"For Choices" Chpt 9 (Gilmore Girls)
And...school rides again. Ugh. But here's the new chapter, finally! I hope you enjoy it. I'm really looking forward to Thanksgiving vacation...lol. Anyway, here you go, and please do review. It helps so much. Thanks ya'll! And thanks for being patient with me...
Chapter 9
Luke was usually the first one up in the Gilmore household that was now sometimes three, but Rory was at the kitchen table staring forlornly into a bowl of cheerios when she heard him come downstairs the next morning. She'd been up for more than an hour already, and it was barely five thirty.
Five thirty. God, the last thing she needed to think about was the last time she'd been awake at five thirty.
Rory looked up at about the same moment Luke saw her and stopped in the kitchen doorway. One didn't necessarily preclude the other. At least she didn't think so. Not that it mattered. Luke, for his part, didn't seem to know what to say, so he stated the obvious.
“Your cereal's getting soggy.”
She glanced down at it again. “I know. I thought I wanted it, but then I remembered that dairy products aren't usually considered the best thing to consume after one has thrown up.”
When she looked up his eyebrows were hiked, for a moment. “Uhm, right. I guess. Well, for stomach flu and all, yeah, but I don't know if that applies to-“ He stopped and abruptly turned to head for the coffee pot.
So he knew. Lorelai had told him, like she'd offered to. Somehow Rory felt immense relief and sharp guilt at the same time at not having had to do it herself.
“I already put the coffee on.” She'd already put it on, and it was already done.
“So you did.” Luke turned to look at her curiously, obviously noticing the distinct lack of a mug in front of her. “You're not drinking any,” he said, with some degree of amazement in his voice.
Rory shrugged and looked away, not quite sure how to answer the question in that. “Don't want it to have two heads or anything...” Letting him know that she knew he knew.
She heard a quiet sigh, and then Luke had lowered himself into the next chair. “Well...you can have coffee, you know. Just don't overdo it, I guess.”
She grimaced. “I know. I just didn't feel like it.”
That should have alarmed her right there. She should have been worried, wondering why on earth she didn't want coffee and she couldn't eat the cereal in front of her. She liked food. She loved coffee. But all she wanted to do was sit here and stare into nothing, and now she couldn't even do that because here was Luke, looking at her with concern. He also looked pretty damned uncomfortable at the whole situation, but he was concerned.
Luke blinked once or twice and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “Oh. Okay. Normally I'd chalk that up to a miracle and let it go, but I don't think I should do that right now.” His voice softened to a level not heard from him very often. “Are you okay?”
Rory stared at him for a moment, and he straightened and held up his hands in apology. “Right. Stupid question.”
“Thanks anyway,” she sighed.
Luke stood to pour himself a glass of skim milk-and again, how did Lorelai Gilmore end up with a relative health nut?-and once the refrigerator closed he paused for a moment, not quite looking at her. “Rory...your mom wasn't just speaking for herself. We'll both help in any way we can. Okay?”
Rory let out a breath and gave him what of a smile she could muster. “Thanks, Luke. I sorry you had to find out from Mom. I trust you, and I promise I would have-“ The words started to come out too quickly, and she tripped over them about the time Luke stopped her anyway.
“Don't worry about it.”
She swallowed. “Thanks, Luke,” she repeated.
That was when Lorelai all but stumbled down the stairs and around to the kitchen, eyes nearly closed and pretending to still be asleep. An electrical beeping could be heard from upstairs. “Luke! You went downstairs before your alarm clock went off again. Which leaves me to turn it off, which means by then I'm awake, and an hour before I want to be, unless it'a a weekend like today which means I'm awake way before I want to be...” She trailed, scrubbing at her eyes as she leaned in the doorway, when she spotted her daughter.
“Oh...hey kiddo.” Blinking herself into a more awake state, she came to the chair next to her husband and across from Rory, pulling it out and dropping into it so she could study her offspring without needing to stay on her feet. “What are you doing up?”
Lorelai squinted at her daughter for a moment, and everything seemed to come back. “Did you wake up sick?” she demanded.
Rory just winced.
“Honey, why didn't you come get me?”
“Well it wasn't a crisis; apparently I'll have to get used to it anyway, so I didn't want to bother you...”
“Rory, when you're home, bother me. I'm your mother; that's what I'm here for. You haven't been home enough in the past several years to keep up your previous level of bothering, so you're more than overdue to do all of it you want when you are home. Got it?”
Because it was her mother, and only her mother would have put it that way, Rory couldn't help but smile. “Yeah...I guess.”
Lorelai held up a hand. “Besides. May the patron saint of mothers strike me down, but I kind of miss being bothered in the middle of the night for god-knows whatever. Accuse me of getting old and nostalgic if you must.”
“Actually, I think that started a few years ago...” Luke interjected.
“Well I wasn't talking to you,” she shot back.
Rory smiled a little more. “Thanks, you guys.”
Luke shrugged and stood. “Any time.” He stole a quick kiss from his wife and headed out for the diner, leaving mother and daughter alone.
“So,” Lorelai said after another minute or two. “Any ideas for today's itinerary?”
“Phsycological damage control?” she snorted.
“Ah, sweetie,” her mother sighed, getting up to got up to go for the cabinets. “Come on, let's find something you'll eat...”
Two pieces of toast and a pop-tart she hadn't really tasted later, Rory was grudgingly deemed fed well enough to continue the day, and Lorelai finally stopped hovering and let her out of the kitchen.
After that, she didn't know what to do with herself.
“Mom, I think I'm going into town,” she called finally, after standing into the entry for several minutes staring at the door. Her mother poked her head in from the living room.
“You are?”
“Yeah...just to...walk around, clear my head, I guess.”
Lorelai closed the distance between them and hugged her for a moment. “Okay...you want me to come with?”
“No, it's okay. I'll be fine.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah...”
“You feeling any better?” she asked, pulling back to look at her.
“I'm not queasy at the moment, if that's what you mean,” Rory shrugged.
“Okay. Good luck with the whole head thing, then. I've had a little experience with that myself. It's not always easy. The luck could be needed.”
She snorted, loving her mother more than anything for always being herself. It was one of the few things keeping her sane right now. “So I gathered.”
The short walk into town wasn't unwelcome, what with the being alone and able to hear herself think-as long as she didn't think to much. Or that was the original plan she'd had, in the clearing-her-head department.
It didn't work out so well.
One of her mother's main selling points for not-freaking-out had been that she wasn't sixteen. She was through college, had, a job, and Rory had taken that to mean that this didn't have change everything.
But it would.
She could keep the apartment, the job, everything...but it would all be different. And not that she was thinking about it much right now, but what abgout finding that one guy, huh? The one she wouldn't want to hesitate over. The one she was really supposed to be with for the rest of her life. Wasn't finding anyone notoriously harder when one had a child in tow?
A child.
Somehow even knowing how well her and her mother's relationship had turned out didn't help in realizing that she was going to be a mother. Rory couldn't wrap her head around it.
Apparently she couldn't wrap her head around watching where she was going, either, because once she was across the square she stepped up onto the sidewalk right into the path of a passerby. She didn't see anything until the tall shadow was on her, and even then she wouldn't have snapped out of her reverie in time to stop if two strong arms hadn't snapped out to catch her shoulders and prevent the collision.
“Whoa, Rory, slow down!”
Finding herself jerked to a stop, Rory sucked in a breath and looked up in a daze. “Wh-what? Oh my god-I'm sorry...hi,” she finished in lame surprise, when she saw who it was.
“Hey yourself,” Dean answered. He let his arms drop. “We've got to stop bumping into each other like this; it could get dangerous.”
She crossed her arms self-consiously over her middle. “Bumping into people can affect one's health all right,” she muttered.
“Huh?”
“Nevermind.”
Dean looked at her in confused concern. “Are you okay?”
She let out the breath she'd pulled in. “Yeah, I guess, I just...sorry.” Rory blinked at him. “Are you always up this early?”
He shrugged. “I haven't had a lot of choice the past few years, having to work and keep up with school. It's just a habit now. But I know you don't make a habit of being up at 6:30, unless I missed something.”
“No, you didn't miss anything...”
“Then what's going on? You were pretty upset last time I saw you...Did you get any of that straightened out, or...?”
She shook her head. “Not exactly. That's the problem.”
Dean's hands went into his pockets as he looked at her intently. “Do you think you can tell me about it this time?”
And he seemed to genuinely want to hear it, whatever it was. Rory looked at him, and she could see it in his eyes, too. He cared. Whatever he'd been doing, exactly, for the past five years, somehow had he...been able to forgive her? Was that why he could talk to her like this? She could tell that it was still awkward, for both of them, even if they weren't making it apparent, but she doubted he would still be standing here if he didn't care. If he still hated her for the way she'd neglected him, left him heartbroken more than once.
Rory still didn't know what to make of Dean's attitude now, but she wasn't about to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth.
“Can we do something?” she blurted.
Dean blinked. “What?”
“I know this is going to sound stupid, but I can't...talk about it, and I just need...I mean we're friends now, right? That was the general consensus, yes?”
“Yeah...” he answered hesitantly.
“Then can we do something? Go somewhere? Hang out? Something? I need to do something. I don't need to think right now. I just need to...go. Or do. I know you were probably heading to Luke's, and I guess we could still go there first, but we can get you something to eat anywhere. Can we please just go? I would drag Lane out of her house right now, but she has kids and I don't want to do that to her. She doesn't have the capability of being as spontaneous, because I think Zach's at work today and she'd have to find someboday to watch them and-“ The tirade stopped, hung over over the subject of children.
She was going to have one. In eight and a half months her life would be different like that, too. There would be a new life, that depended on her, and she didn't know if she could handle that, and-
A dry sob stuck in Rory's throat before she could pull it back, and Dean frowned.
“Rory?”
She quickly swallowed back anything that might have followed, and took an unsteady breath. “Can we please just go?”
She felt pathetic and ridiculous, staring up him and asking him for anything, esecially this desperately, but not because she was afraid he'd think she was crazy. Somehow she knew he wouldn't. Maybe a lot of that was because she knew that he knew her, but something about this knew attitude of his told her that, too. It had put her more at ease from the beginning, besides the shock of seeing him the first time, after the wedding.
Rory hoped it meant he would help her now. She wasn't even sure what she wanted, or what she needed, but she knew she needed help. Walking into town alone hadn't been such a bang-up idea after all. If she was alone with herself one more moment she'd lose it.
And she didn't know why, but she knew that, small remaining awkwardness aside, being around Dean would help. Maybe it was just because he was the only person in sight now that she knew, but that didn't matter to her.
For one of the longest moments of her life Dean stared at her uncertainly, hands still in his pockets as he stood there, looming over her like he always had. Strange how that had never bothered her before. It was a little intimidating now, fearing rejection.
Finally he let out a breath and shrugged. “Okay. What do you want to do?” Part of him still looked a little apprehensive, but she could forgive him that.
Still, her eyebrows went up at the fact that he'd agreed. “Well...I don't know.”
“You were right about Luke's. I was on my way there...we could get some coffee.”
Rory resisted the urge to laugh. “I think coffee is the last thing I need right now.”
Dean forehead scrunched at that, but he didn't protest.
“Okay, uh...”
“Hot chocolate though...that might be good.” She'd wanted hot chocolate last night, too. Her first craving, maybe? Or did that even start this early? Or maybe she just wanted it, and any connection was in her head.
Or maybe she should stop thinking, since that was the whole point of this exercise in all but humiliating herself asking Dean to do something with her.
“I think Luke has that, doesn't he?”
Rory shrugged now. “I don't know. I think so, but...could we maybe...go somewher that's not Luke's?” There wasn't one single reason why she didn't want to go to Luke's. Luke knew, and she trusted him, but he knew, and he would give her that look, because she was with Dean, and it had nothing to do with Dean, but her nerves were frayed enough as it was...
“Uh, sure. Weston's, then?” Dean asked, confused but apparently trying to be acoomodating.
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Okay...”
Weston's was back the way Rory had come, and she turned and fell into step beside Dean as he slowly headed that way. Somehow she couldn't help but remember the last time they'd been in Weston's together. It had been the first time they'd really talked after their breakup senior year, and they'd walked there together after bumping into one another, similar to today.
Right now felt a lot like that day, except that they were nearly seven years older, and she had a lot more to think about now. Neither of them really said anything until after they'd sat down and ordered, and Rory wondered if it was because he felt it, too-because he was remembering, like she was. She would probably never know, but it as enough to be here. It had been long enough since then that being here could feel good.
Despite everything that was happening now, being here with Dean felt good.
Lorelai stayed at home for a while, wondering if she should have let Rory go or if she should have done after her or insisted on going with her in the first place and if she was all right out there.
She had to remind herself that her baby was 24 now.
And about to have a baby herself.
Oh, god.
Finally Lorelai left the house and headed for Luke, hoping Rory was there but promising herself that she wouldn't go looking if that wasn't so. The girl needed her space, and by letting her go Lorelai had conceded to give it.
Still, she walked to Luke's, secretly hoping to catch a glimpse of her daughter. When she didn't, she was left with her thoughts. Sometimes that was fine, but not right now.
She was trying to be the collected adult, but it wasn't always easy.
The last thing Lorelai wanted right now were selfish thoughts, but one came through anyway. It came through because she knew what all of this meant. The promise she and Luke had made to Rory meant that until that baby was born and likely after, their lives outside of work would be about Rory, and about this new child. There would be no time to worry about...other things. About...
About having children of their own.
Rory wasn't at Luke's, and Luke was nowhere in sight just yet. He was probably just in the kitchen for a moment, but Lorelai sat down at the counter with nothing to pull herself out of her thoughts.
“Lorelai? Lorelai?”
She blinked and looked up, and there was Luke. “Hey. Where's Rory?”
“Oh, uh...she went out. For a walk or something, she said. She's fine.”
“Okay.” He looked at her for another moment, coffee pot in hand. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” she lied, smiling. “I'm fine.”
“And seriously, don't wait on sending out resumes and such, or on deciding, either. I waited too long on both, and well, everything turned out okay, but maybe I would be a little farther along in my career if I hadn't taken my own sweet time, so definitely watch yourself there,” Rory finished.
She and Dean had skimmed through their respective college experiences, though Rory had left out anything pertaining to Logan, and he had left out any girls, if there had been any. She got the impression that there hadn't been. For the last little while, at Dean's request, she'd told him some of what being on the campaign trail had been like. And there was the subject of what Dean himself was planning.
“Yeah, I kind of figured,” Dean answered. “I've been doing some cursory looking around, trying to get an idea of where I want to send those resumes. Of course I can't be too picky these days, but I don't want to go too far if I can help.”
“Why not?”
He smirked. “For one thing, Clara would kill me if I did.”
“But she'll be going to college in a year or two, won't she?”
“Yeah, she'll be a senior in the fall. I don't think she wants to go far either, though. She gets along with our parents a lot better, in the first place...”
Rory winced and took a swallow of her hot chocolate. “Ah.”
Dean looked at her for a moment, and she looked at first, but then looked away. She could tell he was debating whether or not to say something, and she didn't want to get in the way.
“You don't have to feel that way, you know. If that's what it is.”
She focused on him again. “Like what?”
“Guilty,” he answered quietly. “Over...that. How I get along with my parents now, or what caused it, or...anything,” he finished uncomfortably, not quite looking at her.
Her mouth hung open for a moment before she answered. “Oh...” Everything about the last time they'd been together was still a jumbled, confused mess in her head even now, but still...she knew enough to know that she should feel guilty. “But-“
Dean cut her off. “No, Rory. Look...anything with us that may or may not have had anything to do with it was a long time ago. My relationship with my parents isn't something you need to worry about. Besides...it's starting to get better. I told you that, didn't I?”
“Yeah...I think you mentioned it when I saw you after the wedding.”
“Good.” He nodded and went back to his pancakes, seeing as this was breakfast for him.
Rory sat back in her chair and took a few more sips of her hot chocolate, noticing that it was nearly gone. After another moment or so she spoke again. “Dean?”
His fork paused on the plate and he looked up at her. “Yeah?”
“At the wedding, even since then, once you were back...you were trying to avoid me at first, weren't you?”
Dean's eyebrpws went up. “What? I-“
“You were nice, when caught. But you were trying to leave the wedding without being seen at all, the first time I ran into you last month you ran off as quickly as you could, and maybe you did sit down with me that time we met at Luke's, but I could tell you really didn't want to. Two weeks ago was the first time I've seen you in years that I didn't feel at least a little like you'd rather be somewhere else. I wasn't really thinking about it, but...I noticed.”
“Rory...”
It had been nice, sitting here, able to really talk to him again, but it had also given her time to put together the small clues that had led to that conclusion, and she needed it to be out in the open. She knew that he cared, but she didn't want his friendship if there was part of him that didn't want it.
“I want to know the truth.”
He let out a breath and lowered his eyes. “I guess maybe I was. Trying to avoid you, I mean,” he admitted. “I'm sorry.”
“No, it's okay. I can understand it. I just...I need to know that you weren't just being nice, when you said we should try to be friends again. I don't want to feel like I pressured you into it by being as completely pathetic as I was last time you saw me. I don't want to think it was only because you felt sorry for me.”
“That wasn't it at all.”
“Because if you want to be friend, then fine. I still think it's a good idea-or at least a decent idea, I guess, if but you don't really want, to then-“
“Rory, I do,” Dean insisted. “Listen...” He set his fork down outright and crossed his arms on the small table as he looked across it at her. For a moment he stared at his arms, maybe collecting his thoughts, and she waited anxious. Then he looked up once more and sighed.
“I've spent the past five years trying to get my life together. I went to college, got new jobs, made friends-even with a lot of my teachers, which has helped a good bit. Like I told you two or three months ago, I'm not a straight-A student, but I work as hard as I can and I'm pretty damn close. I think I've done okay for myself, and I'm proud of that-that I've...moved on, I guess. For a while, at first, I didn't want to, but I did it, or I thought I had, but then I saw you at the wedding.”
His eyes lowered again. “I think I was scared, seeing you at all. I don't know what I'd expected, but I was afraid to find out, so...there was no consious decision, but when I actually made it back for the summer I think I did try to avoid you, at first.” Dean shrugged. “Then I realized I was being stupid. I mean, you haven't really gotten over something if you can't even think about it, right?” He sat back, still looking thoughtful, and finally looked her in the eyes again. “I think this is another step.”
Rory swallowed hard, suddenly realizing that however he'd gotten there, he knew more than she did about a few things. She smiled, because he was right. She didn't understand it all, not yet, but maybe, she thought, she should be trying.
“Ah, so being my friend now is actually all about you?” she retorted in amusement.
Thankfully, being Dean he recognized the humor for what it was-her coping mechanism for dealing with serious conversations, not a legitamate opinion or insult-and laughed.
“No, but if you need to feel less selfish about this and want to think of it that way, go right ahead,” he chuckled.
Rory smiled, and wasn't surprised that she was doing it. Maybe her life was turning upside-down, but this had been a good idea. Maybe she could call Jess a friend now, but she rarely really saw him. Dean, however, was here, at least for a while, and it felt good.
And maybe, with a little more time, the left-over strangeness would fade. Maybe it could be a more than a fleeting experiment.
Now more than ever she didn't know how things would turn out with Logan-if they would ever find some lasting middle ground as her parents had, or if they would hate each other for the rest of their lives....
But maybe it would never have to be that way again with either Jess or Dean.
Maybe she could keep both of them forever, just like this.
Friends.
Even as Rory smiled across the table at Dean, the hand that wasn't holding her mug went self-consiously around her middle under the table.
Friends. God knew she was going to need them.
Chapter 9
Luke was usually the first one up in the Gilmore household that was now sometimes three, but Rory was at the kitchen table staring forlornly into a bowl of cheerios when she heard him come downstairs the next morning. She'd been up for more than an hour already, and it was barely five thirty.
Five thirty. God, the last thing she needed to think about was the last time she'd been awake at five thirty.
Rory looked up at about the same moment Luke saw her and stopped in the kitchen doorway. One didn't necessarily preclude the other. At least she didn't think so. Not that it mattered. Luke, for his part, didn't seem to know what to say, so he stated the obvious.
“Your cereal's getting soggy.”
She glanced down at it again. “I know. I thought I wanted it, but then I remembered that dairy products aren't usually considered the best thing to consume after one has thrown up.”
When she looked up his eyebrows were hiked, for a moment. “Uhm, right. I guess. Well, for stomach flu and all, yeah, but I don't know if that applies to-“ He stopped and abruptly turned to head for the coffee pot.
So he knew. Lorelai had told him, like she'd offered to. Somehow Rory felt immense relief and sharp guilt at the same time at not having had to do it herself.
“I already put the coffee on.” She'd already put it on, and it was already done.
“So you did.” Luke turned to look at her curiously, obviously noticing the distinct lack of a mug in front of her. “You're not drinking any,” he said, with some degree of amazement in his voice.
Rory shrugged and looked away, not quite sure how to answer the question in that. “Don't want it to have two heads or anything...” Letting him know that she knew he knew.
She heard a quiet sigh, and then Luke had lowered himself into the next chair. “Well...you can have coffee, you know. Just don't overdo it, I guess.”
She grimaced. “I know. I just didn't feel like it.”
That should have alarmed her right there. She should have been worried, wondering why on earth she didn't want coffee and she couldn't eat the cereal in front of her. She liked food. She loved coffee. But all she wanted to do was sit here and stare into nothing, and now she couldn't even do that because here was Luke, looking at her with concern. He also looked pretty damned uncomfortable at the whole situation, but he was concerned.
Luke blinked once or twice and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “Oh. Okay. Normally I'd chalk that up to a miracle and let it go, but I don't think I should do that right now.” His voice softened to a level not heard from him very often. “Are you okay?”
Rory stared at him for a moment, and he straightened and held up his hands in apology. “Right. Stupid question.”
“Thanks anyway,” she sighed.
Luke stood to pour himself a glass of skim milk-and again, how did Lorelai Gilmore end up with a relative health nut?-and once the refrigerator closed he paused for a moment, not quite looking at her. “Rory...your mom wasn't just speaking for herself. We'll both help in any way we can. Okay?”
Rory let out a breath and gave him what of a smile she could muster. “Thanks, Luke. I sorry you had to find out from Mom. I trust you, and I promise I would have-“ The words started to come out too quickly, and she tripped over them about the time Luke stopped her anyway.
“Don't worry about it.”
She swallowed. “Thanks, Luke,” she repeated.
That was when Lorelai all but stumbled down the stairs and around to the kitchen, eyes nearly closed and pretending to still be asleep. An electrical beeping could be heard from upstairs. “Luke! You went downstairs before your alarm clock went off again. Which leaves me to turn it off, which means by then I'm awake, and an hour before I want to be, unless it'a a weekend like today which means I'm awake way before I want to be...” She trailed, scrubbing at her eyes as she leaned in the doorway, when she spotted her daughter.
“Oh...hey kiddo.” Blinking herself into a more awake state, she came to the chair next to her husband and across from Rory, pulling it out and dropping into it so she could study her offspring without needing to stay on her feet. “What are you doing up?”
Lorelai squinted at her daughter for a moment, and everything seemed to come back. “Did you wake up sick?” she demanded.
Rory just winced.
“Honey, why didn't you come get me?”
“Well it wasn't a crisis; apparently I'll have to get used to it anyway, so I didn't want to bother you...”
“Rory, when you're home, bother me. I'm your mother; that's what I'm here for. You haven't been home enough in the past several years to keep up your previous level of bothering, so you're more than overdue to do all of it you want when you are home. Got it?”
Because it was her mother, and only her mother would have put it that way, Rory couldn't help but smile. “Yeah...I guess.”
Lorelai held up a hand. “Besides. May the patron saint of mothers strike me down, but I kind of miss being bothered in the middle of the night for god-knows whatever. Accuse me of getting old and nostalgic if you must.”
“Actually, I think that started a few years ago...” Luke interjected.
“Well I wasn't talking to you,” she shot back.
Rory smiled a little more. “Thanks, you guys.”
Luke shrugged and stood. “Any time.” He stole a quick kiss from his wife and headed out for the diner, leaving mother and daughter alone.
“So,” Lorelai said after another minute or two. “Any ideas for today's itinerary?”
“Phsycological damage control?” she snorted.
“Ah, sweetie,” her mother sighed, getting up to got up to go for the cabinets. “Come on, let's find something you'll eat...”
Two pieces of toast and a pop-tart she hadn't really tasted later, Rory was grudgingly deemed fed well enough to continue the day, and Lorelai finally stopped hovering and let her out of the kitchen.
After that, she didn't know what to do with herself.
“Mom, I think I'm going into town,” she called finally, after standing into the entry for several minutes staring at the door. Her mother poked her head in from the living room.
“You are?”
“Yeah...just to...walk around, clear my head, I guess.”
Lorelai closed the distance between them and hugged her for a moment. “Okay...you want me to come with?”
“No, it's okay. I'll be fine.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah...”
“You feeling any better?” she asked, pulling back to look at her.
“I'm not queasy at the moment, if that's what you mean,” Rory shrugged.
“Okay. Good luck with the whole head thing, then. I've had a little experience with that myself. It's not always easy. The luck could be needed.”
She snorted, loving her mother more than anything for always being herself. It was one of the few things keeping her sane right now. “So I gathered.”
The short walk into town wasn't unwelcome, what with the being alone and able to hear herself think-as long as she didn't think to much. Or that was the original plan she'd had, in the clearing-her-head department.
It didn't work out so well.
One of her mother's main selling points for not-freaking-out had been that she wasn't sixteen. She was through college, had, a job, and Rory had taken that to mean that this didn't have change everything.
But it would.
She could keep the apartment, the job, everything...but it would all be different. And not that she was thinking about it much right now, but what abgout finding that one guy, huh? The one she wouldn't want to hesitate over. The one she was really supposed to be with for the rest of her life. Wasn't finding anyone notoriously harder when one had a child in tow?
A child.
Somehow even knowing how well her and her mother's relationship had turned out didn't help in realizing that she was going to be a mother. Rory couldn't wrap her head around it.
Apparently she couldn't wrap her head around watching where she was going, either, because once she was across the square she stepped up onto the sidewalk right into the path of a passerby. She didn't see anything until the tall shadow was on her, and even then she wouldn't have snapped out of her reverie in time to stop if two strong arms hadn't snapped out to catch her shoulders and prevent the collision.
“Whoa, Rory, slow down!”
Finding herself jerked to a stop, Rory sucked in a breath and looked up in a daze. “Wh-what? Oh my god-I'm sorry...hi,” she finished in lame surprise, when she saw who it was.
“Hey yourself,” Dean answered. He let his arms drop. “We've got to stop bumping into each other like this; it could get dangerous.”
She crossed her arms self-consiously over her middle. “Bumping into people can affect one's health all right,” she muttered.
“Huh?”
“Nevermind.”
Dean looked at her in confused concern. “Are you okay?”
She let out the breath she'd pulled in. “Yeah, I guess, I just...sorry.” Rory blinked at him. “Are you always up this early?”
He shrugged. “I haven't had a lot of choice the past few years, having to work and keep up with school. It's just a habit now. But I know you don't make a habit of being up at 6:30, unless I missed something.”
“No, you didn't miss anything...”
“Then what's going on? You were pretty upset last time I saw you...Did you get any of that straightened out, or...?”
She shook her head. “Not exactly. That's the problem.”
Dean's hands went into his pockets as he looked at her intently. “Do you think you can tell me about it this time?”
And he seemed to genuinely want to hear it, whatever it was. Rory looked at him, and she could see it in his eyes, too. He cared. Whatever he'd been doing, exactly, for the past five years, somehow had he...been able to forgive her? Was that why he could talk to her like this? She could tell that it was still awkward, for both of them, even if they weren't making it apparent, but she doubted he would still be standing here if he didn't care. If he still hated her for the way she'd neglected him, left him heartbroken more than once.
Rory still didn't know what to make of Dean's attitude now, but she wasn't about to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth.
“Can we do something?” she blurted.
Dean blinked. “What?”
“I know this is going to sound stupid, but I can't...talk about it, and I just need...I mean we're friends now, right? That was the general consensus, yes?”
“Yeah...” he answered hesitantly.
“Then can we do something? Go somewhere? Hang out? Something? I need to do something. I don't need to think right now. I just need to...go. Or do. I know you were probably heading to Luke's, and I guess we could still go there first, but we can get you something to eat anywhere. Can we please just go? I would drag Lane out of her house right now, but she has kids and I don't want to do that to her. She doesn't have the capability of being as spontaneous, because I think Zach's at work today and she'd have to find someboday to watch them and-“ The tirade stopped, hung over over the subject of children.
She was going to have one. In eight and a half months her life would be different like that, too. There would be a new life, that depended on her, and she didn't know if she could handle that, and-
A dry sob stuck in Rory's throat before she could pull it back, and Dean frowned.
“Rory?”
She quickly swallowed back anything that might have followed, and took an unsteady breath. “Can we please just go?”
She felt pathetic and ridiculous, staring up him and asking him for anything, esecially this desperately, but not because she was afraid he'd think she was crazy. Somehow she knew he wouldn't. Maybe a lot of that was because she knew that he knew her, but something about this knew attitude of his told her that, too. It had put her more at ease from the beginning, besides the shock of seeing him the first time, after the wedding.
Rory hoped it meant he would help her now. She wasn't even sure what she wanted, or what she needed, but she knew she needed help. Walking into town alone hadn't been such a bang-up idea after all. If she was alone with herself one more moment she'd lose it.
And she didn't know why, but she knew that, small remaining awkwardness aside, being around Dean would help. Maybe it was just because he was the only person in sight now that she knew, but that didn't matter to her.
For one of the longest moments of her life Dean stared at her uncertainly, hands still in his pockets as he stood there, looming over her like he always had. Strange how that had never bothered her before. It was a little intimidating now, fearing rejection.
Finally he let out a breath and shrugged. “Okay. What do you want to do?” Part of him still looked a little apprehensive, but she could forgive him that.
Still, her eyebrows went up at the fact that he'd agreed. “Well...I don't know.”
“You were right about Luke's. I was on my way there...we could get some coffee.”
Rory resisted the urge to laugh. “I think coffee is the last thing I need right now.”
Dean forehead scrunched at that, but he didn't protest.
“Okay, uh...”
“Hot chocolate though...that might be good.” She'd wanted hot chocolate last night, too. Her first craving, maybe? Or did that even start this early? Or maybe she just wanted it, and any connection was in her head.
Or maybe she should stop thinking, since that was the whole point of this exercise in all but humiliating herself asking Dean to do something with her.
“I think Luke has that, doesn't he?”
Rory shrugged now. “I don't know. I think so, but...could we maybe...go somewher that's not Luke's?” There wasn't one single reason why she didn't want to go to Luke's. Luke knew, and she trusted him, but he knew, and he would give her that look, because she was with Dean, and it had nothing to do with Dean, but her nerves were frayed enough as it was...
“Uh, sure. Weston's, then?” Dean asked, confused but apparently trying to be acoomodating.
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Okay...”
Weston's was back the way Rory had come, and she turned and fell into step beside Dean as he slowly headed that way. Somehow she couldn't help but remember the last time they'd been in Weston's together. It had been the first time they'd really talked after their breakup senior year, and they'd walked there together after bumping into one another, similar to today.
Right now felt a lot like that day, except that they were nearly seven years older, and she had a lot more to think about now. Neither of them really said anything until after they'd sat down and ordered, and Rory wondered if it was because he felt it, too-because he was remembering, like she was. She would probably never know, but it as enough to be here. It had been long enough since then that being here could feel good.
Despite everything that was happening now, being here with Dean felt good.
Lorelai stayed at home for a while, wondering if she should have let Rory go or if she should have done after her or insisted on going with her in the first place and if she was all right out there.
She had to remind herself that her baby was 24 now.
And about to have a baby herself.
Oh, god.
Finally Lorelai left the house and headed for Luke, hoping Rory was there but promising herself that she wouldn't go looking if that wasn't so. The girl needed her space, and by letting her go Lorelai had conceded to give it.
Still, she walked to Luke's, secretly hoping to catch a glimpse of her daughter. When she didn't, she was left with her thoughts. Sometimes that was fine, but not right now.
She was trying to be the collected adult, but it wasn't always easy.
The last thing Lorelai wanted right now were selfish thoughts, but one came through anyway. It came through because she knew what all of this meant. The promise she and Luke had made to Rory meant that until that baby was born and likely after, their lives outside of work would be about Rory, and about this new child. There would be no time to worry about...other things. About...
About having children of their own.
Rory wasn't at Luke's, and Luke was nowhere in sight just yet. He was probably just in the kitchen for a moment, but Lorelai sat down at the counter with nothing to pull herself out of her thoughts.
“Lorelai? Lorelai?”
She blinked and looked up, and there was Luke. “Hey. Where's Rory?”
“Oh, uh...she went out. For a walk or something, she said. She's fine.”
“Okay.” He looked at her for another moment, coffee pot in hand. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” she lied, smiling. “I'm fine.”
“And seriously, don't wait on sending out resumes and such, or on deciding, either. I waited too long on both, and well, everything turned out okay, but maybe I would be a little farther along in my career if I hadn't taken my own sweet time, so definitely watch yourself there,” Rory finished.
She and Dean had skimmed through their respective college experiences, though Rory had left out anything pertaining to Logan, and he had left out any girls, if there had been any. She got the impression that there hadn't been. For the last little while, at Dean's request, she'd told him some of what being on the campaign trail had been like. And there was the subject of what Dean himself was planning.
“Yeah, I kind of figured,” Dean answered. “I've been doing some cursory looking around, trying to get an idea of where I want to send those resumes. Of course I can't be too picky these days, but I don't want to go too far if I can help.”
“Why not?”
He smirked. “For one thing, Clara would kill me if I did.”
“But she'll be going to college in a year or two, won't she?”
“Yeah, she'll be a senior in the fall. I don't think she wants to go far either, though. She gets along with our parents a lot better, in the first place...”
Rory winced and took a swallow of her hot chocolate. “Ah.”
Dean looked at her for a moment, and she looked at first, but then looked away. She could tell he was debating whether or not to say something, and she didn't want to get in the way.
“You don't have to feel that way, you know. If that's what it is.”
She focused on him again. “Like what?”
“Guilty,” he answered quietly. “Over...that. How I get along with my parents now, or what caused it, or...anything,” he finished uncomfortably, not quite looking at her.
Her mouth hung open for a moment before she answered. “Oh...” Everything about the last time they'd been together was still a jumbled, confused mess in her head even now, but still...she knew enough to know that she should feel guilty. “But-“
Dean cut her off. “No, Rory. Look...anything with us that may or may not have had anything to do with it was a long time ago. My relationship with my parents isn't something you need to worry about. Besides...it's starting to get better. I told you that, didn't I?”
“Yeah...I think you mentioned it when I saw you after the wedding.”
“Good.” He nodded and went back to his pancakes, seeing as this was breakfast for him.
Rory sat back in her chair and took a few more sips of her hot chocolate, noticing that it was nearly gone. After another moment or so she spoke again. “Dean?”
His fork paused on the plate and he looked up at her. “Yeah?”
“At the wedding, even since then, once you were back...you were trying to avoid me at first, weren't you?”
Dean's eyebrpws went up. “What? I-“
“You were nice, when caught. But you were trying to leave the wedding without being seen at all, the first time I ran into you last month you ran off as quickly as you could, and maybe you did sit down with me that time we met at Luke's, but I could tell you really didn't want to. Two weeks ago was the first time I've seen you in years that I didn't feel at least a little like you'd rather be somewhere else. I wasn't really thinking about it, but...I noticed.”
“Rory...”
It had been nice, sitting here, able to really talk to him again, but it had also given her time to put together the small clues that had led to that conclusion, and she needed it to be out in the open. She knew that he cared, but she didn't want his friendship if there was part of him that didn't want it.
“I want to know the truth.”
He let out a breath and lowered his eyes. “I guess maybe I was. Trying to avoid you, I mean,” he admitted. “I'm sorry.”
“No, it's okay. I can understand it. I just...I need to know that you weren't just being nice, when you said we should try to be friends again. I don't want to feel like I pressured you into it by being as completely pathetic as I was last time you saw me. I don't want to think it was only because you felt sorry for me.”
“That wasn't it at all.”
“Because if you want to be friend, then fine. I still think it's a good idea-or at least a decent idea, I guess, if but you don't really want, to then-“
“Rory, I do,” Dean insisted. “Listen...” He set his fork down outright and crossed his arms on the small table as he looked across it at her. For a moment he stared at his arms, maybe collecting his thoughts, and she waited anxious. Then he looked up once more and sighed.
“I've spent the past five years trying to get my life together. I went to college, got new jobs, made friends-even with a lot of my teachers, which has helped a good bit. Like I told you two or three months ago, I'm not a straight-A student, but I work as hard as I can and I'm pretty damn close. I think I've done okay for myself, and I'm proud of that-that I've...moved on, I guess. For a while, at first, I didn't want to, but I did it, or I thought I had, but then I saw you at the wedding.”
His eyes lowered again. “I think I was scared, seeing you at all. I don't know what I'd expected, but I was afraid to find out, so...there was no consious decision, but when I actually made it back for the summer I think I did try to avoid you, at first.” Dean shrugged. “Then I realized I was being stupid. I mean, you haven't really gotten over something if you can't even think about it, right?” He sat back, still looking thoughtful, and finally looked her in the eyes again. “I think this is another step.”
Rory swallowed hard, suddenly realizing that however he'd gotten there, he knew more than she did about a few things. She smiled, because he was right. She didn't understand it all, not yet, but maybe, she thought, she should be trying.
“Ah, so being my friend now is actually all about you?” she retorted in amusement.
Thankfully, being Dean he recognized the humor for what it was-her coping mechanism for dealing with serious conversations, not a legitamate opinion or insult-and laughed.
“No, but if you need to feel less selfish about this and want to think of it that way, go right ahead,” he chuckled.
Rory smiled, and wasn't surprised that she was doing it. Maybe her life was turning upside-down, but this had been a good idea. Maybe she could call Jess a friend now, but she rarely really saw him. Dean, however, was here, at least for a while, and it felt good.
And maybe, with a little more time, the left-over strangeness would fade. Maybe it could be a more than a fleeting experiment.
Now more than ever she didn't know how things would turn out with Logan-if they would ever find some lasting middle ground as her parents had, or if they would hate each other for the rest of their lives....
But maybe it would never have to be that way again with either Jess or Dean.
Maybe she could keep both of them forever, just like this.
Friends.
Even as Rory smiled across the table at Dean, the hand that wasn't holding her mug went self-consiously around her middle under the table.
Friends. God knew she was going to need them.