Chapter 6

Disclaimer: Still don't own it.

When Lorelai came downstairs late the next morning, both Rory and Paris were already up and having a somewhat heated debate about some new political policy. It was just too early (from Lorelai's perspective) with no coffee, for Lorelai to actually comprehend what they were discussing. So she just grumbled, "Need coffee."

Rory looked at her mother sympathetically. Yale was not only educating her, it was also training her to function happily on very little sleep. It was like boot camp, with philosophy and economics, rather than push ups and guns. Rory handed her mom a massive cup of coffee them asked, "Didn't you say something about a Stars Hollow museum opening up today?"

Lorelai's brain was finally catching up, museum… opening… Saturday… Sookie, "Yea, at the 'old man formally known as Twickham's' place. I'm meeting Sookie there around noon, you girls interested?"

Paris shrugged, "It's always amusing when provincials grasp for legitimacy. I'm in."

Rory nodded, "I'll call Lane. Maybe she'll come too."

Lorelai took a long look at both girls, "How are you two holding up?"

At the same time both Rory and Paris' masks seemed to slip. Rory bit her lip and looked down towards her feet. Paris stared intently at an imaginary spot on the wall some where behind Lorelai's head. It only took a second for Lorelai to understand the name of the game was 'Pretend nothing's wrong or die trying.' "Ok never mind, moving on. If we hurry up and get dressed we can do breakfast Luke's, then head over to the opening."

Rory nodded, glad to change the subject. Thinking about Jess, the fight, anything having to do with the night before made Rory's heart twist. "Sounds good."

Lorelai watched the girls slip back into 'Fake it till you make it' mode with an internal sigh. She had a strange feeling today was going to be one for the books. Her mom-dar was pinging wildly.

An hour or so later, Jess ran into the diner looking for Rory. His disappointment was almost palpable when he realized she wasn't there. Still standing by the door Jess yelled, "Luke!"

After a horrible crash, the sound of several dishes breaking and a lot of cursing, Luke came out of the store room. Luke was in a horrible mood and not in the mood to deal with anyone. "WHA- Oh, Jess."

Luke was surprised to see Jess standing in the middle of the usual lunch crowd. He had honestly assumed that Jess would be halfway back to Philly by now.

Jess was running short on time. He'd been calling Rory all night and not once did he get through. Always voicemail. Jess' mood has swung between depressed, angry and worried through out the night. "Have you seen Rory?"

Luke hesitated, after talking to Lorelai last night he knew how upset Rory had been and he wasn't sure if now was a good time for Jess to decide he actually wanted to attempt to talk to her. If Luke knew how the Gilmore's were, which he did, Rory had passed sad and was now in the middle of righteous anger.

Jess tried not to feel hurt by Luke's wariness, after all, Jess hadn't given him any indication if was coming back. And his track record wasn't very favorable. "Look, I've been calling her all night. Please, just tell me where she is."

From the table in the corner, Babette watched Jess. She may be one of the town's biggest gossips but she got that title because she had a knack for seeing people as they truly were, not the front they showed the world.

Babette could see Jess was a man head over heels in love. A half blind idiot could see that if they cared to look. But it was the barest hint of desperation in Jess' voice that moved her the most. "Jess, I'll tell you what you need to know, if you promise me one thing."

Jess turned to look at Babette. At this point he would do just about anything thing to find Rory. He would even read bed time stories to the crazy lady's cats if that's what it took. "Name it."

Babette smiled. Jess really had grown into one hell of a man. Rough around the edges, to be sure. But he always had the best of intentions. "You treat our girl right this time."

"I'll do my best…. Ma'am." Jess had been expecting something slightly humiliating and crazy. Promising to treat Rory well was a no brainier to him. It was something he had every intention of doing before talking to Babette.

"Ok, sugar," Babette realized this was the first time she'd ever called Jess 'sugar'. "They went to opening."

Jess looked over at Luke to make sure that he wasn't being sent on a wild goose chase in revenge for stealing the stupid garden gnome. Luke nodded and said, "Old man Twickham's place."

Jess was already out the door when he decided to turn around and stick his head back in, "Hey, Babette?"

"Yea, sugar?"

"Tell Pierpont I said hello."

Babette laughed from the heart, Jess was okay in her book now. "Go get your girl, sweetie.!"

Luke watched Jess take off toward the other side of town, knowing that Jess was doing the right thing. He wasn't going to let Rory slip away this time.

Richard was in his study, attempting to read over a client's contract. As much as he loved working, insurance matters could be so very dry. Very difficult to spend hours pouting over. Richard welcomed the distraction when Emily walked in. "Emily, you are a sight for sore eyes. Please distract me."

Emily was pleased to find Richard in a good mood, it would make setting up this whole dinner gathering that much easier. "I need you to pick up your dark grey suit from the dry cleaners on your way home from the office before Friday night."

"Why would I need my good suit?" Richard, while always an impeccable dresser, saved a few of his suits for special occasions. And yes, he enjoyed diners with Rory but she wasn't as up tight as Emily's circle of friends.

"The Huntzburgers are joining us for dinner and I want you to look presentable." Emily was planning everything with the precision of a military general invading a hostile country.

Richard's eyes widened in surprise. He knew how much Emily disliked Shira Huntzburger. Though, they'd never really discussed Mitchum, Richard knew that the man certainly didn't meet Emily's high standards. "The Huntzburgers?"

"Yes, I set the whole thing up with Shira yesterday." Emily explained while straightening one of Richard's bookshelves, as if it was all perfectly natural.

Richard sensed one of Emily's mischievous plots, that she always thought were for the best. He wasn't sure if now was the for it though. With Lorelai and Rory still upset about the last time Emily had attempted to 'fix' everything. "Emily…"

Emily knew she needed to explain the logic in this dinner while ignoring all the obvious personal motives for it. "Mitchum owns several establish papers, Richard. And with Rory's dream of becoming a journalist, I thought meeting him would be a wise connection for Rory."

As true as that may be, Richard could see that there was an alterior motive behind this engagement. Part of him wanted to step in and stop it but he knew how stubborn Emily could be. "Fine, dark grey suit it is, my dear."

"Good. It will be Mitchum, Shira and Logan joining us, so I'll need to bring in an extra maid for the night to keep up." Everything needed to be elegant, perfect and prompt.

"Logan?" Though he knew Logan, Richard didn't see why the boy would need to attend a function like this one.

Emily sighed, at least she had already thought up a plausible reason for Logan's presence at the dinner. "We need a sixth person to round things out. Shira volunteered to bring Logan. After all, he and Rory know each other from the paper, so his being there might make the evening less uncomfortable for Rory."

Because Richard wanted to believe that was the only purpose in Logan's attendance he agreed. "That does sound reasonable."

"Perfectly reasonable." Emily was internally congratulating herself. Just because Lorelai could see that Emily knew what was best didn't mean that Rory would feel the same way.

Emily left Richard to his work before her face gave away her thoughts. Soon that delinquent malcontent nephew of a filthy diner owner would be out of the picture and things could progress like he had never come back at all.

After Lorelai left to join Sookie in the first tour group, Paris turned to Rory and broke their unspoken code of silence, "How are you doing?"

Rory didn't want to talk about how she was actually feeling so she tried to put Paris off the subject with a short and too bright, "I'm fine."

Paris, of course, didn't notice this and steamrolled over Rory's misgivings. "Doyle's probably called me and me not calling him back mean he may never call me again. There you go, There, you have it."

Rory was mentally thanking her mom for not returning their cell phones. Not only would Paris be checking hers constantly, Rory would be fighting the urge to call Jess all day. "Paris, you've come this far, don't buckle."

Paris was glad she had Rory to support her, to talk her out of going insane by analyzing everything to death. "I don't want to buckle. I really don't want to buckle. Don't let me buckle, Gilmore."

Rory nodded and gave Paris a mock salute, before she saw Lane waling towards them. "Oh look, Here's Lane. Good distraction."

Lane wasn't in the mood for town festivities but she really didn't want to sit at home wondering where Zach was. "Hello."

Rory could tell just from that one word that Lane was in a mood that matched her and Paris' to a 't'. "What's wrong with you?"

"I don't want to talk about it." 'I don't even want to think about it.' she silently added.

Rory didn't want to pry, knowing Lane would talk when she was ready. "Well, we're a fun group."

Paris looked around trying to find something to take her mind off her own issues. Punch! She grabbed a couple glasses off the table.

"Paris?" Rory tried to stop her. Rory had seen the effects of Founder's Day Punch first hand.

"We paid out three dollars." Paris shrugged.

"Miss Patty's left over punch is used to remove tar from construction sites." Rory explained only exaggerating slightly for emphasis.

"Then let it remove the tar from our souls." Paris handed both Rory and Lane their own glasses. They all needed to do something a little wrong to get out of this funk. Drinking was the easiest option at hand.

Lane and Rory looked at each other having one of those silent conversations only best friends for years are able to have. Then they both took long drinks and felt the fire of alcohol reach their stomachs.

Jess walked up to the crowd around the town's attempt at making their own museum, looking for Rory. She had to be there. Rory never missed one of these things. Never. But he just couldn't find her.

Lorelai and Sookie piled out of the exit still giggling at the last show. Sookie looked up and saw Jess standing across the street scanning the crowd, clearly looking for something. More than likely Rory, Sookie guessed. Lorelai had hinted at a possible complication between the two. "Umm Lorelai?" Sookie pointed to the anxious looking Jess.

Lorelai saw and couldn't help but think of the worst possible scenario. Jess looking for a fight, finding Dean and pounding him. Lorelai had to do something to stop this. "Jess!"

Jess saw Lorelai jogging towards him and felt a wave of relief. Rory couldn't be far if Lorelai was here. "Where's Rory?"

Lorelai sincerely wanted to believe Jess was here to fix things but she couldn't risk him hurting Rory again. Not after what she saw last night. "Why?"

Jess thought Lorelai would be this way, he was positive Rory had told Lorelai everything. He knew he's have to face the angry mother eventually, may as well get it out of the way now. That way when he and Rory talked that wasn't looming over their heads. "Please, just tell me where she is."

Lorelai took a closer look at Jess. He looked terrible, like he hadn't slept and had been pulling at his hair all night. She felt a small pang of sympathy. "You could have called her, Jess"

"I did. I tried to call her all night." Jess knew Rory had assumed the worst, that must have been why she wasn't answering. Rory must have thought he was calling her to say he was leaving. He had called several times after her disappeared before her graduation. But Jess could never bring himself to say anything. Nothing he had panned to tell Rory seemed good enough when he heard her on the other end of the phone.

It struck Lorelai in that moment that she'd never given the cell phones back. After her public confrontation with Dean, they had completely slipped her mind. "Oh no," she breathed and began digging in her purse. When she found Rory's phone she saw the screen. 27 missed calls. "I'm so sorry, Jess. I took their phones last night."

Hearing that actually made Jess feel a little more relieved. Rory hadn't been ignoring him. They could still fix this. "Where is she?"

Lorelai glanced around. "She was waiting for Lane. They have to be around here some where."

Jess was just about to start walking away when Sookie came over. "Hey guy? You ok?"

Lorelai turned to Sookie "Have you seen the girls?"

Jess' eyes continued scanning the small crowd but he listened for Sookie's response in case she knew anything.

"No, but I'll you guys look." Sookie turned to Jess, thinking he probably needed someone on his side right about now. "I'm glad you're here, Jess." She said quietly.

Jess didn't know what to say so he remained silent. Sookie was doing her best to make him know that he wasn't hated. As much as that meant to Jess, he only cared that Rory didn't hate him. As long as he had her he was fine.

Lorelai took charge, divide and conquer style, or in this case, find. "Sook, you look over there, She pointed to one side of the square. "I'll look over there." She pointed to a different area. "And Jess…"

"I'll take everywhere else."

The three headed off in different directions. How much trouble could three girls find in Stars Hollow?

Logan was laying in bed, attempting to sleep off what had to be the worst hangover in the history of man. He, Colin and Finn had done a lengthy pub crawl the night before and Logan hadn't gotten home until the wee hours of the morning. Suddenly, his phone went started blaring, making Logan groan, "Too early!" Even though it was nearly three in the afternoon.

Looking at his phone to decide if he wanted to answer the call, he cursed. It was his mother and she would just keep calling until he answered. If she didn't do that, Logan would never answer her phone calls. "Yes, mom?"

'Logan, dear, how are you?'

"I'm fine. What do you need?" Logan knew his mother would never call him just to check on him. No one in his family actually cared, except his sister.

'Emily Gilmore asked us to have dinner with her family Friday night. She said you may know her granddaughter, Lory, she goes to Yale with you.'

Dinner? With Rory and her grandparents? He was confused. "Do you mean 'Rory', mom?"

'Yes, that's it. Emily thought introducing Rory to your father would be good because Rory wants to be a journalist. And since you're on the paper with Rory, I told Emily you would be happy to join us.'

Logan sat up in his bed. Dinner with Rory? Even if he had to deal with his parents, he knew seeing her would be worth it. "Give me the time and I'll be there."

"6 o' clock Friday night.'

"Sounds good."

'See you then. Do not be late. Emily is a very punctual woman.'

Logan's other hung up the phone, leave Logan with his own thoughts. Dinner with Rory. This was his chance to show you how well they actually fit. Hopefully, things would go back to normal. The way things were before this other guy showed up.

Rory, Lane and Paris were several cups of Founder's Day Punch passed tipsy. The three had reached the warm, painlessness of being truly drunk.

Lane was doing her own version of a stand up comedy routine describing the horrifying details of living with two boys, while Paris and Rory laughed. Rory was really starting to feel better, She had her friends. Even if Jess had left, Rory knew she would be ok. 'I don't need him!' She thought. 'If he doesn't want me, fine.'

The three girls had dissolved into a fit of giggles when Jess saw them from across the street. His momentary excitement at finding Rory was quickly replaced with bitter disappointment. Jess had driven himself nearly insane thinking about her all night. Yet she, it seemed, was perfect fine.

Jess thought about turning around and leaving right then. But he knew he needed to actually talk to Rory to see where things really stood between the two of them. "Rory!"

Rory glanced up at the sound of her name to see Jess bounding toward where they were sitting in the shade of a giant tree. Rory felt a rush of anger at the sight of him that she couldn't explain. When he got closer she asked, "What are you doing here?"

Just as Jess was going to start his lengthy explanation, Lane stumbled between he and Rory and yelled," You left!"

Jess caught the smell of alcohol on Lane's breath because of their close proximity. "Lane, Are you drunk?" Jess questing with disbelief lacing his tone.

"So what if I am?" What are you going to do about it? Run away? Imp mean you've got it down to an art, so why change form now?" Lane was tired of watching Jess hurt her friend, He deserved a talking to, if Lane could get it all out.

Jess didn't have the patience right then to deal with the drunken bulldog routine. No matter how much he deserved it. "Rory, please just let me talk to you."

It took Rory a few second to think it over, because he brain was working at a lower function than normal but she finally said, "Fine. I'll be back in a few minutes, Lane."

While they walked away from Lane and, a now puking, Paris, Jess caught a pattern. "Wait, are you drunk too?"

Rory started giggling at the thought of Jess being offended by her imbibing. "I am NOT drunk!"

She immediately proved that statement false by tripping and falling on the ground in a very ungraceful manner. Which then started another round of giggles. Jess tried his best not to laugh at Rory on the ground at his feet. "How much have you had to drink?"

Something snapped inside Rory. Who was he to question her? "What do you care? You walked away! You got mad about the Dean thing, when you and I weren't even together when it happened, and then you bailed!" Rory yelled up at him from the ground.

Jess didn't want to do this in the middle of town with everyone watching but it looked like that was going to have to be. "Rory, let me talk"

Rory clumsily got to her feet. "No! Why should you suddenly get to talk? You left! You decided you didn't want me! Then you beg me to run away with you! You don't get to be mad about anything that happened! I do!"

Jess couldn't say he blamed her for being angry with him. But for her to think that he had ever stopped wanting her, loving her was something that cut him to the core.

Jess took a small step forward just to be closer when he told her this. "Rory, I never stopped wanting you. Not once. You were constantly on my mind." It came out as a yell. Jess didn't care who heard.

"But you left. Over and over again!" Rory's voice was still raised. She was tired of brushing everything away, pretending nothing had happened.

"I know that." Jess said quietly. Thinking of the time he called her while he was in California and she had said 'I think I may have loved you…. But I'm moving on with my life.' Hearing her say that broke him.

Jess gently took Rory's face into his hands and forced her to look at him. "I'm not leaving again." The way he said it was so firm it was almost a vow.

"I want to believe you." Rory said sadly doubting Jess. This would be a textbook definition of perfection except for the nagging worry that Jess was lying.

Jess knew it would take time for her to trust him again. She could have all the time she needed. All of Rory's doubts were his own fault. "You will believe me. Just give it some time, ok? Give me a chance to prove that you can trust me this time."

Even in the fog of drunkenness Rory could see how honest Jess was being. So she nodded. She could give him that. Rory would give him another chance. Maybe because he had changed but mostly because after all the distance, time and hurt. But more for the fact that Rory would rather be fighting with Jess, than happy with anyone else.

Jess very gently pressed his lips to Rory's in a way of sealing his promise.

"Hey, Jess?"

"Yea."

"I'm not feeling so good." Rory said sheepishly. Rory's stomach was churning and the world was spinning at an alarming rate.

"Rum will do that to you." Let's get you home so you can sleep it off."

Author's Note: Reviews please. Friday night dinner up next.