-1A/N: Okay everyone, this is the last chapter of This Time Imperfect. I'm a little sad to see it come because I had such a blast writing it. It was tough at times, but the end product was worth it. I would like to thank profusely everyone who reviewed. A special thanks to Aiden86, she made me write sometimes when I didn't want to because I'm lazy and encouraged me to post more chapters all the while boosting my ego. I don't know where this story would be without you. Also a special thanks to Just A Girl Of The Hollow x3, XoXoLiteratiLoveroXoX, The Warner Sister Dot, Curley-Q, Hollowgirl22, Amy, Aiden 86, Dragon Dreamer3, Exitlight, and Squealing Lit. Fan for reviewing every chapter or close to every chapter. You guys are amazing, and made my days so many times. I greatly enjoyed discussing and sharing this story with you, and hope to do it again. Anyone who reviews for this chapter, I will reply to if you leave the review signed or with an e-mail address. Again, this has been a great experience for me. I hope you all enjoyed it to. Now on with the end of This Time Imperfect!
Disclaimer- I don't own Gilmore Girls, but I wish I owned my amazing readers and reviewers. Unfortunately though, you can't own people.
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After the bridge incident, Jess had stalked off upset. Cassie told Rory that he would be okay with a little time. That it was hard on him. Which it was. Brought back a lot of memories that he had been trying to repress.
Rory and Cassie were folding clothes from the dryer and talking.
"Do you regret anything?" Rory asked.
"In a way, but also not. I wouldn't be the person I am today without my experiences. I could live without a few though. I think the person I would be, would be better rested." Cassie joked. Rory laughed lightly.
"What happened.." Rory trailed off, not knowing what else to say.
"It sucked." Cassie finished bluntly. "But I was lucky. I had Jess who loved me, and took care of me, and was there for me. I could have been all alone with no one that cared or paid any attention to what was going on. He was the reason that I'm out of that situation because I don't think that I could have done it. I handled it all wrong. There were so many things that now I look back I realize I should've done differently. Pushing Jess away is one. I realize that he just wanted to help."
"That had to have been terrible and I'm impressed you handled it at all." Rory had thought of putting herself in Cassie's shoes throughout the telling of the story, and discovered that she didn't know what she would've done.
"It was hard. I thought about suicide many times, but Jess was there and I don't think I can ever repay him for it. I know it was hard on him, and I know he doesn't show emotions very often. Every time he does, it seems to get him hurt and I know that my situation and the way I tried to handle it, certainly didn't help that."
Rory took a deep breath trying to build up the courage to ask Cassie an important question. "You lost your virginity to Jess, right?"
"Right." She nodded.
"How was it? I mean, I don't want every detail. Just an overall."
"A little awkward." Cassie laughed. "Not because it was Jess, but because neither of us had any idea what we were doing. I mean, we were twelve. We hadn't even had a sex ed. class yet. Not that you need one in New York, but we were just a couple of curious kids. All it was really was fumbling hands and a lot of laughter. Which was good. We were comfortable enough with each other that we could laugh through the whole thing. I didn't expect some life-altering experience." Cassie paused. "But it won't be at all like that with you. You'll be with Jess. Who now is very experienced."
Rory blushed a deep shade of crimson. "So I'll just be the one with the fumbling hands? Great." She laughed nervously.
"No. Jess will guide you on what to do. Just follow his lead. You guys will fall into a rhythm. Trust me." She folded a shirt. "I'm sure he'll be gentle and loving because he loves you, and that's Jess. Once you get past the hard exterior, he is the sweetest person you'll ever meet."
"I don't think he loves me."
"Oh, he does. I know Jess better than anyone. He won't admit it yet. But he does. He'll tell you with time. I mean hell, he didn't tell me until we were thirteen. We'd already been officially together for over three years." A look of panic crossed Rory's face, so Cassie spoke quickly trying to save herself. "Not that it'll be that long with you. We were ten, you guys are much older. It won't take as long to figure out your feelings." Cassie sighed. "We really shouldn't be comparing relationships here. They're completely different."
Rory laughed folding a pair of jeans. "Okay, new subject. Do you have a boyfriend now?"
"No."
"Why not?"
Cassie shrugged. "Haven't found the right guy."
"You will." Rory assured.
"I know."
Unable to resist the other question clawing to get out, she asked, "Do you still love Jess?"
Cassie sighed in response. "Truthfully? I'll always love Jess. He was my first love and I'll never forget him, and never stop loving him. But our time together is over. We were together all of our young lives, and that was it for us. I don't think we were meant to be together forever or anything like that. I'm glad that now we're on better terms than we were, but we're both meant to fall in love with other people. Just like we were meant to be there for each other while we were young, to take care of each other, we're meant to be there for someone else and take care of them now. Jess may have already found his person," Cassie gave Rory a pointed look, and Rory blushed before looking down at the shirt she had in her hands. "and now I need to find mine. I will not always be in love with Jess. But I will always love him."
Rory nodded in semi-understanding.
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"Hey, what're you doing here so early?" Jess asked Cassie as she strolled through the doors of the diner at five in the morning. It was unfortunately Jess' turn to open that day.
"I'm heading out. Thought I'd get an early start."
"You never went to bed, did you?"
"Ah, you know me too well. That's the only way to have me out of bed at five in the morning is not going to sleep the previous night. Not that I've been sleeping at all for the last year and a half. Two to three hours a night. I think that's plenty."
Jess shook his head. "You really need to sleep."
"Okay, dad." She mocked him.
"So are you going to visit regularly?"
"I don't think so. I don't know how much longer I'm going to be in New York."
"Why?"
"I just think I need a fresh start. New York has too many memories. I need a new place with new memories."
Jess nodded. "I can understand that." Something on Cassie's left wrist caught his eye. "What's that?" He jerked his head towards it.
Cassie pulled up her sleeve. "Tattoos." She showed them all to him. "I got the information on all of my hospital bracelets tattooed on me. So I'll never forget that no matter what happens to me, where I've been, and that it could be worse."
Jess examined all of them. He remembered most of the dates and the incidents that happened to call for a hospital visit. But he stopped at the two farthest up her arm that he can't recall being in New York for.
"What are those two for?" He pointed to them.
"Well, that one right there," Cassie pointed to the first one. "is from the mental hospital. I spent a week there after George escaped. Had a breakdown, tried to commit suicide. Obviously I failed. And that one," She pointed to the last one. "is from right before I came. I, uh, didn't tell you because I didn't want you to worry."
"Tell me what?"
"Don't freak out."
"I won't." Jess assured.
"Well about a month ago, I came home from school and when I closed the door, George was behind it. Before he left the country he promised to come back to kill me. I grabbed the phone, dialed 911 and got in a scream for help before he took it from me and hit me across the head with it, breaking the phone in the process. Left a scar." She pushed her thick, straight, black hair back to show him a scar right above her left temple. "Just a little lower and he would've killed me. Then he threw me on the floor. I landed on my right arm, breaking it. Then he started kicking me. He broke four ribs. He pushed my big oak table over on me that had the vase and crap on it. The table fractured one of my legs, and the vase hit me in the head, knocking me unconscious. I woke up in the hospital and they told me that when they got to the apartment he was gone again and I was hanging onto life by a thread."
"Oh my god. How was your mom?" Jess was amazed, and felt a little bad at the same time. A part of him still thought it was his job to protect Cassie, but knew that Cassie was stubborn and didn't want to be protected anymore. If she did, she would've come to Jess sooner than she did. Though what happened was terrible, Jess didn't get a bad feeling like George would be back. Then he thought of how fragile Cassie's mom had always been.
"Hysterical. Blaming herself for everything. Just like I knew she would."
"I'm really sorry. I wish I could've been there to help." He was careful to not say protect. Because although Cassie didn't want to be protected, she had learned that she needed help sometimes. They were two different things.
"That's actually why I'm here. When George came, I thought he was going to finish the job and kill me. And the whole time all I kept thinking was 'I wish I could see Jess one more time. All I want to do is see Jess.' So as soon as I got out of all of my casts and was fully recovered, I went to your old apartment and shook out of Liz where you were."
"You got Liz to tell you where I was?" Disbelief was clearly evident in his voice.
"Yup. I barged into her apartment and sat in front of her fridge so she couldn't get any beer until she told me. I wasn't leaving. It's not like she could call the police, her apartment was full of pot. She'd totally get busted. So after about two hours of sitting in front of her fridge singing the small world song at the top of my lungs, she caved."
Jess actually laughed. "I would've paid to see that."
"It was pretty funny." It was silent for a few minutes. "Oh! I almost forgot to tell you. I got another tattoo."
"Oh really?" Jess raised an eyebrow.
"Yes." She turned her back to him and raised her shirt a little to reveal the words "This Time Imperfect" Scrawled across her lower back.
"Favorite song from your favorite band, huh?" Jess wasn't surprised.
"Yeah. It holds a lot of memories. Always helps me when I'm about to lose it. Something has to with my knight in shining armor gone." Cassie lightly joked.
Jess nodded.
"So anyway, I'm going to get going."
"Okay."
"By the way, tell Rory about the tattoo before you have sex with her. You don't want her asking questions in the middle of the act."
Jess and Cassie were always together in New York and so people used to tease them that they wouldn't recognize one without the other and combined their names. They called them Cassiano. So one day the two went out and got tattoos of the name in black with a read heart surrounding it on the inside of Cassie's right hip and on the inside of Jess' left. Kind of so they'd be aligned when they were... It was a crazy teen thing.
"The guys I'm with never care, but Rory will."
"Ah, I had forgotten about that tattoo."
Cassie mock gasped, putting a hand over her heart. "I'm hurt! How could you forget about that tattoo?"
"I don't take my pants off very often anymore." Jess joked, but was also serious.
"Fair enough." She conceded, smirking and shrugging one shoulder.
Jess' eyes suddenly widened before a "Oh." escaped his lips and he dashed through the curtain. Cassie's brows came together in confusion, and she slightly cocked her head to the right. He reappeared just as suddenly as he had disappeared, but when he reappeared he was holding something behind his back. Cassie tried to see around him, but failed.
"I almost forgot to give you something."
Cassie's eyebrows raised in surprise, and she smiled slightly. "And what would that be, Mariano?"
Jess then pulled a stuffed unicorn out from behind his back and Cassie squee'd like a mad woman, practically knocking Jess over with the force of her hug, while taking it. Stuffed animals had always been her favorite thing on the planet. In that sense, she was still a little girl.
"Thank you so much!" The squealed, pulling away to examine the soft creature.
Jess shrugged a tad embarrassed. If anyone in Stars Hollow saw that, it would ruin his rep. "Just to remember your visit here and the thirteen stores devoted to peddling porcelain unicorns. It's not porcelain, but only because I know you like stuffed animals… So, you like it?"
"Are you kidding?" Cassie looked up to him, smiling like he hadn't seen her smile since they were kids, and right then he thought she looked like a little kid on Christmas. "I LOVE it." She looked at it one more time before hugging it to her chest.
"Good, I'm glad." And suddenly Jess found himself smiling the biggest smile he'd smiled in years. Cassie's smile always had been contagious, and making her that happy after everything between them, made Jess happier than he'd maybe ever been. For a few moments they just stared at each other, soaking up the foreign feeling of being happy for once. Then Jess finally choked out, "You're going to miss your bus."
"Right." She was broken of her trance, and her smile softened. "It was really good to see you, Jess."
"It was really good to see you too." Jess enveloped Cassie into a hug and kissed the top of her head. He was glad she wasn't crying this time. She just kissed his cheek in return and grabbed her small bag from the floor of the diner, still clutching the white unicorn.
"Alright, babe. I'm out."
"Babe?" Jess raised an eyebrow.
"Old habits die hard." She shrugged, walking backwards before turning on her heel and leaving the diner and Jess' life.
END
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A/N: This is the end. Imagine! I actually finished a story. I'm sad it's over, but I hope you all enjoyed it, and tell me what you thought about it. For those who haven't been reviewing, make it up to me with a long review of the story and what you thought. I'd like to hear it. And of course you know I love to hear from the people that have been reviewing. You're all awesome.
A/N2: I do have an idea for a sequel. Let me know if you'd be interested or want to know a little more about it. I haven't started and probably won't for awhile because I have to try and finish the stories I already have going. But maybe if people are interested I will.
Just A Girl- At first I thought the review was going to be bad. Usually making people nauseas isn't a good sign, but I guess in your case it was. I'm glad you love the story so much. I really came to love it too. I'm sad it's over now. :'[
Amy- Thanks!
Exitlight- Yeah, he was just trying to help, and as you see in this chapter she realizes that. No, that was when he was sent to crazy Ville. They never got a chance to fight about that. Now the story's over. What'd you think overall?
Curley-Q- I know she doesn't. She knew that too. It was just a difficult situation to be in.
Squealing- Yes, I'm sorry for the long wait. Was it worth it? Now the fic's over. (tear) What'd you think?
Dragon Dreamer3- I'm glad you liked the length, but apologize for misleading you with the summary. I shall change it. I was going to write more Lit action, but decided that this wasn't the story for it. That wasn't the purpose of this story, and I really am sorry for misleading you. Did you like it anyway?
Aiden86- You finally got on! So sorry that it didn't work at first. What'd you think overall now?
Hollowgirl22- See? Lit. Cassie's gone. This was really just for the purpose of showing a little about Jess' past, and that he wasn't always the sarcastic smart-ass that he was in season three. I was never planning on getting Jess and Cassie together. Also, I realized this wasn't a place for Lit action. You all can make up their first time together on your own. This story gave it's purpose, and I don't want to drag it out longer than needed. I hope you enjoyed it, though.