The tick of a clock, the beat of her heart, a sharp intake of breath.

"I slept with Christopher." These three things register and stretch out into eternity, but span the breadth of only a blink.

Lorelai absorbs every detail of his face. Luke's forehead crumples into three furrows, his eyes squint as if to see past her words. He wets his lips and his adam's apple bobs as he swallows. His body is perfectly still for a moment.

Then, he turns on his heel and heads back towards his truck.

With his back to her, Lorelai is safe. She doesn't have to be strong for him anymore. She holds herself together by hugging herself. She squeezes her eyes shut. She presses her lips into a line so firmly that they go numb. In fact, everything feels numb. There are pins and needles in her fingers and toes.

And then-

The door of the truck slams closed with an enormous bang. Lorelai expects the engine revving to life. She expects the squealing of tires as Luke tries to get as far away from her as quickly as possible.

It's not that she doesn't want him. It's not that she wants to cause him pain. She just can't handle the hope that sprung eternal in her heart as he pledged himself to her, as he told her that he was still "all in". Not when he wasn't, not when it mattered. Not when they could never get back what they had. She had thoroughly destroyed any chance of that.

They'd had a lot of chances.

Except-

After the sound of the door slamming finishes echoing around her yard there is the sound of snow crunching under boots.

Lorelai looks up and there Luke is stomping over to her with a determined expression on his face. He steps right up to her, just short of her personal space. He seems taller than he really is. The set of his mouth is an expression she's often seen. He's gearing up for an argument. For a moment, just one, she lets herself live in the fantasy of casual banter.

And then-

"No."

"What?" she breathes and she can see her breath in the cold morning air.

"I said no."

The next moment lets her be riled. It dredges up the fight that she has left. "No to what Luke?" she demands. "I didn't ask you anything."

"Yeah, you did." The clenching of his fists is audible; his knuckles pop and crack.

"What did I ask you?"

"You asked me if I was giving up on you," when she tries to protest, he steps closer. Her eyes cross and she feels lightheaded. "Not in so many words, but that's what this is really about right? And I'm saying no. Because I don't care. Pack your stuff, call Sookie, we're leaving."

"I'm not going anywhere!" says Lorelai, sparked to life by mild outrage.

"Yes, you are," his unrelenting grip draws her onto the porch and through her front door. Once inside, she wrenches her arm away and glares at him. She musters anger, frustration and a smidge of hate; she hasn't felt that or anything since that night not so long ago, when she gave him The Choice.

"Did you not hear me? Is your baseball cap snapped too tight?" she taunts.

"I heard you just fine. Go pack a bag."

"No."

"Lorelai…"

"No Luke, you didn't want me. There's no getting past this, past any of it. You can't just show up here and ignore me when I tell you that it's over. You can't make me run away with you."

He sighs in a gust. "Lorelai please, I forgive you. Let me forgive you."

Outrage colours her face bright red. "I don't need your forgiveness!"

This time his grip is gentle, but no less firm when he takes her shoulders in his hands. "Lorelai," he says like a prayer. "I can't just let it end like this. I refuse to let us end. I love you so much. We've been through so much. We can fix this, I know we can. We have to try, please please, just say you'll try because I can't-" and his words stutter off. He visibly struggles for breath and releases her to rub the back of his neck. It's a nervous tick he has. And it's so endearing and familiar that Lorelai can't gather the words of refusal.

"Come with me. We'll go to Maryland or Montana if you want. We can go ten miles out of town or across the country. I don't care. As long as we're together, as long as there's a chance we can figure all this out."

"I just," Lorelai starts, "don't know what you think is going to happen here."

Luke's eyes are sad when he replies, "we go somewhere we can be alone and just let it out. Scream at each other. Yell and insult and just get through every horrible thing we've apparently done to each other because nothing else has worked. We're going to drive into the sunset and fight it out, fight for each other."

"And what happens when all the shouting is done?" she demands. "What if when we've lost our voices and the dust settles we can't move past it? What then?"

"Then at least we'll have tried!"

Luke waits while she measures him up. Her gaze is calculating and he stands tall, he withstands the scrutiny for the greater good of her respect and her ear.

He knows that if he can get her out that door he can do anything. He can be Superman, he can fly, he can lift a car above his head. If only he can get the self-proclaimed Wonder Woman that is Lorelai Gilmore to lay her weapons at her feet and agree to peace talks.

Lorelai nods slowly, seeing something in his face that she understands. Without a word she walks upstairs.

Luke doesn't know if he's supposed to follow. He doesn't know what it means. Is she just hoping he'll go away? He won't of course. If he didn't walk away after her admission about Christopher then he doesn't think anything would make him walk away permanently, least of all her silence.

He stares up the flight of stairs and thinks about his life a short time ago. He thinks about their lives before she asked him to marry her. He thinks about Lorelai in terms of being the love of his life. He thinks about the complexities of their intertwined lives that he had not expected. He thinks that if they can just get to the bottom of it all they can get through this.

He sincerely believes it as he walks up the stairs, prepared to fight her tooth and nail, to throw her clothes into the suitcase she keeps under her bed. He wonders what words he can say to convince her further because despite what he said, he won't actually kidnap her.

Lorelai's room is neat, which is strange. On her bed is a duffle bag and Lorelai herself is carefully folding various brightly coloured sweatpants, sparkly sweaters and flannels into it.

"We're going camping," she says.

"What."

"If I'm going to scream at you, I'm not going to do it in hearing range of other people. So we're going to go to the middle of nowhere, where you can't run away from me and I can definitively explain to you how freaking mad I am at you."

"You're mad at me?!" he says, torn between outrage and joy that she's playing along.

"YEAH I'm mad at you! And you'd better have brought an extra sleeping bag and jacket because I don't think I have enough warm stuff."

"Yeah."

"And another thing! We are not getting married this weekend, are you crazy? You don't solve problems with marriage. That's insane."

"That's a little hypocritical don't you-" he mumbles.

"I called Sookie and Tobin. You have me for four days. Make it count." she punctuates the statement by zipping up her suitcase and striding past him in a huff.

The screaming starts almost as soon as they're on the freeway.

"You can start," Lorelai says, gesturing at him grandly, as if she's doing him some huge favour.

"Great," he replies shortly. "Then you can tell me ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR GODDAMN MIND?!"