Chris cradled the top of his drink with his fingers, the din of the bar little more than white noise in the background. It was only his second drink, but most of the ice had melted. He had come to the bar more for the low-key sort of wordless racket that bars were good for than anything else.

Gigi had, at Sherry's insistence and according to their agreed-upon compromise, shipped off to boarding school that morning (excited, albeit tearfully) and the apartment had just felt…quiet. Not to mention clean. And both of those together just left him with an oddly hollow ache that the TV or radio couldn't fill.

So Chris had tried driving with no real destination in mind until he had felt it was too morose to aimlessly wander around in his car like a heartbroken teenager (well, a father suffering lightly from empty nest syndrome maybe). At that point, he had pulled off for the first bar that didn't look like a murder had been recently committed. He had been pleasantly surprised though at the cleanliness, friendly atmosphere, and lack of pushy conversation from the bartender.

He contemplated his watered-down drink, and had started to think that going home would probably be best when the bartender plunked a cold beer in front of him.

Chris looked up with polite confusion, schooled from too many years around high society and cotillion friends. "I didn't order—" he started with a shake of his head, but the bartender pointed over his shoulder. He turned, already preparing a speech about being flattered until he saw who it was. He swore sharply under his breath, his head dropping as he picked up his drink and the beer before making his way over to a table.

"Of all the gin joints," Chris muttered and slid the beer over.

Luke snorted derisively, but his casual stance seemed…off, looser somehow. "You could just take the damn beer and say thank you."

"Come to gloat about it then?" Chris asked bluntly without touching the beer. "Come on, man; I don't need this. She chose you; isn't that enough?"

Luke stared at his beer with an edgy, considering look, an undercurrent of self-deprecation and bitterness behind it. "She sure did, didn't she." He finished the third of his beer left in the bottle he held and took the one he had originally bought for Chris. "You didn't have to come over here, you know. Just thought it would be funny to buy a beer for a guy whose ass I kicked."

Chris scoffed, trying to pin down why the cadence of Luke's words seemed off. "That fight was a draw." He observed Luke take down a quarter of the beer. "And just how many of those have you had?"

Luke scowled at him. "You're not my babysitter; I'm a grown man." He knocked the empty bottle over as he gestured with the beer he had just started. "And seriously, pal, I haven't had enough."

Chris had never considered himself particularly adept at reading between the lines, especially with someone as prickly as Luke, but there was definitely something there beneath the surface, both angry and defeated. He couldn't quite put his finger on it though, other than the fact that man obviously wasn't all together sober.

Luke blinked at him owlishly. "I thought you rich people were polite…or something; you've met Emily." He seemed frustrated, knocking his beer to the table harder than he meant to, hands flailing wildly. "You grew up with Emily; what the hell was I thinking?" He snagged the beer again and drew on it. "So you're not even going to ask why I'm in some random bar, buying you a drink?"

And clearly two sheets in, Chris thought. "I'll admit, I'm…confused," he offered and tossed back what was left of his drink. "No trouble in paradise, I hope?"

Luke's eyes shifted and glittered dangerously, though the haze was still on his reddened face. "If you knew what happened and still said that, you're way more of an asshole than even I gave you credit for."

Chris put his empty glass down, trying to lean back and move in a non-threatening way as the final piece clicked. "Look, Luke…last I heard, you guys were fine and Rory had some interviews lined up in New York, I swear. You know Lore; she doesn't actually tell me things! And Rory's so busy, she barely has time to call once a week."

Luke didn't relax, though some of the fight left his face. "Come on," he said abruptly, shrugging on a battered green army jacket as he teetered dangerously against his chair. He flung an arm out in warning when Chris moved to support him. "I'm fine," he bit out. "You coming or staying?" He finished the beer, and though Chris knew he'd never say it, Luke seemed to want company for once.

Chris got up, pulling on his overcoat before grabbing Luke's shoulder tightly with one hand. The man didn't turn, but the muscles and tendons shifted beneath his fingers defensively. "She left you, didn't she." It wasn't meant to be a question.

Luke tensed further and ducked his head more to his shoulder and the floor than Chris. "Yeah. She did."

Well, Chris thought as they settled their tabs and Luke agreed to the offer of a ride, that explained that.

"We're taking my truck though." Luke handed Chris a set of keys. "We're going to my place. You ever heard of Founder's Day Punch?"

Chris had, if only in passing, and he was pretty sure his liver groaned.

XXXX

The drive to Luke's was long, awkward, and filled with stilted attempts (mostly on Chris's part) at conversation and pointed counters (Luke) at deferring them.

Chris shoved the truck into neutral and jammed the e-brake. He clenched one hand around the steering wheel and waved his other hand in Luke's general direction. "Okay, you wanted company and you got it. I can only assume it's got something to do with both of us being screwed by—" He let his words cut out because Luke had shot him a dirty glare. "Okay, poor choice of words, but you know what I'm trying to say."

Luke rolled his eyes and jerked his door open. "Would you just get out of the damn truck?"

Chris declined to comment that Luke's belligerence was nearly ruined by the fact that Luke all but spilled into the road, flat on his back and against the curb. Chris leaned against the passenger side of the truck, watching in unveiled amusement as Luke struggled to his feet and fell back at least twice (possibly more; Chris wouldn't taunt the drunk man with a specific number).

"You gonna accept a hand up or not?" Chris asked, outstretching his arm.

Luke shot paranoid glances up and down the street before grabbing Chris's hand so he could stand. "This gets to no one."

Chris shook his head bitterly. "Who here would believe me over you? Here's your keys."

It took nearly ten minutes before Chris even entered the apartment above the diner, a solo cup of what looked like fruit punch on ice in his hand. When he sipped at it though (gingerly, since yeah, he had definitely heard stories from any and all manners of townspeople about Miss Patty's founder's punch), he could practically taste the flammability of the drink.

"So," Chris said easily enough once they were seated at the kitchen table. "Why'd you ask me here?"

Luke shrugged, as if the reason were obvious. "We both got dumped by the same girl, in the same way, probably more than once. We also beat each other up over said girl. Why not?"

"So the drunk thing really works for opening those friendships."

"I don't have friends," Luke muttered and swiped his lips after taking a gentler sip of the punch than he had been all night on anything else. "I have a kid."

Chris nodded, bouncing his fingers around the edges of the solo cup. "Lore told me. April, right?"

"Yeah," Luke nodded, eyes brighter than normal at the mention of his daughter. "She's smart. Maybe Rory-smart." He rubbed a hand over his face, pulling the baseball cap from his head and then carding a hand over the wavy, light brown hair. "She did a damn DNA test for her science project in middle school to figure out who her dad was."

Chris whistled low. "That sounds…frightening."

Luke nodded towards his cup of punch, as if giving his agreement through looks alone. "Yeah, it was. It was me. Her mother didn't tell me." He got up, moving restlessly. "She didn't even tell me; if I'd known I had a kid…" He turned on Chris suddenly. "At least you knew you had Rory."

Chris tilted his head at him. "Did I? Lore took that kid from everyone who could have cared about her or even for her. I didn't get to be there because Lore decided that it was best for everyone to give birth and take off to god knows where and do her own thing."

Luke looked furious at this. "You could have found her. You knew her, knew that she didn't want that life for Rory."

"You don't think I tried?" Chris snapped, feeling tired and irritable. "You can't sit there and tell me that if you had known about your kid that you wouldn't have done everything possible to make sure she was happy, that she was cared for, even if only financially. I had to find out that Lorelai was more comfortable asking Emily and Richard for money to put Rory through Chilton than coming to me, Rory's father."

Luke still scowled as he rose, pacing because he could see the point from two different points of view but was unwilling to compromise. "I didn't even know about her."

Chris stood defiantly. "I was refused the ability to know about her at all."

XXXX

Three rounds of Miss Patty's punch later had them in the bathroom. Chris was decently buzzed; it was the only reason he could think of that he hadn't called a taxi or car to take him home. It was also why he could let it go that he was practically reliving his fraternity days, and making sure Luke didn't choke on his own vomit while he got rid of at least a third of what he'd drank.

In the end, Luke seemed drunk and content enough to lean against his bathtub and near the toilet, head buried into his elbows. "This fucking sucks," he slurred out.

Chris nodded, in what he thought looked pretty sage at this point. "Yeah. It does," he agreed, not realizing that his words were equally strung together, "She…she says she wants to marry you…wants to make that family. Then…then…she just goddamn leaves; who does that?"

Luke coughed, maybe choked, into the clear space of skin he had dug his nose into. "Lorelai does. She knows her own heart, she knows her kid, she knows her life."

Chris scoffed. "And those left behind?"

Luke looked up. "She's selfish. She needs to figure out what the fuck she wants, instead of settling all the time, thinking she's got what she wants and then turning tail when she realizes it isn't what she wants." He burped and gagged a bit, but didn't turn for the toilet. "I just…I don't get it…"

Chris sluggishly turned his head so it was resting on an arm over the lip of the bathtub and staring into Luke's face. "Get what?"

Blue eyes stared, suddenly clear, and then hazy again. "I don't get why she isn't happy. You can't do it, I can't, her parents can't…I don't get why she…" He started to drift.

Chris pushed his knee against Luke's with a selfish motive, because he had often wondered that himself. "Why she can't what?"

Luke snored into his elbow a bit until Chris kneed him again. "Christ, what?" he snapped.

Chris sighed; Luke was clearly done baring himself for the night. He swayed to his feet before finding a pillow and blanket from the bed in the other room and making sure that Luke had them for the night. He wasn't even sure he wanted to at this point.

"Hey," Luke murmured groggily as Chris settled the pillow behind his head. "She doesn't know how to be happy. It's not us."

Chris only finished making sure Luke was as comfortable as he could make him before finding himself back in the kitchen of the apartment. He settled a hand for balance on the table, shaking his head and squeezing his eyes shut for clarity.

Neither came, and Chris passed out in the smallest bed he could find in the tiny apartment. The smell of the diner, alcohol, and coffee lured him to sleep.

XXXXX

Luke woke slowly, the steady throbbing of a headache already gnawing at his temple. His neck definitely had a crick in it, and he was certain that had everything to do with the fact he had fallen asleep (passed out, his brain supplied) on the lip of his bathtub. He could still taste a combination of founder's punch and acid in his mouth and his stomach rolled in warning.

He groaned and scrubbed at his face with his hand. He squinted at the floor where the remains of his cup lay next to a second empty one. That brought on a frown because he remembered running into Chris at the bar, but not much past the man offering him a ride.

So who the hell…

Luke splashed water on his face quickly, glancing at his watch. Still only 2AM, which gave him a little bit of time before he had to start prepping downstairs. He exited the bathroom in search of the second drink holder, and felt his stomach drop when he saw Chris sprawled out on Jess's old bed.

"Sh—" He started and stopped before his curse could wake the other man. He ran a hand through his hair, which only served to make him wonder just where the hell he'd left his hat. Swiping it from the table and setting it down on the nightstand beside his bed, Luke quietly padded across the room and looked down where Chris lay.

The man was sleeping pretty damn hard, a quiet snore emanating from him every few breaths. His feet hung off the end of the bed, shoes still tied and his overcoat serving as a makeshift blanket.

Luke groaned quietly to himself and though all he wanted to do was curl up in his own bed and just let Cesar open the diner, he took a few minutes to remove Chris's shoes and cover him with the quilt from the couch. He grumbled internally as he did so, mostly at himself for being so stupid as to get drunk enough to invite Chris back to his place like they were friends or something. They most certainly weren't, despite the shared heartbreak.

He took no small amount of satisfaction in the fact that if he recalled correctly, Chris would definitely be feeling it in the morning.

Luke chugged a glass of water, took two aspirin, and then curled up in bed, burying his head beneath the blankets to catch a couple of hours before opening the diner. The nothingness of sleep was preferable to the rolling of his stomach that couldn't be completely attributed to the alcohol.

Chris snuffled in his sleep across the room.

Luke grunted and rolled over in bed.

XXXXX

Chris was pretty sure he had never felt this awful, even in his college days. He lay in the small bed, unwilling (and maybe a little unable) to even contemplate moving. The smells of breakfast food wafted up from the diner, and he actually choked a little trying to swallow back the nausea kicking at his throat. He moaned and shifted under the quilt, trying to gather the willpower to at least sit up.

The quilt? He frowned, because he had simply collapsed last night on the bed, not even bothering to take his shoes off.

Chris finally sat up, his gut lurching and his head throbbing like fifteen jackhammers had taken up residence in his skull. Rory hadn't been kidding when she had called founder's day punch "a drink that even the devil couldn't have come up with". He looked down to his feet, where his shoes had been removed. On the small table beside of the bed, someone had set up a glass of water and several aspirin settled on a napkin.

It was oddly thoughtful, but then Chris supposed he never thought of Luke as particularly selfish. It was still a nice gesture, however, and he idly wondered just how, exactly, he was going to make an escape without half the town seeing him leave Luke's. And, not to put too fine a point on the matter, Chris wasn't even sure why it bothered him—or if it even really bothered him.

Something unsettled was in his gut though, and he couldn't quite put a finger on it. He downed the water without much more thought, chasing it with the aspirin Luke had left on the table. After a quick trip to the bathroom to splash water on his face (and steal some of the mouthwash there), he felt just human enough to think about calling a cab to at least take him back to his car.

Chris got his shoes on and threw his coat over his shoulders absently, the sheer oddity of having spent the night at Luke's crashing around in his head in time with the headache. As such, he wasn't really paying attention when he pulled the door open, having decided that a quick getaway would be best—just shuffle as quickly as possible through the diner and get the hell out and back home where he could shower in peace and then spend the day watching TV.

Instead, he opened the door just as Lorelai had raised a fist to knock on it.

Chris stopped abruptly. "Lore?"

Lorelai frowned at him, clearly trying to piece it together. "Chris? What are you…why are you…" She held up a hand. "You know what, I don't even want to know. Have you seen Luke?" She looked at his wrinkled clothing and his clearly hungover face. "Okay, I am going to ask. What the hell are you even doing here?"

Chris sighed irritably; he wasn't really in the mood to play 20 questions with her. Instead, he lied. "I got too drunk at the bar last night after shipping Gigi off yesterday; Luke happened to be at the same bar, so he gave me a lift."

Lorelai raised her eyebrows. "A lift," she repeated. "To his place? Why didn't you tell him to take you home? Better yet, why not just call an Uber or a taxi or your own personal car or whatever."

Chris sighed. "I wanted the company. He was nice enough to agree." He decided to completely leave out how drunk Luke had been the night before in the best interests of whatever was going on between the two of them. A small part of him was somewhat proud of the fact Luke had finally decided to deign him somewhat worthy company at this point, and he wasn't sure he wanted Lorelai to hone in on that.

Lorelai shrugged, though she clearly didn't believe him. "Well, have you seen him?"

"Not since last night; he's not in the diner?"

"No," Lorelai replied, biting a thumbnail anxiously. "Are you headed back then?"

Chris nodded. "Soon as I call a cab. It was a pretty rough night; I could use a gallon of water and the greasiest pizza you could possibly imagine."

Lorelai smiled, but it was fragile and didn't quite meet her eyes. "Well, we can go to Al's Pancake World? I have time, and we can catch up." She affectionately knuckled her fist into his shoulder. "You can tell me about your empty nest."

Chris chuckled even though his heart really wasn't in it. "You can tell me what happened between you and the diner guy."

Lorelai's smile faded a bit, and her eyes tightened. "You can call him Luke, you know."

Chris laughed again, but it was even more apparent this time that it was weak and just as brittle as Lorelai's smile. "Yeah, I suppose I can."

XXXXXXXXXX