Gotta Know When to Hold 'Em

"Dammit, Jake!" Lorelai exclaimed a little too sharply as a glob of mushy banana hit her cheek and plopped onto the front of her shirt. She grabbed the roll of paper towels she kept nearby whenever the twins were eating and tore one off, her movements jerky and agitated. She brushed ineffectually at the spot on her shirt, and then looked up just in time to see Jake's face crumple and a heart wrenching sob escaped the lips that had been smiling just moments before. Lorelai quickly unstrapped Jake from the high chair and cuddled him close to her as she crooned, "I'm so sorry. Bad Mommy." She rocked him back and forth as he let loose with another wail. "I know, I know. It was just banana. You're right, I shouldn't have yelled," she told him. "I'm a little cranky," she admitted as she pulled back to look at him. "You know something about that, don't you Ja-luke?" she said coaxingly. She looked down at the banana coated fingers clutching the front of her shirt and sighed. "I'm so sorry. Forgive me, baby boy?" she asked as she brushed a tear from his eye with the pad of her thumb. "Real tears," she murmured softly. "A little banana isn't worth real tears," she said as she held him close again, cradling his head with her hand as she moved from side to side to soothe him. She smiled at Josh, who watched the scene with interest, trying to decide if he had anything to add. "You're right it's not," she said as she smiled brightly over Jake's head, hoping to head off a fraternal show of solidarity.

She carried Jake over to the sink and carefully pried one sticky hand from her shirt. She nipped a bit of banana from his finger, which earned her a tremulous smile, and then wet a paper towel to wipe off the rest of his hand. "Tell you a secret, Ja-luke. I'm a little pouty. Daddy wasn't here when we woke up," she said to him. "I know he doesn't work Sundays very much anymore, so I shouldn't be upset, but I can't help it. Sunday's are our time," she said with a nod as she dropped the soggy paper towel onto the counter and then kissed his dimpled knuckles.

"I should probably stop telling you my secrets now that you guys are starting to talk. You could turn out to be blabber mouths," she said as she carried him back over to the high chair. Jake resisted when she tried to re-seat him, clinging to her shirt with both hands. "You need to finish your eggs," she told him solemnly. "Look at Joshie, he's eating," she said encouragingly as she turned Jake and sat down in the chair positioned between the two high chairs. She settled Jake onto her lap and handed him a bit of scrambled egg. "Go ahead, this shirt is already destined for the hamper," she said with a sigh as she placed his bowl within his grasp at the edge of the table.

Lorelai sat back as Jake began to take interest in his breakfast again, and tried to get a handle on her strange mood. She knew that she was feeling irrationally edgy. Especially given the previous night's activities, she thought with a smirk. Rationally, she knew that she shouldn't have felt abandoned when she woke up to find Luke's side of the bed empty, but she did. Rationally, she knew that this Sunday was an anomaly. She knew that Caesar had just needed the day off to attend his niece's christening party, but she still resented it. Lorelai loved Sundays at home, even though, rationally, she knew that they were nothing special.

The day was usually filled with a thousand little chores, but somehow they all seemed so much easier when both of them were there. Luke would fix things around the house, and she would get the mountains of laundry the four of them created caught up. But there were usually pancakes for breakfast, and right now, she really wanted some pancakes. And, Sundays usually included some kind of a Daddy-hoodlum bonding activity, which afforded her some of her best Kodak moments. Lorelai smiled as she thought of the photo that was on her camera from the previous Sunday. In her head, she had already titled it, 'The Man-Nap' and was picking out a frame for it. Luke had been wrestling with the boys on the living room floor while Lorelai was upstairs putting away the laundry, offering himself up as human sacrifice in an attempt to wear down a little of their boundless energy.

By the time she came back downstairs, the peals of high pitched laughter and the deep chuckles that echoed them had quieted, and she peeked into the living room to find the three of them sacked out on the couch. It took only a second for her to realize that this was a moment that needed to be captured. She dashed back up the stairs and hurried to the nursery to find her camera. Five minutes later, Lorelai lounged against the living room doorway, torn between staring at the pictures she had captured and the real life tableau the men in her life presented. Luke looked every bit the jock, dressed in an ancient t-shirt and a ratty pair of cut off sweat pants, there was two day's growth of beard on his face, and his muscles were flexed as he had his arms flung up over his head, and his chest rose and fell steadily. Josh had snuggled into the spot between his father's chest and the back of the couch, his small hand grasping a fistful of Luke's shirt and his pink cheek pressed into Luke at the exact same spot she would have chosen herself. Jake, in his usual fashion, had more than likely outlasted them both. Also in his usual way, he slept where he fell, draped across Luke's thigh, with an arm and a leg hanging down on each side for balance. His face was turned more into Luke's leg, as if he had been rubbing his cheek against the soft cotton of the shorts to soothe himself to sleep, and she was sure he had.

Lorelai's reverie was cut short though when Jake reached for his bowl again, and accidentally pulled it off of the edge of the table. It clattered to the floor, and Jake looked up at her in shock. Lorelai smiled as she rubbed his back said, "S'okay." She lifted him from her lap and lowered him back into his high chair as she said, "I'll get you some yogurt." This time, Jake went peaceably, their earlier disagreement forgotten as he eyed Josh's tray covetously. Instead of making her feel better, the thought of what Sunday's were supposed to be made her feel even more resentful. Lorelai plucked a container of yogurt from the fridge and scowled as she walked over to pluck a baby spoon from the drawer. She knew that she was being childish, but she didn't care.

She also knew that the fact that Luke wasn't there that wasn't the only thing making her cranky. Lorelai was worried. She was worried about the baby. She was worried that she wasn't feeling that telltale wave of nausea that, in her irrational mind, meant that all was well. She was worried that she wasn't going to be able to handle two toddlers and a newborn. Worried about the inn. Worried about how they were going to juggle it all. Worried that she had hardly heard from her first born lately and missed her terribly. Worried that this thing between Rory and Jess could be the undoing of all that they had built in the last three years. Worried that she was worrying too much. Worried that worrying about worrying too much would finally drive her over the brink. She paused, staring at the Power Rangers spoon in her hand for a moment, and then reached for another, knowing that the moment Josh saw her spoon feeding Jake, he would want in on it too.

She had just settled back into her chair when the phone rang. Blowing out an impatient breath, Lorelai stood up and leaned over, snatching the portable phone from its cradle and pressing the power button before she even sat back down. "Hello?" she answered in a dejected tone.

"Hi, Mom," Rory said cautiously.

Too preoccupied to hear the hesitance in her daughter's voice, Lorelai started to pry the lid off of the yogurt as she said, "Hmm, the voice sounds familiar, but I can't place it. Hey, am I on This is Your Life?" she asked sarcastically.

"Mom, you know what the last month of school is like," Rory said with a sigh.

"Yes, apparently very busy," Lorelai drawled as she tossed the lid onto the table and picked up the red Power Ranger spoon and stirred the yogurt.

"Mom, I'm a big girl now. I am capable of deciding what's right for me," Rory said defensively.

"Oh, so this was just a show of independence?" Lorelai asked, arching an eyebrow at Jake as she held the spoon up to his lips. When he made an attempt to grab it, she shook her head and said, "Nuh uh, you can't be trusted."

"Can't be trusted?" Rory asked in a shocked tone. "When have you ever known me to do something without knowing exactly what I was doing?" Rory demanded in an injured tone.

"I meant Jake, he nailed me with banana just a little bit ago," Lorelai said distractedly as she fed Jake the spoonful. "I'm sure that you know exactly what you're doing," she assured Rory.

"I do," Rory confirmed. "How's Luke? Is her really upset? Jess feels horrible," she said sadly.

"Luke? You're worried about Luke being upset? You don't care if I'm upset?" Lorelai scoffed as she picked up the blue Power Ranger spoon and offered Josh a bite.

"Of course I care that you're upset. I just know that what Jess said was really a low blow," Rory said, the defensiveness back in her tone. "He didn't mean it."

"What Jess said when?" Lorelai asked with a confused frown as she turned back to Jake.

"This morning," Rory said impatiently.

"Jess said something bad to Luke this morning?" Lorelai asked as she gave Jake another spoonful of yogurt.

"Well, yeah. He just, Luke took him by surprise," Rory tried to justify.

Lorelai glanced at the clock and said, "I'm surprised that Jess was up early enough on a Sunday morning to get into it with Luke. Doesn't he usually stay up all night pecking away at his keyboard?" she asked as Jake dripped yogurt down his chin and then grinned at her.

"Well, yeah, but Luke was already there when Jess got home," Rory said in a confused tone.

"Got home from where?" Lorelai asked distractedly as she wiped Jake's mouth and then frowned at him pointedly before turning back to Josh.

"From here," Rory said impatiently.

"From there?" Lorelai asked, the spoon pausing halfway to Josh's gaping mouth as the conversation finally clicked into place. "Jess got home from there? This morning?" she asked in a shocked tone.

"Yes," Rory admitted. "Didn't Luke tell you?" she asked in a befuddled voice.

"No," Lorelai whispered as a dollop of yogurt splatted onto Josh's tray.

"Oh," Rory breathed.

"Jess spent the night? There? With you?" Lorelai asked slowly.

"Ma!" Josh cried, anxious to get her moving again.

"Yeah," Rory confessed. "I thought he would have called you. They got into kind of a bad fight," she explained.

"No, he didn't call me," Lorelai said as she shook her head to clear it. She fed Josh his spoonful of yogurt before dropping the spoon back into the container and placing it on the table. "So, you and Jess, uh, spent the night together?" she asked apprehensively.

"Mom, we love each other," Rory said quietly.

"Yeah," Lorelai said as she exhaled loudly.

"Are you okay?" Rory asked, breaking the silence that stretched between them.

"I'm fine," Lorelai said too quickly. "Um, are you okay?" she asked, wincing as she closed her eyes and braced for Rory's answer.

"I'm fine," Rory assured her.

"And you were, uh, safe?" Lorelai asked as she squeezed her eyes shut tighter.

"All of those Trojan man jokes must have sunk in," Rory said, trying to keep her voice light.

"Oh God," Lorelai whispered as Jake began to pound on his tray calling "Mamama!" Lorelai pressed her hand to her forehead as she let her head fall forward.

"Mom, please," Rory said as Lorelai remained quiet.

"I just need a minute to catch my breath," Lorelai murmured as Josh joined in, banging his palm against his tray and calling for her attention.

"Mom, this is a good thing. Me and Jess, I mean," she said quickly. "The whole thing, not that thing specifically," she babbled.

Lorelai pressed her lips together firmly, but when she opened her mouth, her fears came out. "Rory, it changes everything," she said softly. "We can't go back."

"We don't want to go back, Mom. This is better," Rory insisted.

"But," Lorelai began to protest, and then cut herself off. She looked up, the cacophony of noise the boys were making fading to a dull hum as she took a deep breath and said, "I want you to be happy."

"I am happy," Rory answered firmly.

Lorelai nodded as she looked from Josh to Jake and then down at the banana stains on her shirt which had upset her so much just a short time before. "I have to finish feeding these guys," she said dully.

"Mom," Rory said cajolingly, unwilling to let it go yet.

"Can't you hear them Rory?" Lorelai asked with an edge to her voice. "I'm just, I'm a little overwhelmed at the moment," she said, softening her tone.

"Will you call me later? So we can talk?" Rory asked reluctantly.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll call you later," Lorelai promised.

Rory chewed the inside of her cheek as she hesitated for a moment. "Okay. I'll talk to you later, then," she said quietly.

"I love you, Sweets," Lorelai said reassuringly.

"I love you too, Mom," Rory answered before she hung up.

Lorelai disconnected and stared at the phone in her hand for a minute. When the twins continued to vie for her attention, Lorelai snapped, "Can you just give me a minute? Please?" There was a stunned moment of silence as Josh and Jake stared at her wide eyed. "Thank you," she said as she dropped the phone and reached for the yogurt again and quickly began shoveling it into their open mouths to ward off the tantrum that her raised voice was sure to bring.

Lorelai fed them, turning mechanically from one to the other, and keeping her eyes carefully averted from the phone. At that moment, no matter what it was that Jess had said to upset Luke, she was more upset with him for not warning her. "I could have been prepared," Lorelai muttered as she scraped yogurt from the bottom of the container.

"Mama," Josh said quietly.

Lorelai turned to look at him, and he smiled at her winningly. In spite of the confusion and anger welling inside of her, Lorelai smiled. "Okay, you win the last bite, but Jake gets the rest of your banana," she said as she brew out her frustration in one long breath.

XXXX

"He didn't tell her," Rory reported moments later.

"He didn't?" Jess asked, surprised.

"No," Rory said dully.

"Good," Jess answered as he stared up at his bedroom ceiling.

"I did, though," Rory admitted as she clutched her pillow and breathed in the scent of him.

"Oh geez," Jess groaned as he covered his eyes with his hand.

"Well, I thought he had, and so I was nervous and rambling, and then I realized that he hadn't told her at about the same moment she realized what was going on," Rory said defensively.

"I know, I know," Jess murmured. After a moment he asked, "How's she take it?"

"Well, I don't think they'll be throwing us a party," Rory said with a nervous laugh.

"Oh geez," Jess groaned again.

"She'll be fine. She said that she was just a little overwhelmed. The boys were screaming in the background, and I think she was mainly just flustered," Rory said, trying to reassure herself as much as him. "We're going to talk later," she said with a nod.

"I shoulda come home," Jess muttered.

Rory paused, taken aback for a moment. "Yes, well, you were no match for my powers of seduction," she said stiffly. "Sorry to have put you in such a compromising position," Rory said as the hurt welled up inside of her.

"No, Rory, no," Jess said quickly as he sat up on his bed. "I just, I don't mean, oh crap," he sighed in defeat and attempted to gather his thoughts before he opened his mouth again. "You know I don't feel that way," he said at last. When Rory remained quiet, he said, "I don't regret it. Not for a minute. I just, I'm kind of hating myself at the moment, you know, about Luke and now your mom," he trailed off.

"And me?" she asked quietly.

"I love," he answered.

"It'll all be fine, Jess. This will blow over, I'll be home in a couple of weeks, and they'll get used to things," she said, trying to convince both of them at once.

"I think that maybe we should, um, lay low. What with finals and all, let's not give them or us anything more to worry about," Jess said.

"Wow, now who's changing his tune?" Rory grumbled.

"I'm not, I'm just saying that maybe for the next couple of weeks we should just focus on getting the school year behind us and then we'll be together. We'll deal with it better together," he said with quiet confidence.

"Yeah, we will. And they will too, once they get used to seeing us together. I think right now it's all too amorphous for them," Rory agreed.

"Wow, that's a Yale worthy word," Jess teased, smiling for the first time since he stepped foot into the diner early that morning.

"Well, I guess I should go dig up a few more of them and put them in this paper," Rory said reluctantly. "I feel bad that you're there and I'm here," she confessed.

"I feel bad about that too," Jess said with a low chuckle.

Rory smiled and said, "I meant that you're left there to deal with it, with them."

"I'll be fine," Jess said with more confidence than he felt. "I meant something else," he teased.

"I know you did. Now, stop trying to distract me, I have to get this school year behind me," she told him.

Jess smiled and said, "Never thought I'd hear you say that."

"Well, I'm looking forward to a good summer," Rory answered.

"I'll call you later," he promised.

"Be sure that you do," Rory warned and then closed her phone. She rolled over, pressing her nose into the pillow and breathing deeply. After a moment, she pushed herself up on her arms and murmured, "Okay, time to compare and contrast."

Jess closed his phone and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He glanced at the clock and realized that the morning was slipping away. He dropped the phone into his pocket as he stood up, and bent over to retrieve the bag holding his laptop from the floor by the bed. Jess carried his laptop into the kitchen and powered it up. As soon as his icons appeared on the desktop, he clicked on 'Nuts' and waited while the pages loaded. The cursor beckoned to him as he paused to take a deep breath, and then began writing.

She was perfect. Not in that Hollywood idealized version of airbrushed beauty that the world bought into. She was perfection incarnate. She was warm, soft skin that radiated heat beneath his touch, sweet words that sang in his head, and quiet laughter that filled him with a joy he hadn't realized existed anywhere other than the printed page. If Jeff was once awed by Lori's ability to make his heart race with a single look, he was now completely lost. Nothing and no one would ever compare to her perfection. And he knew that he would never feel as happy, as complete, or as perfect as he had felt in her arms.

Jess sat back and re-read the words on the screen. After a moment, he asked aloud, "What? No commentary?" He scanned the paragraph again, and all he heard was a deep throaty laugh that soothed his troubled mind with its unspoken 'I told you so.'

XXXX

After the lunch rush, Luke handed the dining room over to Lane and trudged home dejectedly. He knew that he was going to have to tell Lorelai what had happened that morning, and he dreaded it. He dreaded it because the realization of what had apparently happened last night made things all too real. He dreaded it because the moment the words were out of his mouth, their carefully constructed bubble of denial would burst. He dreaded it because he wasn't sure how Lorelai would take the news, her moods having been more volatile than bubbling volcano for the past week. He dreaded it because he would have to think of what Jess had said to him. He dreaded having to repeat the words out loud.

In that moment, Luke felt more empathy for any person who had ever tried to parent a child who was not their own than he had ever believed possible. He had fooled himself into believing that his relationships with Rory and Jess were different. He liked to think that he was more than just a stand in for the parent that had been missing from their lives. He liked to think that he was confident enough in those relationships that it wouldn't hurt when the inevitable slights happened. He didn't like to think that he had been wrong, but at the moment, wrong was the only thing he felt.

He opened the front door and called, "Hello?" in a tired voice.

"In here," Lorelai called back from the living room where the twins were enthralled with a cooking demonstration on TV. The moment Luke appeared in the doorway she pounced. "You couldn't call me? Warn me? Give me a little time to prepare myself?" she demanded.

Luke stepped back, recoiling from the vehemence of her attack. "I guess you know," he said slowly.

"Yes, I know, no thanks to you!" she hissed mockingly.

"I didn't want to talk about this in the middle of the diner," he shot back, smothering the hurt that balled in his gut with anger. "I thought it would be better to wait until I got home," he said defensively.

"A call, Luke! All you had to do was call and say, 'Hey, something happened with Rory and Jess last night,' that would have helped," she cried in frustration.

"And you would have been satisfied with that? You wouldn't have demanded the full play by play?" he sneered. He brushed her off with a wave of his hand as he said dismissively, "Yeah, right."

"I was blindsided!" Lorelai said as she clutched her hands to her heart.

"I was too!" he shouted, startling both of the boys and drawing their attention away from the crème brulee that was being browned with a tiny blow torch.

They stared at each other for a moment, both of their chests heaving with exertion and suppressed emotion. "What did he say to you?" she asked in a calmer tone. "Rory said Jess said something bad," she prompted.

Luke's lips twisted into a sad facsimile of a smile as he said, "Nothing I didn't already know," as his eyes strayed to Josh and Jake. He watched them turn their attention back to the screen, and felt an odd tug of satisfaction as he realized that they were watching a cooking show.

"Luke," Lorelai said in a softly cajoling voice as she stepped closer to him.

Luke simply shook his head and said, "We both overreacted."

"Well, that makes three of us," Lorelai said as she crossed her arms over her chest, annoyed that he wasn't going to tell her.

Luke sighed and rubbed his hand over his face as he said, "It was just stupid. No big thing."

"Fine," she snapped. "You don't have to tell me a damn thing. You never do anyway." She lifted her chin and said, "Your sons have been hell on wheels all morning, if you don't mind, I'd like to take a shower," she said as she tried to brush past him.

Luke grabbed her arm to stop her and said, "I cannot be your punching bag today. Any other day, fine, but not today."

"Yeah, well it hasn't been a good morning for me either," she said in a cold voice.

Luke stared at her intently and said in a low controlled voice, "I'm going to chalk it up to the hormones again, just like I have been every day for the last couple of weeks. Believe me, if I thought it would help, I'd stick my own fingers down your throat and hold your hair all day long, but it won't," he said with an edge of desperation in his voice. "I don't know what to do, Lorelai, but I do know that I can't talk about this when were angry."

"Okay," she answered slowly.

"Take your shower, I'll try to unwind a little, and then, can we try this again?" he asked sincerely.

Lorelai nodded and said, "I'll be down in a little bit."

Luke released her arm and watched as she walked from the room. When she was gone, he dropped to his knees with a groan and waited patiently for the boys to notice him again, losing himself for a moment in the drone of the chef's voice. When the show broke for a commercial, he cleared his throat slightly and Josh tore himself away from the scrubbing bubbles racing around on the screen long enough to look over at him. "Hey," Luke said in a raspy voice as Josh's dark blue eyes fixed on him.

"Da!" Josh cried happily, as if noticing him for the first time. He smiled as he scooted over to Luke on his hands and knees.

Luke scooped him up into a hug and closed his eyes tightly as he said, "Use your feet, lazybones."

"Da! Ook!" Jake said as he held up a pink horse with a purple and pink mane.

"Nice," Luke chuckled as he held out his other arm. He watched as Jake pushed to his feet and walked over to him. Luke snatched him up, and with a loud growl pressed the giggling boys together in a bear hug. He pulled back and then placed both of then gently on their feet, holding them until he was sure that they were steady as he murmured, "My boys," under his breath just before he felt the plastic hooves of the My Little Pony smack into his chest. Luke rolled his eyes as he picked up the toy and handed it back to Jake saying, "Good arm."

XXXX

Luke looked up from his cards warily as the talk turned to women as it inevitably did. The only difference was that, this time, instead of gloating over their good fortune in capturing the fairest in the land, they were bemoaning the trials of being married to the most irrational women in the world. Luke smirked as he realized that Kirk had the grave misfortune to have his bachelor night attended by three expectant fathers. They had made all of the right sympathetic noises as Andrew detailed the difficulties of dealing with a pregnant woman who always had a wrench close at hand. Jackson quickly one-upped him with Sookie's kitchen knives, but Luke remained quiet, muttering only the occasional comment on Lorelai's bizarre food combinations.

Only Kirk and Richard seemed truly happy to be there. Kirk sat back, looking like a complete idiot as he puffed on the cigar Richard had offered him and fingering his ever dwindling pile of pennies contentedly; serenely smug in the delusion that Lulu would never give him such problems. Richard helped himself to another hunk of the giant hoagie he had ordered as he regaled them with a story about the fit Emily had thrown the week before when someone had served another woman the first cup of tea at some society function. Apparently, Emily felt that she should have been given the tea in question, and proceeded to rearrange the entire seating charts of three separate functions in retaliation. Every once in a while, Luke's eyes flickered to the spot where Jess sat quietly reaping the benefits of their distraction and sleep deprivation.

They had hardly spoken that week, only grunted acknowledgements if they happened to pass each other coming or going through the diner. Rory had spoken to Lorelai every night that week, earnestly explaining her thoughts and feelings on everything from Jess, to Luke, to the town, and her worries over Richard and Emily's reaction to the news of her blossoming relationship. At the end of each conversation, each one of them dutifully reported the salient information to their silent men, but the gap had yet to be breached.

For his part, Jess had been seriously thinking of ditching out on the stag night, but Rory was insistent, and as usual he was powerless to resist her. He kept thinking about what she had been telling him; how hurt and upset Lorelai said Luke was, how they were really okay with the thought of the two of them together, but just stunned that things seemed to be progressing faster than they had anticipated. He knew that Rory was sincere when she explained to her mother that the more physical aspects of their relationship felt natural and right for both of them. He knew that Lorelai believed Rory when she told her of the depths of their feelings for each other. And he also knew that he had absolutely no idea how to fix things with Luke.

Rory reported that Lorelai said that Luke was even more absorbed in the boys than normal, if that was possible. She said that Luke was taking over more and more of the workload with them, using Lorelai's pregnancy and their need to be cautious as an excuse. She also told him that Luke had never told Lorelai the exact words that Jess had used against him. Jess picked up the two cards that had been dealt to replace his discards and arranged them in his hand as Kirk droned on and on about his mother, and her involvement in the wedding planning.

The enthusiasm in Kirk's voice had long since dwindled away by the time he finished his recitation with a heavy sigh and a heartfelt, "I wish my dad was here to see this."

Luke's eyes immediately flickered to Richard, who offered him a slight smile in acknowledgement of the memory. When Luke turned his attention back to the cards in his hand, he noticed Jess' dark eyes fixed on him intently. Luke frowned in puzzlement as he asked, "My raise?"

"Yeah," Jess said shortly, his gaze unwavering.

"I'll bump you up a little," Luke said as he tossed a stack of pennies into the pot. He watched the others fold, trying to ignore Jess' stare, but soon found that it was down to the two of them and Andrew.

When Luke looked back at him, Jess tossed his cards down on the table and said, "I've got nothin'."

The hand was played out, and Luke puzzled over what had just happened, sensing that he was supposed to take something from that exchange, but not really sure what. As Andrew raked in his winnings, Luke pushed back from the table and said, "I need a little fresh air." He carried his empty bottle over to the recycle bin, and then pulled a fresh beer from the fridge before slipping out of the French doors. He stood staring at the glow of the lights in the still waters of the swimming pool when he heard the door close quietly behind him.

A moment later, Jess stood next to him, his eyes fixed on the pool as he said, "Smoky in there."

Luke snorted a little and said, "You still smoke sometimes."

Jess glanced over at him in surprise and asked, "How do you know that?"

Luke rolled his eyes and said, "I can smell it."

"That's cigar smoke, though," Jess said as he jerked his head toward the pool house.

"Like there's a big difference," Luke said dryly as he took a sip of his beer. He lowered the bottle and said, "Either way, I'm gonna have to shower three times before I can get in bed with Lorelai. She has some kind of super-sensory pregnancy smelling thing going on."

"Morning sickness?" Jess asked, thankful to have a thread of conversation to cling to until he could work his way up to saying what he wanted to say.

Luke shook his head and said, "No. At least, not yet."

"That's good," Jess said with a nod.

"Good and bad," Luke said with a shrug. "Lorelai is convinced that means something is wrong," he told him.

Jess shook his head quickly and said, "I don't know anything about all that."

"Thank God," Luke muttered under his breath as he took another sip of his beer.

"I can say that I'm sorry again, but I can't take it back," Jess said quietly.

"There's no need," Luke answered quickly.

"There's some kind of need, I just don't know what it is," Jess mumbled as he took a drink from his bottle. "Story of my life," he added with a wry smile.

Luke stared at the main house for a moment, trying to formulate his words. Finally he said, "Once, you stood in that house and told me that you wanted what I had. Wanted my life," he said with a sigh. He turned to glance over at Jess as he said, "I want more than that for you, for both of you." When Jess didn't respond, he said, "I want you to go places, do things, and see things. Live your life while you're young, while you can. And then, then, I want you to have my life," he finished gruffly. "Then I want you to have everything that I have, because, other than the moments of hormonal moodiness, it's great," he said as he shook his head in wonder. "But I have to admit, you and Rory strikes a little too close. I'm scared you won't go. I'm scared you won't do. I'm scared you won't be you, you'll be me. Just like me," he finished with a rueful chuckle.

"I have plans, Luke," Jess said as he gazed at the still waters of the pool. "I have plans, it's just that now they include Rory," he said with confidence.

"And if your plans don't mesh with hers?" Luke asked in a husky voice.

Jess turned to look at him as he said, "That's the chance everyone takes."

"But when she leaves…" Luke started to say.

"My plans are incredibly portable," Jess cut him off with a small smile. He placed his hand hesitantly on Luke's shoulder as he said, "Best Christmas present I've ever gotten." He turned to look back at the brightly lit pool house and cleared his throat before he said, "We should get back in there. I need to hit the bathroom before I finish mopping the floor with you guys."

Luke snorted and said, "Yeah, you add up those pennies and you might have almost three dollars. Be there in a minute," Luke said as he drew in another deep breath of fresh air. As soon as the door closed behind Jess, he pulled his cell from his jeans pocket and held the number one down. When she answered, he smiled and asked, "How's it going?" Luke turned away from the pool house a stepped to the left, seeking shelter behind an obliging shrub as he listened. He smiled and asked, "Did you try Goodnight Moon?" as he dangled his beer bottle from his fingers. "No, it's time for the big guns, pull out Goodnight Moon. Pat the Bunny is too interactive," he said with a laugh. He listened for a moment more and then said, "I know, I wish I was home. I miss you, Crazy Lady. I miss the hoodlums, too. Save a spot for me?" he asked.

XXXX

Jess stepped into the powder room off of the living room area and locked the door behind him. He pulled his cell from his jeans pocket and held the number one down until it connected. When she answered he said, "I'm killing them here." He listened for a moment and then chuckled as he said, "Well, Luke said I'd be lucky if it was three bucks, but I'm thinking it's more like five." He smiled as she flirted with him shamelessly and then said, "Yeah, I'll take you to Taylor's for an ice cream soda, two straws." He listened for a moment and then laughed as he said, "You are the only girl I have ever known who could make 'rock around the clock' sound dirty."