Say Something Else
Disclaimer: Not mine. Why do you think my stories are AU?
Summary: So, how do we fix that whole S5 break-up? Here's my try at it. AU elements and LL ahoy!
Genre: Romance/Angst
Rating: T
BIG SHOUTOUT TO ELEDGY for her setting of the Tallman Farm. I didn't even know it wasn't original to the show, so tip of the hat to Eledgy, and my apologies for not asking in advance. I honestly had no clue. *headdesk*
AN: This piece was inspired by my husband, who asked me why I was yelling "Argh!" when I Netflix'd this episode a few months ago. I explained the basic story, and my husband said, "Your dad had a shotgun and called me a (expletive). Didn't stop me. That guy's a loser."
By the way, yes, my father did indeed whip out the shotgun when I brought my now-husband home to meet the family for the first time. Fun like a sunburn.
Say Something Else
(Lines from episode 5.14 "Say Something" are borrowed, and credit goes to the writers, producers, directors, owners, and so on of the show. Everything else is my fault.)
Luke Danes ran.
He ran in high school, as trophies proved. He played baseball, and secretly daydreamed of taking down the Ryan Express, especially that killer 12-6 curveball. He ran to stay in shape, never forgetting his parents died young. He ran to get away from something or to go somewhere.
This morning, he simply ran for lack of anything else to do.
He did a lap around the town square, then jogged out the road to the Tallman farm on a regular route. The early morning sun streaked the road with dark shadows and pale golden light. His feet made small crunching noises in the pea gravel alongside the tar-and-chip road. No auto traffic disturbed him. He saw a deer ghosting home through mist lying low in a pasture, and wished the road went on forever.
Luke Danes ran because he didn't have words.
He'd been a chatterbox, as bad as Liz, when they were little. Their father had often remarked he wasn't a quiet man. He just couldn't get a word in edgewise, what with his wife and kids.
Then his mother died, and Luke's words deserted him. Liz's left her, too. He ran. He hit balls. He stacked boxes and stocked shelves. Liz played loud music, cried in her pillow at night, and as she got older, vanished into any cloud of intoxicating smoke she could find. Liz got her words back, when she drank and smoked. Too many words, sometimes. Hurtful, nasty, cruel words that came from pain and made more pain and finally shut the door on words entirely unless they began with F and ended with U.
Luke Danes ran, because it was easier than screaming, "I don't understand how to talk since Mom died!"
He reversed course, aware he had to open the diner, and also aware he'd made an ass of himself. Not words he could say. After all, he was William Danes's son. Stalwart, stoic, never-hesitates-to-help out Luke. The good guy. Eternally the good guy.
If only people knew, of course, but people didn't know. They chose not to know. And that was a rant in and of itself.
He stopped short as he saw the gazebo. Dropped to a walk for a lap around the square. The air chilling him. His eyes stuck on Doose's Market.
He'd promised to leave.
He went in the back of his diner and upstairs to shower. Prepare for a day at the grill. Flip the burgers, serve the burgers, take the money, repeat. He could do that.
And he did.
Until he had to go to Doose's.
(AN: Pitching reference to Nolan Ryan, aka the Ryan Express, whose curveball was a thing of beauty.)
Lorelai's voice came to him. Displeased. Not that he was thrilled. Ribbons? Sides? What the hell was wrong with Taylor? Did they have a book big enough to list all of the things wrong with Taylor?
He tuned in when her words "I should have told you" registered.
He wanted to run some more.
She babbled. How innocent it was. He stood, frozen inside, thinking only that he'd said the same words to Rachel about Lorelai. To Nicole about Lorelai. And they didn't even have a kid together.
"But you hid it," he accused.
More babble flowed, like water, like grease, like tears. And what did he say? That she should have seen it coming.
Like he should've seen Rachel's return coming. The unexpected probability of the possible expectation. He knew that. He knew Lorelai. He knew how much of her remaining on terms with Christopher was a product of her own lack of relationship with the parents she now vowed to cut out of her life. For him. He tried to push free of her, of the promise of the words, but she was persistent. Always pushing. He needed that. And he hated that. Why couldn't everyone leave him alone as he was?
Then he said something about more time.
More time? He wanted to smack himself. He'd had years, before Rachel returned and reminded him that she was never really in it for the long haul unless it involved a long haul flight to some obscure destination and living out of a suitcase. He'd had time after Max, and he'd had time to not go out with Nicole other than wanting to prove someone wanted him when he said nothing about wanting Lorelai to Lorelai.
He told himself: Say something else!
He said, angrily, "Don't!" because he knew exactly what she was doing. He'd done it. He'd begged like that. For more time with his mother, his father. He knew he had to tell her that. He had to explain that more time was more pain.
The words that next left him were, "Fine. You want to know what I'm thinking right now? That I can't be in this relationship. It's too much."
And Luke Danes did what he'd done for years when words failed.
He ran.
(AN: Monosyllable is a polysyllabic word. Weird, right?)
And then he heard the message. Elated, terrified, he ran on the power of self-loathing to discover Lorelai saying she'd heard him, he was out, it was over, she'd be good and leave him alone, and he stood staring with his mind racing in stupid circles against itself. Telling him to say something.
Say something, Danes!
He said, "Okay."
What the hell? He had ten thousand things to say, and he came out with "Okay"?
He had more eloquence when he took orders in the diner.
Big blue eyes shattered and exhausted, Lorelai said it was cold and she'd be fine.
She was lying. Not about the cold. It was cold. But she wasn't going to be fine.
How many times had he seen her face take on that grim look? Heard her say she would be fine in that tone? Always, because of Emily or Christopher or random strangers, but never him. Not like that.
He had a tape. From his answering machine. She had tried to spare him. As if she was a burden. To respect his wishes.
What he needed to say, and in his head, he did say it, was, "This relationship is too much because it's the one I can't stand to lose."
Lorelai quietly and with something like humility or maybe humiliation shut her door.
Luke Danes ran. Every step pounded into his head: say something say something say something!
He said nothing.
(AN: This is where I yelled, "Argh! Talk, idiot!")
He found Rory, AKA Limo Girl, waiting with Kirk at the diner's front door first thing in the morning.
"Aren't you at Yale?"
"Talk. Now."
"Rory, I have..."
Kirk chirped, "I can wait," and proceeded to sit down at a table with a menu he had memorized, to re-read it as if it was great literature. As carefully as Luke had written it, he knew it was pretty much just a list. Item, price. Item, price. Sometimes, there'd be a major variation. Item, price, asterisk, can make with egg whites upon request.
"You. Up," ordered Rory, and when Luke glanced outside, he saw the limo. An urge to say something about that rose, and as her glare pinned him between the eyes, the impulse died. Quickly, painfully, like a fly under one of Jess's tomes of great authors.
He rearranged himself to block her, redirect her. "Storeroom."
"Fine," hissed Rory, who was, until now, his favorite person under twenty-five in the world, Jess included (sometimes). "You're good at not talking. So, don't talk."
As she shut the storeroom door, he snapped, "I have..."
"Frank's under orders to guard the door," said Rory blithely. "Yes, I know, perks of the wealthy, save the Marxist-populist rant, Luke, we're not listening to you, we are listening to me."
It was a low blow, and would get him back into the diner. "You sound like Emily."
Rory returned the volley with a skill and speed worthy of Billie Jean King. Not that Luke followed tennis closely, only it was impossible to not know who that was. "You sound like me."
Luke folded his arms, leaned against some shelving, and scoffed, "You."
"Oh don't give me that whole impenetrable inscrutable Danes guy thing, it didn't work with Jess, it won't work with you," huffed Rory, pacing three steps one way, three steps back, and repeat. "I know why you broke up with Mom, and don't give me that crap about my dad, you know the longest they were ever happy together? Five days, and I'm pretty sure they were drunk at least three of them or I wouldn't be here."
Rory's bitterness wasn't entirely unexpected. Her coldness was. He prepared a retort.
Her hand flew up. "Shush! Me talk, you listen!"
He rolled his eyes and sighed. Typical Gilmore.
"It's not my dad, and it's not that mom didn't mention a totally innocent night comforting an old friend, at my request, by the way. You keep a lot from Mom, and I know it. Like the fact Rachel sends you postcards, and there's an ex-girlfriend of yours in Woodbridge you still talk to."
The blood drained from Luke's face. He sputtered, to say But nothing happened or happens and...
And how far had that gotten Lorelai?
"Oh, and how about the lunch you had with Nicole the Cheater? Does Mom know about that? Y'know, the one you had two days before you flipped out at her about Jason showing up at the inn's big opening?"
"Uh," said Luke. "That was post-divorce stuff. Not fun."
Rory disregarded him to pose and answer the question Luke refused to voice. "Oh, how do I know? One of the guys in the band saw you with Nicole, and Andrew got the last postcard by accident, and the Anna thing? Paris. She's got interesting friends who can tell me things on very short notice."
Accustomed to sweet, wonderful Rory, Luke had no idea what to do with Valkyrie Rory, and stayed very still.
She stopped pacing. Her hand lashed out in accusation. "You know who you are, Luke? Me. People don't approve of me? Zip zoom bang, I'm gone!" Her hand roughly approximated a poorly piloted airplane to demonstrate the action. "Mom never never asked you to golf or wear stupid clothes or talk franchising! Mom never did that. You did! To get their approval! And that's a stupid reason to break up with Mom!"
Acid burbled and gurgled in Luke's stomach. "You done?" he bit out.
"No," said Rory.
He cocked his eyebrows, awaiting the Grand Revelation.
She stomped to him and poked his chest. "You're less of a man than Logan Huntzberger, and that came out all wrong, but his parents don't like me and hey! He stuck around!"
That stung.
"You and Jess are too much alike. Your way or no way," sniped Rory, flipping her hair a la Lorelai. "I get it, I do. Mom made sure I was loved and so... supported... " Her hands did some sort of dance in the air. "I freak when it's not that way. And I do stupid things to be accepted and approved, even if I know they're stupid! You know why Mom didn't tell you about Christopher? She was scared you'd break up with her over any mistake! And you assumed she'd run to him! Why?"
Intelligent speech devolved to a nasty, "Past experience."
Never had Rory looked so like her grandmother. "They're right. My mom deserves better than you!"
She slammed out of the storeroom.
A moment later, the door re-opened.
Rory picked up her purse, said mildly, "Um. Yeah. I almost forgot. You always forgave Rachel for taking off for years at a time and you're possibly bed buddies with Anna Nardini and you stayed married to Nicole, but you're gonna ditch Mom over one stupid thing when she's been as close to perfect as a girlfriend can be without being Jennifer Aniston?" She glared. "So much for that legendary unrequited love of yours."
Ashen, Luke tried to speak. No sounds emerged from his mouth. His ribs were trying to squeeze his insides out.
"I think I'm out of moxie," said Rory in a tiny voice.
That time, she didn't slam the door.
Shaking from emotion, Luke finally succumbed by throwing a bag of potatoes across the room. It knocked down ten cans. A perfect strike, if he was bowling.
Out in the diner, Kirk warbled, "Can I have my toast now?"
(AN: I threw in the Anna thing for two reasons. One, to try to reconcile the show's inconsistent depiction of Luke regarding romantic relationships. Two, forestall season 6. Mwahaha.)
Lorelai Gilmore woke up miserable.
That was familiar.
Hello Kitty didn't cheer her. The alarm clock that quacked had no smile-inducing power. The wonders of chintzy, cheesy, pop culture childhood she'd missed out on were no comfort today.
Aching, partly from poor sleep and partly from an overdose of junk food, Lorelai shuffled to the kitchen and drank a glass of water.
She tried to give herself a pep talk. Okay, so Luke could have been the one. She'd thought that about Chris when she was fifteen. So third time would be the charm, right? Right. Only... She didn't love Chris. Not that way. It was just the only love she'd known. Until Luke. Who didn't want her. Which meant he wasn't the one. So now...
Now what?
How many more Maxes and Alexes and Jasons would it take to find the one? She hated dating. She hated sitting there during a meal and worrying that her lipstick smeared or her appetite was a turn-off or that she looked too slutty or that she looked too bored or that she talked too much, and oh God, she'd just totally monologued herself.
She knew she had erred. No doubt about it. Lorelai Screw-up Gilmore struck again. But telling him she'd been near Chris was like putting a whatchamacallit on a keg of that stuff in a Wile E. Coyote cartoon with an Acme label on it and she needed coffee but coffee meant Luke and she had no Luke so how could she have coffee?
Lorelai dropped hard to the nearest chair and put her head in her hands. Hopelessly choking back sobs.
"Useless," she said softly, and meant herself. Any attempt to reconcile with Luke. They'd done their maybe-kinda-not-now waltz for years, and the music had ended. Which reminded her: She could use a good dose of Phantom of the Opera. Nothing like "All I Ask of You" to get a good cry going. She could call Sookie, and they'd talk about how amazing it was that Michael Crawford, who'd originated the role on stage, had once been the squeaky-singing guy in Hello Dolly! Irrelevant to the film of the modern age, which definitely had a sexier guy playing the Phantom, but it was better than crying alone, right?
Lorelai groaned. She'd tizzied herself. She'd made tizzy into a verb. It was a new low.
"C'mon, Gilmore. You can do this," she muttered to herself.
Abruptly, she burst into tears. Clueless, worthless, useless, hopeless, that was Lorelai Gilmore. Maybe Andrew sold a book called Life for Dummies? Or An Idiot's Guide to Being Normal?
Or, and her hands clenched into fists as she snuffled into her pajama sleeve, a book titled How To Get Away With Murdering Meddling Mothers.
Her anger faded. She pushed herself to her feet. She drank more water, blew her nose in a paper towel, and listened to the shrill squawk of Babette greeting someone in the street.
She moved for her phone, to call Rory, and was startled by a knock on her door. She squealed, and picked up a magazine from the coffee table to defend herself. Swallowing hard, she rolled up InStyle, and sidled to the door. "Who is it?" she called carefully. Praying Not Babette, not Miss Patty, please not East Side Tillie!
A gruff voice responded with a trademark monosyllable, "Me."
Her heart dropped, splashed stomach acid up to her nose, and settled into a gallop. She couldn't bear to open that door. Yet she had to be brave. She could hear Trix in her head. Going on about being strong. Yes. Strong.
Did strong women want Mary Poppins to come hold their hand?
She opened the door, and said rapidly, "I know there's a few things of yours here, but don't worry, I'll drop them off at the diner, and, um, I'll make sure you're not there, and I'll talk to Taylor, and you shouldn't move, it's my fault, so if anyone should move it should be me, and you know what, I'll have someone else drop off your things, you can have Kirk come by to get them or Cesar or Lane, I promised I wouldn't bother you anymore and..."
"Rachel sends me postcards."
Lorelai's body shot backwards. She shook, cold to her bones. "What?" she whispered.
Luke twisted his baseball cap. His eyes were dark and shadowed. "Rachel sends me postcards. Every six months, something like that."
Her heartbeat sped to a roar. Her skin prickled. "Oh," she said. "Okay?"
"And I, uh, she..." Luke gulped audibly. "I had lunch with Nicole around the Dragonfly opening."
Lorelai blinked. Her mind sped faster than her heart, and words flew to her lips. "Wait. You mean. While you're busting my butt over Christopher, you're still in touch with Elle McPherson and Ally McBeal and not telling me?"
"Yeah," said Luke and grumbled, "but it isn't the same as a night with tequila."
"No," conceded Lorelai woodenly. "Of course not. Anything else?"
"Yeah," said Luke, "I have an ex in Woodbridge, her name's Anna, we had lunch last week."
Lorelai's universe spun. "Lunch. With Anna. Who the hell is Anna?"
"Nardini."
Lorelai yelped in actual pain. "Wait, the Sherilyn Fenn lookalike who runs the store with all the cute stuff?!"
"Er...Yes?"
"And she has the super-nerdy kid?"
"Yeah."
Fear lanced Lorelai through the chest. Her hand rose to her throat. "Oh God, tell me that's not your kid and you didn't tell me that, either!"
"No! God, no! Oh crap," he finished in a mumble.
Mouth a thin and rather Emily-like line, Lorelai hissed, "Oh, and you're having lunch with Miss Gorgeous? While we're... were... Oh my God!"
He scrubbed at his neck furiously. "Look, she wanted to tell me that her kid, uh, she named her after some month of the year, May? April? Whatever," Luke dismissed with a wave of his hand. "Her kid's doing a junior science fair thing in the fall, she needs a favor, she wants to get a bunch of DNA from twenty guys as part of some kind of experiment to show how DNA tests rule out paternity."
"Rule out," sniped Lorelai icily, "or rule in?"
Luke's face darkened to the color of a good wine. "Geez, Lorelai! I'd tell you if I had a kid! Anna had the kid with some guy in Bridgeport!"
Lorelai hunched into herself. "You do realize that of the women you've dated, that I know about, that is, I'm so far the troll, right? So if your point is to rub my face in it..."
"No!" Luke's hands shot out, and then he finally closed the door, eliciting a disappointed, "Drat!" from Babette, hovering near the porch in a fluffy bathrobe.
"Anything else to tell me? Now that we've known each other over a decade? Because I gotta tell you, Duke, I'm a freaking open book compared to you! First I never know about Rachel, then there's all this, and that, and..."
"I thought someone else'd tell you about Rachel!" shouted Luke, and slammed his cap back on his head. Backwards, of course. "Nobody in this town shuts up!"
Lorelai's hair now ached. "Ah. Meaning I fit right in."
"That's not what I meant!"
"Why are you here?"
That earned her a glower. "I was all over you about Christopher, and it never occurred to me I didn't mention my stuff."
"How many exes do you have?" wailed Lorelai plaintively. "You know all of mine! And no, it's not an ex if you only went out on one date!"
"I agree," said Luke quickly, "and, uh, that's not all. Damn it, Lorelai, stop looking so scared of me!"
She flared, "I am scared of you! Nobody hurts me like you do! Nobody! Not Mom, not Christopher, not even Rory! She's my kid, you're supposed to have been my friend!"
She put a decade of hidden truths into that word. It should have broken glass.
Luke sucked in air. He sounded remarkably like the teakettle in Beauty and the Beast. Which was not something Lorelai felt fit to mention at the moment. "You always gave me your truths," he said, "and I... I have to give you mine."
Lorelai fell back on evasive maneuvers. "Can it wait a week or two? I'm not at my best here. Sort of looking and feeling the whole Cruella deVil vibe."
"You wouldn't skin puppies."
Lorelai managed to quirk an eyebrow.
Luke said defensively, "Disney. Mom. Movies." He edged closer. "When my mom died, we stopped talking. The everyday kind you do. So there's a hundred things a week I don't say that I should. When I told you, in Doose's. That this relationship's too much."
"Was too much," corrected Lorelai, eyes wide with fear.
"Is too much," Luke insisted. "It's because you're the only person I can't stand to lose. And it's true you'll always have to deal with Christopher. And your parents. Like I always have to deal with Liz and, God help me, TJ. And Jess. And things like Uncle Louie."
Lorelai frowned. She scooted away from him in her fuzzy slippers with bunny faces on them.
"I thought if your parents didn't approve... I thought you wouldn't."
She scowled at him. "Hence the golfing and the franchising?"
He blushed. "It's how I was raised, okay? Parents have to approve! I... Uh... Oh hell, I know I'm insane, okay? Jess told me that enough when he lived with me."
"Smart kid."
"Smartass," Luke shot back, though Lorelai had no idea if he meant her or Jess or both. He captured her hands, and moved a little nearer. "I'm sorry I ever thought you can't be trusted around Rory's dad."
Lorelai accused herself to spare him the trouble. "I was with him. Off and on. Until the whole Sherry thing."
"About the same as I was with Rachel," sighed Luke. "Only you have a kid together, you're supposed to be together. That's how I was raised."
Lorelai recoiled. "You think that's why I was trying with Chris? Do you have any idea how many times Rory cried for me to make him stay with us? Wait, yes, you do! I told you that! Yes, I wanted happy ever after, but not for Emily or some rulebook! I wanted it for my kid! I wanted it so for once I wasn't so damn alone!"
"You never let anyone in!" shouted Luke.
"Bull!" yelled Lorelai. "I always let you in! You're the one who shuts me out!"
They stood red-faced, furious, and silent.
"Anything else to say?" Lorelai demanded after she caught her breath.
"Yeah," snarled Luke. "I love you."
"Well, I love you, but we're still broken up!"
As I-love-yous went, those weren't exactly the roses-and-candlelight ones dreamt of in fairy tales.
"I'm sorry," said Luke out of nowhere, and took her hands back. This time, she didn't resist. "I'm sorry for not telling you things."
Tears streaming down her cheeks, Lorelai embraced him with a faint hope that they might stay friends after all, and whispered, "Okay."
(AN: I made up Luke's upbringing, but I always suspected from the show's erratic canon that it was very conventional in the 1950s sitcom mold. Yes, Michael Crawford, known as the Phantom on the original London cast recording, was in fact in th film version of Hello, Dolly! I like musicals.)
A long time passed. Or maybe two seconds. It was difficult for Luke to tell.
Although he very much enjoyed holding her, Luke eventually muttered, "That's it? No lectures, no weird references?"
Lorelai giggled unevenly as she pulled away from him. "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain?"
His eyebrows turned into a knot. "Is that something I should understand?"
"By George, I think he's got it," she caroled.
Worry took hold. "Lorelai? Did you drink too much coffee? Tequila? Aquavit?"
She pointed a finger and danced in place. "Ah-ha! He's got it, by George, he's got it!"
"You're certifiable. In a good way, but still," Luke shook his head. "Maybe you should go take a shower and I'll make you something decent to eat. I saw Rory yesterday, I'm sure you had one of your cancer-causing binges." He picked up a Red Vines wrapper from the floor, shaking his head. "I can't believe they let people sell this stuff as food. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to go as far as Rachel, and try the local tribe's grub kebabs, but there's a happy medium."
"Ah," said Lorelai, eyes shining. "Look at that. Luke Danes is talking. Not ranting, not raving, not yelling. He's talking."
He blinked.
She grinned. Smugly.
Truth then hit him between the eyes, as truth tended to do. It resembled a line drive to the shin that way.
Lorelai was right.
He was talking.
He'd always been able to talk to her. He didn't, but he'd always been able to.
"Oh," said Luke as the light dawned, both literally outside and metaphorically inside his head.
He'd nearly lost Lorelai-girlfriend because he'd forgotten, no, never fully allowed the Lorelai-friend part. Which involved talking.
He blurted, "The thing with Christopher. It's because he always makes you feel loved, isn't it."
She shrugged, quavering, "Nobody else who saw the real me wanted it."
Luke grabbed her and hugged her so fiercely that he felt the breath leave her. His voice shook a little, but he didn't care about being masculine or macho or even remotely manly. He cared about this. "I always see you!"
In a tiny voice, Lorelai pointed out, "You didn't want me. You wanted the perfect ones, like Nicole."
It finally struck Luke, somewhat like a wild pitch to the ribs, that Lorelai didn't want her parents to approve of her life. She wanted them to love her. Imperfections and all. Something he'd never had to question or doubt or even think about, in his childhood. A lack of approval was nothing compared to withheld love.
It was a pain, a fragility, he couldn't begin to fathom.
His head was spinning in that panicky, confused way that meant say something!
Her eyes said it all. Don't hurt me. Don't toy with me. Don't give me false hope.
He said, "You're my perfect," and despite the junk food and the obscure pop culture chatter and the goofball humor she wore like armor, he meant it. Because he needed some junk food and goofball humor and possibly even inane pop culture references to balance out the no-fat-low-goof in his life. He needed someone who understood about sprucing diners, and dress shirts he would not wear, and the need to be there for a family he didn't particularly like sometimes, and all the rest of the things Lorelai had always been, long before he'd ever laid lips upon her.
Slowly, he felt Lorelai relax against him.
The door rattled under a flurry of knocking.
Eyes rolling, Lorelai shook her head and called, "Come in, Babette!"
The petite woman panted, "Sorry, sugar, but I couldn't, uh, y'know what, I got nuthin'." Her eager eyes traveled brightly from one to the other and she urged, "So... Good talk?"
(AN: I find it wholly believable that Paris would have scary connections, but agree it's unlikely Rory would actually read Luke the riot act. And yes, I wanted them to reconcile for their reasons, not because Emily approved. One can argue that was Luke's way of getting Emily to also approve of Lorelai, but it didn't come across that way to me. The "By George he's got it" routine is a riff off My Fair Lady when Eliza finally speaks without her Cockney accent.)
END
AN: I am having issues with FF site because of new internet protection software. Apologies for all errors, glitches, and silent screams of frustration as I try to edit and format properly despite the "help" from the new software. LD