A/N- Here is the longer chapter I promised! Hope you enjoy. I'm not going to bore you with my real life...actually damn it, this my own goddamn author's note and I can write whatever I please. If you're bored now, just skip past this. But I found an apartment! And I offered on it and it was confirmed and I'm moving in sometime between end of August and mid-September, so I'm completely ecstatic. I'm looking for an appropriate GG reference for my happiness so please message me or include in your review or something if you have one because I'm lacking...excitement clouding my mind. Anyway, this was a good one to write. Hope you JJ fans enjoy this, as well as the Lit fans. Please keep reading and reviewing as those get me through the days as stressful as the ones preceding the resolution of this process. They really do. I do not own Gilmore Girls or any of its concepts or characters, but I am in possession of a wonderful group of readers that I love and appreciate very much and that's more than enough for me. Except for maybe a few tacos. But otherwise I'm good.
Chapter 67
"Do you think Sookie's gonna be able to breathe soon?" Rory laughed once she and Lorelai were heading back to the Inn. Sookie had to stay home to take care of a kid-situation (Davey put a meatball up his nose) and Lorelai had assured her it was fine, she could handle everything that day. But Rory refused to leave her side.
"Nope," Lorelai laughed. When Rory had explained to Sookie about the progress with Jess, and Lorelai had admitted to being somewhat fond of him now, Sookie had been completely lost. She couldn't understand how this would possibly be the same person who wouldn't eat the food she cooked the first and only time she'd really met him. She didn't count things like the Bracebridge dinner, where she was in the kitchen all night. But with the look on Rory's face and the calmness and satisfaction that was so obviously present there, Sookie quickly came to the same conclusion as Lorelai: he was good for her. Actually, incredible for her. And to her. When Rory had gone to pass on a message to Jackson and Davey upstairs, Sookie had leaned over to Lorelai.
"I've never seen her so happy," Sookie stated in wonder, "How did he do it? What changed?"
"Everything. Nothing at all. All I really understand is that they're sharing their books, which means that you and I should probably be picking out china patterns."
"And flowers."
"And a dress."
"And planning a menu!" Sookie exclaimed, "Does he like cheese?"
"Does who like cheese?" Rory asked as she returned. Lorelai grinned.
"Your boyfriend," she teased, "Sookie never really got an answer the first time she met him."
"Yes, he likes cheese, he's human," Rory answered, looking at them strangely, "And he's not my boyfriend, he's my…Jess. But why do you want to know if he likes cheese?"
"Just…making sure he's a suitable match for you," Lorelai answered quickly, "You shouldn't even consider a man who doesn't like cheese."
"Wouldn't," Rory affirmed, "Never in a million years. In an alternate dimension."
"What if there was a dimension with no cheese?" Sookie proposed. Lorelai and Rory gasped simultaneously.
"Sookie!" Lorelai scolded, "You, of all people, know how horrific such a world would be. So why would you jinx it?"
"I couldn't live without cheese!" Rory added in her patented cute-whine, "What's the point of such a life?"
"Does this mean…" Lorelai began.
"Fine," Rory relented. "Jinx back, double pinky, round the side…"
"Luke, you need to take a break," Jess ordered firmly, three hours later. He hadn't seen the man sit down since he'd arrived and he understood why. "You working yourself to the bone is not going to make things any better for her right now. What will is if you try to calm yourself down and think rationally for a while."
"Oh, so now you're giving me romantic advice?" Luke huffed as he cleaned the counter in his nearly empty diner. This time of day was always very slow, too early for dinner and too late for lunch. "I'm really not that confident in your abilities."
Jess sighed deeply. "I didn't want to have to do this…Kirk?"
"Yeah?"
"Tell Luke that story you told me this morning."
"Oh!" Kirk brightened as Luke's face immediately fell, "Well, my mother and my fiancé were arguing today because Lulu wants us to get a cat and I don't but from what I hear, marriage is all about sacrifice, so I was telling Jess how my mother told me to leave Lulu and find a girl who's more accommodating but that I told her that she doesn't understand why I like Lulu so much since she hasn't seen her…"
"Kirk, as fascinating as this story is, I need to have a private word with Jess for a minute," Luke cut him off quickly, "You paid your bill already?"
"Well, yes, but I really feel my advice could help the predicament that you and Jess seemed to be alluding…"
"Out!"
"Fine," Kirk grumbled, "But since I already paid I'm not tipping you next time. Terrible service here."
"Really? You set Kirk on me?"
"Either him or Taylor and Kirk happened to be here."
"Do you realize how immature that was?"
"No less mature than your reaction to it."
"Why in the hell…"
"Because Lorelai is in a complete hellhole of a situation and since you love her more than anything, bar nothing at all, ever, it's driving you crazy not to be able to help her. It's written all over your face. Now, you can either keep doing this, which isn't helping anyone but your counter, or you can listen to what I have to say. I'll admit I'm no Dr. Phil and that my relationships aren't perfect but you have to admit, there's no one else who could tell you how to effectively handle a Gilmore."
Luke met his nephew's eyes and stared for a moment, trying to find a decent counterargument. He sighed in defeat. "I guess it can't make things worse." He sat down at the counter and Jess sat next to him.
"What happened to her is awful," Jess said slowly, "And you know that. You also know that no matter how you handle it she's still going to want to be in the Inn at all times, as long as possible, even if it drives you crazy and her even crazier. And that since she wants to do it, she will do it and nothing can stand in her way. So instead of fighting it, the best option you have is to screw compromise for the time being. Go there. Be with her. Don't try to make her come home, bring home to her. Let her come home when she's ready."
"You mean…"
"I mean you and Lorelai, staying at that goddamned Inn until she stops feeling guilty about letting something happen to it. Until going home actually feels good to her, rather than like a betrayal of a place that she irrationally feels guilty for letting get hurt. I mean being by her side whenever you don't have to be here. It's great that Rory's with her. She needed a day of that. But let Rory take the diner with me a couple days this week and you go be with her while she deals with this. It doesn't matter if she's talking to a contractor and you're sitting on the couch at the Inn or if she's making phone calls and you're arguing with Sookie in the kitchen. Be there. She says she doesn't want you to, but it's because she doesn't want to feel guilty about you being there when you don't want to be."
"But how can I change that?" Luke asked in exasperation, "She's Lorelai! No matter how I act, she always knows what I'm thinking."
"Then want to be there," Jess said simply, "Think about it. On some level, you already do. You hate that she's there worrying and that you aren't there to comfort her. Of course you'd be happier if she were here and you were comforting her, and better still at her house. Your house, whatever. But that's not an option, and given that, you'd be happier being there with her than refilling coffee all day driving yourself crazy with how upset she is and how stressed she is and how you can't do anything to fix it, especially when you know that just you being there will make a difference."
"Her house," Luke said quietly.
"What?" Jess asked, confused.
"It's her house," Luke answered, "I stay there most nights, but it's always still her house. It's that we're staying at her place, or my place. It's not our place."
Jess looked at him carefully, refusing to break the older man's gaze.
"Do you want it to be?"
Luke looked up and breathed deeply before looking at Jess with more certainty than he ever had in his life.
"Yes."
"Then do something about it," Jess said, looking at his uncle's unblinking orbs. He could see reflected in them the pain that Lorelai had put him through, that life had put him through, but rising above that the desperate hope and need for something strong, permanent, that he could hold onto, that was his. Jess had seen it from the first day he'd met Luke and seen the way he looked at Lorelai. He'd always known it was there. But it was never brighter or more clear than it was now.
Luke nodded at Jess. After a few moments of bursting silence, he looked back at his nephew.
"How the hell did you figure all this out, anyway?"
"I didn't," Jess answered, "Just guessing." He smirked and walked away, leaving Luke glaring and biting back a smile of his own.
