Chapter XX

After chugging a cup of hospital waiting room coffee that was burnt to a crisp, Rory retreated to the restroom, thankfully empty. This resulted in several minutes of aggressive confrontation with herself in the mirror. She saw it. It was all over his face. She could just walk away. Let him leave Stars Hollow for good. Do the one thing that everyone has been telling her to do, that has been so frustratingly impossible. Forget him.

He will leave in a mere three days. She never has to see him again. She can push aside all the stress of having him in her life, all the questions she's asked herself because of him. She can have a relationship with Dean that isn't plagued by his jealousy and doubt. She can focus on Chilton and Harvard, on Lane and Lorelai. She won't be laying in her bed staring at the ceiling replaying their conversations, or sitting on the couch rereading the annotations he wrote in Howl. Her thoughts are swirling around her head uncontrollably, a nauseous swarm of assertions she's suppressed until now with relative success. And it could all go away with a simple act.

"Forget about Jess," she whispers to herself.

But... she can't. She's tried. Well, it felt like trying, but how much effort can she put into something her body seems determined against? It's like smiling while stuffing down an unenjoyable food. Not easily done. It's like he got into her head. But how? He's not like Dean. He doesn't court her or flatter her or tell her secrets. He doesn't ask permission or listen to instructions. It's like her entire world has moved at one speed her entire life; she was the fastest thing there. But then he comes dropping in to the scene without realizing his feet are supposed to touch the ground.

"I won't," she says. Maybe before the accident, she could have. Before he ended up in the hospital, maybe she could have let him leave and pretended he didn't exist. Before she started to see him as he is, maybe she could've erased his image from her mind's eye. But now he is revealing himself to her, his personality showing raw under his physical damages. She sees someone familiar with loss, and she won't have him lose her too.

Rory gives a quick tap on the door before taking delicate steps inside the room. She's decided she was ready to try her luck with defusing the bomb she had activated a quarter hour ago. School starts soon, and she would not be distracted for the rest of the day without attempting to bridge the gap she created.

Stepping on white tiles of ice, she can nearly hear the sound of cracks underneath the weight of her approach. Jess doesn't budge. He seems to be shrinking before her eyes, ever weaker. His eyes are half-closed, cupped by purple crescents underneath. She allows her gaze to float to his chiseled jaw then to his hands, both tightly clenched in pain. He doesn't even blink as she comes to stand beside him. Perhaps too angry or perhaps too tired to look at her.

She glides her thumbs over the Walkman in her hands before setting it to track number three, The Sound of Silence by Simon & Garfunkel. It'd be unacceptable to choose anything else. After all, she understands now, it's the sound of silence that keeps him awake no matter how truly exhausted he is. She turns the volume low so as not to perturb the headache that is surely wracking inside of him. Sometimes when something is pounding against the walls of the skull, a little more noise is what one needs, as contradictory as that seems. He flinches slightly at her touch as she slides the headphones over his ears, fingertips brushing carefully over his jawline and sideburns. Within moments, she sees a change in him as Simon works his magic, as Garfunkel takes his turn. His top and bottom rows of teeth which had been clenched in a stubborn embrace now release each other from grip, and his face softens as a result. His head sinks back further into the pillow, his neck no longer taking on the façade of a tree trunk. Rory watches as he lets his eyes close completely, his hands slightly release. She reaches out with her right one to pry his left open entirely. He resists her only slightly, but soon allows her hands under his. She can feel the semicircle indents from his nails in the skin of his palm as she lifts it just enough to slip the player underneath. She places his fingers over the buttons with utmost caution, supporting each one from below with her own.

She doesn't know why, but she lets her hand rest there under his, her fingertips idling under his palm. It is cold, but not clammy or sweaty. A dry ice. It's not cracking beneath her at all anymore. Minutes pass, her companion growing more relaxed with each one. His breathing evens out, a steady lolling, gliding up and down the melodic dunes of the music playing softly in his ears. Whether he can hear her or not, she is more concerned of whether he would decide to listen. He could easily choose the voices of Simon & Garfunkel over hers. However, she murmurs with their hands still joined, "I'm sorry. I wanted to help you. It was the only way I knew how. I hope that we are still okay. … Please sleep now. You have to rest so that…"

So that there's still time. Before we have to say goodbye.

She finishes pathetically, "So that you can get out of here."

She starts to pull away, but the tiny movement of his thumb against hers is enough to freeze her in place. His eyes remain closed. His torso remains relaxed. Yet there is a firmness in his voice that Rory wouldn't expect.

"We're okay."

"We're not okay."

Jess still hadn't recovered from someone coming through his door who isn't the nurse, Rory, or Luke. He had been peacefully staring at the ceiling with his ice pack on his chest, listening to Fields of Gold, thinking about the complexities of getting on the subway with crutches. His roommate-for-a-day barged in without warning, greeted him abruptly, remarked on the quality of his new room, and proceeded to announce more of his relationship issues. Jess is now watching Romeo pace back and forth in front of his bed, his IV stand hindering his stride.

Romeo - or whatever his name is - says, "I'm talking about Jacob, by the way."

Jess recognizes the name, and he asks skeptically, "Did you mail the letter?"

"No, and I should've. But I decided I didn't want to wait so I called him." Strike One. He walks back and forth muttering further nonsense. Jess follows him with his eyes, like watching a very slow ping pong match.

"Stop!" Jess says, and Romeo pauses his pacing and jabbering. "What happened?"

Romeo's knuckles are white, clutched around the metal rod of the IV stand. "I called his house, and his mother picked up. She thinks we're just friends, so Jake had to talk about chemistry until she left. I actually needed a review on bonds, but the point is that I should've paged him, but I didn't."

Strike Two, Jess counts. He raises an eyebrow in response, waiting for Romeo to continue. Romeo responds to his expression with a defensive explanation. "I told him what I put in the letter! . . . but in a much rougher way."

"You mean what I put in the letter," he reminds. "You were on page 4 of a romance novel before I stopped you."

Romeo rolls his eyes. "Don't you think throwing the whole thing away was a little unnecessary?" When Jess just stares coldly in response, he relents, "Fine, it wasn't great. But… where do I go from here? I already told him how I feel. It seems like all my cards are played."

Jess sighs. Strike Three. Out.

"Did you say what I told you? About understanding the position you are putting him in?" He doesn't even know what he is saying. He doesn't try to fix things. He doesn't give advice. He receives it, swiftly ignores it, and proceeds to do whatever the hell he wants. He doesn't do this.

His uninvited companion nods furiously in response. "I did, I did. But he was so angry. I felt like I wasn't asking that much, you know? But he was acting as though I was attacking him. Viciously."

"He's in denial," Jess suggests quietly. People are much better with denial than honesty. Chills run through his torso, emanating from the ice pack on his chest. A wave of nausea spills over. Maybe he should ask his ex-roommate to leave. The kid is so infernally desperate, though. Jess shakes his head, trying to force his symptoms away.

Romeo is oblivious to the pained expression on Jess's face. "Definitely. He told me he's attracted to me too. He told me that he wants to be with me too. We've established that. But he won't break up with his girlfriend. Claims they're happy. It's like he's using her just to prove to everyone he doesn't like guys, as if people even suspect. You know what I mean right? Like what do you think? Do I even have a shot here?"

Why me? Jess thinks to himself as he is berated with questions, contradicting the thought he'd had a mere 10 seconds ago. He doesn't get involved with other people's business. Romeo doesn't see his eyes roll up as he leans further back on his pillows, and doesn't wait for a response to keep rambling. He resumes his pacing, the wheels of the IV stand making agitating squeak noises on the floor.

"I'm not asking him to come out of the closet. I'm not asking him to be with me in that way." He repeats, "I'm not asking much. If he cares about me like he says he does, then why is he with her? He isn't being fair to me, her, or himself. You know?"

Jess knows too well actually. He nods along, trying to turn himself numb before Romeo's words hit too close to home.

"And I tried to tell him that it's just because I care. I just like him so much that it's driving me insane seeing him stick with someone else just because it's safer. But he said his hands are tied. He's a basketball player. She's a cheerleader. He's a big bulky black guy. She's a pretty blonde girl with a waist the size of a toothpick. How do I compete with that?"

Romeo is staring down at his own body with such a strong dissatisfaction that Jess has to look away. Slim. White. Pale. He finally pieces it together. He states, "That's why you're here."

Silence fills the room, until Romeo's sniffles begin to echo around it.

"It isn't about being cool. It isn't about kids not picking on me anymore. I just thought… I don't know. I thought that if I could look like them, if I could bulk up, he would see me as someone he could be with. Not some useless piece of white trash he'd have to protect all the time." Jess is quiet, simply watches as Romeo swipes away a couple rogue tears. As he tugs lightly on the IV, he continues, "I passed out a couple days ago on the track. Honestly, the food here is better than the protein shakes I was forcing down."

Jess orders, "Sit."

He stalks to the leather chair with his metal companion, slowly squats to rest on its edge. He plucks a tissue from the box on the side table. Jess turns his neck to glare at him. He's been wanting to say his next words since he met Romeo.

"You're being a moron."

Romeo lets out a laugh that sounds more like a sob. He brushes away another stray tear. "I know. I know I am."

"But," Jess's voice softens, "don't give up yet."

Romeo fits his hand around his wrist, watching his thumb and middle finger easily connect around it. "And why the hell not? I've fucked this up to the point of no return."

"No, I have fucked up to the point of no return. You still have time."

Romeo looks up. "You mean you have someone? I mean, of course you do, but I just didn't know. Who are they? What happened?"

Jess smirks with an amused scoff. "I'm not telling you a thing. But the point is you can fix this."

"Thanks, um… what's your name again?" Romeo's cheeks flush as he labors to recall it through their extensive, mostly one-sided conversations. "Sorry, I can't even remember you telling me."

Jess smirks. It's because he didn't. "Get my wheelchair from the closet. We're going on a trip."