I haven't written Gilmore Girls for a while. University has been sucking away my life and free time. But I've been reading a lot of it recently, and watched a couple of episodes over the last week. I was literally seized by the need to write something again.

Jess is one of my favourite characters, and the only thing I can read or write is Literati. I can stomach Trory, but only in a world where Jess doesn't exist, or is never mentioned. The minute they cross paths in a Trory fic, I've switched teams. Its a condition XD.

So, this episode is not a favourite of mine. I like it, definitely, but its not a top favourite. However, I do think it has a lot of potential and space for AU spin offs. I chose it because Lorelai can get on my nerves like no other character over the course of the series. Emily and Richard can be awful, but I sort of love to hate them. I can't do that with Lorelai because I genuinely love her character, I just really want to smack her at times.

So a bit of Lorelai musing in a slightly different version of events towards the end of the Season 2 episode Teach Me Tonight. I just think if somehow Lorelai could see that Jess was, or could be, the person Rory always saw, maybe she wouldn't feel so scared or threatened by his presence in Rory's life.

Enjoy!

Lorelai was frantic. Granted, it was rare to find her in a perfectly lucid moment, but at this precise point in time, she'd surpassed rambling, yelling and crying and gone headlong into crazed, numb and…well, frantic.

Though it wasn't without reason.

If she were in any kind of fit mental state, she'd challenge you to be anything but scared out of your mind when you get a call from your teenaged daughter, announcing that she was – inexplicably – in the hospital.

She threw on a jacket, grabbed a bag to toss her phone in and was in the jeep in under two minutes. She was also fairly certain she'd broken a few sound barriers in the time it took to arrive at the hospital. Speed cameras wouldn't even have caught her in the shot.

It was late, and the car park not very busy. Filled with mental images of Rory moaning in pain, alone in a hospital bed and covered in blood and bandages, Lorelai barely remembered to put a ticket on the car before she was blazing through reception and demanding to know where Rory – Lorelai – Gilmore, she corrected, had been taken.

And then she was creeping down the hallway to one of the examination rooms, suddenly afraid to go in – of what she might discover. Sure, the mental images were a little dramatic; Rory had only broken her wrist, but acknowledging that did little to help.

And then, too soon, she was in front of the right room.

Rory's voice carried easily through the doorway – the door open just a crack so that a stream of white light from inside blazed into the corridor. Lorelai stopped, entranced by the sliver of illumination that fell across her wrist as she reached for the door handle.

She didn't touch it – the word had broken through the haze of panic and apprehension, making her freeze.

"Jess!" She sounded aggravated, vulnerable – possibly slightly desperate.

"Rory!" Whereas he was his usual sarcastic self. His voice made Lorelai's breathing hitch. He was here?

But.

It was strange. There was a playful lilt to his tone – one Lorelai had never been privy to and she was sure would have been masked had the snarky hoodlum had even an idea she was there to hear it. And he was mocking her daughter – not with the uncaring sarcasm he employed when speaking to – well – just about everyone – but with a warm, teasing inflection. Just how she and Rory mocked movies, or Stars Hollow, or Luke, or each other – with affection.

Lorelai let her hand drop away from the handle and moved to the side. Now out of the doorway, but pressed against the frame, she closed her eyes – not sure how to identify the feeling engulfing her – and listened.

"You have to leave!"

Lorelai frowned.

"Mom's coming to get me. I'm fine – I'll be fine. She'll get mad if you're here and there'll be yelling and shouting – she might use the doctor's stethoscope to hang you! It'd be convenient – I mean, she could have you in the morgue before anyone noticed! Just, please…go. I don't – Please."

Lorelai covered her mouth with a hand. She'd never exactly hidden her dislike for Jess, but she hadn't really noticed how much pressure that put Rory under, as she insisted on being the boy's friend. Maybe she hadn't wanted to notice.

"No."

Lorelai's eyes flew open, and she turned to look at the door. The blinds were pulled down, and all she could see through the tiny opening was the edge of a strange machine – completely shut down and silent – and the rails at the end of an examination bed.

She couldn't see either of the teens, and yet she could practically picture it. Jess was a punk, he didn't care about anyone or anything and as far as she could tell, he was opportunistic and unreliable at best.

But a single word, filled with such conviction had shattered Lorelai's mental picture of him.

"What do you mean? No," Rory seemed almost hysterical. "Jess, you have to go – did the whole hanging thing go over your head?"

"Well if she's doing it right, surely it would be going around my head?"

Rory let out a quiet scream of exasperation. At the same time, Lorelai nearly smiled in spite of herself. Then she fixed a scowl back onto her face.

The kid was horrible. Evil. Worse than Spawn of Satan at Chilton – Trevor (Tommy?) had never broken Rory's wrist.

"Rory, breathe, okay?"

"Don't tell me to breathe. When Mom gets here, she'll see you and there'll be a bloodbath. I have finals – I don't have time to mourn for you."

"Aww, you'd miss me?"

"Jess!"

Buuut… An annoying little sing-song voice in the back of Lorelai's mind chimed in. He may be a hooligan, but you don't know the whole story. He brought her here, he's not left – it doesn't sound like he wants to leave – and he's aware you're likely to kill him…

Lorelai cringed. The voice had a point. Damn it.

"Listen to me, okay?"

Lorelai tuned in again, interest piqued by the low, soft note in Jess' voice. She'd never heard him talk like this.

"Your Mom is not going to kill me – hung or otherwise – in a hospital. If she wants to cut me into little pieces and go all 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' on me when you're back at home, wrapped in blankets and watching a happy movie, then fine."

"Bu-"

"Shhh."

Lorelai's eyes bugged out. She suddenly felt very awkward and out of place as it occurred to her for the first time that she was eavesdropping. She'd been so focused on the fact that she was hearing a part of Jess – snarky, sarcastic, evil kid – that she had been refusing to believe existed, despite Rory's insistence.

Half her panic had been that her baby was in hospital, on her own, with a broken wrist and nobody to lean on. As it happened, she'd been wrong about half of it. She definitely wasn't alone, and Lorelai was sure that no one could fake the tenderness she'd heard when Jess shushed her.

Which brought on an entirely new fear that Lorelai really didn't want to look at while she was eavesdropping on her teenaged daughter in a hospital corridor.

"Frankly," Jess continued quietly. "I can't blame her for wanting to throw me off a cliff. I hurt you. If I actually left this room, I'd probably go find one myself and spare her the trouble."

"That's not fair!" Rory answered vehemently and instantly. "You didn't do this, Jess. It's not your fault. I'd have swerved too – you didn't have a choice. It was an accident."

Lorelai became aware she was holding her breath. Jess didn't respond, but he must have been wearing some kind of telling expression, because Rory continued after a pause.

"It was! Stop blaming yourself! And don't even joke about throwing yourself off a cliff – that's not funny!"

"Ro-"

"No, Jess."

"Okay, okay. Calm down. Are you sure you didn't OD on painkillers? That's such a cliché."

"Shut up," but it was said with the same affectionate lilt that had been in Jess' voice since the start.

And then he laughed quietly. A low, genuine sound, "What a comeback."

"Mom's taking a while," Rory muttered then.

Lorelai started, quickly glancing around with the irrational fear that she'd been spotted and found out. There was still no one in the hallway, though.

From inside the room came Jess' self depreciating, mildly amused voice. "She probably took a detour on the way over to find me and set me on fire or something."

"Jess," Rory warned. "Look. She'll be here any minute – if she found you or not, so I won't be on my own long and I'll be home soon. You really can go now. Please."

Lorelai quickly glanced back for somewhere to hide, just in case the boy finally acquiesced and let himself into the hall. But honestly, Lorelai would have been surprised if he even considered it, having heard what she had.

"Rory, stop," all playfulness was gone from his tone. He was speaking seriously, and low, as though it were a secret. "I don't care if your Mom turns up in thirty seconds. I am not leaving you in a hospital on your own – not even if you hadn't broken your wrist."

"I could push you out," Rory tried, but the cracked note in her voice told anyone who wanted to hear that she wasn't even considering it.

"You'd probably hurt your other wrist. Give up, Ror," Jess said softly.

There was a quiet intake of breath – practically lost in the buzzing silence of the hospital building – and a long pause. Lorelai moved off of the doorframe, mind spinning and feeling slightly nauseous, but a lot less panicked. A doctor with a clipboard rounded the top of the corridor, pausing at the desk at the far end.

The movement acted as a reminder that she'd probably been stood outside of the door for near on ten minutes. Taking a deep breath and having to steel herself, she planted herself in front of the door, and finally, pushed on the handle.

Hospital doors were apparently well oiled, because it didn't make the smallest creak as it swung easily inward. In the seconds it took Rory and Jess to register the motion, and their new company, Lorelai felt her heart seize in her chest as a flood of fear, relief and…envy…swallowed her.

Rory was perched on the examination bed, legs hanging over the edge and shoulders curled inwards. Jess was standing directly in front of her. The bed was high enough to be level with his hips, and he was still fractionally taller than Rory's small frame. Their foreheads were touching, their expressions soft and quiet and grasping each others hands as though they were the other's life line. Jess' thumb brushed back and forth methodically against the silky soft skin in the crook of Rory's right elbow, above where the new cast lay, like the whisper of an apology.

Lorelai swallowed hard. Maybe she'd made mistakes where Jess was concerned. Maybe he really was the person Rory talked about, somewhere buried inside. And maybe she really hadn't wanted to give him a chance.

In the back of her mind, she could admit that some of what happened that first night was likely her fault. Not the beer – that was all on him – but New York had raised him, and that was something that she shouldn't have tried to relate to – it was far from her world. He was an angry kid, and having everyone he met rave about a place he desperately felt trapped in had probably not helped.

Somehow, Rory had known how to help. And she'd been too scared of the way her daughter looked at him to see that he looked at her in the same way. And the tiniest, smallest part of her, wanted that for herself. For someone to look at her like she meant everything.

But in just seconds, the two teenagers had noticed her. They leapt apart, Jess keeping his eyes trained on the floor, and Rory's face flooding with heat.

"Mom!"

"Rory!" Lorelai threw out her thoughts and hurried across the room, hugging her tightly from one side – aware of the cast on her arm. "Are you okay? Is it just your wrist? How's the car? What happened? What were you doing?"

"Mom!" Rory cut her off quickly. "Mom, I'm fine. It's a fracture – really small and nothing to worry about at all – it'll heal up in a few weeks and I'll be good as new."

"Good, that's good," Lorelai breathed, dropping her bag on the bed next to – she suddenly noticed – Jess' jacket. She focused herself mentally. One thing down. Tons more to go.

Rory seemed to catch it. "It was just my wrist – everything else was fine. Well, except Jess. He-"

"I'm fine," Came from behind them. Lorelai started. The voice was so guarded, defensive. It was like a different person to who she'd heard from behind the door.

Looking around, she could see that all of the soft vulnerability that had been in his face and posture when she entered had gone. He was lounging in the stiff hospital seat, dark eyes intent but blank and a faint muscle ticking in his jaw.

And there was a purpling bruise, high on his right temple. It was on the wrong side to see from the door, and Lorelai felt the tension of mothering instinct knot in her chest.

"That looks…" she started, awkwardly. It was weird, to now know something about this boy – understand him a bit, and have knowledge of a part of him that he was clearly trying to keep secret. He had no idea, and Lorelai felt a faint prickle of shame. She wanted it to be different, but had no idea how.

"I'm fine," he said again, though there was a flicker of uncertainty in his eyes.

The prickle of shame came again. He'd expected her to not care in the slightest.

Lorelai glanced at Rory. She genuinely looked okay, save the cast, but her eyes were troubled and cloudy as they remained on Jess.

Lorelai looked back. "Has the doctor looked at you? You could have a concussion."

"I don't."

Lorelai mentally stamped her foot. He was reminding her why she had never really tried to understand Rory's friendship with him. He tried so hard to make it so difficult.

By the time she realised she hadn't said anything, an awkward pause had filled the space. But Jess glanced past her shoulder – to where Rory was sat. His eyes flickered again, and he sighed.

"I've had a concussion. Several times. I know this isn't one of them."

Lorelai breathed out slowly, chancing a glance at Rory. She wasn't smiling, but there was a new lightness in her eyes. So she took it for what it was. Jess had offered something – small as the concession was – and Rory…Rory was proud of him. And he...had done it for her.

"Tell me about it," Lorelai found herself saying inexplicably. "Falling out of a tree trying to escape my bedroom through the window when I was seven. It wasn't pretty."

There was silence. Lorelai didn't dare look at Rory, but she could practically feel her surprise. Jess just looked at her steadily – he had a scarily intent gaze – then, with the oddest expression that might have been acceptance, he said, "Huh."

And Lorelai knew Rory smiled. The single word – if you could really call it that – didn't feel like quite the irritating, evasive blow off it once had. It almost felt like acknowledgement.

"So," she turned halfway back to her daughter, now feeling a little odd about excluding Jess. "You were telling me what happened to the car?"

Rory hesitated, glancing back at Jess. Lorelai forced a smile onto her face, though she was still reeling a little from the truce-like occurrence. "Don't worry – I'll force him to put ice on it when we're out of here. We'll tie him to the sink if we have to."

And Lorelai revelled in the equally proud look Rory turned on her now. In the chair, Jess let out an annoyed breath, but didn't say anything. He didn't look as tense as he had before.

"The car's totalled," Rory admitted, tossing a glance towards the chair. It would take a while, Lorelai realised, to understand the friendship between the two. They seemed to know when to push and when to change subjects, all without words. And it was entirely Lorelai's fault that she wasn't up to date. She hadn't wanted to hear it. Rory continued. "I don't really remember much, but its safe to say that crumple zones crumple really well."

"Ooh," Lorelai winced. "Okay, so we can deal with that. Why don't you tell me what you were doing, driving around? I thought you were tutoring in the diner? And how did this happen?"

Lorelai was well aware that if she hadn't been eavesdropping long enough to hear that Jess felt completely remorseful, despite Rory's insistence that the entire thing was in no way his fault, she'd have leapt on him the minute she came through the door. There might have been some wielding of scalpels or hypodermic needles involved.

The realisation that she wasn't blaming Jess outright, and actually had doubts he had been to blame at all was just another startling thing to add to the list of revelations for the evening.

"We were," Rory answered, dragging her mother back to the present. "Studying. Sort of. But we got hungry, so we were going to go for ice cream – Luke's doesn't have any-

"In cones," Lorelai finished, smiling fondly. "He really needs to work on that. Ice cream's always better in cones," she added, oblivious to the startled expression on Jess' face, and the whimsical one on Rory's.

It didn't take her long. "What?"

"That's what Jess said," Rory smiled. "Better in cones. I keep saying you're alike, but neither of you believe me."

Lorelai glanced back at Jess. It was that bruise's fault. He looked entirely too small and broken – sat in the chair, beaten up and still there, despite the possible death threats. "Tell no one," she said, conspiratorially.

She was rewarded with the faintest smirk. It barely showed on his face, and he didn't look at her, but it was there.

"So we went out for ice cream," Rory continued. "And we were driving back – well, Jess was. I was reading Othello."

"Multitasking. Genius child," Lorelai nodded. Jess shook his head in concealed amusement.

"And this furry thing shot out into the road. I don't know what it was – or if it's alive. But there was no time and Jess just swerved to avoid it and the next thing we know, the crumple zone has crumpled."

"Do you think they'll re-enact this every year? The Great Gilmore Crash?" Lorelai asked absently.

"Mom?" Rory asked, brows furrowed in confusion.

"Well, Gilmore- Mariano Crash, technically."

"Aren't you mad?"

"I mean, if Roswell can have an Alien crash Festival, Stars Hollow can have a car crash Parade."

"But- Don't you want to yell or borrow a stethoscope?"

Forgetting that she wasn't supposed to have a clue what that meant, Lorelai shook her head. "No. Though I might be tempted to find this furry thing and throw it off a cliff."

Jess' head snapped up. Rory shot her a peculiar look. Lorelai forcibly shrugged. "What?"

Rory shook her head. "Really alike," she smiled gently.

Lorelai rolled her eyes, but couldn't bring herself to look straight at Jess. Glancing sideways at him, she noticed that his eyes were narrowed slightly, trained on the doorway and his shoulders tense again. Rory was quite possibly right about the other stuff she'd been insisting on – Jess was incredibly well read, with thoughtful and original opinions and ideas on almost every book he'd made it through. She also claimed they were somewhat similar, and he was more than capable of keeping up with her when it came to conversation littered with pop culture.

Was it possible that Rory was also right about him being incredibly smart? A talent that, wasted on schoolwork, was being used now to correctly suspect she must know something to have triggered this strange acceptance of not just him, but his innocence in the whole thing.

Lorelai wasn't sure she wanted to know. It was clear that part of him was not intended for anyone but Rory, and she didn't want to think how he'd react if he knew for certain she'd witnessed it.

"Ah, Miss Gilmore?"

Lorelai looked around. The doctor had entered, carrying a clipboard. There was a stethoscope around his neck and tucked under the lapels of his white coat and he wore a warm smile. Lorelai picked up her bag again as she moved to meet him.

"Your daughter is fine. We've given her some pain medication which should hold out until the morning. After that, she can take one of these every 6 hours. It sounded like quite an accident. They're both very fortunate, but they did all the right things, given the situation."

"Thank you, Doc," Lorelai said fervently. She took the bottle of tablets off of the man and laced her fingers around it tightly. "So she can come home?"

"She can leave now," he nodded, smiling wider. "But as for her boyfriend…"

The doctor's expression fell as he looked over at Jess, who had tensed again. Lorelai held her breath, realising neither of the two had leapt to contradict the title he'd been bestowed with. Oh boy…

"I'm fine," Jess reiterated, voice edged with a sharp note that gave away his increasing annoyance.

"He doesn't have a concussion," Lorelai stepped in, before she'd realised. "And we have peas at home. Frozen peas. Cold – I mean, for the bruising." Aware that Jess was smirking at her and Rory was biting her lip with flushed cheeks again, Lorelai cleared her throat. "We'll keep an eye on him and if he has an aneurysm we'll rush back."

The doctor hesitated before nodding shortly. "Very well. I can't keep him here without more cause and since he's not going to be on his own…Just mind you-"

"Wake him every couple of hours," Lorelai nodded. "We're all good."

The doctor nodded again. "Goodbye, Miss Gilmore, Rory…" after another moment of hesitation he turned and left the room.

Lorelai smiled despite herself, recognising the pause. Jess had never given the doctor his name.

"Come on you two. Let's go home. We need a good movie after this. You can study tomorrow."

Jess smirked again as he lifted himself out of the seat. Of course, it was all a mastermind plan to stop him from any more studying, Lorelai immediately considered, hovering awkwardly by the door. She watched as he held out a hand to help Rory to the floor without putting weight on her wrist. How had she forgotten to do that?

And to make it worse, Jess shot her a glance – somewhere between defiant and uncertain – as he picked up his jacket and draped it over Rory's shoulders.

She smiled up at him brightly. Lorelai swallowed. You're still my kid, Rory. And I'm still scared about this. One step at a time, please?

"Okay, let's blow this joint," she said, prompting them to meet her at the doorway. Forcibly pushing away thoughts she didn't want and smiling wickedly, Lorelai continued, "We can stop on the way back for ice cream."

Jess shot her a considering expression while Rory looked scandalised. "Mom!"

"Oh. Sorry. Is it too early to joke about that?"

Probably a bit out of character - like I said, I haven't written for these characters in a while. But once the idea seized me, I had to try, and this is what happened.

I'd love to know what you thought of it!