Title:Remembering Floyd Nightingale
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Summary: Jess is a nurse, with a doctor for a girlfriend. He's older, more mature, and has made friends with people he works with. So, the one thing to sour his life? Rory Gilmore. However, she doesn't seem to remember much, seeing as she might have amnesia.
A/N: Dude! You guys! Aw! I got 16 reviews! That's awesome! So, this is chapter two. I researched the hospital, and kinda/sorta the disorder. But any medical errors, just tell me nicely in a review, and I shall fix them. It's been ages since I've seen ER.

This chapter is dedicated to my betas, especially Asa and Lydia, who showed me just how kick-ass betas could be.

Chapter three should be out by Nov. 1st, which is when I'm going to try to return to the internet.

--

Jess awoke the next morning with a paperback on his chest and a crick in his neck. Blearily he rubbed his eyes, ridding himself of any leftover sleepiness, and stood slowly. He groaned as his back cracked, a reminder that he was approaching middle age faster every day. He deposited the paperback on his desk, planning to finish it later, and walked into the bedroom.

Sure enough, she was gone. He checked the clock--it was only eight. Camille had obviously gotten her seven and a half hours of sleep and then left, most likely to run back to the hospital. She had been working so much lately it was a wonder she and Jess managed to go out at all.

He didn't work nearly as much as she did, but he was lucky enough to be a nurse, not a doctor always working to get to the next level, be it resident, attending, or whatever came next. Plus, he belonged to a union and they had rules about how much he could work. And this morning, he wasn't scheduled to go in until ten, so he had a little time.

He got dressed and headed downstairs, out into the world. There was, of course, a Starbucks on the corner, so he grabbed a whole-wheat bagel with all natural cream cheese and a coffee and headed for the gym. He tried to work out whenever possible, though it was never anything too strenuous; he just tried to keep his body in shape. This morning, he used the rowing machine for about half an hour, just barely enough to break a sweat. Then he headed for the showers, changed into his scrubs and headed for work.

Little did he realize how much his life would change when he got there.

He'd been at work for barely fifteen minutes when the first trauma came in. A drunk driver, still on a bender from last night, and his three drunken friends were all shoved into a two-door that slammed into a cab rounding a corner. The drunks were all critical, and two of them had been sent to a different hospital. The cab driver was joking with the paramedics on the way over, but had a visibly broken arm. And his passenger, a woman traveling alone, was the least hurt of them all. She had a large cut on the side of her head from where she'd slammed into the window, and was a likely candidate for post-traumatic stress disorder, but other than that she was fine.

This was why Dr. Barnes handed her chart over to Jess before rushing to the trauma room.

"Just suture the wound. I'll be back later to stitch her up."

"What's her name?" Jess asked. He liked to know the names of people before he worked on them. It seemed to make their stress levels deplete with the idea of someone friendly in such a harsh place.

Dr. Barnes glanced at the chart, before holding it out for Jess. "Gilmore."

Jess stared at the chart in shock, and then at the doctor's retreating back. There was absolutely no way this could be the Gilmore he was thinking of. He read the full name, almost wishing it was his aunt--though he knew his aunt took pride in the Danes name. Maybe it was his aunt's mother. Yeah! That had to be it. This was not--oh, God--Lorelai Leigh Gilmore, as the chart stated, but Emily Gilmore, Hartford socialite. Of course. And Emily could easily pass for 31, right? Right.

Gathering his courage, Jess drew back the curtain around the bed. There she was. Lorelai Leigh Gilmore, aged 31. Her hair wasn't shiny, as he remembered, and she was wearing clothes he never would have thought she'd be caught dead in, but those were most definitely her eyes, and they lit up when she saw him.

He gulped almost audibly, and forced a smile. "Rory," he said, nodding. "What'd you do?"

She cocked her head to the side, and a confused look passed over her face. But she visibly shook it off, and smiled, a little sheepishly. "You know, to be fair, I'm not entirely sure. I woke up in the ambulance, with blood all down the right side of my face. They told me I was in a taxi, but I have no clue what I was doing in the taxi, where I was going, or from where I was coming." She laughed a little.

He sighed. He couldn't do this anymore. "What are you doing in New York? Did you come to see me? I wouldn't think you would deign to see lowly old me."

Her face fell, and she said softly, "I don't know who you are, or what you're talking about, but like I said: I don't remember anything."

He kept his face stony, and said, "How did the chart get filled out, if you don't remember anything?"

She shrugged. "I think they had my purse."

"Rory, why are you doing this?"

"Doing what?" she asked desperately. "I'm not doing anything! I don't remember anything!"

"Something wrong, Mariano?"

He spun around to face his girlfriend, standing near him with a chart in her hand and a waiting look on her face.

"No, Dr. Watts. Just a little patient history."

She just pursed her lips, nodded, and left with a, "Just see you keep it down."

He turned back to Rory, who lifted her hands and said, "Don't get on me. I don't know what you're talking about."

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Are you real? You really don't remember me?"

She shook her head. "Who are you?" she asked, interested now.

Jess snorted. "Amnesia seems a little cliché, doesn't it, Rory?"

"Stop calling me Rory!" she almost yelled. "It says my name's Lorelai."

"No! Your mother's name is Lorelai; your name is Rory."

"That's not what my ID said, apparently. And how do you know?"

"Oh, forget it," he said, walking around to her right side and pulling a suture kit out. "I'm just having a nightmare, that's all." He worked for a few minutes, cleaning the blood from the side of her face. When he looked in the wound he noticed a sparkling, and he grimaced when he realized she had tiny particles of glass in the side of her head.

"What's wrong?" Rory asked when she saw his grimace.

"Nothing," he said with a smile at her. "Nothing at all."

"Don't lie to me, Jess. I hate when you lie."

"God, Rory. Let it go," he said, leaning over her with tweezers. Then her words finally hit him, and he said, "I thought you didn't remember me."

"Uh...I don't. I just hate when all doctors lie. Lying sucks," she ended softly, cowering just a bit under his accusing gaze.

"You called me Jess," he said simply, keeping his eyes on hers.

"The other doctor called you Jess!" she said triumphantly after a minute.

"No, she didn't. She always calls me Mariano." Camille, in an effort to distance herself from her boyfriend and squelch any rumors before they started, never referred to Jess by his first name, though most everyone else on the emergency department staff did.

Rory, however, was saved from trying to make up an answer by the return of Dr. Barnes. He was smiling as he approached them, and clapped Jess on the back.

"How're we doing over here?"

Jess looked at Rory one last time, and then said, "Patient exhibits signs of retrograde amnesia. She also has glass in her wound that I'm working on getting out."

Rory nodded, though a little surprised at that glass remark, and then asked, "How is the cab driver?"

"He's fine," Dr. Barnes said. "We set his arm and sent him home with his wife. The other driver and his passenger are upstairs in the ICU, with instructions that they be released into police custody when they are better."

Rory smiled. "Good."

"Jess, if you'd be so kind as to order a CAT scan and get someone from psychiatry down here, I'll finish up with Ms. Gilmore."

"Psychiatry?" Rory asked in a small voice.

"Yes, ma'am," Jess said before Dr. Barnes could speak. "It's standard procedure for those exhibiting signs of psychiatric trauma, such as amnesia," he finished smugly. He was almost entirely sure that Rory was faking.

"Oh." Rory let out a little laugh. "Okay."

"Jess?" Dr. Barnes prompted. "The CAT scan?"

"I'll get right on it, sir," he said, leaving the two alone. He continued on his rounds, working his way through the department, and almost forgot about Rory until he saw Shelia, the psychiatric representative for the ER, talking at her, as Shelia was wont to do. He walked over, and gave Rory a supportive look.

"Hey, Shelia. How's it going?"

Shelia turned to Jess and smiled. "Hey, Jess. I understand you helped this fine young lady when she first came in?"

"Yep. And, actually, she and I go way back."

"Do you really?" Shelia asked, raising her eyebrows and turning back to Rory. "Did you know this, Rory?"

Rory paused for a minute, looking at Jess, and then she slowly shook her head.

Before Sheila could turn back to Jess, he spoke up. "She's my aunt's daughter. My step-cousin." He never took his eyes from Rory's face, and noticed when she raised her eyebrows. Whatever she did remember, she didn't remember Luke and Lorelai's wedding.

"Hmm," Shelia said simply. "And you don't recall Jess at all?"

Rory shook her head.

"Yet, you can recall everything from the time you regained consciousness forward."

Rory nodded.

"Yep," Sheila said. "Classic retrograde amnesia. There's not much we can do. Best case scenario, this goes away in a few hours and we discharge you. Worst case scenario, it goes away in a few months. However, you are perfectly capable of taking care of yourself, so we might just discharge you before it goes away. Jess here will call your apartment and see if anyone answers." Sheila smiled at Jess, who nodded and left for the front desk.

He checked her chart and found her address. His nose wrinkled involuntarily when he saw she lived in Brooklyn. He was a born and bred Manhattanite, and couldn't imagine living in another borough. But, maybe Rory liked Brooklyn, though he couldn't imagine that, either.

He dialed her number three times, each time waiting for someone to pick up the phone. Finally, on the third try, when the answering machine picked up, he left a message.

"Yeah, hi, this is Jess Mariano at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, Roosevelt Division in Midtown Manhattan. I'm calling because we have Rory Gilmore here in the emergency department, and it would be best if we were to release her into someone's care. Please call us when you receive this message." He gave the number and extension for the emergency department, and hung up. There was nothing to do now but wait.

--

Rory was befuddled, to put it in one word. The last time she'd seen Jess, he'd said, "I love you," and then gotten in his car and driven away. But they had been nineteen then, and it had been about six months after he'd left at the end of her senior year. He certainly no longer looked nineteen. For one thing, his hair wasn't standing straight up on top of his head. Instead it was without gel and falling around his face, just barely reaching the top of his eyebrows. He also had a slight five o'clock shadow that reminded her, somehow, of Luke.

And what was this about Lorelai being Jess' aunt? When had her mom and Luke gotten married? Last she remembered, Lorelai was secretly dating...Scooper, or some such name. And Luke was still married to that lawyer chick, and was trying to make it work. But Jess had called her his step-cousin.

Rory wondered just exactly how old she was. Let's see, in order for Jess to be a doctor, he'd have had to go to college for four years, then medical school for another four years. He looked like an intern, maybe; he was running around, doing other doctors' bidding. So that would mean--what was it on ER? Three years as an intern? Or just one? Or two? Whatever.

Time for calculations. If Jess had gotten his GED before he blurted out his announcement, then he could have started college during the summer, or the fall semester. That meant that he would have graduated in...2008? The year after Rory did. Maybe. So, that made him 23 when he entered medical school. Give that another four years, and that made him 27. So, at the youngest, she was 27, and at the oldest...maybe 30?

Ew. She was 30. Talk about forgetting things. That had to be at least 11 years she was forgetting! And a whole hell of a lot can happen in 11 years. Like Luke and Lorelai getting married, and maybe having kids.

She gasped. Maybe she had kids! How weird! Let's see...she probably wouldn't have gotten married until after she graduated, and if she did get married right after graduation, and then had a kid nine months later, the oldest her kid could be was seven. Seven! She had a seven-year-old child wandering around New York!

Well, maybe. Who knew?

Then again, her name was still Gilmore. But maybe she'd gotten divorced and changed her name back. Or maybe she'd followed in her mother's footsteps and had a kid out of wedlock. Or, maybe--and she sat up a little straighter at this thought--maybe Gilmore was her professional name. Maybe she was really well-known as Gilmore, and didn't want to change it! That had to be it. She was even more well-known than Christiane Amanpour, so she couldn't change her name. That was definitely it.

She settled back in her bed, a satisfied smile on her face.