She gets up early and lies in bed until noon. She doesn't have the energy to get up today, to take a shower, to eat, to go to the inn, to do anything that means setting foot out of her bed.
She stares at the ceiling, at the wall, at the bathroom door, at her desk, at the cushioned chair, at her closet, at her dresser. Her. Her dresser. Not theirs. Another wave of that marked guilt crashes into her, forcing her deeper under the sheets.
She's passing time, she knows it. She knows what she has to do, but if she knows him at all, the chances of having him come over again and sit on her couch, use her stove, kiss her softly and hold her is slim. After everything that has happened, she's lucky to even have him look at her, to still regard her as a friend.
She sits up, pushing her hair away from her face. She runs her tongue over her teeth and holds a cupped hand over her mouth, smelling her breath. Wretched. She feels wretched. She smells wretched. She is wretched.
She rolls out of bed and shuffles to the bathroom, closing the door behind her. She needs to be enclosed away from the silence in the house. It's too loud; it announces her failures, her colossal and monumental mistakes, her infinite regret.
She examines herself in the mirror. God, she looks like death warmed over. No wonder Paul Anka runs from her every time she goes to feed him. She strips out of her clothes, clothes that need to be burned, and into the shower, turning on the hot water. She looks for her shampoo and finds it. She hates her shampoo. It's so frivolous. Her soap is frivolous and her toothbrush and toothpaste, hell, her whole goddamn house is frivolous without him. She uses the shampoo and the soap anyway, and when she comes out of the shower, she uses her frivolous toothbrush and toothpaste and after she does that, opens the bathroom door to the rest of her frivolous house.
She reaches a hand into her closet and pulls out a pair of jeans and a sweater. She gets dressed, leaving her hair to air dry. She puts on some socks and searches around for some comfortable shoes, shoes capable of holding her up while she melts. She comes across a pair of old leather boots, well glossed and creased with age. She can't remember where they're from, but he probably got them for her. Before they were more, before that kiss on the Dragonfly porch, before that dance.
She finds a coat and puts it on, not bothering to look at herself in the mirror. She's not going to play dress up today. No funny references, no smiles, none of that. She can't do that today.
She heads downstairs and finds Paul Anka on the bottom step, his mournful face echoing the feeling that's been stitched into her skin.
"Okay, dog. Let's get you some food," she says and he follows her into the kitchen, where she pours his specially ordered kibble into a stainless steel pot, no handle, and sets it in front of the stove, just as he likes it.
She rubs his shaggy head and he starts to eat. She can still hear his munching when she leaves the kitchen and goes to the foyer, where she gets her tea rose colored popcorn Amelia hat, as described by She puts it on and wraps a scarf loosely around her neck. She doesn't want to feel any more strangled than she already does.
She opens the door and steps through it, closing it behind her. Snow is light on the grass and it is frigid, but she is hot. She is burning in her clothes, itching beneath her skin. Her breath comes in short gasps and her mind panics. She can't do this.
She goes back in her house and closes the door swiftly behind her, leaning against it. Taking long, measured breaths, she calms her heart. The prospect of facing him without the fake smile and the artificial niceness scares the shit out of her. She takes another breath and goes to open the door again, but that burning returns and she slams it shut.
"I just need to relax, calm down and not think about it. Don't think, just do," she says softly, going to her couch and sitting. She needs a few minutes to collect herself.
It is ten p.m. and she's finished another episode of Monk. Paul Anka is curled up next to her, asleep. She has been watching Monk since one this afternoon and she hasn't moved, not once, not even to pee or scratch her toe, which really needs to be scratched.
She has been collecting herself all afternoon and all evening. She checks the clock. 10:05.
He's closing up right now, probably washing the last of the dishes. Soon, he'll start to scrub down the grill and then grease it for tomorrow. And then he'll wash down the grill floor, wipe down the counter and the coffee machine, sweep behind the counter, wipe down the tables out front and stack the chairs, sweep the front, then he'll mop and take inventory since it's a Sunday.
"Fuck it," she whispers and bolts off the couch, leaving the t.v. on and Paul Anka still asleep. She leaves the house and hastily walks to the diner. She goes up the steps and looks through the glass door. He has his back to her, his hands moving as he wipes the coffee machine. She remembers how those hands would move across her abdomen, up and down her side, around her back. She takes a deep breath, the memory causing her flesh to bump up.
She opens the door, hearing the chimes twinkle overhead. It smells like pine sol and bleach and she breathes it in, her mind opening up.
"We're closed," he grumbles and he turns around, ready to expound on that fact further when he doesn't hear the chimes ring again.
"I was hoping you'd make an exception for me. Just this once," she says, her voice wavering. Damn her voice.
He seems surprised to see her in the way he would be surprised to see a really good friend in a really unaccustomed place. Friend.
"Lorelai," he says her name with a genial smile, "hey, what's up? I just washed the pot, but I'll make you a cup."
He turns from her again and starts going through the process of making a pot of coffee. She is standing in the middle of the diner, unsure of how to make him stop and stand still and listen.
"I don't want any coffee."
He stops and looks back at her, confused. "No coffee?"
She nods and swallows the nervous bile that's rising in her throat.
"Okay," he throws the water out of the pot and proceeds to wipe it out. "What can I do for you then Lorelai?"
She suddenly hates how he's saying her name, as if it holds the same significance of 'Babette' or 'Miss Patty'. They were going to get married. They loved each other. They love each other. Don't they?
"Chris and I are getting a divorce," she says evenly and watches as he shifts uncomfortably, his eyes wandering to the floor. The proprietor-customer relationship vanishes and she can feel the band-aid starting to rip off.
"Yeah, I heard," he lifts his head and looks at her, "from Babette."
"And I'm in love you," she says, not wanting to wait any more to say it. The words were crowding her mouth, making it hard to swallow.
He is still now; the patented serious look on his face, the only difference is that his eyes are dark and disbelieving.
"I don't know what you want me to say," he says after a silence.
She swallows, trying to lubricate her tongue so she can speak, but she's running out of spit.
"Or do you want me to do something?" he asks, his voice so silky it actually scares her and she finds her voice.
"No…no, I don't. I just…I love you," she says finally, weakly.
"So you're expecting me to what? Be grateful that you finally realize that you 'love me'?" he asks, his voice brittle.
"No, I don't want that. I just wanted to say that and say that I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," she wavers again.
"You're sorry."
He stares at her for a long time, then shakes his head, his face falling into the most inexpressible sadness she's ever seen. It drives her forward and she's at the counter, standing in front of him.
"You're killing me," he says softly, staring into her eyes.
"What?" she gasps.
"Do you know how hard it was to be your friend? Do you know anything about the nights that I had to get use to without you? Do you know that it felt like my heart was being ripped out every time I saw you with Christopher, every time I saw that ring, every time I saw you? And now that your great romance is over, you come back, looking for what's not here any longer."
The soft bite of his words bruises her already wounded skin.
"But it is here, Luke. I can feel it still. Can't you?" she asks, trying to regain some footing on this now rotting slope.
"No, Lorelai, it's not. I know you were counting on it being here, but it's gone, it's been changed. You changed it for both of us and I had to pick up the pieces of our wrecked relationship while you went and got married to the love of your life," he says, a brush of anger in his deep voice.
"Chris isn't the love of my life. And I couldn't face what happened between us. You're right-I changed what we had by sleeping with Christopher, by marrying him, but it was all a lie. All of it was a lie. I love you. I need you," she says, her voice thick with tears.
There's a quick intake of breath as if he's been stuck in the gut. His blue eyes are tempestuous and he looks like a stranger, his face so unfamiliar and unforgiving.
"I don't need you, Lorelai. I have somebody who needs me. I'm a father. I have a family. I'm doing okay without you. I'm sleeping at night, I don't feel the need to reach out and touch you anymore or hear your voice. I am doing fine without you, like you were doing fine without me."
Her cheeks sting as if slapped and a red wave of anger douses her brain.
"You're full of shit."
She moves away from the counter. "You're full of shit. How can you stand there and say that?"
He looks at her darkly. "How could you shit on two years? How could you go and fuck Christopher after I didn't choose you over my kid? How could you go and marry the bastard after he deserted you and Rory? How could you move him into the fucking house that I had renovated for us? For us," he replies lowly.
"I missed you!" she yells, furious. "I missed you and I fucked up! I failed in the one relationship that I wanted, with the one man that I want! I had to feel something other than feeling like shit! I felt like dying the first time we broke up-I couldn't feel that way again."
"So you replace me with another man?" he yells back, leaning over the counter.
"Yes! Because it was easier to do that than to, I don't know, live without you and your love."
At this he starts to laugh, a sardonic, piercing laugh that causes her stomach to turn in on itself.
"My God, poor you. It was easier to choke down that damn dream of a perfect family than to, what was it, 'live without you and your love'? You really buy into your own shit, don't you?"
She presses the heels of her hands into her eyeballs, physically holding back the hysterical tears that are about to fall. She can't believe what's happening. She's never seen him this angry, this hurt. It's painful to watch, it's painful to hear his normally gruff, soft voice sound so clear and thunderous.
"Why are you acting this way?" she asks in a moderate tone which belies her utter agony.
"And what way is that, Lorelai?"
She looks straight at him, at his oddly bright eyes and curious tilt of his head. "I've never seen you act this spiteful before."
He shrugs and takes his hat off, setting it on the counter. He runs a weary hand through his short hair and then scratches his scalp.
"You wanted to get personal-well, that was me being personal. What did you think? That I would be sycophantic and waiting? I can't do that any more, I can't be that way any more. I'm not Chris, I'm not that Luke that used to sit around and wait for you to see me, to know that I love you. This is me without the pleasantries, without the understanding smile and shrug. If you don't want to face it and see what real feelings look like, don't. Go home. Walk away."
Every word hits her like a brick and she feels herself crumbling, dissolving into herself. Her head is pounding lividly and she is flushed. She takes off her scarf, jacket, and hat and sets them on top of chair.
"Can we talk about this without it turning into a screaming match?"
"Oh, I'm sorry, am I putting you off? Wait, I forgot, no one is supposed to raise their voices in Gilmore Land. No one is supposed to get angry and get sick and tired of being jerked around because hey, what you want and what you need are all that matters, right?" he replies evenly.
"Then what do you want, Luke? You want to scream at me, you want to yell?"
She comes back to the counter, her arms on either side, an equally hard glitter in her eyes.
"I asked you a question. What do you want?"
He leans away from her, folding his arms over his chest.
"I want to try to be friends. I want you to know that I love you, yes, but that we can't be anything more than that. Friendship is all I can give you Lorelai."
She shakes her head, a new courage welling up inside of her.
"No. We can't go back to being friends. There's too much history and unfinished business between us, so I'm going to be selfish and say no."
"I'm sensing another ultimatum here."
"Do you?"
"Yeah. Bush should hire you, you like giving them out left and right and you do damage control so well."
"You're getting good at the low blows, Luke."
"I've had some personal experiences, seeing I was on the receiving end of a lot of them recently."
They stare at each other for some time, their eyes battling it out. Neither wants to back down or look away. To do that would admit defeat, and that is a costly price neither of them are willing to pay.
In the end, it is the ringing of his cell that saves them both.
He easily flips open the phone, putting it to his ear.
"Hello," he answers, looking away from her while she stares down at the counter.
"Uh, yeah. No problem. I'll be up there."
She can feel a sudden heat on her neck as his gaze shifts to her.
"Yeah, see you soon. Bye."
The snap of the cell phone makes her jump and she glances up straight into his eyes, curious.
"Where is 'up there'?" she asks casually, as though they were talking about the weather a few minutes ago.
"Massachusetts," he answers just as casually.
A flurry of questions enters her head and she feels dizzy from them all.
"Who is 'up there'?" she asks, plucking the most persistent question from the current buzzing.
"Would it make you feel better if I said it was a woman I've been seeing since Christmas and she's invited me to Boston to do whatever people in Boston do in March?" he asks, and she can hear the grin in his voice, but the possibility that it might be true, the very real possibility causes her spine to tingle and her tongue to get heavy.
"No," she replies, serious and he sighs, rubbing a hand on the back of his neck.
"Lorelai, it's getting late. You should go home," he says, tired and proprietor Luke is coming back. Fuck proprietor Luke.
"I should have waited for you, Luke. I should have stood by what I said."
He is once again alert and he narrows an eye at her, a sliver of cold blue fixed on her like a cat about to pounce.
"But you couldn't and you didn't. Coulda, woulda, shouldas are no good to anyone. You didn't wait. You stopped believing."
"I know," she nods.
"And we've moved on. We can't go back."
"But we can go forward."
At his disparaging look she reaches for him, grabbing his arm. The second her fingers brush his flannel, her mind goes blank. It's soft and warm from his body. Her fingers clench around his forearm, feeling his muscles tense at her touch. She hasn't touched him in a long time. They always kept their distance or they kept it formal, a handshake at most.
"No, Lorelai. We can't," he whispers and there's desperation in his voice. Her mind starts to process this and she knows that he wants to give in and let go, that he wants to with the same type of needling want that allows her to withstand his words, but it would break him if he gave into it.
"You mean you can't."
Her voice is course and she maintains contact with his arm as she comes around the counter to stand directly opposite him. Being this close, she can smell him and involuntary she inhales deeply his familiar scent of burgers, coffee, and Dial soap. She can feel his warmth seeping through her clothes and skin, into her muscles and into her bones. She steps closer, invariably drawn by the nearness of him. Her grip loosens and slips down so that her fingers mingle with his.
She isn't looking at him, her gaze has wondered from his blue stare to the tan smoothness of his neck, but his eyes are burning her hairline, turning her skin red.
"I have to try, Luke," she whispers, tears clouding her vision.
"And I know I sound selfish, I am. I can't delude myself into thinking that everything is better off as it is, because it's not. It's fucking hell," her voice breaks and tears start to fall straight off her lashes to the floor, onto their shoes.
She doesn't realize that she is gripping the front of his flannel. All she can comprehend is the most profound grief she's ever experienced and the force of it requires her to hold onto something. She is shaking, her back trembling with the sobs that are crawling up her throat.
His arms come around her slowly, tentatively, as though giving her this relatively small comfort would be too much temptation, but there is a part of him that has not changed-his inability to see her in any kind of pain, especially when he's the root of it.
He enfolds her into him, holding her head in the space where neck runs into shoulder. His arm is wrapped around her waist and he gently strokes her hair, which is soft and fluffy and smells like pina colada. She cries, her saltwater soaking his collar and his skin. He lightly sways, running his hand down her back, listening to her sobbing decrease in intensity until there are only light sniffles and she turns her head so she can rest it on his shoulder.
How many times has she done this? How many times has he been her crying shoulder? How many times has he rocked her like he's doing now? How many times has he played with her hair, running his hand through the back and rubbing her nape? Too many and not enough, never enough.
It's inconceivable how she thought she couldn't be the one he wanted, how she could waste so many months trying to forget what's been ingrained into her brain and skin.
"Luke," she says quietly and he eases her away, looking down into her puffy, red eyes and pink nose, his blue eyes unsettled.
"I can't walk away," she says and his resolve wavers. He grips her upper arms, probing her face for any sign of falseness, for any pit falls. All he can see is himself, his ache and despair, his total want and need of this person. He knows what he's doing isn't fair to her, but what about him? What about what was done to him? What of his heartbreak? Is it nothing, can he just toss it aside and give up the fight?
"You're asking too much of me," he says in a ragged voice.
"And I'm giving you all of me," she responds quickly. His tightens the grip on her arms.
"And I gave you everything I could and all I asked from you was to wait, just wait. Please, just wait."
His eyes are naked now, open and pulsating with misery.
"Do you want to break me down some more Lorelai? Because if this is what it is to love you, then I don't want your kind of love," he says softly.
He releases his hold, his arms dropping to his sides. He makes a move to walk to past her, but she stops him the only way she knows how.
She kisses him lightly, chastely on the lips and in her mind this is the last kiss she'll ever have with Luke, a kiss one would give to a person on their deathbed.
Before he can respond, she draws back, her eyes searching his and he can see acceptance streaked with regret.
It takes a second to realize that she is kissing him again, but this time, it isn't a simple, mournful, farewell meeting of the lips. It is passionate, it is grand and sweeping, it is all consuming, it is smoldering, it is battle.
She can taste everything she misses about him. All the days between that morning on the porch, when she delivered what she thought would be the ultimate death strike to their relationship to today, when she risked everything she had left to come and meet him is in this kiss.
He brings her closer, wrapping his arms around her, taking her in. It is so acutely familiar to have her lips against his own, to have her one arm around his waist and the other one across his shoulders, her fingers scrunching the flannel.
They break apart for air and dive into each other again, their hands moving as the kiss increases in intensity. He moves her around so that his back is to counter and she's against the section of wall between the entryway to the grill and the coffee/drink/everything else station. The hard support of the wall allows his body to press onto her, causing her to moan with multiplied yearning. The friction of his five o'clock shadow against her chin and cheeks brings fresh wells of water to her eyes and soon he can taste her tears.
He leaves her mouth and kisses the tears from her cheeks, then her eyes. She has her hands on either side of his neck, his pulse jumping and his flesh hot beneath her palm. His fingers are tangled in her hair and they graze her scalp as he uses his thumbs to wipe the last vestiges of tears from under her eyes. He rests his forehead against hers and his breath is warm and minty.
They stay like that for some time, every single nerve ablaze but doing nothing to relieve the ever-constant pressure of further, more intimate contact.
He struggles to find the strength to pull back from her. It is difficult to block the sharp tang of hunger that accompanies his every breath. Can he do this? He searches himself for the answer and it comes simply: he'll never be able to stop loving her. It's tiring to fight against a fact he can never change, but what is he going to do, let her hurt him again? What if he hurts her again and she leaves? Will he be able to withstand it? There are too many contradictions and not enough certainties when it comes to them. But do those certainties weigh more than the contradictions that plague him whenever he thinks of her or sees her?
Nothing but the echo of memories play in his head and they do nothing but remind him of where he was and how he got to be here now.
Her lips brush his and the screw of indecision digs into his skull.
"Please, Lorelai," he murmurs, tortured and she hugs him instead, afraid for him and of herself for doing what she habitually does when it comes to him: push.
He is heavy in her arms and without the wall behind her she probably would have fallen, but she grateful to be bearing his weight, to have this chance to have him lean on her and have his face buried in the side of her neck. She smoothes one hand over his shoulder blades and down his spine and combs the other hand through his hair, her fingers at times massaging his scalp.
"I'll wait," she says in a muted undertone.
When she gets no response, she continues. "I'll wait for you Luke. I'll bide my time and I'll wait, if that's what it takes. And I know that what I'm going to ask you is unfair, but please, please, don't give up on me. Hang on for me, please? Because, as much as you don't believe it and as much as I tried to deny it, you're it for me. And I know you still feel the same, so please, don't give up on me."
He lets her finish before stirring, bringing his head up from her shoulder. He smells her hair and her soap and he can still taste the salt of her tears on his lips. He pulls back, separating their bodies so that the cool air of the diner rushes between them, cooling the heat that was there before.
His eyes are a luminous aquamarine as he regards her fully, digesting her plea. If she didn't know him, she would think his silent gaze was for show, but she can see the wheels turning and the agitation in his stance.
He sighs and rubs the back of his neck and her skin begins to itch because he's made his decision. He reaches out and takes her hand and her heart is thundering so hard inside her chest, it hurts.
He leads her to where she put her outer coverings and takes her scarf, handing it to her. Her heart plummets to the bottom of her soles and she chokes back words and tears, refusing to make another plea for another chance. He made a decision and she has to respect that. She wraps the scarf around her neck loosely, but he redoes it and picks up her jacket, holding it out for her to slip on. She puts her arms through the coat sleeves and he turns her towards him, fitting it on her and buttoning the buttons.
She watches him carefully while he does it, mightily confused. He is probably feeling sorry for her and doesn't want her to get hypothermia on her walk home.
He places her hat on her head and steps back, staring at her.
"You look warmer now," he says, his voice calm and Luke.
She doesn't trust herself to speak, so she just nods, following it up with a sad shrug.
"You should go home, get warm, and sleep," he says.
She takes this as a hint and it takes much more guts to walk to the door and a hell of a lot more courage to put her hand on the handle and turn it than it took to look him in the eye those first few weeks after the shit storm that was their breakup.
"Lorelai," he calls out and she pauses, not turning back.
"I don't want to give up."
She jerks around, shocked and hopeful.
"What?"
He takes a deep breath and lets it out, rubbing his arm.
"I don't want to give up, but we need some time to…figure everything out."
She nods dumbly, totally blindsided. She opens the door and is about to go when she turns back to him, wanting to know one last thing.
"So no more to-go cups?"
He gives her a small smile.
"I'll have your mug out."