She had to let him in eventually. Partially because it would be mighty hard to explain to Luke if Jess was found the next day hacked to pieces in a bush. But mostly it was due to that Rory Gilmore couldn't drive for beans.
However, this vital fact obviously meant nada to Jess, who ignored her indignant protests and reminiscence of the time she'd driven her mother's brand new Mercedes into their kitchen a mere 25 minutes subsequential to it's purchase
Taking no precaution in the safety of his own lifeline, Jess asserted disinterestedly, "It can't be that bad,"
Rory frowned, "I don't appreciate your sarcasm, Jess."
He wasn't entirely wrong though. It, being her ability to operate a moving vehicle, wasn't bad at all. It was abominable.
Four minutes following his careless assertion…
"You realize that we're going twenty miles an hour," Jess stated slowly, watching the arrow on the dashboard descend steadily down the array of numbers, "Now eighteen. Fifteen. Oh wait, progress! Twenty-two. I feel a congratulations is in order."
"Try hallmark, I'm busy," Rory dismissed, ignoring the urge to shoo him off with a wave of her hand. Instead, she chose to focus her fingers on the task of tightening her already-iron-grip on the steering wheel as her eyes fixed themselves intently at the stretch of black pavement extending beyond their line of vision.
"Well I guess that's going to have to be postponed anyway. We're back to eighteen," And after noting the fact that his companion's knuckles were in the process of turning purple, advised somewhat-helpfully, "You might want to go a little faster,"
"No thank you. Eighteen is plenty fast for me."
"…The speed limit's fifty."
Her grasp tightened, "Oh how nice. I would gladly twist my neck around to stare adoringly at the lovely, numbered yellow sign suspended on a brilliant metal stick but unfortunately, my life is at stake. Disruptions cannot be tolerated. That includes you."
"Twenty-one."
"Stop it!"
"Twenty-five. We're breaking a record here,"
"The only thing you'll be breaking is your noggin, after I swerve off course and we plunge to our deaths down a monstrous canyon--"
"Twenty-eight."
"—complete with giant falling rocks, Lost Ark style."
"Thirty." He obviously took amusement in her misery.
She fumed, "You know what? Forget the canyon. I'll save us the trouble and push you out right now."
"Oh no, back to twenty seven. Could I get a rain check on that?"
"Only because Driver's Manual says I'm supposed to keep both hands on the wheel."
"You actually read that thing?"
If she wasn't so preoccupied with the task before her, she would've turned around to stare incuriously at her companion, "…It's required."
"So?"
"And yes, as long as you're asking. I memorized the entire packet."
"Aha. That must be why you drive like a blind old bat."
"Bats are blind. You're being redundant."
"Well then I guess that makes us complements, those driver's manuals are out-dated. You're being trivial."
The statement perturbed her slightly, "I'm not trivial."
"Says the girl who makes references to The Great Train Robbery."
"Hey! That was an indubitably influential silent movie, they composed three remakes of that film."
"Oh yeah. One of which was made in 1904."
"At least I'm not conservational of inanimate objects. You've been clinging to that tape recorder since we left the house."
Her accusation was met with an abrupt cough, "What tape recorder?"
She furrowed her eyebrows, "The tape recorder you stole from your gun-tooting, murderous disciplinarian's house."
"Huh."
Good lord, he was perplexing. Further questioning on this matter failed to persist though, after the subject was redirected towards the frustrated car trailing their bumper.
OOOOOOOOO
Even as a tot, Lane had never been good with codifying sentences in times of unforeseen stupefaction. When you lived in a 20 square foot premises with a mother who considered sugar cookies implements of Satan, you liked your late night powdered donut binge well-planned to the point surpassing obsessive-compulsive tendencies. Fluky mishaps were inadmissible.
Receiving news that your best friend had reeled in her very own cuddlebuddy was not something Lane planned to hear until a good decade later. In her mind, Rory Gilmore was still the ten-year-old teenybopper fashioning a lovely poodle- do' (All thanks to Jess and Chuck's infamous gum expedition) sitting in the quiet circle condemning all boys to Never-Never Land with every once of her prepubescent brain-power.
Lane's eyeballs bulged to the size of golf balls. Inflated golf balls, if such a thing existed, "How did this… Ah!" climbing onto the chair, she slammed her palms onto the table as an attempt to formulate a worthy reply, "You've been—Gah!" her head dropped, "I can't speak."
"Maybe it's because you've got half a patty melt sticking out the side of your mouth," Rory supplied sympathetically.
This comment went unheard by Lane, who was still suspended in a state of shock, "You…" the patty melt dropped from her jaws, "Good lord. You've fished yourself a mate. A breadwinner. A Jess. Couldn't you have just settled for a nice GI Joe doll?"
"Oh yes. If I was six and still unwary of the fact plastic is bad for the digestive tract."
"It's just that Jess isn't the first name that comes to mind when I think spouse," this allegation of Lanes' was accompanied by another chunk of patty melt shoved in her chops, "I mean, really. Are you aware this means receiving gnomes and hubcaps for anniversary gifts? And all his biker buddies would probably send fried poultry and tires for the wedding. Rory, do you want chicken wings a-la' rubber served on your wedding?"
Ah. Rory was stupefied, and her jaw was failing to fasten, "Wedding?"
"Yes. No wait, scratch that. Elopement. The Cosa Nostra don't believe in weddings. And get acquainted with Mr. Goodyear, my friend. Because it's a household name in motorbuddy-land."
"I—
"And Pre-Nup is a must. May I recommend you ask for the car? Leave the rat-shack to him."
"… Okay, first off, we'd have to get married before you start planning the divorce, alright?"
"Unless you're a golddigger."
The party in question took evident offense into this appalling suggestion, "Hey! My name is Rory, not Anna Nicole Smith-- and in order to elope, my name would have to be Britney Spears. So until I start shaking my arse around in belly-shirts or appearing in Trimspa ads, you've got nothing to worry about."
"Nothing?"
"Zilch."
"Nothing?"
"Nada."
"…Nothing?"
"Good time for a new word?"
"Okay," Content for now, Lane chewed thoughtfully on her patty melt, "Hey, do you think Jess' teacher has a name?"
A name. A word or words by which an entity is designated and distinguished from others. Rory frowned, no, she was not aware of Jess' teacher's name. As far as she was concerned, he had a wicked shotgun holding the capability of blowing her precious head off—and that was enough identification by her, "No, I don't think he does. Should we just call him Mr. Bigs then or sum it up to a lost identity?"
"But what if he's tiny?"
"If you mean mass-wise, no, he's as Yeti as you can get without proceeding across American borders. But if you're referring to something dirty, then I want to know who you are and what you've done to my sweet Laney."
"Oh Laney? She's in there somewhere, though cast in somnolent torpor from reluctantly accompanying her respectably insano mother in her massive bible-indulging spurge without the help of energy packed Take 5 bars. The secret stash had been long-consumed by hour six," Lane replied dryly, following up this statement with a spoonful of cheese and cow shoved indignantly into her waiting chops.
"You poor thing."
"Yes well, access to the holy gates- and my own house for that matter, comes with a backbreaking price. What's nine hours of slumber and a pair of dilated eyeballs anyway?"
"Your beauty sleep."
"Hm. Speaking of beauty sleep, your hooligan breadwinner sure spends an awful lot of time dozing. Has he come down yet?"
This called for an irked frown, "If you're referring to Jess, no, my terrifically reliable mother spotted my 'hooligan breadwinner' loosening the screws on Taylor's ladder just this morning. Expect the issue of deficient housing implements to be brought up in the next town meeting."
"Ah. Chivalrous, isn't he?"
"Lancelot reincarnated."
"Aha," the end of a fulfilling conversation, and the Lane's patty melt. Rory prepared to supply pay for another round of Lane's sugar/saturated fat binge. That is, before catching the deceitful latter subtly eyeing the dingy stairs leading up to Luke's mystifyingly concealed apartment. Oh dear.
Lane motioned meaningfully towards the aforementioned coop, "Do you think…"
"No," the response came cardinally and equipped with an admonishing glare.
Apparently not admonishing enough, as this unfortunately failed to silence Lane, "Please? Please? Pleasepleaseplease--
"No."
"Come on!"
"No."
"He wouldn't have to know!"
Rory wouldn't budge, mentally and otherwise, "I may be new at this girlfriend business, but I've watched enough episodes of Days of Our Lives to know that rummaging about my boyfriend's living arrangement is a formula for getting kicked to the curb."
Lane frowned, pondering animatedly over her (lack of) Soap Opera Trivia, "I thought they got dumped for cheating."
"… Yes, that too. But the snooping pushed it over the edge."
Leaning towards desperate now, "Aren't you just a tiny bit curious of your hooligan breadwinner's little black book?"
Rory scowled, "Stop calling him that. And no, I highly doubt my 'hooligan breadwinner' as you put it, would be the kind of person to stash dear diary entries under a strawberry pillow."
Lane brightened, "He has a strawberry pillow?"
"Okay, we're leaving now, Nosy McBrown."
But Lane wasn't about to leave succumb without a fight. She was, in fact, throwing her hands up to the holy heavens, "Good grief! What is the big query? You've been in his room before, my paranoiac lovely."
"I have, yes. But that was when I was supposed to despise him with a thousand fists, thus the concept of potential intimateness was inevitably nonexistent, and with that eliminating the circumscription for the respect of his personal space and apathy towards his right to privacy."
Lane met this with a blank stare, before shaking her head and finally lifting herself from the seat with an bold scrape of chair-against-linoleum, "Well then…" commence mirthful stroll towards invasion of privacy, "…tell me when you change your mind." Permission to conduct herself in unorthodox activity did not exist as far as Lane-world was concerned. Next thing Rory knew, she was watching her best friend climb up the hierarchy towards the violation of her newly-dubbed breadwinner's deserted lax zone.
Shoot. Ah, what was there left to do? Rory soon found herself reluctantly trailing her friend into the not-so-deserted-anymore lax zone. Only for a peek, she told herself. And she figured if there were undergarments of any kind draped over ceiling fans or strange omnipresent collections of toenail scraps littered across the coffee tables, a quick exit stage left (and perhaps a mail-order maid) wouldn't be too much of a hassle.
Rory slowed as she reached the door, "Lane? A man's nest is a incomprehensible dwelling. I would hardly want you to face this arduous journey in companionless solitude."
Lane emerged from the apartment, "Okay, we can go now."
Blink once. Blink twice. Enter incredulity. Disbelief. Agitation. Deep homicidal impulses, "Remind me, my dear Laney, was it you or your demanding shoulder satan who wanted to snoop through my hooligan breadwinner's little black book?"
"Oh yes. About that. It's a little less snoop, a little more steal. Saves more sand in the hourglass, see?" Lane started down the stairs, a journey cut short with the blockage provided by Rory's outstretched arms.
"You're robbing my idiot boyfriend of his possessions!"
"No, I am robbing your idiot boyfriend of my possessions turned his possessions after he took my possession into his possession resulting in a bribery involving me doing his biology homework every withering day in exchange for the secrecy of my embarrassingly palsy-walsy impulsive scribbles."
Rory contemplated this briefly, before concluding slowly, "…My idiot boyfriend stole your diary," strangely not thrown off track by the otherwise mind-boggling babbling rolling out the mouth of her atypical friend.
"Yes. I record my deepest darkest blathers in my baby here. Corny lyrics included. And I hope he knows that he picked the wrong broad to mess with, because I will now make it my duty to write obscene letters addressed to every last one of his teachers and sign his name at the bottom, starting with Mrs. Witterchucker. Dear Mrs. Witterchutter, if you are wondering why my grades are so bad, it is because your ass blocks my view of the blackboard everytime you stand up --"
"Where did you find it?" Rory cut in, consuming herself in thoughts of poor Mrs. Witterchutter contemplating possible liposuction.
"Oh. Under the pillow, like you said. Disappointingly enough, it wasn't strawberry."
Rory was now just beginning to realize the full extent of damage and heartless villainy her hooligan breadwinner was capable of, "Does he do this a lot?" she asked carefully, cautious of the fact she was treading through troubled waters.
Lane wasted no time in responding, "You mean blackmail innocents into bending in shape of his evil amusement?" she nodded energetically, "Yes. He's Jack Nicholson's Joker reincarnated as a manipulative yard bird. The twenty-first century Joseph Stalin. A while back he actually videotaped Mr. Robinson romancing the school secretary on top of the—
Rory's eyes at this point, were nearly protruding from their sockets, as a thought (reminiscence, really) collapsed on her shoulders, "Good god, the tape recorder."
"What? No, I said videotaped. Anyways, that day during the assembly—
"That schmuck! My idiot boyfriend's grease palming Mr. Bigs!"
"Oookay. That's enough 21st Jump Street for you. Where was I? Oh yes. Back to my—
Unfortunately, Lane never got the chance to finish her story (or sentence, for that matter) as Luke had burst upon the scene, baster in hand and well-prepared to knock-out any unsuspecting robbers. ("Ah, it's just you," he'd said, relaxing his grip on the baster, "If you're looking to stick green dye in Jess' hair gel, it's down the bathroom, in the cabinet beside the box of Viagra," his voice turned sour, at that point, " -that your mother had so courteously purchased for me," before adding quickly to Lane, "her mother, not yours.")
With that amusing piece of information tucked away, Rory wasted no time in hunting down the elusive villain tagged Jess, bent on draining every last bit of information for his wicked mind and perhaps even hang him out to dry when his confessions became redundantly arid.
She found him sitting tediously on the bridge, the very essence of a mealy-mouthed varmint. And Rory didn't hesitate in carrying out the déjà vu she'd been keen on repeating ever since their unpleasant (hateful, futile, abhorred) reunion many moons back.
Or in simpler form, Rory sees Jess. Rory stomps over to Jess. Jess comments on her strenuously loud walking. Rory shoves his jack-headed ass in the lake.
Resurfacing, Jess was quick to commence cursing instantaneously, "You… " gurgle, "…are a nutcase," sputter.
Rory's state of mind wasn't at all dissimilar, "You schmuck! I nearly had my head blown to chunks of bleeding corpuscles in a monstrous cerebral death for contributing in your lousy quest of domination-- and all you could do is insult my windshields and fool me into subconsciously escorting your holy narcissist be-hind on your villainous mission to penal institution!"
He squinted at her, thoroughly pissed off and thinking Rory was quite possibly a little kookier in the head than usual, "My what?"
"Mission! Your mission! To corrupt Mr. Bigs—don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about!"
Delirium is a difficult suit to follow.
"My mission? To where? Mars? Where all the ugly green aliens living in your mind reside?"
"Oh, don't tease," she bit back, "They live in Graceland."
"You know what you should do? Sit yourself in front of the computer and click on one of those ads that say, 'seeking psychiatric help? Click here for a free trial!'"
"Pass. But you know what I am going to do, Jess?"
He glared, "Enroll in Narcotics Anonymous sessions."
She glared right back, "Take up your own suggestions, Randle McMurphy. In the mean time, I'm going to burglarize your precious tape-recorder, and drive back to Mr.Bigs' house equipped with a bulletproof vest to return it to him."
"No, you aren't."
Earnestly steaming, "Yes, I am."
"No, you aren't. Rory, stop being such a pain in the ass."
Gaping, "You did not just call me that."
"You're right. I actually meant to call you a bipolar crackbrain, but the thought didn't spring up fast enough."
"I hope you rot in that lake! And that your skin starts to resemble a withering prune and the tissues in your carcass begin to absorb murky lake water and cause your chassis to bloat up to the shape of a beach ball!"
"Jesus, Rory!" Jess was obviously not secretive while expressing stress or strain in apperception. But fortunately, his freezing-yet-moderately-efficient intelligent brain cells managed to perceive that yelling was not going to help him paddle up the hierarchy, "Come here a second, will you?"
"You're in a lake."
And who's fault is that? But he caught himself on that one, and instead chose to drag his soggy posterior out the large body of bitingly frigid water, "What do you need to know?"
She scoffed, and began to back into her original plan of 'burglarizing his precious tape recorder', "Do you seriously think I'm stupid enough to trust you to tell the truth?"
"Yes." Ah, shoot.
Rory scowled in reply. And Jess mentally kicked himself for not sewing his mouth shut when he had the chance.
And so it began. Mission to convey tape recorder, phase one: Run through the gazebo avoiding the dripping wet, though damnable inamorato's clutches. And that's exactly what she did.
Onlookers stopped to stare curiously at the couple, pondering with discombobulated minds before shrugging off queries and continuing on with their daily hankerings.
The soggy, damnable inamorato's clutches eventually caught up, and before long, managed with mild difficulty to drag his slightly-more-than-upset girlfriend behind a mass of miscellaneous rubbish (the dumpsite), where he proceeded to remove her jaws from his arm and consummate mouth-to-mouth as an affronted attempt to stop her excessive reproaching.
Unfortunately, this action of his resulted in a split lip and unflattering lump on the temple after Rory responded by biting frantically into his mouth and whacking the side of his head with her shoe, concluding unanimously that she was not adept in responding to unanticipated displays of passion.
He then offered to rent and watch This is Spinal Tap with her if she stopped pushing him large bodies of water.
She obliged reluctantly, despite that the seed of doubt embedded in her mind was fighting it's way through the tangles that were her conscience.
Concurrently, her interrogatory concerning the tape recorder was forgotten.
And so it beginsAN: This chapter started off modestly short. But somehow through several modifications it expanded into a big mess of scenarios. My sincerest apologies if it sucked. Or if it didn't make sense.