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A/N: Still not beta'd, so please be gentle. Reviews are appreciated, as is constructive criticism.

Chapter Two

When Luke and Jess got home that night after the dinner shift, Jess went to change out of her school clothes which were an off the shoulder leotard that would have shown cleavage if she'd had any to show, her school jeans and a pair of worn loafers. It was eight-thirty and she found Will in his room practicing his addition and subtraction. The kid was another Rory, no question. He rarely watched cartoons, or TV of any kind. He hated comic books and since the time he could read he'd been subscribing to Science Weekly. On her way to her room she saw him hunched over his desk, writing furiously away.

"Watcha doing?" she asked. Will, at five, was the spitting image of Lorelai with glossy black hair, pale but defined features, and sharp blue eyes

"I am practicing my math," he explained in clipped, precise words. Will had had a slight lisp when he was learning to talk and it was one of those thing he hated and ground out of himself, striving for perfection even as a lurching toddler.

Tonight, he was dressed in neatly pressed pajamas with a bathrobe carefully knotted at his waist. Jess took note of the pleated khakis and polo shirt hanging on the closet doorknob. She would bet that he even had his loafers and a pair of navy socks picked out, too, somewhere. For all his affinity for Lorelai, he was nothing like her in personality. She was in the living room right now watching Bridezillas while on the phone with Rory who was watching the same.

As if conjured into the room by these thoughts, Will suddenly looked up and said, apropos of nothing, "When will Rory have the baby?"

Jess pulled up the spare chair that Will kept near his desk and sat down on it, watching his numbers and the careful way he'd erase something when he made a mistake. "I think she said at the end of the month, so only a couple more weeks."

With a nod, as if she'd just confirmed his own dire suspicions, Will said, "And will the baby be our brother or sister?" His forehead was creased and Jess knew that this was something that Lorelai and Luke had explained a couple of times. The closeness in age between Will and the coming baby confused him. He couldn't understand how he himself was Rory's half-brother and any child she might have would be his half-niece or nephew.

"Not quite," Jess answered gently. "You're Rory's brother. So you'll be the baby's uncle. Like Luke is my uncle, because he's my mother's brother."

The crease in Will's forehead deepened and he frowned trying to get it. He'd never understood how he and Jess weren't brother and sister. They lived in the same house with the same parents and they acted like brother and sister, so….

"Grandma and Grandpa are really excited," Will told her looking back down at the problem he was working on.

"They were here?"

"Grandma came by with a telescope for me and to say that she'd seen Rory today and she looked like she was going to burst. Rory's not going to die is she?"

"No," Jess said. "Women have babies all the time. Rory's going to be fine. And Marty will be there in the delivery room with her so he'll make extra sure."

Will nodded. Everybody in the family liked Marty. Their courtship had been long and arduous, not unlike the courtship that had occurred between Luke and Lorelai.

"So Grandma brought you a telescope?" Emily strikes again. The kid was the slightest bit inclined toward science and she'd gone her usual overboard. "Mommy said I couldn't keep it, though. Mommy said she could buy me a telescope. And then Grandma said why didn't she if she could, and then Mommy said she just hadn't thought of it and then Grandma said maybe she should think about her children for a change."

Will looked up at her and smiled. "But then I did the puppy eyes and she let me keep it."

Jess held up her hand and Will high-fived her. "Good job."

As Luke watched Jess round the corner of the kitchen and head toward her room, he followed the sound of his wife's voice into the living room and found her on the couch watching something on TV that looked awful. She was on the phone with Rory he guessed, based on Lorelai's end of the conversation, so he sat down, leaned his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. A moment later the phone clicked off and he felt one feminine hand casually inch up the denim along his leg.

He opened one eye and saw that she was leaning close, a smile playing across her mouth. "Hi honey," she said. "How was your day?"

Leaning forward to steal a kiss, he said with a shake of his head, "It started okay and went steadily downhill. I had to talk to Jess about sex with the predictable results."

"You had a sex talk without me?" She looked intrigued.

"It had to be done. Or maybe it didn't. I don't know." Luke filled her in on what had happened with the boy in the store and then the awkward conversation in the truck.

"It had to be done," Lorelai concurred. "Do you believe her? About not having sex yet?"

"I have no reason not to believe her," Luke said. "But it still worries me. She's still so young, you know? I don't want to see her get hurt and kids today are doing things at younger and younger ages."

Lorelai nodded and didn't speak for a few minutes. Then she said, "My mother stopped by today."

Luke's head again dropped to the back of the sofa and he closed his eyes in mock exasperation. "Six years and that woman still hates me," he murmured.

"She doesn't hate you," Lorelai assured him. "She just thinks you never were and never will be good enough for me."

"Right."

"But you helped give her a grandson who is, if possible, even more of a perfect specimen than Rory was and for that she will always be grateful." She told him about the telescope and Luke nodded.

Will was his mother's son: he sided with her in ever argument, he rarely left her side in public, when he awoke from a bad dream he only wanted her, he would much rather hang around the Dragonfly than come sit at the counter at the diner, as Jess had always enjoyed. Lorelai always patiently explained that he would grow out of it. As soon as he discovered that all of his friends and their dads fished together in the summertime, he'd want some of that, too. Luke only nodded, though, not completely convinced. It did even out, though. Lorelai had Will and Luke had Jess.

While they all really did get along and the warmth between them was genuine, Luke had been Jessie's sole parent for a while, and that left them with a closeness that no one, not even her mother could touch. It was true that Liz had signed away custody of Jessie all those years ago and rather than have a conversation with her daughter about it, she had left it to Luke to explain, which he had done beautifully.

For her part, the feelings had been decidedly mixed. Jessie was very sad to see the evidence of her mother's lack of interest in her; but, on the other hand, her Uncle Luke was her best friend and she found that as the months passed, she didn't miss her mother as much as she thought she would.

"Are you upset that I let him have it?" she asked. "The telescope."

"That was always your thing, not mine," Luke said in an even tone. "She can give him the moon and it wouldn't bother me. You're the one that sets the limits."

Lorelai was quiet again for a moment before saying, "I just don't want…" When she didn't finish Luke took her hand and said, "I know." Because he did know. He knew how Emily could be and he knew what Lorelai was afraid of. It's what made him feel okay about letting her have her way when it came to Emily.

When Emily had come to the hospital to see her grandson for the first time, she had been near tears with happiness. She'd been so crazy with joy that she'd even given Luke a hug, something neither had been able to repeat or talk about since.

Jessie had been there, of course, and to make sure that she didn't feel unappreciated with all the new-baby stuff, Luke had just bought her her first pair of toe shoes and she'd entertained Emily in the waiting room with pirouettes and plies and all the other ballet moves she'd been studying for two years. Somehow, neither Luke nor Lorelai had ever been able to figure out how, but somehow Jessie had gotten to the old lady that day.

Over the years Emily and Richard spoiled little Will to distraction, but equality was their mainstay and they tended to fuss over Jessie, too. There was never a present for Will unless there was one for Jessie, too, and when Luke had awkwardly expressed his thanks to Emily at the end of one excruciating Christmas dinner, Emily had imperiously raised one eyebrow and said, "Luke you cannot expect two children growing up in the same house to be satisfied with favoritism."

She'd said this as if he hadn't already known it. As if having to explain it to him had only increased her disdain for him. And all he'd wanted to do was thank her for recognizing the situation and acting accordingly.

He forgave her eventually. He saw that Emily took as much pleasure in doting on Jessie as she took from doting on Rory and Will and for that if nothing else, Emily won Luke's heart. She could treat him any way she wanted; as long as she was kind to the people dearest to him, he didn't care.

Jess left Will a little bit later and went to her room to change. Sam would be getting home soon and she needed to talk to her.

Sam, Samantha Carter, was Jess' only friend. They met on the first day of Freshman year in English class when they'd been paired up to work on an Emily Dickinson poem together for a presentation. Sam had just moved to Stupid Hollow, as she referred to the town, from New York. Her dad was an investment banker who'd left her mother with nothing, according to Sam's mother, Joanne. The divorce was ongoing and acrimonious. Sam pined for the city and hated the country. She and her mother would have terrible fights that always ended with her threat to go and live with her father. Joanne would simply scream back that she doubted her father wanted anything to do with her since he was probably busy screwing his secretary. Sam always wept after these fights and after a couple of months she'd start coming over to Jess's to sleep over. Since they went to the same school and they never gave Luke or Lorelai a problem when it came time to get up for school in the morning, everyone was okay with it.

About mid-way through Freshman year Sam showed up at school with jet-black hair. Her peaches and cream complexion didn't really work with the drastic and harsh new look. Her natural cherubic blonde self seemed buried under the heavy looking color. Jess didn't say anything, though. It was obvious to her, if not to any of the adults, that Sam was looking for a way to get her father's attention. If she did something so crazy and outlandish that her mother had to call her father, she would win. Her father would drive up, take one look at the ridiculous town her mother had taken them to, see how it was affecting his precious girl, and take her home immediately.

This didn't happen so the next week Sam added royal blue streaks to the blackened mess. Still nothing.

A month later, Sam got her nosed pierced and started overeating. Within three months, her natural curves filled out even more and her clothes got tight. She was only about five foot two but she didn't care that her height couldn't handle the extra weight. She was waiting for her father to come save her.

Now, in late September of their Sophmore year, Sam still had not seen her father since her mother had moved them to Connecticut last summer. She dressed exclusively in black, still had the black hair, although the streaks of color changed every now and then, made her jewelry out of safety pins and black leather, wore combat boots, and was still Jess' closest friend.

How the ballerina and the misfit bonded, the grownups had no idea, Jess was sure. But they seemed to understand each other. Sam had been brought to Connecticut against her will, as had Jessie all those years ago. Sam was estranged from her father as Jess was estranged from her mother. The only real difference was that Sam had dated some in New York and was fairly experienced and for Jess talking to a boy was completely out of the question.

When Sam needed a part-time job, Jess and stepped in and brought her to Luke. Lane now lived in New York with Zach and the other band members, playing clubs and working the music scene there. With Jess taking more and more dance classes Luke had needed part-time help. Sam, for all her rebellious tendencies was a surprisingly responsible and adept employee.

Now, as Jess dialed the familiar numbers on the phone in her room, she was praying her friend would be home. After a few moments of ringing, the phone was picked up by Joanne who answered with a gruff, "Hul-lo?"

"Hi, Mrs. Carter, it's Jess. Is Sam home yet?"

"Hang on," Joanne said. Then Jess heard Joanne yell in the background, "Hey! Phone!"

A few more minutes passed before Jess heard another phone in the house pick up and Joanne's end go down. "Hey," Sam said.

"Hey," Jess said.

"What's new?"

"You'll never guess."

"Tell me!" Sam cried, knowing Jess wasn't one to cry wolf.

"I saw Tim at the store today!"

"No way!" Sam squealed. "Omigod! Did he say anything to you?"

"No," Jess answered, deflating. "He didn't even see me. I…I saw him and then hid."

"Perfectly understandable," Sam told her.

"I'm such a dork!"

"So not," Sam defended.

"Ugh. I hid behind bras and I did it in front of Uncle Luke. And then he asked me if I was having sex with boys. It was awful."

"Ick!" Sam agreed. "What did you say?"

"I told him I didn't want to talk about it."

"And what did he say?"

"He said he didn't want to see me get hurt and that sex is complicated."

"Gross!"

"I know. I wanted to die."

"You know what, though?"

"What?"

"Your uncle Luke is hot. I bet he and Lorelai have sex all the time."

"EW!" Jess screeched.

Sam giggled and said, "I would want to if I was Lorelai."

"Shutupshutupshutupshutup!"

"Okay, okay! What are you doing this weekend?"

"Same thing we do every weekend. Friday night dinner in Hartford, work at the diner, do homework."

"Let's go to the mall."

"Okay," Jess agreed, without any real enthusiasm.

They made plans and then said goodnight, knowing they'd be seeing each other the next day at school. Jess hung up still thinking about Tim Zachary and the sports bras. He was so gorgeous. He was perfectly tanned all year round, his blonde hair, perfectly gelled even in the rain, his green eyes the perfect shade, his smile perfectly white. It was almost as if he'd come from a magazine.

Jess closed her eyes and pictured him. She was standing at her locker and he came up to her, as if he'd been doing it for years. She looked up at him shyly and he smiled, and then he leaned down as if he were going to whisper in her ear. She leaned toward him holding her breath and tilted her head slightly to give him better access and to better hear whatever it was he was going to say. Instead, though, she felt him take the delicate skin of her earlobe into his warm mouth, and her own mouth fell open and her stomach dropped out from her insides and her knees wanted to buckle, so she took hold of his shirt in one hand and said, "Uh." He didn't seem to notice, or if he did, it just made him suckle harder, opening his mouth and sweeping his tongue along the crest of her ear making her flush with heat as a flood of warmth collected and settled inside her.

A sudden knock on her bedroom door made her eyes fly open. Swallowing hard, Jess sat up on the bed called, "Yeah!"

The door opened and Uncle Luke stuck his head in. "Just wanted to say goodnight." He stepped into the room and noticed that she was frowning and a little flushed. "You finished all your homework at the diner, right?"

"Uh-huh," she said, sitting up way too straight on the bed, her long legs stuck out in front of her, toes pointed. She was having trouble meeting his eyes.

"Okay." Luke hesitated and then came further into the room and dropped a kiss onto the top of her head. "Night then, Jess."

"Night," she answered and tipped her head away from him, keeping her hands in her lap.