AN: Hello, dear readers! I wasn't planning on returning so soon, but here we are. Inspired by our heat wave, I wrote a little fic. It's set between s2 and s3. Loyal readers know that I did a chapter of Coffee and Flannel with a similar theme that took place in the exact same time. I tried to do something new here though. Thanks a bunch to my gal DSLeo, editor, friend, heart-sister, who unscrambled the chaos. Enjoy!

Too Too Hot

Lorelai enjoyed the nightly breeze during the most unexpected pastime of hers. Spurred on by the need to give her couch a break as well as the fear of sitting on her porch and attracting unwanted fellows like mosquitos, moths or her nosy neighbor Babette, she strolled along the woods of Stars Hollow at dusk. Trying to think back to a time when she didn't have Rory, she soon came to the realization that she had grown too old for partyhopping or bedhopping. But somehow she had to come up something to make the time go by.

It had started not two weeks ago when she had found herself in no mood for music or TV, and all magazines were read already. It was too hot to do more than that, so she had waited for the night to fall before she left her house for a quick walk to the lake. Eager to escape the curious eyes of her neighbors and friends, she took unusual routes to make sure those questions weren't thrown at her even when she did occasionally see other Stars Hollowians. Most of them were only acquaintances, or elderly people walking their dogs.

She gathered it was her own fault. What was she thinking flaunting her momentary happiness in front of all of their faces? She even had trouble with that phrasing. Was it happiness, or was it some sense of security that betrayed her normally careful self? What was the difference, she wondered as she took a turn to the now well-known path to the lake. She had let her guard down, and it had royally bitten her in the derrière. And the reaction of her friends and neighbors was nothing compared to what was ahead of her once she would break the news to her parents. Yet she got a twisted sense of calm when she thought about the conversation she would have to have. Maybe it was the familiarity of Christopher disappointing her, maybe it was the old pattern of her being the trooper who always broke bad news to her parents. Nearly two weeks of nightly walks in the cooling air didn't bring her one inch closer to a solution. Maybe this wasn't the time yet for a solution, maybe she was allowed to admire the problem for a bit longer.

Lorelai arrived at her spot and sat down beneath the old willow whose long branches so perfectly hid her form on the shore of the lake. He wasn't there yet. She checked her watch and saw that she was seven minutes early. She lay back and closed her eyes for a bit. She wished she could sleep out here instead of in the stuffy bedroom in her house. The branches of the tree swayed with the wind and made the most calming sound. She couldn't wait for Rory to come back from Washington, although it also meant that her nocturnal trips to the lake would have to end. Rory would mock her endlessly for her wish to be outdoors. Especially after having been accused by her to not have done anything for her wilderness skills the summer before.

She was torn from her train of thought when she heard the water splashing. She had not heard the old bridge squeak and was a bit surprised. Maybe the wind was blowing in the opposite direction. She slowly sat up and saw him in the water. She was far enough away from him and the willow's long branches kept her presence a secret. She would be mortified if he ever found out she was watching him. But that was what she was doing. She watched him cool himself off after a long day's work. She was sure he had just closed up the diner. Lorelai hugged her knees to her chest as she watched him intently.

It had all been a coincidence when she first saw him at the lake. It was the third time she had fled her hot house when she saw him plunge in to the cool lake late at night. The sun was gone and with the very last rays of light did he arrive. He took off his plaid shirt, undershirt, shoes and jeans and only clad in underwear dove into the water. Lorelai had watched him with interest. Partly because she was curious to see what he was hiding underneath all those layers of clothes, partly because she was fascinated with the way he undressed. It seemed weird to her that she knew so little of the man who she most of the time considered to be one of her closest friends, and finding out something about him, even just the way he was folding his jeans, fascinated her.

She had many times pondered the one-sided nature of their friendship. Whether it was him insisting on doing some job around her house and forbidding her to pay him or reciprocate it any other way, or whether it was her never quite knowing what to do for him in return, she didn't know. Possibly it was the both of them knowing that it would make the other uncomfortable to disturb their pattern in some way or the other. It had taken a great deal of her strength to accept his help as well as some time getting used to the idea of another person, a man, no less, helping her.

Her eyes still glued to him, she watched his every move. He usually started with a couple laps of freestyle along the bridge, only to then change to backstroke for a couple more. After that his routine varied somewhat. Sometimes he went back to freestyle, sometimes he did a couple laps of breaststroke. One time about a week ago he exhausted himself with two laps of butterfly. In the end the normally was just floating in the water to relax. He never swam for longer than thirty minutes, probably because he needed to go to bed. Lorelai found his movements incredibly powerful and graceful at the same time.

When he was done that night, he got out of the water by propping his hands on the bridge and swinging his legs up. He made it look so easy, yet every time she feared he'd catch a splinter from the old wood. He dried himself off now, and Lorelai watched him closely. Thankful for the distance that separated them and the impending darkness that gave her cover, she leaned forward and moved a couple branches out of the way to see him better. She was fascinated by him. Once his body was dried off with a towel he brought, he put his t-shirt back on and carried the rest of his clothes in his hands. He walked back to the diner barefoot.

Lorelai exhaled a breath she had held the entire time, and lay back down. She curled a strand of her hair around her finger and exhaled once more. It hurt her that she hadn't spoken to him in weeks. She missed him more than his coffee, even though she wouldn't admit it to anyone. She felt like a stalkerish creep for watching him night after night, but it never stopped her from coming to the lake. She was determined to love him from afar. Love? She nodded her head. Love. Ever since their show for the realtor lady a couple months ago, she was certain. Why she had allowed Christopher back in, she did not know completely. She was just sure she was sick of waiting for some signal from Luke. Everyone in town had made her think he was head over heels in love with her. Then why was nothing ever coming from him? Everyone must have been wrong to assume an attraction from his side. In fact, it wasn't hard for Lorelai to convince herself that Luke must be quite disgusted with her way of life. He voiced it every chance he got. When someone is so vocal about their feelings and never even alludes to an attraction to her, it was a safe bet that they don't feel the way everyone assumed.

The next morning Lorelai was slowly waking up, but something was wrong. It was almost as if drops of water were dripping on her forehead. She turned around and hugged her pillow closer to her. She could still feel water on her face. In an attack of fear she shrieked and woke with a start. Had it rained and water was leaking through her roof? Slowly coming to her senses, she realized it wasn't raining. She also realized she wasn't in her bed, or even in her house. She had fallen asleep at the lake. The sun was just rising behind the tall trees on the opposite shore of the lake. Lorelai rubbed her eyes and her hands were moist from the touch.

"What?" she mumbled and incredulously looked at her hands.

She looked around herself and quickly found the source of the water on her face. Luke was standing next to her, his wet hair releasing droplets of water.

"Luke?"

"What on earth are you doing here?"

"Me? I just took an early morning nap. What are you doing here?"

"Cut the crap, Lorelai. You slept here all night."

"I answer you and you don't answer me?" she said as he pulled her up by the hands.

"I came here for a swim."

"You come in the mornings, too?"

"Yeah, why? Is that illegal?"

"No. I, uh, I just think it's weird."

"Not weirder than sleeping in the woods. Damn it, Lorelai, what if someone had found you and..." he said, but stopped himself.

"What? Raped me? Killed me?"

"Yes!" he yelled angrily.

"This is Stars Hollow, Luke. Calm down. And stop yelling at me. I get the impression we only yell at each other any more," she tried to joke with a half smile.

He scoffed. "Then stop giving me a reason to yell."

"Are you serious? You have no authority to yell at me. It's not like we're friends anymore."

Luke felt like a gutted fish in that moment. She didn't think they were friends anymore. He didn't know how to react. Breathing again would be a good start.

"What do you mean?" he asked, unsure of everything in his life.

"We haven't spoken in weeks, and even before then..."

"What about before?"

"Luke, we said the worst things to each other in our fight. And before? I don't think we were such good friends. I was your customer who made you do her home repairs. It's not like you enjoyed my company. You constantly told me how bad you think my choices are."

He looked at her with big eyes, yet he was unable to counter anything. She held his look, expectant of what he might have to say.

After a long while, he opened his mouth to say, "You didn't make me do anything, Lorelai. What I did, I did because I wanted to. That includes home repairs as well as your company. I'm not a pushover. I make my own decisions. So do you. For all the flak you give me, I can't nag you about eating healthy?"

His voice was a lot softer than she had expected.

"I don't know."

They were standing there, at the shore of the lake, just looking at each other. Lorelai thought she had to take her time looking at him more closely. She tried to remember every feature of his face, scared of never having the chance to see him so closely again.

He interrupted their stare-down. "Why did you ask if I came here in the mornings?"

"What?"

"You said 'too'. You asked if I came here in the mornings, 'too'. What did you mean?"

"N-nothing," she stuttered. "I just assumed that you might come here in the evening, you know, for a quick dive in the good old lake."

"Uh huh. That's weird. You saw me here in the morning, why do you ask about me coming here at night?"

"It's early, Luke. I haven't had coffee. I'm not sane before coffee," she tried to lie.

Luke thought for a moment. "When exactly did you come here?"

"It must have been around midnight," she replied and was kind of proud of how honest her blatant lie just sounded.

"So late?"

"Yeah, I couldn't sleep. The house is too hot."

"Then turn your A/C on."

"It's not working."

As she was uttering those words, he turned away from her, and practically sprinted to the bridge. She followed him and watched how he quickly ran the towel over his body, put on his t-shirt, grabbed his clothes and boots and walked in the direction of her house.

"What are you doing?" she asked him impatiently.

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm going to your house to fix the damn A/C in order to avoid you having to sleep outdoors and becoming a crime victim!" he announced angrily and picked up the speed.

No stranger to running, especially from her parents' house, she quickly fell into step next to him, and challenged him. "With what tools?"

He scoffed then. Their quick pace soon brought them to Lorelai's house. But instead of climbing the porch steps with her, Luke went straight to the garage.

"I didn't downsize, I still live in the big house," Lorelai said and motioned to her house.

But he didn't even look to her. He vanished in her garage. How the hell did he get in there, Lorelai wondered. Soon he reappeared with a couple tools. He walked straight by Lorelai and opened the door to her house.

"What the..." she said in bewilderment.

"Figured..." he mumbled in response, not a bit surprised that her door was unlocked the entire night.

"Luke, would you please stop for a minute? Where did you get those tools?" she demanded to know as she followed him inside.

"I put my duplicates in there just in case."

"Why on earth would you do that?"

"Maybe because I was sick of you naming my toolbox, or that you would say the word toolbox a million times a minute, or that you make the pliers talk to the Phillips head screwdriver!"

"Gee, did Taylor hire you to wake up the entire neighborhood?"

Wordlessly, he walked upstairs to the A/C unit. Lorelai didn't bother to come with him. She went to the kitchen to make the largest pot of coffee she had ever seen. When she was halfway through the pot, Luke came back downstairs and sat next to her. She went to the fridge to get him some juice. She placed the glass in front of him and he drained it immediately. She refilled it and sat down on her chair.

"So?" she said.

"I could fix it."

"Thanks."

"Don't mention it."

"I will. I'll mention it to everybody. Luke, why did you come here?"

"I already told you. I only do what I want."

"You woke up with the desperate urge to fix my A/C?"

"No, I didn't know it was broken when I woke up."

"What I mean is that we haven't spoken in six weeks and four and a half days and you come here and fix the A/C. Why?"

"If you ever sleep outdoors again and risk being murdered, I won't be able to look in the mirror ever again. If a fixed A/C means you'll stay at home instead of sleeping by the lake, then that's what I'll do, no matter that we didn't speak in six weeks."

"I lied earlier."

"When?"

"When I said that I had walked to the lake around midnight. It was way sooner. It was around nine-ish. And I saw you, OK? That's why I lied. I'm completely humiliated to admit this, but I watched you swim. And to come clean completely, I saw you the day before. And the other days. It's been ten days, or nights to be exact, and I couldn't stop myself from going to the lake every night. I know how that must sound and I hope you can forgive me for making you uncomfortable in any way. For what it's worth, once you were in the water I only saw your head and arms. I'm so sorry Luke. I know I shouldn't have done it. I'm such an idiot," she said and buried her face in her hands.

"You watched me swim? Why didn't you say something?"

"What was I supposed to say? 'Hey Luke, mind if I sit here and ogle your naked and wet body?' Not likely."

"You could have made your presence known and we could have talked or something."

"Talked? About what? The last time we spoke we sent each other to hell. How do you recover from that?"

"I don't know. Why did you come back after the first night?"

Lorelai's face reddened. She swallowed. "I, uh, I wanted to see if you came back. I don't know your routine, Luke. I basically don't know anything besides your birthday and your obvious plaid fetish. I just wanted to know something, even if it makes me look like a total creep in retrospect."

He softly smiled at her then.

"What?" she asked.

"I usually buy women dinner before I let them see me naked."

"OK, to be fair, you weren't naked naked. You still had your boxers on."

He got up from his chair and walked to her fridge. "Do you have any eggs?"

"Incidentally, I do. Why?"

"The least I can do is make you breakfast. It's not dinner time yet, so I hope it'll do. How come you have anything edible in the house?"

"It started with the fact that I couldn't go to my favorite diner and ended with a lesson Sookie gave me. It was entitled 'Lorelai, make your own breakfast and stop harassing your newlywed friend in the morning because you're hungry and unable to cook your own food.'"

"That line must have made one hell of a flyer," he deadpanned. Did Lorelai see him smile cockily for the shortest moment?

"It was a poster actually."

"French toast OK?" he asked as he turned around and looked for bread.

"Sounds perfect."

Did you like it? Leave me a review if you will.

PurryCat will return