Sniffy's
One of Luke's fondest-kept secrets was that Lorelai Gilmore's face betrayed her every emotion. When she was processing something, or trying to deal with an emergency, it was like one of those speeded-up nature films. Everything flashed across her face at high speed. Sometimes it was accompanied by a steady stream of words which may or may not reflect her actual thoughts, but when she was really working on something, she was quiet.
She was silent as she clutched the horoscope in her hands, but because he knew she was trying to fit this into her giant Luke jigsaw puzzle, he wasn't worried when the scrap of paper that gave him hope for eight long years completely shut her up. Instead, he took a giant swig of champagne, grimaced at the taste, and watched the emotions flit across her face like a slide show. What he couldn't know were the thoughts that drove the emotions.
Awkward: He kept the horoscope. I don't even remember writing it.
Stupefaction: I can't believe he kept this. Eight years.
Terror: I can't make a relationship last eight months. What kinds of expectations must he have if he's waited eight years?
Awe: He kept this through Rachel, Nicole, and all of our fights. And he's still in.
Logic: Why the hell did he wait so long? Oh yeah, Rachel, Max, engagement, Christopher, Jess, Christopher again, other forgotten boyfriends, Nicole, Jason. Maybe a better question is, why didn't he give up long ago? Oh, wait, he did. Nicole. Skinny lawyer bitch. Maybe I shouldn't have teased him about the Love Boat. But I teased him about Rachel. Oh god, he got serious with her after I teased him, too. I have got to stop teasing this man, he takes me too literally. Did I tease him about Grog Booth Annie? Did she get him behind a tent? I'm going to have to joust the little slut for him. I don't know how to joust. They wear armor when they joust. I wonder where I can buy cute armor. And chain mail. Why do they call it mail anyway? Where do they put the stamp?
Wait? What did he just say? "Lorelai, this thing we're doing here - me, you - I just want you to know I'm in. I am all in. Does that, uh - are you, uh, scared?"
Click? What was that click inside my brain? Holy mother of god, so that's what it sounds like when your whole life suddenly makes sense, you see the future you've always dreamed of, and it's wearing a blue shirt and smells heavenly; a mix of wonderful cologne with just a little residual burger scent.
She smiled. Awkward has left the building.
Luke's, a day earlier
She almost hit the jackpot the day Luke returned from Maine, when they 'hooked up' later. The diner was closed and he had gone upstairs. He heard the key turn in the lock and was standing at the top of the stairs as she came through the curtain.
She was in her canoodling outfit. Enough fabric to keep her street legal, but provided easy access in case she decided to suddenly adopt the naturist philosophy. Or seduce someone who knew how to make boysenberry pie.
He was in a T-shirt and sweats. The only hint that he might still have been expecting her was that neither of those pieces of clothing was old, stained or had holes. Well, the T-shirt looked an awful lot as if it had been quickly ironed after being pulled out of the dryer all wrinkly.
She almost knocked him over when she reached the top of the stairs, attacking him like one of those jumping spiders she'd been watching on the Discovery channel that evening.
He caught her handily, wrapping his arms around her waist as she practically climbed up his body.
"Well, hello," he said when she broke the kiss, leaned back and laughed from pure joy.
"I am a salticid," she growled. He ran his hands over her hips to her upper thighs. "We jump." She sprang just high enough for him to catch her as she wrapped her legs around his waist.
"I noticed." He kissed her deeply. "You watch too much Discovery channel."
"I am the tiger among spiders. We hypnotize our prey with our eyes, then pounce."
"You said that last Wednesday during our phone call. You were watching the Discovery channel then, too."
She giggled, sliding down off his body after he carried her inside the apartment and closed the door. "That was right before you screamed like a little girl when you saw a spider on your tent pole."
"I did not scream."
"Eeeek! is only used in Tom and Jerry cartoons and when Luke Danes sees a spider." Lorelai smoothed her very short skirt and twisted her clingy shirt until it clung to all the right curves again.
"Hey, you didn't call a 'dirty' on the tent pole thing," he observed.
"Pacing myself, my friend. We've got a long evening ahead of us."
Luke took two beers out of the fridge while Lorelai reached into her minuscule purse, which had barely room enough for her cell, her glasses and a stack of pig-shaped Post-It notes. She slid her glasses on and sorted the notes, tossing the purse on the kitchen table.
Luke's sweats were already stretching before she pulled out the glasses, but a casual glance from her after which she unconsciously turned her back to him reignited the passion that had flowed easily once their phone calls had moved past the news of the day and into double and triple entendres. Lorelai's phone personality drove him every bit as wild as her physical presence.
"Liar," he said to himself as he pressed his arousal against the backside. Lorelai Gilmore in the flesh was infinitely better than any phone call.
She wordlessly reached behind her, clutched a handful of T-shirt and pulled a grinning Luke with her to the sofa. She settled him down on the center cushion, then draped her legs over one of his thighs, dangling her feet between his legs.
"Big Fat Liar, Big Fat Liar, Big Fat Liar, Big Fat Liar, Big Fat Liar." She slapped one piggy Post-It on his chest for each week he'd told her he was coming home.
He laughed, recalling the many times she had berated him for not coming home. He pulled one off his T-shirt and put it on her shirt.
From the moment that day when she tapped him on the chest in the diner, they had been constantly trying to touch each other. The amount of time they hadn't had physical contact since she arrived tonight could be measured in seconds.
"OK, next. I want to hear about that night." She looked over the top of her glasses at him as she waved another piggy Post-It with the words Annie and Luke on it.
Luke looked down his nose as he took the note from her. "Annie?" he asked. "We talked about that already on the phone."
"I smell a rat. I want to see you try to squirm your way out of this while I look into your eyes, Bucko."
He snorted, then leaned forward, pushing her legs off his own. Lorelai squealed and fell back laughing onto the sofa.
He put one hand on either side of her shoulder, suspending his body over hers. "I'll confess. We were in a tent together. It was night, after the fair had closed."
"Oh! You cheater!" she accused with a giggle, because she'd seen this teasing expression on Luke's face many times before. She smacked his chest playfully.
He lowered his face close enough to whisper in her ear. "It was dark. It was hot." He paused, feeling her heated breath as she panted softly. "I have to confess, I was getting a little excited. It had been so long."
"There was a small light in the corner of the tent. We approached it, and made ourselves comfortable on the ground." He drew the fingers of his right hand lightly through the hair at her temple, and she shivered in response.
"Then Pete handed us each a beer and a dozen of us watched the Sox play." Laughing, he sat back up and grinned wickedly.
"You bastard!" she huffed. "Get back here!" She pulled hard, capturing his lips as he willingly joined her in a prone position.
He shrugged. "It had been a long time since I'd seen a game."
She got her revenge with her kisses. Kneeling between her legs, he wrapped one muscular arm around her shoulder to cradle her head tenderly. Luke's knees grew weak, because Lorelai's kisses drew every bit of willpower that he had from him. He was lost to her soft lips, her scraping her fingernails along his smooth-shaven cheek.
Lorelai's lips opened slightly, and his tongue split them wider as she gave him the access they both desired. Tongues battled momentarily until he was again defeated, following her lead as she sucked him ever deeper.
Sliding his hand under her top, he quickly discovered that she was braless, her nipples straining into his hand as he cupped first one, then the other. She moaned and pressed upward encouraging him to go further.
She pulled the strap of her top down, giving him full access to her upper torso. He claimed this new territory for himself, planting kisses at every strategically defensible location.
Lorelai stretched her arms over her head, arching her back, sighing with pleasure at Luke's attentions. Luke later swore that she purred once.
Luke backed up a few inches on the sofa. Working his way further down, he tugged at the waistband of her white denim miniskirt, then abandoned that to place his hands on her thighs.
Her muscles flexed as she raised her knees one at a time. He smoothed her thighs first to her knees, then approached her apex while caressing her inner thighs.
Skipping over her panties, he pressed the flat of his hand just above her mound under the skirt. The heat from his palm caused Lorelai to moan words of encouragement. Sliding his hands over her hips, he lifted her butt slightly, cupping her cheeks before moving again to her front. His hands brushed against her panties, which were soaked through.
"God, Lorelai, you're so wet," he breathed. Pulling her panties off to the side, he ran a finger along her folds, dipping down to locate the source of wetness, then drew it upwards to her most sensitive spot.
She exploded without warning, her hips bucking wildly. "Luke, uh, ah!"
He saw the emotions roll across her face; adoration, surprise, joy. He had never seen anything more beautiful in his life. Her center throbbed against his hand, almost too sensitive to handle his touch.
Lorelai clutched at his shoulders for support as she came back down to earth. "Bit of a hair trigger tonight," she commented sheepishly. "Sorry."
"Beautiful," he murmured. "Incredible." He kissed her neck, drawing slightly on the pulse points at her collarbone.
"That's what comes from seven weeks of verbal foreplay." Lorelai pulled Luke onto her body.
"I'm too heavy," he protested.
"Not yet. I want to hold you a little longer." She was still throbbing, and the pressure of his hips and his arousal comforted her.
Luke began slowly grinding his hips against hers as they smiled goofily at each other.
"This is good."
"This is very good."
"The best."
"Dammit!" was the next word out of Luke's mouth as the phone rang. It continued ringing while he continued ignoring it until it clicked over to the answering machine and Liz' distraught voice could be heard.
"No, no, no, no, no," he moaned.
Liz's whiny voice caused Luke to sink his head onto Lorelai's breast. "I wouldn't have called you, but it was an emergency. Please pick up, Luke. It's important."
"Take it."
"Don't wanna." Luke's pout showed Lorelai what he must have looked like as a child, not wanting to clean his room.
"Take it. Don't be long."
It took long.
After the first minutes, Lorelai sat up on the sofa and flipped through the most boring fishing magazine on the planet. She had already sent the rest of the notes she'd made for Luke flying over her shoulder. There would be time later to catch him up on the Stars Hollow gossip.
Luke paced back and forth, trying uselessly to get a word in edgewise. He walked over to the sofa, played with Lorelai's hair until she looked up.
She smiled and pointed to the pink puffy jacket in an advertisement for lady's fly fishing gear. Luke snorted, then apologized quickly to Liz. "No, I wasn't laughing at you. I was looking out the window and Kirk was um, uh, doing something stupid, as usual." He glared at Lorelai and walked toward the bed, where he sat down.
Lorelai tossed the magazine onto the coffee table and sighed. Boredom was never her favorite thing.
She picked up the empty beer bottles, took them to the kitchen and put them away. Looking at Luke on the bed, deeply involved in whatever was so important that Liz had to call on the very next day and take up so much of the time she had dedicated to finally getting started with Luke, she formed a plan.
Reaching behind her to loosen the tie on her top, she shook her breasts loose, and gave a little hop to ensure their mobility. Tugging the V-neck down as far as she could, she walked until she caught Luke's eye, then made a 'do you want a drink?' wiggle of her hand and twist of her hip. He nodded, then shrugged apologetically, pointing to the phone.
She spun on her toes and moved to the fridge, making sure she gave her step a little jaunt.
She pulled out a bottle of beer, picked up the bottle opener and popped the cap off. Bending over and taking careful aim, she rolled the bottle cap in Luke's direction, then chased it with a bouncing step, stopping the rolling cap by stretching one long, long leg and pointing her toe.
The bouncing boobies and the never-ending legs got Luke's attention. It got Little Luke's attention as well and his sweats tented again. Luke, who had laid back on the bed and propped himself up by his elbows, suddenly sat up, trying to minimize the effect.
"Liz, wait. I didn't catch that. What did you say?" He paused. "No, I put all the tools back in TJ's toolbox. I brought my own tools back with me, and no, I didn't take his personalized Ren Fair tankard. What the hell would I want with a mug that has TJ's picture on it?" He slowly leaned back on his elbows again, shoving aside the comforter on the unmade bed. Right before Lorelai had arrived, he'd gone to bed presuming she wouldn't be able to make it after all.
Lorelai returned from the kitchen carrying Luke's beer. She put one knee next to his hip, placed a hand on his shoulder and sipped from the bottle she held, slowly licking her lips before putting the bottle in his free hand. She drew back slowly, making sure he had a glimpse of cleavage.
He breathed out hard. When she turned around he ran the cold bottle over his forehead before nearly emptying it in one long drink.
Noticing oranges in the fruit bowl on the counter, she rolled one in the direction of Luke's bed. This time, though, she strolled over, faced away from him and bent over at the waist to pick it up.
She couldn't recall how many months she and Rory had spent perfecting the Bend and Snap, but it was one of their finest accomplishments. It was much harder to master than Elle let on, but they finally did, and improved upon it.
They added a literal twist. With her back to the man she could bend over in heels, then snap to upright and turn to face her prey, um, object of desire. That back to front movement was christened the Gilmore Twist.
Sad thing was, neither of them had ever had a chance to use it. Until now.
As the blood rushed to her head, she peeked between her legs to see if Luke was even paying attention. She wasn't certain. Either he was focused completely on her, or he was being strangled, because in normal life people's eyes don't really bug out that far.
When she snapped upright, she took pity on the man and skipped the boob push. She would later credit the longevity of their relationship to that decision, because the boob push that night would surely have killed him.
In the moment, though, she thought it had backfired. Luke released a string of curses beginning with "Holy Fuck!" and ending with "That's it, Liz! You and TJ and Bill and Annie are just going to have to figure out quoits for yourselves! I'm done with the damn Ren Fair! I'm done with all of you! I have my own business and life to run right here!" A heartbeat's worth of time passed before he added, "And don't let TJ get hit in the head again! He needs every brain cell he has."
He sat up straight on the bed, and everything else of importance sat up straight with him as he angrily pressed every button on the cordless phone. "How the hell do you turn this thing off!" he growled.
Lorelai grinned and launched herself at him on the bed. She landed on only the comforter and pillow that Luke had moved to make himself comfortable while he talked to Liz, because Luke had run out of the room.
"Huh," she said to herself. "Not quite the reaction I expected. May have to rethink the Gilmore Twist."
She concluded he hadn't gone far when a fresh stream of curses flowed from the living room area. "God. Damn. Answering. Machine."
She rolled over on her side and began peeling the orange.
Another "dammit!" was followed by a horrifyingly loud crash.
A moment later, Luke landed on the bed, mirror-imaging Lorelai's position, almost but not quite touching her. He was breathing hard.
A faint dampness on his forehead betrayed his recent exertion. "Hi," was all he said.
"Want a slice of orange?" she asked, breaking a section off and placing it at his lips.
He pulled it between his lips, kissing the fingers that held it. Lorelai bit into another slice herself, letting the wide part remain outside her mouth as juice dribbled from the corner of her mouth. She offered it to him, a twinkle in her eye.
Luke swallowed his slice, then her slice, ending with his lips firmly attached to hers.
They kissed. And grinded. And kissed some more, reveling in the closeness, feeling the heat of physical nearness, so much better than their intimate phone calls.
She rolled him onto his back. "Finally," she breathed. "Now it's my turn."
Her miniskirt didn't have far to go to ride up on her hips, and Luke watched in awe as she rubbed her panty-clad ass against the peak in his sweats.
"Anything," he groaned. "Anything you want."
She slid further down his legs, taking his sweats with her. As she pulled the pants completely off his body, she vowed to find a new nickname, because 'Little Luke' was clearly inappropriate.
Her hands felt the roughness of the hair on his flexed thighs as she stretched her body, reaching for his center.
"God, Lorelai," he groaned as she took him in her mouth. When she could go no farther, her hand took over. Luke's concentration was completely taken up by his effort to not thrust abruptly into her mouth, and he quickly went over the edge with a gasp and a word of warning that she didn't need.
Luke pulled her up beside him and she nestled in his arms.
"Seven weeks of foreplay is definitely too much," he said. She nodded tiredly, enjoying his arm around her shoulders.
His breathing evened out fast and Lorelai was surprised to see he was nearly asleep. The hand caressing her hair slowed, then stopped completely. The five hour drive from Maine plus the excitement of the day had taken its toll on him.
She sat up, drew the comforter up to his waist, then took care of her personal needs. As she stood in the kitchen drinking a glass of water, her cell phone light came on and a few clicking sounds alerted her to a new text message.
"Can't sleep." Rory didn't need to say more. The fallout from the Dean affair was long from over. She replied with a quick "on my way" and went back to Luke's bed.
She lay down beside him, saying, "Luke, honey, wake up." After trying a few more times and getting nothing but one drawn-out "Noooo" she gave up.
Ready to leave, she kissed him again, then impulsively pulled off her panties, slipped them over one of his hands, and folded that hand over his chest.
Her "I'll see you tomorrow" was answered by silence, so she slipped out the door quietly.
Sniffy's
"You know, you maybe should have saved the best pickup line ever in the history of the universe for a time when we're fighting." After Luke had put the horoscope safely away, Lorelai reached over and took his hand. "I'm kind of a sure thing tonight."
His eyes crinkled. "It's not a pickup line," he protested before looking down, sighing, then facing her again. "I'm playing a long game here."
He rolled his eyes as her smile widened into a grin. "Yeah. Dirty. I get it."
"Me, too, I hope." He marveled at her expression as she said that, wondering how she could look so innocent yet be unbelievably naughty at the same time.
Their mutual silence invited awkward back into the room.
"Hey Luke," Lorelai began after more champagne had covered the lull in their conversation. "I've never been on time for a date in my life."
"But ..."
"Yet I was early tonight. I didn't mistakenly start to come meet you. I couldn't wait any longer. And Liz' wedding? Sorta the same thing."
"But you didn't even know it was a date."
"It didn't matter. You were the person I was meeting, and I didn't want to miss one moment of that time with you. As my friend," she thought before continuing, "or more, I didn't want to wait any longer for the fun to begin."
Awkward got on the boat to Fiji, never to return.
"How's the phone?" teased Lorelai as he escorted her to the truck after dinner.
"Pulled the whole damn cable out of the wall," he muttered.
"Really?" she asked, kissing him on the forehead right before he closed the passenger side door.
"Kinda pulled the box out of the wall as well." He handed her the desserts Maisy had boxed up for them, tucked the champagne into a container in the bed of the truck, then leaned on the open truck window and grinned mischievously. "Broke the drywall, too."
"You are a bad boy. Come on, Danes," she commanded, wriggling with anticipation. "We've got some long games to play tonight."
Fin
A/N: thanks to DSLeo for coaching and inspiring Lorelai's revenge.