The next day, Rory got ready early in order to help her mother with her dress. They were getting married in the garden behind the Inn, a beautiful place that Michele had cultivated into something of an Eden. It also meant that the rooms were available to their guests, and convenient. They used the two downstairs living spaces as dressing rooms, careful to keep the men and women apart so Luke would not see Lorelai before they married.

"I'm not nervous in the least," Lorelai said, looking at herself in the mirror. "I can't believe I'm not nervous."

"I can," Rory said. "He's your best friend, your pancake connection, and your baby daddy. What's there to question?"

"Ooh, I knew you were my daughter," Lorelai said, smiling. "Okay, checklist?"

"Something old?" Rory asked.

"Me?"

"No."

"The bespeckled barrettes holding my hair up in back," Lorelai said, turning around. "You made them for me when you were 9."

"Oh, the Bedazzler!" Rory said. "How cute was I?"

"Pretty damn cute."

"Aw," Rory said, smiling. "Okay, focus. Something new."

"The whole damn dress is new," Lorelai said.

"Doesn't count."

"My necklace," Lorelai said. "Luke gave it to me when we first got engaged and I've never worn it until now. Seemed like bad luck."

"Very good," Rory agreed. "Something borrowed."

"The makeup I'm wearing."

"Are you giving it back when you're done wearing it?"

"No."

"Then it doesn't count, does it?

"My earrings," Lorelai said. "They're from Mom."

"Excellent!" Rory said. "Something blue?"

"I can't show you."

"Then how will I know?" Rory asked.

"You'll just have to trust me."

"Why would you choose THAT to be the something blue, though? It doesn't make any sense."

"It's better than if they were borrowed or old."

"Valid point," Rory said. "You may now commence getting married."

"To my baby daddy," Lorelai said.

"I think he really does hate that," Rory said. "I don't think it's his crowning achievement to have two children out of wedlock."

"Nor mine, but you don't see me getting upset about the baby mama drama, do you?"

"Oh, Mom."

Richard came back at that moment to spend a few minutes with Lorelai and Rory, after a few more words, hugged her mom ever so carefully and left the dressing area. She stepped outside into the waiting area and saw Sookie and Jackson, Liz and TJ in their own little groups. She picked up one of the programs for the wedding in order to occupy herself, not feeling like making conversation. The front cover read:

In that book which is My memory . . . On the first page That is the chapter when I first met you Appear the words . . . Here begins a new life

- Dante Alighieri

Rory smiled, and opened to read the inside, which was a basic description of their wedding parties, their families, and their gratitude. At some point, her mother and Luke had turned into romantics. Even with all their resistance, they had turned out something of a traditional wedding.

Jess was leaning against the wall, staring out the window. He was wearing a tux, and didn't even seem all that uncomfortable in doing so. She didn't know if she'd ever seen him in so much as a suit before. She smiled at him as she approached and offered him a program, which he accepted.

"Shaken or stirred, sir?"

He turned and smiled appreciatively. "Look at how nicely you clean up."

"I might say the same of you, buster," she said.

"Yeah, don't get too used to it," he said. "It's back to the rental place after this."

"Like, right after this or are you going to the reception?"

"Does Logan find that sort of thing cute about you?"

"What?"

"The constant need for back-talking?"

"It's not back-talking unless it's from a child to a parent," Rory said. "Between equals, it's rapport."

"Ayn, I'll never understand your world."

"That's okay," Rory said.

"How's your Mom?" he asked.

She smiled that he would ask. "Incredibly calm," she said. "She's not worried at all. How's Luke?"

"Terrified he's going to cry, I think, but claiming he's nervous about reciting the vows," Jess replied.

"Aren't they adorable?" Rory asked.

"Well, I'm glad for them, if that's what you're asking," Jess said. "But don't ask me to get too in depth on this. I have a reputation to protect around here."

"Sorry," Rory said.

Jess gave her a smile, then sighed. "I've had a lot of fun with you this weekend, Rory," he said. 'I really have. I miss doing this with you. We always had a pretty great friendship."

She returned the smile. "We did, didn't we?"

"But, so you know, I don't know how much we should continue being friends outside of family gatherings," Jess said. "It's a lot to expect we can bury the hatchet all at once, just like that. Our entire history is nothing but 'what if' and 'remember when I hurt you' and things like that. I think we should just let it go for a while."

"Jess, we're going to see each other again," Rory said, taken aback by the turn the conversation had taken. "We can't help that. Your uncle and my mother are married."

"Yeah, but nothing outside of that," Jess said. "Strictly holiday gatherings, when you can be torn out of DC. For a while, at least. Until it gets easier."

Her brow furrowed and he sighed at the look on her face. "I'm sorry, I just don't know where this is coming from, setting rules."

"Comes from my very uncomfortable girlfriend," Jess answered. "And me. I get lost in the past with you. I never remember who you are in the present, or who I am, for that matter. Neither does anyone else."

"What - ?"

"I think about us when we were still figuring out whether or not we wanted to be together," Jess said. "Or, rather, when I was figuring that out. I don't yet know how to separate those Jess's when I'm around you, Rory. I'm not going to be Logan's buddy, even though he's making a damn good effort at it."

"You both are," Rory said. "I think it's going really well."

"It is," Jess said. "No argument. Almost too well."

"Okay, I'm going to stop you right there," Rory said, her jaw setting in a very Dean-like way as she grew angrier. "You said you weren't going to do this."

"And I hadn't imagined I would," Jess said. "This is what I'm trying to tell you. I can't think of you detachedly. I still want to challenge your decisions, your boyfriend choice - and he seems to be a really solid guy, by the way - and it's fucked up, Rory."

"Why in the hell are you telling me this now?" Rory demanded. "My mother is about to walk out here and I have to walk down the aisle with you."

"Because I have to walk down the aisle with you," Jess returned quietly. "Because we have to stand at the altar together and listen to wedding vows together. Because if every movie I've ever not watched on Lifetime, don't tell anyone or I'll kill you, is accurate, then you and I might have some sort of tragic, corny, "remember when" moment at some point from here to the altar. But I can't do it. Don't let's do it."

"Problem solved," Rory said, irritated, and walked away.

She wasn't angry because he had said so, she was angry because she hadn't. He had beat her to the punch on this? How did that happen? No fair at all. So he had seen it, too, the way he was regressing to his old habits around her. It was hard to imagine that so much time and history could pass and they still be unable to see each other simply as they were now. She was too angry at him to notice the look of regret on his face, or the sadness in his eyes. He'd done it for himself, for Rory, for Ashley, and even for Logan. He had to hand it to the other guy. He was a class act now and any sort of innuendo or quiet flirting or rivalry that always occurred when Jess and Rory got together would be a disservice to all of them. But if Jess was the only one to restrain the situation, history proved it wouldn't be done so he needed to include Rory in obtaining some distance.

Rory made sure to busy herself in some way until the very moment she had to walk down the aisle with Jess. Liz and TJ went down the aisle together first, then Sookie and Jackson. Rory looked at Jess across the doorway while they were still hidden from view. She glanced down the aisle and saw Logan in the front row, only eight rows up, looking back, waiting for her, eager to set his eyes on her in her royal blue elegant gown. She turned to Jess and forced her face to quiet. It was her mother's day. No drama.

Jess glided out into the aisle, into view, and held out his arm for Rory. She took a step forward, meeting him, and took his arm. He stood tall, easy, and classy. She had never seen him be so at ease in a formal social setting before and she realized suddenly that he could do it, that it had been intentional to not do well in social scenes before. But this mattered to him, so he made a concerted effort to do his part to make it easier.

"It's not because I don't like you, Rory," he said quietly to her.

"I know," she returned, just as softly.

He held out his hand to help her walk up the stairs to the altar and they parted ways. They stood two steps below the top, several feet away from each other. She gave him no looks, no attention, exactly as he had wanted it to be because this wasn't about them, not about their past, not about their inability to have a clean start quite yet. This was about Luke and Lorelai and they both would hate themselves if they had managed to distract their own attention from what was about to happen.

The familiar music struck, and all eyes turned to the back. Lorelai joined her father at the end of the aisle and Rory watched tearfully as her mother began the 30 yard walk towards finally getting her happy ending. Luke was already puffing up his chest, a transparent attempt at reining in his emotion.

Rory turned to Logan and he was already looking at her, a bit of a smile on his face but a very serious look in his eyes. He placed his hands on his heart with his meaningful gaze fixed on her and she got flutters. That Logan, with all his charm and his 'doing the right thing at the right moment' sort of ways. She couldn't help but love someone like Logan, someone who had been broken at the idea of losing her. She no longer wondered what it was like to love that strongly, so much so that you could never be the same when that person wasn't around anymore. Lorelai had been a hollow shell of herself when she had lost Luke in their breakups and Logan had been a mess. Was this the sign of a relationship worth fighting for? Was such a measure really the objective?

Within moments, her mother was married. No angst, no jitters, just emotional, and somewhat humorous, avowals. Rory handed the large man's ring to Lorelai when it came time to exchange rings and she watched as Luke accepted the only piece of jewelry she'd ever see on him. He was such a gruff, grumpy man in general, always irate about something, and perhaps it was very fitting to Lorelai's needs as she generally spent her days never sweating the small stuff. They didn't try to change the other or break them of habits. It just worked.

Luke and Lorelai walked down the aisle together after sharing a kiss, their first as husband and wife. Lorelai had turned to her daughter for the briefest of moments before walking down the aisle, sharing an openly tearful, joyous, rapturous look with Rory. It was done. Lorelai had a new family, a husband finally, and a son. It would never be the same for Rory, coming home. Her mom was going to become more like her sister, she knew, and she'd be an aunt to her little brother more than anything else. After all, there was a 8 year longer gap in age between Rory and her brother than Rory and their mother. Hilarious.

She realized suddenly that Jess was offering her his arm and she shook herself out of it. She accepted his arm and they walked down the aisle together, following Luke and Lorelai's exit. He squeezed her hand that rest on the crook of his arm and she realized she was grabbing him with a death grip. She released his arm and let her hand rest there, wondering where this tenseness came from and hoping there was video of the ceremony, because she felt like she'd already forgotten it.

Rory was relieved to let go of Jess's arm at the end of the aisle and didn't so much as give him a look as she disappeared into the next room. Jess watched her go, understanding that he had pushed her away and she was merely respecting his wish. It would be cordial after this but he had made sure there would no more opportunity on this trip for them to try to be friends again. They couldn't be. Wasn't yet possible.

"Hey, Jess, where's Rory?" Logan asked, clapping his hand on Jess's shoulder.

"Uh, yeah, I think she went through..." Jess said, finishing his sentence by pointing.

"Thanks," Logan said.

Jess observed as Logan went after Rory, prepared to be the man on her arm for the rest of the night, or perhaps the rest of her life. He knew they were happy together, he could see it in the way they were together. Logan knew Rory was his priority, making this work was his priority, and he was giving it everything he had. That was what Rory deserved. Ashley was much the same, finally giving Jess the one-on-one attention he deserved. No more chasing after one-night stands or watching Rory with her boyfriends and quietly wondering if she'd ever come back to him. They both deserved better than what they gave each other. They both finally had it. The rest would come.

Jess had walked out of the reception at one point to find Richard, Logan and Luke on the edge of the party. Richard and Logan were smoking cigars together, Luke looking like he would rather be anywhere other than here. As soon as he spotted Jess, he compelled his presence. Never, in a million years, did Jess think at any point he would be Luke's ally, Luke's safe place. Yet here he was, being beckoned as though he was the only life boat for miles around.

"Cigar party, is it?" Jess asked, approaching.

"Would you like one, son?" Richard asked. "Luke didn't want his."

Jess held up his hand. "Our family has a general aversion to them," he said. "Thank you though."

"You smoke, don't you?" Richard asked Jess, who shrugged.

"I gave it up," he replied. "Bad habit. Seemed like a dumb idea to continue when I want to be a swimmer and Olympic tryouts are soon."

"So I heard, good choice," Richard replied, not missing a beat. "Luke was telling me about your books and your store. Well done, son."

Jess shrugged. "They go hand-in-hand with what I like to do," he said. "Made the most sense. I'm not making any money at it."

"Don't sell yourself short," Richard said. "You've come a long way, and you're making a living at a dying industry in a struggling economy. You should take some credit."

He wondered where this sort of friendliness came from all of a sudden but chose to accept it. "Thank you sir."

Richard nodded then turned his attention to his new son-in-law. "Now, Luke, you really surpassed Emily's expectations," Richard said. "Now I know that doesn't sound like much of a compliment but it is. She's very pleased with today. And that, sir, is good news for me, so I owe you some thanks."

"Owe it to Lorelai," Luke said. "She planned the whole thing."

"Of course we know that, but you played your part and gave her a beautiful wedding," Richard said. "You really came through for her. You always have. I think Rory's speech last night about who was there for her and Lorelai during their early years hit Emily and I pretty hard. I wanted to thank you for that. You're a worthy man for my daughter and I know you don't need our blessing, but you certainly have it."

Luke shifted somewhat uncomfortably on his feet, unsure of what to say to such honesty from the family which had always given him such grief. Luke's meeting with the Gilmores had never gone well. "Kind of you to say, Richard."

And there it was. The nicest things Richard Gilmore had ever said to the Danes family. Luke shot his nephew a look as Richard patted Logan on the back, returning to his far more comfortable and easy camaraderie with Rory's boyfriend. Jess shrugged and made the sign of holding a joint to his mouth with a questioning look. Luke, for once, chuckled to himself at his nephew's inappropriateness and Jess really did feel, finally, as though he had an ally, as though he belonged somewhere.

Rory had caught a glimpse of her boyfriend and Luke with Richard, knowing they were probably getting some sort of 'you're both part of the Gilmore family now, boys' conversation that her grandfather had been dying to give to someone for as long as he had been a father. She edged closer to them, waiting to catch Logan's eye. She had changed into a mauve cocktail dress, slinky and provocative. Logan finally saw her standing several yards away, grinned at her shyness, and excused himself from the party of gentlemen to join her.

"You're incredibly sexy," Logan said, wrapping his arm around her waist and ducking down to give her a kiss.

"You smell like cigar," Rory replied.

"Blame your grandfather, you know how he peer pressures me into drinking and smoking."

"Oh, yes, Mr. Gilmore is the problem," Rory teased, wrapping her arm around his waist and leading him away. "You have to dance with me."

"Is that right, Ace? I don't recall leaving you space on my dance card."

Richard watched them go and sighed to himself. "I hope she marries that boy," he said. "Don't get me wrong, I think Rory's a saint and I would never speak ill of her. But she got lucky that he was willing to come back."

Jess bit his tongue and looked over to Luke. "You know, Richard, Logan cheated on her less than a year before he proposed to her," Luke said, warranting a sharp look from Richard. "She had every reason in the world to say no, not right now. She was too young and so is he."

"How come I don't know about this?" Richard asked, shocked.

"Probably because you like him and Rory doesn't want that to stop," Jess said with a more sour tone than he meant to convey.

"Well, of course I wouldn't like him so much if I knew he cheated on her," Richard protested.

"You should," Luke said. "He's a good kid. And kids make mistakes. Now, how they handle their mistakes and if they do them again, that's how you gauge the man."

"I just can't believe Rory wouldn't tell me," Richard said. "This changes everything."

"I don't think so," Luke rejected. "It happened almost 4 years ago. They're allowed to make mistakes and move on with their lives. And I probably shouldn't have told you if Rory or Lorelai hadn't so would you cover for me and not bring it up?"

This seemed to placate him, or at least redirect his attention, for the time being and he brought up a story of when he had first brought Rory to his club to learn to golf. It was the first day that they had bonded and she had told him all the gossip from the women's steam room, including all the cheating wives and husbands.

"We men never talk about it," Richard said thoughtfully, and without asking for any answers. "I can only imagine what our women hide from us."

When Richard walked away, Jess leaned over to Luke, "Exactly the sort of pep talk you want to hear on your wedding day."

"He has a hard time with his girls being hurt, even Lorelai," Luke said. He gave Jess a careful look. "You're having trouble being around Rory."

"Excuse me?" Jess said.

"You're having a hard time being around Rory."

"Is there something in our history together that makes you think I'm going to answer that?"

"It wasn't a question," Luke said.

Jess stuck his hands in his pockets. "It's hard to be around each other," he said. "It may always be hard. That's it."

"Logan seems like a good kid," Luke said. "So does Ashley."

"Yeah."

Luke waited for Jess to expound upon his answer and when he didn't, said, "Okay, good talk."

"There's nothing to talk about, Luke," Jess said. "Enjoy your wedding day, would you? Rory and I, it's not solving itself today. We made progress. It's not about us. Go be a husband or something."

Knowing how easily he embarrassed and was aggravated, Luke got an acceptable amount of grief from his groomsmen and the townspeople. He was compelled to follow the tradition of removing the garter from Lorelai's leg with his teeth and yet it seemed everyone else was punished for it by their exchanged looks of unmasked lust once he was done. By the time they left for their honeymoon of two weeks in New Zealand, the party had really started to heat up and it was also time for the elder Gilmores, kids, and underagers to leave.

"Want another drink?" Logan offered after saying their farewells to those who weren't staying for the long haul.

"I would," Rory said. "But I have to drive back to DC in the morning and I think I should probably not be too hungover."

Logan nodded. "Good call," he said. "But I'm flying, so you'll be carrying me home tonight, sucker."

Rory laughed as Logan poured himself another glass of wine. "Fine, I'll take one."

"Knew it," he said, handing her a glass. "Can I talk to you for a minute? I've got something on my mind that I wanted to share, but knew it had to wait until after your mom left."

"Is everything alright?" Rory asked.

"Yes, absolutely," Logan said, leading her away from the group so they could have some quiet. "I wanted to have the conversation face-to-face."

"I'm not going to see you for another month, am I?"

"Yeah, probably not," he agreed.

"That's stupid."

Logan chuckled. "What do you have to look forward to when you get back?"

"Work," Rory said. "It's back to the administration and the White House and the whole job."

"How do you feel about it?" Logan asked. "Was it the right choice?"

She shrugged. "I've been doing it for eight months and I'm still not sure," she said. "I was thinking about that, actually. I'm sacrificing my entire social life for this job and I feel like I'm too young to do that, like I'm peaking too early or something. Shouldn't I be having fun right now? I also feel unprepared, that college wasn't enough for me to play with the big dogs quite so early."

"You're thinking about grad school still?" Logan asked, to which she nodded. "You know, everybody has to work, Rory. You're lucky in that you get to have a job which allows you to do what you love."

"I'm feeling antsy because I don't have any sort of support system going there," Rory said. "It's harder than I thought it would be."

"I've never known a Gilmore to shrink from a fight, especially not you."

"But I feel isolated," Rory said. "My boyfriend is in California, my family is in Connecticut, my friends are in Connecticut. I have nothing in DC, and no time to make anything there. I work and go home because it's too late to go out. And how do you make friends in DC? I'm 20 years younger than most of the people in my field."

"Well, this is part of what I wanted to talk to you about," Logan said. "Can we talk for a little bit about figuring out how to make this no longer long-distance?"

"Of course," Rory said, her curiosity piqued as they took seats on the curb about a block away.

"And I'm actually glad that you brought up grad school again," Logan said.

"I'm listening," she said.

"When you were graduating, remember how I told you to not factor me in, that I'd be factoring you in?" he asked. "And, yeah, then promptly took it back and did the opposite?"

Rory grimaced. "Yeah."

"I think I can finally make good on that promise," he said.

"How?"

"When we talked yesterday," Logan said. "It made me realize on what a small scale I was thinking about our relationship. San Francisco or DC. You or me. Our conversation made us both realize our options were much bigger than that. I couldn't sleep last night because I kept being pissed at my inability to rectify a situation that we both were less than satisfied with."

"It's not up to you to fix it, Logan," Rory said. "It's up to us."

"True," Logan said. "But I'm always the idea guy, the guy who gets the ball rolling on solutions to problems. It's what I'm particularly good at. I'd expect we'd talk about it, but I always assumed I'd be the one to lose sleep over how to fix it. Not to say you wouldn't, but it's not the way you are. You're about lists, weighing your options over time, etc. And I love that about you, weirdo. But we're very different that way. And that's when it just hit me."

"What did?" she asked, not quite following.

"I'm qualified to handle and manage both human and fiscal capital," Logan said. "I have experience in news, print, technology, economics, you name it. And what was so good about this company in Palo Alto is they wanted my expertise in getting them up and off the ground. That's perfect for me. I'm not the build a business from the ground up sort of guy, I'm the get a business up and running sort of guy."

"You're losing me."

"Consulting," Logan said. "I'm perfectly built for consulting. I can be a free agent, or I can work for a company. I can go wherever I want and there will be work, temporarily or permanently. I already have connections all over the world and a solid reputation. I get to be the guy who comes in with ideas, fixes things, or gets them going to begin with, then doesn't have to get bored by the hum-drum of running it."

Rory was dumb-founded. Of course! It was perfect, if he wanted to do it, that was. Why hadn't they thought of this before? He was indeed perfectly suited to consulting and it offered the flexibility of a living situation that would allow them to move as needed.

"You see where I'm going with it?" Logan asked, and she nodded silently, her heart pounding with the excitement of possibility. "Even as a junior consultant, I'll make plenty. You pick the city, Ace. Stay in DC, go to grad school somewhere, pick another paper. Whatever you want. I'll meet you there. Consulting work is available for someone like me in any major metropolitan area in the country, especially the east or west coastline."

"Logan!" she exclaimed excitedly, clutching his arm.

"Ace, even if you become an international correspondent, I have international contacts," he said. "I'll have the constant challenge that I'm looking so hard for, and your doors are exactly as wide open as you wanted them to be."

"I KNEW it!" Rory said, feeling tears well in her eyes at the thought of their separation ending. "I KNEW that we could find a solution to this if we gave it time and thought. Oh, Logan, well done! But are you sure? Are you sure you'd like it?"

"Hell no, how could I be sure?" Logan asked. "But it's a very likely fit. And if either of us find ourselves unhappy with the situation, we've learned that we not only can, but should talk about it. We'll figure out something."

"We're not going to be long distance anymore," Rory said, sighing with some relief. "I need to wake up with you, to start and end my days with your arms around me. I'm going mad without it."

"Me, too, Ace," he concurred tenderly, leaning in for a gentle kiss. It deepened quickly, between the two glasses of wine they'd had and the thrill they felt at seeing a light at the end of their tunnel of distance. But he pulled away, cupping her face in his hands. "Rory?"

"Mm?"

"In the interest of full disclosure," Logan said. "I want us to start talking about marriage within the next year, because once we move in together again wherever it is that you pick, it won't be long before I want to ask you again."

"We definitely should talk about it," Rory agreed. "Because you can count on a very different answer this time."

They may not always be on the same page. He didn't always understand her. She didn't always care about what he talked about when it related to his business. They were still not ready to be married. But they were no longer in a hurry to accomplish the paperwork. They knew the conversations they needed to have, were confident in not only their desire but ability to repair any leaks in the dam of their relationship. Slowly but surely, they were becoming partners, figuring out how to transfer their passions for work and each other into a passion for a life together.

A future that included each other was, finally, attainable and in their sights.

"The most wonderful of all things in life, I believe, is the discovery of another human being with whom one's relationship has a glowing depth, beauty and joy as the years increase. This inner progressiveness of love between two human beings is a most marvelous thing, it cannot be found by looking for it or by passionately wishing for it. It is a sort of Divine accident."

- Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole