Disclaimer: I own Phoebe, Paige, Jamie, and Paige's friends.
A/N: Thank you so much for the wonderful reviews! I love writing this story! If you want to see the trailer for it then go to my profile.
All you need to know:
- Rory and Jess never dated, but have been best friends since they were kids.
- Rory went to Yale when she graduated and Jess went off to travel. Still kept in touch, but not as much.
- Both twenty-four.
I got my inspiration from the movie My Best Friend's Wedding and Brown Sugar. Never seen it? It's okay, you'll get it.
And by the way I want to give a special thanks to my BETA: Just A Girl of the Hollow x3 AKA Cat.
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I walk in to the diner behind Jess, he's looking at me oddly and I don't want to know why. We walk up to the counter and Jess taps on her shoulder, "Paige?"
"Jess! Hey!" She kisses him on the mouth. She did it so easily, without even thinking, without any emotion. If that were me … every kiss would be as good as the first. I shake my head to get that thought out of my head and I watch him.
He turns to me with a big smile, "Paige this is Rory, my best man. Rory this is Paige, my fiancée." Paige looks at me with wide eyes. She looks from my head to my toes and then puts on a shaky smile, "Hi."
"Nice to meet you." I force myself to say and I stick my hand out for her to shake. She makes her smile a little wider and hugs me instead.
"Jess talks about you all of the time!" She squeals and I feel like every glass in the diner just shattered. That high-pitch girly squeal that I heard from the slutty girls in my high school days.
I wish I could say the same about her. Jess actually never really told me much about her, "Well I've heard about you, too," I say, pulling out of the hug. Damn this lying mouth.
"My friends are coming with me in a couple of hours to pick out a wedding dress. I would love for you to come with me and meet them."
I look at Jess with a helpless look and he gives me those eyes that used to make me do anything. I glare at him slightly and turn to look at her, "Yeah, I'll come. Can my friend Phoebe come with me?"
"Of course! The more opinions the better!" Paige smiles and stands up, "We're leaving at three."
"Okay, then." I force a smile and turn when I hear the door open behind me. Mom walks in and her smile grows wider as she runs up and envelops Jess in a huge hug.
"Jesse!" She squeals, holding onto him tighter than she intended to, "When did you get here?"
Jess hugs her back and pulls away, "Not long ago … maybe an hour. I had to go see Rory first."
"Oh of course," she says, giving him a slight smirk. I notice it, but I doubt she knows I did.
Jess turns to his fiancée, "Paige this is Rory's mom, Lorelai. This is my fiancé, Lorelai." He smiles at Paige and then glances at me.
"Oh nice to meet you." My mother holds out her hand to shake Paige's.
"You too." Paige shakes her hand and then turns back to her coffee.
Where did the bubbly annoying Paige go? I think, seeing how her attitude just changed quickly. My mom gives me a slight smile and hooks her arm with mine.
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I lean back on the unbelievably uncomfortable couch and roll up my sleeves. It is very stuffy in this store. Phoebe is sitting beside me with her feet propped up on the foot stool, stuffing her face with mini chocolate chip cookies. I glance at her and laugh slightly.
"What?" She asks her mouth full of cookies. I shake my head and wait for Paige to walk out of the dressing room. Her friends are in the back looking for bride's maid dresses and Phoebe and I got stuck watching her try on dresses.
She walks out, "Does this one look okay?" She sounds aggravated and I laugh at the cause of her aggravation. Phoebe can be harsh sometimes, totally unintentional, though.
"I think it looks fine," I say, smiling.
"I think it looks like I should put you in between two graham crackers and a bar of chocolate," Phoebe replied, nonchalantly. She examined the cookie she took out of the bag before popping it into her mouth and looking back up at Paige.
I shoot a look at Phoebe and then look back at Paige, "Anymore options?" I ask, sweetly.
She gives an annoyed groan and walks back into the dressing room. I turn my attention back to Phoebe and fix her with a cold stare.
She eventually feels my eyes on her and she slowly lifts her head up to look at me, "What?" She asks, innocently.
"You are horrible. Can't you at least try to be nice so I won't be scolded by Jess?" I ask her, giving her the best of my doe eyes.
She rolls her eyes and nods, "Fine."
"Thank you," I say, smiling. I grab a cookie out of the bag and pop it into my mouth.
Paige walks out with a really pretty dress on and stands in front of us with her hands on her hips, "What about this one?"
"That's actually-"
"Gorgeous," Phoebe finishes for me and looks at her with wide eyes, "Take your hair down out of that clip."
Paige reaches back and undoes her hair. Dark waves fall past her shoulder and she spins to show off the back-less dress. My stomach turns as I look at her, she really is pretty. No fair.
"You look pretty." Phoebe smiles, genuinely.
"Thank you." Paige smiles wide, showing her perfectly straight; white teeth. She walks to the back to show her friends the dress they picked out.
"I still don't like her, though," Phoebe adds, putting another cookie in her mouth. I laugh at her and wait for Paige to return with her posse from hell.
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"Do you like her?" Jess asks me quietly, later that night. He's swinging his legs off of the bridge and it reminds me of him as a kid.
I take my eyes off of the stars and glance at him, "I guess, yeah, why?"
"It's important to me that you like her," he says, breaking eye contact with me and looking down at his hands.
"Why?" I push and look down into the water. I look back up at him when he doesn't give me a response.
Finally, he looks up from his hands and sighs, "Because you are important to me. If you don't like her, I don't think I could go through with marrying her."
I smile at him, "Yeah, Jess, I like her."
He nods and lies back on the bridge, "Good."
I lay back with him and put my arms folded behind my head, "I don't like her friends, though." I laugh a little and he joins me.
"Neither do I … For some reason I knew you wouldn't," he smirks.
"You know me too well." I laugh and he nods, "When are your other groom's men coming down?"
"Well you, Luke, and two of my other friends from Philadelphia are my groom's men, or woman in your case. So Matt and Lucas should be coming down tomorrow. You'll love them they are two of the funniest guys I have ever met, especially when they are together." He chuckles a little and all I can do is stare at him. He really likes his new life in Philly.
I get a twinge of jealousy when he talks about his new friends or most importantly when he talks about Paige.
"Can't wait to meet them," I say, looking up at the quarter of a moon, "Is your dad coming?" I ask, hoping he'll say yeah. We never talk about his dad a lot. His dad left when Jess was born, but came back when he was five saying that he wanted to be a family. He stayed for four months and then left Jess and his mom again. He came back for Jess' graduation and they have been better since then, but Jess never really forgave him.
Jess and Liz lived in Stars Hollow since Jess was six years old. Liz and Lorelai have been best friends since then. Liz worked at renaissance fairs all over the state. She was gone a lot so Luke, Jess' uncle and owner of the infamous diner of Stars Hollow, raised him.
"I don't know. Paige made me send him an invitation. Him coming is his choice." I know Jess wants his dad to come deep down. I can see through his James Dean wanna-be appearance unlike most people. On the inside his heart is fragile, especially when it came to his dad.
"Okay," I say, nodding.
"Mom's coming home tomorrow," he says with a hint of a smile playing on his lips.
"You miss your mom?" I ask, teasingly.
"I don't know … I kind of do. Don't tell her, please." He laughs a little and I join in with a slight chuckle.
"She'd love to hear that, you know," I tell him.
He nods and mutters, "I know."
I smile at him and prop up on my elbows looking at him, "Do you ever miss when we were kids?"
"Yeah … sometimes I do," he answers me and sits up too.
"Everything was a little easier then … I mean we weren't getting married and it was like we were the only ones that were important to each other. It was me and you forever," I say, thinking about my true feelings for Jess.
"Nothing will change that, Ror. We'll always be best friends and you will always come first," he says, looking at me intensely.
"Good," I say and think about everything. I go over it in my head, how everything will change once he says 'I do.' How even though he says I will always come first, I won't. It all makes me uneasy. I want him happy, but I want him in my life like he is now. Holidays won't be the same. He'll have to go visit her family, or he'll have his own family and the Christmas tradition will change.
"Jess?" I start, uneasily.
"Yeah?" He questions, looking from the pond to me.
I just want to tell him to say he promises, but what comes out of my mouth takes both of us by surprise, "Don't get married."
A/N: Hope you enjoyed! Reviews are appreciated immensely!