A/N this is a post finale literati story.

The characters are not mine but I hope you enjoy where I take them.

It Started With a Text

Taking a deep breath she pressed send.

Rory: I met Christiane Amanpour.

Jess: who is this?

Rory: oh sorry, it's Rory. I got your number from Luke hope that's okay?

Jess: I should've guessed.

Rory was regretting her impulse to text him when a second message arrived.

Jess: So did she live up to the hype?

Breathing a sigh of relief she quickly replied, anxious to see what direction this conversation might take.

Rory: she was amazing. I however was in my pyjamas.

Jess: fluffy slippers too?

Rory: you always knew me well.

Jess shook his head as he read those 5 words. He put his phone down on the kitchen table and went to the lounge to distract himself with the emails he'd been putting off responding to. Somehow it seemed a lesser evil than continuing this little chat with Rory as if nothing had ever changed between them. It was too easy to slip back into rhythm with her. He'd made that mistake when she came to the Truncheon opening and he didn't plan on repeating that error in judgement again.

Rory stared at the phone then switched it to silent and buried it in her handbag suddenly sick to her stomach with regret at having messaged him in the first place. She should've known better. With so much up in the air right now she just wanted to do something spontaneous. Had she taken a moment to consult Mr Hindsight he would've informed her that spontaneity and Rory did not always play well together and often involved a darkly handsome, broody guy she used to know. She paced around her room seeing it through different eyes now that she was back here - an unemployed college graduate with nothing but time on her hands. She ran her hands over the banners on her Yale board and wondered for a moment how different her life might be in this moment had she gone to Harvard instead. She'd have never met Logan, she'd have never had to turn down his proposal. She'd probably never have stolen a yacht or dropped out of school or hurt Jess in such an abominable way.

That morning, as she was meeting her idol she couldn't help but think of Jess and how he'd always believed in her. It had been awkward asking Luke for his number after all this time had passed since she'd seen him but he was almost too happy to oblige. Now she wondered if she had done the right thing or if she'd just opened a can of worms with two sticks of dynamite. She would leave him be. If he replied then she would see where it went from there but she would leave him alone, she wouldn't contact him again. Her heart sunk a little at the thought and she felt 17 again, sitting in her room waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for him to call her. She spotted a familiar favourite book on her shelf and pulled it down. Settling back onto her pillows she opened the cover and began to read.

The emails were all sorted, the dishes were washed dried and put away. He'd even changed the sheets on his bed and put away the clean laundry that had been sitting ignored in the basket for the last 3 days. He was too tired to write but too wired to sleep. He wandered back into the kitchen and picked up his phone from where he'd left it a few hours earlier. Reading back through the short conversation he found himself smiling. So, she'd met her idol. Must've been a pretty major event in the life of Rory Gilmore. He allowed himself to indulge in the feeling it gave him to know that she'd wanted to share this with him. Even after all this time she still had a hold over him. Some days he cursed it but other days he was thankful for the way it helped the words appear on the page and allowed him to write. Every creative needed a muse right? He'd meant it when he'd told her he couldn't have written The Subsect without her. Her voice in his head kept him going long after he would've given up on himself. He typed a short reply then switched off his phone and went to bed.

Rory had dozed off, her book resting across her chest, one finger still subconsciously marking her place. When she woke the next morning she dug her phone out of her bag to switch it back on and saw the message from Jess waiting for her. Her heart began to race as she read those 5 words.

Jess: I hope I still do.