AN: Sorry for the delay, honestly...life is chaotic at best. So here it is, and we start to deal with some of their issues, but it will be an ongoing thing. I don't think you get through what they have been through in just one quick flight.

Disclaimer: I own nothing

Chapter Twelve

"I don't want to," Rory grumbled as she grabbed her purse off the chair and Logan wheeled their suitcases to the door.

"Because you want to stay here, or because you don't want to have the talk?" Logan laughed, he paused at the door and gave Rory a kiss.

"Both?" Rory admitted as she brushed her hand against his cheek gently, "but I do want to see Mia. I've missed her."

"I've been missing her like crazy. Pretty soon we'll have to start bringing her to this thing…maybe next year with her cousins," Logan nodded his head in agreement as they both walked down the corridor towards the elevators. Rory pushed the down button and they waited for a moment until it pinged to let them on. "It will be fine," Logan assured her. He truly believed that to be true. They needed to talk, they had a lot to talk about, but he didn't believe any of it would destroy them. In fact, he believed the opposite to be true, he thought that by dealing with things head on, in a way that they hadn't in years, they might not enjoy the process, it certainly would be uncomfortable, but he was confident in their ability to get through it. "Maybe uncomfortable for whoever is working the flight though."

"We should probably tell her to just lay low," Rory agreed, they were making their way through the lobby now, saying goodbye to the bubble they had been living in for a couple of days. A car was waiting to take them to the private airport and return them to their normal life. Rory was relieved. She was relieved that at the very least, she was returning to Rhode Island, and hopefully she could get back to work sooner rather than later. "Thank you," she smiled as the driver opened the door to the waiting car and she stepped into the back of the black SUV.

They rode to the airport in comfortable silence. Logan reached his hand over and took Rory's in his as they navigated the streets of San Francisco and they both pointed out landmarks and traded anecdotes from all of the times they had enjoyed when they lived in California. They had both agreed the night before, they would not discuss anything heavy until they were seated on the plane with a beverage of some sort in hand. They knew they just needed to get it out and have it out, not deal with constant interruptions from listening ears. They silently made their way onto the plane, engaging briefly with the pilot to discuss the flight duration and requesting a drink from the flight attendant. Logan told her that they would get their own drinks throughout the flight and that she could just relax unless something urgent came up. His intent was clear, that he and Rory needed privacy for the time being.

"So," Rory exhaled as they sat down, each of them holding a coffee in their hands, "I don't even know where to begin. I guess we should just…dive right in?"

"How about sleeping with another guy?" Logan asked, he tried to keep his voice even, but the truth was, even after all these years, the thought of it made him want to throw up. "You…honestly, I understand trying to live in a world without having lost Richard, but…why Tristan? I feel like a random guy off the street or Craigslist, a random from a bar would have been easier to swallow than a man who pretended to be my friend? A man I knew when I was a kid…I don't understand why you brought him into my life if you were just fucking him behind my back."

"You know that I would never just meet a random guy and jump in bed with him. It's not and excuse for what I did, but just like I wasn't built for no strings, I am not built for a one night stand," Rory paused. She needed to consider her words. She had spat out the same excuse for years. She slept with Tristan because he didn't press her on the Richard issue, as far as Tristan was concerned, there was no Richard issue. "I," she paused again, "I liked the attention he gave me." Rory hated herself as soon as the words left her lips. It was the truth though, the other half of the truth. Yes, she had slept with Tristan because he didn't remind her of what they had lost, but also because Tristan had wanted her since they were teenagers. He had pursued her in high school, he had made flirtatious comments about what could have been the few times they had seen each other before they started sleeping together. "When I started Chilton, I was a nobody from this tiny little town and all of the girls hated me…but Tristan…I mean, at first I think he liked tormenting me, but eventually…he was interested. I was with Dean and I didn't know how to handle the attention, I was attracted to Tristan in a way I had never been attracted to anyone before when I was at Chilton…"

"And so you jumped in bed with him? Our son died, you were married and you just thought 'hey, no time like the present?'"

"YES!" Rory finally snapped, much to the surprise of both her and Logan. "I did it Logan, I did it because it felt good and I couldn't handle feeling sad all the damned time! So I'm sorry. I regret it, you know that I regret it, but there it is. The truth. The truth was that Tristan looked at me like the same way you did but without the fucking sadness there was no 'poor Rory', or 'poor me' when Tristan looked at me. So I enjoyed it, and then I hated myself. I hated myself like you would not fucking believe when I was with him. I hated coming home, I hated that I knew I would have to tell you and I hated who I had become. Tristan was sex, there was no emotional connection. I could go and scratch an itch and otherwise be numb."

"Rory," Logan exhaled. He was mad, he wouldn't lie about that, but he also hated seeing her so upset.

"No, you wanted the truth, didn't you? So there it is. Did it make you feel better?" Rory asked him.

Logan shook his head, "I just…I never meant to look at you differently, Ace."

Rory exhaled, she could feel the redness in her cheeks as she spoke. The conversation made her feel sick to her stomach, but they had to do it. "I know you didn't. I know that you tried to be everything for me, but the truth was, we couldn't be everything for each other and let ourselves heal. Something had to give, and I'm sorry, ok? I'm sorry that it was me who gave, and I regret how I did it. But I had failed you, I couldn't do the most basic thing, the thing that as a woman I am supposed to be able to do. I couldn't give our child a safe place to grow. What kind of woman can't provide a safe womb? What kind of wife was I to you if we couldn't have a child of our own? I never drank to excess, I never did drugs, I get physicals and paps, mammograms…I was rigorous about birth control when I was on it…I did everything right, and I couldn't fucking hold on to a pregnancy!"

"Is that how you feel?" Logan reached for her hand to give it a reassuring squeeze. "You think that I thought differently of you because we lost the baby?"

"We didn't lose Richard, Logan. I lost Richard. You played no part in it. Your sperm wasn't the issue, your body wasn't the issue. My body was. My body fucking let you down!"

"Rory, this wasn't your fault. This was…you know this, the doctor told us…the pregnancy wasn't compatible with life…"

"Because of my fucking shitty uterus and placenta!"

"Ror, that isn't true. What can I say that is going to make you believe that?"

Rory was crying now. Tears streaming from her blue eyes and staining her porcelain skin, "nothing. There is nothing anyone can say that will convince me that I didn't fail."

"Is that why you have never wanted to try again?" Logan asked tentatively.

Rory nodded and sniffled, he handed her a kleenex which she gratefully accepted. "I can't do it again. I can't spend all that time worrying and wondering and living in constant fear that it will go wrong again."

"Oh Rory," Logan looked at her sadly and exhaled. "I can understand it."

"What?" Rory asked him seriously.

"Why you ended up with him…how that happened. When we got together…all I could wonder some days is how a girl like you could possibly have any interest in a guy like me."

"A guy like you?" Rory laughed through the tears.

"Oh come on Ace, someone who was smart and gorgeous and had absolutely no interest in anything material being interested in me? I was a playboy, a lazy one at that, I was rude, I was disrespectful…"

"Not to me," she told him honestly, "I mean, cocky and a bit of an arrogant ass from times to time, but you were always kind to me."

"Well you made me want to be a different person," he explained as he took a sip of his coffee. "So if you showed Tristan any of the same grace…then I understand his fascination with you, and I understand how maybe it felt better to be with a person who made you feel exhilarated at 17 than coming home to a man who was just as broken as you were."

"We just…I don't know what we need to say about him now…Richard I mean…I don't know how to talk about it."

"Well maybe that is it?" Logan suggested, "we just…we need to be willing to talk about him when it isn't his birthday, or an anniversary of something. If we think of him we need to talk about him, to each other, and to Mia. The grief has changed over the years, and I fucking know we pay enough therapists who have told us that, that the grief evolves and changes, but we can't just pretend he didn't exist for 360 days of the year."

"Is that what you think I do?" Rory felt her eyes dart up to meet his.

He shrugged his shoulder in response, "sometimes it feels that way."

"You don't talk about him either," Rory countered, "not to me at least."

"Because you never talk about him."

"I don't talk about him because it is all so intrinsically tied to me cheating on you, and I don't want to fucking talk about that anymore. That can't be the craziest thing you've ever heard!"

"We need to untie them Ace. After right now…Richard and Tristan have no bearing on each other. I can spend the rest of my life pretending that guy doesn't exist, that is no problem, but I can't not talk about my son anymore. I need to be able to talk about him to you."

"What is there to say about him?" Rory her cheeks still stained with tears, more brimming in her blue eyes. "What can we possibly say about a little boy who we never got the chance to know?"

"He would be four," Logan shrugged, "he would be four and he would probably have a really cool personality. I wonder if he would like trucks or if he would be into sports? Would he love books like Mia does or would he want to live off chicken fingers and macaroni? What would his favourite colour be?"

"WHAT DOES IT MATTER?" Rory screamed at him, her eyes wide, immediately after the words came out, her hand covered her mouth and she paused, "Logan I…I didn't mean it like that…I just…it hurts. It hurts me…"

Logan stared at her in disbelief. What did it matter? She didn't think about it? She didn't care? "Well, of course…if it hurts you we should just pretend it didn't happen then, shouldn't we?"

"That isn't what I'm saying," Rory told him. "I just…Logan, there are ways that you want to grieve this, and remember him…those aren't the things that I can think about. Having him and losing him…it was the single best and worst thing of my life. I didn't know I could love someone so completely and so quickly until I was pregnant with him, but losing him…it has brought out anger in me that I didn't know was possible. So I get it…you want to think about who he would have been, but I can't. All I can think about is how we held his tiny body and how it broke me into a million pieces. Most of those pieces are put back together now, most of those tiny little pieces have been glued back…"

"There has to be a middle ground. A middle ground between my need to talk about him with my wife and your need to heal. How do we find that? What is that point?" Logan asked calmly. They had agreed, they had agreed that they could both say what they needed to say about this and although it broke his heart, he had to hear her side.

"What if we…" Rory exhaled, trying to think of options that were feasible and fair, "we go back to Cindy," she referred to their therapist in Rhode Island, "we go back twice a month and during those sessions it is a safe place to talk about him."

"And what if I have the hankering before then or between sessions?" Logan countered.

"Then we play it by ear," Rory suggested. "In time…maybe she can help me be more willing to talk about it, but for now…it's something."

"We need a break," Logan stated simply, using the suggestion that their therapist from California had made when they first started attending. "We need to stop for a minute."

"I agree," Rory nodded and shifted in her seat so that she could lean into him. "Logan, I love you so much it hurts sometimes…I can't battle this out with you. It hurts, my chest hurts, my head hurts, I just want to cry."

Logan put his arm around her and kissed her head, "I love you too, Ace. We'll…we'll make an appointment with Cindy and talk about this. I don't want to scream at each other anymore."

"So for now…"

"We're fine," he promised her with another squeeze, "but we still have a lot of work to do. We need to figure out how to discuss this without ending up in a screaming match."

Rory nodded her head and closed her eyes. He was right, she knew he was right, but she also had no idea how to stop it. Her knee jerk reaction was to shut down and protect her heart. "Are we grabbing dinner on the way home?" she changed the subject.

"I told Anna we would grab something so that she can go home and she will be off for a week," Logan nodded. "I know we haven't talked about it, but have you thought about going back to work?"

Rory inhaled again, and moved her head to look up at him, "I haven't," she admitted, "I mean…it's only been a couple of days."

"You see the doctor next week, so maybe we can make a plan after that. Not that you need to be back at work, but I have a feeling you will go crazy at home."

"No more than I already have," Rory laughed.

xxx

"Mia?" Rory called as she walked into the mudroom of the house, Logan was a few steps behind her and he had declared that he would take a shower first so that Rory could have some downtime with Mia. "Mommy and Daddy are here…Anna?" Rory heard a muffled shout coming from upstairs and took that to mean that they were up there. She walked to the stairs and made her way up as Logan disappeared into their main floor master bedroom. "Hey pretty girl," Rory smiled as she stood in the doorway to Mia's bedroom where the two were playing with dolls.

"Mommy!" Mia squealed and ran to hug Rory who took a moment to pick her up and hug her. Inhaling the scent of the watermelon detangler that Mia used, "I missed you!"

"I missed you too," Rory kept hugging her, swaying ever so slightly back and forth as she did. "I love you so much baby girl."

"I love you too Mama," Mia grinned, "put me down! I'm playing!"

"It is time for Anna to go home," Rory smiled at Anna who was standing up from her spot on the ground, "everything been alright?"

Anna nodded, "everyone was great, the kids had fun, I had fun, but I am exhausted."

"Logan said he gave you a couple of weeks off, so please, enjoy it! I don't want to see your face around here for anything!"

"Thank you Mrs. H," Anna smiled and then turned to Mia, "you be good for your Mom and Dad, I will see you in a few weeks, after my break."

"Bye Anna, I love you."

"I love you too sweetheart."

Rory smiled as she watched Anna leave. She knew their nanny loved Mia like her own, it was the only thing that made Rory feel comfortable leaving town without Mia when they did. "So, sweetheart, Dad ordered Chinese food, it will be here soon."

"I want to play," Mia shoved a doll towards her mother.

Rory laughed as she carefully brought herself down to the floor. Although her leg was out of the cast and mostly healed, she still had some occasional pain to deal with, and that pain had certainly been exacerbated by her decision to wear heels in San Francisco. "What is this doll named?" Rory asked as she leaned herself up against the Blythe Carriage bed they had purchased from Pottery Barn kids when Mia moved out of her crib.

"Auntie Honor."

"Oh well I love to be Auntie Honor," Rory smiled as Mia carried her own doll like a baby, "what is your doll named?"

"Daddy."

"Daddy is a girl?" Rory smiled.

"I love this dolly, and I love Daddy, so I named the dolly Daddy."

"Of course, can't fight that logic," Rory laughed, she loved when Mia would explain her thought process as though whatever she had come up with was the most logical thing in the world. "Five more minutes, and then we are going downstairs, Dad will be out of the shower."

"Daddy is home?!"

"Of course Daddy is home," Rory looked at her, Mia seemed to be waiting anxiously for Rory to say something else, "did you think I left him in California? I told you he ordered dinner."

"He can do that from his phone, silly goose."

"Yes, but normally Daddy is home when I am home."

"Can I sleep in your bed tonight?" Mia asked, "With you and Daddy? I missed you when you were gone, and Anna didn't snuggle like you and Daddy do."

"That is because Anna is not your Mom or your Dad."

"So can I sleep in your bed? Please, please, please, please?"

Rory laughed. She normally said no to these requests, but Logan was much more likely to agree. "Ask Daddy," she told the little girl. "But if he says yes, it is one night only."

"Can we have a sleepover?"

"Ask Dad," Rory shook her head and began standing up. The difference between sleeping in their bed and a sleepover in Mia's eyes was that a sleepover involved junk food in bed, a movie, and in the morning, Logan would normally make them breakfast in bed. She smiled, a sleepover was normally the perfect family evening and morning. She wasn't sure Logan would go for it after the flight. It was full of ups and downs, silence, tears, shouting, anger…she supposed it was good. They needed to be able to feel those things in order to process everything they had gone through. "Come on," Rory told Mia once Rory was fully standing and ready to go down the stairs, "dinner."

Mia skipped down the stairs and into the kitchen where she immediately leapt into the arms of her father. "Daddy! I missed you! Mommy says we can have a sleepover!"

"Did she?" Logan grinned widely at the little girl, "that doesn't sound like something Mommy would say."

"Mommy said to ask Dad," Rory clarified as the doorbell rang, "I'll get it. Did you pay online?" Logan nodded as Rory went to the front door and got the food from the delivery person, "are you sure this is enough?" Rory laughed as she walked back into the kitchen with two enormous bags of food a moment later, smiling as she saw Logan with Mia. "Guy probably thinks we're having a party."

"Well we are," Logan countered as he balanced Mia on his hip and took a bag from Rory. She looked at him quizzically regarding the party he had just referenced, "a sleepover-movie party, duh."

"You caved? I was gone for less than a minute and you caved?"

"I'm sorry, but I cannot say no to this face," Logan kissed Mia playfully all over her face and tickled her. He received gleeful laughter in response as Mia began to try to kiss his face as well. "I did say that we couldn't eat the Chinese in bed, so I held my ground."

"My hero," Rory rolled her eyes as she began to unload the food from the bags, "Mia, can you get your plate please?" Logan put the little girl down and she skipped to the cupboard that held all of her dishes and utensils, "and get yourself some water please."

"I want juice."

"No juice, we are having water at dinner and if you are good, Dad will make hot chocolate when we watch the movie."

"Why don't you ever make hot chocolate?"

"Because Daddy is better at it," Rory smiled at Logan. It had become a tradition at the holidays that he would make hot chocolate for everyone because somehow, one of Logan Huntzberger's best qualities was his ability to make a beverage. When they were at Yale, Rory thought it only extended to alcoholic beverages, but in the years she had been married to the man, she realized it was true of almost anything in the kitchen.

"Why are you better at it?"

"Because when I was your age, I had a nanny who taught me how to make hot chocolate," Logan admitted.

"Like Gramma?" Mia asked, referring to Lorelai.

Logan shook his head, "no, a nanny like how Anna takes care of you. She taught Auntie Honor and I lots of cool things, like how to cook and how to make yummy hot chocolate."

"Can you teach me?"

"Maybe tomorrow?" Logan agreed, Rory was sliding Mia's plate across the island and moved on to preparing a plate for Logan. Mia nodded her head in agreement and climbed onto her chair between where Rory and Logan would sit. "Thank you," Logan smiled at Rory, he walked across the kitchen to the wine fridge and then back behind Rory to grab two wine glasses. He put them all down on the counter and paused for a moment to wrap his arms around Rory, he nuzzled her neck gently from over her shoulder and she laughed, her body pressed against his. "I'm glad we're home," he told her before placing a wet kiss on her cheek, that move received a laugh from Mia and a look of fake disgust from his wife. "White good?"

"Yes," Rory used her hands to keep him in place for a moment. After the emotionally exhausting day, she needed the connection. She needed something to physically grasp to remind herself that they would be alright, "maybe one more though?" she moved her cheek towards him, once again received giggles and squeals of joy from Mia.

"Yuck Daddy!" Mia laughed, "no more kisses!"