A/N- Hope you are all enjoying the story! I had a longer author's note written but accidentally deleted it, so here's the gist. I love you all and your reviews, I hope you like what I begin to do here in forming a Lit relationship that is at core the same but also very different from what we got a chance to see in our beloved Gilmore Girls and please share your thoughts on that, if you'd be so kind. More I love you, more please read, review, recommend if inclined, the usual. I do not own Gilmore Girls or any of its characters or concepts but if I ever write a character 1/4 as compelling as Jess Mariano or half as compelling as the others, I'll die a very happy woman.
Chapter 51
Life certainly wasn't the way Rory had expected it to turn out. True, she had a job working as a journalist in New York. But she wasn't really doing it. She was getting in her assignments on time, sure, but her day-to-day life was that of Truncheon's stockgirl, not even the prize stockgirl, just another person helping to keep the place up and running. Just as lowly as anyone else who spent her days shelving books and sorting inventory. And it was nothing like the lazy break she'd spent working at the bookshop in Star's Hollow for Andrew, where she'd haphazardly picked out more books to read than actually focused on doing work. Sure, she found things she wanted to read here, but she never had time to set anything much aside, and she didn't really mind. She was absorbed in what she was doing, fully caught up in the craze of what Truncheon was, the independent press part and the bookstore itself. She did a lot more with the store, though, whereas Jess was now more focused on the publishing aspect. She handled a lot of the day-to-day things in the shop while Jess handled authors and editing and publishing things. It was a nice balance, and she was more than happy with the chaos. She felt secure in what she was doing, and even though she wasn't actively pursuing answers, they had a perfect way of finding her at the smallest, most seemingly unimportant moments.
For instance, take last Wednesday. Rory had been demolishing the Sanders stack, once and for all (Jess' orders, she was to ignore Matt if he protested) and she had caught a glimpse of Jess in a heated argument with an author who had come in to discuss his latest piece of work. Jess felt it needed a lot more editing, whereas the author felt that changing it would take away from the integrity of it and the message he was trying to convey. Of course, Jess would usually be sensitive to such a situation but this was ridiculous.
"It's a French fry, Cole! A goddamned French fry!" Jess exclaimed, refusing to back down, "I will not stake your entire success on the inclusion of a French fry!"
"Aren't you an author yourself?" the man demanded, looking incensed, "How can you refute the flawless symbolism of the fry as an icon of the poor, the disenfranchised, the unblessed?" With that Jess glared at the man.
"I'm willing to bet you know about as much about being 'unblessed' as you do about symbolism," Jess snarled, staring pointedly at the man's expensive shirt. The man narrowed his eyes.
"Funny, I didn't take you for the judgmental sort. Or the kind to make assumptions."
"Assumptions, no. Observations? Absofuckinglutely," Jess responded, his tone dripping with disgust, "But since we don't seem to be communicating very well, let me refer you to one of my colleagues. Maybe he'll be able to understand the depth of your message, because I'm clearly out of mine." He called Matt over, who rushed immediately upon seeing Jess' expression, and then walked over to the office, still fuming.
Rory stood, still processing. It fascinated her how some of the small things she remembered about Jess so vividly from their time together would just slip through in little moments like that. His impatience, his anger, his refusal to tolerate any level of bullshit. It was funny, even the negatives drew her to him. And in this small instance of reverie, it became apparent to Rory that things weren't finished.
There was no dramatic realization or reaction or even internal argument against herself. It was simply a fact that occurred to her, much as any other would. She was in Philadelphia. They were out of post-its. She still had feelings for Jess, and they'd never really gone anywhere.
She continued on with her day, essentially unaffected by this finding. After all, if it was something that had been residing inside her all this time, unchanged, how could she really be surprised or affected? It was just another part of her she hadn't understood, the way she still didn't understand why she had been so broken or why this place was fixing it. Mysteries would uncover themselves in time if she simply took them as they came. Jess' lessons had a purpose, one that he'd been teaching her far before he consciously tried.
Rory kept working, kept stocking, kept avoiding Matt, doing her best and succeeding with Chris. No difference from the way things had been. Even with Jess, nothing changed. Not one thing. She still wore his shirts and laughed at his jokes and stole his fries and felt at peace, but now she just understood why. And it was okay with her. She didn't worry about how he felt or try to decode it or figure out if there was anything to decode. If there was, there was. If not, she probably couldn't change it. So instead she just chose to ride it out, letting whatever come as it may.
Jess noticed the change in Rory. It was invisible to anyone else. Hell, there wasn't really a change. Not in the way she acted or spoke or treated anyone, but that Wednesday he noticed something in her eyes change. He'd spent enough time staring into them to know what every tiny spark meant, not even the expressions she gave willingly but the involuntary reflections that shone in them. Today, however, there was something new.
This was new to the point that he didn't recognize it even from when they were dating. It was most similar to that, the look she'd share with him when they were talking about a book or eating takeout and watching movies, but there was something different there. He felt a confidence in her that was unshakeable, independent, free. Beyond all that, it was peaceful. There was no sense of urgency in her anymore, no neediness or uncomfortable type of uncertainty. It was true that she was still a mess. He knew very well that she was only turning in pieces to her technical job in a perfunctory way, and that she always hated when things like that interrupted what she had here now. He also knew that she wasn't making any concentrated effort to fix those things, though honestly he agreed with her approach. Better to let the answers come to you when seeking them out too desperately is what screwed you over in the first place. But in spite of all this chaos and the many things that would make her life look like a disaster on paper, he saw how calm she felt, how safe. She was home and she damn well knew it. And that particular day, something intensified in that part of her expression. He saw a greater sense of understanding and acceptance, and he wasn't sure to what it corresponded exactly, but he knew that she was certain of something, something important, and that she was letting things come to her, following the path as it appeared.
Jess had always found Rory to be irrefutably compelling but something in that look made him feel absolutely helpless to his need for her. There was no fight left in him and no more need for it. That was all he understood from the look and all he intended to.
