Title: Redemption
Author: Rellik
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Rory/Paris
Spoilers: up until season 6, episode 15
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the words and the pretty patterns they make. I'm borrowing the characters for colour.
Summary: It begins when Rory receives an invitation to the Chilton 10 year reunion.
Notes: School reunions, easy I know. But I intend to spin this baby in all sorts of crazy directions.
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Chapter 1
Saturday night. Movie night.
Lorelai checked her list.
"Let's see here," she said, tapping her pen against the pad.
"Saturday? Check. Night?" she took a moment to look around. Rory tilted her head, amused.
"Check. Movie?"
Here Lorelai waited a beat and then glared at her daughter. Rory turned up her hands. They were empty. She gave her mother a sheepish smile she hoped looked adorable enough to inspire forgiveness. The look on her mothers face was of deep disappointment.
"There were only three things on my list today. Three! And we couldn't even manage that," she said, slapping the pad down dismally on the kitchen table. She slumped, displaying posture not unlike a rag doll, and looked at the floor.
"Not my fault! I went running to the video store, but I ran into Taylor," Rory explained.
"Taylor," Lorelai grunted with disapproval.
"And he demanded my opinion on a new menu item."
"Menu," Lorelai grunted again.
"Then, after giving Taylor an opinion, that is after giving him one he accepted, I raced on and was stopped by Babette."
"Babette." Her frowned deepened.
"And she wouldn't let me leave until I told her all about how my job at the Standford Eagle Gazette was going and what it was like to be living on my own in and what brand of OJ I kept in the refrigerator."
"OJ."
"Then Miss Patty spotted us."
"Spotted."
"And I had to repeat most of what I'd told Babette."
"Told."
"So by the time I made it to the store, Kirk was locking up and he wouldn't let me rent even after I told him your mental health was at stake."
"The."
"Mom, you can't be mad at the word, 'the'," said Rory.
"Permission to continue hating OJ?" Lorelai asked.
"Granted," Rory said with a nod.
Lorelai look satisfied for a few seconds and then sighed.
"Don't we have anything around the house? Didn't you and Luke sort through all our videos?" Rory asked.
Lorelai brightened.
"Ooo! Riding the Bus with my Sister!" she exclaimed, and grabbed her daughter by the wrist, pulling her to the living room.
Soon they were sitting together in the flicker of the television set, throwing popcorn in their mouths with the lazy flops of their wrists, Paul Anka between them, the old dog his chin resting on Rory's thigh.
"It's as if you never left," Lorelai said suddenly.
Rory let a piece of popcorn melt in her mouth until she knew what to say. It had been an interesting past couple of years. Graduating at Yale, touring Europe, Asia and those exotic southern lands, breaking up with Logan, moving out on her own, marveling at the rapid rate her reputation at the Gazette grew. And after all that, a single step into Stars Hollow and the rhythm of the town had welcomed her back into the beat and kept on drumming.
"I don't think anyone can leave this place."
Lorelai was happy with the answer but Rory wondered if it was true. She had left and all but forgotten Stars Hollow and its warm, friendly chorus of villagers. That was five years ago. Lying on her old bed in her old room, the same as the day she left it, thoughts of the past couple of months floated lazily along the stream of her mind. Beginning with the letter she felt an energy charge her body as realization dawned on her that it had already been ten years since her well polished school shoes had echoed in the halls of Chilton.
The emotions struck her like a stampede as her eyes recognized the names of the two girls organizing the reunion. The stone shell that had engulfed her body and her soul cracked and then shattered and a self that had been denied breath for so long had gasped and crumpled into the sofa, tears glimmering and tender smile on trembling lips. It was overwhelming, like waking from a dream neither good nor bad but had been her prison.
Her eyes had wandered over the page, a smart, formal invitation, savoring each word as if were all she deserved from a life she had abandoned. She had cried herself to sleep, right there on the sofa, jacket still buttoned, skirt still tight and heals gnawing the skin from her bones. The invitation was held to the door of her refrigerator the next day, carefully, lovingly.
Like stars blinking to life in the night sky, pieces of her past had come back to her. Little things, tiny things, sparkling, twinkling and making her heart ache with shame and love. The trees, the grass, the very taste of the air and the texture of the sunburned wood of the park benches. Voices and faces, names and all the songs of affection she felt for each and every one of them.
Lane's song. Rory's heart had almost fallen apart as the tune and the words played in that sorry forgotten chamber of a best friend she had not shared a single word with in four whole years. She had visited a picture of her cheerful, spirited friend in her mind, frozen in the image of the last time she had seen her, standing there, waving, watching as Rory went on to bigger and better things.
Rory's only saving grace was keeping in touch with her mother. Piecing together a storyboard of Lane's life over the years, Rory had tried to picture her friend the successful Rock label manager Lorelai had tried to paint for her. Rory had smiled and stared at the phone on her work desk for days, weeks.
Lane was not the only person she had longed to call. The smaller strings of her heart tugged weakly, as if the overwhelmed organ knew it could not handle the sheer tempest of emotions thoughts of Paris would summon. Rory had tried ferociously to hold them back, focusing instead on the thousand of other glittering memories of Stars Hollow. It was as if she knew she didn't deserve to feel even an ounce of shame for neglecting the girl. But by disallowing herself to conjure even an image of Paris, she couldn't even begin to discern why.
She had planned the trip back home, easily earning herself a generous four months off work so long as she continued to send in small perspective pieces on generic social and political issues. Mr Wooles had agreed to the idea, eager to cash in on the influence of his star journalist, deciding its success would herald the dawn of a new era for the Standford Eagle Gazette. Rory hadn't asked what that era would be, but Mr Wooles had looked practically giddy with excitement.
A week she had been home. An hour she had been lying in bed. The reunion was in three days. The tiny strings tugged. Rory ignored them. They gave up the moment she fell asleep.