Willa starts talking in complete sentences out of nowhere, much like was predicted by almost everyone in Jess' life, proving once and for all that she was put on this earth primarily to make him look stupid. It happens at dinner.
"I'm not gonna burn it this time, I promise," Jess says, adding a handful of unidentified vegetable to his stir fry.
"You always say that," says Willa, and Jess turns around so fast he bangs his knee against the cupboard handle and drops his spatula.
"Holy shit," says Jess, and bends over, clutching his leg. "Holy - crap, that hurt. Oh my God. Did you just say what I think you just said?"
Willa eyes him warily, and doesn't reply.
"Oh, don't pull that move with me, I heard you," Jess says, and limps over to the table. "C'mere, you little - "
Willa shrieks with laughter as Jess swings her up into his arms, winding her fists into his shirt collar. Jess kisses her face over and over and over, until her face is flushed and she's almost hiccuping from her giggles.
"Stop! Stop it!"
"Stop what?" Jess says, laughing himself as Willa makes a weird noise, kind of a cross between a gasp and a snort. "Stop what?"
"Kissing me!"
"If you insist," Jess says, and smooshes their cheeks together instead. Willa's face blurs into a blob of color, her hair a dark, puffy cloud in the background. "God, you're smart. A smart alec, too, what were you doing, waiting for the right moment?"
Willa blows a raspberry in his face, spitting all over Jess' nose, then pulls away, laughing hysterically.
"Right," Jess says wryly.
"Down! Down!"
Willa lunges backward, nearly tipping herself straight out of Jess' arms. "Demanding," he says, depositing her back on the floor relatively smoothly. Willa instantly takes off, her little bare feet slapping loudly against the tile. "Hey, hey! Where you goin', we're making dinner here!"
She's already gone. Jess stands there and listens for a moment as something topples over in the living room - that damn lamp again, probably - and Willa laughs loudly in response. "Christ," he says, his heart beating a samba against his rib cage. God, she always manages to surprise him, even when he's expecting it.
Another ominous noise from the living room, and Jess covers his face with his hand for a second and laughs. "Christ," he says again, and turns off the stove. His vegetable is burning.
It's not that Willa wasn't talking before, or that she suddenly turns into a chatterbox after that - Jess still has to prompt her, and she still ignores him when she doesn't feel like speaking. But the discovery of sentence clauses definitely increases the complexity - and frequency - of the demands she can make of all the adults in her life that think she's cute, and Jess also saw this coming, if he's being honest.
The first time Jess picks her up from a weekend in Stars Hollow after this, Lorelai sheepishly hands him an actual laundry basket full of toys, most of which look brand new. Jess glares at Luke, who looks utterly unrepentant.
"We took her to the playground at the mall in Hartford, and they just opened this new toy store there, and um," Lorelai says, by way of explanation, still avoiding eye contact with Jess. "She's, uh - yeah. Sorry."
"No, please, it's my fault," Jess says, still glaring at Luke. "I don't know why I expected you guys to have better impulse control than my three-year-old. Clearly this was an error of judgment on my part."
Willa, hanging from Luke's arm like he's a jungle gym, smiles up at them all angelically. Luke's mouth twitches.
Jess sighs. "Can you at least keep some of it here?"
"Oh, we did," Lorelai says, wincing again. "Heh. This is like...about half of it. Little less than half, actually."
"Really? Really?" Jess says, rattling the basket. Lorelai laughs nervously.
"Build-a-Bear!" Willa exclaims, grinning madly. Luke turns his honk of laughter into a cough, somewhat successfully.
"I thought you, at least, were better than this," Jess says to Lorelai, who is biting her lip against her own grin. She quickly hides her face in her hair, shoulders shaking. "Oh, yeah, it's real funny. Glad you all had a good time."
Luke punches his shoulder as he walks awkwardly to the car, Willa standing on his shoes, giggling and clutching Luke's elbow for balance. "She said you never buy her anything."
"She lies," Jess says, but Luke and Willa don't seem to hear him. Lorelai is still laughing into her hair. "Okay. Great. Thanks for the help."
Lorelai pats his shoulder, in the same spot where Luke had punched, her face red. "You're welcome," she says.
So Jess has been reading to Willa before bed for a few months now, usually from whatever book he's reading at the time - the theory was that she'd pick up bigger words, and also that she'd get bored and fall asleep much faster, which worked most of the time. But now that she's talking more, the experience is interactive, and after an arduous evening with Margaret Atwood, Jess starts censoring.
Rory sends him the extra copies from her collection, a box full of Lois Lowry, Philip Pullman, Louis Sachar, Madeleine L'Engle. Girl Chris brings over a bunch of Magic School Bus books, which Willa tears through herself, bored by the stories but fascinated by the pictures. Matthew buys one of those Hooked on Phonics starter sets, which Jess and Willa have some marginal success with, and Luke and Lorelai continue to spoil the shit out of her with a regular supply of coloring books and fancy markers. Liz sends some kind of weird, hipster version of Where's Waldo that Willa gets bored with in about two seconds, and also, to her credit, a few puzzle pamphlet things that are a bit more of a hit. And all of that on top of the normal mountain of stuffed animals and toys that she gets showered with. Jess has always had trouble finding space for all the stuff a toddler both requires and acquires in their modest little apartment, but now he's started taking boxes to Goodwill on the regular, especially after word gets out at work that Willa's started to read. Jess ends most business meetings with a picture book or two, these days.
The most incredible part for Jess isn't so much the reading, though - as thrilled as he is that Willa is starting to learn, that she seems to be developing opinions and preferences, that she'll sit in Jess' lap and listen to a story for as long as he's willing to read it out loud, it's the conversation that just blows him away each time. He reads Matilda to her in a single afternoon once, mostly because she's so into it that she won't let him stop, but also because Jess can't get enough of the stuff she keeps saying about it.
"She can do like this," Willa tips sideways in Jess' lap and throws her arms in the air, "boom." She laughs.
"Yeah, cuz she's got magic powers, huh? Seems like it'd come in handy."
Willa nods, still lying sideways, her head on Jess' arm.
"What would you do, if you had magic powers?"
"Um." Willa scrunches up her face, thinking intensely. "I dunno."
"C'mon, you'd do lots of stuff. You know you would."
"I, umm," Willa says, drawing the word out as far as she can possibly make it go. "I'd go like this," she flings her hands out, "and make all the windows open, all at the same time, and the wind would come in really loud."
"The wind would come in really loud? Why, is it too hot in here?"
Willa giggles. "Noooo."
"We got fans for that, you know. There's a fan right up there, you don't need to use magic for that."
"No because, because the wind comes in and then it goes like this," Willa does another dramatic hand gesture, eyes wide, "woosh, and it picked me up and then I flew away."
"You flew away?" Jess asks. "Like a bird? A Willa bird."
Willa ignores him, staring off into space for a second, still flapping her hands absently. She's obviously already onto something else, and Jess waits patiently, trying not to smile too obviously. She still takes that personally. "Um - Daddy?"
"Yeah, baby?"
"Daddy I heard a story at Grampa's house, he was talking outside and he said that's not my name, um, that's not my name."
"Grandpa said that?" Jess asks. Willa nods. "Who was he talking to?"
"I don't know," Willa says plaintively.
"Was it Aunt Lorelai?" Willa shakes her head. "Maybe Grandma Liz then?"
"No Liz wasn't there she was at her fair, Granpa said," Willa informs him, bending her fingers backwards against her cheek, one by one. Jess pulls her back upright gently, throwing the book aside, and she burrows into the space between his arm and chest.
"It's a mystery, then. What made you think of Grandpa?"
"The teacher," Willa says, and Jess bites his lip viciously against a grin.
"The teacher in the book? Miss Trunchbull?" Willa nods. "Does she remind you of Grandpa Luke?"
"They talk the same," Willa says, and Jess turns his face away quickly, choking on laughter. "And, and Aunt Lorelai said she has fairies in the backyard sometimes." She pronounces Lorelai's name more like 'Lolly,' but Jess has it on pretty good authority that Lorelai thinks it's adorable, so he's stopped trying to correct her.
"Actual fairies? With wings and everything?"
"I think she was lying," Willa confides. Jess finally gives into his laughter, bending down and kissing her frown again, which has reappeared on her solemn little forehead.
"Willa," Jess says, "you are the smartest bird I know. Have I told you that lately?"
"Every day," Willa says, long-suffering. Jess blows a raspberry against her cheek and she wiggles away, squealing.
More precious than the bedtime conversations are the random bursts of affection that Willa suddenly starts displaying - she's all smiles most days, and her tantrums start getting easier to handle, especially now that she's got the ability to explain what's making her upset (which she does, loudly). She's always been fairly easygoing, but she'd still throw fits and get angry about weird shit just like any other kid - but those incidents are getting more rare, and she's much more open to negotiation than she used to be before (and she's utterly cutthroat about it too, which makes Jess so proud he could explode). She's much freer with the hugs and kisses, and her new favorite thing is to hide somewhere, around a corner or beneath a table, and then launch herself out at Jess' legs yelling "Daddy I love you so much!" at the top of her lungs. Jess will never get tired of that one, even when it's in public. (Especially when it's public, maybe. They got a free pizza because of it once.)
"I think this is what they mean when they say 'enjoy it while it lasts,'" Boy Chris tells him. "Before she grows up and hates you, or whatever."
"Don't even joke about that please," Jess says seriously.
Chris laughs at him. "My mom used to say that I was her karma for the early 70s."
"Sounds like something Luke would say." Jess isn't counting on much sympathy from the Stars Hollow branch of the family, once Willa gets into the moody teen years. To say the least. "You know what the weirdest part of all this is? I actually understand why parents have such dorky senses of humor. They can't help it, dude. It happens to them."
Chris snorts. "No, man, don't tell me that."
"I actually laughed out loud at a Garfield comic the other day. And I was in line at the grocery store once, and I was talking to this old lady about her pet dog for like, twenty fucking minutes. I didn't even realize what I was doing until I got home."
Chris is laughing, his hair vibrating with the motion of his shoulders. "Her dog?"
"She had some funny stories! I thought it was charming." Jess shakes his head at himself. "I'm never getting laid again."
"Brother, the only thing standing in your way in that department is your own damn self," Chris says. "Do you have any idea how hot you are? Just, like, normally."
"No," Jess says dryly, "usually women sleep with me because of my sparkling personality."
Chris rolls his eyes. "Okay, stupid question. But do you know how hot you are with a cute kid on your hip? That's like, super duper mega hot. All kinds of extra hot points."
"You've just got some dumbass theory about single dads," Jess says. "You know, the men you somehow convince to have sex with you aren't exactly a representative sample size."
"Oh please," Chris says, rolling his eyes. "Don't tell me you're so far gone into the Dad Zone that you don't notice all those goo-goo eyes aimed your way. You know that hostess at Pizza East, with the tattoos? She practically goes into heat every time you bring Willa in with you."
"She does not," Jess says, scoffing.
"She'd roll over and pant for you, if you'd just say the word," Chris says.
Jess wrinkles his nose, both at the gross innuendo and the idea itself. "How am I supposed to do that, with Willa around? Just...date people? Like it's no big deal? That's not happening."
"You holdin' out for marriage then?" Chris shrugs. "Ain't gonna happen if you don't date first. Unless you got someone in mind already."
"Yeah, right." Jess sighs. "My mom had so many boyfriends when I was growin' up, she practically had a revolving door to her bedroom. I don't exactly remember that aspect of my childhood fondly."
"You'd be careful about it," Chris says, still dismissive. "There's ways to do it without hurting her. Plenty of parents pull it off."
An old conversation with Rory comes to Jess' mind, one of the many intense, accidentally-too-honest ones they'd had when they were kids. My mom's dated a bunch of guys too, Rory had said, but she hadn't sounded bitter about it. At the time, Jess had felt a little bitter about that. Bitter, and sort of arrogantly self-righteous, in the way he'd thought he was the only one with real problems, back then. Sometimes it gets a little weird...but when we talk about it, we can usually figure out why. Usually it's because the guy sucks, you know. But - I just want her to be happy. I hope she finds the right one eventually - the one who doesn't suck.
The right one for Lorelai had been there all along, turns out, once they were both ready to admit it. Jess doesn't think he's going to get that lucky.
"Maybe when she's older," Jess says.
"She asked about her mom yet?" Chris asks, casually, like it's nothing.
Jess glares at him. "No."
"You know what you're gonna say when she does?"
"Of course I do," Jess says, a little offended. "She loves you very much, but she wasn't ready to be a mom. Do you have any questions? The end."
Chris doesn't push, thankfully, but he does smirk, a little. In a nice way. "Sounds good to me."
"I told her about Angelo, anyway," Jess says. "I called him 'your mother's brother.' She didn't seem all that curious."
"Maybe not out loud," Chris says. "She might be talking a lot more, but she's still a pretty quiet kid, overall. She'll bring it up later, for sure."
"Yeah," Jess agrees.
"How's that going, anyway?"
"Slowly," Jess says. "They talked for a little bit on Skype last week. Willa wasn't too interested, but - when she meets him in person, maybe."
"When's that gonna happen?" Chris asks, raising an eyebrow.
"I dunno. The kid's in college, remember? So he's busy and broke. And I'm sure as hell not taking Willa all the way to New Hampshire for this, so - he can wait."
"Fair enough." Chris gives him a long, level look. "You know what you're doing, huh?"
Angelo's a sweet guy. Jess thinks about his latest email, the long paragraph about a professor that he adores, the pictures of him and Caroline at some tailgate party thing, hugging by a bonfire and looking like the stock photo in a picture frame at K-Mart. He sent Willa a board game for her third birthday - Snakes and Ladders - and told Jess a story about how much he'd loved playing it when he was little, successfully (and cleverly) talking around Mari's presence in the memory the entire time. Yeah, Jess knows what he's doing.
Chris claps him on the shoulder, not needing him to actually reply. "Alright, brother," he says. "Alright."
"Daddy I wanna tell you a story," Willa says, that night at bedtime.
"I love stories," Jess says, and settles in.
"Okay so there was a girl named Rebecca and she always had her hair in two ponytails and it looked like this," Willa says, grabbing her hair and gathering it into two fistfuls on either side of her head. "And she had big hands and really big feet and her friends all told her again and again don't walk on us, Rebecca! Don't do it!"
"Oh man," Jess says, "Rebecca wasn't the type to listen, was she?"
Willa shakes her head gravely. "Because, because she liked walking and she couldn't help it because her feet were like - " Willa pauses, and then says something that sounds a bit like 'washing machine,' but Jess has a feeling that's not right. He nods like he understands anyway. "And so she walked on the all of them and they all died, and Rebecca was sad."
"Wow." Jess waits for her to continue, but Willa just flops down in his lap, looking content. "Is that the end?"
"Yeah."
"Kind of a bummer story."
"Yeah," Willa says flippantly. "Can I have some ice cream?"
"No," Jess says, as gently as possible. Willa huffs a little, but she seems to have been expecting that answer. "We should write that story down. Then you could write more, and once you have enough, you can publish a book."
"Like you?"
"Sure, like me."
Willa thinks about this for a second. "Okay."
"Okay. We'll do it in the morning."
"Yeah," Willa agrees sleepily.
Jess scoops her up, getting her arranged in bed the right way, and kisses her nose. Willa grabs his chin and kisses his nose right back, grinning up at him like she's pulled off a really good practical joke. Jess certainly feels bamboozled.
"Love you, Daddy," Willa says, sweet as anything.
"I love you back, Willa bird. More than anything."
"Please can I have some ice cream?"
"No," Jess says again, and covers her face with the blanket. Willa sputters, and kicks at him blindly, landing one solid blow in his solar plexus that has him gasping for air. She laughs at him, of course, and it takes him another half an hour to get her settled down again.
It's a good night.