After a minute or two, I had finally steadied myself enough to get back to work; unfortunately the madness wasn't over yet. I was hoping to get passed Gerry's office unnoticed, but there was absolutely no chance of that; he was standing in his doorway waiting for me.

"Come on in, Gilmore."

Reluctantly I took a seat across from him at his desk.

He looked at me enquiringly, "So?"

"So…"

"So you know Mitchum Huntzberger?"

I paused, unable to determine how he felt about the subject, but it didn't really matter. You can't lie now. "Yes."

He nodded. Give me something to go off of, please. "You worked for him?"

Was this something he inferred from our little altercation in the newsroom, or had he done some quick research? "I did. I was an intern for him in college."

"And you didn't like the nice things he had to say about you in The Wall Street Journal?"

He had definitely done some research. Damn that interview. "Gerry…" I started to start defending myself, but he continued.

"You know, I have to say, I'm surprised to agree with him. Most people would have included that on their resume."

"Well, to be fair, I wasn't asked to confirm the statement he made in that interview. Besides, you hired me without it." I flashed a smile, but he gave me a look somewhere along the lines of a glare. You have to tell him. "Look, Gerry, in the spirit of full disclosure, I think I need to tell you something before we continue this conversation."

"About?"

"My freelance writing…" He was a little taken aback by the change of subject, but he listened as I continued. "I thought I should let you know that I'm working on pursuing more chances to be published at The Times."

He gave a tight lipped nod. "I get it. Bigger market, bigger draw, but remember what I said about your responsibilities here."

"I know, but I'm going to be focusing on more political pieces, and I don't even know how successful I will be."

He rubbed his hand along his jaw. "Well, I can't stop you, but if this interferes with your work here it could be a problem. I can't let my staff make outside work their priority."

"Of course."

"And as far as your success goes, having connections certainly won't hurt you."

He emphasized connections, obviously alluding to my visitor. "Mitchum is obviously not a connection that I am interested in relying on." He looked at me skeptically. "Would 'It's complicated' be a sufficient response?"

He raised his eyebrows, obviously intrigued. Why does he care so much that I know Mitchum?

"He has a history of wavering opinions of me… on professional and personal levels."

"Personal?"

What is his deal? Yes. Personal… like I don't want to talk about it. He kept looking at me, waiting for a response. I really just wanted to get out of his office and back to work. Screw it. I had started this conversation in the spirit of full disclosure, and as I admitted to Leslie this morning, it was going to get out eventually. I took a deep breath, "I'm dating his son."

Gerry sat across from me with a blank stare for a minute. It was like he wasn't sure if he had heard me correctly. "His son." He spoke slowly, processing. Four years ago this wouldn't have meant much to anyone, but Logan his made a name for himself now. People know who he is. "You're dating Logan Huntzberger?"

I nodded tentatively, but was surprised when Gerry let out half a laugh.

"You're dating a guy who owns the media rights to at least half a dozen major papers, and is the son of the biggest name in the industry, and you work as a reporter here...at The Post?"

Here we go. "Yes."

He shook his head. "You know The Times isn't a Huntzberger paper either." Is he mocking me?

"I do know that." Honestly, that adds to the appeal. I've now told him more than he needs to know about my life. Let's get out of here. "I'm not interested in working at a Huntzberger paper. And with all due respect, I would really appreciate it if this could be the end of this discussion. I'm trying very hard to keep my personal life and professional life separate. The interruption from Mitchum this morning was unexpected to say the least, and it will not happen again." One way or another, it won't be happening again.

His eyebrows had risen as I made my little declaration, but he nodded, "Alright."

Alright? I would really like something a little more concrete than that, but the only thing more that I got was a nod. I guess that will do.

"Thank you… and I will respect my priorities here. So if there's nothing else…"

He nodded once more and dismissed me. Oh boy. I knew it was naïve to ever think that I could have gotten away with never having that conversation, but I was really wishing that I would have been more prepared for it.

As I walked back to my desk my head was swimming. I figured Gerry wouldn't have taken the news that I was pushing more freelance work well, but strangely he seemed more affected by discovering my association with the Huntzbergers. And Mitchum showing up here; I still can't get over that. And Logan! How could he pull me in to their business deal? He is so lucky he's on a plane right now.

I knew I would talk to Logan when he landed, and I could deal with his ridiculous stunt then. For now, I needed to get away from the drama and focus on something else. Like work maybe, what a novel concept to actually do my job.

Thankfully Leslie hadn't been at her desk when Mitchum made his appearance; otherwise I'm sure she would have been waiting for me after I got a fresh cup of coffee. I worked through the afternoon and had a draft of space shuttle instalment number two in Gerry's box before the end of the day. Hopefully that would instill a bit of confidence in my priorities for him.

I started to undo the deadbolts at my apartment at just the same moment I heard my phone ring in my bag. It was too early for Mom to be out of the Town Meeting, so I knew it had to be Logan. I rushed inside to answer before it sent him to voicemail. He had some explaining to do.

"What is wrong with you?"

"Well hello to you too…"

"Logan!"

"Besides the fact that I just spent six and half hours on a plane and am roughly three thousand miles away from you, I thought I was doing alright, but apparently that's a fallacious feeling."

"I'm glad you made it there safely, that's not exactly what I was talking about."

"You're going to have to catch me up then, Ace. I'm a little lost."

"Lost? As in out of your mind? Because I think you'd have to be to require your father and soon-to-be business partner to be nice to me as a term of the major business endeavor you're about to embark on. What in the hell is wrong with you?"

I heard him groan on his end of the line, "Ace, calm down…"

"I'm sorry; I seem to have used up my calm allotment for the day when Mitchum showed up in the newsroom this morning."

"What?"

"My thoughts exactly… What in the world would he be doing coming to talk to me? And at work of all places! Oh, yea… he's come to oh so subtly inform me of the impact I have on your merger."

"I can't believe that he…"

"I can't believe that you did this. You promised me you wouldn't do anything rash."

"This wasn't rash."

"You made me a linchpin in a major business deal. You don't call that rash?"

"No I don't. I thought about this... a lot."

"Logan…"

"Rory, would you just listen to me?"

I took a deep breath. I guess if I wanted him to explain I would have to stop my lambasting and let him talk. "Fine."

"I told you that you don't deserve to be treated the way my family has been treating you. In fact, I promised your mother that I wouldn't let you go through this without a fight, and you wouldn't expect me to risk the wrath of Lorelai Gilmore, would you?"

He has a point, "No, but…"

"No buts, Rory. You're supposed to be listening. I can't control the way that they feel. I wish I could, but I can't, not right now at least. But Mitchum acts solely in terms of business, and if making contingencies to this deal is the only way I can get him to treat you with any respect then that's what I'll do."

"Logan, you can't…"

"I did. It's done. And to be fair, it's a personal contract, not something that will be represented by the lawyers, but I made it very clear to him that it needs to be honored as if it were."

The fact that my name wasn't going to show up in public documents regarding the merger made me feel a little better… but only a little. "What exactly were the terms of this contract?"

"He didn't tell you?"

"He only said that it came down to respecting me, and us. And that he pretty much had no choice but to agree to it."

He chuckled, "That's pretty much the gist of it…"

"I didn't ask for the gist."

He sighed. "Look… I told you, I've thought about this, so please don't accuse me of being impetuous. I love you Rory, and if it came down to it, I would choose a happy life with you over whatever comes of this deal. He needed to know that. You should know that."

This is insane. I didn't know what to say… what could I say? I thought that Mitchum was overreacting about my influence on this deal, but apparently I was wrong. Logan was not messing around… He had every intention of choosing me over the merger. Not at all what I want him to do, but I couldn't exactly be upset with him either…

"I should be mad at you for putting me in the middle of this."

"I guess that's your prerogative, but I really hope you're not. I have meant every word of what I said about doing things differently this time Rory, and that includes involving you in important decisions like this."

"You could have at least given me a little heads up about my involvement."

"I'm sorry. I never thought that he would confront you like that... though I guess I shouldn't put anything past him. How bad was he?"

"Well… he made it pretty clear that he's basically waiting for the two of us to fail, and he obviously resents what you're doing, but he said he can accept it if he has to."

"And he does. The board of his own company would turn on him if this doesn't go through. They've already making plans to rely on what we can do for them. "

"Speaking of plans… I told Gerry about mine."

"I guess I wasn't the only one making risky moves this morning."

"Yea, well, you father made it a point to let him know that I had interned for him… a fact that I had intentionally left out of my resume. So naturally Gerry wanted to know why. I was going to have to explain, but figured it was better to let him know my plans before he thought that I had been waiting to play that card to take full advantage."

"So…"

"Cat's out of the bag… I officially know the Huntzbergers."

"I'll say…" His comment had a slightly suggestive tone.

"Don't be gross. I'm not talking Biblical sense, but he does know about us being together. I had to give him some assurance that I would never be leaving The Post for a Huntzberger paper."

"And what about the prospect of you jumping ship for The Times?"

"There is no jumping ship. There is no S.S. Times to jump to; not even a dingy. I just told him that I was going to be working on pieces that would probably be too political for his column and that I had certain interest in getting them seen at one, particular publication."

"Okay Captain Ahab, so what did he say?"

"Well… he can't stop me from doing it, but he kind of implied that if it affects my work for him that I might need a life vest."

"You can swim, can't you?"

"Does doggy paddle count?"

"Worst case scenario you end up hanging out with Ginger and Gilligan."

"Thanks for those heartfelt words of encouragement." I hope he picked up the sarcasm there.

"Anytime, Ace. Listen, I've got a meeting in five minutes with my right hand man over here, so I've got to get going."

"Didn't you just get off the plane?"

"Yea, but it's still well within business hours over here, not it that would really matter, and he has to fill me in on the latest updates. Besides, I'm running out of nautical references…"

I let out a sigh, "Well alright, Captain Aubrey."

"Aubrey?"

"Oh don't tell me you've forgotten Russell Crowe… Master and Commander?"

He laughed; I'm sure remembering the first real conversation we had. "Well played, Ace."

"I thought so."

"Gotta run."

"Bon voyage…"

"You're exhausting."

"You love me..."

He paused; I knew he was smiling. "Yes, I do. I'll talk to you later."

He hung up and I found myself sitting at my table, realizing how much he must actually love me. He would walk away from everything for me… and to think this morning I thought that moving into his apartment was a big deal.

Before I could do further analysis of the situation on my own, my phone rang again. Mom.

"Hey…"

"Are you working, you seem distracted…"

"Not working, just trying to bring the Santa Maria into harbor."

"Rediscovering the Americas, huh? That's rather ambitious of you…"

"Yes, well it's been a rather ambitious couple of days…"

"Then let's hear it."

"Would you like to hear it in chronological order, or get the headlines first?"

"Well I assume you had something to tell me this morning, and it sounds like more has happened since then, so let's go chronologically."

"Okay…" I started with Dominic's plan to get my foot in the door at The Times, and as I expected she was skeptical. I knew she worried about stuff like this because she wants what's best for me, but I assured her that I was going to try and juggle everything. Besides, there was more to that story later.

Next I filled her in on how Logan insisted I accompany him to the launch party, sans the more salacious details of our evening, but with a few tidbits about Leslie and Finn. She was aptly intrigued by the coupling. I skipped ahead a little bit so that she could appreciate the catty girls from the office this morning, which I had almost forgotten about myself.

"You should have told them off."

"What for? Besides, do you think they would have believed me?"

"That's not the point. I'm with Leslie on this one."

"Surprise, surprise… but she was right about one thing."

"What's that?"

"That it's getting pretty serious…" I told her about what Logan had said, and she inserted 'Awws' in all the appropriate places. In all honesty, it was pretty romantic.

"Are you going to be neighbors with George and Weezy?"

"That's it? I tell you that I'm moving in with Logan and all you have to say involves a reference to The Jeffersons? Did you even watch The Jeffersons?"

"Honestly? No… But I did see a couple of episodes of All in the Family, and how could I miss a chance for a chorus of Movin' on Up…"

I stopped her before she could actually start singing. "Mom. Please."

"Rory, what do you want me to say? You've lived together before so it's not like I have to go over the whole spiel about how to live with a boy… Heck you lived with Logan before I had ever lived with a boy. And you've got to admit that his whole 'want to come home to you' thing was sweet."

"I know. It was very sweet, but it's a big step."

"Of course it's a big step, theoretically anyway. You guys made it clear you were serious, so isn't this obviously what comes next?"

I paused. I guess I may have been projecting some of the weight of Logan's deal with his dad onto the moving in situation. "I guess, but… apparently it's part of a bigger issue."

"How big?"

"You picked chronological so you're going to settle for the trailer on that one for now… So I agreed to move in with him, then this morning he heads off to his meeting with Mitchum before his flight. He told me it's supposed to be about finalizing their contracts, so I'm thinking a couple of adjustments here, argue a couple of last minute numbers there, you know?"

"Sure, sure, typical family breakfast stuff…"

"Well, turns out I had no idea what was going to transpire at this meeting. Later that morning I get a call letting me know that someone was here to see me, and I come to find out that it's Mitchum."

"Mitchum?"

"Mitchum! At my office. Of course there was an awkward thing with us and my editor, which opened a whole can of worms later, but it turns out he had some things he wanted to discuss with me."

"Did you tell him to beat it?"

"I thought about it… but I had to know what was so important that he would come down to talk to me about in person."

"And what was so important?"

"Logan, who promised he wouldn't do anything crazy, had a contract drafted which stipulates that Mitchum has to respect me, and Logan, and our relationship."

"Are you kidding?"

"I wish I were. I was dumbfounded. I couldn't believe what was coming out of his mouth, or the fact that he had actually agreed to it."

"The all-powerful, ever intimidating Mitchum Huntzberger is bowing to a contract that says he has to be nice to you?"

"My question exactly… I'm going to forego the authenticity of our timeline here to skip ahead to the part where I just asked Logan if he had lost his mind. I was so upset that he would do something so ridiculous, but…"

"But?"

I relayed the major points of the conversation I had just had with Logan, emphasizing his sincerity about giving up this deal to make sure that we could be happy.

"Well it's not exactly a sonnet, but it's certainly one way to profess one's undying devotion."

"l like I said, a much bigger deal."

"Yea… who would have thought that my daughter would be a player in a major publishing merger? You know, you're making things very hard on your brother. Unless he grows up to be like the President or something he's going to have a major inferiority complex thanks to you."

"He can thank me for the motivation during his Inaugural Address."

I rounded out the recap of the day with Gerry's reaction to the double whammy of confiding to him my other pursuits, and the fact that I am involved with the biggest family in the business.

"So does reminding you of your priorities mean that he's going to be making your life more difficult?"

"I hope not… I'm kind of banking on him continuing to convince me to stay at The Post, which I'm not at all opposed to, but I also can't not take this chance with Dominic."

"As long as you're not going to be throwing away everything you've worked for since you got there…"

"I'm not… at least I'm hoping that I'm not. I'm trying to get ahead of all my current deadlines in an attempt to prove my loyalty to Gerry. It's just going to be a crazy amount of work to simultaneously be working on pieces that will be quality enough to show The Times…"

She took a deep breath, obviously still trying come to terms with what could be a big risk in my career, "Okay kid, if you think this is your chance…"

"I think it might be. Logan thinks it is."

"Well, if Logan thinks it is…"

"Mom that is not what I meant."

"I know… So back to the whole moving thing; do you have a game plan?"

"A game plan?"

"Yea, does your rich, important boyfriend have people coming to magically have all of your stuff appear at his place?"

"No… I was pretty much going to go old school. Leslie is coming over tomorrow night to help me start packing and maybe make the first trip. Logan won't be back until at least Sunday, so I've got time."

"Want some help?"

"Really?"

"Yea… Wednesday? I can leave Landon with Sookie, I'll take Luke's truck and meet you after work. You can show me your new digs…"

"Perfect. Oh, I'm going to order from this new Thai place tonight, if it's good we can order it again then."

I was glad that she was coming. It always helped to be able to talk to her, but nothing beat having her here.

I poured over the outlines of Obama's 2008 campaign promises I had made four years ago as I ate what turned out to be mediocre Thai food; a little disappointing, but the research proved to be fruitful, so it balanced out the night. There were new appropriations coming to pass regarding his education budget increases. It was topical, there is always consumer interest in education, and I had written a piece regarding his proposed budgets during his previous campaign. This was my piece.

I worked late gathering some research and carefully balanced my time at work the next day. I gave the suggested edits to my space shuttle piece due focus and got a revised copy to Gerry by the end of the day, who was satisfied enough to send it to copy. In the meantime I did some digging around the office to see who had contacts with legislators regarding education, while trying not to be too obvious.

Leslie and I went to pick up my car from the garage after work so that we could make a trip over to Logan's later, and then started the arduous process of packing. For the size of my apartment it seemed impossible to have as much stuff as I did, but apparently all things are possible.

We made the first official moving trip with a few heavy boxes of what were mostly books. Tommy was nice enough to help us get them upstairs, but that's pretty much where the productive portion of the evening ended, at least as far as Leslie was concerned.

She had been impressed by the lobby and the doorman, particularly when he referred to me by name, but she had held it together in his presence. It was only after he had left us at the door to the apartment that she let her true colors show. I undid the single lock… a nice change of pace, I have to admit… and led her inside.

"Damn."

She put the box she was carrying down on the floor in front of her and proceeded to gawk. I bit back a smile as I watched her wander around a little; into the dining room and then, much like I was, was drawn to the windows in the living room. Her mouth hung open like a Tex Avery cartoon staring at an animated burlesque dancer.

"Holy Hell."

I mimicked Logan's response from the first night I had been here, "Not bad, huh?"

She glared at me, knowing full well that it was much more than 'not bad'. "Have you seen this view?"

I nodded and answered sardonically, "Once or twice… Now, are you going to help or what?"

Reluctantly she pulled herself away from the windows, "Yea, yea… So, where are you keeping all this stuff?"

"I don't really know, actually…"I hadn't really thought that far ahead… I was about to pull out my phone to text Logan, but on my way back towards where we had left the boxes I realized that there was a note on the table.

"There's room in the closet, feel free to move whatever you need to. Call Colin and Finn to help, and check the office. – L"

"Well isn't he the second coming of Hemmingway."

I rolled my eyes at her. Personally, I had become quite fond of his little notes. It's rather romantic.

"Come on, we're supposed to check the office."

She shook her head at the notion of having an actual office as I pushed her away from the dining room, past the stairs, and towards our destination. She stopped short in the doorway and I ran into her.

"Rory, there's a suit of armor in here…"

"Henry!" I had only glanced in here before and hadn't noticed my old friend standing in the corner.

"It has a name?"

I nodded enthusiastically, "We haven't always been the best of friends, but I'm kind of glad to know he's still around."

I finally got around her into the room and found an empty book case against the opposite wall.

"Awe, he does love me!"

"And is obviously well aware of what a nerd you are…"

"Hey. I prefer the term bibliophile."

"Whatever you have to tell yourself, but either way, your books are heavy. We got them upstairs, but I'm not prepared to move them again quite yet."

"They'll feel neglected."

"They used to live in your oven. I think they can stand to sit in boxes for a little while."

"Fine…" I started to head for the kitchen. "You want something to drink?"

When she didn't respond I turned around to see her half way up the stairs.

"What are you doing?"

"You know exactly what I'm doing."

"Come on… I'm sure there's at least one bottle of wine around here." There was in fact a whole wine cooler, but I thought maybe a hunt for it might entice her enough to come back downstairs...

Sure enough she turned and eyed me, "You know I'm going to make my way through this place eventually."

I shook my head. "I know, but I've got a bottle of red and a pizza menu that says I can hold you off for at least a little while."

She agreed to my terms and settled for nosing her way through the kitchen and perusing his DVD collection while we waited for the pizza to arrive.

Ironically, there was a rerun of The Jeffersons on TV while Leslie flipped through the channels, but just as delivery man rang the bell we were happy to find that Footloose was just starting… the original of course.

"If only we'd known… I would have ordered bacon on our pizza."

"A lost opportunity, indeed."

By the time Kevin Bacon was getting the final dance going my phone buzzed on the coffee table; it was Logan calling. I hadn't talked to him all day, so I sacrificed to see Leslie do her best Lori Singer impression and answered the phone.

"Hey…"

"Hi… Hanging out with Kenny Loggins?"

He must have been able to hear the movie in the background, but I ran with the bit as I made my way back towards the dining room and sat at the table. "Yea, I think he's going to break into Danger Zone next; honestly, the man is the king of movie soundtracks."

"Damn, and here I am stuck on the other side of the country."

"Well, don't get yourself too worked up about it… Les and I are just taking a break."

"From?"

"Oh you know, just taking over some guy's apartment…"

"Did you break in? I don't know how lucky you'll be trying to get a second felony expunged from your record…"

"No, if you can believe it this guy gave me a key…"

"Brave man."

"Very."

"So you're getting settled?"

"If by settled you mean that we lugged a few boxes upstairs and then ordered a pizza, then yes."

"Sounds like a productive evening."

"Hey, enlightening a town of deprived teenagers to the culture of dance and rock n' roll is quite the task."

"I can imagine. And that warehouse gymnastics routine… I hope you stretched."

"Never… Oh hey, thank you."

"For what?"

"The bookshelf."

I could tell he was smiling, "I'm glad you got my note."

"I did. Convenient too, since my books happen to be what we brought over tonight."

"No wonder you needed a break."

"I'm glad you understand the struggle… By the way, Leslie was very impressed by Henry, and to be honest I was a little surprised that he made the cut given you're mature, professional persona these days."

"Well it's not like I could put him up for adoption or something. He's seen too much to trust him to just anyone…"

"Ah yes, if that statue could talk…"

"…the stories he could tell would get us all in trouble. Not to mention his feelings on you, after the way you insulted him…"

"Oh don't worry; we've put our differences behind us. I think we can coexist, but if he messes with my books, there will be hell to pay."

"Duly noted. I'll have a talk with him."

"So, how are things on the West Coast?"

"Well today was pretty much a marathon meeting with the partners who will be managing things out here; hammering out the details of who will be handling what, how things will work with our board moving to New York, all of which I'm sure will be reviewed tomorrow with our investors. A lot of the rest of the week will be introducing the new team to all of our clients, give them some confidence that they will still be taken care of."

"Sounds like a lot of long days…"

"They have to be if I'm going to get home to you by the end of the week… in fact I have some things I still need to go over tonight before we meet with the number crunchers tomorrow. I just wanted to check in…"

"I'm glad you did... I miss you."

"I miss you too, Ace. As soon as things are done here, I am on a plane back."

I smiled in spite of myself, "Good."

"Hey, did you call the guys? They're ready to be at your beck and call."

"I haven't yet… My mom's coming up with Luke's truck tomorrow to help with stuff."

"Good. So I take it she's cool with this?"

"Would it matter if she weren't?" A little late for that now.

"Kind of… I mean I'd still want you to move in, but I certainly don't want to be on her bad side."

"I think you're safe for now."

"Glad to hear it."

I could hear him trying to stifle a yawn. "Go get your stuff done and get some sleep."

"Sleep? I don't need no stinking sleep."

"Hey, if you get to worry about me, I get to worry about you."

"Fine. Where are you staying tonight?"

"I don't know yet…" I peered around the corner and saw that the couch where I'd left Leslie was empty. "I seem to have lost Leslie, so we'll see."

"What does that mean?"

"You don't want to know." I shook my head, knowing that she had wandered off to snoop somewhere.

He tentatively responded, "Alright... How did work go today?"

"Honestly, I think it's a little early to make a judgement call on how things are going to play out, but so far things were fine."

"Good. They should be."

He was confident that things would be fine, so I should be too, right? Right. There was a funny pause on the line. "Ace, that was my call waiting, I gotta run."

Duty calls. "Alright… Hey, I meant what I said about getting some sleep."

"Alright, alright, jeeze Mom."

"It's only because I love you." It never hurt to use his own logic against him.

"Love you too, Ace."

I hung up and found myself smiling. It would probably qualify in Paris' book as a harlequin romance face, but I didn't care; he was working hard to get home to me.

"Rory!"

Leslie shouting my name from upstairs pulled me out of my love-struck haze. Of course she had snuck upstairs. I shouted back to her without getting up, "What?"

"Get up here!"

I rolled my eyes as I made my way upstairs and found her standing in the walk-in closet, in front of a chest of drawers.

"What are you doing?"

"Well, I wanted to check out just how much room you have in the closet… very impressive by the way, especially considering that you don't have enough close to fill half of this space…"

"You called me up here to tell me that for the first time in my life I have too much closet space? I've seen this closet…"

"Have you seen this?"

One of the drawers in front of her was empty and I realized that she was holding small box that was all too familiar. I had definitely seen it. "I didn't know it was here. I didn't even know he kept it."

"So it's…"

I nodded.

"Can I…"

We both already knew what was in it, but I knew she was dying to see it. "I guess… You've gone this far, why stop now?"

Once more, her jaw dropped as she opened the velvety lid, and then she looked at me. "Rory, it's gorgeous."

"I know."

"And you still said no?"

I sighed, "It had nothing to do with the ring… Haven't we been over this? I needed to live my life, he had to figure out how to subsist away from his family, we were too young. It wasn't right."

"What about now?"

"What about now?"

"What would you do if he asked you again, right now."

"He's not going to ask me right now. For all we know he's held onto it all of this time out of…" I struggled to come up with an ending to that sentence. "…resentment, or something."

She looked at me with one eyebrow raised. "We both know that's not true. Come on… you're living together; he's standing up to his family for you. If he came home on Sunday and asked you to marry him, what would you say?"

This was not a topic that I had broached yet, even just within myself. Everything that happened over the last four years was a direct result of me having said no. I knew now that it was the right thing to do, that we were both better off for it. And I we're better together now because of it…

"Come on. Let's get out of here. My mom's coming into town tomorrow; she can help us with the rest of my stuff…"

She reluctantly accepted my choice to ignore her question and put the ring back where she had found it. "Whatever you say, boss."

** I do not own any character or content related to Gilmore Girls or any other entities mentioned. **

A/N - A nice long chapter, with more to come this weekend, I promise. In other news... How thrilled are all of you about the confirmation news this week! I found myself a little disappointed that other people in my life... ahem, significant other... didn't reciprocate my excitement. My fellow Fan Fictioners are the only ones who will truly appreciate it!

xxoo