Lorelai entered her home, after Sookie graciously offered to clean up the mess from the party at the Dragonfly. She did not make it two steps in when she heard the cries of Rory. Lorelai slowly walked up to the half closed door of her daughter's room and waited for a pause in the sounds. When it came, she cautiously formed a fist with her hand and gently knocked on the ajar door.

knock knock

When the first volley got no response, Lorelai tried again, this time adding speech to the knocking.

"Hey Rory," still nothing, "hun?" She asked, now taking the first tentative steps into the room, finding Rory lying on her side, her back to the door and to her mother.

Cautiously Lorelai made her way to the bed, and gently took a seat, not wanting to wrest Rory from her state.

"Rory. Honey. Look at me. Tell me what's the matter. Why did you send Logan away, why are you crying. This should be the greatest time in your life. You just graduated from Yale! Had a great party with all your friends, and you just got engaged," after saying all this with no response, Lorelai pressed on asking a question she already knew the answer to; "you are still engaged aren't you?"

This caused Rory to move; she quickly sat up and looked at her mother, but not before using her sleeve to dry her eyes. "Of course I'm still engaged. What kind of question is that? If I wasn't engaged to Logan I wouldn't be having this breakdown," Rory said quickly, and angrily.'

Lorelai tread slowly, "So you don't want to be engaged to Logan?"

"Of course I want to be engaged to Logan. I love him, I want to spend the rest of my life with him, his mother on the other hand."

A look of understanding came over Lorelai, knowing the feelings of Shira towards Logan's relationship with Rory, "What did she do now?" Lorelai asked, carefully putting an arm over Rory, comforting her adult daughter like she had with her, the years of her childhood.

After a few seconds of being in that position, Rory released herself of the tension that was in place since the phone call and relayed the contents of it to her mother. It felt good getting it all off her chest, and having someone else to talk to it about.

"Oh Rory, that's horrible. She's horrible for saying that, and on the night of your party no less."

"I just, I just wonder if it's going to be like that when Logan and I are actually married, if she's always going to be so combative, so hostile towards me."

Lorelai looked at her daughter, who was now once again filled with a sad expression and so she had to choose her words carefully.

"If it did, if Shira never accepted you, would your feelings for Logan change?"

"No, of course not,"

"Then what does it matter? Sometimes there just isn't pleasing anyone and you just have to learn not to let it bother you. Eventually I think she'll soften up, it may take a while, but it will happen. Do you think Shira's feelings will affect Logan's feelings for you?"

"No, not at all, if he knew about the phone call he'd probably be over at his parent's house yelling at her and not in…"

"New York," Rory nodded, "Why did you send your fiancé to New York, far away from you? You should have seen the look on his face."

"I know, I know, I'm so horrible, but I just didn't want to add all this stress to him. I didn't want to know that his mother still hated me."

"He's going to have to find out, you are going to have let him deal with his mother his own way, let him say what he wants to say to her. You shouldn't have to protect Shira, at the expense of your relationship with Logan, that's just stupid."

Rory looked at her mother, and couldn't help but agree, it took her a few minutes removed from the situation but she realized she handled it poorly, "You're right. I should tell him. I have to tell him, I will tell him. I'm just going to have a little nap, being this upset tires me, I'll phone him the first thing after I get up in an hour."

"Okay Rory, just as long as you talk to him."

"I promise I will, thanks mom," Rory hugged her mom and resumed laying on her side, hoping to sleep away the rest of her negative emotions, leaving Lorelai to exit the room, but not before gazing at her now grown up daughter, taking a nap. Just like old times she thought as she made her way to the kitchen to put on a cup of coffee.


Logan was in the limo, replaying the events leading to his departure in his mind, but coming to no suitable conclusion. He was 20 minutes outside of Stars Hollow when he took out his cellphone and called Colin hoping to vent and gain a fresh perspective on the night's events.

"Hello?" Colin opened with.

"Hey man, how's it going?"

"Logan, I'm surprised to hear from you. Shouldn't you be having some fun with your fiancée, or did you manage to screw things up already?" Colin's tone was nothing but jovial, but was still not appreciated by Logan.

"Yes I should be having some fun with Rory, and yes apparently I screwed things up already because I am currently sitting alone in the back seat of the limo, on my way back to New York, sent on my own by Rory, who wouldn't say much to me near the end of the party, just to get me to leave," Logan said, angry, not at Colin exactly, just at the situation he found himself in.

"Oh, geez, I'm stupid, sorry, I wasn't thinking, but that sounds weird, even for a Gilmore," Logan laughed lightly at his, "and you have no idea what caused it?"

"None, one minute she was happy, I go away for a couple minutes to talk to her mother and grandmother, I come back and she tells me to leave. I wonder if it was all too much too soon."

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about the engagement, I mean she was dealing with her graduation, and then I forced her to make another life altering decision, no lists nothing, just a straight up yes or no, and now maybe she's regretting it," Logan was getting worried as he said the words. As thoughts in his head they were easier to dismiss, but saying them aloud somehow made them more possible.

"Logan, that's crap and you know it. Now you mentioned your absence and that was when her demeanor changed."

"Right."

"So it's not completely crazy to speculate that something happened during that time."

"No, I guess not."

"Then I suggest you try and find out what that is."

"Were you always this sagely, Colin?"

"There was a reason I was known as the responsible one in our group."

"Here I thought it was the vests," both laughed at this, beep "Hey man, I've got another call, I'm going to let you go. Thanks for the advice, later."

"See ya, Logan."

Logan pressed a button leading to another call, "Hello?" he answered.

"Hey Logan," came Lorelai's voice from the other end.

Upon hearing her voice, Logan instinctively straightened up, "Lorelai, is everything alright? Is Rory okay?"

Smiling at his immediate concern, Lorelai answered: "There's nothing new wrong with Rory, but I did find out why she sent you away to New York tonight."

"Please, Lorelai, tell me. I've been going over it time and again in my head, but I can't figure out why she did it."

"You have your mother to thank for this one, Logan."

Logan shut his eyes and let out a sigh, while she knew his mother still had not accepted Rory, he had hoped that she would be civil towards his fiancée, apparently that was too much to hope for, "what happened?"

"Apparently, Rory got a call tonight from your mother, saying all sorts of crap about how the marriage would never work, how you'll get tired her, so forth and so forth. Rory got spooked, and pushed you away, not wanting to create tension with your mother, she's napping now, but she's going to call you when she gets up and straighten this out."

Logan was relieved to hear that Rory wanted this straightened out, but he was beyond upset at the gall of his mother, not being satisfied with a phone call Logan asked Lorelai if a change of plans would be alright.

"Lorelai, would it be okay with you, if I happened to be there when Rory woke up? I mean apparently she's going to call me and we're going to talk about this. I just think it would be better if I was there."

Lorelai took a moment to consider this and thought it was a good idea, "That sounds good, I'm sure she'd love it if you were here, you know she really is sorry about how she reacted Logan, she really loves you."

"I know, trust me Lorelai, I'm mad at my mother for this, not Rory, I'll be there in about twenty-five minutes. See you then," with that he closed his phone and told the driver to turn around and go back to Stars Hollow.

Rory woke up two hours after she talked to her mother, turned to her side and opened her eyes, only to be met with a smirk that she knew and loved all too well.