Summary: In which Luke follows Jess to know his little secret.
Warnings: a couple of curses. Pure fluff. me being obssessed with Jess, sorry guys.
Masterlist!
Luke didn’t understand.
Where the hell was his nephew going every afternoon at four? Was he doing drugs? Was he planning to steal a gnome again? Did he want to cover Dean Forester’s house in pink glitter?
With Jess Mariano, anything could happen.
But even so, Luke couldn’t even begin to imagine what the hell he was doing. All he knew about the situation at hand was that the kid left his house twenty minutes before four, without fail. Not a minute more, not a minute less, with a black backpack slung over his shoulder and wearing the best clothes he had in his wardrobe.
When he finally figures out the reason, he would feel a little stupid for realizing how obvious it was. But for the moment, all he could do was try to find a solution. And the best plan that came to his mind was to follow Lorelai’s idea as if that was really going to work. He didn’t know what was going through his mind when he agreed to it, but he did. In fact, they both did, pretending to focus on their coffees while they watched Jess walk by at 3:40, like every afternoon. Only this time, as soon as they saw him turn the corner, both of them tossed their coffees to the side before rushing after him.
They were spying on him.
In their defense, they just wanted to know if Jess was up to something weird. Or at least, that’s what they told themselves as they cautiously followed his steps, dressed in dark clothes so no one would recognize them, even hiding in the bushes when Jess seemed to sense that something was off. It was a miracle he hadn’t spotted them. Or maybe he did but he didn’t care too much that they knew in the end. Whatever it was, it allowed Luke and Lorelai to follow his steps perfectly, before watching him enter the city library.
That made even less sense.
Yes, Jess read a lot. Way more than anyone they knew. But going to the library to – apparently – study was a whole different thing. Maybe that’s why they exchanged worried glances, thinking he was really doing something bad, before entering after him. To their surprise, they only startled a couple of people inside, who shot them nasty glares to make them quiet down.
“He’s not here,” the woman glanced around. “He can’t have gone too far.”
As soon as she finished saying that, her eyes landed exactly where they needed to be. On two teenagers sitting on the couches farthest from the entrance, completely in their own worlds. One of them they recognized as Jess, with one arm behind the back of the girl sitting next to him, leaning toward her as he said something that made her laugh. And the girl, they recognized her as the daughter of the owners of the supermarket, the only adults who actually liked the guy.
Now they understood why.
Because there was no way to deny that these two teenagers clearly had something going on between them. Something they fully confirmed when Jess, noticing how close he was, gently pushed a lock of the girl’s hair off her face, with a tenderness they had never seen from him. He moved it away, caressed her cheek delicately, and finally leaned in just to kiss her. His lips, her cheek again, and anywhere else he found, revealing something neither of them had ever seen before.
That’s when they understood.
Jess wasn’t sneaking off for anything bad, but for the exact opposite. To go see his girlfriend, the calmest girl in town, the one who always greeted them with warmth. As if she knew they were the only family her boyfriend had. And that realization instantly made them feel guilty, because everything they had imagined about the guy was completely different. Something they actually hoped would last forever, because for the first time;
