A/N- Hope you guys enjoy. Yes, Lorelai and Luke are getting a lot of screentime early in this fic, and they will continue to because they are amazing. But as I've been saying, things are getting much more Rory and Lit-centric from here on out. But hope you enjoy! As always, please read, review, and recommend if you're so inclined. I do not own Gilmore Girls or its concepts or characters. Feel free to message me on here or on Tumblr.


Chapter 21

About three weeks later, Jess found himself restless. Of course he'd been used to a solitary life for a long time, but for some reason the recent stream of visits had inspired in him a certain desire to have his routine interrupted, to sacrifice a little of himself more often. In the past, when he had on rare occasion suffered this same impulse, he had talked himself out of scratching the itch, either by concerning himself with productiveness or by assuming the same of those he was interested in seeing. However, something about the empty bed sitting in his room every night made him realize that maybe those people wanted to be there too, if only they were asked. Staring at that bed, Jess sighed and picked up the phone.

"Hello?" answered the gruff, familiar voice.

"Hey," Jess said monosyllabically, mentally punching himself for the nerves.

"Jess!" Luke recognized, "How's it going?"

"Alright," Jess said. Add a word, goddamnit. "Actually,pretty well. Work's good, so things are good."

"That's…good," Luke faltered. Jess heard Lorelai saying something in the background and Luke's shushing and he barely suppressed a smirk.

"I see you have company."

"Impressive vision. What's going on, Jess?"

"I just didn't know if you guys were free this weekend. Tell her I say hi by the way, and also that more than two cups of coffee after 8 PM will turn her into something resembling Dr. Frankenfurter by 11."

"Let me check on both counts." Jess heard Lorelai's laughter ringing across, and then her surprised response.

"Um, no, I mean, I don't think so. Even the inn is pretty empty this weekend," Lorelai admitted.

"Apparently we're free," Luke returned to the phone.

"Well, if you feel like it," Jess said slowly, "There's not much going on here either. You could visit. I'd say I could come there but I do have one author meeting on Saturday morning I can't miss."

"Oh!" Luke replied, surprised, "Let me just check with Lorelai." After about ten seconds of incoherent mumbling, Luke returned. "We'd love to."

"Great," Jess said, "I'll see you on Friday then."

"Oh, wait," Luke cut him off, "She wants to talk to you."

"What?" Jess said, but before he could ask why, the phone was being passed.

"Um, hi, Jess." "Lorelai."

"I just wanted to see if, well, what…" Lorelai sighed.

"You talked to Rory," Jess finished.

"Yeah," Lorelai answered quietly, "And it's not that I don't trust you, I just wanted to…"

"I don't know much more than you do about why she came or what the deal is, but as far as I'm concerned she's a platonic friend with an open invitation. And that's about all I can give you. Sorry."

"No, that's actually…helpful. Thanks," Lorelai said, clearly holding herself back from asking more. Impressive. Lorelai trying to develop self-control. Perhaps there was hope for humanity yet.

"Not a problem," Jess said, "So you're cool with this weekend?"

"Definitely," Lorelai replied, "But if you'd rather it just be Luke, that's completely…"

"No," Jess cut her off, "You're always welcome here. Plus, I'm gonna need some help getting him to fix some of the shelves at Truncheon."

"So you're really just having me visit in order to double your powers of persuasion?"

"You're a Gilmore. Quadruple."

"Fair point. I'll bring the big guns."

"And I'll provide the coffee."

"God, who knew you could be this likeable?"

"And how many hours ago did you receive that concussion?"

"Goodnight, Jess."

Hanging up the phone, Jess smiled. A couple years ago, he never would have expected his life to work out this way. Even during the best moments he was always just waiting for the other shoe to drop. When he was with Rory, it was in his mind a question of how long he could live in this Twilight Zone of bliss before something tore it apart, tore her away from him, or more likely, tore him away from her. Even when he and Luke had a good relationship going, Jess half-expected it to fall apart the second something changed, anything changed. Luke's engagement, future marriage, he was certain those types of things would derail whatever the hell is was they had going and that he'd end up like one of his parents before his mid-twenties. He felt the most authentic (though unhappy) when he was living in the worst times. That cramped apartment with the random guys that he was crashing in post-Jimmy, pre-self-help-books. The days in New York with Liz and her myriad boyfriends. The days where he didn't even have one singular place he was sleeping.

Now it felt normal, natural even, to have family and to call on them. To want to. True, he lived alone in a one-bedroom apartment above his workplace and was, in the most colloquial sense of the word, alone, but he felt less lonely than he had in the past. He'd learned pretty early on that having a warm body lying in bed next to you didn't mean you mattered to someone. And now he did.

Maybe one day he'd get the other parts of the program. Someone to share this feeling of contentment with, safety, home, whatever it was that he was experiencing in its totality for the first time in his life. Maybe he'd actually make a home with someone, a real house even, with entire walls dedicated to books. Sharing libraries, now to him, that was marriage. But for now the thought of who wasn't with him was not dominating his mind.

He'd worked hard to build this life, based on the beautiful, pure, self-evident truth revealed to him by one of the most important characters in the novel of his life. And that lesson had driven him since. You could see it in the way that he built up Truncheon and in the novels that he advocated for, as well as in the writing he did on his own. It was the divine simplicity of the revolutionary parts of his life that dictated his current path. He could do more, he could be more, he was more. Later, stronger, he had added something of his own, "I deserve more." He would always be grateful to the person who helped him find this path, find his way, and he hoped to be there for her, strong for her when it was so clear that something in her had weakened.

But for tonight he would read another one of his books, scrawling in the margins notes that maybe no one would ever read, but that mattered now. And later he would fall asleep to the sounds of the city, radiating warmth and life into the small sanctuary he had made for himself in this fucked up world.