"How did this happen Lorelai?"

The drive back to Stars Hollow was slower. Lorelai was more cautious as she factored in not only the sleeping boy sprawled in the backseat, but also the way her vision kept blurring, only to be forced away by a violent sniff and an occasional shake of her head.

She let Luke talk to her quietly. They both knew that for once she held no answers to his questions – the many times he had asked for parental advice for the boy, or comfort that he was doing his best, and yet in this situation she was as obtuse as he was.

"I don't understand how he got to such a desperate point without anybody noticing." He continued. Luke had turned to rear-view mirror so that he could keep an eye on the boy as he slept.

"When was the last time you spoke to him?" She whispered as a reply.

Luke shook his head, looking down at his palms that were persistent in their shaking. "He called me after he got back to New York after Liz' wedding," he mused, "Something had happened, he sounded angry – but he assured me he had it covered."

Lorelai took a deep, shaky breath before she uttered what she knew Luke didn't want to acknowledge, "That was months ago Luke."

His head dipped further as he cradled his face in his palms, hiding himself from his own failure.

"Liz told me she was speaking to him more – I didn't want to get in the way if their relationship was finally healing."

Lorelai couldn't help but snort. She quickly glanced back to make sure she hadn't disturbed Jess before she glanced to Luke and finally towards the road.

"I don't think that can ever be fixed, Luke."

"Jeez," He huffed, sitting up and letting his head fall back against the headrest, his eyes shut and his jaw tight, "I knew that. I've always known that she messed up – deep down. But god, I didn't want to admit it."

He glanced back in the mirror. "And look what happened because I wanted to avoid that confrontation for just a little longer."

"Luke-"

"No. I-" He swallowed, turning his head to look out the window and effectively cutting off Lorelai completely, "Can we just… not right now."

Lorelai turned her focus back on the road.

They went to the Gilmore house. Luke wasn't sure he'd be able to get Jess up the stairs of the diner without waking the boy, and he also knew that he'd get a bit more privacy at the Gilmores than he would at the diner tomorrow morning. Lorelai shut off the engine and ran to open the door, holding it open for Luke.

He went around to the back of the car, leaning in and carefully putting his arms under the boy – blanket and all, to pick him up. Jess still didn't wake. His head lolled back as Luke adjusted the boy in his arms, carrying him up the stairs and through into the privacy of the house. He gently laid Jess down on the sofa while Lorelai ran back out to shut the car door – she entered the house quietly, pulling and locking the front door and standing in the entrance of the kitchen, waiting for Luke.

He was readjusting the blankets over Jess, trying not to notice how skinny he looked, or how light he was. After he caught himself pushing away the curls from the young man's face, Luke stood up and followed Lorelai into the kitchen, taking off his cap and pushing his hair away from his face. He accepted her comforting hand and sat with her in silence – listening to the boy's breathing in the other room.

"Did you have any idea?" She asked quietly, so as not to wake the boy.

Luke shook his head.

"Did Liz?"

"She said she thought he was doing better," he let out a bitter laugh, "she thought he'd be okay."

They settled into silence again. Luke going over what his next course of action could be – but everything he had turned up blank. "I can't afford therapy." He started, "I doubt Jess had insurance – and we can't afford the medication. Liz and TJ won't be able to help – they're still paying off the bills from their car crash." He was thinking out loud, but the more he spoke the more desperate he realised the situation was. "What am I supposed to do, Lorelai?"

"We'll figure it out?"

"We?"

"Yes, we. I'm not leaving you alone in this Luke. You know, that's what I thought was meant by the whole 'I'm all in' palaver."

Luke smiled then. For the first time that night he smiled at his girlfriend and pulled on her hand so that she was closer. He put his hand on her cheek and slowly guided her face to his to meet for a short and sweet kiss – "You're brilliant, you know that?"

"I have been told."

Jess woke up the next morning confused. His throat felt like it was on fire, and it felt like his head was being hit over and over. He turned onto his back, feeling the comfortable cushions underneath him and the duvet on top of him. He didn't open his eyes but he tried to remember what had happened, where he was, and why he was in so much pain.

It didn't take him long. His heart sank when he realised that the events of yesterday weren't some kind of weirdly vivid dream. He was used to that feeling as of late. The feeling that his heart was in his stomach, that he was a struggled to breathe, and that any energy he might have was focused on just moving. It didn't occur to him how deep he was getting, how far from himself he was becoming, until he was stood over that basin looking at nothing but the pills and avoiding his reflection in the mirror.

He blinked his eyes open slowly, cautiously. Staring up at the ceiling it didn't take him long to figure out that he was at the Gilmore residence, rather than the diner. He could hear his uncle in the kitchen, on the phone to Caesar and asking him to cover the diner for a while. Jess wasn't looking forward to whatever conversation faced him that morning. He knew it had to be had, but he just didn't want to talk about how desperate he was last night.

He slowly pushed himself up from the sofa, turning so that he sat properly against the cushions. He leant forward, pushing his hair out of his face with his hands and feeling it stick from the sweat that had dried. He turned when he heard footsteps.

Luke stopped short, seeing Jess sat up and awake that early in the morning. He had dark bags under his eyes, and the boy still looked exhausted – like even if he had managed to sleep a whole day away, it still wouldn't be able to cure the fatigue.

"Morning." Jess voice was barely above a whisper. Quiet, croaky. He attempted to clear it but the pain shot through his throat at the sensation.

"Try not to talk Jess," Luke advised, coming to sit opposite the boy and handing him a glass of water. "You were sicking up bile last night," he explained, "that cuts through your throat like knives – it's going to hurt for a while."

Jess nodded, sipping the water slowly and deliberately, refusing to meet his uncle's eyes. When he was finished with the water he handed the glass back to his uncle and nodded towards the bathroom. He mouthed the word 'shower' and got a nod in return, so he headed up the stairs and away from the pitying glance.

He hated that look.

When he was finished in the shower, ignoring that he could feel his ribs as he washed his torso, or the fact that he looked at his fingers and they looked almost alien – E.T like in their boniness, he dried off and put on the clothes that he was wearing to the house. He went down the stairs and saw Luke sat on the sofa, another glass of water next to him, waiting for Jess to come down.

Jess rubbed the towel over his hair one last time, hanging it up on the banister so that it could dry, and sat down heavily next to Luke. He wordlessly drank from the new glass of water and waited for his uncle to say something to him, rather than start the conversation himself.

"You're staying in Stars Hollow." Luke said eventually. It was a command more than a request but Jess answered him regardless.

"I gathered that." His voice was a whisper, unable to strain his voice too much.

"Lorelai went back to New York to get the rest of your stuff this morning."

"Are you two a thing now?"

Luke glared at him, "Don't change the subject."

Jess held up his hands in mock defeat, smiling down at the sofa as he did so.

"I don't really know what to do here Jess." Luke said eventually.

Jess shook his head at his uncle, looking down at the empty glass that he was balancing in his lap. "I'm not a china doll Luke." He said, "I'm not going to start bawling on you every second of the day. I am sorry that I scared you – I kind of scared myself."

"Why didn't you say anything before?"

Jess shrugged at first, but after glancing at his uncle and seeing his hard and determined look, Jess eventually relented. "It wasn't like one day I woke up and realised that I didn't want to be here anymore," he swallowed, his voice still raspy and tired, "It didn't hit me suddenly. It's kind of been an escalating process. It didn't even occur to me that it was a problem, or even anything to worry about. I honestly didn't realise how bad it's gotten, or how lost I've been, until I was admitting it yesterday. I still don't really want to admit it Luke, or talk about it honestly."

"I just need to understand, they maybe I might have a better handle on things."

Jess nodded again. He knew he had to tell Luke what he'd been thinking – he was desperately trying to resist the urge to fall back into his angry, hard self.

"We can talk about it once, here, and then you don't have to say anything about it again if you don't want to." Luke reassured.

Jess grimaced. He had always had a problem with opening up to people, he struggled to get the right words out, and if he did that he always managed to make it sound insincere.

"I started thinking about how difficult I had made everybody's lives. Started thinking about how different it'd be if I was never born, or if I didn't exist. I don't know – I just started feeling tired. Like I was very heavy or something? I just wanted to be shut in a room somewhere and forgotten about."

Jess leant forward, putting the glass down onto the coffee table so that he could tuck his legs under him and fidget to stop feeling as uncomfortable.

"You think you make people's life difficult?"

Jess raised an eyebrow at the man who was temporarily his guardian for the brief stint in his most rebellious years and sighed when the man remained unrelenting in his sincerity.

"I've not made it easy – have I?" Jess didn't wait for his uncle to respond in some falsified defense, "I mean, I have more than enough proof. After Jimmy told me to leave California I became three for three on my guardians kicking me out."

"The guy's a bum, Jess."

"Nah he's not – which kind of makes it worse." Jess sighed, "He's got his own family up there, raising a kid – I was just a bit of a burden."

Jess could see Luke shaking his head at him, and the boy grimaced pre-emptively at his uncle's arguments.

"You should have come back here Jess. You're frustrating, what teenager isn't? – but you're not a burden."

Jess almost laughed – instead all that escaped was a hard breath through his nose. "Nah," he waved the man off, "you had less on your plate having to worry about getting me to fall into line." He began his explanation, closing his eyes as he really began to consider why, or when he had started to feel like he didn't belong anywhere.

"I saw how happy Liz had gotten after my moving out – meeting TJ, getting married. Rory is doing the school thing and achieving her dream. Jimmy has a kid he can raise, and well – I don't know, it just made things click in my head." Jess saw look ready to interject so he held up a hand to stop him, "Then Corey died and it's like everything made sense. I wanted the same emptiness, or nothingness. I just wanted to stop feeling so tired."

"So you laid out the pills."

"So I laid out the pills." Jess confirmed.

"What made you call me back?"

"I honestly don't know, Luke. I was counting how many it'd take for it to be quick while I was first talking to you, and when I hung up I was meant to reach for the first bottle – but it's like my body took over and I was calling you instead."

"How do you feel now?"

"Honestly?"

"Honestly."

Jess leant forward on one hand, turning his head so that he could look his uncle in the eye. Luke's face was betraying nothing but concern – out of all of his family, Jess knew that he'd be the one most likely to help, he just wasn't sure if the man could. "I still feel just so heavy. I'm so tired. I kind of want to go to bed and never wake up – but how close I got to doing it last night, that was terrifying. I felt so relieved when I was about to do it – like a weight getting lifted, like I was floating for the first time in months – and then it hit me what I was about to do when I was talking to you and I don't think I've ever been more scared of my own mind."

"You're so young Jess – I don't understand. You have so much potential, so much to experience."

"I don't need a cheerleader right now, as much as I appreciate it Uncle Luke."

"What do you need?"

"I –" he stopped, unsure of the answer himself. "God, I don't know. I just need to stop feeling like this."

"I can't afford a therapist." He said simply after Jess' confession.

Jess scoffed, "Good. I don't want to see a therapist."

"So," Luke drew out the word, "What now?"

Jess breathed, letting out the tension that had been building through the entirety of that conversation, knowing that although it needed to be said, it made him uncomfortable, and if he were being honest – a little repulsed at himself. "Any chance there's a job going at the diner? I'm going to need to money to get my life back on track."

"Anything you need Jess."

"So…" Jess started,

"So?"

"You and Lorelai eh?" the boy asked, waggling his eyebrows at his uncle.

Luke pushed Jess's shoulder, laughing as he stood and indicating to Jess that he should follow. Jess followed his uncle from the house, shutting the door behind him and falling into a step with him as they made the relatively short journey to the diner.

"I would say I told you so, but I'm not that type of guy."

"Sure you're not Jess."