IDLE TOWN, jess mariano

¹²drugs, booze, and petty crime

「 chapter twelve 」
❝ if you guys are planning on getting drunk, please don't do it in my house „

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"JESUS!" ARIES EXCLAIMED AS PIECES OF THE CEILING rained down on her.

"It's Jess, actually," Jess said from behind her.

She turned around and rolled her eyes at him, taking some pieces of the ceiling and throwing them at his chest. She walked back to safety behind the counter and watched as Jess put on a blue hard hat and walked back inside the curtained-off area.

Filling up the coffee pot, she drummed her fingers against the counter with a bored expression and watched as cement pieces contaminated the customers' food.

Once the pot filled up all the way, she took it and poured it into customers' mugs, avoiding areas where the ceiling was falling. She returned to the counter and watched as Luke served breakfast to two customers and laughed to herself when it was immediately contaminated.

The diner owner grabbed the half-emptied pot of coffee and gave them refills. Aries grabbed her camera from her backpack; popping off the lens cap and turning it on, she began to snap pictures of the chaos in the diner that morning.

The Gilmores came in and sat down at a table in the danger zone and Aries was about to warn them, but Luke got there first. Lorelai left again with her phone pressed against her ear and Jess emerged from behind the construction zone, pulling out an umbrella from behind his back and handing it to a slightly confused Rory.

"Oh, you are really funny," Luke said and Aries snickered. "You and Tom should put an act together."

Jess walked over to where Aries was standing, bored behind the counter. She raised her eyebrows at him as he pulled a hard hat from behind his back identical to the one on his head and handed it to her.

"Thanks," she said as she put it on. "Remind me again why the ceiling keeps falling down?"

"Because Luke grabbed an ax and smashed through the wall," he stated.

"Is that legal?"

Jess just shrugged. "He bought the building next door so it's his property; he can do whatever he wants."

"He just bought the building?"

"For a hundred thousand bucks."

"How does he have that much money?" she asked in astonishment. "He runs a fucking diner in Stars Hollow."

"Probably because he wears the same clothes every day and lives above said diner," Jess said. "This place is like a clown car with a smaller clown car inside."

"Or those Russian nesting dolls."

"I can hear you guys," Luke grumbled, passing behind Aries and putting money into the cash register.

She gave him an innocent smile. "It's a very respectable diner run by a very respectable owner."

"I don't need my employees kissing up to me, I need them working."

"In this condition?" Aries whined dramatically.

"That's why you've got a hard hat," he said, rapping his knuckles against the hard hat before she groaned and went off to actually doing her job again.