Previously in "I am the Tower Around Which You Orbited: View from the Bathroom Floor"

Rory and Lorelai get into a fight about Jess despite his attempts to explain why they were in the lake.

Chapter Eleven: This feels like a movie ride

School today was a bust. I waited and waited and waited for the bell to ring, but it seemed to take forever. Luke was personally marching me to school these past few days to ensure that I didn't run off the Wal-Mart. I didn't think I was going there ever again. Sure, it was sufficient money, but Luke was right, it cut off from my time with Rory and also jeopardized our relationship. So, here I was, going to school, being a good little boy for as long as I could stand it, spending my working hours with Luke at the diner and my not-working hours with Rory.

In fact, Rory and I had a weekend to plan out. Now, don't get me wrong, I hate school as much as the next guy, but today was Friday, and I was more than anxious to get out of there.

At long last, the final bell. I bolted up from my seat, and out the classroom only to remember that I still had to go to detention. I swore under my breath and walked into the classroom where detention was being held.

I was the first person there, which wasn't surprising. The bell had only rung about thirty seconds ago. I chose a seat and pulled A Midsummer Night's Dream out of my back pocket, ready to read.

I had made it about a halfpage when Dean sauntered in, looking not-too-happy himself.

"Jess."

"Dean." He sat down as far away from me as possible as the two other Star's Hollow High detention-goers filed in and found seats in the room. Dean sat there, doing some sort of work; another student scratched her name into a desk with a penknife and the other guy just sat there, blankly. A lively bunch, we were.

Detention would last another forty-five minutes, and then I could go meet up with Rory at Luke's. I sat there, reading the play a second time around, trying to pick up every detail I could when Principal Merten came in, looking around the room joylessly. He sighed heavily. "You're all going to be out of my hair for two days anyway, might as well leave." The girl scratching her name into a desk looked up, and next thing I knew she was gone. Dean picked up his books and left the in the same manour he had come. The other kid just stared blankly ahead at the black board, not making any signs of movement. I stared at him quizzically, but didn't let my confusion get in the way of the miracle that had just happened, so I got up, and, putting the book back in my back pocket, left the school for the weekend.

I crossed the street to Luke's, where the usual afternoon crowd was gathered. Rory had not yet returned from Hartford, so Lorelai was sitting at the counter, staring at Luke. Luke was standing across from her, staring as well. Kirk was sitting at a table, looking distraught.

"Luke!"

"What, Kirk?"

"Can I please have my coffee?" Lorelai asked.

"Luke!"

"What, Kirk?"

"I'm waiting," Lorelai said.

"I'm not giving you coffee, yet, Lorelai."

"Luke!"

"WHAT, KIRK?"

"Nevermind." Luke looked just about ready to rip Kirk and Lorelai's heads off, and then saw me.

"Why aren't you in detention?"

"Merten let us out early."

"Joy. Now, give me coffee," Lorelai said. Luke sighed heavily and grabbed the pot.

"Rory back yet?"

"Quite obviously not. Unless, of course, you pushed her in a lake, in which case, you would already know, wouldn't you?"

"Okay, I'm sensing some mother-knows-best hostility here, so I'm going upstairs." I could feel Lorelai glaring at my back as I walked up the stairs to the apartment. I sat down on the couch, sighing heavily… it had been a long week. I had to decide whether or not I was going to quit my job at Wal-Mart.

I turned on Give 'Em Enough Rope and picked up a random book off the table. As it turned out, it was one of Luke's, so I quickly put it back, looking for Slaughterhouse 5.

I flipped through the pages, not sure what I was doing, because I obviously wasn't reading it, hummed along with Joe Strummer, and just sat there, unsure of what to do while waiting.

Suddenly, I heard Lorelai scream from downstairs. I jumped from surprise, as most people don't expect a crazy woman to scream out of the blue. However, it was Lorelai, so it either had something to do with Luke or Rory.

Then, there were footsteps coming up the stairs and Luke, Lorelai, and Rory's voices. I tensed visibly when Luke opened the door, holding a completely shocked Lorelai up. I put my book back down on the table and got up from the couch.

"Jess, could you turn that off?" Luke asked, annoyed and concerned at the same time. I leaned over and turned the Clash off, looking towards Luke and Lorelai quizzically. Rory came to stand next to me and took my arm.

"What happened?" I said, noticing blood on Lorelei's arm.

"There was a minute accident," Rory said somewhat jokingly.

"This was no minute accident. This was a life threatening, fatal wound. I shall either die or never heal. Gasp," Lorelai said mock-theatrically, feigning a damsel in distress.

"Okay, sit down now, Lorelai. I'll get the first aid kit." Luke placed Lorelai on the couch where I had been sitting moments earlier. Lorelai looked at her arm, shaking her head.

I turned to Rory, and she looked at me closely. "What happened?"

"Well, Luke wasn't really watching where he was going and he slipped on something on the ground, presumably ketchup," she said, smiling at the last part, "and he was carrying a coffee pot and it fell and broke, and it went everywhere, including Mom's arm, so now we're up here."

"So was it a scream of terror or a scream of pain?"

"Both?"

"Okay then." I pushed a stray hair behind her ear, and Lorelai laughed maliciously.

"Luke, you'd better hurry up before the mating process begins," she said loudly. I rolled my eyes and Rory stepped away to help Luke with the first aid of her mother.

"Jess?"

"Yes, Luke?"

"Could you possibly go downstairs and kill Kirk for whatever he's doing now? This might take a while," he said, glaring at Lorelai, who was making faces at him as he crouched to tend to her wounds.

I opened the door and walked down the stairs, however, I heard footsteps following me. I got out to the counter and turned around, only to see that Rory had followed me. "I'm not good with blood," she said, point-blank.

"Okay then. Cross blood off the list, I'll make a mental note," I said, smiling. She smiled back and kissed me on the lips. I didn't want her to pull away, but I had to.

"Customers," she mouthed, and then crept back upstairs. I stared after her, and then turned around to see Miss Patty, Babette and Morey sitting at a table, with Patty and Babette staring at us intently. When I turned around, they pretended to busy themselves as though they hadn't been looking. Morey just shook his head slightly.

I walked over to Kirk's table, which Kirk was under. "Can I help you, Kirk?"

"Maybe," he stammered, getting up, and hitting his head on the table in the process. I looked at him expectantly. "Oh, yeah, I lost a dime."

"A dime?"

"Yes. Mother taught me to be very particular about correct change. That was my only dime."

"Kirk…"

"Yes?"

"We have change."

"Yes, but if I don't give you correct change, then you'll just have less change for the next person who gives you a twenty and then you'll be very sorry, mister, let me tell you that."

"Kirk, just pay." He sighed and handed me a ten-dollar bill, which I took to the cash register. "Here's your change. Now leave."

Kirk stared at the money in his hand. "Is it supposed to feel like this?"

"Kirk, just leave now?"

"Wow…" he kept mumbling under his breath about change as he went out the door, making that little ringing sound as the door does. I was getting sick of that bell.

I walked over to Patty, Babette, and Morey's table just as Luke pushed Lorelai out from doorway to the apartment, followed by Rory, smiling in her mother's expense.

"No, you do not get free coffee."

"But you injured me. I should get a lifetime supply of free coffee."

"You should, but you won't. Now either stay and order or leave and do something else."

"Actually, we may have to go to get to Grandma's. I think the traffic's really bad. All stop-and-go on 84," Rory said quickly, as if to end Lorelai and Luke's playful bickering match.

"You're probably right. Okay, let's go and get ready and take as long as possible so that we're really late." Rory rolled her eyes as she took her mother's arm and pulled her out the door. "And you and I haven't finished this discussion, Luke. I'll be back."

"Bye Luke, 'bye Jess," Rory said as the bell clanged yet again and then closed.

"Okay, so what do you want?" I asked the three people at the table in front of me. Patty and Babette exchanged glances and proceeded to order. I absent-mindedly wrote down their orders while staring off at the two Gilmore girls, playfully yammering to each other about whatever it was that Gilmore girls yammered about.

I decided to quit my job at Wal-Mart, maybe just to understand that complex woman known as Lorelai Leigh Gilmore just a little bit more, or maybe just because the job sucked, or maybe just because I had decided to. For whatever reason, I knew that I was going to quit tomorrow.

THE END of chapter eleven