When The Day Met The Night
Chapter 9
Better Together
A/N - Better Together by Jack Johnson. My beta Jewels, once again, rocks!
A few things that made me super late with your latest update: My poor iMac died and I fixed it! The internet died! I got a 37" 1080 LCD TV (me: O.O) and I got really into Diner Girl and then Devil in a Kilt. First book was super meh, second one was A.W.E.S.O.M.E. I *heart* Kindle editions that save me from holding books with cheesy romance covers on public transportation.
Thanks for all the reviews! Lovin' your reviews! :D
There's no combination of words
I could put on the back of a postcard
No song that I could sing
But I can try for your heart
Our dreams, and they are made out of real things
Like a shoebox of photographs
With sepiatone loving
Love is the answer,
At least for most of the questions in my heart
Like why are we here? And where do we go?
And how come it's so hard?
It's not always easy and
Sometimes life can be deceiving
I'll tell you one thing it's always better when we're together
Two hours spent in a car with Rory and Emily, from Star's Hollow to JFK in New York City. Four hours waiting at the airport. An eight hour flight from New York to Frankfurt, Germany. Four more hours of transit to Landstuhl. All in all, Lorelai had been traveling for eighteen hours and arrived in Landstuhl at midnight, technically a whole day after she'd left. She had originally planned to go straight to Luke when she landed, but her 22 weeks belly disagreed with that notion and demanded rest. The moment she reached her hotel room – what looked like the honeymoon suite, thanks to Emily Gilmore – she collapsed on the bed and was dead to the world for the next six hours.
Lorelai arrived at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center at promptly 7:30 that morning. Bundled up to counteract the January chill, she stood outside for a moment to gather her thoughts. She hadn't seen Luke in five months, hadn't spoken to him in two weeks, and he had no idea she was on her way to see him. She took some joy in the excited nervousness that roiled in her belly, rested a hand on the twins as if to get them ready to meet their father, and pushed through glass doors into the vestibule of the medical center.
When she discovered the morning receptionist did not speak a word of English, she reigned in her momentary surge of exhausted-uncomfortable-pregnant-crazy-mother and smiled politely. After a few minutes of frustrated sign language and repeating words, she was pointed in a general direction with a few Deutsch words she was sure were not in her English-to-German dictionary.
She felt it, though, as she got closer, that ball of excited nervousness spinning faster and the babies starting to squirm. "We're almost there," she told the twins with a radiant smile. "You're about to meet your daddy!"
After turning the same corner four times, she ran into an Army nurse and was walked personally to room four hundred and fifty-two. The door was closed and the nurse left, leaving Lorelai the task of opening the door to see what was behind it. She took a deep breath, exhaled forcefully, and raised a shaky hand to the knob to turn it.
There he was. Oh, thank God, there he was, nestled comfortably under a blue knit blanket, his left leg propped up and his face and hands an angry red. He had occasional scrapes across his face and arms, but none so bad as to need stitches. His eyes were closed and his breathing steady, accompanied by the soft blip of the machines to his left and right. Lorelai was standing at the foot of his hospital bed, taking in his appearance. She felt her knees buckle and made her way to a chair at the side of his bed as fast as her pregnant body would allow.
Luke always slept like the dead, and she smiled at the thought. Not dead, alive. She reached out to grab his hand but hesitated for a moment when she took in the ugly sunburn again. With a fierce scowl, she grabbed the hand quickly and looked at his face to see his reaction. He seemed to lift one corner of his mouth in a smile before drifting back into a deep sleep.
Holding his hand relieved almost all the pressure off of Lorelai's shoulders and she very nearly broke down with relief. Instead of an onslaght of tears, she allowed that overwhelming relief to lull her back to sleep, with Luke's hand still clasped tightly in hers. His steady breathing was the most soothing noise she'd heard in five long months.
It's always better when we're together
We'll look at them stars when we're together
Yeah, it's always better when we're together
Luke was dreaming. Not all of it made much sense – there were pastel colors and comforting noises. It was better than those nightmares from the plane ride and the crazy feeling of falling when they put him under before his surgery. Earlier, when he had woken up in the recovery room after his operation, he'd forgotten briefly that he was on the other side of the globe and had a moment of panic when a German nurse asked him how he felt. His recovery was apparently going well, the hospital food wasn't too bad, and when the grogginess from the anesthesia wore off, he'd be able to call home.
That was all that really mattered. He wanted to call Lorelai. He figured he needed to hear her voice as much as she needed to hear his. They'd told her he was missing, presumed dead. He worried for her and hoped she didn't take the news too badly, meanwhile knowing she would have. He hated that he put her through that, especially with her current condition.
Through most of the night after his operation, he just dreamt of soothing colors and sounds. He thought he might have been in a sea of foam with slowly changing colors and far off churning ocean waves. The foam felt like a soft blanket on his skin, cool to the touch but almost spongy in his hands. He let it take his anxieties, fears, and pain, and carry it off in waves of foam and light. He drifted without a body, deeper and deeper into that strange world until he felt something anchor him. It was the good kind of anchor, as if all of a sudden he had a body again and his hand was firmly clasped in another. He couldn't see it, only feel it, but he was sure it was Lorelai. He was still floating lazy and naked in the soft breeze of foam. His hand was anchored, but his legs could sink up and down, left and right.
Then he heard her breathing to his side and wondered if it was possible to share a dream with her. When he wondered if the babies had dreams, he slowly started to feel the bed supporting his body and soft beeping noises began making their way into his consciousness. He could still sense the breathing to his side and the hand holding his. The hand was warm and soft in his stinging palm. His eyes fluttered open for a moment and he saw the door standing ajar. Those strange colored lights shining through an ocean of foam played over his eyes again, and he struggled to bring himself fully back to reality. With his eyes completely open now, his gaze drifted naturally to his right and that soft breathing sound.
Lorelai was sitting there, slumped backwards, her hair tucked behind her ears. Her eyes were closed and she was breathing steadily, her left hand holding onto his. Luke blinked a couple times, not sure if she was real. He took in her very pregnant belly, and his heart started to pound in his ears. He ran a thumb over her hand, causing goosebumps to rise on his forearms from the absolute realness of her.
"Lorelai?" he whispered, tightening his fingers around her hand. "Is that really you?" he asked, his voice cracking. He swallowed as he watched her blink her eyes rapidly. She yawned and stretched catlike, resulting in her hand moving from his.
After rubbing her eyes, she finally caught sight of Luke and quickly returned her hand back to his. "Luke!" she said loudly, almost crying. "Hey," she said softly a moment later, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye.
"Lorelai," he said again, swallowing. "You're here?" he asked her, struggling to keep his own composure, almost crushing her hand in his.
Lorelai nodded furiously in response before leaning on him to kiss him. Luke encircled her with his arms and held on, regardless of the pain he felt in his abdomen. They both cried as they reunited with a sloppy kiss, only really caring that they could hold each other again.
When Lorelai pulled back, she sat on the side of his bed with his forearm clasped tightly against her belly. "Luke," she said, still sniffling. "Meet your babies."
Luke moved his free hand that was now shaking slightly to her womb, and an ecstatic smile appeared on his face.
"You have a son, Luke," Lorelai told him happily, to which he was completely speechless. "We couldn't tell what the other one is, but one of them is definitely a boy."
"R-really?" Luke asked, completely stunned.
"Yeah, I was . . . I was thinking," Lorelai said, looking down at his hand on her. "Maybe we could name him Sean? I-I heard what happened."
Luke met Lorelai's watery gaze and nodded. "He - They don't know if he'll make it." He watched as a few tears fell from her eyes and lifted his hand to wipe them away.
"God, Lorelai," he cried. "I missed you so much."
And all of these moments
Just might find their way into my dreams tonight
But I know that they'll be gone
When the morning light sings
And brings new things
For tomorrow night you see
That they'll be gone too
Too many things I have to do
But if all of these dreams might find their way
Into my day to day scene
I'd be under the impression
I was somewhere in between
With only two
Just me and you
Not so many things we got to do
Or places we got to be
We'll sit beneath the mango tree now
"So, we just need to think of a name for little no-name here?" Luke asked, grinning goofily with his hand on Lorelai's exposed belly.
"Hmm, yeah," she said, seated upon the side of Luke's hospital bed with her shirt hiked up just below her bust. She moved her hand to rest on top of Luke's on her womb. "Did you have any ideas?"
"Well, I was thinking maybe Jane or Janey, like my mom?" he said, a blush barely showing through the burns on his face.
"You think it'll be a girl?" Lorelai asked him, her eyes smiling.
"Well, I mean ... I'm happy with either, but I thought ... a daughter would be nice," Luke tried to explain, his ears now as red as his face.
"When I thought you'd-" Lorelai said quickly, stopping short to swallow. "When you were missing, I thought I might name one Luke, if we had a boy."
Luke placed his free hand on Lorelai's thigh and squeezed it. "Least we don't need to worry about naming either of them Luke now, then," he joked, trying to prevent the pooling tears in her eyes from falling.
Lorelai looked away for a moment and wiped her eyes before returning her gaze to him. "I also really like your dad's name, Micajah-Cage."
"Mmm." Luke chuckled, then cringed from the pain in his gut. "Don't make me laugh, Lorelai."
"Why is that so funny?" she asked, crossing her arms.
"Grandma Bonnie got it from some taudry romance novel she really liked, about some southern Confederate soldier. My dad always said he liked his name but didn't appreciate it when his mother told people who she named him after."
"Wow, really?" Lorelai asked him, returning his smile.
"Yeah, well, I guess the author based her character off of a real guy, Micajah Autrey, but it didn't stop us from teasing Dad about his ... love larger than Texas, or his intense flames of agony, that sort of thing."
"Well, I still like it," Lorelai said petulantly, unable to hide an amused smile from blooming on her face.
"I do too," Luke said with a chuckle.
"I also thought that Agnes - Nessa, your Danes family name, was really unique."
"Mmmm," Luke agreed happily, his hand still caressing Lorelai's bare belly. "Who's the one that keeps kicking me?"
"That's Sean, pretty sure," Lorelai informed him, moving her hand next to his to feel the rumbling. "Quite the kicker. Maybe he'll be a soccer player?"
"Nah, field goal kicker," Luke said before lowering his eyes. "When we were out there, Sean and I, I told him he could be a Godfather."
"Okay," Lorelai agreed easily, moving her hand over his. "We owe him a lot more than that. I hope to God he makes it..."
"Yeah, Lorelai, would you..." Luke began, drifting off. He took a deep breath and continued, "would you go visit him? They won't let me go over to where he is, but he doesn't have anyone."
"I had planned to. Do you want me to go now?"
"I was just thinkin' about him, laying there all alone. He deserves better than that."
"I'll go now."
It's always better when we're together
We're somewhere in between together
Yeah, it's always better when we're together
Luke was asleep when Lorelai came back from Sean's room. His breathing was a little more labored than earlier, she figured from pain, and hit the button on his morphine drip as his nurse had recommended. She waited by his side until his breathing returned to normal, kissed him on the cheek, and went in search of food. No matter how dire the circumstances, the twins would not allow her to forget to eat.
When she reentered the room, Luke was still asleep and she smiled at the new patient residing to his left. Lorelai returned to her perch upon the side of Luke's bed, this time knitting a small blue baby cap with her hands resting on the top of her belly. Lost in the world of knitting, Lorelai only really heard the soft tap of her metal knitting needles until a hand on her side stirred her from her focused thoughts.
She smiled at the rousing Luke before her, drowsy and extremely happy to wake up to her by his side. "Good nap, baby?" Lorelai asked him softly.
He nodded, looking at the cap she was making. His smile grew wider. "It's so small," he rasped, clearing his throat.
Lorelai grinned, her eyes lighting up. "Twins are usually born earlier," she informed him. "They're smaller."
"Read that in the book you sent me," Luke said, placing his free hand on her womb. "You comfortable sitting like that?"
"I'll be fine for a little while," she told him, reaching a hand around to her back to rub it.
"I was so happy to see you, I didn't - When did you get here?"
"Last night, around midnight. I'd left the house in the Hollow at midnight, the day before."
"Twenty-four hours? Jeez, Lorelai, what were you thinking, traveling in your condition?" Luke said, suddenly incensed.
"What was I thinking?" she scoffed. "I was thinking that they told me my fiance was presumed dead! I was thinking that you might not make it!" she said loudly, growing irate. She rose to her feet before continuing, red in the face, "I was thinking that you're an idiot who marches through a fucking desert with a broken leg, a hundred miles from anything!"
"Jesus Christ, you two could raise the dead," a hoarse voice said through the curtain to the left. "And he didn't march, I carried the fat bastard on my shoulders."
Luke, who had been listening to Lorelai's remonstrations with a clenched jaw, blinked when he heard the male voice. "Sean?" he asked, stunned.
"So I take it this enraged fury of a woman is Lorelai," Sean snarked as Lorelai moved to pull the curtain back.
"Sean, how did you get in the ICU?" Luke asked. "They said you were in neuro in a coma..."
"No idea, just woke up, thanks to you two. From what I can tell, it was a pretty damn nice coma too!"
"That would be me," Lorelai said with some annoyance. "I convinced them he needed to be in the ICU," she explained, softer now, starting to come down from her rage. She plopped into the chair by Luke's bed and dropped her head to the back.
"Lorelai," Luke said apologetically, taking in her suddenly exhausted demeanor.
"Don't," she cut him off. "It's okay, I have to go back to the hotel. It's getting late."
"Dude, you're so in the dog house," Sean joked feebly, snickering.
"I don't want to hear anything from either of you," Lorelai grumbled, cutting off Sean's laughing as she struggled to stand again.
"Sorry," Sean said quickly, a blush evident across his own sunburned cheeks.
"Lorelai," Luke said again, raising his hand to her. Lorelai sighed and took it, leaning down to kiss him.
"We'll talk tomorrow, Luke," she said softly. "It's okay."
"Get some rest."
Lorelai walked to the door and turned towards the two men with her hand on the light switch. "Sean, it's nice to finally meet you. Now, you two stay out of trouble while I'm gone," she told them firmly before switching off the lights and closing the door behind her.
"What a woman," Sean whispered, awe-struck in the dark.
Luke grunted in response, smiled, and closed his eyes to dream of little babies with blue knit caps on their heads.
I believe in memories
They look so, so pretty when I sleep
Hey now, and when I wake up,
You look so pretty sleeping next to me
But there is not enough time,
And there is no, no song I could sing
And there is no, combination of words I could say
But I will still tell you one thing
We're better together
Sleep did not come easily to Lorelai that night, regardless of how exhausted she had felt before leaving the hospital. Her giant honeymoon sweet seemed to loom over her, and in the dark, all the gaudy furniture pieces looked like evil men lurking in the moonlight. She wanted desperately to go back to the hospital and sleep in that orange chair next to Luke. She reminisced about how easily she fell asleep after holding Luke's hand in hers and thought that if she went back it might be the same way. She wanted so desperately to sleep that when she did finally fall into the world of dreams, she was constantly greeted with fretful scenarios about missing alarms and Luke's bed being suddenly empty. In the worst nightmare that evening, she dreamt she had to run around the entire hospital searching for Luke with a full bladder. All the beds were empty and that annoying German nurse seemed to be waiting for her in every corner. The dream was so disturbing that she was convinced she'd been tricked into coming to Germany and Luke had never really been found.
When she awoke, her heart was pounding furiously, she was drenched in sweat, and her bladder was about to explode. To add to her discomfort, one of the twins was awake and kicking at her full bladder, making it so she almost missed getting to the bathroom in time. It was six am, and she returned to her bed to ease her weight for an hour more of restless, worrying thoughts. She wanted to get up, to head to the hospital, to see Luke, but something stopped her from moving. So she laid there for an hour, consumed with constant negative thoughts.
It was eight when Lorelai arrived at the hospital, feeling even more anxious than she did the day before. She tried to brush it off, knowing that Luke was fine up there on the fourth floor. He was alive; she'd seen him. But she couldn't shake the feeling and resolved to see his face as soon as her feet could take her to him. That at least would loosen that ball of anxiety coiled tightly in her gut. Hopefully, it would also calm the restless babies inside of her who were currently engaged in a kickboxing match.
When she got to four-hundred and fifty-two, she found the door ajar and knew she had been right. In that moment she hated being right. She took a steadying breath and pushed through the door. The second grim sign was the fact that Luke's bed was gone from the room, and the third: Sean was awake and rubbing a shaky hand across his forehead.
"Sean," Lorelai said with a waver in her voice. "Where's Luke?"
Sean McCann met her worried gaze, as if seeing her for the first time, and exhaled forcefully. "He wasn't here when I woke up."
"Did they—"
"Mrs. Danes?" a man said from behind her, cutting off her question. Lorelai spun around and looked at the doctor with some relief. She didn't even notice that the doctor had assumed she was Luke's wife.
"Where's Luke?" she asked, her voice still tremoring. She placed both of her shaky hands on her womb and noticed the room had started to spin.
"Why don't you sit down?" the doctor said as he grabbed her arm to help her to the ugly orange chair before she fainted. "Are you feeling okay?"
"I think … just … a minute?" Lorelai asked him, strained. The doctor nodded and pulled up a second chair across from her. "Actually, please just tell me … Is he okay?"
"Oh, I'm sorry, your husband!" the doctor said, rising. He walked brisky to the doorway and pulled Luke's chart from a cubby on the wall. "He's fine," he told her as he read. "He was brought up to x-ray this morning. His orthopedist wanted to check out his leg again. He should be back any minute."
Lorelai sagged back in the chair and let out an enormous breath of air. "Okay, Doctor, you really need to lead with that next time," she groused, almost laughing.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Danes. I'm actually not here for Sergeant Danes."
"Lorelai. You can call me Lorelai if you'd like. Doctor…?"
"Fonzeratti."
"Fonzeratti? Sounds an awful lot like..." Lorelai said, unable to prevent a smile from lighting her face.
"It's all been done, believe me," the doctor told her dryly. "The soldiers in particular like to shout, 'Aaaayyy!' to me whenever I walk by their beds."
Lorelai chuckled, trying to shake away the dregs of anxiety that had settled around her that morning.
"I spoke to your mother, Mrs. Gilmore, a few days ago over the phone. She had asked that I give you an exam when you arrived. I'm sorry I couldn't make it over yesterday."
"You're the obstetrician?"
"Well, the closest thing to an OB that a military hospital can have. I have an appointment in a few minutes, but would you be able to stop by my office later today?"
"Oh, right, of course," Lorelai agreed easily, resting her hands on her womb. Both Lorelai and Dr. Fonzeratti turned their heads when Luke was wheeled back into the room, looking irate and uncomfortable.
"Two o'clock?" The doctor asked, then slipped out of the room at Lorelai's nod.
Lorelai struggled to stand from the chair and moved over to Luke's newly restored bedside. Luke was rubbing a hand over his forehead, trying to regulate his breathing.
"All right, babe?" Lorelai asked him, petting his other arm.
"Yeah, fine," Luke told her succinctly, forcing a smile for her benefit. Lorelai just rose her eyebrows in question.
"Just, the damn x-ray tech. Idiot almost broke my leg again. It was not pleasant."
"Oh, I'm sorry. Your leg hurts?" Lorelai asked with a frown.
"It's starting to feel better," he grumbled. "I'm sorry," he exhaled. "Good morning," he continued, this time with a genuine smile and a tug on her arm. Lorelai bent to peck him on the lips and plopped back down into the orange chair.
It was Luke's turn to raise his eyebrows in question, and Lorelai sighed. "You weren't here this morning when I got in. I may have freaked a little."
"A lot-a-mundo," Sean piped in, in a sotto voice, startling both Luke and Lorelai as they had forgotten he was there. When Lorelai glared at him, he shrugged and said, "Aaaayyy..." with a goofy grin on his face.
"I'll have what he's having," Luke said to the room with a confused look on his face.
Love is the answer,
At least for most of the questions in my heart
Like why are we here? And where do we go?
And how come it's so hard?
It's not always easy and
Sometimes life can be deceiving
I'll tell you one thing it's always better when we're together
"Was your blood pressure high before you left the states?" Dr. Fonzeratti asked Lorelai who was seated upon an exam table in a hospital gown.
"Dr. Blackwell had mentioned that it was slightly elevated, but not enough to worry," Lorelai told him, almost despondently, trying to force a smile. "It's higher?"
"It's cause for some concern, especially with a multiple pregnancy at twenty-two weeks since you're at risk for preeclampsia. Have you had any other children?"
"My daughter, Rory, but it was twenty years ago," she told him, her feet swinging nervously back and fourth below the table.
"And you're thirty-six?"
"Yeah, thirty-seven in April," Lorelai responded slowly, her heart rate increasing.
"Okay, I can still clear you to fly back home, for now. But come to see me again tomorrow and we'll keep an eye on it. We might have to cut your trip short to ensure that you and the twins can arrive back home safely."
"Oh," Lorelai said, stunned. "Okay."
"Make sure to take it easy while you're here. Don't push yourself or lift anything and make sure to leave every evening so you can get about ten hours in bed at night. I'll have one of my nurses send a more comfortable chair up to Sergeant Danes' room, and you call me immediately if you experience any discomfort. I'd also like a urine sample to check your protein levels, but Jean can help you with that before you head back downstairs."
It's always better when we're together
We'll look at them stars when we're together
Yeah, it's always better when we're together
"He was just worried because my blood pressure is elevated," Lorelai explained to Luke. She was seated on the side of his hospital bed and had his hand clasped tightly in her own.
"Are you worried, Lorelai?" Luke asked her, curious to know what she thought.
Lorelai was only able to nod in response, then she crumbled before him. The tears she had been holding at bay all morning fell swiftly from her eyes, and she leaned towards Luke to place her head on his shoulder.
"Hey, hey," he soothed. "We made it this far," he told her. "We can do anything now."
"I think … I think I hurt them," she told him softly. "When we thought … When they told us … It was awful, I wasn't supposed to get … I couldn't help it," she cried.
"Hey, come on, if anyone hurt them, it wasn't you," Luke insisted, rubbing her back, his own muscles going tense.
"No." Lorelai shook her head forcefully as she pulled back. "You didn't do anything wrong, Luke!"
"Lorelai," Luke said softly before swallowing and wiping the tears from her cheeks. "If anything happened to you or those babies, I ... I'd never forgive myself."
"Luke," came Lorelai's barely audible response.
Taking in a giant lungful of air, Luke continued, unable to meet her eyes. "I know you were supposed to stay for a week ... Maybe it's best if you go home sooner, just to be on the safe side."
"You know I'd much rather stay with you," Lorelai said, looking down at her hands clasped in his.
"You have no idea how happy it makes me to hear you say that," Luke responded huskily.
A corner of Lorelai's mouth quirked up, and she raised an eyebrow at him.
"Some days, I wake up from a dream about ... about buying your basket and having a picnic in the gazebo and you walking away," he explained, almost in an awed whisper. "And I wake up and think, 'Wow, she really loves me. That girl is mine.'" Luke finished, the corners of his own lips lifting upwards.
Lorelai looked down coyly before her eyes met his. Her grip tightened. "I'll call my mother," she said sadly. Luke merely nodded, gulping as he squeezed his fingers around hers.
