Thank you again for the reviews you've been leaving – you're great!
Rather short chapter this time - but at least the updating was quick :)
The morning after the dinner with Rory, Jess woke up with all the signs of a hangover but without having done the excessive drinking that usually caused it. He stretched his arm out towards the alarm clock on the nightstand to stop it from ringing. It didn't work. He hit it again, harder this time and heard a crashing sound as it fell to the floor. The ringing continued.
Jess sat himself up in the bed and looked around to find the source of the ringing and saw his phone lit up and ringing next to his pillow. He picked it up and cleared his throat before answering. "Hello?"
There was the distinct sound of someone breathing on the other end of the line, but not a word was spoken. "Hello?" He asked again and was about ready to hang up when the person on the other end drew a deep breath and finally gathered the courage to say something.
"Luke told me you met Rory" It was Lorelai's voice.
Jess ran a hand over his face and into his hair. He hadn't expected this. He and Lorelai had gotten along quite well lately, they had to; she was married to his uncle. They were polite to each other, they discussed generic topics and they had an unspoken agreement not to talk about Rory. She had never called him up before.
"Yeah" Jess scoffed. "I've met Mrs. Huntzberger" He couldn't think of her as Rory anymore – because in his mind, she wasn't.
His statement was followed by silence and he forced himself to be patient and wait for Lorelai to say something. After all, Rory was her daughter, if they were going to break their silent agreement it had to be done her way. He remembered Luke telling him how she and Rory rarely spoke anymore and he couldn't blame her – he couldn't imagine Lorelai getting along very well with Mrs. Huntzberger.
"She's changed" Lorelai established.
"She's not Rory" He answered, mirroring her establishing tone of voice.
Lorelai seemed to be relieved to hear him agree with her, as a deep, relieved sigh was heard. "No, she's not"
Jess hesitated for a few seconds, but he couldn't resist the chance of finally getting some of the answers he had wanted from Rory. "What happened?"
She sighed again, or was that just the way her breathing sounded like now? Sad and beaten. "Logan happened" Her voice sounded dead; ridden of all emotion. "Society happened" She continued a second later. "The demands apparently related to 'being a Huntzberger' happened"
She uttered the words 'being a Huntzberger' with such obvious distaste that it left no doubt in his mind what her thoughts about 'being a Huntzberger' were.
"When?" He needed to know. This change wasn't something that happened over night.
"I don't know exactly, the old Rory stayed with me for quite long" She paused and Jess couldn't help but notice she spoke about her as if the old Rory had passed away.
"I guess it started when Logan's business in California fell through" She continued. "They moved back here, to New York, and Logan started working for his father. She had a hard time finding a job and eventually she gave up on looking for one" She sighed again. "Everyone told me she had changed; my mother told me she had changed. I didn't want to believe them. I didn't want to see what they saw. And when I did…" She paused again, longer this time. "…it was too late"
"Guess your mother's happy" He said bitterly, remembering the one time he met Rory's grandmother. To him she and Mrs. Huntzberger were two peas in a pod.
"Actually she's not" Lorelai sounded surprised herself at this fact. "Apparently Mrs. Huntzberger is too much 'keeping up appearances' and 'being the perfect wife of an important businessman' even for Emily Gilmore"
Jess shook his head. "How did this happen?" He made sure his tone wasn't accusing, he didn't want Lorelai to think he accused her of what had happened with Rory. She seemed to already be doing that herself.
"I don't know. I think she played a role to begin with. Maybe she needed to, to avoid being hurt. Those 'better than anyone else' wives can be pretty cruel to each other, and maybe she needed to shield herself. It's a rough world, I should know, I grew up in it" She drew a deep, ragged breath.
Lorelai's need to talk about Rory reminded him of Luke's need to do the same and he suspected it was a subject they avoided to bring up with each other; both of them equally afraid to hurt the other.
Lorelai seemed to have regained control of her voice, for she continued. "My guess is that in the end, she lost track of who the real Rory was and she became the role she'd been playing"
That was the first thing he had heard in all of this that actually made sense. She was playing a role and she had lost track of herself while playing it. That had to mean she was still there – the real Rory Gilmore.
"Help me get her back" Lorelai suddenly blurted out, interrupting his thoughts.
Jess was stunned at her request. Was that even possible? If she had been playing this role for a long time, was it even possible to get her to stop? Was there anything left besides the role?
"She can't be happy like that, I'm sure she's not happy" Lorelai continued, trying to convince him. "And she always cared about you, about your opinions, your thoughts; they've always been important to her" She talked quickly, as if she was afraid he would interrupt her if she stopped. "I know we had our…differences…in the past, I know the …friendship, or whatever it is, we managed to establish over the years isn't exactly stable, but I really do think that if we work together on this, if we join forces, we could get her back"
He could hear tears threatening to break her voice as she continued, pleading: "Please Jess, I've tried all I can think of, every possible way, but I can't get through to her. If you care about her at all, if there's one tiny shatter of love left in your heart for her, this must be killing you, seeing her like that"
Killing him? Of course it did, but he couldn't even begin to understand how it must be killing Lorelai.
"Just tell me what to do" He heard himself offer without even stopping to think about it.
"I don't know what to do" She sounded resigned. "Maybe...maybe if you talk to her or…" She trailed off. "…I don't know"
"I could talk to her" He hadn't done that yesterday. He had tried to remind her of their past with a subtle hint and he had tried to yell at her but he hadn't really talked to her.
"I have her number for you" There was a rustling sound heard on the other end before she started reading number of off a paper.
He didn't tell her that he already had Rory Huntzberger's phone number; that she had offered it to him last night together with a plea for him to change his mind and support her in cheating on her husband. He didn't think Lorelai needed that piece of information.
"Jess?" She asked before hanging up, her voice sounding so small and insecure and so unlike Lorelai Gilmore.
"Yeah" He answered simply.
"Thank you" She breathed into the phone before she hung up.
Jess put the phone down and slid out of bed, pulled on the pants he wore yesterday and headed out into the kitchen, where he grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge and leaned against the counter.
He took several big gulps of water before he put the bottle down next to him. Now he had made a promise to get himself involved with Mrs. Huntzberger. How was he supposed to do that without getting his heart broken – getting himself broken – in the meantime?
He was no knight in shining armor, he never had been – yet he had made a promise to Lorelai that he would try to be just that and save Rory Gilmore from the evil queen Mrs. Huntzberger.
He sighed and reached his hand inside his pocket and pulled out the card she gave him and flipped it over in his hands.
Help me get her back
If Lorelai couldn't get her back, how was he supposed to have any chance at it?
Why had he agreed to this?
He sighed. He knew why: because he had never really stopped loving her and if her mother – the person that knew her best – thought there was even the slightest chance to get the real Rory back, he had to at least try.