AN: Shorter chapter today - sorry, struggled a bit with concentration today.
Rory had talked to G for a at least an hour the night before, and what she was feeling for G was an odd combination of friendship and protectiveness - it was a lot like she'd had with her mother with the difference that G mostly told her things afterwards, having very much her own life with her own decisions and dealing with far more complex matters than she had at her age. But then again - times were different too, but what was important was that they were talking.
After Rory had heard G's breathing change, however, as G fell asleep, she'd picked up her phone, feeling she needed to say something more than how they'd left things with Logan.
"Get the farm if it makes you happy," she typed, but retracted the text, realizing that the tonality could be interpreted the wrong way. She wasn't typing this to pick a fight.
She figured he was asleep, considering it was almost 5.15 AM in London she figured she had some time to find the right words.
"I don't want to move, but if having that place is important to you - I see no harm in owning it," Rory typed. But she deleted the text yet again, feeling it sounded too passive somehow.
What she hadn't accounted for was that Logan wasn't asleep, having since coming to London truly struggled sleeping for more than 3-4 hours at the time, unless he had had a few drinks, hence also his inclination to spend his evenings at the bar talking to Otto, who by now had left the country. But that night he'd stayed sober, and he was already up - in part working, but more so simply thinking, and right then he was staring at the three dots at the bottom of the messenger window appearing and disappearing as Rory typed.
"I don't really understand it. But if getting the place will help..." Rory typed, hitting send quickly, feeling like it was the best she could come up with right then.
"I don't care what properties we have. I just want you home and happy, Logan. Please talk to me, help me understand. Not right now obviously..." she added, the messages sounding like she was blabbering. She wanted to add something that would express the fears she felt, but she just couldn't - she didn't want to be a burden, another thing for him to worry about - she wanted to be his rock and help him.
Logan realized that Rory was searching for deeper explanations than what he was giving her, and he couldn't blame her. He was only barely scraping the surface himself - the symptom - craving the feeling of security and control. He was still trying to wrap his brain around what he was doing and now also how to explain things to Rory in a way that she'd understand him. Was it even possible to explain something if he didn't fully comprehend himself?
Logan had hoped she would have at least been a little excited about the place, that she would have expressed something more than just that - I don't hate it - just sounded so forced, so reluctant. Holiday home, retreat, horses and animals to experience for the kids, the library, the pools - if nothing else the Winnie The Pooh bannister - that must've had some appeal to her. Yes, he knew he wasn't the wilderness kind of girl, nor related to farming much... and if he thought really critically perhaps it was a bit too old world, too D.A.R. But the to him the positives had overweighed those aspects - and it was close to Stars Hollow, which had been one of the crutial criteria he'd set when he'd asked his family's realtor in Connecticut to look for a place. He'd done a few video tours of various places, it hadn't been the first he'd considered. But with Rory right there, close by, he just wanted, spontaneously, to feel her share that excitement with him.
Yes, she'd said she didn't hate it, but it was the way she'd said it that had hurt him. He was feeling the first ounce of excitement about something other than work or the kids - something that could almost be a hobby of sorts. Damn, how he missed having that! And being off sync like they were - her tone had just crushed him a little on the inside, even if it held some hope.
Rory had waited for a couple of seconds for Logan to reply, but figured it was unlikely, considering the time. She did see that he'd seen it - but it wasn't the first time he'd left the laptop open for the night which had on occasion also made it appear like he had. She went to sleep without hearing back from him.
But as Rory woke, without the help of a kid powered alarm clock, it was her phone she checked as the first the next morning. Strangely enough there still wasn't a reply. Rory was sure he'd seen it by now as Logan really wasn't one to sleep until noon, especially not these days. The silence was making her worry - what if her initial reaction had still been too strong, too inconsiderate, too untrusting? She could only hope her response the day before and messages hadn't stirred up bigger problems or that the silence meant something positive like Logan jumping onto a plane to come see her, but these days she just didn't believe in that. The adventurous man she'd once known was way too practical, too responsible and too logical for something like that.
"Good morning," G stirred in bed, turning to her back, jolting Rory out of her worrisome thoughts.
"Hey," Rory replied, streching her arms out as much as she could.
"This pull-out isn't half bad," G commented casually with a yawn. Her ash brown hair was pulled up into a messy ponytail on top of her head and as the room had gotten rather warm with two people in it during the night, her eyes looked a little puffy. But despite that she'd slept better than in weeks. The quality of her sleep was likely also affected by the fact that for the first time she'd felt utterly relieved that someone knew about what had happened in France before she left. She felt lighter, the embarrassment of that last night with Jephté no longer weighing on her as much.
Suddenly the two could hear hasty movements upstairs, the bang of a door and footsteps, but very differently from last night to their relief - kind of - the noise was followed by the sound of retching. The bathroom upstairs and the study shared a ventilation shaft and it wasn't the first time what was going on in the study was heard upstairs or vice versa.
G looked at Rory in confusion, her body language speaking of her hestiance on the matter of whether she should go and help. Her first instinct was to go and help. It was definitely not nice to hear either, but more than anything G felt concerned, and was puzzled by how Rory's initial surprise changed to calmness, as she began to get dressed for the day as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening.
Rory just glanced at her, telling her wordlessly that it was okay. But G really wasn't that quick to figure out what was going on, other than that someone was throwing up, which she was hearing.
Rory felt conflicted - it wasn't her place to explain but she didn't want to lie or see her worry.
Soon they also heard Jess' weak voice inquiring from Celeste if she was okay, offering his assistance, which seemed to calm G enough to not feel so guilty for not reacting and rushing upstairs herself. The next moment Leigh's weak cry alerted Rory, shifting other thoughts aside. Rory left the room and G got dressed herself, knowing that Rory would probably need her help soon enough.
The day passed as if nothing had happened, Rory and G not even mentioning the noises they'd heard last night, taking care of the kids, making breakfast and Rory sitting down with Jess to go over some of the book edits together. G hung out with Celeste and later with Doula, teaching her to do her makeup so it'd look tasteful and original rather than tacky, as she'd shared she had a party she was going to next weekend. G also found several new books from the store that she wanted to read, creating the store some additional revenue on a day off.
They drove home in the afternoon, having timed the ride so that the twins would do their second nap in the car.
G didn't say a word the entire time they were in Stars Hollow about what she'd heard in the morning, but she still felt a little concerned. She was too inexperienced with things like that to connect throwing up to anything other than perhaps having a little too much wine or having a stomach bug.
"Celeste's okay, right?" G asked. She'd thought of a number of things besides flue and hangovers - various medicines that might make one sick, including chemo which she'd witnessed with Amelia's mother some years ago. She'd even thought about the possibility of pregnancy but as she knew from Celeste how they'd done the 'snip-snip', she didn't think it was a plausible scenario.
"Yeah, she is," Rory replied, checking over Emma to make sure she wasn't too warm. At least that part she could confirm without lying.
Hallam was caught up listening to a baseball game and over all he had a good tendency to zone out and not listen to whatever was spoken of in the back.
"I'm worried, but as they didn't mention it and you didn't either I just began wondering if it's something they, you, didn't want me to know," G replied. "But I can tell something's up," she added. She was sick of people hiding things, whether it was her or others, she just wanted to be treated like an adult.
"She's pregnant," Rory said in a low tone, deciding not to fool her. She was a smart girl and would figure it out. If she had lied that wouldn't have done their relationship any favors. "But it's early, there's still a chance it won't… get that far," Rory added, picking her words.
"I thought they couldn't…?" G reacted, feeling a little confused.
"It's a bit of a miracle baby. Sometimes the body heals," Rory replied with a shrug. She didn't fully understand it either. But she also knew that Celeste hadn't lied, there wasn't any doubt in it being Jess' baby.
"I wish she would've told me," G said, feeling a little disappointed. She had had some time with Celeste that day, looking after the kids while Jess and Rory were talking work, and as usual they had spoken pretty openly about a lot of things - a little how therapy had gone for both of them, what she thought of the new therapist and how she was determined to practise more self-love but struggled a little to differentiate that from simply indulging by spending a lot of money on spas and clothes. Celeste had recommended her to try some new sport, cook, craft - prove to herself that she could really make something good all by herself, declutter, give herself face and foot massages, nap during the daytime when she had a chance and focus on doing the things that she loved and felt good doing. Celeste had tried it all, and some of these things had truly helped at one point or another in her struggles. Right now the place where Celeste was at wasn't really that bad, she was a little lost, divided between worlds, but she wasn't in a low point right now, hence in giving her the advice she could Celeste had felt grounded and optimistic.
"She's still scared, she barely told me...," Rory explained. "She doesn't want to get her hopes up," she added, hoping the explanation was enough.
"Oh…," G responded, feeling a little lost in the subject. All the sex-ed she'd gotten during her life from various sources had rarely mentioned miscarriages, usually just treating a pregnancy as something happened and then carried on through the end. But then again it had also taught her that vasectomies were permanent and foolproof. Sure, she'd seen it in movies and tv-shows, but it was definitely a topic that was spoken very little about.
"About 25% of pregnancies end in miscarriage, about 85% of those happen before twelve weeks," Rory shot G some statistics. She knew these numbers almost too well.
"Wow.. I didn't know it was that common," G exhaled, trying to imagine those odds.
"The chance also increases with age…," Rory added.
G now felt almost bad for inquiring and sad that she hadn't known before they'd left so she could've given Celeste an extra strong hug of assurance that she too was keeping her fingers crossed for her.
"You know, I too had an early miscarriage. It was before Finny," Rory shared, looking at the hands in her lap. There were still a lot of things G didn't know about her, and being as close as they'd been for the past week or so, she was little by little opening up about herself just like G was.
"You did?" G asked, in disbelief. "I didn't know. I'm sorry," she added.
"It's not something I talk about much," Rory explained, raising the corner of her mouth, hoping to assure G that she was fine. She was, it was just sensitive.
G took her hand and squeezed it, like had become their thing recently - a wordless assurance.
"So I get why she's not very open to discussing it yet. It's easier if you don't have to tell everybody, who's gotten all excited already, about the loss if it does happen," Rory clarified, in a more upbeat tone a moment later.
"I get it, I think," G said. It was something she'd never really thought about, but it provided her some food for thought for the rest of the ride.