A/N Thank you all for your kind words. I'm having ok days and not so ok days, so when the muse hits I'll write. Thanks for all the reviews. They really help and it's nice to know you all like what I do. So enjoy.
Chapter 11 Damiana
Sunday morning Lorelai woke slowly after a wonderful rest. She saw the sun shining through the window and stretched luxuriously. She felt lighter than she'd had in weeks. Somehow the argument she'd had with Luke last night confirmed in her mind that they were committed in a way she'd never been before. Of course she'd wait a few days to have that discussion with Luke.
Sitting up in bed she shook her head remembering his twisted logic. She'd let him off the hook, but he needed to realize that she wasn't the only one with insecurities, for all his bluster about wanting her to be happy, he showed his hand that he was indeed scared too.
Suddenly she became aware of a knocking at the door downstairs. Grabbing her Hello Kitty robe she scurried down the stairs and opened the door.
"Whoa!" she exclaimed as Lane almost fell into the foyer. Her daughter's best friend was laden down with bags of what smelled like breakfast.
Lane looked over the huge pile and whispered, "Help me?"
Lorelai began unpacking the small girl laughing, "Lane what on earth are you doing here on a Sunday morning and with food?"
Unburdened the young girl smiled, "Luke bribed me to bring this over with unlimited French fries for the next month. Since Mama Kim is on a kale and buckwheat fast it was the only way I could stay alive. Whatever he sent over smells really good though."
Lorelai smiled in compassion for the young girl who lived in such different worlds. "Well if you've got the time before Mrs. Kim comes looking for you I'm sure there is enough here. You say Luke sent it over?"
Lane had already started going through the bags, "Yes, he made me promise that I'd get it directly to you as soon as possible. At first it was one bag and a tray of coffee, but as he packed it up he kept adding to it, Danish, doughnuts, muffins, I think he stopped short of a pie. Aren't you able to go to the diner today Lorelai?"
Lorelai chuckled, "Well Lane, I'm actually a bit busy for a few days but I'll get back into my routine soon. Would you like something?"
She was unpacking the biggest bag that had pancakes, bacon, sausage, eggs and French toast. Lane opened the one with the doughnuts and took two out.
"I've got to get back in time for services, can I take these with me?" Lorelai smiled at her and nodded.
"Are you sure that will be enough to get you through?"
Lane smiled, "Yeah, any more and Mama Kim will suspect that I'm getting contraband."
"Well then off with you, you recalcitrant. I can only enable you so far and then the 'Mom Code' comes into play." The two smiled as Lane took her sweet tip and started out the door.
Rory started to open her door still half asleep. "Mom? Did I hear Lane?"
Still opening bags Lorelai grinned, "Yep, she brought me the most beautiful apology bouquet from Luke."
Rory looked around but only seeing food shot a half-eyed stare at her mother. "Am I missing the flowers?"
"Oh no Rory, not flowers, a bouquet of all the food he hates to give me. We have breakfast and junk food that will fill us with happiness that flowers could only wish for." Lorelai brought out the plastic silverware and began eating from the cartons.
Rory shook her head and turned back to her bedroom.
With her mouth full she called after her daughter, "He also sent coffee."
At her mother's words Rory turned back to the kitchen where Luke had sent two coffees each, hers with cream and sugar and her mother's straight. As she sat down she saw the table filled with food.
"Now why did he bring this food?" Rory was struggling to understand why they had a full buffet in their kitchen.
"He didn't bring it, he bribed Lane to bring it," Lorelai smiled. "He knows he isn't supposed to be here until Tuesday but I think he's making sure we don't forget him."
Rory hunkered over a to-go container shoveling the food in, "Mom, why does this taste so much better? I mean it does right? Better than even at the diner?"
Lorelai smiled, "Yeah, I think you're right Rory. I don't know for sure, but you remember when you were upset and Luke was cooking dinner for us but burnt the toast and really screwed up the sauce?"
Rory nodded as Lorelai continued, "Well, I think that Luke is an emotional cook. When he's upset he's distracted and even if he doesn't burn something it tastes terrible. I think this time he's so scared that he's going to lose us that we've gotten his A-game. He cooked like this for me when we had our real date a month or so ago."
Rory raised her eyebrows and chewed thoughtfully. "Huh," she finally said. "I'm torn between you two fixing this or having you keep stringing him along"
She saw her mother's raised eyebrows and started to back pedal, "Which would be wrong. Very, very wrong, right?"
Lorelai smiled, "Yeah kid, it'd be wrong, but we can enjoy it as long as it lasts."
At the diner Luke was waiting for Lane to come back in. He knew Lorelai would be at work by now, but he wondered if she ate his breakfast or threw it out. He was packing up her lunch when he saw Lane enter the diner.
"Oh, hey Lane. Some French fries right?" He smiled at her and he saw she smiled back. That was a good sign wasn't it? I mean she'd feel guilty taking his fries if Lorelai hadn't eaten the breakfast.
"Hey Luke, yeah fries would be great. Tell you what, you throw in a burger and I'll be happy to take that package over to the inn if that's where it's going." She smiled so guilelessly that Luke wasn't sure if she knew what was going on or not.
"Uh, what makes you think it's for the inn?" Luke asked.
"Well Lorelai said that she wasn't going to be stopping at the diner for a while so I figured you were keeping her fed. Did I get that wrong?" Lane was beginning to suspect that something fishy was going on by his behavior.
Luke started, 'a while' that's what Lorelai said. So she didn't say she wasn't going to see him ever again, just a while so that's good, right?
"Right, I mean, right this bag is for her and if you'd deliver it for me I'd really appreciate it and consider the burger on the house. So let me go ahead and get that started for you." He turned but the young girl called him back.
"Well Luke, if you've already got her lunch ready why don't I take it over and then when I get back you can make mine. OK?" Aside from getting the bag to Lorelai Lane wanted to find Rory and find out what was going on. The diner owner was really stressing about something.
Luke sat at one of the tables after Lane took off with his latest meal for Lorelai. 'What if this doesn't work? What if she realized that she was better off without me in her life?'
He realized what an idiot he'd been to think she'd only leave Stars Hollow if he let her. 'Whoa.' That was it. He was afraid she would leave Stars Hollow and him.
'What did she say last night? She was here because she chose Stars Hollow. So if she chose Stars Hollow why am I sure she's going to want to leave?' Luke stood up and moved to the counter and grabbed a cloth to clean it.
'Because everyone wants to leave Stars Hollow, look how few people were left from our high school class. Only Bootsie and me. Rachel couldn't wait to get out of here.' Luke stilled.
'But she's not Rachel. Lorelai came to Stars Hollow, she wasn't born here. She's experienced the world and chose this town.' Luke dropped his head to his chin.
"Shit," he uttered. "OK, so the next question is can I overcome my fear of her leaving to really commit?"
Even though no one was there he still waited for an answer.
Lane scurried to the inn and deposited her delivery at Lorelai's office. From the smile on her face she knew that whatever was going on between the two wasn't going to be devastating. After that she ran to the house to see if Rory was home. Breathing heavily she knocked on the door.
Rory opened only to find her friend gasping for breath. "I…. know….some,,,thing…is…up. So…give." Lane all but fell to the floor and Rory smiled.
"I really don't know what to tell you Lane, just that Mom says that Tuesday everything will be better. I don't get grown-up relationships, but Luke apparently thinks Mom is Rachel and for a while we're getting really great food delivered to the house." Rory shook her head as she sat next to her friend.
"I've never seen Luke so bad. He's got more than usual scruff and he doesn't look like he's slept in days." Rory nodded at her.
"Well, just because Mom doesn't want to go to the diner doesn't mean I can't go, right? After all she said they'll get back together on Tuesday so there's no division of loyalty right?" She smiled at Lane whose eyes brightened.
"Yes! And I get a free lunch today for delivering Lorelai's lunch."
"Well what are we waiting for? Let's go see Luke and do some reconnaissance." Rory and Lane headed out the door to the diner as Lorelai finished off her burger and fries.
She opened up the smaller container to find her favorite, boysenberry pie. She smiled as she took her first bite. Mia came into the room at that moment.
"So child, from the smell of it that's Lucas' pie. Did you make up?" Lorelai looked sheepish as she swallowed.
"Well, not exactly Mia. Apparently Luke overheard Tom and Mike talking about how they'd like to hire me to work for them and he figured that I'd jump at the chance to leave Stars Hollow."
Mia registered surprise, "He did did he? And they want you to work for them?"
Lorelai smiled, Mia knew how much she loved Start Hollow and the inn. "Well, they've not said anything to me, but yeah, that's what Luke said. So last night he tells me this and I realize that he still thinks that I'm going to leave him. So I told him he was a fu…"
"Lorelai!" Mia interrupted.
"Sorry Mia, I told him he was a certain kind of idiot and that I was here because I chose here, and I was with him because I chose him." Mia nodded her head as Lorelai spoke.
"So what did you all decide?"
"That he has until Tuesday to figure out what he wants and then we'll talk." Lorelai smiled as Mia's eyes went from the container on her desk to the overflowing trash.
"So Tuesday and not before?" Lorelai smiled at her employer.
"Yeah, he's got Lane delivering breakfast and lunch today; I imagine I'll get dinner as well. I know we're going to reconcile, but even Rory wants to drag it out cause he's cooking on all burners right now." Her smile lit up the room.
"Lorelai!" Mia admonished.
She sighed, "Yeah I know I told Rory it would be wrong to prolong it… It would be wrong wouldn't it?"
As Mia just gave her a stern look Lorelai nodded and said with more conviction, "Yes, wrong, very, very wrong."
She was looking more like her daughter than she even knew.
The next two days flew by for Lorelai although for Luke the time stood still. He wasn't even able to catch a glimpse of her as she moved about town. It was as if she'd vanished. The only reason that he knew they were moving in the right direction was because Lane and Rory had dinner at his place Sunday and Monday. By Monday night he'd not slept in almost a week. Tomorrow he'd find out what the rest of his life was going to be: fervent euphoria or abject despair.
As he closed up he took the leftover coffee to the sink and dumped it out. The smell reminded him of her and he looked up at the clock. He saw it was after eleven thirty and an idea came to mind. He jammed a new filter full of coffee in the maker and ran upstairs to take a shower.
Coming down a few minutes later dressed in his date clothes, he filled the large to-go cup with fresh coffee and headed out the door before he could talk himself out of it.
Lorelai finished watching Luke Perry on David Letterman when she thought she heard footsteps on the front porch. The porch light was on so whoever it was would be someone she knew. She waited for the doorbell or knock but none came. After about five minutes she walked over to the door and cracked it open. She started to see there was a man hunched over sitting on her top step. She was about to scream when she smelled the coffee. Literally.
"Luke?" she said quietly as the large man turned towards her.
"Oh, hey Lorelai. I didn't mean to wake you." He stood in front of her holding the steaming cup of coffee.
She stepped on to the porch, shook her head and inclined it at the coffee. "That for me or were you keeping your hands warm?"
He startled as if he'd forgotten he brought her the coffee. It'd been two days since he'd last seen her and almost a week since he'd seen her clearly. God he missed her. "It's for you, I was thinking that you said we'd talk on Tuesday but I didn't know what time on Tuesday so I thought I'd bring you some coffee but then I thought maybe you'd be asleep already. So I just sat on the step to think what to do next."
Lorelai gently reached over and pried the cup from his hands.
"It's after midnight Luke."
He smiled tentatively at her, "But it is Tuesday right?"
She smiled and shook her head, "Yes, it's Tuesday Luke. But Rory's asleep and it's late."
"Lorelai, please. I haven't slept in about a week please talk to me. Are we going to be ok? Are you leaving me? Tell me what's going to happen and I can wait for the…"
Lorelai lunged at him and kissed him senseless which in his present state wasn't difficult. He'd just about caught up with her when she pulled apart.
"NO!" he cried.
She smiled at him, "Shhh. Rory's asleep. I need to know that this is what you want Luke. I can't have you dropping in and out. Rory is so attached to you that either we're together or we aren't. I won't put her through the pain that I've felt this week. So this is your chance; you in or out?"
Luke pulled her to him feeling some of the hot coffee seep through his shirt. He held her tight as he whispered in her ear, "I'm in Lorelai. I'm all in."
She smiled and pulled back a bit, "Ok, so tomorrow night after I get off work we sit down and talk about your insecurities and my insecurities and all God's children got insecurities. Then we figure out what we're going to do about them. OK? Cause I know mine won't be going away for a bit, and I would say the stranglehold yours have will also be around for a bit so we need to deal."
Luke nodded as he held her to him, he knew she was saying something and that he should be listening, but all he could think of was that he was home. Thank God he was home. He looked at her smiling and he gently kissed her.
"So it was the coffee right?"
Lorelai laughed gently, "Yeah Luke your coffee is my aphrodisiac. Now go home."
"I am," he smiled. She broke away from him and pushed him in the general direction of the diner.
"Tomorrow after work." She smiled at him as he walked backwards.
"But you'll be in for breakfast right?" He couldn't stop smiling, even when he tripped over Babbette's gnomes.
She shook her head and sighed, "Yes Luke. Rory and I'll be in for breakfast." She went to the door and stepped inside.
Luke felt the bolder he'd been carrying for the past week lift from his shoulders. It was going to be all right. Wait, what'd she say about children? Well he'd find out later. Right now he wanted to go to sleep.
A/N Review please?