"Hey, Luke?" asked Sookie, smiling.

"Yeah?"

"This is good."

I nodded as I watched her walk back over to tend to Kirk. "I hope so."

The whole evening had felt like one surreal moment after another. From Lorelai's flustered reaction to the bouquet of flowers I brought, to the short but knowing look we shared during dinner. Things were definitely on track. Yes, Jason had showed up at the worst possible moment, and yes, Kirk interrupted a third kiss that I wanted even more than the first two. But despite all of that, I felt like the night was borderline perfect. That was until Lorelai came back to the inn looking distracted if not a little distraught. What could have possibly happened in the fifteen minutes she was gone?

I slowly made my way back towards the couch where Kirk lay, groaning in pain. After I sat down in the chair Jason had vacated earlier in the evening, I leaned forward propping my chin on my hand. For a moment, I wondered if maybe Jason had found Lorelai after I left her there, standing, as I chased after Kirk. It was possible that they had another conversation about the status of their relationship and took a walk to discuss it. That would maybe explain the lack of eye contact I received from her or her unwillingness to talk about what occurred out there on the front porch of her inn. Had she changed her mind that fast?

The clicking of her heels down the hall interrupted my thoughts, and I sat up straight as she reentered the room carrying a small basket filled with what looked like different ointments and a few towels. Lorelai placed the basket down on the floor next to the couch and stooped near Kirk's head.

"Kirk? I'm gonna take this blanket off so that Sookie can…tend to your injuries, okay?"

Kirk nodded, and Lorelai removed the blanket carefully so she would not disturb his wounds. Sookie made quick work of removing the several thorns sticking out of Kirk's ass and gently dabbed the sores with the corner of a hot towel dipped in antiseptic. I watched the scene in front of me without really seeing—all I could think about were the things not being said between Lorelai and me.

The awkwardness of sitting there without speaking became too much to bear, so I stood and cleared my throat. "You two seem to have this under control, so I'm just gonna…" I trailed off as Lorelai finally looked over at me. There was something she wanted to tell me, I could feel it. I had known her long enough to know that it is never a good thing when she is not speaking—which did nothing to ease the knot in my gut. But instead, Lorelai gave me a small smile and an almost inaudible goodnight.

Ten minutes later I was toweling off in the bathroom of my room upstairs. I had decided to try and stay positive about the situation despite my head screaming at me that something was not quite right with her demeanor. Something was definitely there between the two of us. It was something almost electric. It was a feeling I cannot remember ever having before tonight. And it was that notion alone that I was holding on to in hopes that this whole awkward phase passed and we could move on to what might be next.

I folded up my dress clothes and placed them in the small duffle bag I brought for the night. It was not until I set the bag back down that I noticed a folded slip of paper on the floor in front of the door to my room. After bending down to retrieve it, I unfolded the note and immediately recognized Lorelai's block print written on the Dragonfly Inn stationary I had helped her pick out a few weeks earlier. The note simply said:

EVENTFUL DAY AND AN EVEN MORE EVENTFUL NIGHT. I NEED TO

WRAP MY HEAD AROUND A FEW THINGS, BUT WE'LL TALK TOMORROW.

I reread it over and over until I could close my eyes and still see the lettering in two neat rows across the middle of the page. I wanted desperately to be able to read between the lines, to find the tone or the meaning. The day could definitely be considered eventful—I agreed with her there. And not only pertaining to the two of us. Everything she worked her ass off for came down to this one night, and it seemed to go off without a hitch. From my vantage point anyway. I folded the note back up, slid it into the front pocket of my bag, and turned off the light.

The next morning I listened as the hustle and bustle of the day began. I heard Babette's raspy, hushed voice say something to Miss Patty who chuckled throatily. A silent prayer was said that they were actually dressed for breakfast and not in bathrobes that left little to the imagination; it'll be years before the image of a half-naked Babette would be erased from my memory. As the rooms cleared out, I tried to hold out hope that Lorelai and I could have some sort of conversation about the events that took place the night before. I waited as long as I could for a light rap on the door that never came.

With a sigh, I stood and grabbed my duffle bag. I gave the room one last cursory glance and headed downstairs. My heart rate increased ever so slightly when I caught sight of Lorelai standing in the living room engaged in some sort of disagreement with Taylor and Michel. Some things never change. I took a deep breath and called her over—hoping she would at least acknowledge the note—but to my dismay, Lorelai acted like I was just another guest who she did not kiss twice nearly twelve hours earlier.

I climbed into my truck feeling more confused than ever. Was she blowing me off? I knew Lorelai had a lot going on—Taylor did not let anything run smoothly in this town—so I decided to immerse myself in the ebb and flow of the diner and the breakfast crowd. It was a welcoming distraction, and before I knew it, an hour had passed.

The phone rang, and to my surprise, it was Lorelai. Finally. I ducked out of the commotion-filled room and into the private solace of the storage room. Nervousness threatened to take over as I realized this conversation could be the end of something that barely started or the beginning of one. Turns out, it was the latter. She finally acknowledged what happened, and I could hear the smile in her voice as we spoke. I sat there, grinning, surrounded by a sack of onions and jars of condiments for what felt like forever. Her soft, almost relieved, voice on the other end of the call still reverberated in my mind. I thought back to my short conversation with Sookie the night before, and I could not help but repeat her words out loud in the empty, quiet room.

"This is good."

A few hours later, after the lunch rush had died down, the phone rang once again. Hoping it was Lorelai, I intercepted the call from Lane. When she gave me a funny look, I told her I was waiting on an important call. Turns out, it was the exact opposite of what I expected. Liz and T.J. were in an accident a few days earlier in Maine and both of them had sustained broken bones. Being the do-gooder, big brother that I am, I quickly relayed what information I had to Lane and told her that she would be in charge for the next week while I was gone. After, I took the stairs two at a time and angrily stuffed some clothes into the duffle bag I had just cleared out a few hours earlier.

This was just my luck. The moment things were on track in the personal department, the universe decided to throw me a curveball. Luckily, I was a former ball player and could handle this all with ease. First things first—and as much as I hated the idea—I needed to get a cell phone. A small part of me wanted to stop what I was doing and call Lorelai to fill her in, but she had enough going on today, and I really needed to get on the road.

According to the map I kept in my truck, Maine was at least four or five hours away, and it was already two in the afternoon. I decided to stop in Hartford at the same cellular service provider I used with my old phone that Nicole had bought me. There was nothing wrong with the phone per se—it ended up in the lake for purely therapeutic reasons. After paying for the most basic, easy-to-use phone I could find, I sat in my truck and dialed the only person who I felt needed to know exactly what was going on and where I was at. Her answering machine picked up right away, signaling she had not made it home yet.

"Hey, it's me. Uh, listen, I got a call from my sister and T.J. They're up in Maine, and they got into a little accident—nothing major—each one of them broke an arm and a leg, so anyhow, they can't run the Renaissance Fair booth for a couple of weeks. So they asked me to come and help them out, and I, unfortunately, answered the phone, so I'm on my way to Maine. I'll be back in about a week. Okay? Bye."

I pressed the red button on the phone to end the call and sat there with an unsettling feeling in my gut. Was that too much information? Would she think to leave me a message detailing her future whereabouts before we have even gone on one date? No, this is ridiculous. She's my friend before anything and would probably want to know why I was missing for a week.

I pulled out of the parking lot and headed north. Nothing on the radio sounded good, so I opted for silence instead. I ran over everything I discussed with Lane in my mind, looking for details that hopefully were not left out. But my mind circled back to the voicemail. About twenty minutes into the drive, I signaled to pull over to the side of the road and quickly dialed her number once again. And again, I got the machine.

"Hey, it's me again. I'm not sure if we're at the point in this relationship where you actually need to know that much information about my whereabouts, so if we're not, I'm sorry. I could have just said 'I'm going out of town, and I'll call you later.' So I'm going out of town, and I'll call you later."

Before putting my truck back into drive, I decided to call her back again and let her know about the cell phone in case she wanted to call me at some point. And like the fool that I can be, I forgot to leave the number. Five messages total. What a rambling idiot. Hopefully she won't see it that way. She is, after all, the queen of rambling and babbling—everything that drives me crazy about a person. And there I was, falling for the leader of their pack. I turned my focus back onto the road and willed this week to fly by, knowing exactly what—or rather whom—I would be coming back to.

A/N: What do you guys think? I have a plan to do all episodes of season 5. I know this has been done, but it would be my take on the scenes we didn't see. Nothing AU, so everything will fit nicely into what we actually saw happen. The POV will change depending on the scene I'm creating. Feedback is always appreciated!