# Author's Note #: Hey, the whole Rory-being-ill thing was pre-planned. I hope y'all are comfortable and hunkered down, I'm sorry if you aren't. Anyway, it occurred to me that I should write a little note saying that she's just got a cold :)

- Asleep

Wednesday, 4.22.09

"No, he did it again! He did it!" Rory shouted, picking up her beer and taking a sip while her free hand smacked Jess in the chest.

"I saw him do it, geez!" Jess laughed, taking a swig from his drink. "Don't put it down yet, he's gonna get eaten."

"Spoilers!" Rory exclaimed.

"Do not pretend you haven't watched Jurassic Park." Rory pointedly ignored this and instead focused on the massive T-Rex stomping away from it's enclosure and toward the outhouse.

Once the 'blood-sucking lawyer' was snapped up like a Scooby Snack, they let out a cheer that probably pissed off their neighbors at nearly midnight on a weeknight. They'd both had a good week, Rory receiving praise for her column again and Jess deciding to allow a limited re-print of 'The Subsect' due to slightly increased demand. Only problem was that it was a Wednesday and no one else was ready to party.

Thus, a Gremlins drinking game. And a Zoolander drinking game... and a Jurassic Park drinking game.

"Do you think she can taste the difference?" Rory asked, standing and taking the empty beer bottles to the sink.

"Who? What difference?" Jess asked, watching the screen for the next drinking prompt. It came when the little poison dinosaurs were devouring Nedry in his jeep.

"What difference?" Rory laughed, knocking back the last of her beer and returning to the couch with a new one. "I mean the T-Rex. Do you think she can taste the difference between a blood-sucking lawyer and just... some tourist."

"She doesn't actually get to eat anyone but the lawyer."

"Yeah, not in this movie. But a lot of people get eaten by T-Rex in the third movie," Rory pointed out, sitting back down on the couch and taking the half of the blanket that Jess tosses at her.

"Is that the same dinosaur? I thought this one stayed on the island," Jess drank again as the children were in mortal danger for the millionth time - one of the rules of the game.

"Even if it isn't, they eat a lot of people. Probably a blood-sucking lawyer somewhere in California," Rory shrugged.

Jess hummed, remembering the few that he'd encountered in his time there. One liked to come into the library and bitch about not being able to find what he needed after all of his two minutes of searching. "They are around the coast, yeah."

"I think they can taste the difference," Rory declared. "Lawyers are probably more tender. They spend a lot of time inside."

"By that logic, you must be like a slow cooked ham," Jess teased. Rory whined and smacked his knees. "Oh, I'm sorry Croc Dundee, I didn't realize you were such an outdoorsy person."

"I'm not outdoorsy. I like to think of myself as pretty tough, though."

"If I had to choose you or an Eagle Scout for protection, I know which one I'd go for," Jess nodded.

"Thank you," Rory nodded graciously, taking a sip of her beer when Alan explained what an 'herbivore' was to the kids.

The night was comfortable and warm and a little bit too boozy, but it was fun. And they definitely deserved to have some fun after working as hard as they did.

They stayed on the couch through the first Jurassic Park and then most of the second. By then end they'd shifted positions from leaning against their designated arms - Rory on the left, Jess on the right.

After all, having a crush makes people do stupid things. For example, when your crush gets up to go to the bathroom, you might scoot a little closer to the center cushion of the couch. When you return from your own bathroom trip, you might not lay against your arm of the couch, you might sit upright on the corner of your cushion so that you're even closer. Thought you might not do the classic yawn-and-grope move, somehow your arm might find its way to laying on the couch behind them. You aren't touching them, so it doesn't really count.

The stupidest thing is really just that because you're so focused on covertly getting yourself closer to them, inch-by-inch, you probably wouldn't notice if they were doing the exact same thing.

When Jess realized that Rory had passed but her head leaned back on his left wrist (the one on the couch behind her), the only thing between them was a squashed throw pillow. He didn't think to imagine Rory had purposely laid her head there.

Monday, 4.27.09

"I think I'm dying," The mound of blankets mumbled, shuffling forward so that it could collapse down onto the couch. The eight-step walk from Rory's bedroom had exhausted it.

"Dying?" Jess responded, taking a break from his breakfast to humor Rory. "What's killing you?"

That was a question. Rory had been feeling just fine the night before, she'd had a bit of a headache but that was from wearing a really tight ponytail all day at work.

"My hangover came back," She decided, shuffling her blanket cocoon to let her head out.

"I don't think hangovers have a tendency to resurge," Jess shrugged, shoveling the last bites of egg into his mouth so that he could deposit his plate into the dishwasher. "Are you going to work, then?"

"I have a meeting, I have to go," Rory grumbled, glancing at the time on the cable box. She was awake an hour before her alarm clock. "Doesn't mean I have to like it."

"That it doesn't," Jess nodded, continuing on with his morning routine. More than half of the mornings, they left the apartment at the same time but on certain mornings, when one of his clients needed him or something was due, Jess left early. She'd find a note on the kitchen counter about how he would grab milk before coming back or that she shouldn't expect him home at the normal time. Sometimes it was a stick figure scene.

She wondered if he'd already left the note.

While she was trying to peer over to the kitchen counter, Jess reemerged from the hallway with a digital thermometer.

"Open your mouth," he directed, uncapping the thermometer and holding it out to her.

"I'm probably fine," Rory said, waving him off.

"You don't want to be the Typhoid Mary of the Philadelphia Inquirer," Jess insisted. She rolled her eyes and wrestled a hand out of her blankets to take the thermometer. She was probably dehydrated or tired or something stupid. She didn't feel particularly warm, really she was frozen.

The thermometer beeped and Jess took it from her mouth, checking the display and then showing it off to her.

"See? A hundred point two. You're sick," He walked the thermometer to the kitchen sink and then started making what looked like a cup of tea. She wasn't much of a tea person, really. Apparently he'd gotten into it recently, one of of his clients had given him a box as a 'thank you' for something or another. She didn't bother calling him off because she didn't want to argue about it, it was too early. Plus it might actually feel nice on her throat.

"I still have to go to work. Rita said that the meeting is about logistics," Rory sighed, tightening her bundle by hugging her knees to her chest.

Jess didn't respond, busy stirring honey into the tea. She watched him bring her the cup and set it on the kitschy coasters she'd bought for the coffee table a week before.

"Do we still have ibuprofen? DayQuil would probably be good too," Jess asked, sitting on the edge of the sofa to slip into his work shoes. He had goofy socks on, the green ones with little golden dragons that he'd gotten from TJ.

"We've got Tylenol, no DayQuil," Rory reported reaching out for her cup of tea. She warmed her fingers on the mug for a moment before taking her first sip. "I'll be fine, though. It's just my throat and a little headache. I'll take some cough drops and be alright. I only really need to be in the office for the meeting, so I won't lick any doorknobs."

"You're still licking doorknobs, Rory? I thought we talked about this," Jess sighed, standing and going to the coat rack to grab his old green jacket. "That's a really gross habit."

"What can I say? The sweet sweet taste of brass and unwashed hands is just unparalleled," She shrugged, watching him over the rim of her mug while he got ready. He looked like he was tired before the day even started... Though, she did remember the living room light still being on when she went to bed.

"Alright, then," Jess nodded, standing at the door with his work bag slung across his body and his keys in hand. "You sure you'll be alright?"

Rory nodded, clearing her throat before she could verbalize her confirmation. "I'll be fine, promise."

"Well, if you really promise," he said, opening the front door. "Try not to spread the plague too far."

And the door swung shut behind him, leaving Rory on the couch in the silence of an empty apartment. The more she woke up, the more she felt the aches weighing her down. It took her twenty minutes to convince herself to stand and gather her things for a shower. By the time she could convince herself to leave the warm foggy bathroom, Rory came back to her room to find her alarm clock pointlessly telling her to wake up. Instead of the snug pants and professional blouse that she was planning on wearing, she instead forced herself into a comfortable thick grey dress. She brushed out her hair and let it lie, not bothering to do any sort of styling beyond a simple thin braid down the back. As long as it didn't look lazy, she didn't much care that it was lazy.

Instead of subjecting her cluster-mates to her disease, Rory set up shop at the kitchen island, working her way through half a box of tissues while she sorted through her notes on the books she'd gathered for her next piece. The local teachers had been trying to broaden the portfolio of books that the Philadelphia high schoolers had to read, choosing more representative works from a more diverse group of authors. One teacher had said that "the girls in my class that don't like books aren't likely to be tempted by yet another book about how sad the Dust Bowl was for men." Though Rory liked the books that she read in high school, she could understand that she was often the outlier, not the rule.

The name of the article was going to be: "The American Classics are Under Attack." It would definitely catch more eyes than something level-headed and reasoned out. Luke liked to call her misleading titles the "set up" for her "left hook" of a thesis.

In a flash of time, Rory found herself shoving her notes, flash drives, and tissue box into her bag before shoving her feet into her shoes, taking care to tuck the fuzzy blue socks down into her shoes. Sure that she had an emergency hairbrush in her car, Rory didn't bother checking her appearance before leaving.

Seeing as she'd stayed home past the usual rush hour, Rory managed to cut her travel time by about ten minutes. She parked and used the extra time to check her make up and re-brush her hair while she worried about what the hell 'logistics' was supposed to mean. Her car kit wasn't doing much to hide the redness in her cheeks.

By the time she got to her desk, she had about five minutes until she was meant to make her way to the conference room. She'd been tempted to walk by 'on her way to the bathroom' and check out who else was in the room besides Rita, but she figured that she could stomach her nerves for the next few minutes.

The only other person at her cluster of desks when she set down her purse was Eartha, jamming out to whatever she was playing through her headphones. Her tight curls were pulled back into a neat bun, as usual, though she seemed to be wearing brighter make up than usual. Rory didn't bother trying to read into that, instead collapsing in her chair and pulling out her work USB. She still had about half an hour left of work to finish her rough draft and she wasn't sure she would want to put in the effort after she left the meeting. She was considering running to get a cup of coffee from the kitchen when her wrist watch started to beep.

Eleven-thirty. She stood and smoothed her dress, taking only her phone and the folder of her published pieces. That's all Rita said that she'd needed.

She swept through the bullpen, wishing she'd brought one of the little plastic tissue packs with her. It turned out that, had she decided to walk by and peer into the big glass windows of the conference room, it wouldn't have made any difference. The blinds were drawn and it would have been impossible to see anything unless she laid on the floor. That tended not to be a good thing.

Rory knocked on the door of the conference room and waited for Rita to tell her to step in before opening the door. At the table was Rita, an incredibly polished woman in a dark purple silk blouse, and an older man with a very shiny head. She offered a polite smile to both of them, stepping forward to shake hands and introduce herself.

The older man stood to shake Rory's hand, replying with his name: "Peter Trell."

"Oh, I know," Rory nodded, setting down her folder and her phone. "I mean, I've seen you around. I think we met once in my first week, but I don't blame you for not remembering."

'Smooth, Rory' she chided herself. Though, Mr. Trell didn't seem upset by her pointing out the lapse in memory, he actually chuckled and sat back down.

"Well, Rory, I'm sorry I forgot you. I had a chance to read a few of your pieces and I've really been impressed."

Rory raised her eyebrows, sitting down in the chair across from him and adjacent to Rita. Rita nodded encouragingly at her.

"We've both been impressed," Rita said, holding her hand out for Rory's folder and then thanking Rory once it had been handed over. She started laying out the articles in a row. It seemed like less than it had in the hallway, laid out in front of her boss and her boss's boss.

"When it was suggested that we hire a complete unknown, even temporarily, I had been worried that it would be unwise. It's not as if we had a shortage of professionally published writers to move toward," Mr. Trell nodded, picking up one of her pieces and gazing over it. "And then your file managed to make it onto our desks despite the fact that the notice we sent out was for 'local talent' only..."

Rory was confounded by that last bit, the 'local talent' part. She had known she was the only one that wasn't originally from Philly back when she was interviewing for the position, but she thought that was just by happenstance. Really, she'd been under the impression that someone had read her New York Times piece and reached out on their own. How else would her story have gotten into their hands?

"... can admit that there seemed to be a level of fate involved," Mr. Trell grinned, as though they were sharing a joke. She returned the smile as convincingly as she could, her headache returning despite the Tylenol she'd taken before coming in. She couldn't get distracted by why her folder was on a desk, she had to focus on focusing.

"Thank you," Rory finally nodded, leaning forward in her seat.

"Well, don't thank us just yet," Mr. Trell said, turning his head toward Rita. She picked up with the conversation like they'd rehearsed their delivery.

"As you know, Tonya is coming back from her maternity leave next Monday, making this Sunday your official final day," Rita started, sitting up like she was excited for what was happening next. "But we were wondering if you were interested in a longer-term position."

Rory blinked, considering for a moment that she wasn't understanding what was being said. She hadn't heard a whisper of anything indicating she would be offered a position at the paper.

"An internship?" Rory asked, considering the fact that she was about the age of a good portion of the interns in the building. She hadn't yet heard back from the places she'd put in her application yet and she could definitely do with a sure thing, even if it was just an internship.

Both of the people across from her laughed like she was truly delightful.

"Of course not," Rita smiled. "No, we would be offering you a column. Not the same one, of course, that is still Tonya's place in the paper. However, in the last few years we have been trying to establish a wider online presence, changing times and all that, and we believe that there is a place for you in our online edition of the Inquirer."

Rory felt shell-shocked, completely knocked off-balance by the offer. She imagined that some of that was due to the illness, but one way or another... there she was. Rory Gilmore was sat in front of two very important people with her mouth open like a wall-mounted Billy Bass.

"I'll take the aghast silence as an excuse to continue," Mr. Trell nodded, his voice sliding from 'fun grandpa' to 'business man'. "We've noticed that opinion pieces have been doing very well online and that, combined with the impending end of your employment here, we want to offer you the opportunity to write a weekly opinion piece online about the goings-on inside Philadelphia. Mind you, it wouldn't be a political column, but you wouldn't be prohibited from dipping your toe into that pool as you have been with your previous pieces. Or your piece for the Globe, for that matter."

Rory thankfully hadn't burst out in some sort of embarrassing display of excitement and thanks yet, one of the more positive aspects of fatigue. But once the question was asked again, the 'are you interested in being an employee for the long-term in a way that would give you a rocket ship up the ladder of professional journalism' question, Rory was ready.

"I am incredibly interested," Rory said, "I'm honored that you would consider me for a position like this. If I can accept right now, I would really like to."

Now, that wasn't the end of the meeting. They talked a lot about how Rory saw her online column going and how they wanted her to inject it with 'youth' and 'passion' and other buzzwords. They talked about the fact that her pay would be the same and that she would stay in her desk in the bullpen. They talked about getting her a permanent building pass and parking lot pass.

Really, the only thing that you need to know is that she got the job.

By the time Jess came home, after five, Rory was passed out under the same lump of blankets on her side of the couch as though she hadn't moved all day. If he didn't see her toes peeking out of the blankets, he wouldn't have been sure that the lump actually contained his roommate.

Rory didn't stir until his last trip in from the hallway, the gentle rustling of plastic grocery bags pulling her out of a dreamless sleep. She peeled back the blankets and looked out at Jess while he leaned down to load the fridge with food. While she still could, Rory stole away down the hallway as gracefully as she could manage.

Her mouth tasted terrible and her hair was... well, not as bad as she'd expected. Especially not after sleeping all day.

Rory had left the building immediately after her meeting, too excited to call her mother and give her the good news. Of course, this meant that she wouldn't be staying with her mother and Luke while she searched for another job, but even Lorelai didn't sound too disappointed. The only reason she had to leave the phone call was so that she could clean the mud off of Will when he and Luke came home from a rowboat trip on the lake behind the high school. Luke had been teaching him to fish with a velcro fishing hook and pool toys. Seeing as Will was stuck in a baby bjorn the whole time, it was more Luke struggling to catch pool toys with a velcro fishing hook.

The call was the only thing she managed to do before she was hit by a wave of exhaustion. She crawled back home and had been going through nap after nap, only broken by the need for a glass of water every once in a while. She was still wearing her grey dress.

When she emerged from the bathroom, her hair was put up into a loose bun and her smeared make up was completely washed away. Her breath was minty-fresh too.

"Behold, the thing that sleeps a lot," Jess announced, sorting out a few packages on the island. She waved him off and sat at the stool on the end, resting her chin in her hands. "How are you feeling?"

"Better," Rory yawned. Her headache was gone and her body didn't feel as run down as it had before. She was much better than she was when she got home at least. She was actually hungry.

"Good," Jess nodded, putting away the last of whatever he'd gotten and then returning to the counter with a glass of orange juice and a little packet of Emergen-C for her to drink. "How did the meeting go? Lots of logistics?"

Rory took a sip of her drink before responding. "You wouldn't believe the amount of logistics they can fit into one meeting."

"I'll bet."

"It went well. Took longer than I thought it would, but they talked about next week and how it would work and basically told me that I couldn't work anywhere else after that."

Jess eyebrows shot up like she'd poked him with something sharp. "What does that mean?"

"It means that I signed a contract and I have to work for them for the rest of the year." Rory had tried to deliver the line coolly, but she couldn't stop the grin from overtaking her face.

Jess looked almost as shocked as she had in the meeting, but he seemed to recover faster.

"Rory, that's awesome!" He exclaimed. It hit Rory that he never really said 'awesome'. A flash of Jess in board shorts and carrying a surfboard flashed across her mind's eye and she suppressed a giggle. He'd picked up some of California and brought it back to the east coast.

"It is pretty awesome," Rory agreed. She proceeded to give a quick run-down of what she was being offered and she could sense that Jess, if he was any more of an emotional guy, would have given her a bear hug. She could manage to get along with just the enthusiasm he was radiating.

"How do you want to celebrate? We can go out for drinks and tell everybody if you want. Or maybe we could have people over?" Jess asked, searching his pockets for his cellphone.

"I think I want it to just be us." Rory could tell that hit Jess's ears in a way that she didn't mean for it to, so she hurriedly continued, "I just mean that I'm feeling better but I'm not all the way better. Plus, it's a Monday. So... let's just wait for the weekend? We can turn the going-away-drinking into here-to-stay drinking?"

Jess nodded, his face relaxing like he was maybe relieved? She wasn't sure. Either way, she hadn't meant to make it sound like she was looking for some sort of intimate quality time, she just couldn't be bothered to look nice enough to see people she didn't live with.

"How about I pay for take out tonight and you can choose all the movies, no vetos?" Jess offered, going to the fridge to get himself a drink now that he was over his initial excitement.

"No vetos?" Rory repeated.

"Not even one. You get to choose from now 'til we pass out."

"That's only until nine if we judge by the trend," Rory teased.

"I do not go to bed at nine."

"Alright, old man. Whatever you say," Rory sighed, running a hand through her hair. "You do realize what no vetos means for you, right?"

"I'm not a moron. Legally Blonde and Mean Girls have been standing at the threshold of this apartment since you moved in," Jess sighed, leaning on the counter and shooting her a fake-pained look.

"Just because movies are pink doesn't mean they're bad," Rory said, reaching out to pat his arm with little sympathy. "You'll survive."

"So you say. But do you know a single guy that's survived both of those movies back-to-back?"

"Luke."

"But is really alive or is it just a facade?" Jess smirked.

"Trust me, Jess," Rory picked up her glass and traipsed over to the couch. "Before long, you'll be wearing a Santa suit and telling Gretchen Weiners that she has no candy cane-grams."

Saturday, 5.02.2008

By the end of the week, Rory and Jess had made a few key decisions.

Firstly, Rory had to decide whether to continue packing or put her books back up on the shelves. After all, she was going to be staying in Philadelphia at least until January 2nd. That was a much larger commitment than the twelve weeks they'd agreed to, especially because Jess's landlord still didn't have any idea that she was living there.

After they'd decided that Rory was signing onto the lease, the rest of the decisions had to do with what they had to buy for the party on Saturday. It would have been Friday night as they had previously planned, but seeing as Rory was officially staying in town, she had to make a trip up to Hartford, Connecticut to have a Friday Night Dinner, as was tradition. It seemed a little silly to Jess to drive three and a half hours both ways just to go to dinner, but she was happy to do it. Plus, she came back with a gilded copy of The Second World War by Churchill.

Jess thought he might like Richard Gilmore if they ever met.

The plan was:

1. Invite people

2. Drink

Rory and Jess both thought that it was one of their more inspired plans, really.

Their invite list was pretty loose, they had everyone from Truncheon, all of Rory's desk mates, and a few miscellaneous people that either Jess or Rory knew. Everyone else was a guest of a guest.

She hadn't had that much fun since her last Life and Death Brigade event. Even if, near the end of the night, she'd caught a glance of Jess standing in the kitchen and laughing delightedly with a pretty young poet.

Author's Note: My computer is currently broken and with the world the way it is, I can't repair it. This will update a little slower because of that as I am writing on my phone.

As it is, let me know what you think! I love hearing from people and predictions are my absolute favorite. And let me know if you catch my reference to one of the GG cast members ;)