AN: Wow, I thought that this would be the last chapter, but then my
fingers just seem to fly through the pages here! So this will be 3 of 4.
Stay tuned (and please review!)
Who are you and what did you do with Jess?
Chapter 3
Rory drank her coffee sitting at her desk with a textbook in front of her. She couldn't seem to focus - her eyes kept getting drawn back to her unmade bed, and the events of the previous night and early morning. She sighed and smiled. **God, I love him** she thought then caught herself. "Oh my god!" she screamed to no one in particular, standing up and knocking her chair over.
"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god," she squealed, picking up clothes and rushing into the bathroom to take a shower. She quickly showered and dressed and rushed out the door, barely having time to put her coat on.
She ran up to the Kim residence and rang the bell. Lane's mother answered.
"It's very early, why are you here so very early?" Mrs. Kim announced loudly.
"Oh, I need to talk to Lane if that's okay, Mrs. Kim, it's kind of important," Rory said out of breath.
"You in trouble?" Mrs. Kim asked, squinting her eyes at Rory.
"Oh no, no, no, just some good news I need to share," she said pleadingly.
"Okay, five minutes," Mrs. Kim allowed her into the house. Rory ran up the stairs to Lane's room and knocked loudly. Lane opened it and Rory rushed her back into her room and closed the door.
"I love Jess!" Rory announced excitedly.
"What?" Lane asked in confusion.
"Oh my god, I was sitting there with my coffee, and thinking of what happened when we woke up together this morning, and .." Rory was pacing and flailing her arms wildly, ranting.
"What?!" Lane asked again excitedly, interrupting the rant. "Wait, you slept together?! Does Lorelai know????"
"No! No, I mean yes, I mean, we slept together as in sleeping, not as in, you know, SLEPT, and no, my mom is in New York with Alex" Rory tried to explain.
"So you slept in the same bed and then he told you he loves you?" Lane asked clasping her hands together in excitement.
"No, he didn't actually say it, but you should have seen him last night at my grandmother's. He was so polite and friendly to her. He really made a great impression. And he told her that he's already applied to both Uconn and So Conn State to study creative writing and will go to whichever one is closest to the school that I pick!"
"Wait, are you sure he was Jess?" Lane asked. "I mean did you ever see 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'? Should we go look for pods? Because that does NOT sound like the Jess we know."
"I know, I know, but he did it for me, he was so wonderful, then we came home and my mom is in New York and Luke was staying over Nicole's, and we just decided to stay together, and although we didn't do IT, it was so nice, just being in his arms, and waking up with him, except for the morning breath thing, but I'm not sure you can really get around that." Rory started to rant again.
"Wow! So go back to the 'I love Jess' part"
"Well, I don't know. I was just sitting there thinking about all the things that have happened, and I just thought, 'God, I love that guy' and then I freaked! I mean, I never just had that thought with Dean, not like, okay, that's how I feel now. So what do I do about it? Should I tell him?"
"Ooh, I don't know if you should tell him.I mean, what if he isn't ready for that? What if he freaks out and breaks up with you? I don't know if Jess is prepared." Lane said cautiously. Rory sulked a little.
"Yeah, you may be right. I guess I'll wait until he says it," Rory said dejectedly, wondering how long it would be until that happened, IF it would EVER happen.
"Hey, don't get upset, he'll say it when he's ready, he will, SOON," Lane tried to reassure her, but knew that her wheels were spinning and she'd be thinking about it for a while.
"So what are you going to tell your mom?" Lane asked trying to change the subject (a little).
"I'm not sure, but I have to tell her he spent the night, I mean, I'm sure half of Stars Hollow was watching the house to see when he dropped me off and when he got home, you know how nosey everybody is around here," Rory stated and Lane nodded her agreement.
"Time's up!" Mrs. Kim yelled up the stairs. Both Lane and Rory jumped.
"Gotta go! Thanks for letting me rant!" Rory said, giving Lane a quick hug and ran down the stairs and out the door.
Rory walked across the street, thinking of the things that Lane had said. Before she even realized it, she was at the door to Luke's. She came in and sat at the counter. Jess brought over a mug and filled it. "Good morning, sunshine!" he said a little more enthusiastically than usual, leaning across the counter for a kiss. Most of the townspeople in the diner turned and looked at him when he said it.
"Hey," she answered, still lost in thought.
"So, do you know what you want?" Jess asked, pulling out his order book.
"Huh? What I want?" Rory stammered, not thinking about breakfast, but about him, about his body, about his love and affection.
"You know, breakfast? Pancakes? French toast?" Jess said with a laugh.
"Oh, I'll just have a muffin and a coffee to go, I've got a lot of studying to do before my mom gets home, so I need to go," she stammered.
"Okey dokey," Jess said with a puzzled look, putting a muffin in a bag and filling up a to-go container.
Luke said out of breath as he rushed into the diner from the apartment, still buttoning his flannel shirt. "Oh, hey Rory, how's it going?"
"It's going just fine, Uncle Luke!" Jess said with a smile as he took the coffee pot and went out to do refills. He hesitated briefly to swat Luke on the arm in a 'hey-pal' sort of way.
"What's wrong with him?" Luke asked Rory.
"Um, beats me, well, gotta go," Rory said in a rush, trying not to blush too deeply for Luke to notice. "Bye Jess!" she said as she ran out the door with her muffin and coffee.
He looked up from the cup he was pouring. "Bye." He wondered why she was acting to strange. In the back of his mind, he wondered if she was regretting what had happened this morning, maybe that's why she's so skittish.
"What's wrong with Rory?" Luke asked as Jess came back around the counter.
"Beats me," Jess shrugged.
"Come on," Luke growled, dragging Jess into the storeroom and closing the door.
"Spill it, what did you do to her?" Luke was pissed.
"Nothing! Geesh, why would you think that her mood is my fault?" Jess threw his hands up in disgust.
"Jess." Luke growled.
"Look, we spent the night together last night - but NOTHING happened," Jess emphasized the last two words.
"What?! Jess! Geez, you can't be doing this! Lorelai is going to freak out again, and it'll be all MY FAULT!" Luke threw his hands up too.
"Look, can we just drop this? I don't like the idea of discussing my sex life with you." Jess said irritated.
Luke narrowed his eyes. "I don't want to HEAR you talking about having a sex life with Rory!"
"Geez, Luke, I'm not going to hurt her. I love her too much to do anything that she isn't ready for, so let's just drop it, okay?" Jess said with finality.
"What? What did you say? Did you say that you love her? Have you told her that?" Luke said in complete surprise.
"Huh? Oh.well, no, I haven't said that yet, I mean, it's not something you just blurt out, like 'hey, nice weather we're having, oh by the way I love you'," Jess stammered.
Luke crossed his arms. "Jess, listen, if you wait until the PERFECT time to tell her, you might miss the chance to ever do it, believe me."
"Like you did with Lorelai?" Jess raised an eyebrow.
Luke sighed. "Yeah, like me, I had a couple chances and never did it.."
"You still can, you know, you should tell her how you feel about her," Jess said sympathetically.
Luke cleared his throat. "Look, we're not here to talk about my problems, you need to talk to Rory, let her know how you feel."
"Okay, I'll go over after my shift is over and talk to her about it," Jess said, giving in.
"Good. Let's get back to work," Luke said and they left the storeroom.
Meanwhile, Rory spent most of the morning in her room, doing homework. She did her best to keep her mind on the subject at hand, but Jess kept creeping back. She eventually moved all of her books into the living room, since she couldn't concentrate with the bed right in front of her.
"Lucy, I'm home! And you got some 'splaining to do!" Lorelai roared as she came in the door.
"Huh?" Rory asked, wondering if Babette had seen Jess leave this morning and had already cornered Lorelai to tell her.
"Oh nothing, I just need coffee, and you know how the 'I Love Lucy' references just pop out of my mouth when I need coffee," she said dropping all of her luggage.
"Where's Alex?" Rory asked, peeking up from behind
"He had to go pick up his kids for the week, so he had to leave right away. So, how about that coffee? Luke's?" she said flopping down on the couch next to Rory, causing half of her books to fly off the couch. "Oops," she said trying to pick the books up in some order.
"Hey mom, can we, um, talk first?" Rory asked tentatively.
"Sure hun, what about?" Lorelai asked, obviously not thinking about her curt warning to Rory the day before.
"Well, I wanted to tell you about last night." she started.
"Oh!!! The dinner with Emily! Oh my god, how did it go? Was Jess a jerk? Was Emily a witch? Oh! Tell me, tell me everything!" she squealed while bouncing up and down on the couch, spilling even more books.
"First, you need to calm down! Second, Jess was great. He got there late, but it was because of traffic. And he was all dressed up nice, and he was very polite to grandma, and I found out that he's applied to two colleges to be near me, and he wants to take creative writing and become a writer and. he was just so wonderful and." she hesitated and started to cry a little.
"What's wrong? Oh my god, did he hurt you? Did he start a fight or something? I'll kill him!" Lorelai started to freak out.
"No!!! Nothing like that!! He was perfect. Grandma loved him, she even asked him to come back when Grandpa is back in town," she tried to calm down.
"So what's the problem, sweets? It sounds like things are going great!" Lorelai was confused.
Rory cleared her throat. "Well, things are going really, really great. I mean, really great. And I know you're going to be mad.but he slept over last night."
"What?!! Rory! I'm so disappointed in you! I told you this would happen!" she stood up flailing her arms.
"Mom! Nothing happened! I mean, not nothing, but not THAT," Rory pleaded.
"Okay, so THAT didn't happen. What DID happen?" Lorelai sat down and put her hands in her face. Rory sat there, wringing her hands in her lap.
"Well.we slept in my bed together. But I had my pajamas on and he had his boxers on. Well, I took my top off, but it wasn't his idea for me to do that, he was sleeping when I did that, oh geez, that really makes me sound like a slut, doesn't it? Oh geez, I was the one who wanted to go further and he said no, and he stopped me, he said that I was moving too fast and that my first time should be special because it wasn't special when he did it for the first time and he regrets it, and then he said something about there should be flowers and candles and music."
"Okay, okay, take a breath, sweets," Lorelai said, her eyes sympathetic to Rory's rant.
Rory caught her breath. ".And then this morning, he woke up and saw that I wasn't wearing my top and."
"Okay, stop there." Lorelai interrupted holding out her hand in a 'stop' motion. "I can figure out what happened. But all other clothing stayed on, right?"
"Yes. Second base stuff only," Rory said with a nod.
"Okay, then. I guess we need to talk about the future. Things that will eventually happen. I'll make an appointment for the doctor and we'll get you on.birth control," Lorelai stammered on those last two words. "Oh, my baby, going on birth control, agh!" she threw her hands up.
"Um, yeah, I guess that would be a good idea," Rory paused, not sure if she should say it or not. "Mom, I love Jess,"
"You love him. Oh. Hmmm. And he loves you?" Lorelai was also trying to calm down, but the subject matter wasn't helping.
"Well, he hasn't said so, but I'm pretty sure he feels that way, I don't know, I've been so confused since this morning, and I talked to Lane and she said that I shouldn't say it first because he might not want to hear it, then I saw him at the diner and I could barely say a word to him, and then LUKE! I saw Luke and totally freaked and ran out of there." Rory put her face in her hands. "God, why I do I keep screwing everything up?" she moaned, fighting back tears.
Lorelai smoothed her hair. "Hey, you haven't screwed up anything. Talk to him later. And if it feels right, say it, don't worry that he hasn't said it first, just say it. And if he doesn't want to hear it, well then, that's his loss. You might be surprised. I would hate to see you not say it and then regret having the chance to," Lorelai said thoughtfully.
Rory studied her mother. "Is there someone you wished to you said it to, but didn't?"
"Well.naw! Forget it, it'll never happen," she said quietly.
"Is it Luke?" Rory asked quietly back.
"Yeah," Lorelai stated and got up to bring her luggage up the stairs to her room. Rory heard her close her bedroom door gently and flop on the bed. Rory just sighed. She would not let this go. She had to tell him.
Up next: Rory and Jess have something to say to each other.or do they chicken out?
Who are you and what did you do with Jess?
Chapter 3
Rory drank her coffee sitting at her desk with a textbook in front of her. She couldn't seem to focus - her eyes kept getting drawn back to her unmade bed, and the events of the previous night and early morning. She sighed and smiled. **God, I love him** she thought then caught herself. "Oh my god!" she screamed to no one in particular, standing up and knocking her chair over.
"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god," she squealed, picking up clothes and rushing into the bathroom to take a shower. She quickly showered and dressed and rushed out the door, barely having time to put her coat on.
She ran up to the Kim residence and rang the bell. Lane's mother answered.
"It's very early, why are you here so very early?" Mrs. Kim announced loudly.
"Oh, I need to talk to Lane if that's okay, Mrs. Kim, it's kind of important," Rory said out of breath.
"You in trouble?" Mrs. Kim asked, squinting her eyes at Rory.
"Oh no, no, no, just some good news I need to share," she said pleadingly.
"Okay, five minutes," Mrs. Kim allowed her into the house. Rory ran up the stairs to Lane's room and knocked loudly. Lane opened it and Rory rushed her back into her room and closed the door.
"I love Jess!" Rory announced excitedly.
"What?" Lane asked in confusion.
"Oh my god, I was sitting there with my coffee, and thinking of what happened when we woke up together this morning, and .." Rory was pacing and flailing her arms wildly, ranting.
"What?!" Lane asked again excitedly, interrupting the rant. "Wait, you slept together?! Does Lorelai know????"
"No! No, I mean yes, I mean, we slept together as in sleeping, not as in, you know, SLEPT, and no, my mom is in New York with Alex" Rory tried to explain.
"So you slept in the same bed and then he told you he loves you?" Lane asked clasping her hands together in excitement.
"No, he didn't actually say it, but you should have seen him last night at my grandmother's. He was so polite and friendly to her. He really made a great impression. And he told her that he's already applied to both Uconn and So Conn State to study creative writing and will go to whichever one is closest to the school that I pick!"
"Wait, are you sure he was Jess?" Lane asked. "I mean did you ever see 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'? Should we go look for pods? Because that does NOT sound like the Jess we know."
"I know, I know, but he did it for me, he was so wonderful, then we came home and my mom is in New York and Luke was staying over Nicole's, and we just decided to stay together, and although we didn't do IT, it was so nice, just being in his arms, and waking up with him, except for the morning breath thing, but I'm not sure you can really get around that." Rory started to rant again.
"Wow! So go back to the 'I love Jess' part"
"Well, I don't know. I was just sitting there thinking about all the things that have happened, and I just thought, 'God, I love that guy' and then I freaked! I mean, I never just had that thought with Dean, not like, okay, that's how I feel now. So what do I do about it? Should I tell him?"
"Ooh, I don't know if you should tell him.I mean, what if he isn't ready for that? What if he freaks out and breaks up with you? I don't know if Jess is prepared." Lane said cautiously. Rory sulked a little.
"Yeah, you may be right. I guess I'll wait until he says it," Rory said dejectedly, wondering how long it would be until that happened, IF it would EVER happen.
"Hey, don't get upset, he'll say it when he's ready, he will, SOON," Lane tried to reassure her, but knew that her wheels were spinning and she'd be thinking about it for a while.
"So what are you going to tell your mom?" Lane asked trying to change the subject (a little).
"I'm not sure, but I have to tell her he spent the night, I mean, I'm sure half of Stars Hollow was watching the house to see when he dropped me off and when he got home, you know how nosey everybody is around here," Rory stated and Lane nodded her agreement.
"Time's up!" Mrs. Kim yelled up the stairs. Both Lane and Rory jumped.
"Gotta go! Thanks for letting me rant!" Rory said, giving Lane a quick hug and ran down the stairs and out the door.
Rory walked across the street, thinking of the things that Lane had said. Before she even realized it, she was at the door to Luke's. She came in and sat at the counter. Jess brought over a mug and filled it. "Good morning, sunshine!" he said a little more enthusiastically than usual, leaning across the counter for a kiss. Most of the townspeople in the diner turned and looked at him when he said it.
"Hey," she answered, still lost in thought.
"So, do you know what you want?" Jess asked, pulling out his order book.
"Huh? What I want?" Rory stammered, not thinking about breakfast, but about him, about his body, about his love and affection.
"You know, breakfast? Pancakes? French toast?" Jess said with a laugh.
"Oh, I'll just have a muffin and a coffee to go, I've got a lot of studying to do before my mom gets home, so I need to go," she stammered.
"Okey dokey," Jess said with a puzzled look, putting a muffin in a bag and filling up a to-go container.
Luke said out of breath as he rushed into the diner from the apartment, still buttoning his flannel shirt. "Oh, hey Rory, how's it going?"
"It's going just fine, Uncle Luke!" Jess said with a smile as he took the coffee pot and went out to do refills. He hesitated briefly to swat Luke on the arm in a 'hey-pal' sort of way.
"What's wrong with him?" Luke asked Rory.
"Um, beats me, well, gotta go," Rory said in a rush, trying not to blush too deeply for Luke to notice. "Bye Jess!" she said as she ran out the door with her muffin and coffee.
He looked up from the cup he was pouring. "Bye." He wondered why she was acting to strange. In the back of his mind, he wondered if she was regretting what had happened this morning, maybe that's why she's so skittish.
"What's wrong with Rory?" Luke asked as Jess came back around the counter.
"Beats me," Jess shrugged.
"Come on," Luke growled, dragging Jess into the storeroom and closing the door.
"Spill it, what did you do to her?" Luke was pissed.
"Nothing! Geesh, why would you think that her mood is my fault?" Jess threw his hands up in disgust.
"Jess." Luke growled.
"Look, we spent the night together last night - but NOTHING happened," Jess emphasized the last two words.
"What?! Jess! Geez, you can't be doing this! Lorelai is going to freak out again, and it'll be all MY FAULT!" Luke threw his hands up too.
"Look, can we just drop this? I don't like the idea of discussing my sex life with you." Jess said irritated.
Luke narrowed his eyes. "I don't want to HEAR you talking about having a sex life with Rory!"
"Geez, Luke, I'm not going to hurt her. I love her too much to do anything that she isn't ready for, so let's just drop it, okay?" Jess said with finality.
"What? What did you say? Did you say that you love her? Have you told her that?" Luke said in complete surprise.
"Huh? Oh.well, no, I haven't said that yet, I mean, it's not something you just blurt out, like 'hey, nice weather we're having, oh by the way I love you'," Jess stammered.
Luke crossed his arms. "Jess, listen, if you wait until the PERFECT time to tell her, you might miss the chance to ever do it, believe me."
"Like you did with Lorelai?" Jess raised an eyebrow.
Luke sighed. "Yeah, like me, I had a couple chances and never did it.."
"You still can, you know, you should tell her how you feel about her," Jess said sympathetically.
Luke cleared his throat. "Look, we're not here to talk about my problems, you need to talk to Rory, let her know how you feel."
"Okay, I'll go over after my shift is over and talk to her about it," Jess said, giving in.
"Good. Let's get back to work," Luke said and they left the storeroom.
Meanwhile, Rory spent most of the morning in her room, doing homework. She did her best to keep her mind on the subject at hand, but Jess kept creeping back. She eventually moved all of her books into the living room, since she couldn't concentrate with the bed right in front of her.
"Lucy, I'm home! And you got some 'splaining to do!" Lorelai roared as she came in the door.
"Huh?" Rory asked, wondering if Babette had seen Jess leave this morning and had already cornered Lorelai to tell her.
"Oh nothing, I just need coffee, and you know how the 'I Love Lucy' references just pop out of my mouth when I need coffee," she said dropping all of her luggage.
"Where's Alex?" Rory asked, peeking up from behind
"He had to go pick up his kids for the week, so he had to leave right away. So, how about that coffee? Luke's?" she said flopping down on the couch next to Rory, causing half of her books to fly off the couch. "Oops," she said trying to pick the books up in some order.
"Hey mom, can we, um, talk first?" Rory asked tentatively.
"Sure hun, what about?" Lorelai asked, obviously not thinking about her curt warning to Rory the day before.
"Well, I wanted to tell you about last night." she started.
"Oh!!! The dinner with Emily! Oh my god, how did it go? Was Jess a jerk? Was Emily a witch? Oh! Tell me, tell me everything!" she squealed while bouncing up and down on the couch, spilling even more books.
"First, you need to calm down! Second, Jess was great. He got there late, but it was because of traffic. And he was all dressed up nice, and he was very polite to grandma, and I found out that he's applied to two colleges to be near me, and he wants to take creative writing and become a writer and. he was just so wonderful and." she hesitated and started to cry a little.
"What's wrong? Oh my god, did he hurt you? Did he start a fight or something? I'll kill him!" Lorelai started to freak out.
"No!!! Nothing like that!! He was perfect. Grandma loved him, she even asked him to come back when Grandpa is back in town," she tried to calm down.
"So what's the problem, sweets? It sounds like things are going great!" Lorelai was confused.
Rory cleared her throat. "Well, things are going really, really great. I mean, really great. And I know you're going to be mad.but he slept over last night."
"What?!! Rory! I'm so disappointed in you! I told you this would happen!" she stood up flailing her arms.
"Mom! Nothing happened! I mean, not nothing, but not THAT," Rory pleaded.
"Okay, so THAT didn't happen. What DID happen?" Lorelai sat down and put her hands in her face. Rory sat there, wringing her hands in her lap.
"Well.we slept in my bed together. But I had my pajamas on and he had his boxers on. Well, I took my top off, but it wasn't his idea for me to do that, he was sleeping when I did that, oh geez, that really makes me sound like a slut, doesn't it? Oh geez, I was the one who wanted to go further and he said no, and he stopped me, he said that I was moving too fast and that my first time should be special because it wasn't special when he did it for the first time and he regrets it, and then he said something about there should be flowers and candles and music."
"Okay, okay, take a breath, sweets," Lorelai said, her eyes sympathetic to Rory's rant.
Rory caught her breath. ".And then this morning, he woke up and saw that I wasn't wearing my top and."
"Okay, stop there." Lorelai interrupted holding out her hand in a 'stop' motion. "I can figure out what happened. But all other clothing stayed on, right?"
"Yes. Second base stuff only," Rory said with a nod.
"Okay, then. I guess we need to talk about the future. Things that will eventually happen. I'll make an appointment for the doctor and we'll get you on.birth control," Lorelai stammered on those last two words. "Oh, my baby, going on birth control, agh!" she threw her hands up.
"Um, yeah, I guess that would be a good idea," Rory paused, not sure if she should say it or not. "Mom, I love Jess,"
"You love him. Oh. Hmmm. And he loves you?" Lorelai was also trying to calm down, but the subject matter wasn't helping.
"Well, he hasn't said so, but I'm pretty sure he feels that way, I don't know, I've been so confused since this morning, and I talked to Lane and she said that I shouldn't say it first because he might not want to hear it, then I saw him at the diner and I could barely say a word to him, and then LUKE! I saw Luke and totally freaked and ran out of there." Rory put her face in her hands. "God, why I do I keep screwing everything up?" she moaned, fighting back tears.
Lorelai smoothed her hair. "Hey, you haven't screwed up anything. Talk to him later. And if it feels right, say it, don't worry that he hasn't said it first, just say it. And if he doesn't want to hear it, well then, that's his loss. You might be surprised. I would hate to see you not say it and then regret having the chance to," Lorelai said thoughtfully.
Rory studied her mother. "Is there someone you wished to you said it to, but didn't?"
"Well.naw! Forget it, it'll never happen," she said quietly.
"Is it Luke?" Rory asked quietly back.
"Yeah," Lorelai stated and got up to bring her luggage up the stairs to her room. Rory heard her close her bedroom door gently and flop on the bed. Rory just sighed. She would not let this go. She had to tell him.
Up next: Rory and Jess have something to say to each other.or do they chicken out?
