Summary: It's the 2008 recession. Rory loses her job, but finds a friend.
This was written for the "Losing a job" square on my bad things happen bingo.
The shrill ringing of her phone pulled Rory from her thorough enjoyment of her (very overpriced) airport cafe soft pretzel. "Rory Gilmore speaking," she answered as professionally as she can with her mouth full.
"Rory, good, I was hoping to catch you before your next flight," her editor replied on the other end.
"Oh, Jonathan, hi!" Rory replied as soon as she'd swallowed the rest of her mouthful. "I know I haven't emailed my draft yet, but my flight got delayed so I had to reschedule the interview."
"Yes, I got the message you left with my secretary. I was calling to tell you that we actually reassigned that piece to someone else."
"Oh. So I guess I don't need to catch my flight to Chicago then," Rory replied awkwardly.
"Not unless you want to, I suppose."
"I thought the piece got reassigned? I figured you would want me to go somewhere else? Cover another story?"
There was a stretch of awkward silence on the line before her editor cleared his throat.
"About that," he began awkwardly. "I regret having to do this over the phone, but you're so rarely in the office."
"Because I'm in a traveling position!" Rory protested. She had a sinking feeling that she knew what this phone call was about.
"Right, yes, and we really appreciate the work you've done for us, but, well, with the economy the way it is and the decline of paper news, we just can't afford to keep you on, Miss Gilmore."
Rory's heart sank. Her editor continued on about the recession and offered to be a reference for any job interviews she might have, but Rory couldn't really take any of it in. Her brain just kept repeating fired, fired, fired!
"I could come work at the office. I know I specifically asked for a traveling position, but I would be a great local correspondent," Rory said once she could get her mouth to open and her brain back online again.
"I know, Miss Gilmore, and I looked for an in-office opening that you could fill, but there just aren't any."
"But-"
"I really am sorry, Rory." To his credit, Jonathan did sound like he was unhappy about the whole thing.
"Thanks, Jon," Rory said quietly, refusing to let herself cry.
"I meant what I said about being a reference. Just send them my way and I'll sing your praises to anyone who will listen. You're a good writer, Rory, someone will scoop you up in no time," He sounded so sincere. Rory wanted to vomit.
"Right, yeah. I'm sure I'll be writing again in no time." Rory couldn't even try to make herself sound genuine.
"That's the spirit. Listen, I gotta run, but I'll have my secretary mail you all the paperwork and your last check, okay? Is the address in Stars Hollow still a good one?"
Stars Hollow.
Her mom's house.
Her mom would see it and know she got let go from her job.
Suddenly everything about the situation felt way too real.
"Yeah, that'll work." She wanted to have them send it somewhere, anywhere, else, but Rory had spent pretty much the entirety of the 6 months that she'd been at the Portland Press Herald living out of hotel rooms, so she never bothered to actually get an apartment in the city. The rent in Maine was high, and she would've been home maybe 2 or 3 days a month so she'd just been living out of her car when she was in town. She'd sent her mom most of her stuff, claiming her apartment was tiny but it was okay because she was hardly ever home.
Guess that particular cat coming out of the bag too, Rory thought to herself.
"Great. Listen, Rory, I've really got to go, but don't let this screw with you. You're a great writer. You'll be just fine," And, with that, he hung up and Rory was forcibly snapped back to her new reality. She was unemployed, technically homeless, and sitting in a really uncomfortable plastic chair in Philadelphia International Airport holding a half-eaten soft pretzel waiting for a flight to Chicago that she no longer needs to be on.
Rory suddenly found herself completely unable to sit down any more. She shoved the rest of her pretzel into her mouth, picked up her backpack and her duffel bag, and just started walking. Away from her gate, away from the job that had been pretty much the entirety of her life for the last half of a year. She needed a strong drink and lots of really good, really cheap food and somewhere she can wallow for the rest of the afternoon. And, well, she'd already been issued her per diem for this trip so she had money for a hotel and a taxi. And she always has money for junk food.
With a plan, such that it is, Rory left the airport and hailed a cab.
Rory was on Long Island Iced Tea number 2 when someone sat down next to her at the otherwise fairly empty bar. She was ready to either give this guy a piece of her mind or move when she actually saw who it was.
"Fancy meeting you here," he said with a smirk. "In town chasing a story? Please tell me you're covering a corruption story about the governor or something. I kind of hate that guy."
"Jess?" The day has just gone from bad to weird. Rory knew that he lived here, but she didn't imagine she'd run into him. Philly was a big city after all. And, yes, she'd gotten a hotel room near Truncheon, but it's the more affordable part of town.
"Rory," he replied with a nod.
"What are you doing here?" She should probably have a normal conversation but it's been a long day and now the universe has thrown her ex into the mix.
"Matt and Chris think they're good at pool and they drag me along every Wednesday," he said, pointing to the two guys who were arguing over a cue stick at one of the tables at the back of the bar.
"Oh," was all Rory could muster in response. Her brain was still stuck in its repetition of Jess, fired, Jess, maybe I'm not cut out for this, Jess.
"What about you? What brings you to my neck of the woods?" Jess asked.
Rory wants to lie, say she's here for a story or overnight for a layover or something- anything- but Jess's dark intense eyes are on her and he's got her spilling her guts without even trying like she's 17 again. "I got fired. Well, laid off technically, I guess, but the result is the same. One minute I had a job and I was eating a ridiculously expensive soft pretzel and waiting for my connecting flight and the next I'm unemployed and hailing a cab and now I'm here."
The story comes spilling out of her mouth without her permission, but now that it's out she can't seem to stop herself. "And now I've got to crawl back to Stars Hollow with my tail between my legs. And my mom will be great about it. She'll plan movie nights and hold my hand and feed me ice cream while I wallow on the couch. And she'll rail against the universe and Luke will rant about the recession and cook any gross food combo I ask him, but the end result will be the same. I'll still be a washed up writer with a fancy degree, no job prospects, and living with my parents. Maybe I'm just not cut out for this." Rory's rant trailed off as she was pulled back to being 20 and having Mitchum tell her that she doesn't have what it takes to be a successful journalist.
A tiny part of her wonders, for the thousandth time, if maybe he was right.
An even tinier part of her wonders if she'd be in this position if she'd said yes to Logan.
Probably not.
She'd probably be working her way up at whichever Huntzberger paper fell over itself first to hire her to please her would-be in-laws. She'd probably be trying to make guacamole from the avocados from the tree in their yard. She'd probably be a little miserable.
Well, she's miserable now so at least that much seems consistent.
"That is such bullshit," Jess said, pulling her out of her spiral. "No way they have a better writer on staff than you." He sounds so genuinely pissed off on her behalf.
It's exactly what she's been dreading from her mom and Luke. But, instead of grating on her, it makes her smile just a little. Maybe it's because Jess is also a writer (a better writer than she is. She has no shame in admitting that). Maybe it's because he has no real tie to her life anymore but he's still so upset on her behalf.
Maybe it's just because he's Jess.
"Yeah. It really is," Rory agreed, lifting her glass toward him in a silent toast. He clinked his glass against hers and they both took a hearty drink.
Rory sat in silence after, sipping at her drink and letting the sounds of the bar wash over her. Jess sat beside her, also quiet, watching her out of the corner of his eye like he did when they were younger and dancing around each other. With anyone else it would have been depressing and awkward, but with Jess it just was. Rory rushed to down the rest of her drink in an effort to drown out the old ache and the burst of fondness that that train of thought brought with it.
"Do you want to get out of here? There's a really good Indian place a couple blocks from here," Jess said after the heavy thud of her now empty glass hitting the bartop broke their silence.
Rory wanted to say no, wanted to go back to her sad, empty hotel room, or order another drink, or blow him off somehow. But Indian food sounded so good, and another drink would probably make her sick, and, despite the fact that she felt like she should, she didn't really want Jess to leave her alone.
"Indian food sounds good."
"Let me just let Matt and Chris know and we'll go."
"Oh, my god. I forgot about your friends. We don't have to go. I totally don't mean to monopolize you or anything-"
"Rory. It's fine. Matt and Chris won't even notice I'm gone. They only drag me along because they claim it's depressing for me to stay home reading all the time," Jess said, interrupting her.
"Oh." She'd normally argue more, but the warm hands he'd put on her shoulders to interrupt her rant were distracting her.
"I'll be right back. Don't disappear on me, Gilmore." And then the warmth was gone and he was headed back to the bar. She couldn't hear what he'd said to his friends, but, based on their grins and one's wink, they seem to be under the impression that Jess was in for a much more enjoyable evening than Indian food and ranting. Based on his eye roll, Jess had said as much as well. Before she had any more time to try to dissect their conversation from across the room, Jess was coming back.
"All set?" He asked as he put his jacket on.
"Let's blow this popsicle stand."
The Indian restaurant he'd taken her to was amazing. It was a tiny hole in the wall place with several booths crammed in and hardly any space to navigate between them and they served what was undoubtedly the best tandoori chicken that Rory's ever had in her life.
Jess didn't mention her unemployment the entire dinner. He just told her stories about the publishing house— temperamental poets, an indie author who read House of Leaves and now fancied themselves the next experimentalist author with a cult following, and Chris's obsession with opening their own bar in order to have somewhere to gather the masses that are the Philly independent lit scene.
Halfway through Jess's story about a poet who answers all his emails in haikus, Rory is struck with a sudden thought.
I missed this.
Not just Jess, although she has, and has been for years, but she's missed sitting in a booth somewhere and eating good food with another person and laughing. When was the last time she had dinner with someone? She hadn't so much as been in the same state as her mom or Lane or Paris for more than two days at a time in months, let alone had time to actually do anything. Not having a job sucked. And dealing with it was going to suck. But this exact moment? Was pretty nice.
"God, I haven't laughed like that in months," Rory confessed as they left the restaurant and started walking toward her hotel.
"Oh, yeah?" Jess said with a half smile, the same one he'd worn when they were younger and he'd said something that made her blush.
"Yeah," she replied, smiling a full smile back at him. "I've been so busy writing and bouncing around to places I'd spend a few days in if I was lucky and keeping my nose to the grindstone to prove myself. I haven't had time for anything like this in a long time."
Jess stopped walking and turned to her, "you could do something else. Write a book or something."
"I'm a journalist," Rory argued.
"You're a hell of a writer, and if you wrote a book, there would be an audience for it." Jess sounded so sure, so full of conviction, that it drew her in just a little.
"What would I even write about?"
"About your life, you and your mom's story. Hell, you could write a book of haikus and I'd read it."
Rory laughed.
"Right. I think you might be my only reader if I did any of that," She said as she started walking again. Jess silently fell in step with her and within minutes they'd reached the front of her hotel.
"Thanks for tonight," Rory said as she moved to hug him.
"Anytime," he said, wrapping his arms around her waist briefly before she stepped back and started to go inside.
"Rory, wait."
She turned toward him curiously.
"In case you change your mind." He was holding out a business card.
Jess Mariano, Editor
Truncheon Books, Independent Publishing House
His phone number was listed there at the bottom. "I'll think about it," she said, looking up from his card.
They shared a smile, then Rory went inside, feeling lighter than she had since this afternoon- or maybe even than she had in months.
Author's Note: This is probably not my best work, but I am so happy to actually get a work finished and out of my drafts that I simply do not care.