back from Jess, talking a mile a minute to try and salvage the disaster that has been their conversation. "I- Yes! Eep! I'm not- Jess! I didn't want to touch them, touch them, I just- Maybe this is all a very elaborate illusion and- and we're all living in the Matrix and- I'm not gay! I mean, I'm quite certain that I am not gay, no sirree, not me, I am not a lover of the ladies, except you were a guy- are you a guy? I mean, this is all very confusing, I'm sure you can agree, and I think that if we could just scientifically evaluate the situation-"

"By touching my tits," Jess says, barely holding back a grin.

Rory gives a solemn nod, her blue eyes wide and innocent. "It's not like that!" she chirps. "I would touch respectfully, I promise, and I wouldn't need to- I mean- Unless you wanted-" Rory's face flushes further, and now Jess laughs, because whatever little fantasy Rory Gilmore has just concocted, it's entirely a product of her own mind and Jess pities her just a little bit for how deeply this girl has inserted herself into the closet. Rory's eyes go wide. "Dean!" she exclaims. "Oh my god, I forgot about Dean- I mean, yes, absolutely, you're correct, I do have a boyfriend, Jess Mariano, so you get your head out of the gutter, missy!"

Jess takes a step closer to Rory, looking down at the shorter girl, her smirk coming back in full force. Rory gulps. "Oh, right, because I'm the one who wants to go around fondling practical strangers," Jess purrs.

"I do not fondle," Rory gasps. "I would- would politely and respectfully grope- oh no, that didn't sound right either…" She buries her face in her hands, taking another step backward, and now she's the one who's dangerously close to the edge of the bridge. "And we're not strangers! We had dinner tonight and we broke bread – that's got to make us at least acquaintances, or- or- comrades-in-arms! Comrades can't be strangers! Besides, you're Luke's nephew and Luke's my, um, Luke, so that makes us practically… um…"

"Strangers."

"Yes! No! But-"

Rory tries to back further away from Jess, and her foot bumps against the edge of the bridge, tripping her backward. Before she can make the plunge backward, Jess is already darting out to catch her, grabbing her hand to keep her from a muddy bath. "Rory!" Rory gasps, teetering unstably over the water, and whips her gaze to meet Jess' with wide eyes as Jess tugs her into her body. Rory flies into her arms.

They stand there for a few minutes, together on the bridge by the lake, Rory tucked into Jess' arms, shaking from the shock of it all. Almost without thinking, Jess pulls Rory into a hug. Her heart is racing; thank god she caught her, even if turnabout would have been fair play there. Kind of stupid, really, considering that Rory's getting wet now anyway because of Jess. The innuendo should have made Jess smirk, but instead Jess is trembling, and she wraps her arms around Rory tighter and squeezes, the shorter girl slotting into her hug like she belongs there. Jess shuts her eyes.

"Jess," Rory whispers. "I do have a boyfriend."

"I know that," Jess snaps too sharply. "You need this, you almost fell."

"Are you sure, cause-"

She's so fucking close to the edge. Jess grits her teeth, mentally begging Rory to play along. "I said, you need a hug."

"Oh. Right." Rory stops fighting against Jess, and Jess feels the moment things shift, the moment Rory leans into her and snakes her arms around her waist, snuggling her head against her shoulder. Jess shakes harder. She shouldn't have smoked the whole pack. "This is nice," Rory whispers.

"I don't hug," Jess says. "I'm not a hugger. This- Don't expect more of this."

"It's okay if you need a hug. You kinda have a good excuse."

"I don't need a hug."

"Like, it doesn't have to be some kind of macho thing if you don't want it to, you know. Hugs are good. Great, even. Almost as good as ice cream. And, y'know, if you don't want a hug cause boys are cool and hugs are stupid then I got some good news for you, my dude- er, my gal, my gal pal-"

"I don't," Jess hisses.

"Okay. No hugs," Rory murmurs, hugging Jess tighter.

They stay like that for a while.

They're sitting on the side of the bridge now, having reached a mutual accord that standing is too dramatic for such fraught bridge-related confrontations. There's a comfortable three inches between them. It feels like less.

"So you were a guy."

"Yup."

"And now you're a girl."

"I guess."

"Do you… want to be a girl?" Rory asks.

"Dunno." Jess flicks a pebble across the surface of the lake. It sinks. "Doesn't seem like I've got a choice, now does it? Unless you've got a magical expert hidden somewhere in the town that knows how to undo magical reality shifts."

Rory considers this. "We could ask Kirk?"

"That was a joke, Rory."

"Oh. Right."

…

"Well, either way, you and I are in this together! Everyone else might've forgotten that you're a mister macho under all that sugar and spice and everything nice, but I haven't! We'll get you back to the way you were before, or- or- not, if you like this better, I guess! We'll be gender buddies! Gender together! You and me, partners in memory!"

"Don't call us partners."

"What? Why not? We'd be great partners, I'll have you know!"

"Doesn't mean what you think it means."

Rory blinks owlishly at Jess. "What does it mean, then, partner?"

"Well," Jess starts, "Unless you'd like your entire little town to think you're batting for the other team, then I think you're gonna have a hard time convincing people that you're not a lesbian. Which – just guessing – won't go over too well with Dean."

"Oh," Rory says. "Right."

"Very convincing, Gilmore."

"I'm not."

"Mhm."

"I'm not!"

"Yeah. Sure. Whatever you say, Portia."

Rory gasps. "Traitor!"

Jess can't help it. It's the way Rory's staring at her with the most genuine outrage she's ever seen; it's the absurdity of the day. She burst out laughing – real big open laughs, the kind that clears the heart and makes the sun sparkle on the water. It only takes seconds for Rory to join in. And it feels right. Healing. It feels like maybe it's okay for Jess to be sitting on this bridge, to have something for herself in the world, even if she's gotta be a girl and lose everything she thought she knew about herself to do it. Tomorrow she'll come down from this high, fall back on old patterns. But today, Jess is giddy. Happy, even, the loathsome feeling.

Eventually, once they've both calmed down enough, and Jess feels her walls starting to go back up, she ventures one last vulnerable question, gives herself her last indulgence. "Rory?" she asks in a small voice.

"Yeah?" Rory says. God, her eyes are so blue.

"You'll remember me, right?" Jess says, her voice trembling. "The way that I was before?"

Rory smiles and reaches down to take Jess' hand, and someway, somehow, Jess' cold dead heart warms just a little bit, and whispers yes, this is right. "I don't think I could ever forget."

[A/N] This is one part a style exercise cause I love the rapid-fire dialogue of Gilmore Girls and writing it is a real joy; and one part self-indulgent fluff to celebrate finishing my finals. Also, I read every gay fanfic in this fandom and figured I might as well give back and spread the wealth :) I hope you all enjoyed! Let me know what you thought, and if you want more!

Remember to comment and kudo!

Love, Allie