Everyone Hates Jess (Gilmore Girls / Jess / m)

[tarotgal]

Title: Everyone Hates Jess
Author: tarotgal
Fandom: Gilmore Girls
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: This is a fanwork. I received no money personally for its creation nor am I affiliated with the Gilmore Girls.
Summary: When Jess returns from a brief stay in New York, he finds that everyone in Stars Hollow hates him. And he finds himself with a head cold. Life is not fair.
Word count: 3,848
Author Notes: Written for symphonyflute as a thank you for donating on my fundraising page for the Walk to End HIV. The requirement was a 3,000 word fic but, of course, I went over.

Everyone Hates Jess

Rory

It was easy to hate Jess Mariano. The thing about Jess was that he never did what you expected him to do. He was smart and loved learning, but refused to study and ditched classes whenever he could. He claimed to hate Stars Hollow, but he’d apparently chosen to come back and live with Luke. And instead of dating girls who were clearly infatuated with him, he went after girls who were already spoken for.

Or, rather, one girl in particular. But after what had happened, Rory didn’t want anything to do with him. Really. Seriously. She was with Dean. Jess could stand over there behind Luke’s counter staring at her forever and she wasn’t going to give him the time of day once. She was just going to sit here and drink her coffee with her mother like she did every morning whether he was there or not.

“heht’CHIIIH!”

Rory looked over to see Jess with a hand clapped to his nose and mouth. His eyes were squinted shut. His body rocked backward and forward. “h’Eeschhhh!”

“Rory?” Quickly her head snapped back toward her mother, who sat with both hands around the large, yellow mug from which she was sipping steaming coffee. “I asked if you had thought any more about your application.”

Rory nodded quickly and had a little of her own coffee. “I thought I’d group my achievements by topic instead of chronologically. That way they can get a better sense of—“

“hah-Chishh!”

Both Rory and Lorelai looked over at the counter. Jess had a paper diner napkin cupped to his face this time and was blowing his nose. “Looks like he has a cold,” Rory observed.

Lorelai nodded. “Or he’s suddenly allergic to pancakes.” Today was pancake day. “Oh! Or maybe he has a haunted leg.”

Rory chuckled.

“You think?”

“Occam’s razor; the simplest answer is often correct.”

“You’re right. Definitely a haunted leg then,” Lorelai concluded. “Serves him right.”

“h’IHSchhh! hihSchhhh!”

Rory made a conscious effort to not look over this time. She didn’t care if Jess were sick. She was with Dean now. She loved Dean. Jess being back in town didn’t change that fact. Jess being sick didn’t change that fact. If he was even sick at all. He was probably just doing this for attention. Maybe he was only doing it to get her attention specifically. Maybe as soon as the Gilmore girls left the diner, he’d be fine. He’d toss the dry napkins away and chalk this up to one more scheme that hadn’t panned out. Just like having her tutor him hadn’t worked out. Just like moving back to Stars Hollow hadn’t worked out. So she shouldn’t be at all concerned. Right?

“hah-hah-CHIHH!”

Right. Not concerned. Not at all.

“Could you try that again, honey, and not sneeze on it this time?”

Rory looked back over at the counter to see Miss Patty sliding her plate back and Jess rubbing the back of his hand at his nose. He apologized quickly, snatched up her plate, and dumped its contents into the trash can. When he turned back around, his gaze suddenly fell on Rory.

Though she looked away at once, her cheeks did go red. She hoped her mother wouldn’t notice. Because it didn’t mean anything. She was with Dean. She loved Dean. She definitely didn’t love a sneezy, pathetic Jess Mariano. “The question is: if I order them by topic, what do I lead with? Do I start with the strongest, so they can’t miss it? Or do I build up dramatically?”

“I bet the Harvard application board doesn’t see any drama. Their lives are probably void of drama, just a lot of messy ink pads for their APPROVED and REJECTED stamps.”

Rory smiled and nodded. She didn’t look back over at the counter again.

*

Jess

She’d looked at him. Granted, it was just to see who had just sneezed; she might not have even known it had been him when she’d begun looking around. But she had looked all the same. He’d been wanting to catch Rory’s attention for days now. He just wished it wasn’t this way. Here he was again, the man of contradictions.

It was just his luck to finally get her attention only to show her that he was at his most pitiful. For the first time ever, he wished she weren’t in the diner. Hell, he wished he could be completely alone, maybe curled up with a book under the covers upstairs. If that couldn’t happen, maybe weighed down under a few warm layers and sitting out on the dock. With a box of tissues.

God, this cold was a nightmare. It had hit Luke first and had hit hard. And though his uncle had tried to deny it for a whole day, in the end he’d practically lost his voice from all the coughing and congestion. And then the patrons at the diner couldn’t help but notice. Luke had finally given up and gone to lie down and take care of himself, leaving Jess to run the diner all day. Good thing Jess didn’t actually care about going to school any more. Once in a while he ran some soup or tea upstairs to Luke. But mostly he was too busy to do anything but take orders, prepare food, keep the coffee filled, and overcharge people who looked like they were going to be bad tippers. That woman from out of town with the diamond tennis bracelet? She could afford to pay more than a buck for a cup of coffee. Hell, she probably expected to.

“heht’CHIIIH!”

What he hadn’t counted on was coming down sick himself. At least, he assumed that was what was happening. Luke had been coughing from his cold more than sneezing, but this didn’t feel like some sort of allergy to Jess. His head felt foggy and stuffed-up. His nose felt so damn tickly. Even after he sneezed he felt the need to sneeze again right away. Absolutely no relief. That didn’t seem fair.

But, really, since when had life ever been fair to Jess? He’d been passed around because none of his family members actually wanted him, so he didn’t feel like there was anywhere he actually fit in. Nowhere felt like home. He’d finally found a girl he could connect with, who actually bothered to look past all his acting and see who he really was, only she was already dating some jerk. He’d finally been able to take her out on something sort of resembling a date, only to accidentally crash her car and send her to the hospital. And now, just as she was noticing him again, she was also probably noticing how his nose was an unnatural shade of pink and ran. Not exactly the cover of GQ.

No wonder she kept glancing over and then looking away again. Now if only he could quit sneezing, everything would be so much better. But if Luke was any indication, this cold bug wasn’t of the light and quick variety. So Jess endured the fluttery, urgent tickle in his nose and kept his hand cupped to his nose and mouth so he wouldn’t sneeze all over everything. He rocked back on his heels and then pitched forward again. “h’Eeschhhh!”

Not wanting to deal with any complaining customers, Jess washed his hands, scrubbing hard. No one was even mentioning his sneezing, they just wanted their breakfast. No one seemed to be noticing how crappy he felt except for Rory. But she and Lorelai would be leaving soon anyway. He could hang on until then.

Jess refilled the coffee pots, even though everyone’s coffee levels looked good, at a glance, which was a relief. He felt better hiding out behind the counter. It was a lot easier to hide a little cough or sniff back here rather than out there, squeezing between tables, practically on top of customers. Obviously, the best plan would be not sneezing in the first place. But his nose already itched. Not wanting another messy sneeze in his hand, he grabbed a napkin from the dispenser on the counter and pressed it to his nose just in time. “hah-Chishh!”

That felt a lot better, actually, being able to wipe the napkin under his nose and then drop it into the trash. The diner napkins weren’t the softest things ever, but as far as keeping his nose from running in front of Rory, this wasn’t such a bad solution. Had she seen him that time? He didn’t want to look over in case their eyes met for longer than a second, because he was worried she would narrow her eyes or somehow convey how angry she was with him. She was always pissed off whenever she spoke to him, and he wasn’t sure he could take it right now. He’d look over at her again before she left, but not just yet. Not… not until… until… Quickly he grabbed another napkin. “h’IHSchhh! hihSchhhh!”

He looked over at her. Just like the sneeze, Jess just couldn’t help it. But she wasn’t looking back at him. She didn’t care at all about him. Well, why should she? He’d been trying to show her a fun time and instead he had crashed her car and sent her to the ER. And now here he was, sneezing from an annoying cold. He must look terrible.

“One order of pancakes.”

Jess tossed this napkin and washed his hands again, looking up to see Miss Patty looking none too thrilled to be there. Most of the diner’s customers were cold to him because of what had happened to Rory. Not that it was any of their damn business. God, he hated small towns. But he nodded and grabbed the spatula. He’d just made up a new batch, so all he had to do was pour a few circles onto the griddle and do some flipping. It wouldn’t take a few minutes. And, with any luck, he’d manage to keep from sneezing for that long.

He didn’t actually mind pancake special day. Making pancakes was sort of mesmerizing. Most mornings, the diner was filled with people rushing in and out on their ways to school or work. But Jess had found a few moments amidst all that where he could just zone out and relax and let his mind wander. Sometimes it wandered toward whatever book he was in the middle off. Sometimes it wandered in the direction of whatever plans he was trying to come up with for his future, not that he’d ever tell anyone he gave that a second’s thought; it was a lot better for everyone if he just pretended to not care. But mostly his mind wandered toward Rory. There had to be a way to get her back on his side. She couldn’t be as in love with Dean as she seemed, she just couldn’t.

Jess slid the pancakes onto a place, tossed a few strawberries on the side and on top, and then placed the plate on the counter all in record time. Not that anyone would ever notice how good a job he was doing at running Luke’s place while Luke was upstairs, sick in bed. “hah-hah-CHIHH!” The sneeze had come so suddenly he hadn’t even had a second of warning to try to cover his nose and mouth.

Both he and Miss Patty looked at the plate on the counter. Then she made a face of disgust and shook her head. “Could you try that again, honey, and not sneeze on it this time?”

Jess rubbed the back of his hand against his runny, sniffly nose as he took her plate back and dumped its contents straight into the trash can. “’m so sorry. I’ll make you a new one.”

“You know what? Don’t bother. I’ll just take a coffee to go.”

Knowing he wasn’t going to get a tip out of her now, Jess nodded and, sniffling, reached for the coffee pot.

*

Rory

If he were faking it, he was doing a really good job of it. He was keeping the act up even when the diner didn’t have any customers to see him. Maybe he was just practicing.

Or maybe Jess was actually sick. That had to really suck, trying to run a diner when you felt bad. And was he going to school? Had Luke remembered to call him in sick? Did Luke even know he was sick?

Rory stood outside the diner, one hand on the glass, peering in through the window. Jess was wiping off the tables one-handedly. The other arm was bent over his nose and mouth and every so often he would pause, squeeze his eyes shut, then bob forward. He was sneezing so much. Was that normal? She couldn’t remember sneezing so much during her last cold. Was he taking any medicine for this? Or was he trying to be all stoic, insisting he was all right when, clearly, he wasn’t? Or maybe he was just doing this for the attention, trying to get the town to feel sorry for him instead of hating him so much. Rory hated that they hated him. The accident had partly been her fault; they shouldn’t have even gone out for ice cream in the first place, let alone been driving around. They should have been studying. The whole town wouldn’t hate Jess so much if they had just been studying. And then he’d be doing better at school and she would still have the car Dean gave her.

Jess raised his head, eyes closing, mouth dropping open, and nose twitching before his head snapped forward, face planting back into the crook of his arm to smother the sneeze. Poor Jess. This was a monster of a cold. Even Jess shouldn’t have to deal with it while working. He should be in bed.

Jess’ whole body shook, either with a shiver or maybe a cough, Rory couldn’t tell from where she was. But his whole body tensed up for a few moments afterward before relaxing. Then he looked up with unfocused eyes and suddenly she found herself locking her gaze with his. At first she thought he might not have seen her, that he might just be looking out of the window. But at once he rubbed his sleeve at his face and dropped his arm as if nothing at all were wrong.

That’s how Rory knew he was really sick. And that’s what made her pull open the door and go back in again. “Hi,” she said, not sure how else to start this.

*

Jess

“eh-hah-hah-hahhhhhh-IHTCHOO!” He sneezed, rearing back and pitching forward. The sneezes were getting worse, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do for them. The chicken soup he’d made himself for lunch was a complete disaster, but he didn’t really feel hungry anyway. He just had to get through tonight’s dinner service then close up the diner and he’d be free to go sleep. He figured if he buried himself under enough blankets and smothered sneezes into his pillow, he wouldn’t bother Luke too much. Luke was so oblivious about things sometimes anyway, plus he had his own cold to deal with. With any luck, it would run its course fast and he’d be better tomorrow.

A shiver hit him hard. His whole body gave into it, shuddering helplessly. The cool wetness of his sleeve against his face felt uncomfortable all of a sudden, so he wiped his nose dry and lowered his arm. Only to find himself face-to-face with Rory Gilmore. Well, she was outside, but still. He froze, not knowing what else to do. He didn’t want to frighten her off but he also didn’t want her standing there watching as his nose did its best Niagara Falls impression. But then she left her spot at the window and actually came inside the diner.

This couldn’t end well. He had to get her out of here before he had another sneezing fit. His nose just tickled so badly, and it wasn’t going to stop just because Rory was there. Why did she have to choose now to talk to him? “Hi.”

That was it. Just ‘Hi.’ All the things that had transpired between them. All his feelings for her. And all he got was a stupid ‘Hi” from her? “What do you want?” he asked coldly, his voice breaking a little as he spoke. He scrubbed his wrist at his nose, which didn’t do a damn thing to help. If anything, the tickle flared up even stronger. Jess looked at Rory, trying to pretend there wasn’t a sneeze just itching to get out.

She didn’t answer right away. Maybe she hadn’t been expecting the question or his tone or maybe she was wishing she’d stayed outside. She looked around the empty diner for a minute before asking, “What are you doing, Jess?”

The way she spoke to him… it was part kindness and part frustration. It put him on edge at once. “Haven’t you noticed I… work here?” Oh, not again! The tickle in his nose flared up to massive proportions, making the situation so urgent he had to grab a napkin from the dispenser on the table in front of him. “hah-H’CHITshhhhhh!”

“Bless you,” she said softly. “You really don’t look so good.”

Jess wiped his nose with a second napkin and pocketed them both to get them out of sight as fast as possible. “Thanks so much for the reminder. But I’m not some Dostoevsky protagonist throwing myself a pity party. Someone’s got to feed the customers and pay the bills.”

“Where’s Luke?”

Jess nodded toward the stairs. “He’s sick.”

“So are you.”

He coughed and cleared his throat. “Nah, I’m fine. The poster boy for health. Look, are you going to order something or are you just here to make me extra miserable?”

She looked taken aback. But she had to have known. She had to have been aware that her just standing there so close he could kiss her but so completely and utterly unavailable was killing him. He’d come back, determined to win her over, only to find the whole town turned against him and Rory even more securely wrapped in Dean’s embrace. What would it take for her to understand how he felt?

Rory didn’t order anything. Rory hesitated then left. The door slammed a little louder than necessary as it closed behind her with force.

*

Rory

Every single table was filled during dinner service. People in the town might hate Jess, but they still liked Luke’s food. Or maybe making Jess work when he was sick was just another way to torture him? Rory stood outside again, looking in at the chaotic scene. This was more than one person should handle, especially if that one person was sick. Rory scanned the inside of the diner again, searching.

She only saw Jess, his nose just a little pinker than it had been that afternoon, his eyes just a little more tired, his movements just a little slower. But when he needed to sneeze, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a napkin from the wad he had stashed there. He held it up to his face, sneezing strongly into it.

Usually he just sneezed once, but, as she continued to watch, she saw him turn away several times to sneeze repeatedly. Through the window, she watched him cough and sniff and even blow his nose a couple times. She watched him wash his hands only to sneeze wetly into one of them a second later, making him start all over again. She watched him lean against the counter for support. She watched him warm himself by holding his hands up to the coffee pot. And she watched him close his eyes for a second, not to sneeze but just to collect himself, gather up his energy before going to serve another table.

Rory watched him for longer than she had intended to, feeling self-conscious suddenly. Anyone could have come by and seen her. Dean could have seen her. So she did what she had to and pulled out her cell phone to make a call. The phone rang once, twice, three times before it was answered.

*

Jess

Getting out of bed in the morning had been harder than usual. His head felt clogged up with stuffiness and, for a while, all he seemed to be able to do was curl up on himself and sneeze and sneeze and sneeze. After what seemed like the hundredth sneeze, he managed to stumble toward the bathroom and turn on the hot water in the shower.

Then he spent a long time standing in the shower, sneezing over and over again. But these sneezes felt like they were loosening something in his head. With the steam surrounding him and the hot water raining down on him, Jess didn’t feel quite so congested or weak.

By the time he got out, he actually felt well enough to get dressed and head downstairs. A glance at his watch told him it was nearly six, so he hurried. There would already be customers at the door, wanting to come in by now, and he couldn’t remember if he’d set the coffee properly before heading up to bed last night. Jess skipped the bottom two stairs, jumping over them in an attempt to get down faster.

But when he reached the bottom of the stairs, he froze in the doorway. Rory was there, sitting at the counter, nursing a cup of coffee. And there, behind the counter, was Luke. Jess had thought his uncle was still asleep upstairs, but now he realized he hadn’t looked, just assumed. Luke didn’t look so hot either, but he was upright, which was a definite improvement over yesterday.

All at once, the tickle in Jess’ nose flared up, and he raised his arm to vampire sneeze into his sleeve again. “hah-eeITCHew!” But, just like his other sneezes that morning, his nose continued to tingle and didn’t stop at just one. “hah-ITChhhh! Heh-Shihhhhh! Huhhh…” A couple strong sniffs kept the last sneeze from coming out.

When he cracked his eyes back open, he found Luke looking over at him. Luke waved him away, gesturing that Jess should go back upstairs. And though Jess was eager to comply, he hesitated there a moment longer in order to look at Rory.

She looked up from her coffee and met his gaze for just a second. Then she turned back to talk to Luke. But that one second had been enough to fill him with hope. Even without that second, it would have been enough. Because she cared enough about him to get Luke back into the diner so Jess could have a break. People who were completely in love with their boyfriends didn’t bother doing that, did they? Jess headed back upstairs to bed, secure in the knowledge that not everyone in Stars Hollow hated him.

[muffins]

I love this ? Jess and Rory are my otp

[MoonDuck]

Omg this is great! They sound perfectly in character and I love seeing all of their thoughts, which are so perfect. And Jess is so miserable hehe. And the ending is so sweet.

[tarotgal]

I love this Jess and Rory are my otp

Aw, thanks! This is only my second time writing them. I think I'm more of a Dean girl as I don't usually go for the bad boy types, but Jess has his softer sides :-) I'm glad you enjoyed this. Thanks for the comment!

Omg this is great! They sound perfectly in character and I love seeing all of their thoughts, which are so perfect. And Jess is so miserable hehe. And the ending is so sweet.

Thank you! I'm definitely not experienced in writing these two, so I'm glad you thought the characters sounded like themselves! It was so difficult to write a story that was so heavy on the hurt part of hurt/comfort but I'm glad you liked how I managed an at least somewhat happy ending :-) Thanks so much for your kind feedback and letting me know what you thought worked.

[Zwee]

This is the cutest thing ever! I looove Gilmore Girls, and Jess is my favorite <3.

I really liked the switch back and forth between perspectives, it made for a really good story, and it definitely wasn't too redundant.

I liked the way you spelled his sneezes too, they seemed to fit right in with what I imagined his sneezes would sound like!

The whole thing was super in-character too, and the dialogue was on point!

Thank you!!

[tarotgal]

This is the cutest thing ever! I looove Gilmore Girls, and Jess is my favorite <3.

I really liked the switch back and forth between perspectives, it made for a really good story, and it definitely wasn't too redundant.

I liked the way you spelled his sneezes too, they seemed to fit right in with what I imagined his sneezes would sound like!

The whole thing was super in-character too, and the dialogue was on point!

Thank you!!

Thank you for the wonderful comments! I am glad you thought the repeated portions didn't feel too redundant; I had fun overlapping and pulling the two apart so there was no overlap by the end.

I'm so glad you enjoyed everything. It was only my second time writing these two, so it's nice to hear that their dialogue and actions seemed in-character! That's high praise coming from fans :-) Thanks for reading!

[ellwren]

This is great! Awesome work as usual, TG!

[tarotgal]

This is great! Awesome work as usual, TG!

Aw, thank you so much! :-)

[Ciuty80]

awesome!!! :drool:

playing around with jess is really cool!

please more!!!

[Seniorstatus14]

Love love loveeeeeeeee Gilmore Girls! This is so fantastic! I could read Gilmore girl fics for days!

[tarotgal]

awesome!!! :drool:

playing around with jess is really cool!

please more!!!

Thanks so much! I am glad you liked it!

Unfortunately the fic is complete, as it was done to fill a request with a set number of words. But maybe I'll write more with Jess in the future. I definitely have a Dean one I'm scheduled to work on in 2016.

Love love loveeeeeeeee Gilmore Girls! This is so fantastic! I could read Gilmore girl fics for days!

heehee I've only seen the show through once (and certain episodes more than once) so it means a lot to know the story works for fans. Thanks for the feedback!

[AnteatersOnParade]

This was beautifully done! You wrote the two beautifully and the dialogue was spot-on! Fantastic job, thank you for sharing this with us! It's fantastic and will definitely be added to my reread list!

[gingerdean]

So, this is the first fanfic that I've read in a looooong time that is not SPN-related. But this piqued my interest, because I just recently started watching GG on Netflix. (I'm in mid- Season 3, so this was right in my current timeline ) Anyway, I REALLY enjoyed this! The voices of all of the characters were pitch perfect, and you perfectly captured Rory's love/hate relationship with Jess during this time in the show, which was a lot of fun to read. I loooved the beginning, where Lorelai and Rory are having breakfast, and Jess just keeps sneezing and sneezing in the background. And then how the frequency of the sneezing just keeps increasing as the day goes on. And the delicious early morning sneezy-ness the next morning, and the adorable fit as Jess walks into the diner. The outsider perspective of Jess' illness, combined with Jess' internal dialogue was incredibly hot. And the spellings were to DIE for. A lovely story, and beautifully written!

(And did I hear that right.. a GG Dean fic on the horizon? I will be looking forward to that...)