It was strange timing, even Rory Gilmore would admit. With everything that had happened, all the pure chaos that was the last few months, the one person that Rory had found utterly constant (in a bad way albeit) had changed. He looked like an angel compared to the things she had done recently. She still couldn't believe she had stolen a yacht. She, Rory, had stolen something! To make it even worse, a big something! And all those "sleepovers" at Paris's. She laughed out loud now, finding it hard to believe that her grandmother had eaten those lies up.
When Jess had shown up at her grandparents' place (with no black eye this time), she had been shocked. After their last meeting, she didn't think they would ever see each other again. She had been very, very tough on him, even though they both knew he deserved it. Then, he looked, well, the only word that her vocabulary that could describe him best was brokenhearted. She winced at that thought. Now, however, he looked good. Sturdy and lean, but grown up, in a way she would have only believed with her own two eyes. He still had the crazy hair-do, but it was tamed into a beautiful mess on top of his head, and had stuble on his face, as if he hadn't slept in days. And he wrote a book. He wrote a book. A great book, in fact. A book that she would recommend to anyone. However "happy" she was with Logan, she really cared for Jess Mariano.
Don't kid yourself. You love him. Still, she thought to herself. And it was true. If he had stuck around for one more minute, he would have heard her say "I love you, too." She had, to an empty Stars Hollow, after watching his car speed away.
Now, as she speeds down the highway to Yale to start her classes again, she realizes how stupid she really was. Dropping out of Yale? And started living with her grandparents? In the room that her grandmother decorated with a 98 degrees poster and Hello Kitty! Stuff sophomore year in high school! Who sucked her mind and possessed her body?
Logan, her competent brain told her. He was the one who wanted to party, to steal things, to be basically bipolar about everything. And she knew that their relationship was still "open," no matter how much she wanted it to be as closed as any Hemingway book.
She smiled at her lame joke, with Jess' words said so long ago ringing in her ears: "You know, Earnest has only lovely things to say about you."
She found it ironic that he was the one who snapped her out of it. Who, in about a one minute conversation in which he did most of the talking—yelling, actually—told her everything she already knew, but didn't have the guts to admit. And he remembered her birthday!
Once again, Rory had the feeling that if he had stuck around for five more minutes, she would probably be crying into his chest and blubbering her love.
In her head, she wished he would have stayed. But that was in her head. In real life…it would have made things much more complicated.
She felt stupid for not figuring this out until now, but her relationship with Logan was simple, easy. It was routine. She liked routine. Right? All the lists, all the school, living in Stars Hollow. Even Dean, for God's sake, was a routine.
Her relationship with Jess, however, was anything but simple. Jess had never been good at communicating what he actually needed to say. He should have asked for help with school, but he was too proud. He should have told her he was living, but he was too much of a wimp.
Don't try to push all the blame on him, Rory, she frustratingly told herself. She wasn't the best girlfriend in the world. She pushed him around, acted like she owned him, and always compared everything he did to Dean. There were some good parts of the relationship (he could always make her spine tingle), but they were both just too immature for the intellectual level they were both on.
Jess' words two years ago spun in her head: "You know we're supposed to be together. I knew it the first time I saw it two years ago, and you know it too." Maybe he was right. Maybe they were supposed to be together. But their timing was always off.
Rory knew one thing for certain: she missed him. She missed his eyes, and his smirk, and his annoyingly gorgeous hair. She missed his mannerisms, and the crook in his neck she fit into just right (because, let's face it, he's short). She missed their banter, and their sarcasm, and the...love he had for her. She couldn't believe she didn't see it in high school.
Once again, Jess Mariano made Rory question herself.
But what was she possibly supposed to do? She was in love with Logan. She was sure of it…wasn't she? He was everything she always wanted: adventurous, smart, affectionate, and could give her everything she would ever think to want.
But did she want him? That was the question that was impossible to answer.