Thankfully, there is a cool new thing called probability. And before long, it occurred to Rory that throwing 50 rocks all at once had more of a chance to hit the window than one at a time. Alas, this solution triggered her to launch an entire spate of pebbles to go flying at the window. The glass window.

When you throw an army of gravel at a glass window, guess what happens?

Fortunately, if there's one thing that could be counted on, it's Rory's atrocious ability to aim. Thus, a grand total of zero rocks managed to make contact with the glass pane, thereby concluding that she would probably have to find an entirely different way to inform Jess of their situation at hand. Preferably smoke signals, but Rory was no caveman and already knew from past experiences she lacked the talent to start a fire (a trait she'd most likely inherited from her mother) without lighting her clothes and half the campsite with it in the process.

She settled for making an attempt to scale the giant tree of some kind that eventually led up to the roof. Key word here being 'attempt,' and it really didn't take long till she realized she was severely lacking in the tree-climbing department as well. The fact that the pathetic-looking branch she had decided to sit upon was making a hair-raising cracking noise very much confirmed that.

This couldn't be good. Cracking never led to anything good. Their toaster had made cracking noises just before it burst into flame and took half the counter along with it. Same thing happened with their laundry machine. And microwave. And television. And the guy who came to fix the television.

Now, she could add tree branch to the list. Though she did manage to utter a quick prayer before it entirely collapsed, igniting an ear-busting crash and little birdies to dance around her head singing 'Walk Like an Egyptian' which was ironic considering she couldn't walk, period, at the moment. It was unanimous. Cracking was bad.

What's more, by the time Mr. Jess' teachers' disgruntled, 'What the hell was that?' reached her ears, all feeling below the back was pretty much long gone.

"I hate you, Jess," she told the sky, before concentrating on the task of limping back into her little bush. Which proved to be very difficult mostly because the entire concept of limping usually came with the territory of being able to at least move your ass.

Ah, but no time for that. Jess' teacher had already reached the front door and—hey look, he was carrying a gun.

Jess' teacher has a gun.

Forget limping, she dived headfirst into the bushes. A worthy survival tactic that would've emerged successful if not for the fact branches tend to make a big rustly noise that in this case, could very much cost you your life.

"Damn raccoons," Mr. Jess' teacher-who-has-a-gun grumbled, starting towards the bush and, much to Rory's despair, fired about three shots straight into the branches.

It was around that time when it occurred to her that she was possibly about to die kneeling over in a bush. An ugly, bug-infested one at that. She wrinkled her brow in a sudden surge of annoyance. No, Rory Gilmore had spent too much time ignoring bushes (particularly the rosebushes her mother had planted and forgotten about in the summer of '98) to have her brain (shoulder, arm, chest…) blown off in the middle of one.

Her fingers enclosed almost sub-consciously around the gravel scattered along the ground, and was throwing the tiny pebbles straight Mr. Jess' teacher's face before she could even comprehend what she was doing.

Only about a quarter of the rocks actually hit the guy, but it was apparently enough to make him drop the gun and clutch his precious face screaming the words, "HOLY FUCK" at the top of his lungs.

Jess chose to make his appearance from behind the back door at that point. Calmly walking over to his antagonized teacher to whack him over the head with what else, but a tape recorder. Isn't life fun?

Not really, Rory thought, rightfully vexed seeing as she'd just been mistaken for a raccoon.

"He should be knocked out for a good five hours, at least," After experimentally kicking at the pavement (or more specifically, the teacher) Jess shifted his glance from the collapsed form to Rory, who was in the process of glaring daggers at his direction, "So… did he get you?"

Without a word, Rory proceeded to bombard a startled Jess with the spare rocks enclosed in her palm, the main target being his head.

"Hey!" his arms went up in self-defense, "Fuck… okay, I guess I deserved that," He paused for a moment to comment, "Wow, you really suck at aiming."

"Gee, you think?" She'd ran out of rocks, unfortunately, and had now settled for shoving him repeatedly on the shoulder at the appropriate times during her lament, "You idiot! You idiotic idiot! You idiotic idiot indebted to idiocy and… agh!" Aha, the rocks were back again.

"I…ow! Hey, you actually hit me with that one there. I thought I told you to stay in the bush."

"If I'd stayed in the bush, you would be mince meat right about now!"

"And you could've been mince meat right about now. Why the hell didn't you just sit still?"

"Because unlike the vertically challenged bimbos you're used to associating with, I have a brain. I see a big guy holding a gun using my bush as his point of destination, I throw about forty rocks at his head, okay?" Shoot. Out of rocks again. And damn it, she was getting rather emotional, as one should be after facing a life-death situation with the company of a couple spiders sitting in her hair. Already beginning to snivel faintly, she gave Jess' shoulder one last shove before starting towards the car in a mess of tears and whimpering.

Jess was not used to (or good at, for that matter) comforting a distressed female. Especially not one that despised him with the passion of a thousand fiery pits in hell and wanted to burn him to a stake whenever she caught sight of him. But he trailed after her nevertheless, "Rory—

…And she'd slammed the car door in his face.

"Come on, open the door," Jess tried, at his very best attempt to be civil.

"No."

"Jeez, Rory…"

"Go to hell." So much for civil.

With a sigh, he smacked his forehead against the windowpane, "Will you go out with me?"

This was met by a scoff, "What am I, stupid? You're an complete egghead if you think I'm falling for that one."

His jaw tightened, "I'm serious."

"I'm not opening this door, Jess."

"Why not?"

"I hate you."

"You love me."

"Try again."

"I love you."

"Excuse me for having a backbone. You're going to have to do better than that."

"I adore you. I cherish you. I'm John Cusack standing outside your window with a boom box." Shoot, that came out more sarcastic than intended.

She appeared not to have minded too much. On the contrary, maybe even, dare say, intrigued. Or at least she wasn't looking at him like she wanted to stick a fork through his face anymore, "Getting warmer."

Agh. This sucked beyond measurement. "You had me at hello."

He was being painfully insincere, yes. But it was amusing nevertheless. Someone here really did not want to walk home, Rory mused. The upperhand was a nice place to be, "Great. Now say 'You complete me.'"

There was a scowl fixed on his face, signaling the end of the line, "I have boundaries, thank you very much."

"You mean a wildly inflated male ego."

"I'm not quoting any more Jerry Maguire."

"Hey it's either Tom Cruise or Leonardo DiCaprio, mister."

He looked at her, "Go out with me."

She furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, "Which movie is that from?"

"Is that a yes?"

She squinted at him. Clearly, someone had lost their mind, "What?"

He stared back. Clearly, someone had lost their mind, "What? Will. You. Go. Out. With. Me. I'm not asking again."

"You've asked before?"

His forehead, once again, slammed the window in frustration, "Yes or no?"

She grew eerily quiet with speculation at that. For a moment, she wondered if Jess maybe had some medication he'd forgotten to take. Which would, for the most part, explain his even stranger than normal behavior this entire evening. "Okay," the word tasted funny in her mouth. Okay okay okay.

Rolling the window down, she plopped her arms over the edge and paused to point a menacing finger to his face, "But just for the record, I'm still mad at you and you're still walking home."

(AN: Wasn't entirely sure how to end it. But yes, I am finally where I want to be. Things will begin to make sense in the next chapter, hopefully. Specifically the tape recorder and the late-night batterings.)