8. Tree
I leaned my arms against the railing and looked out to the expanse of sloping foothills; beyond it was the craggy mountain range, halfway lost in mist. The view was wide, so wide, I felt my lungs expanding just taking it all in. The foothills baked in the mid-morning sun, appearing to scorch in various shades of brown—tannish, chocolatey-ish, sienna. This barren palette was punctuated by clusters of dark green, nearly black foliage. Trees, probably. Redwood? I don't know, never actually having seen a redwood before. From this distance, they looked very small, like bushes.
This landscape is unlike anything I've ever seen in New England, where autumn meant orange, yellow, maple gold. Quite unlike anything I've ever seen in this country, period. It was amazing.
The Santa Cruz mountains. And over there, the San Mateo bridge. Santa Cruz, San Mateo. I rolled the names around in my mouth. Palo Alto. They seemed foreign, and as all foreign things, heralded something new or unexpected. My heart was beating rapidly, pumped up in adrenaline, with the excitement and uncertainty of it all.
I was on the viewing deck of the Hoover Tower. Somewhere 250 feet below me, students dotted the Oval. Reading, lying on their backs soaking in the sun, playing frisbee. That was a more familiar sight. Being back in University grounds felt easy, like fitting into a worn-out, comfy glove. I couldn't wait to check out the Cecil Green library.
"Are you a student here, or are you just visiting?"
The voice to my left broke my reverie, and I saw a tall, wiry, bespectacled man leaning casually against the wall beside me. There was a backpack on the floor by his feet. He looked like a student.
"I, uh…I've been going around the campus. First time," I said vaguely, rubbing my palms against my bare arms. And then I said with more conviction, "But yes, I'm a student here. So no…not just visiting. I hope to stay longer." I hope to stay. For as long as he does.
"Not too long, though," the man laughed. "I've been in Stanford for six years; they're about ready to boot me out." He stared at me, and I looked slightly away. "So it was nice watching someone who seemed to be seeing all this for the first time." He gestured to the view in front of us. "Beautiful, isn't it?"
"Yes it is."
"Do you want to go grab a cup of---"
Before he can finish the question, I gave him a serene smile and drifted past him towards the steps to the top of the tower. According to my visitor's map, the carillon of 48 bells on top of Hoover tower was cast in Belgium. On the largest bell is inscribed, "For Peace Alone Do I Ring."
For peace alone do I ring. Later today, or tomorrow—very soon—I'll be seeing Logan. The prospect stilled my heart and quieted my questions at last. In my mind, I heard the bells ringing for me.
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"There you go, Miss…" The woman with the short cap of curly hair looked at the form in her hand. "…Gilmore," she finished, handing me my receipt and registration form. "Looks like you're all set for the Fall term."
"Thank you," I replied, shifting the heavy mailbag slung across my torso. It was crammed with my laptop and freshly-purchased supplies: yellow and green highlighters, pens, notebook paper, two spiral-bound folders of required readings for a couple of my courses. New term, new beginning. I always looked forward to this.
"Oh, and have you checked out our graduate housing yet? They're usually filled up by this time, but it's worth trying anyway. Some students withdraw or find some other place to stay."
"Oh, um…okay, I'll do that." I hadn't looked into any housing at all, whether on or off-campus. Maybe I should; I shouldn't be so presumptious after all. My stomach clenched at the thought of having to look for my own accommodations. Coming all the way here, and possibly having to live on my own after all. I mentally added "Housing" to my lengthening list of things to do. As I stepped out of McClatchy Hall, I ran down my registration form, for the nth time.
Department of Communication
Graduate Program in Journalism
Lorelai Leigh Gilmore
210-76-4902
Autumn Quarter 2007
Comm 273 – Public Issues Reporting I (4)
Comm 225 – Perspectives on American Journalism (4)
Comm 216 – Journalism Law (4)
Comm 291 – Graduate Journalism Seminar (1)
Everything was in place. Now if only they had a "Getting Your Boyfriend Back After Walking Out On Him (While He Slept) 101", then my head would be, too. I felt light-headed; my sense of peace on top of Hoover Tower all but shattering once I found myself back on the ground, down to the patchy green-brown earth. It didn't help that I was suffering from the toxic combination of caffeine withdrawal and jetlag. Nor have I found the time to scope out the good coffee places in and around campus. Sixteen hours in the West coast, and I was feeling distinctly un-acclimatized.
I paused to sit under a shadowy archway of a sandstone building, and fished out my phone from my jeans pocket. I was sorely tempted to call Lorelai. Her mindless histrionics over my 8-week absence would be a welcome distraction, a reprieve from the anxiety wrought by my all-important mission. She would probably dog me about stalking Tiger Woods if she found out I was in Stanford. Or she might be stunned enough into silence to find out I had turned down the Times and gone back to school. While it might be worthwhile just hearing dead air at the other end of a call to my mother, I desisted, stuffing my phone back in my pocket and lying on my bag on the cool floor.
I promised myself (promised him, in my mind) that Logan would be the first person to know of my current whereabouts, where I've finally decided to plant myself. I owe him that.
Besides, I wasn't quite ready to be interrogated by Mom. How it was that I turned my back on my childhood dream, resigned from Clio, and went to Stanford. (Grandpa would be turning over his grave at my treachery of Yale, I imagine, if I hadn't spent a whole month in Fez paying him tribute.) As far away as possible from everything and everyone I've known and loved, the road ahead was suddenly, startlingly clear to me. But that's the kind of revelation that is difficult to put in words; in the end, it's just something you know.
The endless campaign trail, the snow in New York; Lane's pregnant belly, and Grandpa's deathbed; Hillary Clinton, and my stomach ache from Mitchum's steak. My avocado plant. Every thought, every memory, every feeling, every dream led me to Logan. I knew that to be true. But to anyone else, it seems trite perhaps. Too poetic. Not substantial enough a reason for me to shift gears in my journalism career. Hugo wouldn't buy it, and the Times certainly wouldn't either, which is why I told both that I still needed to hone my craft and figure out what kind of writer I wanted to be, what niche I wanted to occupy before settling down to any one paper. That was true, too. I knew from my experience in Obama's campaign that I wasn't cut out to be a political journalist, whereas my foray into feature and opinion writing still left me with a vague sense of discontent, and an OJA nomination I felt I didn't fully deserve. Were those substantial enough reasons for my change in direction? For taking that other path in the fork in the road? I don't know. I expect many—my mother included—would be surprised, or disapprove.
But here's another revelation: I no longer care—or perhaps that's too strong a word—it no longer matters as much to me what others think. My only hope, as I lay on the floor on one of Stanford's hallowed halls, is that my presence is substantial enough proof to the one person whose opinion mattered the most. Every thought, every memory, every feeling, every dream led me back to you.
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"Here we go," Rory whispered, facing the frosted glass doors that simply bore the name HELIX.
"Well go on, now is not the time to wilt. You've never looked so green, so alive!" Rory muttered again, in encouragement.
A couple of faceless people passed her, a quizzical look in their eyes as they looked askance at the potted avocado she held. Impatient, they jostled ahead of her and pushed the door open themselves. As they did so, Rory caught a glimpse of the interior—the red couch in what looked to be a receiving area, a dirty-blonde woman wearing an earpiece, her loud voice fading away as the door once again swung shut. And Logan—was that him in the blue shirt that had caught her eye for the most fleeting of milliseconds?
She entered the premises, the pot held firmly against her stomach, the wayward leaves of the avocado brushing against her face. And she simply stood in her spot for several moments, slightly agog at being smack dab in the middle of one of Silicon Valley's fastest-rising companies. (Earlier, she was thrilled enough to find out that Macintosh was just a stone's—apple's?—throw away.) Instead of offices, there were open carrels, each dominated by a huge computer workstation. People were leaning casually against or hanging their heads and arms over the neighboring cubicles chatting with their co-workers. No one was dressed more formally than a button-down with rolled-up sleeves; nearly everyone wore jeans. Until she saw it, Rory would never have imagined Logan working in such a place. But apparently he did, and she realized with a pang how little she still knew of his life in the last year-and-a-half.
"Hey there," a blonde man in a blue t-shirt walked up to her. Not Logan after all, she thought with a mixture of relief and disappointment. "You looking for someone?" He wore a winsome smile, the kind that was meant to send many a young intern or receptionist's heart a-flutter.
"Yes. Is…is Logan Huntzberger around?"
Her question was greeted with a quiet guffaw behind the receptionist's desk, and the man rolled his eyes heavenward. "Why do I even bother to ask?" he muttered. "Um, yes, he's around. Sandy, she's all yours," he called out to the dirty-blonde receptionist. "I'm Mike, by the way, and if ever you need…"
"Give it a rest, Mike," Sandy drawled, her chin in her hand.
"Oh, Mike!" Rory exclaimed in pleasant surprise. At Mike's raised eyebrows, she struggled to explain. "I've heard a lot about you…"
Mike shot a look at Sandy, as if to say, See? "And you are…?"
"Rory. Rory Gilmore."
"Nice to meet you. I hope to see a lot more of you around here. Although if Logan has anything to do with it, I doubt it. No woman that comes around here looking for him—and that's plenty—is ever seen a second time. It's a mystery. I suspect he zaps them into our virtual world and keeps them all to himself." He winks, hardly noticing Rory's fallen face. "It has distorted the gender balance here in Palo Alto. You've been duly warned—so I do hope to see you again," he said, loping away.
Rory couldn't tell what it was that made her chest tighten painfully—the fact that Logan apparently had not mentioned her name at all to his partner and good friend, or the fact that women come around looking for him often enough for it to be a part of office culture, office humor. Even Sandy seemed bored by it all.
"Honey, is that plant for Logan? How—original. You want me to go leave it on his desk for ya? I'm afraid he's out for the rest of the afternoon for a series of meetings." She looked—almost sincerely—apologetic, her thick eyeliner slightly runny.
"Oh. No, it…it's okay." She was feeling increasingly crestfallen by the second. She placed the pot on Sandy's desk, ignoring her affronted look. Rory took a breath, as if to steel herself, and asked, "May I please have his home address, then?"
Sandy knew that was coming next. She could read and predict these women who fawn all over Logan to a 98 percent certainty. A request for some alternative or secret phone number should follow. "Sorry dear, I'm not permitted to give you that information."
Damn. It was now or never. She couldn't bear to live another day in this city, breathing the same air as he, without seeing him. "Would that be the office policy?"
"That would be the Logan policy," Sandy said matter-of-factly.
"The Logan policy?"
Sandy looked at the Rory-person with growing pity. She obviously expected something else entirely. Perhaps Logan Huntzberger himself coming out to greet her with open arms, professing his undying love and fidelity and all that crap. Another one bites the dust, she thought, quoting her beloved Freddie Mercury. Although this one seemed different, not quite "another one". She was as beautiful as the rest of them, but she looked like she didn't know it, or was unaffected by it. She wore jeans and flats, a pretty white blouse. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail; it was the luscious brown color that Sandy had been dying to have hers dyed in for the last 25 years (upsettingly, it always ended up a dirty-blonde). So maybe it was the hair—she felt an affinity to it. And the eyes. They nagged at her for some reason.
"He just doesn't like any woman coming to his place, honey," Sandy said with greater gentleness. "It applies to all, so don't take it personally. In fact, the sooner you don't take things personally, the better for you and whatever thing you have with him. He's just…he's just the way he is." She spoke as if she possessed the font of knowledge on Logan.
What Logan and I have…does that qualify as a "thing"? Rory simply looked at Sandy, her blue eyes wide. She felt the familiar burning in her throat which she recognized as jealousy, and valiantly tried to douse it with tiny trickles of relief that Logan still kept some measure of himself apart from them. Even if it was just his apartment.
"But I'm not just any wom…" she stammered to say, under her breath.
"Mother of God!" Sandy exclaimed unexpectedly, slapping her palm on her desk and nudging the potted plant a fraction with the force. "You, Are, The, One!" she wagged a finger at Rory accusingly, triumphantly.
From just anyone, to the one, Rory was thoroughly confused at Sandy's reaction to her. "Whatever. Listen, I'll come back first thing tomorrow morning." She hefted her plant back in her arms. "Please don't tell him I dropped by. Please."
"You're the one," Sandy said again, stopping her from leaving. "The one that broke him. Broke his heart." She said it plainly.
And it was true. "Yes," Rory said simply. "That would be me."
"Well then. I guess that changes things a bit. Now I'm laying my job on the line here, missy…" She grabbed a post-it and scribbled an address. "I figure you have something to say to him, hm? Here you go, before I change my mind."
Rory clasped the tiny square in her fingers, crumpling it a bit. "How did you know…me?" she asked. Might there be a photograph of me stashed somewhere in his desk?
"Your eyes, dear. And I've seen that look before, ya know? His eyes have that look, too." She shrugged her shoulders. "Like you've both been kinda sad for a long time."
Rory unconsciously put her fingers to the corner of her eye, wonderingly. Then she said, "He's told me a lot about you, too." Sandy smiled at that, looking thrilled. And I would prefer that you desist from pinching his butt, from here on out, she added inwardly
As she pushed the door open to exit, Sandy called out to Rory, "Maybe that plant will do the trick, honey."
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424 Seneca Street, 424 Seneca Street. I kept the address in mind, like a mantra, as I drove down tree-lined streets, passing old-style lamposts and children playing on front lawns. My hands were clammy, and stiff from gripping the steering wheel too hard. Damned GPS. I should have taken the bus.I had taken several wrong turns. Getting lost, on top of my headache, my busy morning at Stanford, and the unpleasant discoveries at Helix, have reduced my nerves to a cold mass of spaghetti noodles. I'm just about ready to lose it. Not the best frame of mind to be in to see Logan.
428…426…424. I parallel-parked along the curb. Across the street was a cream-colored bungalow. The roof was reddish-orange, and shingled; some crawling vine had covered it in parts and spilled over the front, ending in a hanging tangle of yellow and white flowers that almost kissed the overgrown grass and weeds. Compared to its neighbors, it looked relatively lifeless, though quaint, in a way, like some house in the woods that found its way to suburbia. A yellow rubber ball was lodged beside the mailbox, all but forgotten. A house. I wasn't sure what I expected—an apartment building, a bachelor pad, a loft downtown perhaps. Not a house, in a street where children played.
"There it is," I murmured to my avocado plant on the passenger seat beside me, as if in introduction. As I sat in wait in the dipping afternoon sunlight, I suddenly felt overcome with fatigue, and along with it, doubt. I bent my arms and head over the steering wheel. I won't ask you to wait for me, I had written to him. And perhaps he didn't. He might have had a line of women (heck, if Mike and Sandy were to be believed, a whole town of them). He might have grown tired of my vacillation—swinging back and forth and back again. He might have thought, mistakenly (very mistakenly), that I left because I didn't want to be with him. He might have come to hate me, might not have understood. He might have moved on, finally.
And here I was again, trying to get back in his life.
This was the end of the road for me. There was no place else I should be. I was certain of it, of myself. But I don't know how it is for Logan.
I wiped my tears with the back of my hand and checked my face in the rearview mirror. The original plan was to be bold and brave, face him squarely, me and my plant. But now it seemed brash and naïve, like that time in New York. You never thought to ask whether I want you back in mine. I faltered. Perhaps I should give him some time.
As I crossed the street, I wondered whether I should leave it by the front door. Instinctively, though, I knew he hardly used it; it looked permanently closed off. Pretty though, it had a small stained glass circle embedded in the dark wood. Besides, in the flurry of weeds and overhanging flowers, my avocado would literally be lost.
So I shuffled around the house, holding my avocado plant against my hip and opening the small gate that led to the back. Just leave the pot by the back door, then leave. Sleep. Tomorrow is another day. And if he doesn't discover it any time soon, well then I'll just pray to the gods of guacamole to preserve it and surrender my plant (and my heart) to the elements. Let nature take its course.
But what I saw around the bend made me stop short, and nearly made me drop my pot.
Like the front, Logan's backyard was unkempt and ill-maintained, littered with dried leaves and bramble from seasons past. But it did contain one thing that stood sturdily and quietly amidst the brown mulch and the graying sky.
An avocado tree.
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Logan picked up the yellow rubber ball from the ground, as he opened his mailbox to gather his mail. Charlie would be looking for this, he thought, throwing it easily onto the neighboring lawn to his right. He tiredly scratched the nape of his neck as he surveyed his own front lawn, making a mental note to talk to Brian Shanahan this weekend. Maybe he'll do it for twenty—maybe for free—if Logan gives him those long-promised tips on wooing Amber Stuart as a date for the end-of-summer neighborhood barbecue. Or maybe he should just go ahead and buy a damned lawn mower. Or maybe he should just move. He was too busy, too alone, to be keeping house.
Shutting the front door behind him, Logan dropped his laptop bag and strode through the dim living room straight to the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator to grab a beer, but not before pausing to touch the lone item posted on the refrigerator door with a magnet. A postcard from Fez, dated five weeks old. Dearest Logan, did you know that Fez is the largest car-free urban center in the world? He took a swig of beer, looking blankly out the window over the sink. Tomorrow, I go to Casablanca. My mother would never forgive me if I don't. He would have to check his email that night; Sandy had left a message on his cell that some people had dropped by the office to see him. I think about you everyday, every minute of everyday. He supposed he should have some dinner, even though he wasn't hungry. Love always, Rory.
A slight movement in his backyard caught the corner of his eye, and his brain automatically switched to vigilant mode. The sun had just set, casting the air in grayish twilight. And there, underneath the shadow of his avocado tree, something appeared to be huddled. Some animal?
He went out the back and down the two steps, bending to pick up a dried branch to shoo the animal away with. Foxes and raccoons created a mess around these parts (not that he really cared, but his neighbors did). But as he walked cautiously closer, it dawned on him that it wasn't an animal. A human figure lying in slumber, her knees drawn up to her chest, her fingers grasping her sweater close.
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Rory was here. In his backyard. Under the avocado tree. Asleep.
There was something faintly absurd in the idea, dreamlike. He was sitting on the ground beside her sleeping form, gently hitting the back of his head against the trunk of the tree. He turned to quietly observe her, this woman who eluded him the past eight or so weeks, eluded him the past year-and-a-half. She lay on her right side, her right fist curled under her cheek. Her mouth was slightly open, and she breathed evenly, deeply. He was loathe to disturb what looked like very deep sleep. Jetlag, he supposed. Her feet touched his leg, and of their own accord, his hands took both her feet and lay them on his lap. The exposed skin was cold, and he rubbed it gently with his palms. He traced a faint bluish-green vein that snaked across one foot.
He didn't know how he felt. But something that had been bottled within him seemed to be struggling to get out—some semblance of hope? The beginnings of happy? No, not yet, he fought back, breathing hard. Not until you hear what she's come all the way here to say.
Unwittingly, the ministrations of his hands on her feet warmed Rory, roused her enough to drowsy wakefulness. Her eyelids were heavy, but opened a fraction to the blurry view of Logan sitting up beside her, contemplating her feet on his lap. His blonde hair was messy, as usual, ruffled by wind and hand. The relief of seeing him made her tear up, and she drank him in from under half-closed lids.
"Logan?" she finally croaked, her voice hoarse from sleep.
Logan looked at her as she sat up; dried leaves were stuck to her hair, her sweater. She looked as if she belonged here, all this time, under her tree. "Rory."
The exchange of names seemed to break their mutual dreamlike state. Forgetting her well-rehearsed introduction, Rory instinctively knelt closer to Logan, touching her cheek to his and slipping one hand against his neck. "I'm so sorry. Logan, I'm so sorry for all the hurt I've caused you," she murmured. She kissed his cheek, his nose, his chin. "I missed you so much," she said. She was crying quietly.
It seemed weak, Logan thought, as he gathered Rory on his lap and held her tightly against his chest. To give in again and again; to love her still all this time. But with her in his arms he felt strong. Like he could risk his heart again and again for her.
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"So. What brings you to my part of the world?" He dropped one last kiss on her upturned mouth. It had become darker still, but they seemed to glow with their own light. If only they could do away with words, as they did away with light.
You, Rory thought automatically. Instead, she blurted out, "School."
"School?"
"I entered a grad program in journalism."
"So you turned down the Times." Logan whistled low. "Wow. That's major, coming from you. Did you quit Clio, too?"
"Yes."
"Because…you love…school," he mocked her a little, but felt more than a little crushed at the reason she cited for being in Palo Alto.
"Right, I do. Love school." Since she had stupidly mentioned it first, she plowed ahead with it. "I thought it a good time to step back and explore what kind of writer I can best become. Try to be better, you know, now that I've had a year of 'real-world' experience under my belt." She awkwardly played with the buttons on his shirt.
"But Stanford? There are better programs out there. Columbia, for instance. Or Northwestern. Either of those two are right up your alley, geographically speaking." Damn it. School?
"Yeah, well. Stanford is Daniel Pearl's alma mater, though. In keeping with the world's obsession with Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt."
"Rory," Logan sighed tiredly, pushing her slightly away from him so her butt slid from his lap and landed on the ground. "Look. It's good that you seem to have figured out your next step, career-wise. But why are you here, in my house, or in Stanford, when you could have gone someplace else? So you've given up the Times and your other options to move all the way to the other side of the continent. That's huge, and I need you to just answer me—what are you doing? Do I have anything at all to do with this?" he finally asked plaintively, giving her a sidelong glance, before looking away again. "And I can do without all the quippy remarks or the cryptic notes and postcards, because I've had a very long da…year."
Duly chastised, Rory moved so she sat beside him shoulder to shoulder. She tried to recall the things she had thought about, things she needed to tell him, but had wanted to childishly entrust her avocado plant to say in her behalf.
"Logan," she began, "when you asked me to marry you a year ago, I told you that…that my future was wide open, and that marrying you would make it less so. See, I thought that was the important thing—to have many options and have all these unknown possibilities to explore. I thought the more choices I had, the more successful I'd be, the luckier I am. Kind of like Paris—who was accepted in Harvard and Yale and Princeton. I envied her. And if I moved with you here…I was afraid that would limit my options. And all these people who wanted me to have all these options—my mom, my grandparents—I was afraid I would let them down, too."
Logan remained silent, reliving Rory's graduation day, looking up through the now black leaves that shielded the view of the sky.
"And then at some point—when I realized I was utterly miserable without you—I thought or I wanted to believe I can have both. Have you and my career; have it all. How archaic after all, to think that a woman in this day and age would have to sacrifice one for the other. I can pursue my dreams, can't I, and be in a relationship with you at the same time. That would have been perfect. That would have been real Hillary-like." Rory shook her head, as if the idea was still stuck, somehow, and she needed to shake it off. "And it seemed possible, Logan, everytime we were together, it seemed easy. But what happened at your parents' house—what you were ready to do for me, I wasn't ready to accept, after all. You were making a sacrifice, and I didn't think either of us were supposed to."
She cleared her throat, swiped at the tears that were falling fast again. She must get through this without snivelling too much. "So I was wrong on both counts, Logan. What I've learned—I think I've learned that there is a big difference between having many choices and making a choice. We have to choose, all the time; everything has its trade-off. And so there's really no such thing as 'having it all'. What we end up having are the consequences of the choices we make. That's what we have to live with, what would make us happy or not."
Rory shifted, sitting on her heels and turning half-way to face Logan's profile. "So. I've made the choice now, finally. I've chosen what is essential in my life, essential to my happiness and the happiness of the one I love. And you know, the truth is that it really has limited my options—but necessarily so—and I accept that. I cannot work in New York—no; I cannot be in Chicago, or anywhere else for that matter. I can no longer think about furthering my career, without factoring you in. You may call it 'sacrifice', but that seems so negative, doesn't it? Like I'm giving up something precious. When really, I've chosen the most precious thing of all."
She had unconsciously been gathering up dried leaves in her fist, plucking them out in bits and shreds as she said her piece, until there was one left in her hand.
"Rory—" Logan said, finally looking at her. He might have been crying too, she thought, though it was too dark to see. "I don't know what to say."
"As usual," Rory said lightly, as Logan pulled her closely in his embrace again. "My profundity has rendered you speechless."
"I love you," he simply said against her hair. "Thank you for being here."
"That will do for now." Rory smiled against his full and earnest kiss, their cheeks wet with wonder at the gift of love and time, bringing them full-circle to where they would have begun the year before.
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After a while, Logan spoke. "So grad school. Was that ever part of some plan? A Rory-in-Five-Years To Do list?"
"Yeah, sometime, somewhere, I would have gone back to school. I think this is a good time. You're the reason I'm in Stanford, though—don't think I just happened to be here because of that. Being accepted in the Journ program was lucky; my application was late as it is. It's the icing on the cake, the…just the tip of the icing even, the wick—the dripping wax of the birthday candle." She nuzzled the side his neck, leaving a trail of kisses from ear to collarbone.
"You just compared Stanford to dripping candle wax. I'm increasingly amazed at your eloquence."
"Well, it would take more to impress me. More than the fact that Sandra Day O' Connor, Scott Turow, or Fred Savage are among its stellar alumni."
"Wonder Years' Fred Savage? You mean he's actually graduated? From college? Damn, I feel old."
"Although Logan," Rory gripped the front his shirt excitedly, and Logan groaned inwardly at the sudden loss of her arms around his neck. "You should see my subjects. I have Digital Journalism next term, and something called Democracy, the Press, and Public Opinion. And I have to admit the Bing Wing of the Green library is amazing. Huge daylight, incredible views of Santa Cruz all around…and the books! I could camp out in those cozy chairs all day, buried under the books."
"Do they smell as good as the books in Yale, though?" Logan asked seriously.
Rory ignored him, continuing to regale him with trivial factoids she had discovered about Stanford and Palo Alto since arriving the previous day, which were much more than he had learned from being a resident for the last year-and-a-half. (The Grateful Dead and Condoleeza Rice, for instance, both hail from Palo Alto. Who knew? Only Rory.)
"Hey Ace," Logan spoke at a lull in conversation, during which they had both managed to lie on the ground, languidly seeking and touching skin revealed in the spaces between buttons, under the untucked hems of shirts. "I think it's time we go inside. It does get colder. Even in California."
Rory caught her breath as the pads of Logan's fingers reached the underside of her breast. "I kind of like it here," she said dreamily, looking up at the canopy of leaves. "Is this house—is this…the tree? My tree?"
"I don't know about it being your tree," Logan replied, raising himself on an elbow and looking down at her blue eyes, her hair the color of the leaves spread out around her. "I kind of like guacamole."
"No you don't."
"No I don't," he amended sheepishly. "But yes, this was to be—is—our house." Our house. The hair on his arms stood on end.
"But Logan," Rory protested. "It must be costing you a fortune to pay for this!" For another trivial thing she knew about Palo Alto was the astronomical cost of housing.
"Yeah. But I had signed the contract and paid the downpayment even before I went back to New Haven to propose to you. Stupid, but there it is. And I just…lived with it." He shrugged. "In the beginning, when I was so angry, living here fed that anger and served to remind me of the folly of loving too much, hoping too much."
Rory touched his cheek. "It would have been cheaper to just call Finn," she quipped.
"Then later on, after New York…it just reminded me of you. And I needed that." He took her hand and kissed the palm. "But yeah, I've been thinking of moving. Just a while ago, actually, when I thought my front yard and backyard had been overrun by weeds and wild animals."
"Wild animals, huh."
"Yup. I was about to beat one off with a stick. I'm glad I didn't—"
"Beat it with a stick? Me too, that would've been a pain."
"I'm glad I didn't move," he continued, looking over his shoulder at the house. "Do you like it?"
"It…uh, shows promise," Rory answered feebly, and gasped as Logan started poking at the ticklish spots at her waist. "I love it!" she corrected, "It has character!"
"Character???" Logan demanded, doubling his efforts. "'Character' is Finn's euphemism for ugly!"
"Stop! I like the front door. And that little gate leading here to the back. The overgrown flowers spilling from the roof. And this tree," she finished, gasping for breath. "But Logan, you don't even have a bed."
"We don't need a bed," he leered at her wolfishly, bending to kiss her ear.
"I mean, it's empty. You don't have furniture," she explained. "Oh wait—you do…there's a refrigerator, a TV, a stereo system—if you'd consider all that furniture—and a mattress. Which doesn't count as a bed."
"Actually, the Japanese refer to it as a futon, which does count as a bed. Were you snooping in the house?" he accused.
"I was only looking through the windows!" she protested. "I was intrigued, considering that the person who lives here, in such spartan accommodations, once had a walk-in closet that was larger and more tastefully furnished than my entire bedroom."
"Then you'd better get to work, little woman." He stood up, brushed off the dirt from his clothes, and bent to carry Rory in his arms. "I want you to cook, clean, and buy furniture," he wobbled slightly under her weight, before gaining his balance and striding to the back door. "Um, after your classes and papers and writing your Pulitzer prize-winning articles of course…"
"I'm game, but be careful what you ask for, or you've just committed yourself to a lifetime of frozen pizza," Rory replied, clutching at Logan's neck. "The movers are supposed to arrive in a couple of days with my things. And about five boxes of Grandpa's books," she added ruefully. "We have room?"
"Why do you think I didn't get any furniture?" Logan reasoned, as he carried Rory over the threshold.
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Rory's avocado plant remained at the foot of the back porch steps, ignored until the next morning. Contrary to Sandy's prediction, it wasn't quite the one that did the trick after all. But as a consequence of its discovery, Logan was embarrasingly late for work, and Rory overslept an extra hour from all the pleasant exertion.
Logan had stepped out the backyard to check on the chores he would have Brian Shanahan do that weekend. He surveyed the fallen leaves and overgrown weeds, then had noticed the potted plant at the bottom of the steps. There was a note that had been stuck in the dirt a fraction.
The note had given him a nasty sense of déjà vu, and though he felt stupid doing it, he went back to the bedroom to make sure. And there she was, on the phone with Lorelai, twisted into the blanket like a cocoon, a bare leg and arm sticking out as she blew him a kiss. Reassured, he had gone out again, sat on the steps and read her note.
What I've learned from growing a plant is that it doesn't need much. Just a few essentials that are necessary to sustain its life: a vigilant eye, a constant hand, and earth, water, sun, air. And what I know from loving you and being loved by you is how important you are in my life, as necessary as the earth, water, sun, air.
I grew this avocado plant in memory of what might have been our tree, our house, our life together. I'm giving it to you, a year-and-a-half later, that it might serve not just as a memory but possibly—if you accept it, accept me—the real beginning of a life together. We might never have that avocado tree, for I can't take anything back. But we're hoping, this avocado plant and I, that you might still have room in your heart for me to be planted, to grow, to love you.
Rory
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Author's Note: There is now just a brief Postlude that is yet to be written and posted. But I'm hoping this chapter is as satisfying enough an ending as one could hope for for Rory and Logan. I know this is the ending I can live and be happy with :). Let me know what you think. It was a pleasure writing; thank you so much for reading.