After spending his morning in a book store a little ways out of Stars Hallow, Jess quickly sneaks into his science class and slides into his seat behind Lane.
"Lane. . .Lane."
"Sh."
"I need a pencil."
"I don't have one."
"Then I need a pen."
"You only have fifteen minutes left."
"Then I need the answers."
"There's a pen in my bag."
"I can't go through your bag."
"Yes, you can."
"My mother told me never go through a lady's bag. . .at least, not until you're a couple blocks away. I'm just kidding, she never said that. Though it sounds like pretty good advice, doesn't it?"
"Take it and shut up." Lane angrily hands Jess a pen
"Well, I tell you, it's true small towns sure are friendly."
After school Luke gets called by the principal to talk about Jess. The principal informed him on his missing homework, lack of participation, his attendance record, his occasional hostility towards the teachers, and his failing grades. He also mentioned something about all the school's baseballs disappearing which Luke said he would check on. He suggested to Luke that he should look into a tutor for Jess or he might have to repeat the year.
When Luke returned to the diner he found Lorelai, Sabrina, and Rory talking about movies at counter because Taylor put Lorelai in charge of picking the movie for the towns film festival.
"Hey. Listen, have you seen Jess?" Luke asks the girls
"Oh yeah, he went upstairs earlier" Sabrina said
"Oh, great thanks."
Luke walks in on Jess as he was arranging his CDs.
"Oh, good, you're here. So, you file those under the band names?"
"Genre." Jess stands up a picks up a book
"Right, genre, that makes sense, makes a lot of sense. Oh, what is that? Something for school?"
"Nope."
"Oh, well, shouldn't you be reading something for school?"
"Why?"
"I don't know. I mean, I know you like reading and since you like reading, you might as well read something you're gonna get graded on so you can get graded on something you like because you like reading."
"What are you babbling about?"
" I went to see your principal today."
"Huh."
"He says you're flunking out. He says you're not showing up for class. He says you stole their baseballs." Luke notices a slight smile creep up on Jess' face
"You stole their baseballs? Why would you do that? What could you possibly need five hundred baseballs for?"
"Can we talk about this later?"
"Why, you got a big Frisbee heist going down at six? Jess, Mr. Mertin said if you don't start doing better, they're not gonna let you be a senior."
"Bummer."
"They're gonna hold you back."
"Well, at least I'll know where my classes are."
"Jess, this is serious. You're flunking out. You're looking at being in the eleventh grade for the rest of your life. You're gonna be the kid in the back of the room with a beard and a racing form babbling incoherently about Steely Dan."
"Steely Dan?"
"The group may change, the freak in the back never does."
"I'm going out."
"Don't you wanna go to college?"
"Don't wait up." Jess picks up his coat and heads towards the door
"What do you wanna be when you grow up?"
"About twenty miles south of wherever you are."
"You have to think about the future. If you don't get through high school, who's gonna hire you? You're not gonna have any skills."
"Stop."
"How you gonna work, huh? How you gonna eat? How you gonna pay rent? What are you gonna do, Jess?"
"Geez, I don't know, maybe I'll work in a diner."
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Luke knocks on the door of the Gilmore's with a bag of brownies, that accidentally had too much cocoa powder added into them, in his hand. Lorelai answers and Luke gives her the brownies and asks to speak to Sabrina who was up in her room.
"Sabrina, it's Luke. Can I come in?" Luke says knocking on her door
Sabrina confusedly opens the door "Hey, uh what's up?"
"Not much. Can I . . ."
"Uh, yeah, come on in."
"Okay, look, I wanted to ask you a favor. I uh was wondering if you could tutor Jess."
"What?"
"He's not doing too well in school. The principal said he's not gonna let him move on unless something changes. I was wondering if you could help."
"That doesn't make any sense, he's smart enough to pass any subject."
"I don't think it's his lack of smarts, more like his lack of proximity to the actual classes that's the problem."
"Ah"
"Look, I don't expect you to work miracles or anything but you're basically with him all the time, if you could just get him through the next couple of tests, make himself show up a little more, let the school see that he can do it, that would help out a lot"
"Sure"
"Really?"
"Of course Luke I care about him passing just as much as you do"
"Thanks Sabrina"
"Anything for you Luke"