A/N: The second chapter is officially here! I know had time to actually write it all out and I hope you guys like it. There is quite a bit of reused dialog used from "Say Goodnight, Gracie", but I'm sure that's okay with all of you. Please favorite, follow, and review if you like it - that really keeps me going. Stay tuned for more soon!

The following morning, Jess sat up in bed and looked around the small apartment. He still didn't see its appeal, but it's most likely that Luke didn't either. The boy spotted all of his things sorted out nicely due to his pickiness of where things belonged. Eventually, he spotted a duffle bag, just big enough to stuff the important stuff in and leave. It's not like he hadn't thought about it before. He knew that getting out of Luke's hair was probably what his uncle wanted most and he knew it. He felt unwanted, even though he felt more love than he'd ever felt with sixteen years with his mother.

He threw himself backwards, back into laying position, making a big pounding noise. He rubbed his face, thinking about what to do before heading off to school. It was eventually that he came to the conclusion that Jess couldn't leave Rory behind. He couldn't do that to her; he cared too much to up and leave.

As soon as he started thinking about the blue-eyed girl, Luke came swinging through the door with his veins popping out of his forehead. Jess braced himself for the worst. "Guess where I just was," Luke told him with rage running through his being.

"I have no idea," Jess shrugged.

"I was at Kyle's house," he started. The teenager already knew where he was going with it. "I was in bed this morning. I had ten more minutes to sleep. Not a lot of time in the grand-scheme of things, but ten minutes is ten minutes. You know what I mean."

"What's the point of this conversation?" Jess lifted his eyebrows as he reached to the end of the bed to get his book.

Luke inhaled deeply, ready to continue his rant. Jess already felt like his eyes were going to roll back into his head if he had to hear some other account from the night before. "And then the phone rang," Luke started, "and it just rings and rings and rings and rings, so I pick it up—"

"That's a lot of rings," Jess quipped.

"Let me finish my story," Luke snapped back. "On the other end of the phone is someone named John who says he's Kyle's father and Kyle threw a party last night without permission and two guys got into a fight and tore the place apart. So John wanted me to come down and look at the damage and discuss some sort of solution to the problem of the damages. Now I don't know John and I certainly don't know Kyle, but I do know someone who would get into a fight at a party and leave the place completely trashed. It's a wild guess, but I think his name rhymes with Tess." Luke stopped for a moment, sucking in another deep breath. Of course it wasn't over. "So there I was, heading over there to talk to John about Kyle and discuss what is to be done about the Hummel."

Once he was finished, Jess raised an eyebrow, trying his best to feign innocence. Luke always knew. It wasn't a surprise that Kyle's parents found out, but Jess at least tried to act like it wasn't his doing. "You done now?" Jess finally asked after moments of silence. His uncle glared at him, waiting for the truth to come out. "Dean started it," he said quickly, placing the blame on his enemy. It was true, but he knew Luke wouldn't see it that way.

"Oh, you're gonna use that one, are ya?"

Jess was quick to stand up and face Luke. "Well, he did, he sucker punched me and I was just defending myself."

"Oh, apparently you defended yourself all the way through the house and out into the front yard. You defended yourself with a chair that is now broken. You defended yourself with a coffee table. You defended yourself with an Ottoman."

Jess sighed, "I seriously don't need a recap."

"Do you have any idea how much damaged you caused?"

"Dean caused it too!"

"The place was trashed!" Luke yelled back.

"Dean trashed it too."

Luke stopped for a moment to clear his throat and shake his head. "Are you trying to kill me?"

"Nope, it'll just be a perk," Jess said with a smug smile.

"Okay, here's the deal: From now on, every cent that you make here goes towards paying them back."

Jess pointed across the street towards Doose's. "Hey, what about-"

His uncle cut him off, "Dean's paying them back also."

"How do you know?"

"Because he was at Kyle's house when I got there."

Jess tried his best not to laugh. "You're kidding me."

"He had already worked out a financial agreement with the parents and was helping them with the fence."

"Man, he's going to make some woman a fine doormat someday," Jess rolled his eyes and tried walking away.

"You're going to make good on this Jess," Luke said as he followed him downstairs.

"I have to get to school," Jess said as if he actually cared about going.

"Every cent you get is going to paying them back. I never want those people calling me again."

"Whatever," Jess said as he headed towards the door and across the street to school. He didn't even know why he even bothered to show up after getting told that he probably wouldn't graduate anyway. He kept in mind that he was trying for Rory. He was staying for Rory. Sure, it was easy to pack up his bags, take all of his money from Luke's and Walmart and just go, but he knew that could cause too much damage. Not only for Rory, but Luke as well. Luke had done so much for him already that he wasn't about to go and screw the whole thing up. Not this time.

x-x-x

After school was finished, he headed straight back to the diner. He hoped that the Gilmores would be there when he walked in and from across the street he could tell that they were. He didn't know what was going to happen. He doubted that Rory even wanted to look at him after the catastrophe at Kyle's, but from the sound of her on the phone the night before, she wasn't too upset about it. Lorelai, on the other hand, was a whole different type of storm to deal with. She was fast on her feet and already disliked Jess enough to pounce on him like a mother lion defending her cub.

He stood at the door for a minute and started pacing. Going inside seemed like a giant shit-storm that was coming for him and he couldn't shake off that feeling. No matter what he did or thought, he couldn't bring himself to walk through the door just yet.

On the inside, Lorelai and Rory watched the boy as he walked back in forth. The older Gilmore had a wide smirk on her face as she watched; she knew that it was because of her and that sparked some type of fun for Lorelai. "How long do you think he's going to do that?"

"Maybe until you leave," Rory shrugged. She turned back to spying on Jess with a frown. She wasn't as upset as he thought she was, but that didn't make the situation any less awkward.

"I'm not going anywhere, I'm staying for the show." Lorelai grinned at her daughter before taking a sip of coffee. "Luke!" She yelled as soon as he came down the steps. "There's a lost puppy at your front door."

Luke looked out the window and let out a strong huff. He knew exactly what the boy was thinking and that made Luke make a dash across the diner and pull him inside by his shirt.

"Hey!" Jess yelled. "Watch the shirt."

Luke ignored the cries and threw Jess rag. "Get to work."

"I feel like this is breaking a child labor law somehow," Lorelai commented with a shrug. "Even if it is, it's highly entertaining."

After a few minutes of talking to her mother about the day she had, she finally had the guts to stand up and walk over to her boyfriend. At first he didn't notice she was standing near him, but as soon as he did, he felt as if he were being backed into a corner. No matter how far away they stood, he felt like he was about to start suffocating. "Humiliated" was the last word he wanted to use, but it summed it up pretty nicely.

"Hey," Rory said before biting down on her lip.

"Hey," he greeted her back before picking up a few left-behind plates and walking behind the counter to set them down.

Rory sat down in a stool and placed her hands on the counter. She didn't make eye contact, but instead stared at her hands. She could feel her mothers gaze on the back of her neck, but tried her best to ignore it. Everyone knew that Lorelai was nosey anyway, so this wasn't the first time something like this had happened. "Should we talk?" she asked. "About last night, I mean." She cleared her throat and started playing with a packet of Equal that was left on the counter.

"If you wanna," Jess shrugged. "There's not much to say, Rory."

The honesty and irritation in his voice threw Rory off for a moment. Maybe there was nothing to say. Maybe she was overreacting. She knew that there would come a moment when he and Dean really would snap at each other, but she had no idea that it would turn into an all-out brawl.

"Okay," she nodded and lifted her head up to look at him. The boy looked sad and disappointed in himself. His usual tough exterior and confidence had faded away during their conversation. Rory almost didn't know that it was possible for Jess to look vulnerable, but she was suddenly witnessing it.

"I'm sorry." His apology was genuine. "I was acting like a jerk. I shouldn't have done that." Rory's face lit up in the slightest way as she grinned. Hearing an apology was the last thing she expected to hear from him. "I'm trying here, Ror. I really am." He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, trying his best not to look like a small lost child. "What can I do to make it up to you?"

"Movie and food – my pick tonight."

"That's it?" Jess was utterly confused. "That's all you want?"

"That's all I want," she told him simply.

His brows furrowed as he looked at her, but eventually he realized that she was being honest. "I have to finish my shift first, but afterwards I'll call and we can do just that." A smile started to appear on his face, which also caused Rory to do the same.

"I'll see you then," Rory told him as she leaned over to place a kiss on his cheek.

"Yeah, see you then," he whispered.