Logan stood outside the apartment door and lightly tapped. He waited for a few moments before tapping again. He didn't really know why he felt so nervous. He had been so swept along with just going to see Rory but now he was stood outside the door to Jess's place and reality had begun to hit. Maybe she hadn't contacted him because she didn't want to see him? What was he going to say to her if that was the case? Should he fight for her or just walk away? Deep down he already knew the answer to that. He'd walked away once before, he would spend the rest of his life fighting for Rory if he had to. He was still deliberating these thoughts when finally the door opened.

Rory couldn't hide her surprise at seeing him standing there. "Logan! What are you…I mean…how did you…" she couldn't quite manage to get all her words out. He was the last person she had expected to find on the other side of the door and she immediately felt a little self-conscious about how she looked. Cursing herself she brushed her messy hair back out of her face and pulled into a ponytail.

"Can I come in?" he asked. Logan looked at Rory. She looked tired and emotional and her eyes lacked that sparkle he so loved, but she was still the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen.

"Sure" Rory opened the door wider and gestured for Logan to enter the apartment. He walked in awkwardly, not feeling entirely comfortable being in Jess's apartment.

They both sat down next to each on the sofa. Rory looked down and fidgeted with her hands, only just realizing that she was still wearing her wedding ring.

"How did you know where I was?" she asked without looking up.

"Jess," Logan said.

"Oh!" Rory said a bit surprised that Jess would have gone to Logan. It seemed a little out of his comfort zone given the history of their last meeting many years ago. She didn't know whether she should be happy or mad with Jess for interfering. "I guess you know all about it then?"

"Not really, only that you've left your husband," Logan said. "Why didn't you call and let me know what was going on?" he asked gently. "I would have been there for you"

"I don't know Logan. It's just been really hard." Rory said without looking up at him. "I needed a bit of space for a few days."

"Rory talk to me," he said "Please". Logan knew she wasn't saying everything that she wanted to.

"Okay. Last time I saw you, I'd kind of already made my mind up that we wouldn't do that again. Don't get me wrong, it was amazing, more than amazing, but I figured I needed to work on things with James – getting married, it's a big thing, isn't it? You shouldn't just walk away without trying, right? When I said goodbye to you I told myself that was it but then it was just so hard to leave you, and you said you wanted to be with me, I was just really confused."

"Sorry" Logan smiled a little.

"Not your fault" Rory smiled. "It 's always nice to hear someone say something like that. Anyhow, in my crazy confused state I decided to go and see my mom to talk things over with her, and well you can imagine how smoothly that went."

"Pretty bad I am guessing?" Logan asked carefully. He knew that Lorelai probably wasn't a huge fan of his right now.

"She was generally okay, but clearly she felt that I shouldn't be giving up on my marriage so easily but how could I stay with him when I know it's not what I want. I can't keep pretending it is, neither of us are happy."

"So you went home and told James everything," Logan asked.

"Not everything." Rory wrinkled her nose "I didn't think there was any need to hurt him more than I already had – although I did tell him about being on the pill." Rory grimaced. "I don't know why I did that. It was like word vomit. Ugh, it was just so unpleasant and he was angry. I could deal with the anger but then he got upset and he basically begged me not to leave him. I told him I had to and it was so painful, I never wanted to see him like that. I was just so upset, that I came straight here, I just needed to lay low for a few days."

"Okay, but you should have called me," Logan said taking hold of Rory's hand.

"I know but…" she paused.

"…but what?" he prompted.

"My head has been such a mess and my mom put all these doubts in my mind…" Rory paused, not sure if she was ready to have the conversation yet.

Logan looked at her. "Doubts? About what?"

"Us, you" Rory shrugged "and if I am honest, I am scared of getting hurt again. I was scared that maybe I had imagined all the things we were feeling, that actually it was nothing."

"It's never been nothing Ace, you know that," he said as he touched her cheek.

"Yeah, I do" Rory hesitated before speaking again. "And I kind of realized that I had to do something about my situation when Mom asked me…" Rory stopped.

"Asked you what?" Logan looked at Rory, he could see she was having an internal struggle over something and he wished she would just open up to him.

"She asked me if I was in love with you and then said, what would happen if you didn't love me back."

Logan smiled at Rory "I'd quite like to know the answer to that question"

Rory looked up at Logan "The answer was yes" she said quietly "Yes, I am in love with you"

Logan leaned in and kissed Rory tenderly on the lips before pulling away to look at her. "Rory, I am SO in love with you, you never need to doubt that."

"Really?" Rory smiled but Logan noticed that she only managed to hold it for a moment before it quickly dropped again.

"What's wrong?"

Rory nibbled her fingernail nervously. "I'm a little scared Logan, of us and the future if this doesn't…"

Logan knew what Rory was getting at. They'd always seemed to love deeper and harder than anyone else but that also meant that when things went wrong, they fell a lot harder too. Moving on from Rory, or at least attempting to, had been one of the hardest things Logan had ever had to do.

"Rory, I don't think that we can worry about what happens IF we can't make it work because I've got news for you lady, I fully intend to make it work." he smiled as he pulled her in close.

"Promise?"

"I've had to wait five years to get you back in my arms missy, you really think I am going to let you escape now?" he joked.

"The thing is Logan, I think that we really need to take this thing, whatever it is, slowly, I'm talking snail speed. This past week has been so hard for me and I want to be mindful of James…and I really don't think that we need any of this being splashed all over the office. I'm so not ready for that and at the end of the day, I'm still married."

"We can take it any speed you like. I will wait until you're ready to be us again" Logan said earnestly. "It doesn't matter how long it takes."

"Thanks Logan. You are way too patient with me. I want you to know though that ultimately it is what I want, I just need to get all my ducks in a row if that makes sense. Does that even make sense? God, you must wonder what you've ever let yourself in for" She rolled her eyes.

"Not for one minute," he said as he put his arm around her. "You go arrange your ducks, I'll still be here. I'm not going anywhere" he said as he kissed the top of her head. "Now, next order of business. Your boss wants to know when are you going to get your ass back into work? People are missing you and by people I mean me!"

When Jess got back to his apartment he wasn't quite sure what would be waiting for him. He hoped that Rory wouldn't be too mad at him for getting involved but he couldn't take any more of her wallowing. He wanted to bang their heads together. If they were going to come back into each other's lives and cause all this mayhem, they needed to get on and start moving forward.

He slowly opened the door "Rory? Is it safe to come in? Do I need a helmet? Full body armor?"

"It's fine," Rory said.

"Wow Gilmore, I barely recognized you without the blanket that has been surgically attached to you all this time. Tell me, was it a particularly painful procedure to have it removed?"

Rory threw a cushion at him.

"You look better. And you're finally out of those nasty old Yale sweats. I take it things went well with lover boy?" Jess said sitting down next to her.

"Yeah, they did" She nodded. "Thanks Jess."

"I thought you might be crazy mad with me for sending him here"

"It was a bit of a risk on your part" she raised her eyebrows "but it's all good, I guess we needed to talk and now we have."

"And?"

"Things are good. We know what we both want but we're taking things one step at a time. There's still a whole lot of mess to get through yet" she said as she pulled off her wedding and engagement rings. "What are you meant to do with these things anyhow?" she asked as she held them up to Jess.

"I dunno" he shrugged. "Give them back to him maybe?"

"Would you want them back?" Rory pulled a face.

"Hell no, I wouldn't want them anywhere near me."

"Exactly. Can you please just bury them somewhere where I don't have to look at them?" she said as she handed them over to Jess. "Wow, that kind of feels weird not to have them on my hand anymore."

"Weird good or weird bad?" he asked.

"Good I think," she said with just a hint of melancholy. "I feel like they've been dragging me down like a dead weight recently."

"Onwards and upwards huh," Jess said as he nudged her gently.

"Definitely."

After finally facing Logan, Rory felt ready to get back to her normal life and take herself back to work. She had missed the newsroom, she loved all the buzz and activity and it had felt weird not being part of it for a few days. She wasn't relishing the huge backlog of work that would be awaiting her though. She knew she was going to need some serious shots of caffeine to help her through as she caught up with everything.

Rory walked back into her office to be greeted by a huge arrangement of flowers tied up with a big bow. She picked up the card that was attached and opened it to read it.

"In Omnia Paratus"

Rory smiled and picked up her phone.

"Logan Huntzberger"

"Oh Mr Huntzberger, I just wanted to say thank you so much for the flowers," Rory said in a faux sweet voice.

Logan smiled "Ah you found them then"

"Well, they would have been pretty hard to miss seeing as the bouquet is so big that I suspect you must have had to remove windows to get them into the building." She joked.

"Anything for you, you know that?" he laughed "Too much?"

"Never too much" she laughed "Thank you so much, they're beautiful".

"I'm glad you're back Ace"

"Me too," she said sitting happily back behind her desk.

A/N: Wow, I've posted way more than I normally would this week! I hope you've enjoyed all the updates. I've loved reading your comments on the story - they keep me writing and also sometimes help me direct the story if I get a bit of writer's block, so do keep them coming. Updates will probably slow down for a few days now as I've got a busy weekend coming up but there will be at least one more update before Monday, maybe two if you're lucky!