Luke reached her as fast as humanly possible, sliding to the floor for the second time that day and reaching out to turn her over.
Her eyes.
The deluge of tears threatened to erupt from beneath his eyelids as he gazed at those eyes so shrouded in misery. Blood-shot and vitreous, they were nothing like those he had been imagining all these weeks. She was no longer the angel he had been dreaming of. She was an apparition- a celestial being that had fallen from grace, covered in a shroud of dark despair. Her tattered wings hung lifeless at her sides and her halo had turned turbid and gray. A cold fear swept over him as he realized that she was no longer moving.
What's wrong with her? He thought frantically. "Lorelai!", he cried as he gently cradled her head against his chest in an effort to shield her from harm.
The veil of love and denial lifted as he gazed at the rest of her body. The teal dress that she had been wearing the last time he laid eyes on her was stained, and her beautiful hair hung lank and dull. Her nose and cracked lips were covered in scabs and dried blood. Consumed with terror, Luke reached out and felt her ribs and hips.
"No," he whispered feverishly into the dark house, "no, no, no, please no!" He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed 911.
"Hello!" he cried frantically into the phone, "I need an ambulance immediately! I just found my fiancée. She's dehydrated and she needs medical attention right now!" A jolt of pain raced through his veins when he reached the word "fiancée". He gave the operator the address and struggled to return the phone to its pocket.
"Lorelai," he gently pleaded, "please Lorelai, wake up."
It wasn't until then that the smell had hit him. The putrid stench overwhelmed his already overloaded senses as the bile rising up his throat threatened to choke him. Luke was reduced to a trembling mass as he gazed around the room. The puddle of mysterious fluid that he had tripped on in his effort to get to her was in fact canned soup. The fallen can had spilled its contents what looked like weeks ago. He found it quite odd that only the noodles and some broth had remained. All of the vegetables were missing. Juice and water bottles covered the floor in their immediate vicinity. The trashcan had been overturned and spilled out onto the floor. "To go" coffee cups littered the floor around that area, but there was something wrong with them. He shifted carefully, making sure not to disturb Lorelai's fragile body, and squinted in that direction. There were holes cut out of the front of each of the cups.
What the hell? He thought again.
Glancing over the empty boxes of Pop-Tarts and Mallormars, he found what he was looking for. She had cut out the front of each of his coffee cups, lining them in a row on the coffee table in front of her.
Luke's Luke's Luke's Luke's Luke's Luke's Luke's Luke's
His strength shattered like his broken heart at this sight. The sob welled up from deep within his soul. Had she really been here the whole time? Had he really been spending day after day in her front yard while she had been wasting away body and soul all these weeks- merely yards away from her? Through his watery eyes he looked down at her to see that she too was crying silently and liberally. She still had not moved nor made a sound. How was it possible that she could be so dehydrated and still make tears like that?
An unspeakable sorrow washed over him as he, in that moment, realized the profound responsibility he had to her- that any man in love had towards his woman. He wasn't sure how, but he had made her love him, need him, and want him. By denying her access to his entire heart, he had chained her in this prison of mental torment. She had sentenced herself to death- famishing herself body and soul. His cruelty and betrayal left him feeling contaminated and worthless. The ache left in his heart could not compare to the suffering that she had endured these past months. He had imagined her reaction to that night many times, but he had never thought that his Wonder Woman would die without him.
A torrential downpour of tears fell on Lorelai's face and mingled with her own. Was this the occupational hazard of soul mates? One is not worth much without the other? In a mere matter of months, he had taken this impetuous tender blossom overflowing with eternal joy and strangled her with neglect.
No, he thought with intense anguish, she's not dead. She will not die. It isn't too late for me to fix this. I will fix this if it's the last thing I do.
In that infinitesimal moment, he knew what he would spend the rest of his life doing. He was going to win back the trust of Lorelai Gilmore, marry her, and spend the rest of eternity making her happy. Luke didn't care how long it took, he was going make sure that Lorelai knew that he would never cause her this agony again.
Luke stood on the front porch and watched as they carried her to the ambulance. He looked up at the sky and silently pleaded…
Listen, I know you and I don't talk much. Sorry about that. I really need this favor though. Don't let her die because of something I did. Maybe it's too much to ask for a second chance, but I'm asking for it anyway. Forgive me for what I've done and let me have her back. I promise I won't screw it up this time.
He looked back down to see the ambulance driver staring at him.
"Shouldn't you be driving away right now?" Luke snapped.
The young man shifted uncomfortably and said, "We're taking her to New Miliford Hospital. This is a little too serious for the first aid doctors in Stars Hollow to handle." He looked down as he shifted again, "We're going to need you to come with us."
"What, did you think I was just going to stand here on the porch while you take her off to the hospital? Of course I'm coming with you!"
Luke strode over to his truck as the ambulance driver shook his head and headed back to his vehicle and the sick woman inside it.
A/N: Credit goes to the writers of the movie What Dreams May Come for the "Occupational hazards of soulmates" line. Don't forget to review please!