Author Note: As always, thank you so much for the great reviews. I am trying to get through this quickly, both for myself and for you.

Rough Seas

"Wow." Lorelai had no other words for what she was seeing or, for that matter, what she was feeling. The first day on the boat was light and fun, a much-needed escape from the heavy emotions of June 3rd. The first couple of hours on the water had her wondering what on Earth made her agree to this insanity. The boat was surprisingly livable at about the size of a small RV and they had 'christened' the sleeping quarters rather enjoyably before casting off, but once they were moving it wasn't quite so pleasant. She didn't get seasick. Luke had made sure that she took Dramamine on the way to the docks. But just walking around in a moving boat was a challenge. She stayed below deck to unpack and was glad she did. When she finally headed above-deck to take her place next to Luke she discovered how cold and wet a morning on the water could be. It was a bit like riding in the jeep on an early spring morning with the top off. Through a car wash. Surrounded by gigantic fans.

But eventually the day warmed up and Luke took breaks from driving, dropping anchor so they could eat or just sit and enjoy the view. There was no end to the wildlife they saw. Seagulls seemed to follow them as they made their way up Long Island Sound. Occasionally a pelican floated by. They chatted about nothing in particular and kissed every time they were close enough and didn't have food in their mouths.

Luke kept the shore in sight, which helped to combat some of Lorelai's nervousness. Still, she felt so small surrounded by all that water.

And now, lying on her back next to Luke, staring up at the night sky, she felt downright microscopic. She never knew there were so many stars. She could actually see the shape of the Milky Way, something she'd only ever seen in pictures in books and magazines. It was humbling and exhilarating and… wonderful.

Her belly full of lasagna and her heart full of appreciation for God or fate or nature or whatever force allowed this moment to happen, she searched for words and came up with nothing. Lorelai Gilmore was speechless. So she just squeezed the hand of the man lying next to her in the big warm sleeping bag and sighed.

~ooooo~

The morning of Day Two they woke up early, anxious to get to their first port of call, the little town of Stonington. Although they had made a lot of progress the day before, it was still a long ride. As they approached Fishers Island, Luke made a game of serpentining across the imaginary line in the water that divided Connecticut from New York-"Now we're in Connecticut… Now we're in New York…" like a young child on cross-country road trip. When Lorelai laughed, he promised to drive the boat in circles when they reached the Connecticut/New York/Rhode Island border after they left Stonington the next day so they could do it again.

They approached the marina just after noon and Lorelai was thrilled to have her feet on solid ground again. She walked a little funny until she got her land legs back, but the adorable town was well worth it. Luke wobbled a bit, too, almost dropping her laptop bag in the water as soon as both feet were on the dock.

They found a little cafe that had WiFi and she opened her laptop while they waited for their meals.

"You're working already? We've been gone less than two days."

"Actually, Mr. Grump, I'm going to check my Facebook account, upload some of the pictures that we took yesterday, and email Rory."

"Well, okay," he said, smiling.

The first thing Lorelai noticed when she opened Facebook was a friend request from Jess Mariano. That was quite a surprise. She hadn't sent him one. She figured he wouldn't want to have anything to do with her. They got along fine the last time she saw him, but that was three years ago at Liz's wedding and it hardly made up for the tumultuous relationship they had shared in the years before.

Her mouse hovered over the "accept" button. She looked at Luke. He looked up from the paper he was reading and asked, "What's up?"

"Jess sent me a friend request."

"What does that mean?" He was still trying to figure out this internet stuff.

"Well, it means that he wants to share stuff with me, that he wants me to share stuff with him."

"Okay, so? Isn't that a good thing?" he asked, puzzled.

"I don't know, is it?" she really didn't know.

"I guess there's only one way to find out. You can always undo it, can't you?"

"I guess so." She held her breath and clicked. Then she went to his profile and took a look around. She was impressed. He posted often, sometimes about books his company was publishing, sometimes quotes from things he was reading. He had some albums of pictures, including one from the open house the year before. She opened it up to find about 30 pictures. As she flipped through them she came across one of Rory, standing with Jess and Luke. The three of them were smiling. Luke looked incredibly handsome and happy. In contrast, Rory's smile was a little sad and Lorelai remembered that at that time Logan was being his usual irresponsible self, having flown off to Costa Rica to nearly kill himself trying to be Evil Kenevil.

She quickly clicked away, not wanting to see any more. She was afraid that she would see April and she was right. In that album there was a shot of Luke with April and another with Luke, April, and Rory.

I should have shown the picture to Luke, she thought. We should be able to smile about it. We were still engaged when that picture was taken. Would he have been that happy if I had been there with them? She couldn't help wondering. She knew they should talk about it, but she didn't want to spoil the day.

"Are you okay?" Luke asked, noticing that her mood had changed.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine," she replied. Then she smiled, but it didn't quite reach her eyes. She quickly clicked back to her newsfeed and found updates from Rory. She had shared a few articles and some pictures. Lorelai turned the computer around to share the pictures with Luke before he could ask her any more questions about her mood.

Rory had also shared her first blog post. Lorelai read it out loud to Luke, who beamed with pride, forgetting all about Jess and Facebook.

~ooooo~

After an afternoon touring the beautiful lighthouse and shopping in Stonington, Luke they had a light dinner and slept in the boat, exhausted. In the morning they headed out, planning to spend the next few days on the boat, tooling around Block Island, then heading to Newport for a night in a hotel.

By Day Four they'd had sex in every area of the boat (which isn't hard to do-dirty!) except the bathroom, which was barely big enough for one person. The captain's chair was a bit of a challenge, but they managed to pull it off. While topside there was a weird thrill of being naked and doing what they were doing outdoors, even when they were far enough from shore that there was nobody around to see them. And at night those stars…

They laughed. They played cards. Luke gave her a cooking lesson-scrambled eggs. Lorelai teased him about wearing shorts, but he caught her ogling him more than once, so he knew he'd made the right choice in wearing them. And she was right about the shoes, too. They were having fun. They were in love. They weren't thinking about the future or the past. That's the way of vacations. But they both knew that it wasn't good to go on like this. They couldn't allow themselves to get caught up in the good times, then retreat to old habits when things got rough as they were sure to do with any relationship. They really needed to get back to work, to talking things out. They could relax later, once they had really cleared the air.

Lorelai's body had grown accustomed enough to the motion of the boat that she was able to read and she was doing just that when Luke decided that it was a good time to get back to talking. He hesitated, because he knew that what he wanted to talk about was going to be tough and there was no easy way to start.

They were lounging on the sofa below deck, listening to the patter of rain as a light summer shower fell above their heads. He got up and started to pace a bit, which signaled Lorelai that it was time to put down the book.

He finally exhaled loudly, then jumped right in. "Let's talk about the wedding-Lane's wedding."

"Okay," she replied.

"Tell me what happened." Nice volley, Danes. Ball is in Gilmore's court.

"I drank a bunch of shots, then got up on the stage and made a fool of myself."

"Lorelai…" he warned.

She sighed and closed her eyes, then opened them and began. "This is hard, Luke."

"Yeah," he said quietly, nodding his head. She nodded back, telling him that she wasn't planning to avoid the conversation. She just needed to get her thoughts together. Once she did, she spoke.

"I was sitting with Rory, looking through the pictures on her camera so I could delete some of them. You know how self-conscious I am about pictures of myself."

"Yes, and I don't understand it." Luke said. "You're beautiful."

"I love that you think so, but I don't think I'm photogenic and I hate most pictures of me."

"You like the one that Rachel took, you know of you and me at the Firelight Festival," he reminded her.

"Well that says more about Rachel's talent than my self-esteem. Besides, it was you and me."

"Oh jeez. I let you change the subject!"

"I didn't change the subject."

"Yes you… argh!" A small smile crossed her face. "Okay, so you were looking at Rory's camera."

"I was looking at the pictures on Rory's camera, and went past the wedding pictures to a few days before," her voice started to shake just a tiny bit with the memory. "And there was a picture of Rory with April."

Luke thought back to what that could be. "At Jess's open house."

"Yes."

"I didn't know that Rory was going to be there." He tried to explain.

"I know."

"Why did that make you so upset? And what did that have to do with our wedding?"

"Luke, everybody got to meet April." Lorelai's voice went up in pitch and volume. "Everybody in town got to know her. Lane got to play games with her. Even Rory got to meet her. Everybody did. Everybody but me."

"I needed time to get to know her myself. I thought you understood that. You acted like nothing was wrong."

"But Luke, everybody else got to meet her and get to know her! It was just me you kept away!"

"You said that you understood," he persisted. "You acted like you thought I was doing the right thing."

"I knew that needed time with your daughter. I was trying to be a good girlfriend!" She was shouting now. "I promised you that I would be a great girlfriend, remember? I promised you that I was going to be patient! I was trying to be patient!"

Then she was crying.

"But, Luke, months went by and it didn't get better."

"You can't ask me to choose between you and April," came his response.

"My god, you're not even listening to me! I never asked you to choose between us! I wanted you to have both of us! Luke, she was the most important thing that had ever happened to you and you wouldn't share her with me!"

Luke was shouting now, too. "I talked to you about her all the time. I shared it all with you."

"But you wouldn't let me near her! Do you know how that made me feel? I wasn't even allowed to come to the diner sometimes because April might be there. That place was like my second home. It was where you were. But I couldn't go there because I might intrude. I was an outsider, Luke. You treated me like an outsider!" He knew she was right and he searched his mind for soul to figure out why he had been so stupid as to treat the love of his life that way.

"Do you realize that my mother lectured me about it?" Lorelai continued. "She actually thought that I didn't want to get to know my own step-daughter-to-be, because of course in her eyes everything is always my fault." She paused to breath, but she had not calmed down even a little. "At what point were you going to get back to us? She invited you on a trip, she was calling you "Dad", but you still didn't want to get married and you still didn't want me around her. At what point were you going let me in? She was going to be my step-daughter, Luke, and I had never even really met her. What was I supposed to think? All I could think was that you didn't want me anymore. You had April. You didn't need me anymore. And you didn't trust me."

"Of course I trusted you!" he shouted. "I wanted to be like you." He took a deep breath. "I just wanted to be a good dad. I failed with Jess. I didn't want to fail with April. I was afraid that you would see me fail again. I wanted to show you that I could do it, or maybe I wanted to show myself, I don't know. You are such a great mom."

"I'm such a great mom?" Lorelai's eyes were wide and wild. "My daughter lost her virginity to a married man, Luke. She stole a yacht! Not a dinghy or even a ski boat-a yacht! Jess hasn't even been arrested for jaywalking, has he? My daughter dropped out of college and I couldn't stop her! Some great mom."

"Oh, Lorelai," he said, more calm now. He sat down. "Those bumps in the road don't define her as person or you as a parent."

"Maybe, Luke," she said. She calmed down a little, too, but she was still agitated, "but why was it so important that you do it all alone? Why did you have to shut me out?"

He was quiet now. He thought for a moment before answering. "I don't know. Maybe I didn't want you to see me so… vulnerable. I don't think I've ever felt so unprepared, so incompetent. I didn't want you to see how scared I was."

"But Luke, what did you think I would do? Did you really think that I was going to take her from you somehow? Or did you just think that you couldn't rely on me?"

"Well…" At the time he wasn't entirely sure that he could rely on her. But he didn't know how to say that without hurting her. "Do you remember when Rory broke her wrist?"

"Of course I remember. It was the worse summer of my life until last year." She thought back to the loneliness she had felt when Rory was in Washington, DC and Luke wasn't speaking to her. She let Rory and Sookie believe that she was depressed about Christopher breaking her heart. She even let herself believe that it was about losing the opportunity to be a family with the man who gave her Rory, but if she was being honest, the person she missed the most was Luke.

The rain had stopped, which was a good thing because Luke was almost whispering now. "You totally overreacted. A hairline fracture to the wrist, and at 17."

"But she was in the hospital!"

"You broke your leg, remember?"

"Of course I remember." Lorelai said, not understanding the connection.

"And you weren't nearly as young as Rory, but you healed just fine and with very little help. I remember. Rory came to the diner at least five times a week." He smiled at the memory.

She smiled, too. "You added pie and brownies without telling her."

"I wanted to deliver stuff myself and check on you, but Rory kept insisting that you'd be upset if I did."

"Well, I barely knew you then and I was embarrassed."

"Embarrassed that you broke your leg?"

"Embarrassed that I couldn't take care of myself."

"Okay, well think about that for a minute," he said. "You and I are not all that different that way. I can admit that I am stubborn about accepting help, but you can be, too. I would think you'd understand." Lorelai just listened. "Anyway, my point is that Rory's injury wasn't that bad. She was 17-almost an adult-and all she had was a cast for a couple of weeks, but you acted like she was in critical condition. And worse, like I had put her there."

"I was scared, Luke!"

"There you were, yelling at me about how I'd let you and Rory down."

"I apologized like a million times for that!" Lorelai shouted, standing up. She really didn't enjoy thinking about this pain from so many years ago.

"Yes, you did. And I forgave you, even though it hurt like hell." He stood up now, too. "But you know what I don't think I ever forgave you for? You never once thought about what I was going through. You never once thought about how I might be feeling!"

"I knew that you were worried about Jess. I just…"

"Lorelai, you're still missing it... I failed him. He was failing school, still getting into trouble, and then the accident… I failed him. I couldn't help him. I couldn't do it. Mr. Fix It couldn't fix Jess."

Lorelai stayed quiet, searching his face and trying to process what he was saying.

"I couldn't even talk to you about it. You were my best friend and I couldn't even talk to you when it was happening. I looked at you and saw this amazing mom and all I wanted was to be a good parent. And I sucked at it….

...And you know what, Lorelai? When the accident happened and I knew that I had failed, YOU WEREN'T THERE FOR ME."

And it was out. And he couldn't take it back.

They stood staring at each other, the only sound was the water lapping against the side of the boat.

~ooooo~

"I was a shitty friend," Lorelai said while Luke was cooking dinner. They had spent the rest of the afternoon in relative silence, each letting the discussion sink in. Luke puttered around the boat, Lorelai read the same page in her book over and over again until it the routine of living took over.

"No, Lorelai. You weren't," he replied, stirring peppers and onions on autopilot. "You weren't perfect, but you always had my back, even when it came to Jess, and you hated Jess."

"I didn't hate Jess. I was afraid of him." She really didn't hate the kid. She saw some of herself in him. "I was afraid that if Rory got involved with him her life would be derailed the way that mine was."

"You did just fine on your own."

"Yeah, but it was hard, Luke. And if I hadn't had Mia, I probably would have ended up back at home. Or married to Christopher." Luke was quiet. He wasn't ready to talk about Christopher. He'd had enough high emotion for the day.

"Tell me about fishing guy."

"Fishing guy?" Lorelai asked.

"Yeah, that guy that you went fishing with."

"Oh, um…what the hell was his name?"

Luke laughed, "You don't even remember his name? Didn't you go to New York with him for a weekend?"

"Yeah, but… hey, how did you know about that? I just told you I was going with a group of friends."

"How dumb do you think I am?" Luke asked, laughing. "Set the table, please," he added, gesturing with his chin.

"I don't know why it was so hard to tell you about stuff like that."

"Because you wanted me to see you as available." Luke said, as if it was obvious.

"Well if you knew that-"

"I didn't know that at the time. I was too wrapped up in my own insecurities to even think about why you didn't tell me about the guys you dated. And maybe I didn't want to know about them."

"But you did know."

"Yeah, I did," he said. "I couldn't help it. I was so tuned in to you that I could be at the diner and I'd know if you sneezed at your parent's house in Hartford." He plated the food and they sat down to eat. "So tell me about fishing guy."

"Alex."

"Okay, tell me about Alex."

"Well, there's nothing to tell, really," Lorelai explained. "We met at a really bad seminar that Sookie and I went to. He called me, he asked me to go coffee tasting with him, I went. We dated a few times, then it just kind of petered out."

"Hmm."

"In fact, I'd say that technically I'm still dating him." Luke raised on eyebrow. "We never officially broke up. He just stopped calling."

"And you stopped calling him."

"Yeah…" She thought for a moment. "He wasn't you."

They continued to eat, laughing and teasing each other. She ate half of his mashed potatoes and gave him half of her vegetables. He glared at her until she ate the rest of her veggies. She washed the dishes while he took a shower. Then they cuddled up on the bed to watch a movie.

When the movie was over and the lights were out, Luke said, "You know that things are different now, right? I know I did it all wrong, with April."

"Okay," Lorelai replied.

"I mean it, Lorelai." He turned toward her, palming her face. "I regret that so much. I should have stood up to Anna much sooner and I should have involved you from the beginning." He brushed his hand over her hair. "I'll never make that mistake again."

She answered by pressing her lips to his for a soft kiss, catching his bottom lip between hers. "I'll never let you," she whispered, then went back for more. "I'm sorry you were in so much pain with Jess and I didn't see it, didn't think about it." She caressed his face and kissed him again. "I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you." He felt the wetness on her cheeks as she kissed below his ear. "I know you thought then that you had failed Jess, but I hope you know now that you didn't. Look at him." She kissed along his jaw. "You don't have anything to prove to me, Luke."

He pulled her close and whispered, "I love you."

A/N: Next Up, "Calmer Waters"