There was a light tap at the door to the room Dean had been assigned for getting ready.
"Yeah?" Dean asked; he was going to die of embarrassment if it was his dad with more wedding night advice.
"It's Lorelai. Can I come in?"
"Uh, I guess?"
She did, closing the door softly behind her.
"Wow. Don't you look sharp."
Oh boy. Lorelai Gilmore opening with a compliment on his appearance, wearing an expression he recognized: she was avoiding getting to the point. "Lorelai, what are you doing here?"
"I had an interesting conversation with Luke a few minutes ago."
Unbelievable. He shook his head, stood up, refusing to face her head on. It was his wedding day, for God's sake.
"No, Dean, it's not what you think."
"Oh yeah? So tell me, what do I think?" He didn't try to keep the bitterness out of his voice.
"I'm not here because when you were drunk last night you started going on about Rory. Well, OK, I am, but not because it was Rory."
"No?" He still wouldn't look at her.
"No. I'm here because you're a great kid, and I care about you, and I don't want you to make a mistake."
"The mistake being not, what, breaking Lindsey's heart so I can get back together with Rory even after all the ways she broke mine?"
"Oh, kiddo, no. The mistake being rushing into a commitment that I think even you suspect you aren't ready for. You and Lindsey are eighteen, you haven't even been together for a year yet, you've barely started college, you don't know what you want to do with your life. Just because you are quite possibly the most mature, well-adjusted, tall teenage boy in the history of the universe doesn't mean you're ready for this."
He turned to her then, an involuntary smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, because Lorelai. There was just no one like her. Lindsey's mom was great, but he couldn't imagine ever having a conversation like this with her. He couldn't imagine that, if he and Lindsey had broken up, she would have told him that that didn't mean he and her had, because she wasn't a . . . friend, like Lorelai was. Well, maybe not so much friend as eccentric aunt. Eccentric aunt who, with the exception of the misunderstanding about breakup #1, had been nothing but good to him. On the other hand . . . "So, what, leave Lindsey at the altar? I can't do that. I love her, she loves me, and we make each other happy. I know that marriage is hard work, but hey, I'm a hard worker. We'll figure it out as we go."
"Maybe. Or maybe you'll crash and burn because you're very, very young and you're at an age where people change and grow a lot in a short amount of time. Have you and Lindsey ever had a fight? Not like a little argument about what movie to see or what the color scheme for the wedding would be, but a real fight with yelling and tears and anger and frustration and wondering what the hell you ever saw in this person in the first place?"
"No, of course not!"
"Not 'of course not,' buddy, because when you're in it for the long haul those fights happen, and you're telling me you're ready to commit to her for life without any practice having them?"
"Because you're such an expert on commitment and working through things."
There was a silence.
"Lorelai—"
"No, you're right. I blew it with Max. I blew it because I let things move too fast, so that by the time I realized I wasn't actually ready for the big commit, it was too late to not be dramatic and awful about it. If I had been more honest about where I was at, then maybe we could have stayed together, and then, after a while, I would have been ready because we would have been together long enough for me to really see him fitting into my life in a permanent way. But I didn't because I was in love and everything felt good and wonderful and right, and when a relationship feels like that it's hard to have perspective on it, to see the ways it might be heading for a train wreck, so I didn't, and I blew it."
"Well, I'm not you."
"No, you're not. But I think we have something in common."
"Yeah, and what's that?"
"Sometimes, people come into our lives, and no matter how much time passes, no matter who else we come to care about, no matter how sure we are that it's for the best that we're not with them anymore, we never fully move past them, never fully get over them. Rory's dad, Christopher, is like that for me. And I think Rory might be like that for you. I called Christopher during my bachelorette party. And you started talking about Rory when you got drunk at your bachelor party. Calling Christopher didn't mean that I should get back together with him, but it was one of the many warning signs that I wasn't ready to marry Max. Do you think that, maybe, you thinking that much about Rory on the night before you wedding is a sign that you aren't ready to marry Lindsey?"
"You're really trying to talk me out of this, aren't you?"
"I just want you to be sure. Because if you aren't, and your marriage doesn't work out, that's going to be a lot worse than calling it off the day of, for you and Lindsey and everyone who cares about you."
Dean realized that Lorelai was saying things that at least a part of him had been hoping adults—real adults, like his parents—would say to him almost ever since he got engaged. He knew why they hadn't: his parents had gotten married at 19 and had his oldest sister a year later, and they were happy and OK. And his sister Janie had done the same, and she and Kevin were happy and his nephew was adorable and loved and cared for. But the thing was, he wasn't so sure he wanted that life. Well, he wanted marriage and a family, yeah, for sure. But there was this voice in the back of his head, Rory's voice, telling him that he was smart, that he could do whatever he put his mind to, he just had to figure out what he wanted and go after it. And it would be nice to maybe look forward to going to work someday, rather than being content doing whatever so he could hopefully fund all the things in his life that actually made him happy. And Lindsey . . . why had it never struck him as a warning sign that she was so willing to just go along with his plans, that she talked about the future in terms of the size of their house and the model of their car, that she just assumed that he would be able to provide those things even though he wasn't even through his first semester of college and hadn't declared a major yet?
He sank into a chair, staring at the floor. He watched Lorelai's shoes approach, felt her reach out and gently lift his chin to bring his face up to meet her concerned, sympathetic expression.
"There's that uncertainty I thought might be lurking."
"What do I do? Lorelai, what do I do? I can't do this to Lindsey, to everyone. Oh, God, and everything's all paid for, the wedding and the reception and everything! I can't do this to them!"
She grabbed another chair and pulled it over so she could sit down facing him. "It's going to suck, and I won't pretend otherwise. People are going to be hurt. But they'll get past it eventually, and hopefully recognize that, in the long run, you did the right thing. You can be much more mature than I was and have an actual conversation with Lindsey, as opposed to running away in the wee hours of the morning and leaving everyone to draw the inevitable conclusion. She'll probably still be angry, and no matter what she'll be hurt, but there's a slim chance that you'll be able to talk her into not breaking up and just taking a few steps back instead, if that's something you want to try. And if you need to be away from everyone right after you do this, I'll kick Rory back to Yale a day early and you can crash at my place. Or I'll make Luke let you stay with him. I've got your back, Dean. Always."
He nodded slowly, staring at the ground. The fact that it was this easy, one little five-minute conversation and he was sure that calling off the wedding was the right thing, was proof enough that it was. God, this was going to be awful. "Thanks, but I think I'd better just face all the music. Rip the bandaid off all at once, you know?"
She nodded. "Want me to stick around?"
"No, you'd better not. I don't want people to get the wrong idea, you know?"
"Right. Of course. Wouldn't want people thinking that this is about Rory."
"Exactly."
"OK then. I'll sneak myself out."
He smiled then; he couldn't help it. They both stood, and she turned to go. "Lorelai?"
She turned back. "Yeah?"
He swallowed. "Thank you. I . . . " he trailed off, looking up at the ceiling and blinking back the sudden moisture in his eyes.
She walked back and pulled him into a quick, tight hug. "You call me any time, OK?"
"OK," he said.
She patted his shoulder. "Good luck." And she left.
After a couple of minutes, Dean took a deep breath, and went to go find Lindsey.
. . .
A month after the day Dean almost got married, Rory got a call from a number she didn't recognize.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Rory, it's me."
"Dean?"
"Yeah."
"Wow, hi. So . . . how are things?"
"Oh, you know, about as well as could be expected."
"Right."
"Listen, I was thinking about going home this coming weekend, and I was wondering whether there was any chance I'd see you in Stars Hollow?"
Rory's heart leaped. "Yes. Definitely."
"Really?"
"Yeah, if you're sure that's what you want."
"Yes. Definitely."
"OK, it's a date. I mean, not a date date, obviously, just using the expression signifying that we are in agreement that we will see one another at the aforementioned time, and—"
"Rory."
"Yeah?"
"It can be a date date if you want it to be."
". . . Oh."
"Or not. Whatever. I mean, no pressure or anything. Just—"
"Yes."
"'Yes,' what?"
"Yes, it can be a date date. I mean, we can start small, get coffee, re-create the first time you hung out at the house by watching movies with my mom. But it can be a date date. Can we stop saying date date now? It's starting to sound weird."
"Sure. Yes. Absolutely."
"'Sure, yes, absolutely,' what?"
"Sure, yes we can get coffee and watch movies with your mom, absolutely we can stop saying date date because it totally does sound weird."
"So, I'll see you at the coffee shop on Saturday at, say, 2?"
"Perfect."
Rory grinned. "Hey Dean?"
"Yeah, Rory?"
"I've missed you."
"I've missed you, too. And now I'm really hating that I have class in ten minutes. Will you hate me if I ditch so we can keep talking?"
"Dean Forester, don't you dare."
"So you would hate me."
"No, of course not. I could never hate you. But you're in college and class is important, and if you skip, how will you tell me every single thing about it over coffee on Saturday?"
"Every single thing?"
"Yes. Lecture topic, the tone of the professor's voice, who asked what questions, on a scale of 1 to 10 how hard it was to stay awake, was it actually necessary to stay up until midnight to get that reading done or could you have blown it off in favor of a little more beauty sleep? All the gory details."
Dean laughed. God, she'd missed that.
"OK, it's a deal. I will get off the phone, go to class, and bore you to death with the details on Saturday at 2 at the coffee shop."
"It's a date."
"A date date, even."
"Go to class, Dean."
"Fine. See you Saturday."
"I look forward to it."