Jess Mariano has always hated clichés. His whole life had been full of them with his runaway father, alcoholic mother, and him being "the neglected, young child." When he was six years old, his mother told him, "There's no place like home." He decided he agreed with her- no other place could be as putrid and obscure.
Jess hates being thought of as a statistic. The first day of second grade, his class was taught how to bubble in answers on a scantron. The minute he read the first question, "What is your favorite sport?" he knew that school was a crock. His teacher had thought that it would be a fun way to collect data to see what the class had in common with each other. He responded to this by ripping the scantron into miniscule pieces.
Ever since he was young, Jess has been categorized as a hooligan. He rather enjoyed the fact that his peers were afraid of him. His favorite pastime besides chasing the girls in his class with worms and stealing his classmates' money was reading. He spent his elementary school hearing the same sob theory, "Jess is very gifted, but cannot seem to focus in class. He might have emotional problems."
In fifth grade Jess was sent to the guidance counselor, Mrs. Chan, after he had been caught writing intellectual insults on the blackboard. Mrs. Chan was confident that she could help Jess from his terrible ordeal that he must be suffering. Ten minutes after meeting with Jess she sent him out of the room, and was just relieved that she hadn't had a breakdown.
In eighth grade, a motivational speaker came to speak in an assembly at Jess's middle school. He started his speech with, "No pain, no gain." After that assembly, Jess was ordered to write apology letters to the school board, and of course to the speaker for his "irrational, reckless behavior." Jess couldn't see what was wrong with what he had done- after all, if the man had really been a motivational speaker, he should have been motivating when Jess had run up to him and asked, "Has anyone ever committed suicide after your "motivating" speeches?"
In eleventh grade, Lizz (his jacked up mother) caught him smoking weed. She believed that he needed parental guidance, and that he needed help as soon as possible. He couldn't believe that for once she was sober enough to even see the smoke in the family room. The day she sent him away she told him, "You only hurt the ones you love."
Jess scoffed when she told him that, but funnily enough, it was the most truthful statement she had ever told him. He met Rory Gilmore who he had loved more than anyone. However, love wasn't enough to keep him graduating high school. When he was on the bus leaving to California, he remembered what Lizz had told him, "You always hurt the ones you love."
Jess has always hated clichés. He believes they're overrated, silly, and funnily enough there's a grain of truth to each and every single one of them. Everyday he remembers one specific cliché, "You always hurt the one you love."