The seasons are proof enough that it is human nature to want what we can't have. Here in the dead, cold, bitter midst of winter, she wants spring. There in the warmth and the freedom of spring, she will find herself longing for the sun of summer. And so it goes. There is always too much of what you have. And she finds herself surrounded by it all and not wanting any of it. She wants what is ahead of her, what is just out of her reach. She wonders if once she has him, she will want something else. If once this chase is over, she'll tire of him and long for other things. Maybe she likes this longing. Maybe it is why she wakes up in the morning, because there is something she wants out there. Because everyday is another opportunity to reach out for it.
His mother lives on Plum in a house she's never seen before though she's sure she's passed it many times. It stands tall and blue with bright yellow shutters. And in the winter sun, it is so bright that her eyes are forced closed. And she stands on the sidewalk, squinting up at this house, her hands clenched in fists at her sides, her knees locking in place. She stands in front of this house on Christmas morning because she wants to give him a Christmas present. It isn't much, but she wasn't sure what to give him. She wasn't sure what was appropriate to give to someone who you only wanted to give yourself to. So she is giving him a journal, leather bound and thick for his pen to press into and his fingers to work steadily over. For his mind, his heart to be spilled onto.
She has been standing in front of his mother's house for possibly thirty minutes. She isn't sure anymore. But it's cold and her fingers have long since gone numb.
Someone opens the front door and her mind instantly knows to flee. Her feet, however, do not.
He walks out of the front door, pulling on a sweatshirt. His strong arms forcing their way through the fabric. He wraps his arms around himself and she's never seen him look more like a child: Shivering and disheveled with tired eyes on Christmas morning.
He stands on the front porch, looking out at her. His look is one of curiosity, not anger or bitterness. Not like she had expected at all. He moves down the steps, taking each one slowly, pausing in between for a few seconds before his foot falls on the next step. Eventually, he is standing at the bottom of the steps. She is still on the other side of the fence that surrounds the house. She makes no move towards him.
He unfolds his arms and pulls the sleeves of his sweatshirt down further so his hands are covered. He shrugs, looking away from her for a second. "Merry Christmas, Rory."
Her body feels stiff from the cold air and his presence. She tries to unlock her knees, but they remain tight. "I, uh, wanted to give you your Christmas present." She reaches into her bag for the package, pulling it out and noticing a tear in the flimsy wrapping paper.
He walks toward the gate in the fence and unlatches it, joining her on the other side.
"It's probably the most generic gift I've ever given somebody. And you, of all people, probably deserve a non-generic gift, but I didn't know what would be appropriate so I just….Well, I don't want to ruin the generic surprise."
He likes hearing her ramble nervously, like she used to do. It means everything isn't ruined.
He is opening it slowly and when she starts to speak, he looks up at her. He smiles. "Just shut up and let me open my present."
With that, he finishes opening it. The paper falls to the ground and he looks at the journal. His eyes moving over its surface. He opens it and flips through its pages, thick unlined recycled paper.
"I thought the non-conformist in you would enjoy unlined paper. I know you don't like feeling…confined."
He looks up at her, his eyes emanating warmth . "It's great."
She smiles fully. "Really?"
"Yeah." He pays no attention to her hand which is now resting on his forearm.
And then her face is falling to the sidewalk because she didn't just come here to give him a present. "Jess, I…" She looks down at the cracks in the cement. There is one running right between them. She places the toe of her shoe on top of it. "I think this is a little ridiculous. You and me, what we're doing. It's…."
He shoves his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt. His nose is turning red from the cold, his eyes are turning that light shade of brown. " Rory, we are what we are."
"But, we don't have to be." She can smell him, smoke and fabric softener. She takes a step back so as not to lose her head. "Why are you so against this? I know it went wrong the first time, but now we're both ready."
He shakes his head. "It's not as simple as that, Rory. There are other factors involved."
"What factors?"
"Distance, significant others, our so far tragic history, where we are in life right now." He counts each of these off with his fingers. He hesitates on the fifth one though, his pinky still not yet unfurled. "And." He bites down on the inside of his cheek. "And the timing…"
"What about the timing?"
"It's…bad." The word comes out with a cloud of breath and his eyes follow it as it twists through the air and lands in her hair.
She nods her head. "Right. Bad timing. That didn't stop you before."
"I was different then."
She starts to turn away from him slowly, nodding again. "Yeah, I guess you were." She's halfway down the sidewalk when she turns to him again. "You know, I almost miss the old you. At least then you weren't afraid when it came to what you wanted from me."
The Christmas tree spins. TJ and his mother have opted for an artificial tree that rotates. He sits in the living room, watching the lights as it spins. The colors meld together in a red, green, gold rainbow. Her hears his mother laughing in the kitchen as she tries to cook dinner for "her guys." He smells something on the burner and cringes slightly. The smoke detector goes off and this is his cue. He's been holding the dishrag for about an hour and a half. It is his job to wave away the smoke when this happens. This is the seventh time. He rolls his eyes as he waves the dishrag until the beeping stops. His mother turns to him from her position at the stove and smiles in gratitude. TJ says something from behind the refrigerator door, but it goes unnoticed by Jess.
He sits back down in the recliner by the living room window and gives his attention back to the spinning tree, the buzzing of it, the colors, the jingling of ornaments. There is one branch that always gets caught on the corner of the window sill. It's longer than any of the others. It causes the spinning to be staggered and the whole tree to shake. Something that could be so easily fixed, but no one ever bothers to cut that branch off.
He called Annalise this morning. Her voice sounded different somehow, but he hadn't questioned it. Now, thinking about it, it had been tinged with something close to guilt. And suddenly he knows how she's been spending the days without him. He isn't angry. In fact, he is the opposite. He finds himself almost overjoyed at the thought of her twisting and contorting in her sheets with David. Maybe part of it is for her, because she's got him. Finally. She's got him for now at least. Most of it is for him though. He has been thinking about the future with her and it has always felt like he's being held underwater. He can breathe now.
A date has been set. Her mother greets her excitedly with the news after she returns from her encounter with Jess. She is screaming at her and wrapping her arms around her as she walks through the door. The middle of February. The peak of the snow season, Valentine's Day, all of these reasons for the date are being listed incoherently by her mother whose smile is contagious despite everything that day has already brought.
"So where've you been? Luke's been cooking like a madman for the past four hours and I was left with no one to talk to after he exiled me from the kitchen."
They're sitting on the living room couch. Rory toys with the ends of her scarf before looking back up at her mother. "I just went for a walk," she says and smiles.
Lying has become easy. She can't think of a single person she isn't lying to anymore. No, she can think of one person.
He walks through town and breathes in the pure winter air. It's late, after midnight. He isn't sure of the exact time. But, the air is so still that it has to be late. As usual, he can't sleep. So he takes to the streets of this small town, hoping to clear his head. He is looking to achieve some sort of calm. Something that will settle over him and stop everything that is turning.
He's carrying a bottle of cheap champagne in a brown paper bag. The only liquor he could find in Stars Hollow. And he's walking towards her house. Unconsciously, his feet are leading him in that direction. Making the turns so easily and so blindly. Street names having been burned into his memory. He feels his eyes burn and blames the wind, but he grips the neck of the bottle tighter.
Her house is dark and this shouldn't surprise him. It does though. He is astounded that she is capable of sleep when he became an insomniac that minute he was less than fifty miles from her. When he hasn't entirely fallen asleep since years before. Maybe since that day in Luke's apartment three years ago, with the rain falling hard on the roof and her body on top of his.
He quietly makes his way to her bedroom window, knowing this routine all too well. The tapping of his fingers upon the glass resounds in his head, filling it with memories. He taps again, seeing her sleeping form in her bed. She stirs and she's at the window, opening it slowly and cautiously.
"Jess, what are you doing here? It's after three," she whispers as she climbs out of the window to join him on the porch.
He holds up the paper bag. "I thought maybe you could also use a little drink."
She takes the bag from his hand and pulls out the bottle of champagne. "Ah. Doose's famous four dollar champagne. Helping the teenagers of Stars Hollow get to second base for many years."
"Only second base? Well, darn. My plans for tonight are ruined." He smiles and takes it from her. The bottle has a twist off cap that comes off easily. "Huh. Not as satisfying as popping the cork."
She leans back in through the open window of her bedroom and returns with a sweater in her hands, pulling it tightly around her and leading him to the front steps. He sits down next to her and she takes the bottle from him, putting it to her lips and taking a large gulp.
"Easy, tiger."
She passes the bottle back to him and gives him a look. "What are you doing here? More importantly, what are you doing at my house at three in the morning with a bottle of champagne after we have done nothing but fight since you got here?"
He takes a drink and sighs. "Because you were right."
"Right about what?"
Another drink. "About this being ridiculous. About…everything."
"Jess, I.." She stops, and grabs the bottle from his hands, taking another long drink.
"Stop hogging the booze, Gilmore."
"That's not going to get either of us drunk enough to have this conversation, just so you know." She watches his throat as he swallows the liquid.
"Well, there's no harm in trying."
She stands up. "We've got better stuff inside. Come on." She pulls him up by the arm.
In the kitchen, she is bending over and looking through the cabinet beneath the sink. She stands back up, holding a bottle of pink. "Sorry, looks like all we have is this bottle of grenadine."
He takes it from her and examines it. "Great. I can feel my testosterone levels dropping already.
"Well, it tastes like candy and gets the job done." She opens it and takes a swig. "Drink up."
Drunk in the moonlight, she has never been this beautiful. With rose tinted skin and her slurred tongue. The bottle of grenadine is empty. The bottle of champagne is almost gone as well and they're in her backyard, lying on the cold grass.
She turns to him, laughing for a minute and turning serious. "You know, I went to Yale because of you."
"Did not."
"Well, not entirely. But, it was a deciding factor." Her fingers are toying with the sleeve of his jacket and smiling. "22.8 miles. It wasn't because I would miss you though. It was because I thought you needed me. Which was selfish and clearly a wrong assumption. You don't need anyone."
He rubs his face with his hand, pressing his eyes closed for a minute. "I'm pretty sure Annalise is cheating on me. Not that I was…Whatever." He downs what's left of the champagne and tosses the bottle off somewhere in the grass. "Tell me something…" A drunken pause as he holds his hands up to the sky, gesturing meaninglessly. "…earth shattering."
She scrunches up her face in a strange way. "I just did, didn't I?"
"Well, tell me something else. Something even more earth shattering."
She begins to move in the darkness of four o'clock. He sees her silhouetted against the moon as she towers over him, swinging a leg over his body until she is straddling him . The ground moves underneath him. Spinning, spinning. Alcohol or the overwhelming feeling of her body against his own, he isn't sure. She leans in closer to his face, her hair dances across his chin, his cheeks. She whispers, her breath hot against his mouth. "I'm going to kiss you."
"Well, that's certainly is earth-" He's cut off as her lips stumble awkwardly, drunkenly into his. She tastes like the grenadine, sweet but with a bite and a burn. She is pressing her entirety against him and he kisses her back, taking her face in his hands.
Somewhere in the back of his head, he is saying: Stop. Somewhere in the back of his head, he is saying: You'll regret this. But he can barely hear this through the incessant hum of his being and the quickening pace of his heart.
A/N: I'm not sure how I feel about this chapter. But, it's been a couple weeks since my last update and I had this written so I decided to go with it. I'm not really sure at all what's going to happen with this. We shall see. Anyway. Review away.