A/N: Thanks to all for your continued patience. I know I take forever between updates and for that I'm sorry. As always, many thanks go out to my betas, Ann and Pathwatch! You guys rock!

Comments always appreciated! They make me happy and I could certainly use a little more of that right about now. ;)

And now, on with the show...

"Richard," Emily chided. "For heaven's sake, take it easy! You heard what the doctor said."

"I'm well aware of what he said. But unless you plan to carry me up the stairs yourself, how do you propose I get up there?" Richard groused.

"Which is exactly why I think you should take the guest room downstairs. Lorelai," Emily said, glancing behind her. "Tell him he shouldn't be climbing stairs yet!"

"Nonsense," Richard grumbled before Lorelai could respond. He gripped the railing tighter as he continued the slow climb. "I can handle a few measly steps. I will not be treated like a guest in my own home."

"He's doing fine, Mom," Lorelai interjected, following a few steps behind them carrying a few pieces of their luggage across her shoulder. "As long as he goes slow, the doctor said he could climb stairs just fine. Plus, walking is good for him."

"Thank you, Lorelai," Richard said, turning to smile at her.

"Anytime, Dad," she replied, ignoring the glare she got from her mother. "So, what's on the agenda for tonight? Got any crazy shenanigans planned for your first night home? Drink 'til you drop? Pull a Tom Cruise, dance around in your underwear?"

"Honestly, Lorelai," Emily said as she helped steady Richard as he climbed the last step. "Richard is doing nothing except for getting into bed. Right, Richard?"

"Yes, Emily," he smiled indulgently at his wife, as he paused at the top of the stairs to catch his breath. "I'm going straight to bed." He turned to look back at Lorelai. "But I'm curious, why was Tom Cruise dancing in his underwear?"

"Stop encouraging her, Richard," Emily warned. "Or else she'll never stop."

"I don't know, Emily" Richard said with a smile towards his daughter. "She's kind of amusing at times. You know, we don't laugh nearly enough in this house."

Lorelai grinned as she hefted the bags higher on her shoulder. "Laughter is the best medicine, I hear."

"Yes, I think I've heard that somewhere, as well," Richard replied, giving his daughter a wink as she took his arm and they shuffled slowly towards the bedroom. Emily, forced to follow behind the pair, narrowed her eyes slightly at this change in rapport between the two.

-----

"Lorelai," Emily called out as she came downstairs a little later to see Lorelai gathering her coat. "I wanted to talk to you."

Lorelai checked her watch and sighed. She'd promised Michel she'd be back by 2 and it was already after 1.

"Mom, can this wait? I've got to get back to the Dragonfly."

"No, it can't. Come sit down, please." Emily gestured towards the living room. Lorelai reluctantly followed before taking a seat as Emily sat down across from her.

"Ok, Mom," Lorelai said dramatically. "I'm sitting. What's up?"

"I want to know what's going on," Emily stated and stared at her daughter expectantly.

"In…the world? 'Cause I think I heard something about a nasty war going on somewhere."

"Stop being cute, Lorelai. Where is Christopher?"

Lorelai tensed immediately. "He's — he's working."

"And when he gets done working? Where might I be able to reach him? If I call your house tonight, will I be able to talk to him?"

"Uh, well, he might be working late tonight. If you need him, I'd recommend his cell phone," Lorelai said quickly as she stood up. "Now, I really have to go. I promised Michel-"

"Sit. Down."

Just those words alone sent Lorelai back to this very spot 25 years ago, facing her mother's wrath after being caught sneaking back home in the middle of the night. She'd never forget that night, coming face to face with her furious and seething mother and the verbal lashing she'd received. It might not have deterred her from doing it again (and again), but she'd gotten smarter at least. She started using her bedroom window instead of the front door, for one. Though Lorelai might be taller and older, clearly not much had changed the past 25 years. She sat.

Seated across from each other, the two women shared a tense moment as they stared at one another, Emily's steely expression causing Lorelai to feel smaller and smaller with every second that passed. She shifted uncomfortably, finally breaking eye contact with a defeated sigh.

"You know, don't you?" Lorelai said, unable to stand the silence a moment longer as she absently picked at a loose thread on her skirt.

Emily pursed her lips, her glare intensifying. "I know Christopher has been spending an awful lot of time at Francine's house this past week. I know other than the flower arrangement that was sent to the hospital with his name on the card, we haven't heard a single word from him. I know you've been extremely careful to not even mention his name since your father's heart attack. I know you've been fighting. And when I mentioned him to Rory last night when she called, she suddenly had to study."

Lorelai closed her eyes as she sat back against the cushions. "I'm sorry, Mom. I'm not purposely trying to keep you in the dark-"

Emily huffed in disbelief. "Oh please, Lorelai. You've spent your entire life perfecting that very thing."

Lorelai couldn't help but flinch at her mother's words, mainly because she couldn't deny what was said. "I'm sorry, Mom," she repeated. "I honestly don't mean to hurt you, it's just-"

"Spare me the heartfelt explanation," Emily interrupted again. "I'm not in the mood to listen to your excuses about what a terrible mother I am. I simply want to know whether my daughter is still married to our granddaughter's father."

"Technically," Lorelai said after a moment, emphasizing the word. "Yes."

"But you're not living together?"

Lorelai swallowed thickly. "No."

"I see."

"We tried," Lorelai started to explain before Emily put her hand up to stop her from continuing.

"I don't want to hear your lies right now. The truth is, you didn't try. Has it even been 3 months? That is so far beyond trying, I can't even believe you of all people would try to convince me otherwise. Oh wait, I take that back. I do believe you would."

"Mom, that's not fair!" Lorelai exclaimed, sitting up straight. "You don't know anything about what we tried or didn't try!" Lorelai said, her voice beginning to rise.

"Maybe I'd know a little more if you, just once in awhile, filled me in on what is going on in that head of yours!"

"Maybe I would if you didn't immediately treat everything that I do tell you with contempt and disappointment!"

"Your father and I have done the best we knew how to with you. All we asked in return was for a little respect."

Lorelai laughed harshly. "Oh please, Mother. The last thing you wanted was respect! You wanted someone you could mold into mini versions of yourself. Someone who said 'Yes, ma'am, yes, sir,' day in and day out. Yet you had no respect for me and for what I wanted out of life!"

"Lorelai, I am not going to fight with you about this, not now," Emily said, rubbing her fingers against her temple. "Especially not now, with your father asleep upstairs recovering from a heart attack barely a week old. And please, keep your voice down. You're going to wake him up and the last thing he needs is stress."

Lorelai took a steadying breath, staring up at the ceiling. She silently counted to five.

"Getting married, it was a mistake. I knew it was a mistake the second it happened. Christopher knew it as well but we both tried to deny it. But once we both admitted it, there was no way we could stay together. No amount of counseling was going to fix something that never existed in the first place."

"Then why in the world would you do such a foolish thing if you felt that way? "

"I don't know!" Lorelai cried, throwing her hands helplessly in the air. "That's the $64,000 question, isn't it?"

"You don't know why you married a man you've spent the past two decades refusing? To the point if your father or I even mention his name, it was almost guaranteed to end in a fight with you storming out the door?" Emily asked, disbelief clearly evident in her voice and expression.

"I don't know, Mom," Lorelai said quietly. "I guess I was just feeling happy again, for the first time in a long while. I was so scared of being alone and that is not something I'm used to feeling. I suddenly found myself wanting to be married more desperately than ever before, I guess to ensure I wouldn't be alone, and Christopher loved me and I foolishly thought that was enough. Add in Paris, the romance capitol of the world, and well, I just lost my head. Plus, I had your voice in my head telling me to stop being a fool, stop trying to fight everything so hard. That here was my chance to put this family together once and for all…and I thought maybe all these years, maybe I had been refusing to marry him just out of spite."

She glanced up to find her mother's face void of any discernible expression. "I was very confused, Mom. I didn't know what I was feeling but being with Christopher was easy. He made me forget."

"Forget…Luke?" Emily said after a minute.

Lorelai took a deep breath, holding it for a few lingering seconds before letting it tremble out of her slowly. "Yeah," she admitted at last, not wanting to hide the truth anymore, not even from her parents. She was just too tired to even try. "He made me forget Luke. The pain I felt last year when I realized I was losing him, when I realized he didn't want to marry me, I don't know how to describe it, Mom. I've never felt that way before, not about a man. Not even Christopher has ever made me feel that way. It was just…unbearable. A part of me was afraid that if I said no again, I'd lose Christopher for good. And then I'd have to deal with all the Luke stuff and I just didn't think I'd be able to survive that again." Lorelai impatiently brushed away the tears that had filled her eyes.

"I'm sorry that I wasn't honest with you from the start. I really didn't do it to hurt you. But yeah, Christopher and I have decided to get a divorce. I'm sorry if this messes up your plans for me or causes you any societal embarrassments but I really can't help that. I can't pretend to be happy and in love with someone when I'm not. It's not fair to Christopher or myself. Or Rory. And I'm sorry, but I really need to get back to work now. Tell Dad I'll call him tomorrow."

She stood up on shaky limbs and started for the door. She sniffed back the tears, her hands clumsy as she struggled to get her coat on. Finally giving up with only one sleeve on, she grabbed her purse and reached for the doorknob.

"I do understand, you know."

Lorelai stilled, her arm outstretched and frozen.

"I understand how you felt," Emily repeated, standing behind her in the foyer. "When I left your father, I thought I'd never feel whole again. I had never felt so alone before in all of my life. It felt as if every piece of me was being torn apart."

Lorelai's arm dropped to her side as she turned around. Her eyes were wide at her mother's uncharacteristic confession and she held her breath as she waited for her mother to continue.

"How did you get through it?" she finally asked after a few beats of silence, her voice small.

Emily shrugged slightly. "We got remarried."

Lorelai smiled sadly. "Somehow, I don't think that's gonna be an option for me."

"Lorelai," Emily said, her tone unfamiliarly kind but tinged with familiar impatience. "You've done a lot of stupid things in your life but this one has really taken the cake."

"Gee, thanks Mom," she said, rolling her eyes. "You really know how to cheer a person up."

"I mean it," she warned. "If you honestly think Luke didn't want to marry you, you're blind as a bat."

"You don't know-"

"No, I don't know what happened between the two of you. I don't need to know that. All I need to know is what I see with my own eyes. I've watched the two of you dance around each other for years. I knew it back when I first met the man, and I knew it every time you mentioned his name. It's why I was terrified when you finally started dating him. I saw where it was heading and I knew where it would eventually end."

"Broken engagement?" Lorelai muttered with sarcasm as she drew an invisible line on the floor with her toe.

"No, Lorelai. Marriage."

Lorelai couldn't contain the staccato laugh that escaped. "Sorry to inform you, Mom, but you might want to look into getting a new crystal ball because I don't think it's functioning too well."

"Stop being so dense, Lorelai," Emily said, exasperated.

"Fine. Then spell it out for me. What are you trying to tell me?"

"Think about it, Lorelai. A man who supposedly didn't want to marry you showed up without invitation the other day and spent half the day with possibly the most aggravating woman alive just to help me out. To help you out."

"That's just who he is," Lorelai said with a helpless shrug. "He'd have done that for anyone. He'd do that for Kirk, for God's sake."

"Maybe he would have. However, I saw the way he looked at you at the hospital. And I saw the brief but obviously pained look on his face when you hugged him that day in the waiting room. That was not a man doing a favor for a friend. That was a man clearly in love and having to hide it."

Lorelai found herself unable to speak for a moment as she processed her mother's words. She couldn't deny the jump-start her heart took at the thought her mother was right. She didn't doubt Luke still cared for her but could he actually still love her?

She gave her head a firm shake. "Even if he is, it doesn't change what happened. It doesn't change what either of us did. Love isn't always enough, Mom!"

"If you both want it bad enough, it can be," Emily said, her words matter of fact and strong. "You're making this too hard."

"Wait, you hate him," Lorelai reminded her, suddenly suspicious. "Why are you trying to get us back together?"

"I don't hate him, Lorelai. He's clearly a kind, honest and hardworking man. I admire that. Your father admires that. I haven't exactly approved of the two of you together in the past, that's true."

"But now?"

"Well," Emily paused, choosing her words carefully. "You're my daughter. And despite what you may think, I do want you to be happy. And if Luke, well…clearly our versions of happiness are quite different but it's very obvious that Luke made you happy. And it's just as obvious that you haven't been happy in some time now."

Lorelai stared at the older woman in shock, unable to speak. She bit her lip to keep her mouth from gaping open in surprise. She just barely restrained herself from looking behind her to be sure her mother, Emily Gilmore, was actually speaking to her. Her eyes glanced towards the staircase as sudden realization began to dawn.

"Wow," Lorelai whispered.

"What?"

"Dad really scared you, didn't he?"

Emily stiffened slightly, her eyes focusing on a spot on the wall to Lorelai's right. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Lorelai smiled softly, shaking her head. "Nothing. Never mind. I appreciate what you are saying and…and thank you. It means a lot, coming from you."

"Yes, well," Emily stammered slightly, her eyes darting around the foyer, unable to meet her daughter's eyes for a moment. She took a deep breath as she forced her attention back on Lorelai and released a small, tired sigh. "Just think about what I said. If you want something bad enough, you have to fight for it. I just can't believe I have to remind you of all people of that fact."

An almost contrite expression crossed Lorelai's features as she stared up at a spot on the ceiling as her mother's words rang in her ears. It was not lost on her that in her desperate desire to not lose Luke, to give him the space she knew he wanted and needed to adjust to the life altering event that was April, that she'd somehow managed to lose herself in the process. She sighed as she glanced down at her watch.

"Look, Mom," she apologized. "I'm sorry but I really do have to go. Michel is going to throw a conniption fit if he misses his yoga class again because of me."

"Fine, go," she said. "Tell him it's my fault if you want."

"Exactly my plan," Lorelai said with a grin as she opened the front door and stepped outside into the cold. She turned to give an almost shy look back towards Emily. "Thanks, Mom."

Emily nodded with a small hint of a smile. "See you Friday," she simply said. As she watched her daughter dash towards her Jeep, she couldn't refrain from calling out, "Don't be late!"

-----

Lorelai swerved slightly in her lane as she fumbled in her purse for cell phone. Her fingers grabbing it finally, she waved a quick apology to the driver coming towards her and clicked the talk button.

"Hey, babe! How's the catching up going?"

"It's going," sighed Rory. "I only missed 3 days! But it's going to take me 2 weeks of reading to catch up!"

"My little speed reader? You'll be done in one week and you know it."

"I wouldn't bet on it," Rory laughed. "Where are you? I called the Dragonfly. Michel sounded pissed, by the way."

Lorelai sighed dramatically. "I know. I'm late again and he's convinced he'll miss his yoga class again because of me. He's been stressing about it for days now." She glanced at the speedometer and pushed down a little harder on the pedal.

"Why are you late? It's not like you to linger at the grandparent's house. Everything go ok with Grandpa?"

"Oh, that went fine. Like a good little boy, he went straight to bed and was pretty much dead to the world within minutes. The trip home tired him out. But with Emily Gilmore breathing down your neck every second of the day, I wouldn't put it past him to fake it."

"She's just worried about him, Mom," Rory reminded her. "Cut her some slack right now."

"Don't worry, we're good," Lorelai said as she took the exit towards Stars Hollow. "A little too good actually," she added as an afterthought with a curious frown.

"What are you talking about?"

"Oh, just that Emily knows about the divorce and the universe didn't implode."

"You told her already? I thought you were going to wait until Friday so that I could be your buffer."

"That was the original plan, yes. But apparently her network of spies were not informed of said plan and she basically cornered me into admitting what was going on."

"Well, at least it's out in the open. So Grandma's really ok with it? She didn't get mad?"

"Oh, she got mad but after a few exchanges in our outside voices, she ended up trying to get Luke and I back together."

"You are kidding!" Rory exclaimed in disbelief. "But she hates Luke!"

"Who knows with your grandmother? I can't keep up with her. Nearly twenty-five years of my life has been nothing but 'Christopher this,' and 'Christopher that.' And now it's practically 'Christopher who?'"

"Speaking of…" Rory said suddenly, her voice hesitant as she trailed off.

"Yes?" Lorelai asked with a sigh. "What did he do now?"

"Nothing. It's just that, well, I talked to him today. He called me, actually."

"Oh," Lorelai said, surprised. "Well, good. That's good, kid."

"Really?"

"Of course, 'really,'" Lorelai said. "I've always wanted you to be on good terms with your dad."

"No, I know," Rory said, quick to agree. "I just didn't know if you wanted to hear about it."

"I definitely want to hear about it. I'm glad he called you. I was worr…" Lorelai stopped herself suddenly before she could continue that thought.

"What?" Rory prodded. "You were worried he'd disappear like he usually does after you guys fight and forget about me?"

Lorelai shook her head. "No, Rory, that's not-"

"It's ok, Mom," Rory interrupted, her voice low and quiet. "It's not like I was completely oblivious growing up despite your best efforts to hide it. Whenever you guys fought or you turned down another marriage proposal, he tended to disappear without a word for months."

"You always were too smart for your own good," Lorelai said, her voice light to cover the crack she felt in her already battered heart that happened anytime her baby girl sounded sad.

"Good thing I go to Yale, then," quipped Rory.

Lorelai pulled into her parking spot at the Dragonfly but she remained inside the warmth of her vehicle for a few extra minutes. She sat with the engine idling and leaned her head against the window. "I'm sorry, babe," she finally said. "He didn't mean it. It didn't mean he didn't love you."

"I know," Rory said. "He's just immature."

Lorelai couldn't help but laugh. "Yeah," she said. "That's a good word for him. He's trying, though. He really is trying to be better. He knows he was wrong and he regrets it all, you know."

"Yeah, I know. He told me."

"He did?" Lorelai asked, surprised again.

"Well, kinda. I knew what he was trying to say anyway. He's bringing Gigi to New Haven tomorrow night and we're going to have dinner. "

"That's great! I'm really glad, babe."

"Yeah, me too. Anyway, I'm sorry to cut out on this really great, heartfelt moment we're having here, but I really do need to get back to reading."

"Yeah, and I gotta get inside before Michel blows an artery. If anyone needs the benefits of yoga, it's Michel. He could be their poster child! It could say, 'Do yoga or turn into this!'"

Rory laughed and after a few more parting words, the two hung up. With a sigh, Lorelai tossed her cell into her purse and climbed out of the jeep and hurried towards the doors. She was barely to the front steps when the door flew open and one very angry French man stormed out, arms folded tight across his chest and a sour expression on his face.

"You're late!"

"I know, I know. I'm sorry! But you've got 10, er, 7 minutes! You can still make it if you hurry!"

"You did this to me on purpose, didn't you?" Michel muttered as he stormed past her in a huff, nearly knocking her over. "You live to make my life miserable! Admit it!"

"My to do list, it just got that much shorter," she called after him.

"I hate you!" he yelled back.

"God, I need coffee," she muttered to herself as she walked inside and headed towards the kitchen.

to be continued…