A/N: It's been a while huh? Thank you to every one who reviewed, it's nice to know someone's reading, and to those of you who have pushing me to update; thank you reminders, I get side tracked easily. :-) Anyway, on with the story.

Kari

Chapter 33

The old wood planks creaked and bent slightly, making him aware that his hiding place had been found out.

"So..." she sat next to him, dangling her feet over the edge like a little girl.

"You came looking for me, so you go."

"I have feeling that this whole hiding away thing means your troubles are much more...advanced than my latest freak outs. You go."

Jess stared into the water, "I'm not feeling very talkative, you go."

"Jess." Rory said seriously.

"Fine, you want to follow up on what Lorelai tells you about my last little screw up?" He was getting more and more uncomfortable in the situation.

"Don't attack me, if you don't wanna talk don't. We'll just sit here." Rory shrugged, swinging her feet. Jess looked over at her, agitated by her silence.

"I'm thirty-eight Ror, I should be able to handle things like these," he broke, staring into the water, "You, you dealt with a baby at twenty-two. I can't even handle an almost grown one at thirty-eight."

"Jess, you're great with kids..."

"But I'm not ready to be a father." he countered.

"No one's asking you to be, the kid already has a dad." Rory reasoned.

"Like I had one?" Jess cut her off heatedly. It clicked, in that second she realized why this was so hard for him, "I just don't wan to be one of those guys my mother constantly paraded around that didn't give a damn."

"The fact that you're so upset about this is proof that you're not."

"Doesn't really matter though, does it?"

"Why not? Why can't you go fix things?"

"Can we talk about something else?"

"That serious about this girl huh?"

"Ror." he replied firmly, yet pleadingly.

"Okay then, Tristan wants me to move in with him." Rory said casually, knowing it would jolt him out of his silent brooding self.

Jess raise his eyebrows, "And..."

She took a deep breath, "I don't know...it's just...too-"

"Soon?" Jess supplied knowingly.

"Kinda, I just know us...I know the way we work...we'll screw it up all over again this way."

He had to give her some credit for taking off the rose colored glasses.

"Can't live life afraid to move." he mumbled, speaking primarily to himself, and hating what it meant.

Rory smiled wryly, "You got wiser in your old age."

Jess smiled and shook his head, "Must've been that thumbing through of Luke's old self help books."

"That'll do it."

--

"Alex, we can't just leave, can we?" Lana grabbed his arm

"That'd be the ideal." he raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"You're the one that hates him, if anything I'd thought you'd be with me here."

Lana pushed the door open a crack only to find them where they had been only a second before.

"What're you gonna do Lan? Tap him on the shoulder and say 'Could you please get off my friend?'" Alex imitated her voice. She threw a few daggers at him.

"I was thinking of something more like this," she countered, sweeping the pot and pans from the stove to the floor.

"That's another way to do it." Alex said absently, looking over the still trembling lids.

--

He should've felt better about this. This kind of thing... it wasn't new to him. The couches, names and the faces all seemed blurred to his memory, even while he was living them, but this couch, this name, and this face were etched in differently. The reason was completely elusive to Travis, every time he pushed back the thought it leaped back at him.

Something was wrong with this picture, his head kept pointing out, it shouldn't have been this simple.

"What?" Emma smirked when he broke the kiss, "I'm not aloud to play your game?"

Travis looked her over and shook his head, a wry laugh rolling about his head.

"No, thought I heard something." he attempted to brush his thoughts swiftly back where they had come from.

"Did you?" she asked plainly and unhurried, her questioning face becoming a little more serious.

"It was nothing." he persisted.

She gave a restrained smile, "I'd better leave anyway,"

"Emma?" he caught her standing up. She wished he would just leave it alone for then, but he still didn't know any better.

In the moment she paused he had pulled her into another kiss and she gave in, forgetting completely why wanted to leave and remembering the reasons she gave in to him before.

A cough broke into their consciousness. Emma looked to see Lana and Alex standing sheepishly at the kitchen door. She looked back and forth between them and Travis, who was as cool and calm as always.

"Well fuck." she mumbled angry with herself and walked out the door.

The other three stood awkwardly, trying not to look at each other and not sure of what to say.

"Wouldn't this be a good time to- uh maybe, I don't know, go after her?" Alex suggested sarcastically. Travis nodded and left, still not believing any of it.

--

The bells above the door clanged as the two stepped through. There was a certain 'air' about the diner in that moment. Too...subdued, consciously subdued.

Rory observed cautiously how the eyes of the all too interested town's people lingered on them as they entered.

"Is it just me or..."

"They're always like this," Jess shrugged her off, rolling his eyes.

"Right," she nodded, taking a seat at the counter.

"Hey Luke." Rory greeted.

"Hi Rory," seeing Jess a fleck of apprehension appeared in his eyes, "Jess, someone here to see you."

"How ya doing Jess." a girl's voice said softly, coming from the entrance to the stairs.

Rory, along with a good percentage of the diner, looked over at Jess, who stood there in a stupor.