By Stew Pid

Rating: Should be okay.

Disclaimer: I only own the Stew Pid stuff.

A/N: Okay. I'm experimenting with different forms of fic and this was a new idea I had. It's not really my style so I don't know if I pulled it off, but I hope you like it.

The next day Rory waits for Lorelai in the diner, accompanied by Jess. They're doing the crossword puzzle in the newspaper.

"Okay, a seven letter word, starts with an 'a,' for 'fun,'" she inquires of Jess.

"Alcohol."

She rolls her eyes, not impressed.

"An adjective."

"Well, you didn't say that before. Amusing."

"That is correct."

"You realize these are stupid."

"They're supposed to be intellectually stimulating."

"Don't tell me you're one of those people who eats fish every day and listens to classical music while doing crossword puzzles because a bunch of crack-pot doctors say that stuff makes you smarter."

"Let's see. I ate fish sticks on Tuesday and was listening to Falco on Thursday, you know, 'Rock Me, Amadeus' and all. Now today I'm doing this crossword puzzle, so I guess my IQ has jumped up about a quarter of a notch."

"Well then, I guess you don't need my help."

"Guess I don't."

Jess watches, smiling to himself, as she buries herself in the crossword puzzle.

"How do you like The Iron Heel?" he asks, smirking.

"Um, I haven't started it yet."

"Why not?"

"Um, I've been busy. End of the school year and all. And then there're these crossword puzzles."

"Very time consuming."

"Some of them, yeah."

Jess pulls the book out of his book bag and tosses it in front of her. She smiles sheepishly and takes it.

"I thought I had lost it. I was going to pick it up again at the bookstore, but it wouldn't have had your notes."

"Well, this time I pretty much let London's words do the talking. He says it better than I ever could."

"I've never heard you praise even Hemingway like that."

"I wouldn't call it praise. I mean, I did say he's a nut, but a readable nut."

"I'll read it tonight."

"Good. Well, I better get back to work."

Lorelai comes into the diner carrying a bunch of magazines. She wears a surreptitious smile on her face and Rory watches her curiously.

"Hey, babe. How was school?"

"Uneventful. What is going on with you?"

"Nothing. We were doing some Spring cleaning in the Inn. We had a whole bunch of old magazines. I can't believe the guests don't take these things."

"I know. What do you have?"

She takes the stack of magazines.

"Now I know why they don't take them."

"But we would take anyway."

"We're kleptomaniacs."

"You think so?"

"Why else would you steal National Geographic magazines? You don't even read nutrition labels because they're educational. These are just going to sit in the top shelf of the closet until we both die and someone else has to clean out our house."

"Silly. I didn't steal them for us. They're for Luke."

"You're not going to let it go, are you?"

"Never. Come on, amoeba farm?"

They both giggle.

It is later that evening. Rory finishes the last of her homework. She puts her books in her bag, laces her fingers and stretches out her arms, yawning. Picking up The Iron Heel, she walks over to her stereo and punches the play button. She waits for the Falco CD to start and smiles, settling into her bed with the book. Upon opening, Jess' familiar handwriting greets her immediately. He has not written notes, however, but a note:

Rory, London says it better than I ever could.

'Did I say that the human might be filed in categories? Well, and if I did, let me qualify -- not all humans. You elude me. I cannot place you, cannot grasp you. I may boast that of nine out of ten, under given circumstances, I can forecast their action; that of nine out of ten, by their word or action, I may feel the pulse of their hearts. But of the tenth I despair. It is beyond me. You are that tenth.

Were ever two souls, with dumb lips, more incongruously matched! We may feel in common -- surely, we oftimes do -- and when we do not feel in common, yet do we understand; and yet we have no common tongue. Spoken words do not come to us. We are unintelligible. God must laugh at the mummery.
The one gleam of sanity through it all is that we are both large temperamentally, large enough to often understand. True, we often understand but in vague glimmering ways, by dim perceptions, like ghosts, which, while we doubt, haunt us with their truth. And still, I, for one, dare not believe; for you are that tenth which I may not forecast.
Am I unintelligible now? I do not know. I imagine so. I cannot find the common tongue.
Large temperamentally -- that is it. It is the one thing that brings us at all in touch. We have, flashed through us, you and I, each a bit of universal, and so we draw together. And yet we are so different.
I smile at you when you grow enthusiastic? It is a forgivable smile -- nay, almost an envious smile. I have lived twenty-five years {in my case, seventeen} of repression. I learned not to be enthusiastic. It is a hard lesson to forget. I begin to forget, but it is so little. At the best, before I die, I cannot hope to forget all or most. I can exult, now that I am learning, in little things, in other things; but of my things, and secret things doubly mine, I cannot, I cannot. Do I make myself intelligible? Do you hear my voice? I fear not. There are poseurs. I am the most successful of them all.
Jack {and Jess}

A rush of warmth blankets Rory's skin, yet she shivers. Why did he put that it? What was she going to do? What was she supposed to say? Worries send her off to sleep and memories of the lake dance in her dreams.