I’ve Been Here Before by La Rose Bleue
Summary: Another (somewhat bizarre) take on “Partings”. What if, after waking up at Christopher’s, Lorelai woke up again at home in a very different era of the Gilmoreverse?
Rating: PG-13
Categories: Lorelai/Luke
Characters: None
Genres: AU (Alternate Universe), General
Warnings: None
Challenges: None
Series: paths unspoken
Published: 2006.06.25
Updated: 2006.07.31
Index
Chapter 1: Unrenovations, Harvard and the porch rail
Chapter 2: Let's Play a Game
Chapter 3: Pancakes and Pod Lorelai
Chapter 4: Ennui is Just Another Way to Fall
Chapter 5: If I'd known then
Chapter 6: Stuff and Nonsense
Chapter 7: It'll All Work Out In The End
Chapter 8: Fathers, Mothers and Daughters
Chapter 9: Fusing Together, Falling Apart
Chapter 10: Invincibility Made Easy
Chapter 11: The Intervention
Chapter 12: You've Always Got A Choice
Chapter 13: Oxygen
Chapter 14: Do It All Over Again
Chapter 15: The Fruits of Unscripted Reality
Chapter 16: Evil Stepmother
Chapter 17: Where It All Began
Chapter 18: Epilogue: This Is What It Comes To
Chapter 1: Unrenovations, Harvard and the porch rail
Chapter 1: Unrenovations, Harvard and the porch rail
What am I doing here? What the hell am I doing here?
Crazy that she thinks these thoughts before she even wakes up fully, isn’t it? Crazy that these are her first waking thoughts, as if her subconscious is aware before she is that this isn’t where she’s supposed to be. Here, in Christopher’s bed. Christopher. Not Luke. She’s here, in Christopher’s bed instead of Luke’s. Only that Luke’s bed isn’t just Luke’s, it’s hers, too. It’s theirs. She’s not in their bed. And she’s not sure why. For a moment, she’s really not sure why.
She can hear sounds, sounds that sound foreign to her ears. Slowly, slowly, those sounds start to work their way into her brain. Her brain translates them, her brain processes them, she starts to understand. Christopher is helping the nanny find Gigi’s coat. Gigi. Christopher’s daughter. The spawn of Sherry. Gigi, the 5 o’clock ballerina. The nightmare she babysat just months ago to help out a friend. The friend whose bed she just happens to have found herself in. Cold, cold tendrils start to creep around her stomach as she realizes that she’s unclothed. What happened? What happened last night?
Last night. Last night. All she wants is to erase last night. Standing outside the diner, trying desperately to convince Luke to elope with her. Now. Now is the best time, because it’s now. I want to DO. I want to GO. Don't you love me? I love you, Luke. I love you, and I have waited and I have stayed away and I have let you run this thing. No more! I asked you to marry me, and you said YES. I'm going CRAZY here. I made a commitment to you and I need to make it happen. I'm not waiting! It's now, or never!
I don’t like ultimatums.
I don't like Mondays but unfortunately they come around eventually.
She wants to erase last night. She wanted to erase last night and so she ran. She ran and she ended up here. And she’s not sure exactly what happened, but the headache and the state of undress really don’t add up to paint a particularly pleasant picture. What have I done? What have I done?
“Who’s that?” a little voice says. Lorelai can hear footsteps, the footsteps of a child. Fast and just a little bit clumsy. Followed by another set of footsteps, older, heavier, slower.
“That’s your Aunt Lorelai,” Christopher’s voice replies. “I’ll explain later.”
There’s some more activity that Lorelai barely registers, until she feels the bed shift and a warm body slip into bed next to her. An arm folds itself around her, bare skin touches bare skin in a way that makes her stomach churn. Her stomach is churning, she’s icy cold and she wants to cry but she doesn’t seem to have the energy to do even that. She closes her eyes and wishes desperately that she could erase it all properly, last night, all of last night, this morning with the child that’s not hers running around and the arm that’s not Luke’s around her. If she keeps her eyes shut, maybe it will all be okay. If she keeps her eyes shut, maybe she’ll realize that it was all some crazy dream. That everything’s fine. That her life hasn’t fallen into pieces around her. That everything hasn’t gone wrong. That’s she’s happy again and that she could even picture being happy again. Because right now she can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel and even if she could, her state of mind is so pessimistic that she’d probably assume that it was just a train heading her way. Anything but this. Anything but this…
***
An impossibly loud banging noise sent a jolt right through her and she awoke with a start. What the heck was going on? The banging continued, slow, steady and rhythmic and… somewhere outside the house. The house? Blinking, she examined her surroundings, the feeling that something wasn’t quite right nagging at her insides. It was familiar. Of course it was familiar, it was her bedroom. But she could swear that she’d been somewhere else… She could also swear that her bedroom hadn’t looked like this for almost a year now. She and Luke had renovated the Crap Shack while Rory was living with the grandparents in Hartford and the bedroom had been an area they’d paid special attention to. This wasn’t their bedroom, this was her bedroom. The way it had been before the renovations. There was something not quite right about this.
Lorelai looked at herself, in blue long sleeved pajamas. She didn’t remember putting these on. She hadn’t been wearing anything at Christopher’s… but obviously she wasn’t there anymore. Had he taken her home? Why didn’t she remember? And if he had taken her home, how would that explain the bedroom being back to it’s pre-renovating state? And what the heck was going on outside? What was all the banging? She wasn’t sure if it was due to the trauma of the previous evening, or that she was simply just going completely crazy but something was really, truly, very out of the ordinary here.
Climbing out of bed, she padded out of her room and down the stairs to find everything, absolutely everything, exactly the same as it was before the renovations. A thought occurred to her: had Luke found out about Christopher and undone all the work on the house? She shook it off. That’s ridiculous. He wouldn’t have found out this soon and besides, it’d take more than just an hour to unrenovate the house. Luke’s not a spiteful or vindictive person… he just didn’t want to marry me. The ache in her heart hadn’t been forgotten in the confusion over her current whereabouts. She didn’t know if the ache in her heart was going to be leaving anytime soon. She highly doubted it.
The banging noise was louder as she went into the kitchen and looked over to the door of Rory’s room. She supposed it was habit — even though she knew she wouldn’t be in there, she still always at least glanced at the door. Suddenly a somewhat bizarre thought occurred to her. This whole situation with the banging outside waking her up was just a little familiar and… no, that was insane, but it wouldn’t hurt to look, would it? Slowly, marveling at her own active imagination, Lorelai peeked into her daughter’s room. The first thing that hit her was the wall. And a red banner with the word “HARVARD” emblazoned proudly across it. Posters of countries, places Rory had always wanted to see… but the poster of Harvard? Harvard. Lorelai herself had replaced the Harvard wall with Yale merchandise the minute that pro/con list revealed Rory’s choice to them. She recalled her parents happiness that Yale had been Rory’s choice, even though she had been accepted into Harvard. And Princeton, too. Princeton, where all the Hayden’s had gone. Where Christopher would have gone. Should have gone.
Her heart starting to pound faster, Lorelai glanced at the bed to see her daughter’s sleeping form, long brown hair on the pillow, her eyes still closed, covers up to her chin. The bangs were gone. Lorelai had to admit that she’d like the bangs, even though a part of her wanted her daughter to stay her little girl forever. The bangs had made Rory look older, wiser, more like a 21 year old and less like the angelic little teenager from Lorelai’s most vivid memories. Was it just the difference in hairstyle that made Rory look younger? No. Lorelai stared at her daughter and gasped audibly when she realized that it wasn’t just the hair that was different. The face. The face was rounder, younger… if she didn’t know any better, she’d swear that this was her 16 year old daughter in the bed. Not her 21 year old daughter. Who, all things considered, shouldn’t even be in the house. The not renovated house. Her 21 year old daughter should be at Yale. No, she should be seeing off her boyfriend who was about to leave for London. Her 21 year old Yalie daughter should not still have Harvard memorabilia on her wall. Something was not right. Something was definitely not right.
She stumbled out of Rory’s room into the kitchen and cautiously headed towards the front door, something in the back of her mind warning her of what she was about to find. An unformed thought, a distant memory. Five years. Five years. Why was she… she pushed the thoughts out her head, refusing to acknowledge them. This was crazy. This was completely crazy and in all likelihood, she was probably dreaming but for some reason it just seemed so real. She opened the front door and headed out onto the porch where the banging noise was at its loudest. Her eyes went immediately to Luke, hammer in hand, intently hammering away at her porch rail. She stared at him, eyes wide with shock, trying to get her head around what was going on. She remembered this scene well.
What are you doing?
Fixing your porch rail.
That's right. You are. You're fixing my porch rail. . . . At six thirty in the morning!
The banging finally stopped as Luke looked up at her. His expression turned from one of amusement at her somewhat disheveled appearance to one of concern in a matter of seconds. Her heart had practically stopped at the sight of him. Everything came flooding back.
I can’t just jump like this.
Well, I’m sorry to hear that.
“Oh my god,” she whispered, almost inaudibly. She grabbed the door frame to steady herself. This didn’t make sense. It didn’t make any sense at all.
He stared at her with obviously concern. “Lorelai, are you alright?”
She blinked a few times, trying to ascertain whether this was real or whether she was just dreaming. It didn’t make sense. It just didn’t make sense. It dawned on her after a few minutes that Luke had said something, that he was standing there, expecting some form of answer. She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. “I’m… I’m just… it’s early, and you woke me up, and I’m gonna go back inside and you keep fixing the porch rail and…”
She wasn’t sure what else to say so she turned around and went back inside, heart pounding so loud she could practically hear blood rushing around near her ears. She shut the front door, walked into the kitchen in a daze and sat down at the kitchen table. Coffee. She needed coffee right now. But she couldn’t seem to get up. What the heck was going on?
Back to index
Chapter 2: Let's Play a Game
Chapter 2: Let's Play a Game
“Okay, what the heck is going on outside?”
Lorelai hadn’t noticed Rory walk out of her bedroom, hair mussed, bleary-eyed and with a tone of genuine annoyance in her voice. Lorelai was momentarily set back - I thought she slept through the banging and all that jazz. Then again, it didn’t go on for as long last time, seeing as I scared Luke off by yelling like a crazy person… funny how that seems to happen. Her mind drifted right back to the events of last night. At least, what she thought was last night, because now she wasn’t sure what was going on. Was she dreaming now? She didn’t feel like she was dreaming. Do the crazy know they’re crazy? Wouldn’t it defeat the purpose?
“Mom?”
She snapped out her thoughts, focusing on her daughter, whose tone had gone from annoyance to concern. “Hey sweets,” she greeted her, feeling slightly awkward and strange to be talking once again to her sixteen year old when only days ago she’d been talking to her twenty-one year old. I must be dreaming. I really must be. “Luke’s outside fixing the porch rail.”
Come on, Gilmore. Hold it together. Her voice hadn’t cracked at the mention of Luke’s name. But her heart had shattered all over again. He’d hurt her. She’d hurt him. And once he found out about Christopher, he’d never trust her again. And it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair because she couldn’t trust him not to keep secrets from her. Two months. He’d waited two months to tell her about April. And he hadn’t even told her — she’d found out on her own. How long would he have waited if I hadn’t found out then? Would he have just never told me? Why didn’t he tell me? Why didn’t he trust me enough?
“At six thirty in the morning?”
“It was the only free time he had,” Lorelai explained dully. “He noticed it was loose the last time he was over here.”
Rory frowned. “He’s outside hammering away on our front porch at six thirty in the morning and you’re not out there yelling at him?” She looked at her mother pointedly. “That is not the Lorelai Gilmore I know. Who are you and what have you done with my mother?”
Lorelai sighed, trying desperately to act normal for the sake of her kid. “I’m a little out of it, I had this really weird dream,” she admitted. A thought occurred to her. To test out this crazy situation she seemed to have found herself in. “Hey, let’s play a game. Tell me if any of these names mean anything to you.”
Rory looked bemused, but nodded. “Okay, shoot.”
“Bennifer.”
Rory shook her head. “Nope.”
“Brangelina.”
“Still no dice.”
She swallowed. “April Nardini.”
“Not a clue.”
“Logan Huntzberger.”
Rory pondered. “The name sounds familiar. The last name, at least… that publishing guy! Newspaper mogul.” She looked at her mother with true curiosity on her face. “As much as I enjoy your entertaining little games, may I ask the point of this exercise?”
Lorelai forced a smile. “Like I said, weird dream.”
Rory sat down at the table next to her. “Ooh, do tell.”
Oh, but it was a tempting idea. To just spill everything, everything she remembered from five years she was more and more uncertain had actually happened. But she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t delusional. She couldn’t be sure that it hadn’t all happened, that it wasn’t all in her head because it had all felt so real. She could feel Luke’s lips on hers like they’d been so many times — if she was where she thought she was, they’d never kissed before. She could hear that little girl’s voice and footsteps — if she was when she thought she was, that little girl didn’t exist yet. She refused to believe she’d babysat a kid that didn’t exist.
“I dreamed I was five years into the future,” Lorelai said finally, trying to keep her tone light. “Think of that, the future. We were partying like it was 2006, which makes sense, because it was. 2006, that is.”
“Cool!” Rory exclaimed. “Future dreams are fun. Ooh, I would have been… 21. Right? 21. Wow. Did we go to Atlantic City?”
“Yeah, we did.” Late. Because on your 21st birthday, we weren’t speaking. I went for months without talking to my baby girl because she stole a boat, dropped out of Yale and moved in with my parents.
“Well?” Rory pressed. “What’s 2006 like? Seriously, you’ve got to give me something here.”
Lorelai tried to focus on the amusing anecdotes. “Well, in 2006, Kirk has a girlfriend.”
Rory gasped. “No!”
“Yes,” Lorelai replied with a grin. “Coming up two years by that stage, I believe.” She thought for a moment. “Lane got married.”
“Lane got married?”
“Yeah, it was very rock and roll, slash Buddhist.”
“Buddhist?”
“Yeah, I know.” Lorelai was warming to her theme now, trying to find more things that would make it all seem like a crazy, out there, wacky dream. “I had a dog. I named him Paul Anka. He was afraid of almost everything. I had to write a list of everything he was afraid of and put it on the fridge.”
“You had a dog?” Rory echoed. “Mom, don’t you remember Skippy?”
“Hey, I was an excellent dog owner!” Lorelai protested it.
“I’m sure you were,” Rory agreed with a smirk. “Anything else?”
“No, that pretty much covers it,” Lorelai lied.
Rory’s mouth opened in indignation. “Aww, come on! I wanna hear about my fabulous time at Harvard! I did get into Harvard, didn’t I?”
“Of course you did,” Lorelai replied. She forced a laugh. “Sweetheart, it’s just a dream. A weird dream, but a dream none the less. I dunno, maybe we shouldn’t have had that pineapple pizza last night.”
Rory frowned. “We had pineapple pizza three nights ago.”
“My bad, sorry. Maybe we shouldn’t have had that pineapple pizza three nights ago.”
“But I haven’t had any weird dreams,” Rory countered.
“Well, maybe I ate more pizza than you.”
“True,” Rory conceded. She stood up and stretched. “I’ll make coffee. Gah, I really didn’t intend to be up this early but I suppose it’s good. Gives me a chance to catch up on some studying before I get the bus.”
“That’s my little workaholic,” Lorelai commented with an uneasy smile. “I’m gonna go shower.”
Climbing up the stairs towards the bathroom, Lorelai realized that she almost had herself convinced. Convinced that five years worth of memories were just… weird hallucinations. She was sure she was awake. Completely sure of it. It must be some weird coincidence that she dreamt about Luke fixing her porch rail and that he was actually there, fixing her porch rail. She’d go through the day and see if it added up. Ooh, maybe she was psychic. That would be cool. As she entered the bathroom, she looked at her reflection in the mirror. She looked younger. She really did look younger. Five years younger. Not as much of a difference in appearance as Rory, but still. She supposed that the difference between 33 and 38 wasn’t as significant as the difference between 16 and 21. Then again, at 38 she was closer to 40 than she’d been at 33. She was blessed enough to have maintained a youthful figure the whole time through but really, what a difference those five years made. She examined closer. Her face looked like her 33 year old self, sure. Her body felt… well, younger. But her eyes carried the weight of those extra five years. Or, more specifically, the last year she remembered.
She closed her eyes and tried to think. Had it all actually happened? Had she dated Luke? Had she proposed to Luke? Had Rory really dropped out of Yale? Had she and Rory really spent months not speaking? Did Luke really have a long lost daughter? A daughter he hadn’t told her about for two months? A daughter that he wouldn’t let her meet for even longer? Had she really given him an ultimatum outside the diner? Had she really ran straight to Christopher after he turned her down?
Sighing to herself, she turned on the shower, undressed and got in, letting the hot water wash over her, trying to wash away what she was slowly beginning to accept might have only been a dream. It might have only been all in her head. Everything? Everything she’d ever shared with Luke was all in her head?
Lorelai, this thing we're doing here -- me, you -- I just want you to know I'm in. I am all in.
I love you and I am going to marry you and at our wedding, we are having lobster.
Will you just stand still?
She almost didn’t realize that she was crying until it got just that little bit harder to breathe. Whether it was a dream or reality, that didn’t matter. What mattered is that either way, she’d lost it. It was gone. And she wasn’t sure how she was going to get it back.
Back to index
Chapter 3: Pancakes and Pod Lorelai
Chapter 3: Pancakes and Pod Lorelai
“Hey Mom,” Rory called out as Lorelai walked back into the kitchen, showered, dressed and in a slightly better frame of mind. “I have a suggestion.” Lorelai noticed that the banging had stopped. Good. It meant that Luke was elsewhere and she wouldn’t have to deal with him for awhile yet.
“Suggest away, kiddo.”
“Luke’s for breakfast. Pancakes and bacon.”
Lorelai hesitated. The brief encounter with Luke on the porch had been bad enough. She did not want to go to the diner. But if she said no, she’d have to explain to Rory why. And that wasn’t exactly something she could do.
“Please?” Rory pleaded. “Come on, Mom. It’s the last week of the semester and I think I deserve some power brain food.”
“Pop Tarts are power brain food,” Lorelai countered. “And coffee. Magic, magic coffee.”
“Exactly,” Rory said with an air of triumph. “Luke’s coffee is the best. I know that. You know that. And the magic, magic coffee is what’s gonna get me through the week so let’s hop to it! To the diner!” She paused and looked at Lorelai, who was fighting desperately to keep her expression neutral. “Mom, are you sure you’re alright?”
“I’m fine,” Lorelai lied. “I’m just… man, dream time travel takes a lot of out of a girl, you know? I’m tired. I’m really tired.”
“You did get home late last night,” Rory pointed out. “How is Mr. Medina anyway? No, wait, hold up, I don’t want to hear the dirty details. I have English first period and I really don’t want the mental image dancing around up there.”
Max. The name hit her like a ton of bricks. Of course. She was still with Max. And in just a few days, he’d propose to her. And she’d say yes, but she wouldn’t go through with it. Because she didn’t love him. I don't think I ever really loved anyone until Luke… “He’s fine,” Lorelai replied. “Let me get my purse, we’ll get you your power brain pancakes and bacon.” Even if it broke her heart to see him, there was still very little she wouldn’t do for her daughter.
Moments later, they were walking through the middle of town and Lorelai marveled at the fact that Stars Hollow really didn’t ever change. Everything was pretty much the same, but it did seem to look just that little bit fresher, less worn. Not that five years could change much. They’d done some general house-cleaning after Rory moved to Hartford, hadn’t they? Taylor had insisted upon it. Don’t, she urged herself. Don’t think about it. The ramifications of this weird situation she’d found herself in were beginning to dawn on her. Do I have a second chance? Or am I just going crazy here? Luke had always called her ‘crazy lady’, but from his lips, the words had sounded like ‘I love you’. Probably because that’s what they’d meant. He loved me once. I have to believe that he loved me once.
“Mom, seriously, what is with you this morning?” asked Rory, breaking into her thoughts, a look of serious concern on her face. “You’re really, really out of it. Did something happen with Max?”
“No,” said Lorelai, her mind still elsewhere. What was she going to do about Max? She’d have to break up with him. And she’d have to do it soon. She hated that she’d practically left him at the altar. She hated that she’d hurt him like that. The sooner she ended it, the less hurt he’d be. She’d never wanted to hurt him. She’d never wanted to hurt anyone. I never wanted to hurt Luke. And I don’t think he wanted to hurt me. But somehow that’s what ended up happening. Isn’t the saying ‘you only hurt the ones you love’? There was just one flaw in that. I didn’t love Max. I don’t love Max. Would it have been easier if I had? Should I have just married him? Would it have made things work out in the long run? Would I have learned to love him?
Luke hadn’t learned to love Nicole. And realizing that he didn’t love her had driven Nicole to another man. That’s what made sleeping with Christopher so horrible. She was the sock man. It didn’t matter that they weren’t married yet. It didn’t matter. Because she and Luke had had a real relationship, nothing like him and Nicole. Except that Luke kept things from me, just like he kept things from Nicole. He couldn’t completely include Nicole in his life, just like he couldn’t completely include me in his life.
“Mom?”
Lorelai hadn’t realized Rory was still talking. “Huh? Sorry sweets, I kind of zoned out.”
Rory grabbed her arm. “Come on, you’re a hazard to yourself this morning. I blame Luke for waking up at the crack of dawn. And you haven’t had any coffee yet.” With that, Rory forcefully led her mother into the diner and towards the one free table by the window. Lorelai sat down and looked out the window. Rory cleared her throat. “Okay, spill. What the heck is wrong with you?”
“Nothing,” Lorelai insisted. “Rory, I’m fine, I just need coffee and… I don’t know, an anvil or something.”
“What are you going to do with the anvil?”
“I’m going to drop it on my head and hope that it somehow gets me out of this weird funk I’m in.” Lorelai smiled at her daughter. “Honey, by now you should be used to the eccentricities that make up the ravishing Lorelai Victoria Gilmore. I’m fine, I really am.”
Luke came over and poured two cups of coffee without saying anything. Lorelai swallowed nervously to see that he was acting… completely normally. It felt strange to see that he had no idea. He didn’t know they’d been together. He didn’t know that they’d been engaged. In his head, he was just her friend, coffee supplier and Mr. Fix-It. In hers, he was her soon-to-be-ex-fiancé who had shut her out of his life and said no to her proposition of eloping. He’d be her ex-fiancé the minute he found out that she’d slept with Christopher. But that didn’t happen, a voice in her head insisted. It was just a dream. A crazy dream. It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.
But it seemed so real…
“What can I get you?” Luke said gruffly.
Lorelai couldn’t seem to find the words to say anything. There was momentary silence, then Rory piped up. “You can get us two plates of pancakes with bacon on the side. And, oh, if you could find my real mother, that’d be great. It seems that sometime during the night, she was kidnapped and replaced with Pod Lorelai here.”
“Very funny,” Lorelai muttered, unnerved that Rory had called her on her weird behavior in front of Luke.
“You should get up at 6.30 more often,” Luke observed. “It seems to shut you up.” He left to get their orders and Lorelai took a sip of coffee, grateful for the distraction and for Luke no longer being in such close proximity.
“All teasing aside Mom, is there anything you wanted to talk about?” Rory asked, her voice serious. “I mean, if you did have a fight with Mr. Medina you should tell me about it so I can throw spitballs at him in English class.”
Lorelai laughed quietly. She sighed. Perhaps this was the answer to her daughter’s questioning. “Rory, I’ve been thinking about this thing with Max and I honestly think I need to break up with him. I mean, I like him and he’s fun but I’m not in love with him and I don’t think it’s fair to keep stringing him along like this.”
Rory frowned. “But you only just got back together. And you were so upset when you broke up.”
“Things change,” said Lorelai, cradling her coffee cup in her hands. “I just think that… it’s not right.”
“Are you saying this because you really think that or because you’re scared?” Rory pressed. Her eyes widened. “Mom, you didn’t take seriously what I said about you and Mr. Medina going to break up anyway, did you? Because I didn’t mean it. I was upset and I wanted to say something mean and I did… I didn’t mean it. I don’t want you to break up with Mr. Medina because of something I said.”
“It’s not that, Rory,” Lorelai tried to explain. “I really, really think that it’s not right. And I don’t want him to get any ideas that it’s going to go further when I know it’s not. And I don’t want to be with someone just because it’s fun. I thought that maybe… but now I know I don’t love him and it’s…” she trailed off, not sure of what else to say. “It’s complicated, and I’m having trouble explaining it, but think of it this way: what if he thinks that he and I are marriage material or something? I know I don’t love him but he thinks he loves me and proposes. Is it better to break up with him now or turn down his proposal? Or, worse yet, run off the night before the wedding on a crazy road trip to Harvard? That would be horrible. I don’t want to be that person.”
“Okay,” Rory replied simply. She gave her mother a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry I bugged you. I just… you can talk to me, you know? I mean, I know that you’re the mom and I’m the daughter but you’re my friend, too, and I want to be able to help.” Luke arrived at their table and put down two plates of pancakes as Rory continued. “Hey, was the crazy road trip to Harvard in your dream? Because that does sound cool. In different circumstances, I mean.”
“Yeah, it was,” Lorelai admitted.
Luke looked at them with amusement. “Your dream?” he echoed.
A knot formed in Lorelai’s stomach as Rory began to enthusiastically tell Luke all about Lorelai’s dream. “Mom dreamed it was 2006 and Kirk had a girlfriend and Lane had a rock and roll Buddhist wedding and Mom had a dog named Paul Anka.”
“You had a dog?” Luke asked Lorelai, looking straight at her. “Remember Skippy?”
“Why does no one have any confidence in my pet owning skills?” Lorelai complained. “Besides, you were the one who let him get into the baking chocolate.”
“I fed your dog chocolate?”
“Not exactly,” Lorelai explained. “You were looking after him in your apartment and he got into the baking chocolate. So you took him to the vet and the vet gave him this medicine to make him throw it all up and then you sat with him for hours with water so he’d be properly hydrated and you made him an omelette because kibble would have been too hard on his stomach and you asked me if he was afraid of cheddar because he was afraid of a lot of things.” Stop. Stop it. Just stop talking, Lorelai. Stop it right now.
Luke looked at her skeptically. “Why was I looking after your dog?”
She tried to smile. “Because you’re my friend? And friends don’t let friend’s neurotic dogs stay home alone?”
“You have weird dreams.”
“I suppose I do,” she replied, thinking back (or forward… something…) to the rest of the conversation when he’d told her everything he’d done for her dog, the dog he professed not to like and she’d told him she wanted to wait until things were right with Rory to get married. What would have happened if we hadn’t waited for Rory? What would have happened if we’d just done it? Would it have changed anything?
Luke cleared his throat, breaking her out of her thoughts. “Enjoy your breakfast.”
“Thanks,” she murmured, focusing her attention on the plate in front of her. She took a few bites of her pancakes and bacon before she dared to look back up at the counter. What she saw nearly made her choke on her mouthful. Luke was standing behind the counter, next to a morning fresh Rachel wearing his flannel shirt over a tight white tank top. Rachel smiled at Luke, said something Lorelai obviously couldn’t hear and then kissed him lightly on the cheek. Her heart clenched tightly in her chest. Red hot jealousy flared inside her, threatening to burn her alive. Rachel. How the heck did I forget about Rachel?
Back to index
Chapter 4: Ennui is Just Another Way to Fall
Chapter 4: Ennui is Just Another Way To Fall
Being back at the Independence Inn is 54 different flavors of trippy, Lorelai thought as she walked into the inn that morning, a little later than she remembered being. The phone was ringing, and Michel, right by the phone, wasn’t answering it. She sighed. “Michel, get that please,” she called out.
“I cannot,” he replied dully.
“Michel, we've been over this, we all cover the phone, that includes you.” The phone stopped ringing the moment she reached the desk to stand beside Michel who was leaning on the desk, his head in his hands.
“Don't misunderstand,” he said in a particularly unenthusiastic tone. “I want to answer it, I truly did, but today, today I am suffering from ennui.”
She gave him a look. “Ennui?”
“Severe ennui. You know what ennui is, yes?”
Even though I could swear we had this conversation years ago, still no. “Yes. Um, Webster's defines ennui as a lazy soon to be out of work French concierge who won't answer the phone.”
“Look, I've had my peace with the fact that everyone who calls here is a notch above brain dead, and that the pennies I am thrown each week are in exchange for me dealing with these people in a nonviolent manner. And usually that is fine, but today, sorry lady, I have ennui.”
“So, you're sleepy?” she tried.
“It's a metaphysical angst.”
Sweetheart, don’t talk to me about metaphysical angst! “So, you wanna go beddy-bye?”
“You make light, it increases my ennui.”
She sighed. “Okay, come on, that’s it, you need coffee.” She dragged Michel through into the kitchen, where she encountered an equally glum looking Sookie. Nice to know some things never change. “Let me guess… you have ennui.”
“Yeah,” Sookie replied sadly. “I know it sounds weird, but…”
“Michel, why did you explain ennui to her? You know that Sookie ends up thinking she's coming down with whatever illness other people else have.”
“Nuh uh!” Sookie protested.
Lorelai made a cup of coffee and handed it to Michel. “Here. Drink the happy coffee. Let it decrease your ennui.” She poured herself her own cup of coffee and started to drink it when her phone rang. She pulled it out of her pocket and answered it. “Hello?”
“Is this a bad time?” a male voice asked. Her heart dropped to her shoes when she realized who it was.
“Max, hi,” she greeted him. “Uh, yeah, actually it is a bad time.”
“You can spare a second, though, can’t you?”
She suppressed a sigh. “Sure.”
“I just wanted to say hi.”
“Hi.”
“And thank you for last night.”
Lorelai, try as she might, couldn’t bring herself back to the last night Max was referring to, so tried to flub her way through it. “It was fun,” she said non-committedly.
The tone of his voice changed. “Everything okay?” he asked her, concern in his voice.
“Yeah, just… busy, you know,” she lied, turning away from Sookie who was giving her a quizzical look.
“Okay, well, I won’t keep you,” said Max. “I’ll call you tonight, okay?”
“I might be busy,” she blurted out. “Work is crazy and I woke up this morning feeling kind of sick so how about I call you when I’ve got a spare minute?”
“Okay,” he said, sounding a little taken aback. “Lorelai, what’s with the sudden cold front?”
“I’m sorry,” she apologized, trying to sound sincere. “It’s just… I’m not feeling well. I told you that.”
“Well, you seemed fine last night.”
“I didn’t sleep well. I got an early wake-up call from a friend who decided to fix my porch rail in the middle of the night. I’m crabby and really bad company right now, so I’m gonna hang up now before I saw anything else idiotic.” She inwardly berated herself. She didn’t want to hurt Max. But the very idea of him was getting on her nerves. She didn’t want to think about last night with Max when last night with Christopher was still in her mind and sickening her.
“Okay,” he relented. “So I’ll hear from you tonight?”
“You will hear from me tonight,” she assured him. “Bye.”
Lorelai turned around, preparing herself for a barrage of questions from her best friend. Sookie didn’t disappoint. “Okay, what was all that about?”
“Headache,” Lorelai claimed. “Just… not in the mood right now to deal with Max.”
Sookie’s eyebrows practically hit the ceiling. “Well, from what you’ve been telling me you’ve been perfectly happy to deal with Max over the past few weeks, why the sudden change of heart?”
“I’m breaking up with him,” Lorelai announced flatly.
Sookie didn’t say anything for a long moment. Lorelai sighed and looked away, sipping at her coffee, waiting for Sookie to say what she was thinking. “You’re scared,” she said finally, directing a pointed look at her. “You’re running.”
Lorelai sat down at the seat next to Sookie at the table and looked at her with as much seriousness as she could muster. “I’m not in love with him,” she said gently. “I know that it would be great to have this amazing relationship and that he’s good to me and he’s smart and wonderful but I’m not in love with him.” She managed a small smile. “I kind of wish I was, because it would make things easier because I think he loves me, but I’m not, and it’s best I end this before it gets too serious.”
Sookie sighed slightly. “What brought this on?” she asked. “Yesterday you seemed so happy.”
“What can I say?” said Lorelai. “Last night I had an epiphany. He’s not the one.”
“So you’re going to go through your life looking for the one?” Sookie asked. “I mean, sweetie, I’m not saying settle for just anyone but maybe you’re being a little unrealistic. You could give Max a chance.”
“I have,” Lorelai reminded her. “I really have. There’s been a thing with Max pretty much ever since Rory started Chilton. I’ve given it a chance. I like him, I really do. He’s a fantastic guy but it would never work. And I don’t think I’m being unrealistic, I honestly think that someday I’m going to find the one.” Rory’s voice at twenty one echoed through her mind. These could be the ones…
“I’m sure you will, sweetie,” Sookie said reassuringly. “Hey, you want a muffin? I just made them, it’s a new recipe and it’s fantastic.”
“Sure,” Lorelai replied as Sookie handed her a plate with a very rich looking chocolate muffin. She picked at it mindlessly, her thoughts elsewhere. Luke is the one. It’s always been him. Always, always, always. Can I start over? Can I get him back? Or will it just all fall apart? How can I know it wasn’t just a dream? How can I know that we aren’t really over? And what am I supposed to do when I’m back here and everything’s completely different?
“Sweetie, I think maybe you might have ennui.”
***
When she got home from work that afternoon, she was surprised to find Luke on her roof, hammering away at something. She squinted up at him, trying to figure out what the heck he was doing. Then it hit her. Roof shingles. He was fixing the roof shingles.
“Hey,” he called down to her.
“Hi,” she replied, somewhat uncomfortably. Just let me hold it together. Just let me act like a normal person around him. A part of her told her she didn’t have a show. She remembered when she’d first fully realized the extent of her feelings for Luke and falling over onto a table in the diner. Even though he’d broken her heart, there was still something about him that was raising her temperature, making her heart beat faster.
“I’m just fixing the roof shingles,” he informed her.
“Okay,” she said back, not sure what else to say. There was an awkward silence as he stopped working and met her gaze. Her heart sped up to twice its speed. She finally thought of something. “How’s Rachel?”
“She’s good,” said Luke, leaning over the edge of the roof down towards her. “You okay?”
She nodded, not trusting herself to say anything else. He could always tell. Before April, a voice in her head piped up. Before he shut me out of his life. She tried to stop thinking about it. Stop it. Stop it. That Luke doesn’t exist. The Luke in front of you had nothing to do with that. It was a dream. It was just a dream. Why won’t it just go away?
He looked at her for a long moment, his expression unreadable. Then he started to climb down from the roof. She watched him as he almost effortlessly maneuvered himself to the edge of the roof and then let out a gasp as he lost his balance and went tumbling. His fall was broken by the porch rail, which protested under his weight and came apart. She barely noticed in the panic that overtook her.
“Luke!” She rushed towards him, sprawled on her porch, swearing and yelling in obvious pain. “Are you alright?” she asked in a daze, gently taking his shoulders and helping him sit up. “Is everything okay, is anything broken?”
“I broke your porch rail,” he informed her, wincing. “Dammit.”
“I don’t care about the porch rail,” she snapped. “Are you okay?” She ran her hands over his shoulders and arms. “Nothing seems to be broken.”
“I’m fine, Lorelai, just bruised my pride a little,” he assured her, trying to stand up. She held him back down.
“Just sit,” she ordered him. “Just for a minute. Just stay still. Catch your breath.” She sat down next to him, still holding onto his shoulders. His eyes caught hers and her breath caught in her throat. She could still hear his voice in her head. I can’t just jump like this.
“Lorelai…” His voice saying her name in that tone tore her apart all over again. Tears began to form in her eyes. She didn’t want to lose him. But she already had. She closed her eyes, trying not to let him see her crying. She could feel the tear dripping down her cheek and realized she was fighting a losing battle. “Hey. What’s going on?” His arms enfolded her within seconds and that was when she knew she was lost. As she began to sob, she could feel his strong hands rubbing her back, his face buried in her hair, murmuring reassuringly into her ear. “It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re okay.”
“I didn’t want to lose you,” she found herself saying through her tears. “I didn’t want to lose you.”
“You didn’t lose me,” he assured her. “It’s gonna take more than a fall off your roof to get rid of me.” Desperately, she tried to regain control. This was not supposed to be happening. She pulled away from him gently and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. He looked at her intently, concern written all over his face. “Lorelai, what’s going on?”
“Bad day,” she choked out. “Just… a bad day. And seeing you fall off the roof like that gave me a scare. I’ll be fine. Are you… are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m tough,” he joked. She tried to laugh, but it came out more like a choking sob. “I, uh, think we’ve been over my feelings about handkerchiefs and chivalry in the not so distant past, so you don’t need to hear my little speech again to know that I don’t have a handkerchief to offer you right now.”
“It’s okay,” she said, trying to compose herself. “I should… uh, I need to get inside and do some… stuff. Don’t… don’t even think about getting back up on my roof.”
She could picture him on her roof, standing there, yelling at her that he was stuck in the middle of this fight with Rory and that he won because he had the high ground. Stupid Star Wars movie. Stupid dumb Bewitched remake. Why would such an awful remake be a figment of her imagination? Why wouldn’t such an awful remake be a figment of my imagination, a voice in her head retorted.
“Okay,” he said quietly. She climbed to her feet and he followed suit. “I’ll fix your porch rail. Again.”
“Thank you.” Sniffing, trying not to cry again, she turned around and let herself into the house.
Back to index
Chapter 5: If I'd known then
Chapter 5: If I’d known then…
Inside the house, Rory was already home from school, rummaging through the refrigerator for some form of afternoon snack. Lorelai hurriedly wiped her eyes again and put on a happy face for the benefit of her daughter. “What’s shaking?” she asked in as upbeat a tone as she could. “We have anything edible in there?”
“Not really,” Rory replied, head still firmly buried in the fridge. “You know, sometimes I think that maybe we should suck it up and actually get some groceries. Learn to cook. I mean, we spend a lot of time looking at the cooking channel and they make it look so easy. Wouldn’t it be great if we could just whip up an omelette or a batch of chocolate brownies or a peach cobbler or lasagna… hey, we could even ask Luke for the recipe for that coffee cake he made on my birthday coz I’m telling you, that stuff is…” Rory’s voice trailed off as she turned to face her mother. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Lorelai lied. “Coffee cake, huh? Sounds good… I don’t know about Luke giving us the recipe, though, he seems like the kind of person that would guard a recipe to the death. It’d be kind of fun to watch him running around screaming “I’ve got the secret formula!” like a mad scientist cook person and… coffee cake sounds good.”
“Mom,” Rory pressed. “Have you been crying?”
Lorelai shook her head vehemently. “No!” Rory gave her a look that clearly said she didn’t buy it. “Okay, yes, we had a little… waterworks incident. Leaky pipes.” She giggled nervously. “Dirty.”
“What happened?”
“I just had a bad day and a minor freak out when Luke fell off the roof, that’s all,” Lorelai explained. “The whole idea of being blamed for the death of this town’s only decent food supplier sent me into floods of tears. I just had this picture in my head, you know… of villagers. Pitchforks. Angry masses, storming the house, wanting my head on a stick… and probably yours, too, since you live here, and, you know, your head would probably look cute on a stick…”
“Luke fell off the roof?”
“Luke fell off the roof.”
“But he’s okay?”
“He says he’s okay.”
“Well, did he go home?”
“No, he’s fixing the porch rail,” Lorelai explained. “It broke his fall.”
Rory turned back into the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water. “I can’t believe he’s still out there,” she marveled. “He must really love us. I’m gonna give him this. Be back in a sec.”
Lorelai sat down at the kitchen table and rested her head in her hands for the second time that day. She couldn’t believe she’d completely melted down in front of Luke. It must have freaked him out, she mused. Poor guy. Was he happy with Rachel? He’d seemed to be. But then again he was fixing things at her house all the time. The beginning of the end for Rachel. Would Luke have been happier with Rachel? Would Luke be happier with Rachel? Should she say something? Lorelai pondered this. She’d liked Rachel. She really had. The only thing she hadn’t been too keen on was her tendency to get bored and leave. It wasn’t fair to run out on Luke like that. You run, too, her conscience nagged at her. You ran to Christopher.
But not because I was bored, she thought. Because he broke my heart.
With a sigh, Lorelai stood up and was about to turn into the living room when Rory appeared, looking solemn and holding a cardboard box. Lorelai’s heart gave a sharp little twist when she realized it was the Dean box. Thinking about Rory and Dean still hurt, after everything that had happened. Her daughter, her angel was the other woman. Her daughter had destroyed a marriage. Not single-handedly by any means — Lorelai knew from first hand experience that it most definitely took two to tango — but she never thought that Rory would do something like that. She’d never thought she’d hear the words “I hate you” coming from Rory’s mouth. Yet there she’d been, screaming, real anger in her voice and those words had cut Lorelai to the bone. She would love Rory no matter what and wanted her to be free to make her own choices but there was something in her, that motherly instinct, that wanted to keep her from doing anything that might hurt her, physically or emotionally, ever again.
“Mom, I…” Rory began hesitantly, breaking through Lorelai’s thoughts and leaving her with the distinct feeling that she’d missed her cue. “I’m not mad that you kept it. I know I said I wanted it gone but… you were right. I did want this stuff. You were right.” She smiled slightly. “I’m gonna go and…”
“Okay sweets,” Lorelai murmured as her daughter made her way past her towards her bedroom. She shook her head, walked towards the living room and sat down on the couch. She closed her eyes and lay back. How could it have all been a dream? How could five years of her life have been a dream? Would everything go as it would have? Was she changing things? She’d change things by breaking up with Max before she could hurt him more by running out days before the wedding. That was something she’d wished she could change for years. She’d never meant to hurt him.
Rory. Dean. Dean and Rory. Should she do something? Should she prevent them from getting back together in the first place? After all, they were going to break up anyway. Twice more, in fact. Would Dean be the one that Rory always ran back to? Would Dean be Rory’s Christopher? Lorelai curled up on the couch, holding her stomach. The confusion of everything was taking its toll. Her eyes tightly shut, she listened to the sounds of Luke still hammering the porch rail outside and let herself drift off to sleep, hoping it would make more sense on waking.
***
Groggily, Lorelai awoke to the sound of a doorbell ringing. She opened her eyes to find herself still on the couch, the room dark, a blanket over her and no longer wearing shoes. Rory. A flash of guilt went through her at the realization that she was scaring her kid. She could hear the door open and voices drifted towards her.
“Rory, hi, I’m looking for your mother.”
Rory’s voice was hesitant. “She’s had a really bad day, she fell asleep on the couch so I just left her there… did you maybe want to come back later? Or I’ll get her to call you when she wakes up.”
“I’d really like to talk to her, Rory. I drove all the way out here because she won’t answer my calls. I’ve been trying to get hold of her all afternoon.” Lorelai sat up on the sofa, debating whether or not she should go and talk to him. She was up. And what better time than the present to get everything sorted between them?
“She’s been sleeping since almost straight after I got home from school,” Rory defended her mother. “She hasn’t even had dinner. You know how she loves dinner. I don’t think she’s very well.”
“She seemed fine last night.”
“Maybe she did, but she’s been off all day and I really don’t think it’s a great idea to wake her up…” Rory trailed off as Lorelai came into her line of vision. “Mom. You’re up.”
“I’m up,” Lorelai said curtly. “Rory, could you, uh, give Max and I a second to chat?”
“Sure,” Rory replied, looking somewhat pained. “I’ll be in my room if you need me.”
Rory left Max and Lorelai alone. Max looked at her, an obvious amount of fight in his eyes. This was not going to pretty. It struck her that she hadn’t seen Max since that day at Chilton, when he’d declared that they should both go their separate ways and never see each other again. Funny how I seem to hold onto things, Lorelai mused. Kissing Max nearly two years after practically leaving him at the altar. Nothing’s really over for me, is it? Max… Christopher…
“You didn’t call,” Max stated.
“I was going to,” she defended herself.
“When?”
“Tonight! It’s just one day, it’s not like I’ve been ignoring you for days, I just… I had a day where I needed not to talk to you.”
“Lorelai, this seemed to be going pretty well, this thing between us,” he said, more than a hint of anger in his voice. “Then you just… blow me off today. You don’t usually blow hot and cold. Not unless you’re planning to run off like you did last time.” When Lorelai didn’t defend herself, Max’s expression changed again. “That’s it. You’re running away from this again.”
“Max…”
“Do you have some sort of self-destruct button?” he asked, obviously frustrated. “I mean, come on, Lorelai, we’re just getting to a good place again and you freak out. Do you want a relationship? Or do you just revel in dysfunction?”
“That’s not fair!”
“Well, I’m sorry that it’s not fair, but that’s what it looks like from where I’m standing.”
“Move then!” Lorelai shot back. “Max, did you ever think that the reason that it’s not working out between us is because it’s not right?”
“But it was! It was working out! Just last night. And here you are, breaking up with me… and your breaking up skills haven’t improved any, I just thought I might mention.”
“Sorry for not living up to your expectations, Max,” Lorelai said bitterly, trying to keep her calm, “but this isn’t going to work. And it’s best that we end it now before it goes too far.”
“Goes too far? You want to end it before it goes too far?” Max repeated incredulously. “Lorelai, this is a relationship, not playing with matches.”
“A relationship is playing with matches,” Lorelai retorted. “And I always get burnt. And do some burning while I’m at it. And trust me on this, if you persist in this you are going to get burnt and I don’t want you to!”
“You don’t want me to get burnt? You’re not giving me a chance-”
“We tried, Max. Okay? We tried. But what it all comes down to is that I don’t love you.” The words seemed to stop Max in his tracks. He took a step back from her, in a movement that looked almost involuntary. He didn’t say anything. The look of hurt on his face made Lorelai’s stomach churned, and she tried to backpedal, to soften the blow. “I’m sorry, Max. I thought I did, I really did. I care about you. I do. But I’m not in love with you. I don’t love you.” She choked out a laugh, feeling slightly light-headed. “I wish I did.”
Max didn’t reply for a long time. Then he looked her straight in the eye. “Is there someone else?”
The question took her aback momentarily. She wasn’t sure what she hadn’t been expecting it, since it seemed like an obvious question to ask at this particularly moment, but she wasn’t prepared. She shook her head. “No.”
Max was silent for a few more moments. “You’re lying,” he said finally. Almost inaudibly. She didn’t reply. He didn’t push it. “If you don’t love me, then there’s nothing I can do to change that, is there?”
She shook her head, her eyes filling up with tears despite herself. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he replied, his voice strained. “You can’t tell your heart what to feel.”
“Max, if I’d realized that I didn’t love you, I would never have started things back up with you,” Lorelai told him. “I would’ve just left it at that. Please don’t think that I ever hurt you intentionally. Please don’t doubt that I ever had feelings for you because I did and I still care about you and that’s why I feel like I owe it to you to end it now.”
“I understand,” said Max. “I should, uh, get going.” Lorelai nodded. Max made a move towards her as if to kiss her goodbye, but pulled back. His head down, he walked towards the door. As he opened it, he turned around to face her. “Goodbye Lorelai Gilmore.”
She smiled at him sadly as he turned back around, walked out the front door and closed it behind him with a gentle click. She watched the door for a moment. “Goodbye Max.”
Back to index
Chapter 6: Stuff and Nonsense
Chapter 6: Stuff and Nonsense
As Lorelai woke the next morning, she could swear she felt an arm around her. She kept her eyes closed for a moment, enjoying the sensation, breathing in an all too familiar scent. This surreal place between waking and sleeping had always been the nicest thing about waking up with Luke. Slowly, slowly, everything came properly into focus and she lay in bed, reluctant to move. Her eyes opened and she scanned the room to find… it was still her bedroom. Her old bedroom. Her arm searched beside her for the body she could swear had been there only moments ago to the find the bed empty. Her heart sank as she realized that she’d woken up alone. In the same place she’d woken up the morning before. She took a deep breath and could no longer smell that Luke smell she’d been sure she could smell. With a heavy heart, she climbed out of bed to shower and dress for the day.
Showered and dressed, she made herself a breakfast of coffee and Pop Tarts and had awkward small talk with Rory for a few moments before heading out to the inn. It actually felt strange to have Rory there. She’d been so used to having Rory away at college that seeing her in the morning, getting ready to go to Chilton was rather unusual. How can you get so wrapped up in a dream? But how can you dream five years of your life? Am I really going insane?
At least working at the inn came naturally. She could practically do it in her sleep. That’s pretty much what she did for most of the morning. After having familiarized herself all over again with the Independence Inn and its differences to her beloved Dragonfly (another thing she was having a very hard time believing had only been a dream) she worked on autopilot all morning until Sookie dragged her into the kitchen after lunch to interrogate her about the Max situation.
Lorelai had come clean about the night before and the breakup. Sookie had been sympathetic and tried to cheer her up with copious amounts of junk food, which Lorelai accepted. It wasn’t really cheering her up, but the way she figured it was that if there was a choice between being miserable and being miserable with pie, the pie was really the way to go. It’s all about finding that silver lining, she thought to herself as she idly ate her way through three slices of warm raspberry pie.
As she sat in her office, eating pie away from the rest of the world, her mind drifted back to the events of her dream. She’d had it. She’d had it right there in her hands. She was engaged to Luke and they were in love and they were going to get married and have that whole package she’d always dreamt about. How had it all gone so wrong? As much as she wanted to blame everything on April’s arrival, she knew that it wasn’t the kids fault. April was sweet and smart and she just wanted to know her father. Rory as a child had been so much like April and Lorelai had seen firsthand just how much Christopher’s non-presence in Rory’s life had affected her. April was lucky to have Luke as her dad. Even though the whole situation was painful, Lorelai refused to blame April for what had happened.
What does it mean now? The question was at the forefront of her thoughts. What did all of this mean? The dream she wasn’t sure was a dream. The fact that she was back somewhere she thought she’d already been, doing things over differently to fix things she’d always wanted to fix. In her mind, all through her “dream”, she’d wished that things with Max could have ended differently. The way things had ended last night was… better. Nothing could ever be perfect, she realized that. But it was slightly less horrible. Slightly less a complete and utter mess. She hadn’t humiliated him in front of friends and family this time. She hadn’t led him to believe that the two of them would have a life together, start a family together, only to disappoint him. Max, I’m so glad I spared you that, she thought to herself. I know all about the disappointment. I know what it feels like to think you’ve finally got what you always wanted, only to have it come crashing down on you.
She finished her piece pie and grabbed her coat, deciding that she’d head back into town. The inn was covered and she really needed to get out and do something. After walking for awhile, she found herself in the middle of town. She took in a deep breath. The town really didn’t change. She looked over to see the troubadour standing in front of the flower shop and smiled slightly to herself. I’m never gonna understand that guy, Lorelai thought as she stopped for awhile to listen to him sing.
“Disobey my own decisions, I deserve all your suspicions
First it’s yes and then its no, I dilly dally down to you, oh
But I’ve got no secrets that I battle in my sleep
I won’t make promises to you that I can’t keep
And you know that I love you, here and now not forever
I can give you the present, I don’t know about the future
That’s all stuff and nonsense…”
“Lorelai,” a voice called out from behind her. She turned to see a familiar head of curly hair.
“Hey Rachel,” she greeted her, feeling a little uneasy.
Rachel looked equally as uneasy. “Hey, have you seen Luke around?”
Lorelai’s heart practically stopped at the mention of his name. She tried to act cool. “Oh, he's probably at the diner.”
She shook her head. “Nope, he's supposed to be at the diner, but he's not.”
“Oh, well-”
“We were supposed to meet for lunch, but he didn't show,” Rachel cut in.
“Oh.”
“Again.”
“Ah.”
“I made tuna.”
“Nice,” Lorelai commented.
“Yeah, yeah, he usually comes back upstairs for a break between lunch and dinner, but recently he's been other places,” said Rachel. She gestured to Lorelai. “Uh, your place actually.”
“Oh, yeah, well, Rachel, he's just fixing some things.”
“I know.”
Lorelai felt the need to elaborate. “The porch rail, a couple roof shingles, then the porch rail again after he fell off the roof onto to the porch rail.” She gave Rachel a pained smile as she remembered her reaction to Luke’s fall.
“Yeah, yeah, he's been telling me.”
Lorelai nodded. “Good.” I just hope he didn’t tell you about my little meltdown.
“Look if you see him, can you tell him to just, I don't know, check in?” Rachel asked, obviously a little frustrated.
“Yes, will do,” Lorelai assured her. Rachel thanked her and left, leaving Lorelai a little freaked out. She’d most definitely had that conversation before. In retrospect, it probably was the first warning sign that Rachel was about to pack up and leave. This is where I start to wonder if I’m really losing my mind, Lorelai thought to herself.
When she arrived at her house, she could hear noises upstairs. Luke, her mind immediately told her. Breaking into her house. Hiding from Rachel. She sighed. “Luke!” she yelled. “Did you break into my house?”
She could hear him walking down the stairs as she walked into the living room. “I had some things to fix upstairs,” he informed her. “You weren’t home and I don’t have all that much time on my hands so I broke your back door lock.”
“We have a spare key in the turtle,” Lorelai replied. “Everyone knows that.” Her mind drifted back to the time he broke into her house to check up on her after she’d left him a humiliating answering machine message and then gone into his apartment to steal the tape. It’s so clear in my mind. It’s all so frigging clear. Why is it so clear when it was all in my head? Was it really all in my head?
“If everyone knows that, then one day you’re gonna get robbed,” Luke said, breaking her thoughts. She blinked and looked back at him, trying to focus.
“Well, yeah, especially if the back door lock is broken,” said Lorelai, heading towards the kitchen. Luke followed her. “You want tea?” she asked.
“Yeah, sure.” She got the kettle out of the cupboard and set about the familiar process of making tea. I could do this in my sleep. Which is great because it’s a little hard to concentrate right now. She was glad to be doing something because it hurt to look at Luke. This is insane. If I’ve dreamt our entire relationship, if it was all a dream, does that mean that I fell in love with him overnight? What does it mean now? How do I really feel? The thought hit her like a brick. I have always loved him. Through it all. It started years before they’d started dating. The horoscope in his wallet. Please, please, please don’t let that be a dream. Please say he still has the horoscope. There was no good way to ask him about it and she’d never been good at the pick-pocketing thing. Maybe I’ll just wait until Jess arrives on the scene and get him to do it.
“What is going on with you?”
The question jolted her back to the present. She laughed nervously. “What?” Luke walked over to stand next to her and put his hand lightly on her arm. Her heart started up a none too shabby Riverdance impression.
“You’ve been… weird since yesterday,” Luke continued, looking at her intently. “Rory’s worried about you. She came into the diner last night and when I asked where you were she said you were sleeping and that you’d been acting weird.”
“I am weird, it’s not acting,” Lorelai quipped, meeting Luke’s gaze and trying not to crack under it. “There is nothing going on with me, I’m fine.”
“Bull,” Luke shot back. “It’s gotta be something. You’re not acting like yourself. It’s freaking Rory out. And it’s freaking me out, too.” He looked at her challengingly and she didn’t say anything for a few minutes. She didn’t know what to say. There was a part in her that just wanted to confide in Luke like she had so many times. But that wasn’t an option right now. Not when he was the cause of her heartache. Not even this Luke. Another Luke. A different Luke. “Lorelai?”
She sighed. “I broke up with Max,” she said in as light a tone as she could muster.
She could see him visibly deflate before her eyes. “Oh. I’m… uh… I’m really sorry.” There was an awkward silence. “Is there… is it something you can work out?”
“No,” she replied with a shake of her head. “It’s… it’s okay, it really is. I broke up with him.” She smiled sadly. “I didn’t love him. It didn’t seem fair to lead him on.”
Luke sighed. “You gonna be okay?”
She nodded. “Yeah. It’s really no big deal.” She focused her attention back on the kettle. “Rachel was looking for you. You should probably check back in with her.”
“Oh yeah?” said Luke, obviously resigned to the subject change. “I’ll, uh, yeah, I’d better get back to the diner. Sorry about the tea.”
“It’s okay,” Lorelai assured him. “I’ll see you later. Thanks for all the help with… everything.” I don’t know how to deal with you anymore. I don’t know if I should tell you how I feel. I don’t know if I can trust you. I don’t know if I can let you go. I don’t know if I can ever look at you again without feeling my heart break. I don’t know if we can get back what we had. I don’t even know if we ever had it.
He gave the familiar half wave as he walked out the door and she hugged herself tightly, those thoughts still running through her head.
***
AN: Song "Stuff and Nonsense" by Split Enz.
Back to index
Chapter 7: It'll All Work Out In The End
Chapter 7: It’ll all work out in the end
“Hey, I bought some popcorn for the town meeting,” Rory announced as she walked into the kitchen, brandishing said item. “Which, by the way, we should probably get going to.”
Lorelai looked up from where she was reading a magazine at the kitchen table. In her quest to do something to take her mind off everything, she was reading gossip magazines and having a good little laugh to herself. Britney, in the Justin Timberlake days. Long before the quickie marriage, Kevin Federline and getting pregnant. And, oh, oops, I did it again. The woman is crazy. Completely and utterly crazy.
“Yeah, sure sweets,” Lorelai replied, closing the magazine and shaking her head in dismay. “You have a good time studying with Lane?”
“Oh, yeah,” said Rory, looking a little uncomfortable. Lorelai didn’t press it. “So, uh, should we go?”
“Sure.” Lorelai grabbed her coat and the two of them headed out the front door and towards Miss Patty’s. They walked for a few moments in silence. It was weird that she just couldn’t muster up the energy to talk to her daughter in the manner that they usually did. Her mind drifted to Luke’s words from earlier. You’re freaking Rory out. She was debating what to say to break the silence when Rory spoke up.
“Hey Mom, you know that you can tell me anything, right?”
“Yeah,” Lorelai was quick to reply. “I know that.”
Rory gave her a pointed look. “Okay. Well, are you sure this whole breaking up with Max thing hasn’t affected you more than you’re admitting?”
“Rory, it was the right thing to do,” she insisted. “I am fine with it, trust me. It was something I had to do.”
“Okay,” said Rory, nodding. “Is there anything else?”
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Mom, you’ve been weird for the past two days. Even Luke’s noticed, and he’s got a pretty high tolerance for your weirdness.”
Lorelai had to smile at that. “Yes, that he does.”
“So come on, spill.”
Lorelai sighed. “It’s… if I told you, you might try to get me locked up and unless you can guarantee that you could get me a straightjacket with rhinestones on it, I don’t even want to risk it.”
“If I promise to do everything in my power to get you a straightjacket with rhinestones on it if I deem the straightjacket necessary, will you tell me what’s going on?”
Lorelai hesitated. As much as she’d like to confide in someone, the whole thing sounded crazy. It was crazy. And it certainly wasn’t right to lay all of this on Rory. “That dream just has me a little freaked out,” she confessed. “The dream from the other night?”
“You’re still hung up on that dream?” Rory asked incredulously. “Mom, it was just a dream.”
“Yeah, but stuff that I dreamt about actually happened.”
“Like what?” Rory challenged.
“Michel had ennui. Luke’s fixing stuff. We’re about to go into a town meeting and in my dream, two troubadours had it out over who had the right to be there.”
Rory sighed. “Mom. Michel being Michel and having ennui is predictable. So is Luke fixing stuff in our house. And as for the meeting, well, we’ll see but I’ve seen the usual troubadour getting all mad because this other troubadour with long hair who whistles has been usurping his territory. The two of them having it out at the town meeting is also entirely predictable.” Rory patted her mother on the arm as they neared Miss Patty’s. “I think you’ve been working too hard. It’s the stress. Hey, it’s summer soon, maybe we could go on a vacation somewhere fun! Take a break from the inn. Call Mia, I’m sure she’ll agree that Michel could handle it.”
Lorelai nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right.” Rory’s comments made the whole thing sound a little nutty. They entered Miss Patty’s to find the town meeting had already started. The two nearest available seats were right behind Luke. The two Gilmore girls sat down as Taylor continued to speak.
“All right, I'd like to open the meeting up for miscellaneous issues.”
The troubadour Lorelai had seen earlier that morning stood up. “I have an issue.”
“Who are you?”
“The town troubadour.”
Taylor frowned. “The what?”
Babette piped up from the back. “You've seen him Taylor, with his guitar.”
“Right, the guitar.”
“Yes, he plays on all the street corners,” added Miss Patty.
“He loiters on street corners,” Luke countered darkly.
“We're two peas in a pod Luke.”
“Scary thought Taylor.”
Babette gestured to the troubadour. “Go on honey.”
Lorelai tuned out after awhile, her mind elsewhere. Could Rory be right that it was just a coincidence that things seemed so similar to how she’d dreamt them? After all, things had changed already. She wasn’t seeing Max anymore. In her dream, if it was in fact a dream, Max was at the town meeting with her and Rory. And he’d bought them chocolate covered expresso beans. Mmmm. Chocolate covered expresso beans sound so good right now. Things were different from in her dream. A different conversation with Luke. A different work day. A different route to her meeting to Rachel. Different… she sighed. Things are different from your dream because you made them that way, she told herself. You changed things. You’ve got a chance to change things, to make them right.
Her mind drifted to the April situation. As crazy as it was that Luke had this long lost daughter, it was good that he got to know her. He should have had the chance so much earlier. It hit her a second later. This was it. The way to find out if what she’d dreamt had actually happened. April. If April exists then I haven’t dreamt this, because otherwise how would I know Luke had a daughter he didn’t know existed? Tomorrow she’d go to Woodbridge to Anna Nardini’s boutique. If it was there, if Anna was there, if April was there, then it was all true. Then what? Do I tell him? Of course I tell him. But how? How do I convince him to believe me? How would I know? What do I tell him when he asks me how I knew?
“This troubadour act is a money making scheme,” Taylor said angrily, breaking into her thoughts. “Why else would he be doing it?”
All of a sudden Rory sprang to her feet beside her. “Because sometimes you have something you need to say but you can't because the words won't come out or you get scared or you feel stupid, so if you could write a song and sing it then you could say what you need to say and it would be beautiful and people would listen and you wouldn't make a complete idiot out of yourself, but all of us can't be songwriters so some of us will never be able to say what we're thinking or what we want other people to know that we're thinking so we'll never get the chance to make things right again ever.” There was a moment of silence as the entire room stared at Rory. She put her hand on the troubadour’s shoulder. “So give this guy a license!”
The entire room burst into applause and Rory sat down. Lorelai leaned over. “Well, I liked that little speech.”
“In the interest of not talking about this subject for another second, I hereby designate 'Mystique Guy' over here the official town troubadour,” announced. “And no other troubadour may usurp his territory, meaning this other guy.”
The first troubadour stood up and smiled, looking grateful at his victory, whereas the second troubadour just looked glum. As the townspeople started to talk amongst themselves as they left the meeting, the first troubadour turned around to face Lorelai and Rory.
“Thank you for your help,” the troubadour said to Rory with a smile. Lorelai looked at him warily. Okay, in my dream he didn’t talk to us after the meeting, she thought to herself. Although in retrospect, Max was there. But he could have.
“Uh, no problem,” Rory replied with a polite smile in return, obviously not having intended to step in for the troubadour. “I’m glad I could help. I like your guitar playing. It’s nice.”
“Singing gives me my chance to say what I want to say,” the troubadour replied. “Like you said. You really get the whole gig, you know? It’s nice to have people get it.”
“Yeah, I’m totally for people getting it,” Lorelai chimed in. The troubadour focused his attention on Lorelai.
“Hey, I’ve been meaning to tell you, it’ll all work out in the end, you’ll see.”
Lorelai frowned. “Huh? What are you talking about?”
He looked as if he was about to reply but just at that moment, Luke stood up and the troubadour wandered off towards the door. Luke turned to talk to the two of them. “Hey, how are you two? Rory, nice speech.”
“Uh, thanks,” Rory replied nervously. She stood up. “Mom, I’ll meet you back home.”
“Okay sweets.” As Rory left, Lorelai turned back to look and forced a smile. “Where’s Rachel?” she asked.
“She’s minding the store,” Luke said. He gestured to the door awkwardly. “I should probably get going.”
Lorelai nodded. “Yeah, sure.” She looked at him carefully, trying to figure out how he’d react if it turned out that April did exist and was his daughter. In the dream, if it was a dream, he’d said kids would be nice. But he’d also said earlier that he hated kids. Is he ready to find out about this now? Have I really got a choice? He deserves to know his own daughter, if she exists. She’d be eight now, wouldn’t she? Eight years is less than 12 but it’s still a long time for Anna to go without telling him. If April hadn’t done that science project, would Luke have every found out about her?
“Lorelai?”
She snapped out of her thoughts. “Huh?”
“You okay?”
“Fine,” she replied automatically, flashing a smile.
He chuckled softly. “I guess you’re sick of me asking you that.”
“A little, yeah.”
“You just seem… is there anything else you’re worried about?” he asked suddenly. “I mean, I get that breaking up with Max must have been rough but it seems like you’ve got a pretty positive outlook on that one and you still seem really… I dunno, out of it. Quiet. You’re never quiet. It just isn’t you.”
“I’ve got a lot on my mind,” she confessed.
He nodded. “Right. Right… anything I can do to help?”
She shook her head. “It’s nothing, really, just… you know, a lot to do. Life, the universe and everything. Rory’s finishing the year at Chilton, the inn is busy this time of year, weekly dinners with parents are like an energy sucking vacuum cleaner and… yeah, maybe I just have to up my coffee intake.”
“You’ll kill yourself if you put any more caffeine in your system than you already do,” Luke retorted. “It’s slowly killing you anyway.”
“So that’s your way of saying you’ll still provide the coffee?” she teased.
He laughed. “I’ll still provide the coffee.” He looked at her intently, his blue eyes serious. “If there was anything that I could possibly do to help — besides the liquid death, that is — you would let me know, wouldn’t you? Because I’m here if you need me. Always.”
His words were touching and brought back so many memories. He’d always been there for her. He’d done so much for her. How had things fallen to pieces like they did? April’s arrival had made Luke almost oblivious to her. He hadn’t realized she was hurting. He’d been so wrapped up in April that he’d forgotten about her, he’d pushed her out of his life, he’d let her slip away. And she hadn’t challenged him on it. Maybe she’d taken it for granted that Luke would always know what was going on with her. When he didn’t, she didn’t know how to deal, how to tell him. It felt foreign to have to beg for his attention when it had been given so readily for so many years.
“Thanks,” she managed to reply. “You should get back to the diner. And I should go home.”
The two of them stood up and headed towards the door. They walked out of Miss Patty’s and Luke waved goodnight as they went their separate ways. Lorelai hugged her jacket tighter towards her as she walked home. If it wasn’t a dream and April really is Luke’s daughter, maybe I can somehow bring them together and let them get to know each other before I tell Luke how I feel about him. He needs to deal with things one at a time, I need to pick one. Me or April. If April exists, then he has to know. A child is too important. April needs her dad. Once they’re settled, once it’s all working, then I can tell Luke how I feel. He waited for me for eight years. The least I can do is wait until everything can be alright again.
She chuckled humorlessly to herself as she walked. All things considered, my heart can’t break anymore than it already has. Everything from here is up. As she turned into her street, the troubadour’s words rang through her head. It’ll all work out in the end, you’ll see. It was nice that he was so sure.
Back to index
Chapter 8: Fathers, Mothers and Daughters
Chapter 8: Fathers, Mothers and Daughters
Lorelai drove out to Woodbridge in the middle of the morning. It was a quiet time for inn and most probably would be a lull in Anna’s boutique. If it was there. She still wasn’t a hundred percent convinced. As she drove, she turned up the stereo as loud as she could and let ACDC drown out the perpetual babble in her head. If she thought about it too much, she’d freak out. It was better to get there, see if Anna Nardini was there and figure it all out once that was sorted out.
Waking up that morning had been just that tiny bit easier. She wasn’t sure if she liked that. It had been easier to accept that she was where she was, easier to go downstairs and chatter with Rory over coffee and poptarts, easier to drive to the Independence Inn and work with people who she hadn’t seen since it had burned down in her dream. That’s a thought, she mused. What caused that fire again? Is there anything I can do to prevent that?
When she arrived in Woodbridge, she drove to the street where she’d found the boutique the time she’d visited Anna after April’s party. She took in a sharp breath when she realized that it was there. It was smaller. It wasn’t as nice. It obviously needed a little more work. As she parked and got out, she examined the place. The window display didn’t quite have that flair it had had the last time she was there. It obviously takes some time to get into that groove, she rationalized. I mean, it must be fairly new, and a lot can change in five years. Just because Luke never changed the sign on his dad’s old hardware store and kept everything the same when he turned it into a diner doesn’t mean that Anna would keep things the same for five years. I wouldn’t keep a store exactly the same for five years. You can’t really do that with a store anyway. Stuff will run out. And didn’t Rory say that everything was one of a kind at Anna’s store?
She sighed. Gilmore, you’re stalling. Go in there. With a tightness in her chest, she walked to the door, opened it and walked in, browsing around as she did. There were some cute purses. Maybe Rory would like one. Or maybe she’d buy one for herself. A new purse might cheer me up. I like the blue with the sparkles on it.
“Hey, how are you?”
Lorelai looked over to see Anna behind the counter, smiling. She looked… not that much different. Still the same brown hair, so similar to hers. Still gorgeous. A little younger, sure, but not much. “I’m great, thanks,” she managed to say. “Your store is beautiful.”
“Thanks,” Anna replied with a smile. “You looking for anything in particular?”
“Actually, yeah,” Lorelai began. “A present for my daughter. She finished in the top three percent of her class at school and I want to get her something nice to celebrate.”
“Wow, that’s great. How old is she?”
“Sixteen.” Man, it feels weird to say that. “She goes to Chilton in Hartford.”
“Good school,” said Anna with an approving nod. “And very impressive to finish in the top three percent! You must be really proud.”
“Thanks, I am,” Lorelai replied. “Do you have kids?”
“I have a daughter. She’s eight.”
“Eight’s a nice age.” Lorelai smiled. “I remember when Rory was eight. She was really into Jane Austen around then. She reads a lot. She loves it. She wants to be a journalist. A foreign correspondent, actually.”
Anna smiled. “April reads a lot, but it’s mostly science related. She loves science. She reads scientific journals and does experiments on things to find out how they work. She takes things apart to see how they work, which is always fun because as smart as she is, sometimes she lacks the motor skills to put them back together again.” Anna shook her head in amazement. “I really have no idea how I managed to produce a kid that smart.”
“Yeah, what’s with the younger generation being smarter than us?” Lorelai joked.
“My sentiments exactly.” Anna smiled. “Your daughter — Rory, was it? - likes books? I have some really cute book bags over here. Personally, I like this blue one here, but you obviously know your daughter better than I do, so it’s up to you.”
“The blue is great,” Lorelai said as she fingered the delicately beaded bag. It really was beautiful. Anna did have good taste. “I’m sure Rory would love this.”
“Unusual name,” Anna commented. “Is it short for anything?”
“Lorelai. I’m Lorelai, too, actually. I named her after myself. Combination of feminism and Demoral, I believe. But yeah, we call her Rory to avoid confusion or else there’d be Lorelais running all over the place.” It was a little strange how easy it was to talk to Anna when she wasn’t April’s potential stepmother. Anna was… friendly, and seemed completely at ease in her own skin, qualities Lorelai had always admired.
“I like it,” Anna replied. “April is actually a family name as well. A great aunt of mine. She died when I was little, but I liked her and I liked the name so I called my daughter April. That and I like the fact that it makes me think of spring.”
Lorelai nodded. “Cool.” She played with the strap of the bag. “This would really suit Rory. She has my eyes.” She laughed. “Actually, she has my everything. Everyone always says she’s the splitting image of me. But sometimes I can see just that little bit of Christopher in her. Left earlobe, to be exact.”
“Is Christopher your husband?” Anna asked.
Lorelai shook her head. “No. No. Christopher is in California. In his mind, he’s still sixteen and he hasn’t quite figured out this whole ‘being a dad’ thing. He doesn’t visit much. He’s pretty much your textbook deadbeat, actually.” She looked at Anna carefully. “We were supposed to get married when I got pregnant, because that’s what you do when you get pregnant at sixteen. But we didn’t. I didn’t want to. Christopher did, but when I refused, he just took it as his invitation to run off and take no responsibility. I left home when Rory was a year old and got a job in Stars Hollow. It’s been just me and Rory ever since.”
“I get that,” Anna replied, obvious empathy in her voice. “It’s just me and April. My parents are around sometimes and they helped a lot when April was little, but now it’s just her and I.”
“April’s dad is a bit like Christopher, huh?” Lorelai asked, bracing herself for the answer.
“To be honest, I have no idea,” Anna confided. “I haven’t seen him since I got pregnant. I never told him. He wasn’t really a kid person, you know? He really wasn’t a kid person and he would have freaked out. Then he would have done whatever he could to support me and April and he probably would have stuck around through sheer obligation and I didn’t want that. I didn’t want him there unless he wanted to be.”
“Did you love him?” The question almost burned her throat coming out. But she had to know. And this was her only chance.
Anna laughed softly. “I was fond of him, that much I can safely say. He was a great guy. Toxic bachelor, though. Not exactly a family guy. Its better that he doesn’t know about it. I don’t think he ever seriously saw us as a happening thing. We weren’t exactly destined for picket fences and a friendly mutt.”
Lorelai chose her next words carefully. “It might have been different if he’d actually known,” she suggested. “I mean, I get that he didn’t seem like a kid person and some people aren’t, but others are. I have a friend in Stars Hollow, he runs the local diner and we eat there almost every day. He’s grumpy and he’s monosyllabic and he really, really doesn’t seem like a kid person but you should see him with Rory.” She smiled at the memories. “When Rory had the chicken pox, he made her mashed potatoes every day for a week because that’s all she’d eat. When she was about ten, she went around with these angel wings on her back inviting everyone in town to her caterpillar’s funeral and he came and didn’t make any comments about how stupid it was and even brought a plate of cookies. He helped Rory bury her caterpillar. He made her a coffee cake for her sixteenth birthday even though he severely disapproves about the amount of caffeine ingested by the two of us on a regular basis. He’d claim he isn’t a kid person but I’ve always thought that actions speak louder than words on some things. Not that you could tell from listening to me, because I talk a lot. I mean, here I am, babbling away to a total stranger.”
“It’s okay,” Anna assured her, her expression almost nostalgic. “It’s nice to have an actual conversation sometimes that doesn’t involve handbags or the life cycle of frogs. Frogs are April’s latest thing.” Anna sighed. “It’s a little too late to tell April’s dad about her. He’d freak out. I mean, it’s been almost nine years since I’ve seen him.”
“Do you think that maybe April would want to know her dad when she gets a bit older?” Lorelai said gently. “I mean, even if it all turns out a bit… weird and he doesn’t show much interest in her, at least he’d know if you told him and he’d have that option. Plus, she might… you know… try and find him herself when she gets a bit older. She’s a smart kid from all accounts, I’m sure she’d figure it out if she wanted to.”
Anna sighed again. “You actually have a point.” She chuckled softly. “You know, I really figured I was justified not telling him because I wanted to handle it all on my own and I didn’t want his charity but now I don’t need anything from him. I don’t want child support. If he was in her life, he’d be there for April, not for me. April does deserve to know.”
“Hey Mom, I found this box of glittery stars in the storeroom,” a young voice called out from behind a curtained door. Two second later, out popped a small girl with long dark hair and red rimmed glasses. “Wouldn’t it be really cool to make a display with these stars? I can put them into all sorts of constellations. Maybe some of the constellations that you can’t see from here so that I can actually see them, even though they’re not real stars and I’m perfectly aware that stars aren’t actually glittery and pointy, they’re just big balls of gas but I still think it’d be really, really cool. What do you say?”
“I think it sounds like a great idea,” said Anna warmly, giving Lorelai an apologetic look. “Lorelai, this is April.”
It was almost like her heart had stopped. The little girl stared up at her and that was when Lorelai knew. She has Luke’s nose. She really does. She’s his kid. I wasn’t dreaming. It all happened. How else would I know? How did this happen? It certainly defies all the laws of science.
“Hi,” April said. She pointed to the bag. “Are you getting that bag for you? It’s pretty. It goes with your eyes. You should buy it.”
“Actually, I’m getting it for my daughter,” Lorelai managed to choke out. “But we have the same eyes, so it’s okay. I’m definitely going to buy it.”
“Lorelai was telling me that her daughter Rory goes to Chilton,” Anna said to April. “She just finished in the top three percent of her class.”
“Chilton’s a really good school,” April announced. “I did some research. Did you know that almost all Chilton alumni get into an Ivy League school if they can survive?”
Lorelai nodded. “Yeah, I do. Rory wants to go to Harvard. I’m sure she wouldn’t be opposed to Yale or Princeton, though.”
“I haven’t decided,” April informed her. “Ivy League would be good. I’m still doing research. I’ve only really just started but I think I have plenty of time. I’m still trying to decide where I want to go for high school.”
“Fair enough,” Lorelai agreed, trying to play it cool despite the major explosion that had just taken place in her head. “I’m gonna get this bag and then I’d better get going, but can I grab a business card? I love this place, I’ll definitely be back. Maybe next time I’ll bring Rory.”
“That’d be nice,” April chimed in. She walked past her mother to reach the cash register. “Okay, that’s seven ninety five.” Lorelai fished out her purse and gave April the money. April put the bag in a carry bag and handed Lorelai her change, along with three business cards. “That’s so you can give them to your friends. If you like the store, then you’re sure to have friends who’d like it, too.”
“Makes sense,” Lorelai said with a forced smile. “Anna, April, it was really nice to meet you. I have to get going. I’ll hopefully see you later.”
“Nice talking to you,” said Anna with a real smile. “I hope Rory likes the bag.”
“Thanks! Bye!” April exclaimed as Lorelai left. She waved as she walked out and managed to get safely inside her car and halfway down the road before she burst into tears.
Back to index
Chapter 9: Fusing Together, Falling Apart
Chapter 9: Fusing Together, Falling Apart
The rest of the day passed in a daze. Lorelai drove back to the inn and holed herself up in her office until she finally couldn’t take anymore and headed home, stopping momentarily at Doose’s for supplies. Ice cream. Chocolate. Chips. Anything sugary and unhealthy she could get her hands on. As desperately as she was craving a cheeseburger, chili fries and coffee from Luke’s, she knew that going anywhere near Luke in this state would be a Very Bad Idea. She needed time to strategize, to figure out a game plan… to mourn. Because if April existed, then everything else was true. Everything had been screwed up big time. She’d screwed up. He’d screwed up. And she couldn’t seem to get it out of her heart. Where do I go from here? What do I do now?
The ball was in Anna’s court now. Lorelai hoped that what she’d said had convinced the other woman to get in touch with Luke. Her mind drifted back to April’s science project. There had been three guys April had taken DNA samples from to find out which one was her father and Luke had been it. However, Lorelai suspected that Anna had always known that April was Luke’s. The nose was the same. And there were probably other similarities that would be more noticeable on closer examination. Anna would be able to tell. She knew her daughter well. And once upon a time, she’d been intimate with Luke. Even if the sheer thought made Lorelai feel physically ill, she had to just suck it up. After all, it wasn’t like Luke was a monk before they started their relationship. And it wasn’t like she didn’t have her fair share of past loves. But the thought of Anna and Luke together… she sighed. She had no right to be upset about it. The way she felt about Anna and Luke was probably the exact way Luke felt about her and Christopher. And look what happened with that.
Rory came and went, informing her mother she was going to the library to study with Lane. She was obviously in a pretty nasty mood. Lorelai remembered it. Paris and her vendetta because of Tristan and the PJ Harvey tickets. Knowing what was happening, what was going to happen was freaking her out. Why me? Why is this happening? And why five years? Is there something I’m missing here? Is there something here that would prevent other things from happening? What choice am I supposed to make? What’s supposed to happen? She parked herself in front of the television with the ice cream and turned on some banal sitcom, wanting just for a moment to escape the storm of questions in her head.
The doorbell rang. She cursed slightly, got up and answered the door. There stood Luke, looking a little uncomfortable at the sight of her. Probably because she’d changed into her rattiest yoga pants and a tank top, she’d washed off all her makeup and her curls were decidedly untamed. “Hey,” she greeted him.
“Hey.”
“Uh, what are you doing here?” she asked stupidly. As soon as the words had left her mouth, it hit her.
“I forgot my toolbox so I just-”
“Thought you’d pick it up,” Lorelai finished for him. “Yeah. Sorry. I should have known.” She gestured to the hall table. “It's right over here. Rory and I couldn't lift it or we would've brought it to you and then we got used to having it here, so we named it Bert and we'd say Goodnight Bert and it'd say Goodnight girls and we spend too much time home alone.”
Luke smiled. “Well, thanks for taking care of it.”
“Our pleasure,” she replied with a smile of her own.
Luke picked up the toolbox but then almost immediately set it back down on the hall table. He faced Lorelai with a serious expression. “So Rachel left.”
Lorelai’s heart started to pound faster. “What?”
“Last night. She left. For good.”
“Oh no, Luke I'm so sorry. What happened?”
“Ah, it's hard to explain,” Luke said awkwardly.
“Okay,” said Lorelai cautiously, a prickly sensation crawling up her back. “I really am sorry, Luke.”
“Yeah, well, she had her reasons.”
“Like what?” Who wouldn’t want to be with Luke? He’s just such a great guy and Rachel left, just like that.
Luke took in a deep breath and the prickly sensation crawled further up her back and into the base of her neck. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears. She could see the hesitation in his eyes. He was going to say something before Max arrived that night, she realized. And this time, Max isn’t here to interrupt. “She said that it was pretty obvious I had… feelings for somebody else.”
“Somebody else,” Lorelai echoed, not wanting to put it all together. No. No. You can’t do this now. Not when you don’t know about April. It’s too much for you. It was too much for you. And it’s too much for me.
“I didn’t want to admit it for the longest time, but she was right,” Luke continued. “She told me not to wait too long to tell her how I felt.”
“To tell her…” Lorelai’s words trailed off as she looked up into his eyes, trying to read what she saw there. There was something intense in his gaze. Something that said that once he’d gotten up the courage to do this, he wasn’t backing down. “Luke-”
She could barely get his name out when suddenly his lips were on hers. He pulled her towards him, one arm snaking around her waist, the other finding its way into her haphazard curls. The touch of his hand on the small of her back was like fire and he tasted just the way she remembered. The kiss deepened, hungry and desperate, like it had been at the beginning. Not like the chaste, perfunctory kisses the last few months had brought. This was urgent, this was passionate, this was him finally claiming her as his own after years of wanting her. This was her finally letting herself be claimed. This was two people finally fusing together. Nothing’s going to be the same after this, her mind thought wildly. His lips on hers exposed her, brought to the surface the incredibly intense emotions that she felt for him. I can’t hide this from him now, her heart screamed. He knows. He knows.
After what felt like an eternity, the kiss ended abruptly, leaving her breathless. His eyes met hers. He was panting slightly and it was so good to see that she’d affected him as much as he’d affected her. His voice was raw with emotion and desire as he spoke. “I’ve wanted to do that since the day I met you.”
“Luke-”
“I suppose you think I think you’re crazy and that I’m disgusted by your eating habits and the amount of caffeine you put into your system everyday and you’re right, I do think you’re crazy and I am disgusted by your eating habits and the amount of caffeine you put into your system everyday but I also think you are beautiful and smart and loyal and caring and completely amazing and I have to tell you this now before I lose my nerve or wake up and realize how completely insane it is to come here and tell you all this.”
“Luke, I-”
“And I know this seems like weird timing since we both just got out of relationships and there’s something going on with you that you won’t tell me about but if I just let this chance go by I would kick myself because I don’t know how long it would take me to work up the courage to finally, finally act on what I’ve felt since we met.”
“Three years,” she whispered.
His ranting stopped momentarily and he looked at her, obviously taken aback. “Three years?”
“It would have taken you three years,” she said before she could stop herself.
He looked at her carefully. “What are you talking about?”
All of a sudden the enormity of it all crashed down on her. “We… we can’t do this, Luke. Not now. There are other things to consider, things that… I need to… you need to… we can’t do this!”
He didn’t say anything for a long moment. He looked down at the floor. Then he looked up and straight at her, his blue eyes challenging. “I felt it. I know I felt it. Just now, we kissed and you… you felt it, too, I know. I know you and I know you felt it. So if you’re going to tell me that we can’t do this, you need to give me a solid reason. And I am not leaving until you tell me why we can’t do this!”
“I can’t get hurt again!” Lorelai exclaimed, feeling tears well up in her eyes. “I can’t go through it all again. I just… I mean, I thought I was strong enough to deal but I wasn’t and I snapped and I made the biggest mistake of my life and now here I am and I have this chance to make it right but I can’t trust myself not to screw it up all over again!
His expression portrayed frustration, concern and total bewilderment all in one. “What is going on? What happened?” When she didn’t answer, he reached out and lightly held onto her arm. She wondered if he could feel her shaking. “Talk to me. Tell me what’s going on with you. Did Max do something? Did he hurt you?” Anger was starting to rise up in his voice now. “If he hurt you...”
She shook her head. “This has nothing to do with Max,” she replied. “He’s history. Ancient history, in fact.” She laughed harshly. “It’s crazy. I think I’m actually crazy. I may be actually losing my mind completely and if you knew, you’d probably have me committed or something. Rory said she’d try to get me a straightjacket with rhinestones and I’m gonna hold her to that.”
“Lorelai…”
She looked at him carefully, knowing that it wouldn’t be fair to tell him all the things she wanted to say. You didn’t notice that I was hurting for months. You didn’t notice that you were breaking me. You just kept on living your life, unaware that you were ripping out my heart by shutting me out until I finally cracked, Luke, and I went crazy and gave you an ultimatum when I knew you didn’t do ultimatums well. And then I went to Christopher because I needed a friend and I needed a little human contact because you’d been so distant and I woke up in Christopher’s bed. And that one crazy act, it would have hurt you but it wouldn’t have hurt you as much as it hurt me because with that one act, I destroyed every chance I’d ever had of my happily ever after, my whole package, because Christopher is not the one but you, you… you broke my heart. The cracks started when you didn’t tell me about your daughter. They got bigger the more you shut me out of your life. When you wouldn’t elope, when you let me walk away, my heart fell apart. And by sleeping with Christopher, all those pieces of my heart shattered into even tinier pieces and now they’re so small and so scattered that I don’t think I can put them back together again. But I want to. I so desperately want to.
“Talk to me.” His voice was strained, almost pleading. He looked hurt and confused and worried and she hated that he had to suffer for something he hadn’t even done yet and might not ever do but it was just too soon. If you hadn’t come over tonight, I would have had more time to figure out what to do. What to say. How to handle this. It’s too soon. It’s too raw. I can’t tell you. I can’t tell you.
“I went shopping today,” she blurted out. “In Woodbridge. I bought a bag for Rory from this cute little boutique. The proprietor was really nice, she gave me really good advice.”
“What?”
She pushed past him and picked up the shopping bag containing Rory’s present that was still sitting on the hall table, next to the toolbox. She fished around inside it and pulled out one of the business cards. “The bag is great. I’m gonna give it to Rory when she gets home tonight. She finished up in the top three percent of her class at Chilton.”
“That’s great, Lorelai, but what-”
She thrust the business card at him. “Go have a look at the store,” she told him. She forced a smile. “It’s beautiful.”
“I’m not really a boutique kind of guy…” Luke trailed off as he caught sight of the name on the business card. “Anna Nardini. I knew her.”
“Go visit the store,” she repeated, willing him to take her seriously. He had to know. She couldn’t tell him and she wasn’t sure if Anna would but if she could get him to that boutique then maybe, just maybe, it’d all come out and he’d know the truth. “Trust me on this, Luke.”
“Okay,” he answered, almost numbly.
“You should go,” she said softly.
He looked at her, his eyes still revealing his hurt and confusion. Finally he nodded. Without another word, he walked to the front door and opened it, turning to look at her briefly before he left. As the door clicked shut, Lorelai realized that Bert was still sitting on the hall table. Funny, she mused, he left it behind last time, too.
Back to index
Chapter 10: Invincibility Made Easy
Chapter 10: Invincibility Made Easy
The next few days passed by in a blur of activity. Lorelai didn’t go into the diner. Every morning she went straight to the inn, buried herself in her work and stayed there until dinner time, going straight home and ordering pizza. Sookie fed her at the Independence Inn, of course, but there were questions galore accompanying breakfast and lunch. Why aren’t you at Luke’s? Did you have a fight with Luke? You don’t have fights with Luke very often. He adores you. What happened?
She didn’t answer any of Sookie’s questions, but the next day she skipped lunch. Rory came home in an insanely happy mood having just gotten back together with Dean and Lorelai recalled the two of them, both insanely happy, giggling and dancing in the street outside the town gazebo. Oh, to be happy again. She hadn’t been truly, really happy in a very long time and it was starting to really affect her ability to keep up a happy face. She’d always prided herself in that stiff upper lip, the ability to keep up appearances that had been ingrained in her since childhood. As much as she didn’t agree with her parents in some respects, she did agree that there were some things people just didn’t need to see. Her flipping out was one of them. She didn’t mean that she should just be an emotionless automaton but she didn’t like everyone seeing her pain. It was easier to put on her fight face or crack a joke or babble incoherently using as many pop culture references as possible than to be honest enough to let people see she was hurting. Luke used to always realize when I was hurting, she thought to herself. He was one of the only ones who did, who could succeed where Rory failed in digging out those nasty issues to talk about and process. He always managed to make her feel better, to fix things. She didn’t know how to handle it when he was at the root of her problem. This is something he can’t fix. At least not straight away.
Before she realized it, Friday night had rolled around and they were on their way to the parents for Friday night dinner. Lorelai was quiet the entire drive out to Hartford, while Rory chatted about Dean, school, the feud with Paris, options for summer classes, Tristan and the PJ Harvey debacle, Lane’s trip to Korea with no return ticket. Once they got to the front door of the Gilmore house, Lorelai reached to ring the doorbell but Rory stopped her.
“Mom, you’re acting really, really weird,” she commented with obvious concern. “Is everything okay? I mean, you could get a cab home and I could tell Grandma and Grandpa that you’re sick.”
“I’m here now,” said Lorelai, trying to muster up a little bit of energy. “And I skipped lunch so I could probably use a decent meal. Trust me, the grandparents won’t notice me being quiet tonight.”
“Why won’t they notice you being quiet tonight?” Rory asked. Lorelai didn’t bother replying, she just leaned over and rang the doorbell.
Emily opened the door with a huge smile on her face. “You're here. Richard, they're here.”
“Wonderful!” came Richard’s voice from somewhere else in the house.
Emily put her hand on Rory’s shoulder and ushered them into the house. “Come in, come in, come in. Let's get you a drink. Put your coat down. Oh, and are you hungry? I had Antonia make some Roqueford puffs. Antonia, bring the puffs! Come, sit down, sit down. Richard!”
“Say nothing until I get there!”
“Well, hurry up!” As they sat down on the sofas, Emily turned to face them with a broad smile on her face. “So, tell me what's new with you girls.”
“Uh, nothing,” said Lorelai.
Rory looked at her grandmother with curiousity. “Hey Grandma, what about you? Did something special happen?”
“Well, as a matter of fact…” Emily peered in the direction of Richard’s study, her expression turning to one of annoyance. “Oh for goodness sake. Richard, dammit!”
“Mom, why don't you just tell us what's happening now?” Lorelai asked, wanting to get it all over with so she could slip into being unnoticed while they reveled in Rory’s good grades.
“Oh, all right. I can't wait for your grandfather any longer,” said Emily, leaning in conspiratorially towards the girls. “Well, you know I'm very good friends with Bitty Charleston, the headmaster's wife.” Lorelai nodded. “Well, we had this little arrangement where she keeps me aprised of all the goings on at Chilton. You know, she tells me all the gossip on the students and their parents, and any piece of information I might find useful. Well, this afternoon she called to tell me the class list just came out, and Rory has finished in the top three percent!”
“I know,” said Lorelai flatly.
“You do?” Emily asked, taken aback. “Well, who do you know at Chilton?”
“Um, Rory.”
“Oh.”
Rory looked apologetically at her grandmother. “It wasn't definite, but I had a pretty good idea.”
Richard walked in with a broad smile on his face. “Rory, wonderful news. You finished in the top three percent of your class.”
Lorelai nodded. “We know.”
“What? I told you not to say anything before I got here.”
“No, no, we already knew and it’s good news either way. Let's all agree on that.” As Richard and Emily started to fill Rory in on their plans to have a special dinner to celebrate Rory’s success, Lorelai felt herself begin to drift again. She wondered if Luke had gone to see Anna. She wondered if Anna had told him about April. She wondered if Anna actually knew that Luke was the father. After all, she had all but named him in her description of the guy who didn’t seem like a kid person speech. Either Anna hadn’t caught on or she thought that April’s father was someone else or she was simply just really good at hiding her reaction. Science fair… weren’t there three different guys April took DNA samples from? Was that because Anna really did have no idea which of the three guys it was? Maybe Anna just agreed with me on the ‘you should tell him’ speech because she wanted me to stop talking. After all, it was a pretty intense conversation for two strangers to have. What if Luke goes there and Anna doesn’t tell him? I mean, April must have school. She wasn’t at school that day, though, maybe she’s on vacation? Or maybe they had a teacher only day or something. What if Luke goes there and April’s not there so Anna doesn’t tell him that she has a daughter that might possibly be Luke’s? Then what? What do I do then? Especially since Luke probably never wants to see me again after I all but completely shot him down. What’s the next step? There has to be a next step.
“Lorelai, are you joining us?”
Her mother’s voice jolted her back to the present and she realized that Richard and Rory were already heading to the dining room. Emily was looking at her with mild concern.
“Yeah, sorry, just… thinking about stuff for the inn,” Lorelai lied. “There’s a lot going on at the moment, I’m a little distracted.”
“We’re having a family dinner,” Emily said in a chilly tone. “I’m sure you can put aside your worries for just one evening.”
Once they were all seated at the table, Lorelai couldn’t seem to stay focused on the conversation. Instead she concentrated on her food, making sure her mouth was full most of the time so she wouldn’t have to say anything. Richard and Emily were positively buzzing with excitement over Rory’s marks, Richard going on about how he had bragging rights to some guy at work whose son’s head was shaped like a football. Rory kept up with the conversation, telling the grandparents about projects and summer classes, every now and then shooting a glance at Lorelai who was trying to stay under the radar. She didn’t trust herself to make small talk. If she’d had a choice, she wouldn’t be here at all.
“Lorelai, how are things at the inn?” Richard inquired.
“Good,” she replied. “Things are good.”
“You told me there was a lot going on that was distracting you,” Emily said with a frown. “That doesn’t sound good to me.”
“It’s nothing major,” Lorelai said, trying to keep her tone light. “Just normal seasonal stuff.”
“You’ve been awfully preoccupied all throughout dinner,” said Emily, looking at her pointedly. “You’ve shown no enthusiasm whatsoever about Rory’s success at Chilton. Honestly, Lorelai, we’ve all worked so hard to get Rory into that school, the least you can do is celebrate her victories. You can put aside work stress long enough to be happy for your daughter.”
“I am happy for her,” Lorelai insisted. “I’m just… I’m not feeling well and work is a little stressful, yeah.”
“Do you need to hire more help at the inn?” Richard asked. “I’m sure your mother can find you some names of companies to contact for extra staff if you’re experiencing a rush.”
“No, we’re fine,” said Lorelai.
“Maybe you should see a doctor,” Emily suggested with a frown. “You’re most certainly off color this evening. Perhaps you’re coming down with something.”
“Maybe I am,” Lorelai agreed, figuring it was the best way of getting her mother off her case.
“We can call Joshua and ask him to come over and check you out,” Richard suggested. Lorelai was too tired and preoccupied to even muster up a ‘dirty’. “He’s a great friend of the family and I’m sure he’d be all too happy to oblige.”
“Thanks Dad, but that really won’t be necessary,” Lorelai replied, focusing back to her plate. “This is really good, Mom. I’ll have to give my compliments to the chef.”
“Rory, has your mother been getting enough sleep?” Emily asked Rory who had so far been wise enough to stay out of it.
Rory hesitated. “She’s had a bad week,” she admitted. “And she has been busy at the inn the last few days.”
“Lorelai, you need to take care of yourself,” Emily scolded. “You shouldn’t take your health for granted. I know you imagine yourself invincible but you’re not as young as you used to be and one day you’re going to start having problems if you don’t pay attention. Think of the example you’re setting for Rory. You’re setting her up for future health problems. Do you want to be responsible for Rory not looking after herself properly when she’s older?”
Emily’s words, though mild in comparison to the millions of things Lorelai had heard her say over the years, were just enough to send her over the edge. The composure she’d been barely holding onto since Luke left her house that night melted and, to her mortification, she found herself dissolving into tears right there at the dinner table. The room went deadly silent as Lorelai put down her knife and fork and picked up her napkin, wiping her eyes and trying desperately to regain that composure. This was the worst possible place to start crying. Her parents stared at her in utter shock and she realized that Emily, at this point, had never really seen Lorelai with her defenses down.
“Oh my goodness,” whispered Emily as Rory sprang up from her seat and ran around the table to where her mother was sitting, putting her arms around Lorelai as she lost any hope of getting it together.
“I think maybe we’d better go,” Rory said softly to her grandparents.
“Yes, I think that may be best,” said Richard, somewhat uneasily. “Rory, drive safely and make sure your mother gets a good nights sleep.”
Lorelai barely noticed as Rory helped her out of her seat and guided her towards the front door. Emily and Richard followed them out, Emily having sent the maid for the coats. As Lorelai sat in the passenger seat of the Jeep, still quietly sobbing, she vaguely heard Emily telling Rory to call when they got home. They drove home in silence, Lorelai’s sobs eventually quieting down to the occasional sniffle. When they finally arrived in Stars Hollow, Lorelai looked out the window despondently as they passed Luke’s. The diner was dark and deserted. A knot formed in her stomach as she saw an all too familiar large cardboard sign attached to the front door: Gone Fishing.
Back to index
Chapter 11: The Intervention
Chapter 11: The Intervention
Lorelai woke up on Saturday to sunlight streaming through the crack in her bedroom curtains and the distinct feeling that she’d overslept. She looked at the clock to see that it was nearly ten thirty and she started to panic when she remembered that she’d agreed to be at the inn today. She clambered out of bed, threw on some clothes and ran down the stairs, a pair of shoes in her hand. When she arrived in the kitchen to get her coffee, she stopped dead in her tracks. Rory was calmly eating at the table a meal she couldn’t have possibly prepared. Pancakes. Bacon. Eggs. French toast. The works. She stared in bewilderment.
“What are you doing?” Lorelai blurted out.
“I’m eating breakfast,” Rory said, looking slightly confused. “What does it look like I’m doing?”
“Where did you get that?”
“Sookie made it,” Rory explained. “I called her to say that you wouldn’t be at work today. I didn’t think you’d be up to it after what happened last night.”
Lorelai winced. “You told her.”
Rory nodded. “Yes, and she flipped out and said that she’d make us breakfast and so she brought it over from the inn. She just left, she wanted to wait for you to wake up but she had to get back to work. She says to call her when you woke up.” Lorelai sat down across from Rory at the table. Rory gave her an odd look. “Your shirt is on inside out.”
Lorelai sighed. “I saw the time and I panicked… I should have set an alarm.” She started digging into the plate of breakfast. “I need to eat this and I need to get to work.”
“You are not going to work today,” Rory stated. “You are going to go upstairs and have a nice, relaxing bath. We’re going to hire out a whole bunch of movies and get a whole lot of junk food and sit and blob for the day.” Rory grabbed Lorelai’s wrist before she got her fork load of food to her mouth. “And you are going to chew and swallow and savor your breakfast, not inhale it. You are not in a hurry. Today, you are relaxing. Do you hear me?”
“Rory, I have to go to work-”
“Sookie says she’ll send you home if she sees you there,” Rory interrupted. “Eat slower.”
“I will if you give me my wrist back.”
Rory let go of her wrist and Lorelai went back to eating at a regular pace. They ate in companionable silence for a few moments. “I was gonna go get us breakfast from Luke’s, but it’s closed,” Rory commented. “Apparently Luke’s gone fishing.”
“I know,” Lorelai replied. “I saw the sign last night.”
“Any idea what’s going on?” Rory asked.
Lorelai shook her head. “He’s probably just… going fishing. He likes fishing.”
“Yeah, but Luke’s is never closed,” Rory insisted. “Did anything happen? I wonder if it’s because Rachel left.”
“Maybe,” Lorelai admitted. Where did he go? Did he really go fishing? Did he see Anna? Does he know about April? Is that why he left?
“That would explain what’s going on with him,” Rory mused. She cleared her throat and looked seriously at her mother. “Now how about you explain what’s going on with you?”
“It’s nothing, just stress at work-”
“I know what you told Grandma,” Rory interrupted. “But how about you tell me the truth? You make me tell you everything, it should go both ways.” Lorelai sighed. Rory gave her a pointed look. “You freaked Grandma and Grandpa out. After you went to bed, Grandma called.”
Lorelai sighed again. “Let me guess, she’s going to call social services because she thinks I’m mentally unstable and unfit as a mother and they’re going to take you away from me and put me in some kind of institution.” She pointed a finger at her daughter dramatically. “Don’t forget, you owe me a rhinestone covered straightjacket.”
“Grandma thinks you need a vacation.”
Whoa. Definitely didn’t see that one coming. “Excuse me?”
Rory took a deep breath. “We talked, I said that you’ve obviously been under a lot of stress recently and that you hadn’t been a hundred percent clear exactly what was causing that stress and Grandma thinks that you taking a vacation would be good for you. She says she can look into booking you in for a couple of weeks at this health spa in Florida. It’s right near the beach and there’s a ton of pampering involved. Massages, facials, you name it.”
“It’ll also be incredibly expensive,” Lorelai countered. “Rory, it sounds great but I can’t afford it.”
“Grandma says she’ll pay.”
Lorelai laughed. “You know there’s no way I’d accept that.”
“Yeah, well I think you should.”
“Rory-”
“Grandma wants to do something nice for you,” Rory interrupted. “She was really worried about you. She thinks you could do with some time to yourself, to relax, to unwind. She thinks last night’s outburst was all bottled up stress and that you need to get rid of some of that tension. And you know what, I think she’s right. I mean, this has been a really huge year for both of us. Not only that, but you’ve worked really, really hard for the last sixteen years to keep a roof over our heads, to keep us in coffee and junk food, to keep us from running around naked and to keep me educated — no wonder you’re stressed!”
“Last night’s little meltdown was a one time thing,” Lorelai assured her. “And yeah, life can be stressful sometimes, but its life, you know, and you just have to deal with it. Build a bridge, get over it, etcetera, etcetera. I am fine. I can deal with stress on my own without massages and facials and Florida, thank you very much.”
“I know this isn’t just stress,” Rory countered. “If it was just stress, then I would probably agree with you. But you have been acting really weird lately and you crying at Friday night dinner was just the last straw. I am staging an intervention here.”
Lorelai raised her eyebrows. “Oh, are you?”
“I talked to Sookie about the possibility of you taking two weeks off and she said she’d call Mia and let me know but that it shouldn’t be a problem,” Rory informed her. “Sookie agrees. You need a vacation. Grandma said I could stay with them while you’re in Florida. Since you’re going to flying to Florida, that means I’d have the Jeep so I can be in Stars Hollow to spend time with Dean and Lane before she goes to Korea and to keep you up to date on town proceedings so you won’t feel like you’re missing out on anything-”
“And what makes you think I’m going to agree to this?”
“I’m not backing down on this,” Rory shot back. “Not unless you tell me exactly what’s going on with you that’s got you so worked up.”
Lorelai sighed and pushed her breakfast plate away, her appetite suddenly gone. “What do you want me to say, Rory? I wish I could give you a reason for why I’ve been acting like a fruit cake for the past week but I can’t, because I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t understand any of it. I’m going insane. One moment, I’m in bed with the wrong man, listening to him try to explain to his kid what I’m doing there and my heart is breaking and then here I am, five years earlier, waking up to find Luke fixing my porch rail and thinking ‘I’ve been here before, I recognize that tree, I’ve done this and I’ve bought the tee-shirt’! And so, what, I’m supposed to believe that I just dreamed five years of my existence? I’m supposed to believe that I dreamed Jess and Sherry and Gigi and Alex and Nicole and Jason and Logan and Mitchum Huntzberger who dares to shoot down your dreams and sends you off to steal a boat and get arrested with his son?” Lorelai laughed harshly. “No, wait, that bit sounds like a dream. You, Rory Gilmore, getting arrested for stealing a boat, dropping out of Yale, not talking to me for months, moving in with my parents and joining the DAR? I can accept that being a dream, because that was crazy. Completely and utterly crazy.”
“I dropped out of Yale?” Rory echoed. “Didn’t you say I went to Harvard?”
“I said you got into Harvard,” Lorelai corrected her. “And Princeton. And Yale. And the pro/con lists chose Yale. You don’t argue with the pro/con lists, Rory. You just don’t. Unless you’re Luke, that is.” She held her head in her hands. “I’m supposed to believe that I dreamt everything with Luke, too? I dreamt dancing with him at his sister weddings. I dreamt him kissing me at the test run for The Dragonfly. I dreamt an incredible first date when he showed me a horoscope I’d written for him that he’d kept in his wallet for eight years. I dreamt him making me an ice rink when I had a fight with snow. I dreamt us a breakup and a pretty spectacular reunion. I dreamt that I proposed and he said yes but we held off the wedding until things were right with you and when things were finally right with you, he found out that he had a daughter. A twelve year old daughter named April. And he didn’t tell me for two months until I found out accidentally because she was at the diner and then after that, I didn’t meet her properly for months because he wanted to keep that part of his life separate from me. His fiancée. And I got drunk at Lane’s wedding and gave an embarrassing toast, telling all of Stars Hollow that I was never getting married because we postponed the wedding. June 3rd. It was supposed to be June 3rd. Then I finally got to meet April at her birthday party and things felt like they were going to be okay but April’s mom didn’t want me near April until Luke and I were married and then just… I snapped and I asked Luke to elope with me. I told him it was now or never and he told me…” she slowed down and took a deep breath before finishing, “he told me he couldn’t jump like that. And I walked away and he didn’t follow me.” By this stage, Lorelai was in tears and Rory was staring at her in complete and utter shock. “If he’d followed me, I would have stopped. If he’d even just called out after me, I would have stopped. But he let me go. And… I went to see your dad. And we had too much to drink, and one thing led to another and before I knew it, I was waking up in his bed. Unclothed. And it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened there. And I went back to sleep and… all of a sudden, it’s 2001 again. And Luke’s outside at 6.30 in the morning, fixing my porch rail.”
“Mom… I don’t know what to… that doesn’t make any sense!”
“I know it doesn’t,” Lorelai replied miserably. “But I went to April’s mom’s boutique today. Like I remembered it in my dream.” She stood up, walked into the living room where she’d stashed the bag after giving Luke the business card. She pulled out the bag and gave it to Rory. “Here. This is for you.”
Rory opened the bag and examined its contents. She pulled out the remaining business cards and read them. “Anna Nardini,” she read. “That’s April’s mom?”
“Uh huh,” Lorelai affirmed. “And I saw April. She was younger, sure, but it was still her. And she has Luke’s nose. Luke has a kid he never knew about for twelve years. She’s eight now.” Lorelai smiled sadly. “She’s cute.”
“Luke has a daughter?” Rory echoed. “Wait, how do you know she’s really his? How do you know that somehow, this isn’t all some weird coincidence and you’re just freaking yourself out over nothing?”
“I want to believe its some weird coincidence,” Lorelai admitted. “But I don’t think it is. And Luke has to know. I gave him a business card.”
“When?” Rory asked.
“A few nights ago,” said Lorelai. “He came over to get his toolbox and… we kissed.”
“Did that happen in your dream?” Rory challenged.
“No,” Lorelai admitted. “But in my dream, Luke did come over to get his toolbox and he was going to say something but Max interrupted.”
“That’s why you broke up with Max,” Rory realized.
“I broke up with Max because I didn’t want to hurt him,” Lorelai countered. “And in the dream, I hurt him.”
“You broke up with Max because you’re in love with Luke,” Rory corrected. A look of realization dawned on her face. “That’s why Luke’s gone fishing, isn’t it? He went to the boutique and Anna told him about April and now he’s gone fishing to get away from it all.”
“Maybe,” Lorelai admitted. She buried her face in her hands. “This is so screwed up.”
Rory was silent for a few moments, then began to speak. “Mom, I think you should seriously take Grandma up on the Florida thing. It could make things easier to handle. It might give you some insight into this whole ‘is it a dream/did it really happen?’ debate.”
“You don’t think I’m crazy?”
“Oh, I always think you’re crazy,” Rory teased. Lorelai managed a real smile for the first time in weeks. “But I… I need time to process all this and if I need time, then you definitely need time. Time away from here. It’ll be good for you.”
As much as she hated to admit it, Lorelai was beginning to think her daughter had a point. She sighed. “Florida, huh?” Maybe it’s what I need. To be somewhere else. Somewhere far, far away from where all of this is happening. “I think I’m gonna need to buy a new swimsuit.”
Back to index
Chapter 12: You've Always Got A Choice
Chapter 12: You’ve Always Got A Choice
My mother sure knows how to spring into action, Lorelai mused as she, Rory and Emily sat in the departure lounge at the airport in Hartford. As soon as Lorelai had agreed to the proposed vacation, Emily booked Lorelai two weeks at the health spa and a first class flight to Florida for Sunday night within the hour. Saturday was spent shopping with Rory. Rory didn’t bring up the subject of the five missing years until later that night when they sat together on the couch, eating junk food and watching movies in preparation for the two weeks apart. Lorelai realized then that Rory had never been apart from her for that long. Lorelai was used to not having Rory around, after three years at Yale, the trip to Washington in the summer before her senior year at Chilton and the months spent not even talking to each other. Rory seemed a little on edge as they sat until she finally asked the questions that had obviously been on her mind since that morning.
“You and Luke were engaged, weren’t you?” she asked. Lorelai nodded. Rory smiled. “I always knew you had feelings for him. Everyone knows he’s always been crazy about you.”
“I love him,” Lorelai confessed. “I think I always have… I don’t think I ever really loved anyone else.”
Rory was quiet for a few moments, then asked another question. “What happens with me and Dean?”
The question made Lorelai uncomfortable. “Rory, I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to tell you this.”
“Why?” Rory asked. “I want to know what happens. I want to know if I should invest in this or not bother. I mean, you knew it wasn’t going to work out with Max so you broke up with him sooner. If I know that I’m going to eventually break up with Dean, maybe I should just… I dunno, do it now, before I get too attached. That way the eventual break-up will be easier.”
“Honey, you can’t think like that,” Lorelai said gently. “You’re young. Of course it’s conceivable that you’ll be with other guys other than Dean. But you shouldn’t dwell on that because you’ll miss out on the good stuff.” She tried to think of a way to explain it. “Look, things between Luke and I ended really, really badly. But if I had the chance to go back, I wouldn’t not date Luke just to avoid getting my heart broken. There are things I would change, sure, but I wouldn’t just completely forget about being with Luke. It’s that whole ‘better to have loved and lost’ thing… totally clichéd, but at the same time, rather appropriate in this case.”
Rory gave her mother a serious look. “Mom, if you’re right about all this and it wasn’t just a dream and a crazy coincidence, then you have the chance to go back. You’re gonna try to work things out with Luke, aren’t you?”
“I want to,” Lorelai confessed. “But April… April has to come first. Luke doesn’t cope well when more than one huge thing in his life is happening — he’s a very tunnel vision kind of guy. He focuses on one thing at a time and it’s an amazing feeling when that one thing he’s focusing on is you, trust me. But when it’s not… it’s heartbreaking. He needs to learn to get that balance and he needs to learn to accept help and input. And I need… I need to accept that I need to put everything that happened behind me and take this new chance, if that’s what it is. I can’t hold onto how much it all hurt because I need to start over. And things need to be different.”
“You need to tell Luke all this,” Rory said, her voice grave. “Otherwise he won’t understand.”
“I know,” Lorelai replied, her voice equally as serious. “But… Rory, you can’t tell anyone else about this.”
Rory nodded. “I know.” She grinned. “No one would believe me anyway.”
Lorelai looked at her daughter, a little mystified. “You believe me?”
“I think so,” Rory admitted. “I mean, I know it sounds crazy, but it does clear some things up. Man, it’s a shame we don’t buy lottery tickets, because if we did we could be rolling in it if you’d remembered the lucky number from a certain night…”
“Not a chance,” Lorelai countered with a grin. “I have no head for numbers, you know that.” With that comment, Lorelai realized that at that moment in time, she hadn’t completed her diploma. Rats. More finals. More classes.
“Is there… is there anything else that you can tell me about?” Rory asked, cautiously. “You did tell me that I stole a boat and dropped out of Yale and it all sounds so crazy and it really doesn’t sound like me… what happened? Why? I don’t want that to happen again.”
On one hand, Lorelai wanted to tell her everything, every little detail and watch her innocent sixteen year gasp in horror and firmly resolve that she would let none of it happen. She wanted Rory to fix it all, not to sleep with a married Dean, not to fall for Logan Huntzberger and have his father crush her dreams, not to drop out of Yale and move in with her parents. But on the other hand, she didn’t want Rory to spend the next five years trying desperately to avoid making all the mistakes she’d made. She didn’t want Rory to have her life dictated like that. Yes, they’d been awful things to experience but Rory had grown because of them. Lorelai had been so proud to see her bounce back from her time away from Yale and end up the editor of the Yale Daily News only months after her return. And even though Logan would probably never be her favorite person, it had seemed that Rory was happy with him. Things might change for Rory. Things might stay the same. But either way, she’s going to be okay because she’s Rory and she’s resilient and she’s a fighter. I can’t control her life and if I told her every little detail, I would be controlling her life.
“The only thing I’m going to tell you is that I want to give you two pieces of advice,” Lorelai said, trying to convey how serious she was by her tone.
“Okay, go ahead.”
“Number one,” Lorelai began. “Learn to let things go, learn to recognize when things are really over. Never think that you can truly go back to the way things were because you can’t. People change, people move on. Treasure what you have in the present, embrace the possibilities of the future. It’s okay to look back, sure, but you can’t get something back because it was good once because it probably won’t always be good. Everything has a season. And seasons pass.”
“Philosophical and cryptic,” Rory commented. “I don’t suppose you’re gonna explain why that’s important, are you?”
Lorelai shook her head with a smile. “No, honey, because I want you to have a choice. You’ve always got a choice.”
Rory nodded, apparently accepting it. “Okay, number two?”
“Number two,” Lorelai announced. “Always believe in yourself.”
Rory gave her mother a look. “Okay, incredibly high cheese factor.”
“I’m serious,” said Lorelai. “Believe in yourself. Believe in your abilities, believe in your dreams and work to make those dreams come true. If the dream changes, it’s okay. As long as there’s still a dream, there’s still a goal, there’s still something you want to accomplish in your life. I don’t care what it is. As long as there’s something you’re working towards. Something worthwhile. Because you have the world at your feet, Rory, and I want to see you set it on fire. I want you to believe in yourself as much as I believe in you and that is a whole lot.” She looked at Rory and wrinkled up her nose in distaste. “Do I have to hand back in my “I’m a member of the Cool Mom Club” card due to that rather geeky little speech?”
Rory shook her head. “Sorry, but we got you a lifetime membership deal, remember?”
“Of course! Silly me!”
The rest of the evening had been spent watching movie after movie and they’d fallen asleep on the couch sometime after two. They woke up at nearly midday to a phone call from Emily who informed them she was on her way to Stars Hollow to help them prepare for the trip. No amount of persuading would get her to change her mind on this one. After frantically cleaning up the mess from movie night and hiding all objects that could possibly cause offence in the thirty minutes it took for Emily to arrive, they managed to argue for a good four hours about what Lorelai needed to take to Florida, what Rory needed to bring to Hartford and why on earth Lorelai had bought a bikini covered in fruit. By the time they reached the airport, Lorelai definitely was looking forward to some peace and quiet in Florida, even though she knew that both her mother and Rory would be in touch pretty much constantly throughout the trip.
The idea of a vacation all by herself scared her slightly. She’d never really spent any extended period of time like this alone and not working. She was about to spend two weeks with herself and her thoughts and that scared her more than slightly. Maybe this is what I need, she thought to herself for the millionth time since she’d accepted the idea. The more she thought about it, the more sense it made. After all, Luke had taken off, she had every right to do the same. It was summer. It would be fun. It would be… different. And her fruit print bikini really did look incredible on her.
“You’re going to have a fabulous time,” Emily said once again as they waited for Lorelai’s boarding call. “Some of the ladies from the DAR have spent time at this particular health spa and they say that it’s just sensational. Relaxing, rejuvenating… it’ll make you feel ten years younger.”
“Yes Mom, it would be nice to be twenty two again,” Lorelai commented. “Rory, maybe it’s a good thing you’re not coming. When you were six you were still doing those ballet lessons and I really don’t want you prancing around the living room twenty-four seven again.”
Emily frowned. “Rory dear, your grandfather and I are perfectly happy to take you somewhere exciting for a vacation sometime this summer but we both agreed that it would be best if your mother had this particular vacation alone.”
“I know,” Rory assured her. “I don’t particularly want to be six again. I couldn’t reach the Mallomars.”
Emily chose to ignore that comment. “Now Lorelai, I’ve booked you in three sessions with the masseuse. I’ve written down the times for you — make sure you go. I had to bump someone else off to keep these appointments.”
“Mom!” Lorelai exclaimed.
“We’re paying a fortune for this spa and we expect to get what we paid for,” Emily insisted.
“You can’t just bump someone else off,” Lorelai insisted.
“Nonsense,” Emily replied. “There’s always someone to bump.”
Before Lorelai could protest further, her boarding call came over the intercom. Rory looked at her. “That’s you.”
Lorelai smiled sadly. “That’s me.”
“Do you have everything?” Emily inquired. “There’ll be someone to meet you at the airport in Florida to drive you to the spa. Just remember to relax. That’s why you’re there. We’ll be in touch. Call when you arrive. Anything you want, you just charge to your room account. We’re paying for everything. Don’t worry about a thing.”
“Thank you,” said Lorelai sincerely. “This… this means a lot to me.”
“It’s not often we get a chance to do something like this for you,” Emily replied. “Thank you for letting us. I know you value your independence. But you can accept a little help once in awhile.”
“Yeah,” Lorelai admitted. She turned to Rory. “You gonna be okay without me, kiddo?”
“I think I’ll survive,” Rory joked, hugging her. “You’ll call when you get there?”
“I’ll call when I get there.”
“I’ll let you know what the haps are in the Hollow,” Rory said in a tone that was light enough to disguise what Lorelai knew her daughter was really talking about. I’ll tell you when Luke gets back. I’ll let you know what’s happening with him. “Meanwhile, you go chill in Florida.”
A few more minutes of goodbyes, a wave from behind the glass. As she sat in her first class seat, waiting for the plane to take off, Lorelai closed her eyes and pictured Luke in her mind. I didn’t mean to rock your world like this. But I didn’t exactly plan for all of this to happen. I hope you’re okay.
Back to index
Chapter 13: Oxygen
Chapter 13: Oxygen
The first week in Florida passed by almost without her noticing it. Each day rolled into the next — massages, facials, spa baths, sunbathing. At first she tried to fit in as many activities as she could to distract herself from everything, but after a few days (and an embarrassing experience trying to learn how to surf) she truly allowed herself to relax. Most days were spent lounging in the sun, reading trashy novel after trashy novel — after all, she mused, there is a reason they call these things beach reads — and most nights were spent at the bar. She hadn’t been holding her breath for a bar at this health spa, remembering the “no caffeine” rule from the one she’d been to with Emily but she figured that this was Florida and there were too many rich alcoholics to truly deny them their tipple. The bar was nice, elegant and full of nice, elegant, available men of around her age that seemed to notice her and send her over drinks. She was polite but dismissive. She wasn’t here for that. She just wanted to go out, get dressed up, have a few drinks and sit and think.
It was at the bar where most of the really deep thoughts started happening. She thought back to the night she went to Boston and wondered why, out of all the people she could have gone to, she went to Christopher. I was hurting, she realized, and I wanted to hurt Luke as much as I was hurting. She’d never realized that about herself before and it wasn’t exactly pleasant. I’m not perfect, but neither is Luke. For the longest time I thought he was the perfect man. And when he found out about April, he didn’t tell me straight away because it was proof that he wasn’t. He wanted to be, though, I think. She sighed. I don’t suppose it matters anymore.
She couldn’t help comparing the two very different first kisses. On the porch of the Dragonfly, when he asked her to stand still and for what felt like the first time in her frantic existence, she actually did. And it just felt so right that they’d waded through the Rachels and the Christophers, the Nicoles and the Jasons to bring them to that very moment, on the porch, on the night her dreams came true in more than just one way. There was a touch of destiny in that kiss, something about having waited so long that made it… fated. The second first kiss was something else all together. Technically, it wasn’t her first kiss with Luke, but it was Luke’s first kiss with her and it had been like an explosion and she hadn’t been standing still, she’d been buzzing. And it had all been so heartbreakingly familiar. There was a touch of destiny in that kiss, too. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that subconsciously, she’d broken up with Max so early on to pave the way for that moment. It was supposed to be Luke. It should have been Luke all along.
Friday night was busier than it had been throughout the week. The piano player in the corner was busy playing some decorative jazz that reminded Lorelai of Morey next door. With a pang, she realized she was a little homesick for Stars Hollow. It was strange to be away from the bustle and craziness of the town that had become home for her and her daughter all those years ago. Sure, she’d been places with other people, but this was her first vacation all by herself and as good as she knew that it was for her, she was lonely and felt ready to go home. Going home early really wasn’t an option, though. Emily would call her ungrateful and Rory would worry about her. She took a sip of her martini from her position at a table by the window and looked again at the piano player near the entrance of the bar.
The man in the suit tie who had just walked into the room was definitely dressed the part but looked slightly out of place. Like most of the others in the room, he wasn’t wearing a tie. The difference between them and this man was that most of the men in the room didn’t wear ties as a deliberate statement of casualness. This man, however, did not look casual. He looked uncomfortable, he looked a little out of his depth and he was obviously looking for something or someone. Lorelai’s heart started pounding in her chest moments before she made the connection. It wasn’t as if she’d never seen him without the flannel and the baseball cap — after all, they’d been on plenty of dates that had him dressed not at all dissimilar to the way he was dressed now. Before she knew it, he was walking towards her, his expression guarded. She smiled at him, still not a hundred percent sure if she was dreaming. What the heck is Luke doing in Florida? Especially after everything that’s happened. When he arrived at the table, he gestured to the seat across from her. “May I sit?”
“Sure,” she managed to say. He sat down facing her, still with the same guarded expression. He didn’t speak for a long moment. She finally broke the silence. “Uh, did you want a drink?”
He nodded, standing up again. “I’ll go get one — do you want anything?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m good with this, thanks.” He nodded briefly again, then left for the bar. She watched him as he ordered his drink, her mind going too fast to even properly formulate all the questions she had. This was unexpected. She’d been so used to knowing what was about to happen that the unexpected was throwing her completely off track. What is he doing here? Why is he here?
He came back with a glass of scotch and sat down again. “Figured this was appropriate for the place,” he commented, looking around somewhat awkwardly. “This seems nice. You enjoying it?”
She nodded. “Yeah. It’s been… fun. A little weird, though. It’s the first time I’ve ever been on a vacation by myself.”
“I can imagine,” he replied. “You’re not exactly a solitary person.”
“No,” she admitted. “I think it’s good for me every once in awhile, though. This is probably my version of going fishing.” She looked at him pointedly. “Catch anything?”
His expression changed. “Wasn’t really the point,” he admitted. “It was more for… thinking.”
“I understand,” she assured him. He took a sip of his drink and then placed it back on the table with a soft thud. “Luke, what are you doing here?”
“I’m not sure,” he confessed after a long pause. “Rory told me you were in Florida and I dunno, I just… I found out where you were staying and booked a room at a hotel nearby and booked a flight to Florida and here I am. I thought maybe we could talk away from… everything. Florida is as good a place as any.”
“How long did you go fishing?” she asked a few moments later.
“Just a few days,” he replied. He looked at her, his expression serious. “I went to Anna’s boutique, like you told me to.” He swallowed, looked down briefly then looked back up. “I hadn’t seen Anna Nardini in over eight and a half years. I show up at that boutique and out comes this little girl and Anna tells me that her name is April and she’s just turned eight. Her daughter. Anna has a daughter. So I did the math in my head and asked her if she was mine. Anna didn’t know.” Luke looked down again and when he looked back up at Lorelai, she was a little startled to see that he looked hurt. “She said that she hadn’t thought about it but that it was possible. Then she went on about how she’d always assumed it was the other guy.”
Lorelai frowned. “The other guy?”
Luke sighed. “Yeah. Apparently she didn’t think we were exclusive and she was with some other guy the whole time we were together.” He took a sip of his drink and continued. “I mean, I don’t date much. You probably know that about me. But I don’t really date for fun, either. And I don’t go around dating three different guys at the same time.”
Ah, I think I remember this bit. And I should hope you don't go around dating three different guys at the same time. “Three?” Lorelai echoed.
“Didn’t I mention the other other guy?” said Luke with another sigh. “It’s great to know I’m such a high priority, isn’t it?”
“I’m sorry,” said Lorelai, patting his hand sympathetically. “At least you found out after the fact when it’s all kind of in the past. I mean, if you’d found out while you were with her, it could have been a whole lot more messy and painful.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Luke admitted. “I kind of lost it, just a little. I asked her if she knew for sure that April was… his, whoever he was and she said no, April could probably belong to any of those three guys. She broke up with me and both of the other guys when she found out. She never told any of us. But I think she always had it in her mind that April was… whoever’s. Probably he was the one she was most into, I guess, isn’t that how it works?”
“I suppose so,” Lorelai agreed. “But, Luke, that doesn’t mean-”
“So I asked for a DNA test,” Luke interrupted her. “I asked because I wasn’t sure and she wasn’t sure and what was she gonna do, tell her kid that she doesn’t know who her father is? I mean, sooner or later, the kid’s gonna want to know this stuff. And what’s Anna gonna say? There are three options out there? She could have told all of us when she was pregnant and found out then so that the father at least had the option of knowing his kid but no.” He sighed.
“She was probably embarrassed,” Lorelai said softly. “Think about it, it’s embarrassing. It was probably easier to just… do it herself. Raise April by herself.”
“I still don’t understand it,” Luke muttered. He looked at Lorelai, his expression serious and still somewhat shell-shocked. “She agreed to test me and April, just to calm me down, I guess. April’s really into science so the whole idea of DNA testing was really exciting for her.” Luke laughed softly. “Aren’t most kids excited when you take them to the circus or the movies or something?”
“I remember the first time I took Rory to the public library in Hartford,” Lorelai reminisced. “She was so excited. We spend hours there. She just kept saying about how huge it was and how there were so many books and how many could we carry with us on the bus back to Stars Hollow?” Lorelai smiled at the memory. “I can imagine April was probably a bit like that.”
“Yeah,” Luke admitted, a small smile on his face. “She’s a smart kid. Really smart.”
This was it, the moment of truth. “And so?” Lorelai pressed gently. “What were the results?”
Luke took in a deep breath and let it out. “She’s mine. I’m her father.” He laughed softly. “I have a kid. I’ve had a kid for eight years and I never even knew.”
“It’s better than twelve,” said Lorelai softly. “Isn’t it?”
Luke looked at her. “Of course it is,” he agreed. His expression changed, guarded once more. When he spoke, his words were deliberate, questioning, heavy, challenging. “You knew about this, didn’t you?” Lorelai couldn’t seem to get the words out, so she simply nodded. He sighed and took another sip of his drink. He looked at her again. “How? You never knew Anna. You had no way of knowing she was my ex-girlfriend when you walked into that boutique. If she didn’t know that April was mine, if she was so sure that April was someone else’s, how on earth could you know?”
“You’re going to think I’m crazy,” Lorelai began, feeling her eyes beginning to well up. “It sounds crazy, I know it does, but Rory believes me and maybe you’ll believe me, too, but maybe you won’t and you’ll try to get me committed or something.”
“Tell me,” Luke urged her, his voice raw. “I’ve been racking my brain for an answer to this for days. I’ve been trying to figure out how you knew about my daughter before I did. I’ve been trying to figure out why, when I finally, finally worked up the nerve to kiss you and you were so… so there with me, I know I didn’t imagine that, you told me that we couldn’t this. I’ve been trying to figure out what it is that had you so worked up for days before that and what could have caused you to melt down at your parents and prompt them to offer you this vacation which you took which is weird in itself because you don’t take anything from your parents apart from the money for Chilton, you’re too independent. I’ve been trying to figure it out and I can’t. So help me out here.”
Lorelai sat still for a few moments, her head reeling, not knowing what to say. “You shouldn’t have kissed me like that,” she finally blurted out.
He blinked, a little taken aback. “Like what?”
“Like…” she began, not sure how to explain it. “Like I’m your oxygen.”
He didn’t say anything for a few moments, he just looked at her. His gaze made her nervous, her heart was pounding faster than she believed humanly possible. And then his reply made it stop. “What if you are?”
“Luke-”
“I came all the way out here to Florida because I think you might just be the one,” he interrupted her, his face serious. “With everything that’s been going on with Anna and April and going fishing and you… what it all comes down to is that I’m here because I missed you and I think I’m in love with you and I think… I hope that you feel the same way.” His eyes searched her face, waiting for a response.
It was almost as if time was standing still for a moment as she pondered her next move. He needs to know. He needs to know. “You haven’t kissed me like that in a long time,” she said slowly, watching his reaction carefully. It didn’t disappoint. He looked completely bewildered.
“That was our first kiss,” he said, his voice portraying confusion. “Trust me, if I’d kissed you before, I wouldn’t have just forgotten all about it.”
“Our first kiss was at The Dragonfly,” she announced. She took his hand, took a deep breath and prepared to tell him everything.
Back to index
Chapter 14: Do It All Over Again
Chapter 14: Do It All Over Again
“The Dragonfly?” Luke echoed, looking even more confused, if at all possible. “Lorelai-”
“I need you to listen to me,” she interrupted. “I need you to listen to me and let me explain everything and then you can make your final decision on whether to believe me. Just hear me out. Please.”
“Okay,” he agreed, mystified.
“Do you remember a few weeks ago when you were fixing my porch rail at six thirty in the morning?” she asked.
“Yeah…”
She closed her eyes and tried to figure out how to explain this. “I was freaked out that morning because I remembered the exact same situation happening before,” she told him. “See, the last thing I remember before waking up that morning wasn’t going to bed at home the night before. It was 2006 and I was at Christopher’s.”
Luke blinked. “Christopher is Rory’s dad, right?”
Lorelai nodded. “Yeah. I… um… this is really hard to explain and you really are going to think I’m crazy and you might possibly hate me, but I went to Christopher’s because we’d just had a huge fight. I asked you to elope with me and you said no.”
“You asked me to elope?” Luke echoed.
“We were engaged,” Lorelai explained. She looked at him carefully, trying to gauge his reaction. “We were engaged, we were going to get married on June 3rd but then you found out about April. She had a science project for school and she wanted to find her dad, so she went to visit the three guys and took hair samples and did some DNA tests and… you’re her dad.”
Luke looked at her with an incredulous expression on his face. “Are you telling me that you knew about April because she found out I was her father five years from now and you’ve gone back in time?” he asked.
The words sounded stupid to her own ears. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “All I know is that I have five years worth of memories of things that are happening pretty much exactly as I remember them, apart from the things I changed… it could have been a dream. I thought it was a dream. But me dreaming that you had a daughter and then you finding out you have a daughter… it sounds pretty crazy, don’t you think?”
“It does,” Luke agreed, looking at her carefully. “You’re not making this up.”
“You thought I was making this up?”
“You’ve said some pretty crazy things to me before,” he reminded her. “But I can always tell when you’re serious. And you’re… definitely serious. If it’s not true, you at least think it is.” He let out a breath. “You were right about April.”
“You didn’t tell me about April for two months,” Lorelai blurted out. She tried not to let the hurt she still felt over that show but from the flash of guilt in Luke’s eyes, she realized that he’d noticed. “I kind of found out by accident. I didn’t really properly meet April for months afterwards… you wanted to work on having a relationship with her before introducing her properly to me. I respected that but it hurt. I felt like you were shutting me out of your life.”
“Lorelai-”
“Then I helped out with her birthday party and I thought everything was going to be okay,” Lorelai interrupted, feelings now tumbling out. “But Anna was mad that I was involved with the birthday party so I went to see her and she said that she didn’t want me around April until we were married. And we postponed the wedding but we never set another date for it so it just felt like we’d cancelled it and I felt like I was losing you and I just… I snapped and I asked you to elope with me and you said that you couldn’t jump like that and I left and you didn’t follow me.”
“So you went to Christopher,” Luke filled in for her, hurt evident in his eyes.
“I went to Christopher,” Lorelai echoed, her heart breaking just that little bit more at the look on his face. “I wanted a friend. Rory was busy seeing her boyfriend off to London and Sookie had Jackson and the kids and… Christopher and I had really settled into a good friendship, you know? I needed a friend and we started drinking and then I woke up unclothed in his bed and I don’t remember but happened but I’m not naïve, Luke. I single handedly ruined the best thing that ever happened to me. And I knew it. And then I fell asleep and all of a sudden I’m woken up by you fixing my porch rail.”
Luke didn’t say anything for a few moments. He looked out the window stoically, not looking at her. Lorelai bit her lip and finished the rest of her martini with gusto. He couldn’t look at her. He was mad. He was hurt. Even though she’d technically done nothing to hurt the man sitting in front of her. But the man sitting in front of her had never done anything to hurt her, and she was still hurt, too. He turned back towards her, his eyes wary. “It sounds crazy,” he said finally.
“I know,” Lorelai admitted.
“I don’t know exactly how I’m supposed to react to this,” he replied, raking his fingers through his hair. Briefly, she noticed that his hair was much fuller. It has thinned out over the years, she thought to herself with a slight tinge of guilt that she was noticing this particular fact at that exact moment. It seemed a little inappropriate.
“I don’t think there’s a textbook answer to that,” Lorelai said gently. “This is… this is crazy and I don’t what to make of it and I don’t know what it means.”
He sighed. He looked at his hands. Then he looked up at her. “So what now?” he asked.
It was her turn to look out the window. She bit her lip. “I don’t know,” she said again.
“What do you know?” he asked, his voice serious. She turned to look at him. There was a glimpse of hope in his eyes. At least she thought there was. She hoped there was.
“I know that I love you,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “I know that whatever it was — a dream, a weird time-traveling thing — is in the past and that I have to let go of it.”
“You want to let go,” he echoed. “You want to let go of… everything?”
She shook her head, smiling slightly at the memories. “No. No. Not everything.” She looked at him and thought back to all the times they’d shared. The kiss at the Dragonfly. That amazing first date, followed by an amazing yet slightly embarrassing morning after when she walked into the diner wearing only Luke’s flannel shirt. Him cooking her breakfast. Standing with him outside in the first snow. The ice rink he made her when she and snow had a falling out. Dancing with him at her parents vow renewal. The breakup and the spectacular reconciliation when he showed up on her doorstep and kissed her until she couldn’t see straight. Countless dates. Countless moments. Her white knight, taking over things at the inn while Sookie was on bed rest even though she nearly drove him crazy checking up on all the food. Wanting to step in and fix things when Rory dropped out of Yale. Her proposal. His almost immediate acceptance. We should have sex and drink Zima every night. Renovating the Crap Shack. Him looking after her dog after he’d professed to hate it. The weekend at Martha’s Vineyard. I love you and I am going to marry you and at our wedding, we are having lobster. So many things. So many memories. If she let go of everything, she’d be throwing out the good with the bad… and that was something she didn’t want to do. “Not everything.”
He looked at her intently. “How long did we have?”
“Two years,” she said simply. “But I refuse to believe that’s all we’ve got.”
He sighed. “Did I really wait that long?” he asked.
She nodded. “But I think that I wasn’t ready then,” she admitted. “I was scared. I was scared it would ruin our friendship. I didn’t want to lose you and if it meant having you but only as a friend, then that was what I was going to do. I didn’t realize that it would be so much better if it were more.”
“Are you ready now?”
She closed her eyes briefly. Was she ready? Was she ready to start it all over again? Yes. I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. To have that all back, to be with him again, to have the chance to make things right… I’m ready to start over. “Yes,” she told him, opening her eyes and looking straight at him, willing him to see how serious she was. A thought suddenly occurred to her. “Do you have your wallet?”
He looked at her, confused. “What?”
“Your wallet,” she repeated urgently. I need to see this with my own eyes. One final proof.
“Yeah,” he said, still looking at her warily, pulling it out of his pocket. “Why?”
“Give it here,” she ordered. He looked at her in utter disbelief for a few moments and then realization started to dawn. Tentatively, he handed it over to her. She held it, noticing it was still warm from his body heat. She was almost trembling as she opened up the wallet, fumbled through it for a few moments then finally pulled out a thin piece of newspaper. Holding it in her hands, she blinked back tears that had sprung to her eyes. This is it. Proof that this is real, this is right and this is worth fighting for.
Luke stared at the horoscope. “How… you remember this?”
“Not exactly,” she admitted. She looked up at him and smiled a watery smile. “You showed this to me on our first date. And you told me something that I need to tell you now.” She took a deep breath and continued. “I want you to know that I am in. I am all in.”
He looked at her, his expression unreadable. “You mean that?” he asked after a few moments.
“Of course I mean it.” She looked at him significantly. “And when I say that I’m all in, I mean that I want to be in on everything. I want to be a part of your life. I want to get to know your daughter. I don’t want to get in the way or steal the spotlight, I promise I’ll try and tone down my coolness so she gets to know you first but please, please don’t shut me out. I couldn’t take it. I just couldn’t.”
He flinched slightly at the pain in her voice and she closed her eyes briefly, trying to collect herself. When she opened her eyes, his face was laden with guilt. “I hurt you,” he stated softly.
She bit her lip. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters, Lorelai!” He sighed and looked at her again. “I don’t know what to make of this whole crazy situation. I don’t know what to believe. But you knew about April and you knew about the horoscope and you’re obviously hurt and apparently I caused that… I’m sorry.”
“It wasn’t you,” she told him, her voice a little stronger. “You didn’t do anything.” She swallowed. “I hurt you. I… I did something terrible and unforgivable and crazy and I ruined everything and if anyone should be sorry, it’s me.”
“You didn’t do anything,” he countered softly, taking her hand and squeezing it gently. “Ancient history now.” He gave a wry smile. “Though I’m not sure if you can call it history if you’re the only one that remembers it happening.”
She nodded. “True. True.” She looked into his eyes, trying to gauge his next move. “So what now?” she asked finally.
“We move forward,” he said simply. “Together. You tell me if I’m being an idiot and I’ll try to stop. Maybe it was a dream or a coincidence or something else entirely… I don’t care. All I care about is that I’ve got this chance with you and I’m not going to waste it or ruin it. I’m not.” He grinned. “Like I said, I’m not going anywhere.”
“What are you going to do about April?” Lorelai asked.
“We’ll figure that out when we get back to Stars Hollow,” Luke replied. “You and me. But right now, right here… this is for us. Just us.”
She smiled at him and looked over to the small space near the piano where a couple of people were dancing to a slow jazz tune on the piano. She recalled their first date, dancing under the stars at his sisters wedding. All of a sudden, she wanted that back. “Did you… do you want to dance with me?”
He raised his eyebrows slightly. “I don’t dance.”
She grinned as she stood up and pulled him up from his seat. He made no move to protest as she led him onto the dance floor. As they stood together, his arms around her waist, she leant into his chest and whispered in his ear. “I have it on good authority that you’re a compulsive liar.”
Back to index
Chapter 15: The Fruits of Unscripted Reality
Chapter 15: The Fruits of Unscripted Reality
Waking up in Luke’s arms the next morning felt like the most natural thing in the world. As she slowly woke up to the faint sound of his heartbeat, she breathed in his scent and moved closer to him, emboldened by the feeling of the familiar warm body next to hers. I’m not dreaming this time, was her first thought on waking. He’s here. With me. She smiled as she snuggled up beside him and felt his hand gently stroking her hair. Tilting her head back, she looked up to see him looking at her, very much awake. “Hey,” she greeted him, her voice thick with sleep.
“Hey,” he replied, smiling slightly. “Did you sleep well?”
“Uh huh,” she said, not wanting to move from her position in his arms. “How long have you been awake?”
“Not long,” he said, pulling her closer towards him. “Maybe half an hour. I didn’t want to wake you. You looked so peaceful.” He smiled. “That, and you snore.”
“What?” she demanded, pulling back to hit him gently on the arm. “That is no way to talk to a lady.”
He laughed. “If it’s any consolation, you snore in a very ladylike manner.”
She laughed back and kissed him. “Here’s hoping that makes up for the things that I do in a very unladylike manner.”
“So I’m taking that there are no regrets after last night?”
She shook her head. “None whatsoever.”
“This is new for me,” Luke admitted. “I mean, obviously not new as in I’ve had the… mechanics of it all down for awhile, but new as in… I’ve wanted this for a long time and now it’s here and it’s real and it’s… new.”
“I haven’t disappointed you, have I?”
He chuckled. “Far from it,” he said. “If anything, it’s better than I thought it would be.”
She smiled. “That’s a ringing endorsement. Should we get up?”
“We could just… stay here for awhile,” Luke suggested. “I don’t mind. Unless you want to get up.”
“I’m good,” she said, breathing in nice and slowly, allowing herself to relax. The tension she’d been carrying around with her for months was slowly starting to dissipate. She was finally starting to believe that things were going to be okay.
“Me too,” he replied. They lay there in companionable silence for awhile, each lost in their own thoughts. I’ve missed this so much, thought Lorelai. She thought back to over a week ago, her subconscious taunting her with memories of what she’d lost, what she might have had. Now, she had it again. And something told her that maybe, just maybe, it could be even better. They could make up for wasted time. They could get back what they’d lost and then some. She thought about all the things that she’d have to start over. She’d have to finish her business classes again. She wasn’t looking forward to that. But Luke would be at her graduation, the way he should have been the first time around. The Dragonfly probably wouldn’t open until around the same time, sure… but Luke would be around to help out. He wouldn’t let her run herself ragged like she had the first time around. And even then he stepped in to help with thirty thousand dollars, she mused. Even then, he was there for me when he didn’t really have to be. Jess. If Jess ended up in Stars Hollow like he had, perhaps it would all work out differently. I’m going to give the kid a chance, she vowed. I’ve seen how he turns out and it’s not all bad news. And with Luke and I together, maybe it’ll be easier.
The thoughts turned to Luke. How much do I tell him? What do I tell him? What do I leave out? There was so much that had happened and no doubt he’d be curious. It’s the same as what I told Rory, she realized. You have to make your own choices. Besides, nothing is set in stone. Things will happen, things will be different. I’ve made them different. I’ve set the wheels in motion on a different path… maybe a better one. Things are going to be okay.
“Penny for your thoughts,” said Luke softly, bringing her back to the present.
“My thoughts come that cheap, huh?” Lorelai joked. He laughed and she positioned herself so that she could face him more comfortably. “I was just thinking about… things.” She smiled. “I’m really happy.”
“The feeling is mutual,” he assured her.
“Everything’s going to work out,” she continued with a smile. “It’s just… wow. I’m here, you’re here and we’re… us. I’m so happy.”
His expression grew serious. “It’s not going to be easy, is it?”
She shook her head. “No,” she acknowledged. “But where would the fun be if it was easy?”
He gave a wry smile and shook his head slowly. “I can’t believe it. Everything’s just… I have a daughter. You and I are together. Everything’s changed all of a sudden… it’s a little overwhelming.”
She looked at him, concerned. “Are we moving too fast?” she asked. “If we’re moving too fast, tell me. I can slow down. I can wait for you. You waited for me, it’s the least I can do.”
“We’re fine,” he assured her. He reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I don’t know anything about little girls,” he admitted. “I’m gonna need your help. I don’t know how to be a parent. I’ve never done it.”
“You’re gonna be great,” she said with a smile. “Trust me.”
“I don’t even know what my role is,” he continued. “I mean, I don’t want to take April away from her mom. And I don’t even know if April will want to get to know me.”
“She will,” Lorelai assured him. “She’ll love you.”
“It just kills me how much I’ve missed, you know?” His expression was slightly pained as he spoke. “A kid should have two parents. It always made me so mad that Christopher wasn’t around for Rory and… I hate that I wasn’t around for April. It makes me feel like a hypocrite. I never wanted to be one of those guys that just abandons their kid.”
“You are not one of those guys,” she said firmly. “You didn’t know. You had no way of knowing. You can’t beat yourself up over this.” Hearing him speak so honestly about this made his actions a little easier to understand. Luke had been trying to make up for lost time because he felt guilty and because he’d made his feelings about Christopher not being there for Rory as a kid so known. That had been his goal — to establish a relationship with his daughter, to make up for twelve years of not being in her life. And I know that once Luke has a goal, he can get very set on it.
“I know that,” he admitted. “But it doesn’t make it any easier.” He smiled ruefully. “I thought we agreed not to talk about this until we got home.”
“It’s good to get some of it out in the open now,” she said softly. “Before we go back into the fishbowl that is Stars Hollow. There are some kinks to work out, sure.” She hesitated before continuing. “Just… talk to me about it. Be honest. It’s the only way this is going to work.”
“I know,” he replied.
“I keep forgetting this is all new for you,” Lorelai said with an apologetic smile. “Just because I can remember us together for two whole years doesn’t mean you’re where we were then right now.” She kissed him gently. “I can wait. As long as you need. As long as you keep me in the loop. As long as you still want me.”
“There’s no doubt about that,” he assured her. He kissed her back, the kiss growing deeper and more passionate as she tried to get closer to him, as close as she could get. He breathed her name softly into her ear and a shiver went down her spine. We’re gonna make it, she thought. We’re really gonna make it.
***
“Do you have everything?”
She sighed. “Yes, Luke, I have everything.”
“Are you sure?” he pressed. “Because I really don’t wanna get a phone call from the hotel saying we left something behind.”
Lorelai smirked. “You mean coz it could be something dirty?”
“Lorelai…”
“I might have left my panties in between the cushions on the sofa.”
“Aw jeez.”
“Hey, I didn’t hear you complaining at the time,” she teased him. “In fact, you were instrumental in their removal.”
“Okay, that’s it, I’m double checking.”
She giggled as Luke put down the bags he’d been carrying and went back to the sofa to investigate. Sitting down at the edge of the bed, she smiled and looked around the room where she and Luke had spent the majority of the week. After his arrival, she’d practically moved into his hotel room for the rest of the stay. It had been quite a week. A getaway unlike anything they’d ever had before. It was starting new, starting over and Lorelai was glad for it. A fresh start. A new beginning. Nothing is going to be the same as it was, she realized now. All those moments she’d spent with Luke only existed in her memory now and in some ways that was sad. But reality… reality is nothing to sneeze at, she mused, a smile covering her features as her thoughts drifted to the past week.
“Okay, so they’re not there,” Luke announced as he walked back over towards her. He gave her a look. “You were just trying to get me all worked up, weren’t you?”
She stood up and wrapped her arms around his waist. “I don’t know,” she murmured. “Did it work?”
He kissed her in response and she felt the familiar jolt go down her spine at the touch of his lips on hers. I hope I never get used to this, she thought. I hope it’s always as wonderful as this. I don’t want to ever settle for anything less than this. That was a promise to herself as much as anyone else. If I want this for good, I’m going to have to fight for it. I’m going to have to work at it. I’m a fighter and so is Luke. We’re going to be alright. We just need to be in this together.
“If we’re not careful,” Luke warned between kisses, “we’re going to be late for our flight home.”
“Couldn’t we just stay here?” she asked breathlessly. “I don’t want to… go home and find out that I imagined it all.”
He chuckled softly into her ear. “Not even my imagination is this good.”
She pulled away reluctantly and smiled up at him. “You’re right about us having to go.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Did I really say that?”
“Look at you being all Mr. Smooth,” she teased, raising her hand up to his neck and playing with the soft curls at the base. “I would stay here forever with you if you asked me to,” she confessed seriously. “But we have lives back in Stars Hollow.”
He nodded. “You have Rory and I have… April.” He was silent for a few moments. “You really think I can do this?” he asked finally.
She looked him straight in the eye. “I know you can,” she told him sincerely.
“So what now?” he asked. “You seem to have a better idea about how things are supposed to go than I do.”
Lorelai shook her head. “I threw the script right out the window, mister.” She grinned. “We make our own future. We do things our way. The possibilities are endless. We have all this time ahead of us and heaps to look forward to.” Everything that’s going to happen, you’ll be with me for it. And that’ll make it worth going through it all again. “It’s up to you.”
“Us,” he corrected. “It’s up to us.”
“Right,” she agreed.
He looked at her seriously. “Do you have any… suggestions as to what our next move is?”
“We sit down and talk things over with Anna,” she said, equally as seriously. “Get things clear from day one. Find out what April wants. Take things slowly. Non-threatening.” She smiled at a memory. “Invite her to the diner. You might even get her to fill the salt and pepper shakers for you.”
“Sounds good,” Luke agreed, smiling. “And what do we tell our crazy town?”
“That we finally did it.”
Luke grinned. “Dirty.”
She swatted him playfully on the arm. “Aw, come on, that was far too easy.” He grinned and pulled her back towards him. She smiled up at him. “Thank you for following me all the way to Florida. This has been… amazing.”
“I wouldn’t have missed it,” he assured her. “And it was all worth it just to see you in that fruit print bikini.”
“That’s the closest you’ll ever see me to fruit,” she countered with a smirk. “You ready to go back home?”
“Ready if you are.”
Back to index
Chapter 16: Evil Stepmother
Chapter 16: Evil Stepmother
The good town of Stars Hollow had never seen anything like it. Lorelai was used to the craziness of the place she called home by now but still, it never ceased to amaze her how fast things spread. The closing of Luke’s Diner had sent the town buzzing and Lorelai’s departure to Florida had only added another element to the speculation. Adding all this to the fact that Babette had seen Luke leave Lorelai’s house the day before the appearance of the ‘Gone Fishing’ sign was a surefire recipe to create the juiciest rumors Stars Hollow had seen in a long while.
Luke reopened the diner the following day and blew off the town’s questioning in his usual gruff manner. The fireworks really started that Wednesday when Anna and April Nardini arrived at the diner. Miss Patty recognized Anna immediately. Lorelai recalled Babette and Miss Patty’s comments on Anna’s beauty and how serious the town gossips thought the Luke/Anna relationship was. They were wrong about that, she thought wryly as her mind’s eye conjured up an image of Luke’s hurt expression as he told her about Anna’s two other boyfriends, the two other Dad candidates for young April. I hate that she hurt him. At least the first time he had no idea about this part. Another part of Lorelai’s brain, however, was almost sickeningly pleased that this recent development meant that the chances of a Luke/Anna reunion had diminished greatly.
The diner was literally buzzing with curiosity at the arrival of the Nardinis, especially April. Miss Patty made herself known almost immediately, greeting Anna like a long lost friend, cooing over April (“aren’t you just the sweetest thing? How old are you, doll? Eight?”) and exchanging significant looks with Babette as the mental calculations came up with the scandalous result. Minutes later, Luke ushered Anna and April up to his apartment. As Anna and April climbed the stairs, Anna obviously familiar with the apartment, Luke stood at the doorway and looked over at Lorelai, who was sitting at the counter, her heart torn. Was it going to be like it was before? Was he going to insist he did this himself? He stared at her for a long moment and she hesitated, unsure of what he wanted, unable to read his expression. Finally, he beckoned for her to come with him.
And that one action, that one moment where he let her in, changed everything.
The conversation between the four of them had been matter of fact and to the point. Luke had calmly told April that he’d like to get to know her but he wanted her to be comfortable and that it was entirely up to her, he didn’t want to force anything on her. He introduced Lorelai as his girlfriend and best friend. April had recognized Lorelai from the boutique and asked after Rory, her voice excited as she reminded her mother about the bag Lorelai had bought and the fact that Rory was in the top three percent of her class at Chilton. Anna had given her a pained smile and Lorelai had felt a little twist in her heart at the obvious discomfort and disapproval on the other woman’s face. Anna was silent throughout most of the meeting, only speaking when asked a direct question. At Luke’s suggestion that April might like to spend a few afternoons a week at the diner so they could get to know each other, Anna simply replied that it was up to April to make that decision. April was perfectly contented with the idea, informing Luke that the diner was “really cool”, which made Luke smile. They ended the conversation with a decision that April would spend the following afternoon at the diner. Anna would drop her at about two and Luke would drop her off home after dinner. April seemed excited at the prospect of a cheeseburger. Luke was obviously nervous but thrilled to have the opportunity to spend some time with his daughter. Anna remained stony-faced throughout the entire ordeal and the knot in Lorelai’s stomach grew tighter as the Nardinis said their goodbyes and left, April happily chattering that she’d see Luke the next day and maybe Rory could come to the diner at dinnertime so she could meet her. Lorelai replied non-committedly, watching as Anna’s lips formed a thin line and her folded arms tightened around her. She suppressed a sigh as she watched them go. Luke’s arm was suddenly around her waist, pulling her towards him. She forced a smile as Luke beamed down at her.
“That went okay, didn’t it?” he commented with a smile. “I mean, it really seemed like April wants to come here tomorrow and Anna doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.”
“April seems to be looking forward to it,” Lorelai echoed, her mind still reeling from Anna’s expression. “Just… take it slowly.”
“Of course,” said Luke, nodding. “I can’t push her into anything. I’m not going to.” He looked thoughtful. “She wants to meet Rory. Are the two of you going to be around for dinner tomorrow night? I thought that maybe, since I’ll be working, the two of you can sit with her and keep her company. How does that sound to you?”
As much as Lorelai knew she’d love to get to know Luke’s little girl, a part of her was still uneasy. She remembered Sherry’s insistence that she be a part of Rory’s life. She remembered Anna’s uneasiness. She remembered Luke’s confession that he was afraid April would like her better. All those things made her hesitate, made her think twice. But as she looked at Luke’s eager face, obviously so willing and wanting to include her, she couldn’t bear to let him down. “Sounds like a plan,” she replied in as light a tone as she could manage.
Lorelai made a point not to be at the diner when Anna dropped April off the next day. She wanted to give Luke the space to make initial contact with his daughter without her in the way. Two o’clock went by, then two thirty. She thought about popping in at the diner for coffee and a muffin. Luke had told her that morning that she was free to do so and had in fact encouraged her to. It was such a strange contrast to the way he’d been before, wanting to keep her away from April. She realized then that Luke had heard what she’d said, he had realized how much he’d hurt her and was almost going to the opposite extreme to try and keep from repeating mistakes he hadn’t even really made. In a way, it reminded her of her own reaction to Rory’s dropping out of Yale and the consequent fallout. The fact that opening her big mouth and speaking her mind about Rory’s plans to drop out had caused her to lose her daughter was a big factor in not telling Luke how she really felt about him keeping her away from April. Maybe not wanting to make the same mistake twice could lead to a bigger one, she thought uneasily as she stood at the counter, unable to concentrate on her work.
Almost without realizing it, she picked up her purse. It was only when she got into her car that she fully realized her intended destination. Almost too soon, she found herself once again parked outside Anna’s boutique in Woodbridge. Bracing herself for battle, she got out of the car and walked into the store as boldly as she could. As the bell sounded over the door, she saw Anna look up, the smile of greeting fixed on her face freezing as she caught sight of Lorelai.
“How’s it going?” Lorelai greeted her uneasily.
“Lorelai,” Anna stated, her voice even but chilly. “What brings you here?”
She shrugged. “Shopping,” she answered as nonchalantly as she could. “I really do love this place.”
“I figured you’d be at the diner with my daughter,” said Anna, her tone still even but unable to disguise the underlying hurt.
“She’s Luke’s daughter, too,” Lorelai reminded her gently. “But she’s not mine. She needs time alone with her dad.”
Anna looked at her with an unreadable expression for a long moment, then nodded and looked away. “Can I help you with anything?” she said finally.
Lorelai approached the counter, unsure of exactly where to go next. “I don’t want things to be weird between us,” said Lorelai, trying to inject as much sincerity into her tone as she could. “I don’t want you to think that I’m trying to take your place as April’s mom.”
“You can’t,” Anna shot back, her tone icy. “April is my daughter and that isn’t about to change.”
“I know,” Lorelai insisted. “Believe me, I know. I have a daughter and I love her more than life itself. I would do anything for her. It’s been me and her for so long that I’d be a basket case if anything happened to screw up our relationship.” She looked at Anna and waited patiently for the other woman to meet her gaze. “I would never do anything to undermine your relationship with April.”
Anna took awhile to reply. When she did, her response wasn’t what Lorelai expected. “Why did you come here that day?” asked Anna, anguish in her voice. “Why did you tell Luke to come here? What makes you think you can waltz on in here and turn my life upside down? Turn our lives upside down? April’s just a kid, she doesn’t need to deal with this kind of drama. She’s spent eight years without a father and she’s been fine. She doesn’t need Luke. Why did you let this all happen?”
“I didn’t plan this,” Lorelai tried to explain. She laughed slightly. “How could I have planned this? I know it was unexpected and I know it’s not going to be easy but it is what it is and nothing can change that.” Her tone grew even more serious. “But April deserves to have a father.”
“April deserves a real family,” Anna said softly, almost as if she didn’t intend the comment for Lorelai’s ears. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. It wasn’t supposed to be Luke. It was supposed to be… I don’t suppose it matters now.”
And it was as if the last piece of the puzzle had slotted into place. “You really didn’t think April was Luke’s, did you?”
Anna’s head shot up. “Luke told you about that?”
She nodded. “He was a little… upset. I mean, since you were technically cheating on him-”
“I know,” Anna interrupted, her cheeks growing a little flushed with obvious shame. “And if I could take that back, I would.” She sighed. “It wasn’t supposed to be like that. It got out of hand and things weren’t going so well at the time and then when I found out about April… I’ve always thought she was John’s.”
“You really loved him, didn’t you?” asked Lorelai softly.
Anna was hesitant in replying once again and Lorelai was all of a sudden concerned that she was stepping over some kind of boundary. But then she thought back to their conversation before Luke made contact. There’d been an easy connection there when the reality of Lorelai’s position in her daughter’s life wasn’t obvious. “I did,” Anna confessed. She smiled a wavery smile, seemingly on the verge of tears. “I kept thinking that he’d… come back to me and say that he’d missed me, that he couldn’t stop thinking about me, that it’d always been me the whole time. I pictured all these stupid scenarios where he’d come to the boutique, meet April, realize she was his and want in.”
“Except it wasn’t John who came into the boutique,” Lorelai filled in for her.
“I thought about it for years,” Anna continued, as if Lorelai had pushed a button that had opened a floodgate on things the other woman had never admitted to anyone for over eight years. “I thought about it when I was pregnant, that he’d come find me and realize I was pregnant. And then when April was a kid, the whole time she was growing up, I kept thinking he’d find me. And when I opened the boutique, I figured I’d made it easier for him.”
“And now that’s gone,” Lorelai realized. “Anna…”
“It was stupid anyway.”
“No, it wasn’t stupid. It was perfectly understandable.”
Anna laughed shakily. “I’ve never told anyone this,” she admitted with a choking sob. “It just figures that the first person I tell is my kid’s potential step-mother.”
The word grated on Lorelai’s nerves. “I don’t want to be the evil step-mother.”
“I don’t think you are.” Anna wiped at her eyes briefly then looked at Lorelai with a sad smile. “He loves you, you know.” She blinked a few times and continued. “I could tell by the way he looked at you yesterday. It’s serious, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it’s serious,” said Lorelai. “If I wasn’t around for the long haul, if I wasn’t sure that Luke wanted me there for the long haul, I wouldn’t be here. April’s got enough changes to deal with. She doesn’t need to adjust to anyone who isn’t going to be… permanent.”
“I know,” said Anna. She nodded slowly. “Things are going to be different.”
“For the record,” Lorelai began, “Luke’s pretty fond of April. You should have heard the way he talked about her after you guys left yesterday. You should have seen the look on his face.” Proud Daddy Luke had always made her heart melt.
Anna smiled. “He’s a good guy. I shouldn’t be worried. I know him and I know it’s going to be okay but…” she trailed off, as realization hit her. “I should have figured out who you were talking about when you came in to the store that day and told me all that stuff about him and your daughter. Knowing all that… it kind of tips the scales.”
“I know the feeling,” said Lorelai warmly. The bell sounded at the door and a customer walked in. Anna straightened up noticeably, plastering a smile of welcome on her face. Lorelai recognized the smile herself. It was the ‘everything’s okay’ smile, the ‘I’m just going to have to grin and bear it’ smile. It was the smile she’d worn when she and her daughter weren’t speaking, it was the smile she’d worn when Luke kept his daughter from her. It was a smile she saw through in an instant. “I’d better let you get back to work,” she said, her voice soft. “Can’t keep all this fabulous stuff from the rest of the world a minute longer.”
Anna smiled a real smile this time. “Sounds good.”
Lorelai started to go, then doubled back and headed to the counter. “I just want you to know,” she began, “that you don’t have to think of me as April’s potential step-mother, even if that’s kind of what I am. You can think of me as Lorelai, because that’s who I am, in spite of everything else. I’m not saying we have to be best friends but I am saying that… we can work on being people and not April’s mom and April’s future step-mom, right? That’s okay by you?”
Anna nodded. “You gonna join Luke and April for dinner?”
Lorelai smiled. “I think so. Rory’s looking forward to properly meeting her.”
The two women exchanged a look and Lorelai felt the tension in her heart release. Things really are going to be different this time, she thought to herself. As she turned to go, Anna’s voice called out to her before she reached the door. Lorelai turned around to face the other woman. Anna smiled and gave her a knowing look. “Make sure Luke has her home by nine.”
Back to index
Chapter 17: Where It All Began
Chapter 17: Where It All Began
She’d called back at the inn after meeting Anna, just to check up on things. She buried herself in a pile of paperwork, pausing only when Rory paged her to ask what the plans for the evening were. She instructed her daughter to go straight to the diner and that she’d meet them all there soon. Going back to her pile of paperwork, she promised herself she’d finish in ten minutes. Ten minutes became fifteen, which became twenty and soon, forty minutes after her message to Rory, her cell phone started to ring. She picked it up and answered it tersely.
“Where are you?” Rory demanded. “You said you’d be here soon forty minutes ago, forty minutes is not soon.”
“I got tied up with some work at the inn,” Lorelai explained. “Give me another ten minutes, okay? Then I promise I’ll be there.”
There was silence on the other end of the line, aside from the faint sound of footsteps and people’s voices fading into the distance. Finally Rory spoke. “You’re scared.”
Lorelai laughed. “Of an eight year old girl? Rory, I hate to break it to you, but I have met eight year olds before. In fact, remember your eighth birthday? Plenty of eight year olds. Then again, going by that party, maybe I have reason to be scared of eight year olds considering we got shut down by the cops.”
“Mom.”
“Rory.”
“You’re procrastinating being here for one reason or another, so you may as well just tell me what it is or suck it up and get here.” Rory’s tone softened a little. “He’s looking up every time the door chime rings with this look on his face like a puppy anticipating a walk because the owner’s got the leash in his hand. And then when it’s not you, he just looks away so no one can see his disappointed puppy face.”
“I cannot believe you just compared Luke to a puppy.”
“Mom.”
“We’ve never had a puppy. How would you know about the walk anticipation hopeful puppy face?” Lorelai pointed out. After all, Paul Anka hated the leash.
“There’s this thing called TV and bad Disney movies… why are you trying to change the subject?”
Lorelai sighed. “I’m coming. I will be there in ten minutes.”
“No, you will leave now and be here in five,” Rory shot back.
“Just a memo, sunshine — I’m still the mommy.”
“April does have a curfew, you know,” Rory pointed out. “She really, really wants to meet you and Luke is freaking out that you’re not here.” When Lorelai didn’t reply immediately, Rory pressed on. “He wants you to be here for this.”
Lorelai let out a small sigh before she could stop herself. “He didn’t before,” she confessed, her voice sounding small to her own ears. “What if it just ends up being exactly like it was before? What if April doesn’t like me? What if it all goes to hell in a hand-basket? I couldn’t deal with losing him again, Rory, I just… I just couldn’t.”
“Wow,” exclaimed Rory after a long pause. “You love him. You really love him.”
“I do,” Lorelai admitted, her voice strained. “So much that it hurts.”
“That’s enough, isn’t it?” Rory asked.
“Sometimes it’s not,” said Lorelai, thinking back to the bewilderment on his face as she poured out her heart to him. I want to DO. I want to GO. Don't you love me? I love you, Luke. I love you, and I have waited and I have stayed away and I have let you run this thing. No more! I asked you to marry me, and you said YES. I'm going CRAZY here. I made a commitment to you and I need to make it happen. I'm not waiting! It's now, or never!
“I think it is,” said Rory, cutting into her painful reminiscing. “I think that if you love someone so much that it hurts, you can make it work. I think that if you’d loved Max, you would have made it work. I think that if you’d loved Dad, you would have made it work somewhere along the line. I don’t think that you can just… blame everything on fate. Loving someone takes work. It does. You were the one who taught me that, Mom. You were the one who ran away from home with me when you were a kid because you love me and you wanted what you thought was best for me. I have never been unhappy with you. I have never doubted that you love me. Even when we were living in a potting shed, we still had everything we needed. It wasn’t easy raising me alone, was it? But you did it because you love me and you wanted me to be free to have my own choices and not have to wear fancy dresses and sit still like a lady and have anything forced on me. You loved me enough to do something really, really hard. And you were my age! I don’t know if I could do that, Mom. I don’t know if I’d be as strong as you if I were in your position.”
“I don’t want you to be in my position, Rory,” Lorelai began. “Getting pregnant at sixteen is not something I want for you. It was… it wasn’t what I planned.”
“You made a mistake,” Rory filled in.
Lorelai’s heart twisted violently inside her. “You are not a mistake. Don’t ever think that you’re a mistake. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”
“I may be the best thing that ever happened to you but I sure wasn’t the easiest,” Rory said, a smile in her voice. “I think… I think that Luke might be the second best thing to ever happen to you. I somehow doubt he’ll be the easiest, either.”
Her daughter’s words hit right to the core. She was right. The things that count the most are the things you have to work the hardest for. Her mind drifted back to a memory she’d replayed over and over in her mind. Sitting on the couch, watching Judy Garland sing about the man that got away. Hearing the doorbell ring and answering it to find Luke standing there. He hadn’t said anything. He’d kissed her and that kiss had said everything it needed to. Words came later, but right then, right there in that moment, she reveled in the fact that he’d come back to her. He’d fought for her. He’d seen the ugly side, he’d faced the biggest obstacle between them and declared her worth fighting for.
“Mom? Are you still there?”
If I want this for good, I’m going to have to fight for it. I’m going to have to work at it. I’m a fighter and so is Luke. We’re going to be alright. We just need to be in this together.
“I’ll see you in a few minutes,” Lorelai managed to say, fighting to keep her voice even.
Five minutes later, standing outside the diner, she could remember clearly the ugly scene that had somehow brought her to this particular moment all over again. Would that moment always replay in her head? Am I always going to think about that fight when I stand here? Do I have the strength to put it all behind me and focus on ‘here and now’, not ‘now or never’?
As she looked inside, she could see that the diner wasn’t too busy. Summer made things slower as people went out of town, even though tourists still came and went. It was really luck of the draw as to whether the place would be packed or empty. Aside from a few regulars — notably the ever present Kirk — and a table full of tourists over to the side, it really did seem like a slow night. From her position outside she could see Rory and April sitting at a table near the counter, engrossed in conversation. April’s face was animated as she spoke and Rory was smiling as she listened. Lorelai smiled a smile of her own as she watched the two of them sitting there. My daughter and Luke’s daughter. Who’d have thought?
It was then that she made the decision. From now on, when I stand here looking into the diner, I’m going to look back on this moment. The birth of this crazy little family. This is the start of something new for us. This isn’t the place where it all ended. This is the place where it all began.
With a deep breath, she walked purposefully towards the door of the diner. The bell rang as she entered and her eyes went straight to Luke, who had looked up the minute the bell rang, in the middle of wiping down a table. Their eyes met and he stood up immediately, smiling.
“We were wondering where you’d got to,” said Luke as he approached her.
“Work stuff,” she replied simply, smiling back at him. She gestured to Rory and April who were still deep in conversation. “Looks like these two little ladies are getting along just fine.”
“They seem to have a lot in common,” Luke commented. “They’ve been talking about cloning. Almost every single word out of either of their mouths went right over my head so I just left them to it.”
Lorelai nodded understandably. “It can get a little disheartening hanging around with these super geniuses all the time.”
“Lorelai, you’re here!” exclaimed April, having just registered her arrival.
“Took you long enough, Mom,” Rory chimed in, giving Lorelai a knowing smile. Lorelai smiled back.
“Now I can finally get my cheeseburger,” April continued, a broad grin on her face. “And pie. Luke promised me pie for dessert.”
Lorelai slipped into the seat next to Rory across from April and hung her jacket over the back of the chair. “You haven’t eaten yet?”
“We were waiting for you,” said Rory.
“Well, if I’d known that I might have hurried up!” exclaimed Lorelai, smiling at April. “I’ve always been firmly opposed to letting children starve.”
“I was not letting her starve,” Luke shot back. “She and Rory already ate a plate of chilli fries.”
“And it was an exceptional plate of chilli fries,” said April, smiling. “My compliments once again.”
Luke looked proud, embarrassed and taken aback at the same time. “Uh, thanks.” He cleared his throat. “So, uh, I’m getting three cheeseburgers?”
“Do you even have to ask?” Lorelai teased.
“Aw jeez.”
April giggled and Luke smiled at her before going back into the kitchen. “So you hung out with Luke this afternoon?” Lorelai asked April.
“Yeah, I did,” said April. She smiled a wide smile and Lorelai noticed that a tooth was missing. “I got to refill the salt and pepper shakers.”
Lorelai laughed softly to herself. “Hey, did you lose a tooth?”
April nodded. “This afternoon. It’d been loose for about a week. I kind of liked it, though, coz you can do that thing with your tongue where you put your tongue underneath your tooth and it feels weird but kind of cool at the same time. You know?”
“I liked that, too,” Rory agreed. “It makes this weird clicky sound sometimes.”
“Exactly,” said April. “Anyway, I was playing with my loose tooth and Luke saw me and he said that if my tooth was that loose I should just pull it out or else I might choke on it. But I don’t like pulling out teeth so I asked if he’d do it.”
“Luke pulled out your tooth for you?” Lorelai asked.
April nodded once again. “Uh huh. With a napkin. Then we wrapped the tooth up in a napkin and put it in a takeout bag so I can put it under my pillow for the tooth fairy.”
“Good gal, the tooth fairy,” Lorelai commented. “She and I are great pals. We go way back. I tell you, she really does know how to party but for your own safety, I’d suggest banning her from the dance floor once she’s had one too many.” April raised her eyebrows and looked like she was about to say something but Lorelai spoke first. “Could you two excuse me for just one second, I’m gonna go check on those burgers.”
“Don’t even think about trying to get involved in the cooking process!” Rory warned as Lorelai stood up and headed behind the counter and into the kitchen.
Luke was standing at the grill, flipping burgers, oblivious to Lorelai’s presence. She smiled at the thought of him pulling out his daughter’s tooth. He’s gonna be fine. He is more than capable of doing this. Coming up behind him, she slipped her hands gently around his waist and kissed him lightly on the neck. He turned to face her with a smile on his face. “This isn’t going to make your burgers arrive any faster, you do realize?” She shrugged. He turned her around to face him and kissed her properly. The contact nearly made her melt and she was thankful he was holding her waist. The thought that right in front of the grill was an inappropriate place for a make out session briefly crossed her mind before the kiss ended and Luke looked at her, amusement plain on his face. “If you stay here much longer, I’m never going to get any work done.”
“Have you cooked everyone else’s food?” she asked. “Apart from our burgers, I mean.”
He nodded. “Yeah. As you can see, it’s been pretty slow.”
“Make yourself one, too,” she suggested. “Sit and eat with us.”
He looked at her and a broad smile slowly made its way across his face. “Okay.”
Ten minutes later, as the four of them sat together at the table, eating their burgers (cheeseburgers for the girls, a turkey burger for Luke) and chatting comfortably amongst themselves, Lorelai couldn’t keep her own broad smile off her face. This was what she’d wanted all along. If this was starting over, it was worth the repetition.
Back to index
Chapter 18: Epilogue: This Is What It Comes To
Epilogue: This Is What It Comes To
As she wakes, she is vaguely aware of a pounding headache and a general sense of fuzz in her brain. Her eyes open bit by bit to a dimly lit room, the partially open curtains letting in dusky light. It takes her a few moments to recognize her surroundings. The room, airy and spacious, is relatively tidy, all things considered. The clock on the dresser reads 6:13. A sound slowly permeates her consciousness. A faint, low buzzing that she can’t quite identify. Groggily, she begins to sit up and notices an armchair next to her side of the bed. Its occupant sits there asleep; his head tilted back, a blanket draped haphazardly over his lap. Slowly, her addled mind puts the two together. Luke is sitting by her bedside. And he is snoring. She tries to pull herself up to a seated position but finds that her arms are barely cooperating with her. She feels… weak and a little bit dizzy, her head a little bit fuzzy, everything just that little bit… surreal.
Lorelai has finally managed to more or less prop herself up when she hears voices from the doorway of the bedroom. She peers at the doorway to see two little heads poking out. The instant they notice her looking at them, two little sets of eyes widen and a little boy and a little girl both come tearing over to her.
“Mommy, Mommy, you’re awake!” cries out the boy as the two of them run towards her. The little boy jumps up onto the bed onto her legs and she winces a little at the impact, her head still protesting, but smiles down at him. He peers at her, his big blue eyes solemn, his brown hair a scruffy mess. “Are you feeling better?”
Lorelai nods. She looks over to the armchair where the little girl is bouncing on Luke’s lap, her dark curls flying everywhere as she moves. Luke, obviously awake, is trying to calm her down. “Amelia, sweetheart, it’s still early. Will, don’t jump on your mom, she’s still not feeling very well. How would you like it if I jumped on you when you were sick?”
“I’m giving Mommy a hug,” Amelia announces as she climbs off Luke’s lap and onto the bed next to her brother almost before Luke can react. In seconds, a small, chubby pair of arms is around Lorelai’s neck. “I’m glad you’re better, Mommy.”
“Me too,” Lorelai manages to say, her voice faint to her own ears. Her head is spinning. Literally spinning. She looks over at Luke, who catches her eye and nods understandingly.
“Come on, you two, you need to leave Mommy to get some more rest,” says Luke as he swiftly picks up both children. They wriggle in protest in his arms and he places them gently on the floor. “How about you go downstairs and see if Rory’s awake?”
“Yeah!” exclaims Amelia, taking her brothers arm and pulling him out the door with her. A loud cry can be heard from down the hallway. “RORY! Daddy says you’ll play with us!”
Luke winces at the words and sits down gingerly at the side of the bed next to Lorelai. “I’m sure she’s really going to appreciate that at six in the morning,” he comments with a wry smile. He takes her hand gently. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m… I’m a little out of it,” she admits with a daze, her mind working furiously to collect her scrambled thoughts. “What… what happened?”
“Flu,” he explains in a matter of fact tone. “You got it pretty bad. Mostly because you wouldn’t take the time off when you needed it and you just got worse and worse until finally you surrendered, got into bed and have been barely coherent since Thursday.” He strokes the back of her hand with his thumb. “You gave us all a bit of a scare, crazy lady. I was about to call an ambulance on you at one point but April insisted that as long as your fever wasn’t higher than a certain temperature there really wasn’t any need or anything the hospital could do that we couldn’t.”
“Rory’s downstairs?” she asks, sinking back into the pillows.
Luke nods. “Uh huh. She’s back for the summer, remember? Everything’s all moved back here. Jess helped her with the last load of stuff from her apartment in New Haven just yesterday.” He looks at her sympathetically. “Can I get you anything? Are you hungry? You haven’t eaten since Thursday, either. You must be hungry.”
“A little, yeah,” she admits, pulling the covers back gingerly. Luke grabs her arm a little firmer and fixes her with a glare.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Getting out of bed.”
He shakes his head. “Not a chance. You wouldn’t make it to the door. I’ll bring you something.” He pulls the covers back over her and kisses her on the forehead. “Stay right there. I’ll be back with some breakfast.”
She nods and smiles at him weakly as he disappears out the door. She feels like her head is full of cotton. Man, that must have been some flu, she thinks to herself. She looks over to the dresser near the bed to see a cluster of photo frames, full of photos. There is a candid shot of an eight year old April, sitting at the diner counter next to Rory looking at a book while Luke leans over from his position behind the counter to see what’s going on. Next to that frame is a picture of Lorelai’s graduation, wearing her cap and gown and a broad smile on her face. Her parents stand at her left and there on her right are Luke and Rory. Everyone is beaming with pride. In her minds eye, she can picture herself standing there, surrounded by her family while April takes the picture on the digital camera Luke and Lorelai had given her for her ninth birthday. She smiles as she looks at the image of herself, a glistening diamond adorning her left hand. It’s so small on the photo, yet for some reason it’s always the first thing that catches her eye.
She looks to the next frame and the image takes her breath away, like it always does. There they are, on their wedding day. Not one of the posed photographs — although the posed photographs had turned out absolutely beautiful. Rachel had come back to Stars Hollow to be their wedding photographer and had done a wonderful job with the official photos. She’d taken the one on Lorelai’s dresser, too, unnoticed by the couple at the time. In the photo, the sun is setting and the light reflects on Lorelai’s hair. Neither of them is facing the camera. They are standing beneath the chuppah, hours after the event, although Lorelai is still in her wedding dress. Luke’s hand is on her waist, positioned as if it were the most natural place for it to be. Lorelai is looking up at Luke and although her loose curls partly obscure her face, anyone could see that she is practically radiating with happiness. The chuppah is the same as it was in Lorelai’s memories of her engagement to Max — the engagement that wasn’t, as she referred to it whenever it came to mind (which, admittedly, wasn’t very often) — but this time, there’s something different about it. It had been made for them. For that very moment in time. The carvings on the wood are as beautiful as ever but as beautiful as the chuppah is, it’s still secondary to the couple standing beneath in, smiling, leaning in towards one another. Looking at it still brings tears to Lorelai’s eyes. She blinks them away and looks at the other photo frames.
In the next frame, a group of ten year old girls fill the diner, make up and glitter as far as the eye can see. April sits at a table next to Rory, who has just put the final touches on April’s eye shadow. April and Rory are looking straight at the camera and lean in so their heads are touching, each putting on an exaggerated pout for the photo. Behind them, slightly to the right, stand Lorelai and Anna. Both women are laughing. Lorelai’s hand rests almost unconsciously on her stomach, protruding under a blue peasant shirt. Although only six months pregnant, her stomach is large enough for all of the parents to comment that she must be due any day now as they dropped their daughters off for the party. At another table, Luke is placing a large plate of fries in front of a gang of girls who are comparing nail polish color. Luke looks out of place and a little awkward and if you look closely, you can see a trace of glitter on the right sleeve of his flannel shirt. Lorelai smiles at the memory. That had been a good night.
The next few photos are posed and somewhat ceremonial but still nice. There’s Rory and Jess, standing in front of the stairs, about to leave for the prom. Rory looks amazing in a light blue dress with her hair curled and pinned back. Jess is… well, it’s not a smile in the true sense of the word and it’s not his usual sarcastic smirk. He looks happy. Lorelai has to admit that her now step-nephew cleans up good. The next photo is the whole gang at Rory’s graduation. Rory looks radiant in her cap and gown, standing next to Lorelai who is, by this stage, absolutely huge. It’s funny that Lorelai doesn’t really mind being incredibly fat in her daughter’s graduation pictures. Luke is at Lorelai’s side, Jess at Rory’s. The grandparents stand behind Rory and Jess and April stands beside Luke. Next to the framed posed photo of the graduation is a little frame containing a photo of April and Rory together, April wearing Rory’s cap and both of them making faces at the camera.
Then there’s her favorite photo. Lorelai, sitting up in a hospital bed, newborn Amelia in her arms, while Luke sits on the edge of the bed beside her, proudly holding a newborn William. Rory stands next to Lorelai, April stands next to Luke and the four of them are all smiling like idiots. Emily and Richard are standing next to Rory, slightly to the side but still definitely part of the picture. Jess is standing beside April, also slightly to the side. Lorelai marvels at the ease in which Jess fits into the picture, standing next to his cousin, still not really smiling but looking happy. There they are. Her crazy little family. Her husband, her eldest daughter, her step-daughter, her step-nephew and her parents, all in one room together, to celebrate the newest additions to the Gilmore-Danes clan.
She barely has time to process this when Luke returns, a tray of food in his hands. He smiles as he approaches and places the tray on her lap with almost aching familiarity. She smiles back at him, thanks him and looks at the tray. A plate of pancakes with a side of bacon, a bowl of cereal and two tall glasses of orange juice.
“No coffee?” she asks, pouting as she does so.
He shakes his head. “No way. Not when you’ve been so sick.”
“I feel fine now,” she insists. It’s a testament to how well he knows her when she sees him shake his head and narrow his eyes in slight concern. She’s still a bit fuzzy-headed and he knows it.
He sits down at the seat next to her bed and takes the cereal and one of the orange juices from off the tray on her lap. It’s a familiar routine, eating breakfast together. She enjoys it more than she can say. Since Luke is always the one who cooks, being able to enjoy food with him is something she has learnt to love. If she goes into the diner, he’s inevitably busy and doesn’t have the time to sit and eat with her properly. It’s here, at their house (or as she sometimes refers to it, “The House Formerly Known As The Crap Shack”) where he can sit and eat at a normal pace. It’s comforting to see him relax. He places the orange juice on the dresser and his eyes rest for a long moment on the photos she’d just been looking at. A smile crosses his face and it warms her heart just that little bit more.
“Did the twins wake Rory up?” she asks, imagining her eldest daughter’s reaction to a wakeup call at this hour.
Luke nods, grinning slightly. “I made them all pancakes so I think she’ll forgive me,” he informs her. “She says she has some work to do. She doesn’t seem to get the concept that not only is it summer but it’s also a Saturday.”
“Rory can be like that,” Lorelai admits. A thought suddenly occurs to her. “It’s Saturday?”
He nods again, looking at her carefully, his expression guarded. “You really haven’t been well, have you?”
Realization dawns slowly, piercing its way through her still slightly fogged consciousness. “June 3rd. Today’s June 3rd.”
“Our fourth wedding anniversary,” Luke adds. He looks at her and smiles. “June 3rd, like it was meant to be. Even though your mother nearly threw a fit when you told her you were getting married on a Monday.”
Lorelai laughs. “Weekends are for getting married, Lorelai. Why on earth would you want to get married on a Monday? Honestly, sometimes I don’t understand you at all.”
“She got over it, though,” Luke reminisces. “She was proud. She cried. Never thought I’d see that.”
“Hey, she wasn’t the only one,” Lorelai ribs him gently. He looks sheepish but smiles at her warmly before eating a spoonful of cereal. Another thought grabs onto her insides, holding them in a deathly cold grasp. “I haven’t got anything for you,” she blurts out. “For our anniversary. I meant to, really I did, but then I got busy and sick and-”
“It’s okay,” he interrupts. “I don’t care.”
Guilt overtakes her. “I’m a sucky wife.”
“You are not a sucky wife,” he says, looking vaguely amused but still sincere. “Honestly, what kind of husband would I be if I got mad at my wife for not getting me an anniversary present when she’s been sick in bed for the last two days?”
“Did we have plans?” Lorelai asks, still not ready to let herself off the hook. “We had plans, didn’t we? And now I’m sick and I’ve ruined your plans. Oh Luke, I’m so sorry, I-”
He interrupts her again. “It’s fine. Quit apologizing for getting sick.” He smiles at her. “We don’t need big fancy plans, I’m fine just hanging out with you today. April’s coming around later on to spend some time with Amelia and William and Rory’s promised to have all her work finished by tonight so we can all have dinner together. Jess should be around as well.” He takes her hand, both of their breakfasts forgotten. “Family dinner. Do you think you’re up for it?”
“I’m always up for it,” she says, smiling. A family. The whole package she’s wanted for so long. She didn’t expect it to turn out exactly like this — how could she have, really? Who could have imagined this? Who could have imagined any of it? Yet here she was, married to Luke, with an amazing Ivy Leaguer daughter, an equally brilliant scientist-in-the-making step-daughter, a little boy and girl who are every bit as bright as her eldest had been at that age and even a published author nephew to add to the mix. She hadn’t expected any of it. It wasn’t like it had all been rainbows and unicorns and sunshine — it had been hard work.
The situation with Anna had been hard to work out and it had taken awhile for Anna to fully be comfortable with Luke, Lorelai and Rory’s role in April’s life. Then there was Christopher to consider. He had taken Rory to her coming out party. He’d married Sherry when he found out she was pregnant. Things had happened just as Lorelai knew they would. With some notable exceptions. Jess’s arrival had brought its fair share of chaos to Stars Hollow, sure. Including some notable conflict between Luke and Anna about Anna not wanting to expose her daughter to Jess’s bad influence. Luke had been furious. Lorelai can still remember his words. Jess is family. You don’t just walk out on family. April is family, too. Now, I’m sorry if you’re uncomfortable with this but there is no way that I am going to lose any member of my family. Not again. Don’t you dare try to use this as an excuse to keep me from my daughter. Jess is April’s cousin, Jess is April’s family. I know you don’t think you need me or anyone else but if there is one thing I will always, always stick to, it’s that everyone needs family. Of some form. You take what you can get, sure, but you don’t throw it away for no reason.
This is what it comes to. A family. Not your nuclear family, sure, but a family none the less and a family she’s going to hold onto. After all, it’s not every day you get a second chance when you think you’ve thrown everything you ever wanted down the drain. She still doesn’t understand why it happened, or how it happened. All she knows is that this is here and this is now. It’s June 3rd and she has her whole package. As she smiles at the man eating breakfast beside her, she realizes that this is exactly where she’s supposed to be.
Back to index