Disclaimer: All Gilmore Girls content belongs to Amy Sherman-Palladino.
. . .
Rubbing at his eyes, Jess shut the alarm clock off and furrowed his brows when he saw Ella wasn't next to him. Her side of the bed was cold and didn't look nearly as disheveled. But the anxiety at her absence quickly subsided as he walked out into the living room. With papers strewn around on the coffee table in front of her, Ella had spread out on the couch with no blanket, despite the Autumn chill in the air. She was still in her dress from the day before, and it was twisted around her form, riding up her thighs. Mascara was smudged around her eyes. Jess smirked, then went over and began shaking her shoulder gently. The light was soft through the gray curtains, and the sky was overcast. Even still, she squinted as she stirred awake, confused at her location.
"Elle? Wake up," Jess said, coaxing her out of her groggy state. "Jeez, how late did you stay up?"
She sighed, sitting up and gathering herself. "I don't know. I was grading essays for at least a couple more hours after you went to bed. But I couldn't keep my eyes open, so I was just gonna rest for a little while. Obviously, that was naive of me."
He chuckled, pressing a kiss to her cheek before going to put on the tea and coffee in the kitchen.
"What time is it?" she asked, stretching her arms high over her head as she stood up, her skirt falling around her knees again. She pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to wake herself up and shake off the throb pulsing behind her eyes.
"Seven," Jess replied, filling the coffee pot up with water.
Ella nodded, relieved. Her first class wasn't until nine. At least she would have time to shower off her makeup from the day before, and brush her teeth. The taste in her mouth made her grimace; she couldn't believe she'd fallen asleep without brushing her teeth. It was almost time for midterms at school, and the students in the art history class she was a teacher's assistant for had just turned in their first major essays. Overall, they were pretty decent. But, she was also never one to shy away from the red pen. Shuffling the stacks of paper on the table into neat rectangles, she stifled a yawn.
"I'm gonna take a shower," she said, coming to lean against the island. "I'd probably scare the undergrads if I showed up like this. Thanks for waking me. I would've slept forever if I could."
"I know." Jess turned on the tea kettle and faced her. "You gotta take it a little easier. I think that vein in your forehead is bound to pop, the way things are going."
She rolled her eyes. "I'm fine, Mariano. The concern is appreciated but not necessary."
"You've slept a total of, like, seven hours in the past three days," he argued.
"Hypocrite," she scoffed, making for their bedroom again to get fresh clothes.
"Nihilist," Jess retorted, calling after her. He would've worried about the volume of his voice so early in the morning, but he could already hear Matthew and Chris talking through the walls.
Ella chuckled breathily, half-heartedly. "I'm not the one who hung Nietzche above our bed."
. . .
Despite Ella's time at Luke's, she had never mastered making breakfast. Or cooking in general. Baking came natural and easy, her pies a hit at every single holiday and gathering she brought them to. But she burned the toast, didn't fry the bacon long enough, couldn't get the pancakes just right. Jess, however, had somehow picked up cooking skills between sighs and snide remarks. He and Chris took turns making breakfast sometimes, when everyone didn't just resort to cereal. It was common knowledge in the apartment, though, that both Ella and Matthew were best away from the kitchen in the morning hours.
As Ella reemerged from the bedroom, her hair damp and braided, her simple black dress loose and comfortable, the smell of the scrambled eggs Jess was making hit her in the face. Pepper and butter and orange juice mixed in, Chris on the couch flipping through the news channels on the TV sat opposite, Matthew at the counter talking with Jess. With everyone up so early, it made sense Jess would make something. She wondered sometimes if it was nostalgia which drove him, serving them food as Luke did his customers. And, of course, he lived above the business he owned just like his uncle. Ella had pointed out the irony to him more than once. After all, Ella knew just how much Jess looked up to Luke, even if he would never admit it in so many words.
Her stomach did a flip instead of growling as it usually would have, as the ache in her head pounded with the beat of her heart. It made her want to sigh audibly, but she bit it back. The only silver lining of the morning had been not bleeding through her dress and onto the couch, her period having shown up at some point in the night. Cramps were already twisting her insides, nauseating her.
"Did you hear what Bush did last night?" Chris asked, head perking up when he saw her enter the room. He held a coffee in one hand, the liquid pale from copious amounts of milk and sugar.
"Please don't tell me," she said tiredly, hopping onto a stool next to Matthew. "I can't handle his idiocy this morning."
"I'll spare you, then."
"Thank you so much."
Matthew chuckled breathily at them, sipping from his own mug. He was clean-shaven again, having stayed at the apartment for the first time in several days. Still, they did not know the name of the mysterious girlfriend.
"He's never that nice to me," Matthew said, his words a joking sigh.
Ella shrugged. "He owes me for covering his ass when he pissed off that spoken word lady last week."
"Not my fault," Chris chimed in from the couch, defensive.
"Right, so when you told her she wasn't as important as the other woman, that wasn't your fault? Someone else said that?" Ella prodded, eyebrows raised skeptically.
Chris sighed heavily. "I didn't say that. She just heard me wrong."
"Excuses, excuses," Ella chided.
Scoffing, Chris turned his eyes back to the TV and said nothing more. Ella snorted at his petulance, facing ahead where Jess stood over the stove. With a spatula in one hand and the handle of a frying pan in the other, she was reminded again of their days at the diner. Of a lonely morning when Luke had an appointment and Ella had gotten into a fight with her father. It was the first time Jess had made her breakfast. A wistful look crossed her face, and she was lost in thought when Jess put her tea down in a mug in front of her.
"Earth to Eleanor," he said, waving a hand in front of her face. "What, thinking about Emily Dickinson again?"
"Close, but no," she replied, blinking herself out of her daze and taking the mug with both hands. She blew steam from the top and shot him a small smile. "Thanks, cutie."
Rolling his eyes, Jess went back to the stove with a flushed face. He didn't have to look back over to know she had a teasing grin on her lips. Since their ride to California, she'd been poking at him with the nickname. He thought she would let it go, but then he remembered who he was dealing with. And though he wouldn't admit it, as he blushed, it was growing on him just a touch. Besides, he knew it was due retaliation for 'honey,' which he still used on a daily basis.
"You want toast with these eggs?" he asked, hoping his face would cool down sometime soon.
Biting the inside of her cheek, Ella shook her hand. "No thanks, actually, I'm good without either. Just tea is fine."
Jess's brows furrowed immediately and he looked up from his work, tilting his head at her. "Really? You sure?"
She shrugged. "Yeah, I'm not hungry."
His eyes narrowed slightly. Getting a good look at her, he thought she was paler than normal, though it could have just been his imagination. Lack of sleep probably wasn't helping her pallor, anyway.
"You might be hungry later."
"Well, I'll come back here for lunch. Four hours isn't so long," she said, her tone light against his puzzled gaze.
"Okay, Stevens," he said suspiciously, but then let the subject drop. It was strange for her to skip breakfast, sure. But it was also strange for her to stay up half the night grading papers; perhaps she was just having an off day.
Her eyes lingered on his a little longer, but she kept her emotions masked beneath a complacent smile. Eventually, Jess focused back on the eggs which he was apparently making for himself. Matthew had a plate in front of him, and Chris had already scarfed his down.
"Oh my god, guys," Chris piped up from the couch again.
Ella suppressed a groan; he updated them on various happenings from the news every single morning. The information was rarely relevant to anything.
"What?" Jess asked flatly, putting the eggs on his own plate and setting them down across the counter from Ella. He leaned against the tiled surface as he ate.
"There's like three people in Berkeley with mad cow disease," Chris answered, a shocked look on his face. Ella had no idea how he kept up so much energy, and could be so consistently amazed at the world around him. It was a little exhausting, but endearing nonetheless.
She scoffed. "Good thing I couldn't afford it, then."
Jess nodded knowingly as he chewed.
"What?" Matthew asked.
"Oh," Ella said casually, taking another sip of the tea. She wished it was green, but Jess would almost certainly have more questions for her, about whether she was getting a migraine, if she drank that. Already, she could see him trying to get her to stay home. And she simply couldn't flake so close to mid-terms. "When I was a kid, I always wanted to go to Berkeley. Maybe because it was the farthest place I could think of. But I'd never been there. And after finally making it to California, I'd say it's a good thing the tuition was too insane for me to handle."
A bark of a laugh came from Chris. "Yeah, you're too pretentious for anything but the East coast."
"I am not," she retorted, not even turning around to face him again. "Maybe I'm just too much of a realist for that hippie bullshit."
"More like a stick-up-your-ass killjoy, but sure, I guess realist is another way to put it," Chris said, with self-satisfied lilt in his tone.
"Fuck off," she shot back lazily. Both Jess and Matthew watched on in amusement, as they had grown accustomed to doing, while she continued. "You're just pissed you're not deep enough to understand true art. All you can wrap your brain around is ABBA and Andy Warhol."
"Andy Warhol was an American treasure!"
Ella finally turned around to see Chris shooting daggers at her. "Andy Warhol was a sellout! I have a whole book about him; you can borrow it!"
"Oh, well, if a book says so," Chris mocked, feigning belief.
She laughed. "It's too early and there's just not enough time for me to explain to you how wrong you are. I gotta get to class. Professor Stanton wants me to go over her presentation with her before."
Getting down off the stool, she rushed behind the counter and gave Jess a long kiss goodbye. Her feet felt heavy in her black oxfords as she went over to the door, donning her peacoat from the rusty rack and grabbing her bag.
"See you for lunch at noon?" she asked, throwing one last look at Jess.
He nodded, gave her a reassuring smile. She seemed frazzled and uneasy. "I'll be here, Daria."
"Just checking, James Dean."
"Bye, Ella," Matthew said.
Ella gave him a little wave and rolled her eyes when Chris was silent from the couch, pouting over her slight to his god, Andy Warhol. "Fuck you very much, Chris."
He yelled an cheerful obscenity back to her as she raced out the door, the old bronze clock down in the main room of Truncheon chiming half past eight.
. . .
By lunch, her headache had progressed to a full-on migraine, but she still had one more class and office hours to attend to, so she was pressing on. The day was chilly, a faint drizzle misting her as she trudged up the sidewalk back to Truncheon. She made a note to herself to grab an umbrella before leaving again; at least it hadn't started pouring on her walk. Her old shoulder bag was dragging on her tired frame, packed to the brim with books and papers. The green fabric was faded to almost gray, as she had been lugging the bag around since high school. But it had yet to rip or fray, and she'd added a few patches to the front at some point during college. What wasn't broken, she didn't intend trying to fix. Why waste the time?
She was glad to be met with the familiar smell of old books as she reentered the small publishing company. Matthew was reorganizing shelves to his preference, silent and analytical. Hanging her bag and coat on the hook by the door, she ran her hands up and down over her own arms in an attempt to warm up. The tights she wore were thin and cheap. Chris was nowhere to be seen, which Ella was almost grateful for. As much as she enjoyed the two guys, Jess was the only one she wanted in the moment. And though what she really wanted was to lean her head on his shoulder and fall asleep, an hour for lunch up in the apartment, as they had every day, would have to do.
Sluggish as she ascended the stairs, Ella felt a gnawing hunger in her stomach, but was nervous to eat. With the cramps ripping up her insides, she knew whatever she downed might just come back up. Jess was already upstairs, reading at the counter, when she opened the door to the apartment, and he looked up with a tiny smirk as she walked in.
"Hey, Daria," he said, marking the place in his book and tossing it aside.
She shot him a weak smile of greeting and made for the fridge, scanning the various homemade leftovers and takeout boxes. Jess came up behind her, peering in over her shoulder. At his closeness and his aroma of pine, she breathed a sigh of relief and stopped what she was doing. Just having him near made her feel better instantly, knowing she would come home to him at the end of the day. A mixture of emotions welled inside her, rising up in her throat. Shutting the fridge door and spinning around to face him, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and enveloped him in an embrace. His arms twined around her waist instinctively, but he let out a surprised chuckle.
"Hey." Her voice was muffled against his shirt and when she pulled away, Jess thought he saw a fond sorrow in her eyes. She pressed a kiss to his lips.
He tilted his head at her when their lips were separated again. "What was that for?"
Ella shrugged. "No reason."
Soon, they sat next to each other at the island with a container of cold lo mein split on two plates in front of them. Breaking the comfortable silence, Jess set his fork down and turned to her, a hesitant look on his face. He had held off telling her as long as he could stand; he could rant about it forever, but still didn't want to say a word.
"Liz called me earlier," he began, watching her glance up from her plate, where she pushed her food around, noncommittal.
She raised an eyebrow. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. Um...she's pregnant." Jess ran a hand over his mouth and sighed lightly.
Her eyes perked up in surprise. "What?"
"Unfortunately, it seems TJ's incompetence in everything else didn't extend to his reproductive skills."
She snorted a half-hearted laugh and trained her eyes on him carefully. "Are you okay?"
He nodded. "I'm fine."
"Okay, chatty Kathy," she said, taking a sip of her water and then facing him fully. "But, how do you feel about it?"
"Honestly, Elle?" he asked, his tone dejected. He didn't quite meet her gaze. "I don't know. Jimmy's got a stepdaughter. Now, Liz is gonna have a new kid. It's...I don't know. I just hope she doesn't binge-drink quite as much as she did with me."
Ella furrowed her brows.
"I was five weeks early and I weighed something like four pounds. She says she doesn't remember most of being pregnant," Jess explained, a bitter tinge to his words.
"Jesus Christ," Ella muttered, shaking her head slightly, not in disbelief but in simple sadness for him.
Jess shrugged dismissively. "But, hey, now she's gonna get a second try. I'm sure the next one won't be as much trouble as I was."
"Hey," she said firmly, bringing a cold hand to his cheek, stroking his skin affectionately with her thumb, "it was her fucking fault."
"I know," he said quietly, suddenly struck by her blunt tenderness. It filled him up, but made his insides flutter. "I don't wanna talk about it anymore."
"Alright," she whispered, waiting a moment longer before she dropped her hand back from his face. "But if you do-"
"I know," he repeated, light to disguise the pit in his stomach.
"Good."
. . .
Bowie played softly on the record player and Ella sat up against the wall behind the bed. She was still in her black cotton dress, though she had let her hair down from its braid, hoping to relieve some of the pressure behind her temples. A dull ache was constant in her lower stomach, occasionally tightening to a sharp burst of pain. Her breath was slow and steady, as she hoped to relax her muscles. She wrote against the thick stack of paper in her lap, only a few essays left. Maybe she could actually get a chance to sleep a sensible amount. She'd been at it since the moment she got upstairs at three in the afternoon, and her eyes were dry and hot in her skull. Rain pattered against the window on her left, the pane fogged up from the cold day.
A creak sounded in the room as the door opened, and she peeked down at her watch. It was nearly six; she hadn't realized how much time she'd spent sitting in the same position, staring at the endless pages of Times New Roman. Jess walked in with socked feet, a crease of concern between his brows as he strode over to the bed.
"Hey, you almost done?" he asked, sitting down on the end and running his hand up and down the back of her calf.
She bit the inside of her cheek as she finished scribbling a comment on the side of a page. Then, she looked up at him with an exhausted, pale face. "Sort of. I've still got a few to go."
"Why don't you take a break?" Jess asked. When their work day had ended at five-thirty, he'd come up to find her pouring over the assignments. It was clear she was concentrating hard, and he'd silently come over and placed a kiss on her forehead in greeting before leaving her to her work. The worry had not left him in the hour he'd been sitting on the couch with a Barker novel in his hands and an old sitcom on the TV. "We ordered pizza. Half mushroom."
A smile formed on her lips, less strained than it had looked all day. Mushroom was her favorite on pizza. "Maybe in a little while. I don't finish what I need to, and they could definitely replace me with another TA."
Jess scoffed in disbelief at her unfounded fear. "Where else are they gonna find a Lily Briscoe nihilist who dresses like it's 1994?"
"Same place they'd find another Kerouac wannabe who knows close-up magic tricks," she quipped coolly, going back to her work. Her patience was wearing. No matter how much her mind was screaming for a reprieve, she simply needed to finish. Some strong fire burned within her, forcing her to be productive or suffer intense guilt.
He gasped in mock offense. "Low blow, Stevens. The magic phase was not my best, I will admit. But, it was really only to impress a certain waitress."
"Well, when you talk to her, tell her I think she should raise her standards," Ella replied, not looking up from the paper.
Jess sighed in frustration, taking his hand from her leg. When she got into her working zone, one he recognized well from high school, it certainly took some effort to get her out. But rarely was she quite so irritated. "You've barely eaten anything all day, Eleanor."
"Didn't realize I was under surveillance, Jess."
Rising from the bed again, Jess rolled his eyes. "The pizza's gonna be here in fifteen minutes. You don't come out, and I'll tell Chris how much you hate jazz. You'll have to face his wrath."
"I think I can handle him," Ella said flatly. Still, she didn't lift her eyes from the writing.
"You've been warned," Jess chagrined, shutting the door behind him gently.
. . .
The growling of her stomach ultimately forced her out of the bed, the stack of papers left on the nightstand with the red pen neatly atop it. She decided she didn't need anymore arguing with Chris for the day. And the hungrier she got, the worse her headache was. Searing pain radiated all the way through her brain, but she tried to quiet it the best she could. She hadn't experienced a migraine in a long while, but remembered how to power through it. It was better to at least attempt to eat, she decided. She hated the odd dichotomy of the nauseating cramps and the intense hunger.
A smug smirk formed on Jess's face when she opened the door, stifling a yawn with the back of her hand.
"Oh, look. Judas," Chris said from his spot in the armchair, still offended from the morning's Andry Warhol argument.
"Not my fault you can't handle the truth," she replied, going over to the fridge and grabbing a ginger ale. She didn't know whether the ginger ale soothing stomach trick worked with period cramps, but it was worth a shot. She popped it open and took a few sips before placing it on the end table near the windows and flopping down on the weathered green couch next to Jess.
"Your stomach okay?" he asked, an eyebrow raised at her choice of drink.
She shrugged dismissively, her face wan. "I'm fine, Mariano."
"You sure you're not pregnant?" Chris teased, glancing at Jess. "Apparently it's in the water."
Jess swallowed dryly at the reference to his mother's news. Both Matthew and Chris had overheard snippets of the phone conversation.
"Believe me, I'm not," Ella answered, running her hand through her hair and sweeping it over one shoulder. The back of her neck was hot beneath it.
"But how could you know?" Chris continued, a mocking twinkle in his blue eyes.
As she shot him a withering stare, Ella's lips turned up in a thin, sardonic smile. Her tone was cold and venomous. "One guess. I'm sure it'll come to you, Einstein."
After a moment with furrowed brows, realization crossed his features and his eyes widened. Chris blushed and said nothing more. Jess snickered at him and brought an arm around Ella, unphased.
Goosebumps rose on her skin at his touch, as she leaned her head on his shoulder. A slight sigh escaped her lips as she allowed herself to slacken against him, seeing the Frasier rerun playing on the grainy television across from them. Matthew sat on Jess's other side, working on something which looked like an inventory sheet. She could certainly identify with his workaholic side. He leaned over and told her the pizza would be there any minute. Nodding, she put a hand on her anxious stomach and shut her eyes. She hadn't felt the fatigue weighing her down fully until she gave into it, suddenly worried she could fall asleep at any moment.
Jess looked down at her, a crease of concern reappearing between his brows. Frowning, he took in her flushed face and placed his hand to her forehead. Though he couldn't be sure, he thought she seemed feverish. "You feel warm."
"The heat's on. Our room is stuffy. I've been in there a few hours. Really, cutie, I'm just tired," she said shortly, not opening her eyes and shifting to get more comfortable. His skin was cool against hers. It wouldn't have surprised her if she was running a slight temperature. Sleep deprivation and her period both sometimes caused a tiny fever for her separately; it would be less than a shock if together they'd had a bit of an effect.
His eyes lingered on her doubtfully, but a knock then sounded on the door. Jess dug in his pocket with a free hand to find a few crumpled bills, handing them to Matthew, who went to greet the pizza guy. In a few minutes, they were back in their respective spots with grease-splotched paper towels, holding cheap pizza. Matthew and Chris were deep in a debate about the acts to book for the following week, and were throwing around the idea of an open mic night. Jess didn't have much to say on the matter, instead watching as Ella ventured a few bites of her slice and kept her eyes on the TV, trying to ignore his watchful gaze. Not even Luke had ever been so concerned over her well-being, insofar as whether she had something she could potentially spread to customers. Only her mother stuck out as a caregiver in her life, and of course, no time in recent memory. It was just Jess.
"You're staring, Romeo," she snapped after a while, realizing he wasn't going to quit.
"Thought I was a Mercutio?" he asked through a mouthful of pizza.
Scoffing, annoyed, Ella felt the mixture of both hunger and discomfort mingling in her stomach again. "Not tonight. Remember how much Romeo stared?"
"It rings a bell. But I also haven't read that since ninth grade English."
"You did reading for school?" she asked doubtfully, snorting a laugh.
He nodded. "I had gold stars plastered all over my forehead."
"Oh, yeah, I can just picture it," she said, taking another bite, almost finished with her piece. "Romeo and Juliet sucks anyway."
"Once again," he said, shaking his head at her in feigned disappointment, "so blasphemous."
"And still, you can't keep your eyes off me."
He shrugged. "Sad but true."
She chuckled, about to retort in the easy way she always could, but instead there was a shift in her features. Her freckled cheeks drained completely and tinged to a slight green. Saying nothing, she put the back of a hand to her mouth and she hopped up, rushing towards the bathroom. Not running, but definitely rushing. Her movements were silent but swift as she shut the door behind her with a slam. Chris and Matthew didn't even notice until the sound rang out in the apartment. Jess sighed heavily, going after her. Pressed up against the door, he could hear her gagging.
"Eleanor?" he asked, knocking.
Knees grounded on the blue tile of the bathroom floor, Ella found she couldn't reply through her breathless retching, bent over the toilet bowl. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes and her nose began to run.
"I'm coming in," Jess said resolutely.
Ella would've cursed at herself if she'd been able, realizing she had forgotten to lock the door in her race to make it to the toilet. Before she could protest, Jess took her hair in one hand and began rubbing circles on her back with the other. His touch was deliberate and gentle, and almost made her want to cry harder than she already was, her entire body radiating embarrassment.
"Fuck, Jess, get out," she pleaded through bouts of vomiting. "I'm fine."
"Yeah, I can see that, Linda Blair," he deadpanned, not moving from his spot.
Eventually, the swirling in her stomach stopped, and her breathing became regular again. She flushed and immediately went to the sink to splash cold water on her face, rinsing her mouth out and brushing her teeth thoroughly. Jess watched carefully from where he sat on the edge of the blue tub. She wiped her face with the hand towel and threw it back down next to the sink in frustration. Her body was strained and tired, and she sat down heavily next to him when she was finished. She brought her elbows to her knees, holding her chin in her hands.
"You okay?" Jess asked, tucking some hair behind her ear to expose her cheek. He pressed the back of his hand against it, noting how hot she still was. The puking probably hadn't helped, though.
She cleared her throat. "Yeah. I'm sorry."
"Nothing for you to be sorry over," he replied lightly. "I mean I'm sorry for getting on you about not eating. I just thought you were working through meals like you used to in high school. I didn't know you felt sick."
"I'm not sick, Jess."
"Eleanor, you were just puking your guts out like two minutes ago," he said, eyebrows raised. "And I'm pretty sure you have a fever."
Ella sighed, sniffling though the tears had stopped involuntarily streaming down her cheeks. "When I was a kid, I used to run a temperature when I didn't sleep enough. And the whole Exorcist routine is because of my period."
"Really? Usually, you seem like you feel okay when you're on your period."
She chuckled. Most of the time, they had sex every night when she was on her period. The hormones were often a pleasant experience in her case. Such bad cramps hadn't afflicted her since before she'd started the pill at age fifteen, either. "I usually hardly even have cramps. But I got on new birth control this month and stress can also make things way worse. Sleep deprivation, too. I don't know. The perfect storm."
His face softened sympathetically. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you're insane."
"Oh, well how could I possibly take that the wrong way?" she quipped through slight laughter.
"You're working so hard, you're literally making yourself sick," he explained. "Not that you're gonna listen to me, but I really think you should ease up if you don't wanna have a stroke before you're thirty."
Again, she sighed, straightening up and averting her gaze. "I just...if I'm working as hard as I can, I'm not worrying as much about losing my spot in the graduate program."
"Why would you lose your spot?" he asked, his brow crinkling. Maybe he shouldn't have laughed her off so easily before.
"I don't know. I just worry about it. Anything's possible," she said.
And he could see her mind was off somewhere other than Philadelphia. It was back in Stars Hollow, on the night when her mother had died and she'd lost everything out of the blue. Pieces fell into place, and all of a sudden he understood. Why she had been staying up late and editing papers more heavily than she needed to and running herself ragged only halfway through the semester. To Eleanor, nothing was permanent, nothing could be counted on. The feeling wasn't lost on him, considering he had a new fake daddy pretty much every year as a child, but he hadn't even seen a semblance of stability in his life until moving to Luke's. He remembered how different it was not having to worry about losing the apartment for unpaid rent or having all of his possessions stolen by some deadbeat his mother had inexplicably allowed into their lives. But Ella had lived in a home that had a least a decent amount of security for fourteen years before the rug was pulled out from under her. That was the difference, and it was an important one.
"Elle?"
"Hm?" She lifted her eyes, slightly glassy, up to his.
"No matter what happens with this grad school thing, or after, anything is not possible with me," he said in earnest. "Because I was yours the first time I saw you five years ago. At this point, I can say with complete certainty that's never gonna change."
Breathing out a long breath through her nose, Ella couldn't help the smile which bloomed on her face. Before, he'd said he fell in love with her that night in the gazebo. Maybe he had been holding back so he wouldn't scare her, though the time he'd asked her to run away with him and told her he loved her hadn't exactly been his most restrained moment. She didn't know. And, the idea that it had actually been the minute when they'd met all those years ago in the diner was so preposterous in her realist mind, she had to tease him at least a little. "Love at first sight, huh? Time has really made you soft, Mariano. The Hemingway, too."
"I'm serious, Stevens," he continued, though a smirk tugged at his own lips. "And, for the record, there's no way in hell they're gonna kick you out of that program. They're lucky you even accepted their offer. Please, just take a fucking sick day tomorrow. Watch Stephen King, and drink green tea, and eat peanut butter out of the jar."
A moment passed between them, and finally she gave a slow nod. "Fine. But only because you asked so nicely. And because this is the most disgusting I've felt since that time I drank my dad's tequila."
He chuckled, bringing an arm around her shoulder and pressing a kiss to the crown of her head. "Good. By tomorrow night, you'll feel like one of the living again."
Leaning into his side again, she was so utterly relieved. A weight she didn't know she had been carrying lifted from within her. The nerves and the worry weren't gone, but for the first time, perhaps ever, she truly believed Jess. She trusted him so completely it shocked her. They weren't the same people they had been when he'd run away to California. But they still fit together exactly right. And it wasn't going to change. She pulled away from him, placing a hand on the back of his neck and running her fingers through the ends of his hair affectionately.
"I love you."
For a moment, Jess's breath caught in his throat and he thought his heart would explode from joy. But, instead, his grin grew more genuine. "That's nice, but I kinda figured."
She rolled her eyes, giving his shoulder a playful shove. "Such a jackass."
"So I've heard," he replied easily, then took her hand in his and squeezed it. "I love you too."
. . .
Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know what you thought! Feedback is greatly appreciated!