Part One: Like Logan Never Left
"Ms… Ms. Gilmore?" The timid, frizzy-haired intern skittered forward, knocking over a teetering pile of empty coffee mugs in the process. "Umm… more coffee?" She tried desperately. This question always brought a glimmer of reaction into her boss's eyes, which were usually downturned, a foggy window into the abyss of deadlines and article assignments.
"RORY!" The intern shuddered at the voice's abrasiveness, turning to see who it belonged to. Who would address one of the most influential women in journalism this way? She stared in shock as Rory turned and attentively met the eyes of a stern, perpetually worried looking man with thinning brown hair and a stiff gray tie.
"What, Doyle? And could I get some more coffee, Nina?"
The intern gathered the mugs in her arms with a small, embarrassed nod, praying that she didn't drop them just steps away from Rory's desk. She placed the email and attached document that she had just printed out with the same tentativeness, relieved to see that Rory's gaze didn't waver. Though Nina had only been working at The New York Times office for a month, she knew enough to feel sure that when Rory read the email her light blue eyes would harden with that piercing ferocity usually reserved for when she was holding a red pen and a crumpled rough draft.
Rory liked to be perceived as tough, professional, and unaffected. But despite her nonchalant exterior, despite the constant cycle of meaningless, replaceable guys that appeared on her arm at each black tie gathering, it was clear that a devastating heartbreak had shaped and shook Rory's world, had maybe even propelled her to success. Nina knew the stories, yearned for them like bedtime fairytales, snapshots of her editor's path to success, pieces of her mysterious transformation from Stars Hollow girl to New York City near-celebrity.
The delightfully crazy characters like Babette and Miss Patty were spoken and laughed about with ease. The romance between Rory's quick-witted mother, Lorelai, and the surprisingly sensitive diner owner Luke had been recounted so many times throughout the office that one ambitious writer even joked about incorporating it into a screenplay. Those were the stories Rory let slip willingly, elaborated upon in a fast-paced blur of giggles and small town sentimentality.
Then there was the story that Rory hadn't told them. The one whispered about during staff breaks, hinted towards in the sudden detached sadness that sometimes crept into her gaze. And that was the story— the tragedy— of a character they all knew too well, but who never ceased to intrigue them: Logan Huntzberger.
Doyle knew it best. He and Rory had started work at the New York Times together, five years ago. And while Doyle had brought a long-term girlfriend to this new stage of life— a shrill, domineering med student named Paris Gellar, who was cautiously maneuvered past at every staff get-together— Rory was alone. She chased after each project with a sole, overpowering dedication that terrified everyone, but ensured her the position of new editor just two years later. She stayed late on Friday nights, was early to the office each morning, and never got tugged away by a phone call or text.
But she stared at her phone like these were distractions she yearned for. Like she was expecting explanations and apologies, the poetry of passion and pleas, but the only words she ended up with were the ones she wrote herself, fueled by coffee and the constantly illuminated screen of her laptop.
Then at the wedding of Penelope Fletcher, the newspaper's top opinion writer, it all came pouring out. The normally reserved Rory Gilmore drank six strong, sparkling glasses of champagne, and the mystery of the unknown boy and tumultuous heartbreak finally unfolded. She blubbered something about how she and Logan first kissed at a wedding, how her mom walked in but it still didn't spoil the moment for her, the bold promise of finally claiming what she had wanted since the night she broke up with Dean, since Logan had made everything better.
"Who's Dean?" Someone had pestered curiously. "A hot actor? Anyone we've heard of?"
Rory had laughed through the obvious tears that were gathering in the back of her throat. "No. Dean was from Stars Hollow. And he was only meant for Stars Hollow, I realized. He couldn't move forward alongside me, he couldn't be a part of my future. His life was never going to fit together with mine. Not unless I forced it. And then… Logan. Logan was different, he was seamless. It seemed right to have him by my side at Yale, in Stars Hollow, even at my grandmother's crazy cocktail parties. I guess I just thought that anywhere we went, we would go together."
"Anywhere besides for the New York Times?"
"No, he should be with me even now. And we should be g-getting married, I should be joining the family that said loud and clear they didn't want me, because it doesn't matter as long as he wants me. Lane should be here, she would be a bridesmaid… and Paris, she could catch the bouquet…"
That night everyone saw Rory at her least sensical. Nothing that she said seemed to connect, there was no sequence…
Her life wasn't like her articles, they all realized then. There was something she was dying to edit, but for once it wasn't in her power. She took daring risks by writing about scandals and social issues, but this time she just wanted the safe happy ending with the predictable Prince Charming.
But it turned out this Prince Charming wasn't so predictable. Otherwise, he wouldn't be sending emails trying to contact the girl whose heart he broke five years ago. Trying to impress her, trying desperately to show her how much he still loved her.
"He still loves me…" Rory whispered as Nina brought a fresh mug of coffee to her desk. "And he's been writing. Not because his father told him to, in fact, he's been writing all the things his father wouldn't approve of. He's been saving all of his words for me."
"Huntzberger?" Doyle piped up from across the room, exercising his well-known, somehow beloved lack of sensitivity. He leapt from his chair and raced towards Rory, more expression burning in his eyes than when he ranted weekly about Time magazine.
"Huntzberger," Rory echoed with weary breathlessness. "Logan. He's coming in for an appointment this week, with all the heads of production and all the newspaper's marketing agents, and I… I have to be there too, 'meeting must be attended by the editor,' this email says. I can't believe it, he might be getting his own column."
Logan had always been a talented writer, he had a way with words that Rory knew all too well, a skill he had used to persuade her to stay the night when she had a test in the morning, or to down another drink with him and Finn… come on, Ace. Rory could almost hear him say it now, wherever he was— however far from her he continued to be— that easy laughter in his voice and the familiar smirk curling up his face, charming her every time.
"What has Logan been writing a column about, for God's sake?" Doyle inquired bitterly, steps away from Rory. "I couldn't get him to turn in a damn thing on time at the Yale Daily News, he was late to every meeting so he always got the most boring assignments… and then, when he did come in on time, it was only so he could stare at the pretty girl in the desk across from him."
Rory blushed at this reference, remembering how Logan had traced the straps of her high-heeled Mary Janes with his feet, egging on an aching eagerness that she always hoped wasn't detectable in her face. Thinking of how he sent her messages saying he could really use a coffee break, and a coffee-flavored kiss…
"Rory? The column?" Doyle's irritation was unmasked. He was probably reliving the same memories as Rory, only from his point of view they centered around being ignored by two members of his staff, as they paid attention to only each other.
"Partying Away the Pain: One Man's Crazed Attempts to Forget the Love of his Life."
"A little wordy," Doyle retorted. "No, it would never work as a headline…"
But for Rory, what else could it be? It was a vibrant, neon headline that defied the realm of black and white she stared at every day. It felt more real than anything she had ever written, than anything she had ever read. It was the words "Rory Gilmore I Love You" and "Rory Gilmore, I Can't Replace You" conveyed by the blazing sun throughout her window, finally uncovered and peeking out from beneath the clouds.
Logan was partying, but not with Anna or Chelsea or any of the girls from before. With the thought of Rory, distinct and unshakeable in his head.
"I have to do something!" Rory urgently whispered to herself. A feeling had overcome her suddenly, not unlike the feeling that had propelled her the day she kissed Logan at her grandparents' wedding, or the day she went to Logan and insisted that she would never be a "casual dating" girl— that day he became her boyfriend, her little glimpse of a possible forever.
"Nina," Rory commanded sharply, sounding startlingly like her grandmother, "can you please retrieve the contact information for Logan Huntzberger?"
"Umm, s-sure," Nina stuttered. She hadn't envisioned this particular assignment when she joined staff at the New York Times. She was the coffee-and-bagel-run girl, the perpetual copy machine attendant, not a match-maker. But then again, Rory was the lonely night owl, holed up in her office with research materials for various articles, not a pined-after heartbreaker with a secret love story to piece back together. And as both women transformed, working at The New York Times was about to become a lot more interesting. "Do you mean like an email address, or a phone number?"
Rory pursed her lips and tapped her anxious fingers against the desk, pondering. Was now the time to be cautious? Hell, Logan hadn't been cautious when he had unexpectedly asked her to marry him before graduation! And Logan still wasn't cautious now, he was writing articles about her, undoubtedly pissing off his father, his mother, his whole ritzy realm of society! No, now wasn't the time for Rory to be cautious, it was the time for her to be bold, to do something that wasn't in the plan, to set her and Logan on two opposite sides of an inevitable collision.
"Actually, Nina dear, I was thinking I might want his address."
But first, I have to call my mother!
Lorelai had been there when Rory refused Logan's proposal, and she was there in the disastrous aftermath. It wasn't like her breakup with Dean, so many years prior, this time she didn't need to be told to wallow, she collapsed inward automatically. Sookie delivered endless amounts of decadent desserts, while Lorelai kept PopTarts and takeout food on constant rotation. And no night passed without the girls entangling themselves on the couch and watching an episode of The Donna Reed Show, Rory drifting asleep with tear-stained cheeks and her head against Lorelai's shoulder.
But most importantly, Lorelai had been through more than her share of heartbreaks and romantic rekindling, but had ended up okay, secure in what she wanted.
The phone stopped ringing, and Lorelai's sleepy but elated voice overflowed from the phone. "Hey, honey, how's it going in that busy newsroom of yours? Won any awards yet, interviewed Justin Timberlake, had an illicit affair with a young, smoldering intern fresh out of college?"
"No, no, and mom! No! But something big did just happen, with a guy. A guy that you know, actually, not a celebrity who you can tell Babette and Miss Patty about."
On the other side of the call, Lorelai was now hushing all the noise that reverberated around her every morning. She waited until Paul Anka wasn't barking, Luke wasn't muttering, and their small child Quincey wasn't blabbering in her own undocumented language. "Rory, a boy? So you really aren't contemplating joining a convent? Because, you know, I just recently dug out the rosary beads I bought while we were backpacking through Europe."
"You better stop joking around, or I'm going to tell Luke to bring out the decaf! It's serious, i-it's him. Mom, it's Logan."
"Logan?" Lorelai breathed. "There's still a Logan? He, you-"
"He's been writing about me, not just about me but for me. And I've… decided to go see him."
"Today?"
"Today, right now! Mom, I need your help! This is kissing Dean and shoplifting the cornstarch, Jess returning, you tripping over every piece of exposed furniture in Luke's Diner that one day… it's all of it, all at once! I've never been more nervous or more uncomfortable… I'm Ms. Kim at a Fifty Shades of Grey reading!"
"Oh honey, please don't use that as a reference, Luke was eating! And don't share it with Logan, either. But, seeing him for the first time in all of these years… it might be awkward no matter what. Just keep in mind that he'll be the same in some ways, but there will be differences. It won't be exactly like five years ago. You've changed, too, Rory. Now both of you have to decide if you've changed for the better, in ways that will compliment each other."
Rory felt a light tap on her shoulder, so cautious and polite she knew it had to be Nina. "I compiled Mr. Huntzberger's contact information, including his address, Ms. Gilmore."
"Mom," Rory hurriedly announced into the phone, "I've got to go. Hug Quincey for me, stop feeding Paul Anka popcorn, and tell Luke it's the season for the Santa Burger and I better see it on the diner menu next time I stop by! I love you all!"
A "good luck" was perched on Lorelai's tongue, but as a click sounded on the other end and anxious silence hung where Rory's voice used to be, Lorelai knew it wasn't needed. Whatever skepticism or fear Logan was battling, it didn't stand a chance once he saw her beautiful, intelligent daughter, finally emerged from her stony wall of solitude.
Maybe Rory hadn't accepted that engagement ring five years ago, but it had always been unofficially reserved for her. There was nothing stopping her from claiming it now. Lorelai gazed up at Luke, tightened her arms around their sweet, giggling daughter, and felt her heart swell as Luke bent down to kiss her.
You can have this too, Rory, if you decide you want it, she thought. Sometimes, Lorelai felt as if she and her first born daughter— her best friend— had some weird brand of telepathy, and this was the message Lorelai was choosing to send. Honey, you should know that no one can resist a Gilmore girl.