The Storm

The next morning Lorelai managed somehow to talk Luke into going to a Starbuck's for breakfast. The hotel didn't have WiFi and Starbuck's did. It was the perfect excuse. Not that she needed an excuse. The truth is, after the night they had he would probably drink coffee if she asked him to. But she didn't need to know that.

He read the paper while she set up her laptop, ready to share at least a dozen pictures from their visit to Boston. But when she logged on to Facebook, she gasped. She had a friend request. From April Nardini.

"Oh my god, Luke!" Loreali said excitedly as she clicked on 'accept'. He looked up from his paper. "April is on Facebook and she sent me a friend request!" She didn't see him furrow his brow. "And she sent me a message. I'll read it to you. 'Hi Lorelai! I don't have much time to write, but I wanted to say hi. I just joined Facebook and found you on my cousin Jess's friends list. It looks like you and my dad are having a great time on your boat trip! Please tell him I said hi and I can't wait to see him in a month. I will try to write more later. Please take lots of pictures! Bye!'" She sighed and smiled, beaming.

Until she looked at Luke.

He was staring off in the distance at nothing, clearly lost in thought, and he did not look happy. He looked nervous and scared. Lorelai's face fell. He's upset that I'm friends with April, she thought, but what came out of her mouth was a quiet, "Oh my god, I'm a fool."

Her voice brought Luke's attention back to her and he said, "What?"

She could almost feel the wall go up when she plastered on a smile and said, "Nothing." A fog descended as she watched Luke return to his headspace, clearly worried. He pretended to read the paper, but his eyes weren't moving and he looked pensive. She looked around at the table, confused by her feelings.

She wanted desperately to go back to the night before, to when everything was right in the world, to when she was sure that she would spend the rest of her life enjoying her family-a family that included a daughter and a step-daughter. But instead she returned to those feelings she'd had more than a year before, of being an outsider in her own life, to a time when she sacrificed her dreams and almost her sanity in order to please the man in front of her. And while only seconds had ticked by, those seconds felt like days. She had the sensation of shrinking, like she was sliding bonelessly to the floor. And she was scared.

But then the fear dissolved and anger took its place and she regained the ability to act. She closed her laptop and put it in its bag. As she started to rise, putting the straps of her bag and purse over her shoulder, Luke noticed what she was doing. "Lorelai?" he asked, but received no answer. He sat stunned as she walked out.

He grabbed his backpack and ran after her, making it outside just in time to see her duck into a cab. Then she was gone.

He had flashbacks to that night when she had left him standing in the street in front of the diner. He panicked. He pulled out his cell phone and hit the speed dial for hers. It rang, then clicked over to voice mail. She was screening. "Lorelai, I- I don't understand what happened," he said to the machine. "Please call me. As soon as you get this. We need to talk. Please call me so we can talk about it. Whatever I did, I'm sorry, but please call me."

After standing there helpless for a few minutes, he headed back to the hotel. He didn't know what else to do. In the 10 minutes it took to get there, the last 11 years played in his head. The day she came into the diner for the first time. Lorelai, the annoying customer who became the highlight of his day. The friendship that was slowly forged over coffee and burgers, Rory, town business, teasing, and banter. The deepening of that friendship into something more like family. His decision to pursue something more. The dance. The first kiss. The break up. The reconciliation. The movies. The shopping. Her laugh. Her heartbreak when Rory left school. The proposal. The dog. The renovations. April's birthday party. The ultimatum. The image of her walking away from him, leaving him standing alone in the middle of a wet street unable to move, unable to speak, unable to do anything except watch her form get smaller and smaller until it faded into the darkness.

Not this time.

~ooooo~

I'll just catch the train to Hartford, she thought. Good thing we're in Boston. But two minutes into the cab ride to the train station she realized that her Filofax was back in the hotel room. Her life was in that book. All of the contact information for her personal life and for the Dragonfly was in one place. Her calendar, everything. She could replace it, but that would take work and time and in the meantime she'd be miserable. She couldn't just leave it behind. Luke might not be back to return it for a month.

But she didn't want to go back, either. She couldn't face him. She couldn't stand to listen to his excuses, to hear that he needed more time.

As all this was going through her head she started to calm down. My life is falling apart again and I'm thinking about my damn Filofax. Then she realized that wasn't the crazy part. The crazy part was the way she was just running away. Running away was childish and it wasn't fair to Luke. He at least deserved to know that she was leaving and why. The fog cleared. The heartache remained, but she shoved it aside. She took a deep breath and told the cab driver to head to their hotel, then she pulled out her cell phone and called Luke to ask him to meet her there.

~ooooo~

"You wanna tell me what's going on?" He asked when she walked in the door.

She wouldn't look at him. She grabbed a duffle bag and started to shove clothes into it while shaking her head and mumbling, "I was a fool."

"What do you mean? What is going on, Lorelai?" He didn't know what to make of this. She seemed to have gone off the deep end.

"Lorelai, talk to me." Now he had flashbacks to the night of Jess and Rory's accident.

"I was a fool," she said again. "And I can't do this again, Luke."

He grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. He could see tears starting to spill from her eyes, and he could clearly see that they weren't the first. He wanted to pull her close and tell her that everything would be okay, but he realized that she was angry and wouldn't appreciate such a gesture. And he needed answers.

"What the hell is going on?" he pleaded with his voice and his eyes. "You were fine one minute, then running out the next and I didn't say a word, so please tell me what is going on. What did I do?"

She finally looked him in the eye, angrily. "You're never going to let me in, are you, Luke?" She was yelling now and she didn't care who could hear it. "It's always going to be like this. And I can't do it, Luke, I can't."

"Lorelai, what are you talking about?" He really didn't get it. "Come on, calm down and tell me what this is about." He managed to get her to sit down on the bed. She still wouldn't look at him. She couldn't look at him and it was a long time before she spoke.

"You-You're upset that April connected with me on Facebook," she finally stammered. "Y-You still don't want me around her. You don't want me to get to know her."

"Lorelai, that's not true," he replied. "Where did you get that idea?"

"I saw your face when I read her message. You can't tell me you aren't upset. I could tell. I'm not crazy! I saw it!"

"Oh my god, Lorelai. Yes, I'm upset," he admitted. "But I'm not upset about her getting to know you!" He spoke slowly, making sure she heard every word. "I'm upset because my teenaged daughter is online, probably talking to strangers. You hear about these people, predators, who go online and pretend to be someone they're not and they lure young girls. I've heard about girls running away and meeting up with scumbags they met online. She's 14, Lorelai! Of course I'm scared. But it's not about you. In fact, I feel better knowing that you're on there with her. Maybe you can keep an eye on her. I don't know how to use that stuff."

Lorelai wasn't sure if she believed him, but she was so relieved that she visibly relaxed. "But she's had a website for years, Luke."

"Yeah, where she could share stuff," he said. "But isn't Facebook where other people can talk back? People have conversations and you can meet strangers, right?"

She nodded. Then she wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands and looked at him. She saw nothing to suggest that he was lying. She saw a man who was nervous about his daughter and maybe one who was scared to lose her. She allowed him to hug her.

"Lorelai, I know it's a lot to ask after what I did last year, but at some point you have to trust me. I want you to know April. I got past that stupid fear after her birthday party. I want us to be a family. It's a weird family with April and Rory not living with us full time, but it's a family. And Anna doesn't have a say anymore. She can't tell me who I can and cannot have in my child's life." He was pleading now, pleading for her to understand, to believe. "April adores you. And I wouldn't have it any other way…" He saw that she was relaxing and maybe a bit ashamed for not trusting him, so he pulled back and looked at her. "But, Lorelai, you can't just run off every time you get upset." He held up a hand before she could say anything. "And I know I can't just clam up. We have to be able to talk... We were doing so well…" He put wiped his face with his hands. He was irritated now. He took a deep breath and stood up. "We need to go back to the boat. We need to talk about that night and we need to do it soon."

She knew that he was right. Without saying a word, they both resumed packing.

~ooooo~

Despite Luke's reassurances that she had misread the situation and they would work it out, there was tension between them as they checked out and headed to the boat. It didn't help that, after checking the weather forecast, they now had to rush. A storm was on its way and Luke wanted to make it to Salem Harbor before it hit. They had slept late and it was already almost noon.

They waited in near silence for a cab, all of the warm, fuzzy feelings from the night before just a memory. Instead, they both felt scared and exposed, brittle even. Luke tapped his foot, Lorelai drummed her fingernails on the handle of her bag. In the cab, Lorelai could see the muscles in Luke's thigh clench as he pushed his right foot into the floor, trying to will the cab to go faster. He took her hand, but she had to pull it away after less than a minute to keep him from crushing it. She put it on his knee to show that she didn't want to break the connection, and he settled for covering her hand with his.

When they got to the boat, Lorelai unpacked and put the bags away while Luke readied the boat to cast off. She asked him what she should do to help and he told her take some Dramamine NOW, then go through the cabin and make sure that everything was secured. It was going to be a bumpy afternoon.

~ooooo~

With the traffic that time of day, it took them more than an hour just to get out of the harbor. It seemed that everyone else was trying to get in. Lorelai busied herself making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches-something that Luke could eat while he drove-and cleaning up right away so that everything stayed secured. She also made him some tea, filling a large thermos before adding some to a travel cup. She didn't know if she would be able to make more later and she wanted to make sure he had tea to fend off the cold as he drove. She could do without coffee for an afternoon. Her stomach felt like a bowl of acid, anyway. And it was tied in knots. Luke's mood worried her as she sat next to him, buckled into the passenger seat and bundled in layers of clothing under her rain jacket. He was pensive and focused. She did not know what concerned him more, her meltdown that morning or the weather.

He kept a steady pace, staying relatively close to shore. As the afternoon wore on, tensions grew as dark clouds began to fill the sky, blotting out the sun. The water got choppier, prompting Luke to slow down some. It was taking them a lot longer to drive the 20 miles or so from Boston Harbor to Salem than it really should have. Around 4:00 they started to see lightning in the distance.

"Go below deck and unplug every appliance you can reach," Luke ordered Lorelai. "Then get on the bed and stay away from the hull, the windows, and anything metal. She didn't argue. She didn't want to stress him out any more than he was.

They managed to reach the harbor before the rain hit, but there were no slips available and there was no place to pull up to get themselves out of the water and into shelter. This shouldn't have been a surprise; everyone wanted to get out of the storm. Luke got out his cell phone and managed to get a hold of the marina for instructions to moor in their reserved spot. When they were safely anchored-as safe as they could be-he buttoned up everything on deck as fast as he could and made it into the cabin with the hatch shut behind him just as the rain started to fall. He stripped off his excess clothing and climbed into the bed with Lorelai, holding her tightly and telling her that they were going to be alright. She didn't know if he was talking about the storm or their future. Neither did he.

The rain was as loud as the thunder and the waves pushed the boat up and down more violently than they had experienced in the nearly two weeks they'd been living on it. Lorelai was scared, but Luke's arms around her pulled her emotions in another direction. And the memory of the look on his face this morning tugged her in yet another direction. She had never felt so alive, but never so close to death, so hopeful and so worried, so angry and so exhilarated. Luke was breathing heavily and he smelled so… Luke.

She lifted her head to look into his face and when he looked back, into her eyes, she no longer heard the storm outside. He lowered his face to hers, pressing his lips firmly against hers. She wrapped her arms around him, trying to get closer, to get inside him. There was no foreplay or teasing. He stripped off the sweatpants that she had donned for warmth and her panties along with them while she yanked at his. Before he could enter her, she panted, "Wait… I need to… put in di-..."

"Don't," he responded.

"But… if we don't… I can't..." she couldn't hold back the tears as she considered the possibility that they wouldn't be okay, that they wouldn't make it, that if she got pregnant she would have to raise this child alone, too.

"We will…" he said, with absolute certainty in his voice. He looked into her eyes. "We will. We'll make it." This time she didn't object when he thrust into her. Instead she tried to push him deeper, to become a part of him. To make him hers. They made love urgently, hungrily, seeming to use the rise and fall of the boat as assistance rather than a hindrance. It was not a fun, happy rush like their coupling during Rory's party. It was simultaneously desperate and hopeful. Afterward they lay huddled together on the bed, nerves on edge, until the storm passed and the sun came out.

The storm last 20 minutes, then it was gone. Within an hour from when the rain hit it was hard to tell that it had even happened. They were both quiet and exhausted and in no mood to talk, so they ate leftovers and went to sleep early and without fanfare.

~ooooo~

They awoke to a light rain and a gloomy day. Neither knew if the weather matched or set the mood. Lorelai felt like she was swimming in mud and a bit like she had swallowed some, too. She believed Luke when he said that he wanted them to be a family, but wanting and doing are different things. The feeling of being shut out had become difficult to shake, especially after yesterday's events. He was right, they needed to talk about that night, because that night hung over them like a cloud blacker than the one that brought yesterday's storm. They needed to talk about why she left him and they needed to talk about where she went after she left him. They'd been avoiding the subject of Christopher for nearly three weeks now.

So after the breakfast dishes were done, they sat on the sofa and Luke threw the first pitch.

"I need to know what happened that night, Lorelai."

"What happened was that you didn't want to marry me," she answered, very matter-of-factly.

"I did want to marry you. I just didn't want to do it without thinking first."

"But you married Nicole without thinking, Luke," she said, hurt showing plainly on her face. "Why did you marry her? Why did you marry her and not me?" Tears flowed easily at the thought of Luke proposing to that skinny lawyer while Lorelai was traipsing across Europe with Rory, oblivious to the fact that the man she loved (and she was in love with Luke by that time, Lorelai was sure of it even if she didn't know it at the time) was marrying another woman.

"I… I married her because I didn't think I could have you," he said. "I married her without thinking and it was a huge mistake. It turned out badly, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes, but I wasn't Nicole." She sniffled. "You were willing to marry her. You weren't willing to marry me."

"Oh, Lorelai. I didn't love Nicole. I married her because I didn't have anything else going for me in my life except work. I made a huge mistake. You were more important to me than that. I wanted to be able to really focus on our life and I felt like I couldn't do that until I was settled with April. How is that different from you putting it off until things were right with Rory?"

"It is different, Luke. I put it off for Rory because I wanted her to be able to be a part of it. And I knew when things would be right, I had a goal in mind-when Rory decided to go back to school. When were things going to be okay with April? What did 'okay' look like? And I didn't shut you out when things were bad with Rory. I leaned on you. I depended on you. You helped me and I let you help me."

"Okay, okay, I get it. It's not the same." Luke conceded. "So, different approach. I need to know what led up to that night, then. I need to know where you were for the three days before. I need to know what happened when you went to see Anna. I need to know why you didn't tell me that you were unhappy."

"I did tell you that I was unhappy, Luke." She reminded him of their conversation at Martha's Vineyard on Valentine's Day weekend.

"I guess I didn't realize how bad it was." He tried to understand himself. He tried to understand why he didn't hear her. "I took you for granted. I don't know, maybe I thought the problem would just go away."

"It didn't," she said. "In fact, within minutes of being home after that trip, it was clear that nothing had changed. Remember, Caesar told you that April was coming by the next day and you told me not to come in until she left."

"Right." He sighed, remembering and regretting.

"Maybe that's why it's so hard to trust you about it. Part of me knows that we can say anything to each other while we're on vacation, but what matters is what we do when we get home."

"But you said you were okay. You pretended like you were fine with everything."

"I was so afraid to push you, Luke." More tears started to form. She fought them, but lost. Her voice cracked as she recounted the first time they broke up. She reminded him that he had asked for time then, too, and when she pushed him, he bolted. "I couldn't get out of bed for three days, Luke, and we had only been dating for 5 or 6 months at that time. I couldn't risk losing you again."

"But you did risk it. You pushed me that night," he said.

"It had been months, Luke! Months!" That escalated quickly. "I was patient for months before I gave you that ultimatum! I was dying inside. I didn't feel that I had a choice anymore. I… I broke."

"I need to know what the breaking point was," he said quietly. "What happened? Was it Anna?"

Lorelai calmed down some. She nodded. "Partly. April's birthday party… I was so happy, so relieved. It felt like a breakthrough, like my exile was over."

"You were great. You really came through." He admitted.

"But then when you came home that night… huh, home," she scoffed. "You wouldn't even move in." Luke lowered his head, another regret. "You came home and said that Anna was mad… and something in me just… broke." She got up to get a glass of water.

"So you went to see her," he said.

"Yeah. I thought if I could explain it to her, explain that I understood, that I knew what she was going through, but that she didn't have to worry, that I could get her to lighten up." She drank slowly and returned to the couch.

"I need to know what Anna said to you," he said quietly.

"I told her that we were real, that we were permanent. And she said." Lorelai had to choke back tears before she could continue. "She said 'Engaged isn't married. People get engaged all the time.'"

Luke had tears in his eyes. "I'm so sorry."

"But she was right, Luke. Engaged isn't married. It doesn't mean you're going to get married. Nobody knows that better than me."

"I wish I would have known."

"I tried to tell you, Luke. I tried."

"But you didn't right away. You avoided me for days."

"Because I didn't know what to do! I couldn't hide my feelings anymore and I knew that if I pushed you, I could lose you. I knew that if I saw you, if I talked to you, that things would come crashing down and it might be the last of us. I didn't want it to be over. I didn't want us to be over. You were everything to me, Luke." He was quiet, trying to process it all. "And I was right. I was right. It was the end of us."

"No, it wasn't." He shook his head. "It wasn't the end of us. We're here now."

"But it did break us. I stood up for myself and I lost everything. Fast forward to today, I feel lucky to be here with you, but even with this, with getting you back, we lost a whole year. And that year… it was…"

"That year wasn't lost. We're learning from it."

"God, I hope so," she whispered.

"Go on. What made you come to the diner that night?"

"I was at my parents' house for dinner and they had invited a woman… they were trying to set her up Christopher. She was a therapist."

"You talked to her?"

"Yeah. I explained the situation. We talked about marriage. I told her about Max and Christopher and Rory. I told her that I never really loved anyone until I loved you. I told her that I was ready to get married, to have another kid, but I couldn't wait anymore. I told her how unhappy I was, how I felt like shit all the time."

"What did she say?"

"She said that I'd never get what I want if I didn't ask for it. Which made sense, I mean I asked you to marry me."

"And I said 'yes'." His tone suggested that he understood how that was part of the problem. He sighed. "I wanted to marry you, Lorelai. I really did. I just… I thought you'd always be there, like a favorite piece of clothing that you can put in a closet and pull out when you want to wear it. I didn't think I could hurt you like that. You were always so tough. I wasn't listening. I didn't get it."

"But you had hurt me before. Did you really not remember? I never actually understood what happened then. What happened back then, Luke? Why didn't you fight for me back then, after my parents' vow renewal?"

"I thought they were right," he said simply.

"Who? You thought who was right?"

"Your mother, your father, Christopher."

"About what?"

"That you deserved better than me, more than me, more than Stars Hollow. That I was just another sucker that you would eventually cast aside when you realized that I wasn't your soulmate or whatever. That you should be with someone who would take you to parties like that, someone you don't have to beg to go dancing. The truth is, I don't know how we even broke up. One minute I'm telling you I need time and the next you're calling me your ex-boyfriend."

"But you said you couldn't be in the relationship, that it was too much."

"You asked what I was thinking. That was what I was thinking, not what I wanted."

"Well, you certainly didn't do anything to rectify the situation," she reminded him.

"By the time I came to my senses I didn't know how to fix it. And you seemed fine, you seemed to be over it, so I thought that maybe they were right. Maybe you wanted more. Until your mother came to the diner, I thought that you had gotten over me and had moved on with your life."

"I don't know why you would ever think that I wanted more than you or Stars Hollow. And what does 'more' mean, anyway? In Stars Hollow I found acceptance, support, love. That town was a haven for me. It still is. I'll die there."

"I just thought…" He sighed. "You're an unstoppable force."

"And you're an immovable object."

"But I move for you."

"And I stop for you."

They looked at each other for a beat, then both burst out laughing.

"Well, that was corny as hell," he said.

"Yeah, but there's truth to it," she replied.

"You know, Anna accused me of bailing on you," he informed her.

"You didn't bail on me," she said. "If anyone bailed, it was me."

"I understand why now," he said. "I mean, I understood before. I knew that I was compartmentalizing. I knew that I had pushed you away." She could see tears forming in his eyes. "I got that stuff before. But I don't think I really understood just how bad it was until now. So I get why you left."

"It hurt too much."

He nodded, then paused. "But what I still don't understand… is why you… why you went to him... Why did you go to him that night, Lorelai? It was like you were trying to do the one thing that you knew would hurt me the most." He let the tears flow.

In a voice barely loud enough for him to hear she said, "I didn't do it to hurt you. I wasn't even going to tell you, but you wouldn't let it go."

"Of course I wouldn't let it go!" he bellowed. "I loved you! I realized that I had screwed up and I was trying to fix it!"

"Too late. It was too late. Luke, you still don't seem to understand how devastated I was!" she cried. "Every dream and hope that I had for my life other than the Dragonfly was wrapped up in you, and it was gone. Hell, even the Dragonfly was filled with you!

"After we got engaged I felt safe with you. I felt that finally I had a relationship that was real, that worked, that I wanted. I didn't just give you my whole heart. You had that the minute you danced with me at your sister's wedding. But by the time we got engaged I trusted you with it. I've never trusted anyone with my heart, except Rory.

"I trusted you and you let me walk away, Luke! You let me go! You didn't want me! You let me walk away!"

He sat with his face in his hands, forcing himself to feel her pain, to feel the pain of her leaving all over again, to remember it so that he wouldn't ever allow it to happen again.

"I was broken," she continued. "I was heartbroken. I was lost. I was broken. Everything I trusted, everything I dreamt of for myself, for my future, it was all gone. You were another failed relationship, another time that I was wrong to think that I could have that whole package that I talked about, but it was even worse because I didn't have my friend to tell me that it was going to be okay, that I was going to be okay. So I went to someone who would tell me that, someone who I thought knew me, understood me. And I think I wanted to punish myself. I didn't feel worthy of you. I thought that maybe all I had to give was my body. And that maybe if I gave my body to someone else, I wouldn't belong to you anymore. I couldn't be yours anymore. And I had to stop thinking of myself as yours, because you weren't mine anymore. You didn't want me, Luke. You let me go! You let me walk away!" She got quiet again. She practically whispered, "You let me go."

He regained his composure. "I couldn't fix it after that. It was too broken."

"Yeah, it was," she said. "And things you said to me afterward. That you didn't think we belonged together? Ohmygod that hurt, maybe more than anything else. Like I was always just a customer to you."

"You were never just a customer to me. But I had to think about it that way, that is just wasn't 'meant to be', even though I don't really believe in that fate stuff. Otherwise I had to face my part in it. I didn't want to believe that I had blown it, that I could have been with you forever, but I screwed it all up. I couldn't face that at first."

"I didn't… I didn't even know how to go on. I was a stranger to myself for a long time."

"I had to go on because of April. If I didn't have her…" He shuddered to think of the person he would be today without someone to make him want to be a better man. He would probably be a lot like his Uncle Louie.

"Well, if you didn't have her, we might not have been in the mess to begin with, but we also might never have dealt with any of our problems, and we did have problems. If we didn't, we would have been able to withstand it. We would have handled the situation better."

That truth sat with them in silence for several minutes before Luke spoke again.

A/N: Next Up, "Reconciled"