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Rory leaned her head back and let the hot water from the shower rain over her face. The last couple of days had been like travelling back in time; hanging out with Matt, fighting with Jess…kissing Jess.
She ran her hands over her face and tried to shake it all off. This was her life now. Here – with Logan. That was the only thing that mattered and from now on Logan and the wedding would be the only things on her mind.
Jess was a part of her past – Logan was her future. Simple as that.
Turning the water off, she stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel. She only wished she hadn't left like that – again. Not because of Jess, no of course not. She had no feelings left there, she assured herself. Besides, the signed divorce papers on the table spoke for themselves – he wanted nothing more to do with her.
No, not because of Jess, but because of Matt. She wished she hadn't left without saying goodbye to him. He had been so hurt about the way she left the last time, and now she'd done it again.
She sighed and wrapped the towel around her body. Maybe she could give him a call, invite him over as soon as she and Logan got settled in San Francisco.
Yeah, she nodded to herself as she walked towards the bedroom. She should do that. He could fly over and they could spend some time together, maybe for a weekend. Hanging out with Matt would be easier when Jess wasn't in the next room.
Because of their fight, of course. Nothing else. If it weren't for the fight she couldn't care less whether Jess was there or not when she was hanging out with her friend. It was not like she was afraid of anything happening. Not at all.
The fight. She stopped in front of the bedroom mirror.
Jess had looked so hurt when she told him about the baby she'd lost. The baby that had forced her to take a closer look at the life she was leading and the life she was throwing away. It hadn't been until she was on the verge of losing her dreams that she had realized just how important they were to her.
Tears streamed down Rory's face as she entered the apartment. Luckily, she was alone – Matt had dragged Jess with him to his sister's engagement party in Philadelphia. Rory hadn't been able to get out of work and so she was alone for the weekend. She was thankful for that now.
The doctor had told her that an early miscarriage was something very common and it most probably happened because the embryo had not been developing as it should have. He had been talking in a calm, soothing voice, telling her that it wasn't her fault and that the miscarriage wouldn't affect her chances of getting pregnant again.
Maybe it was the 'Mrs.' part of her name that had led the nice doctor to believe that the pregnancy was planned, that the baby was one that was wanted and longed for. Maybe he got confused by the tears that seemed to flow endlessly from Rory's eyes. Maybe he thought her eyes were all red and watery because of what she'd just lost.
He couldn't know that the baby had been unwelcomed. That she hadn't wanted it or longed for it. He couldn't know that the tears that were streaming down her face until a point where the skin actually hurt from the salt they contained, weren't running over something she'd lost, but over something she hadn't lost – and the guilt she felt over crying for the wrong reasons.
The worst part of it all, the part that filled Rory with a self-contempt unlike anything she'd ever felt before – was the thought that if her mother had ever felt anything like she did right now, she most probably wouldn't even be.
She'd be a nothing. An almost at best.
Wiping the tears from her eyes, Rory stared at her reflection in the mirror.
"No" She said out loud into the empty apartment. "No" She shook her head. Her lost baby wouldn't be a nothing. It wouldn't be an almost.
She closed her eyes. She owed it to the baby that never even got a chance be to turn him or her into a something.
When Rory opened her eyes again, there was a newfound determination in them. A determination that had been lost for a long time.
"Maybe it's not the way you had planned it, and maybe it's a poor consolation in comparison to a life…" She spoke as if the baby that hadn't even developed ears before its way towards becoming a life had ended could hear her. "…but I promise you that I will always remember you as the one that made my dreams come true"
She had been too ashamed to tell Jess about her reasons for leaving, which was why she had snuck out, leaving nothing but a note behind.
Last night, she had thought he would understand. Looking back, it was easy to see that it would have been crazy for them to bring a child into their world of chaos and fighting.
She had wanted him to know. Not because she wanted to inflict pain over the baby he didn't even know they had lost, but because she didn't want him thinking that she'd left because she'd stopped loving him.
She couldn't explain why, but she didn't want him thinking that.
She shook her head and reached for the dress she'd picked out for today's dinner at the grandparent's. She hadn't stopped loving him. She could admit that. He would always have a place in her heart, the way that people that once was a great part of your life always did.
That didn't mean that she loved Logan any less. Jess was her past – she couldn't ignore that he once had been the most important thing in her life, so important that she had given everything and everyone up only to be with him.
But that was in the past. Logan was the future. She sighed. Logan was her future and now she was about to give everything and everyone up for him.
It wasn't the same, she told herself as she zipped the dress up. She wasn't giving anything up this time. Her family and her friends; they would all still be there, only a bit further away. But they would still be in her life.
It wasn't the same. None of it was the same.
Luckily for Rory, her somewhat confused train of thought got interrupted before she had the time to get into just exactly what she meant by that, as she heard someone opening the front door. A feeling that resembled nervousness started flittering in her stomach and she ran her hands over her dress to smooth it out as she exited the bedroom and headed towards the living room, where she immediately spotted Logan, placing his suitcase down.
She smiled at the sight of him and was suddenly overcome with the sudden need to be near him, to feel his arms around her – to make everything that had happened the last couple of days go away. As a result of that need, she rushed towards him and threw herself in his arms.
"Wow!" Logan exclaimed and laughed that way that she loved so much. "If this is the welcome I get, maybe I should go out of town more often"
"I've missed you" Rory mumbled against his neck, without letting go of her somewhat desperate embrace.
"I've only been gone for a couple of days" Logan smiled and kissed her neck.
"It felt longer" Rory whined, and she really meant it. The last two days Logan had been so far out of her mind that he might as well could have been gone for years.
Seeing him again made it all the things she'd been trying so hard not to think about come rushing back to her; how she had lied to him, or at least kept very important aspects of the truth away from him, and how she had betrayed him. Cheated on him even. She hardened her embrace even more, as if that would somehow make up for her bad conscience.
"I've arranged for you to have a sit-down with Mrs. Dawson on Wednesday" Emily Gilmore informed as she handed Logan and Rory their drinks.
"Mrs. Dawson?" Rory asked, not really having paid attention to her grandmother's monologue about their upcoming wedding.
"The wedding planner" Her grandmother explained, letting it be well known in her tone of voice that Rory should very well know who Mrs. Dawson was.
"Wedding planner?" Rory asked. "Already?"
"Planning a wedding takes time" Emily explained. "Unless you elope of course" She continued with a pointed look towards Lorelai that was sitting at the end of the couch, paying minimal attention.
Lorelai didn't answer, but merely rolled her eyes.
"Have you considered any themes for the wedding?" Emily turned to Rory again as she sat herself down on the opposite couch.
"Themes?"Rory echoed with a confused and just a tad bit scared look on her face.
"Yes" Emily started to sound annoyed. "It would be good if you at least had a few ideas of what kind of ceremony you'd like before you met with Mrs. Dawson, give the woman something to work with"
"What kind of ceremony?" Rory asked, her voice revealing the panic she felt inside. There were different kinds of ceremonies? And themes? White dress and church – wasn't that the standard wedding theme? Wasn't wedding in itself a theme?
"Why are you repeating everything?" Emily turned to Lorelai with a frown on her forehead. "Did you put her up to this?"
"To what?" Lorelai did her best to sound offended, but it seemingly went unnoticed and she shook her head. "They just got engaged, maybe you should ease up on the wedding plans for a bit" She tried to reason with her mother.
"Ease up on the wedding plans?" Emily echoed and was rewarded with a muttered "who's repeating everything now?" from her daughter.
"I don't think you understand this Lorelai" Emily explained, trying her best to keep her annoyance at bay. "This is a Huntzberger-Gilmore wedding. People will expect something spectacular, something out of the ordinary…"
If she hadn't been so busy trying to convince her daughter of the importance in getting the planning of the wedding started up at an early level, Emily Gilmore might have noticed how her granddaughter's face was turning paler and paler with every word she spoke.
"I'm sorry" Rory interrupted her grandmother and placed her drink down on the coffee table. "I'm sorry" She repeated once Emily had stopped speaking. "I need to use the bathroom"
"Are you okay?" Logan turned to look at her and Rory nodded.
"Yeah. I just…" She gestured in the direction of the bathroom. "I'll be right back"
Rory leaned over the sink and sighed deeply. She wished the planning of the wedding could be postponed just for a dew days, until her divorce-papers were at least sent in. This didn't feel right, planning a wedding while she was still married to someone else.
It made her feel nauseous, and even more so; the fact that she hadn't told Logan about Jess yet. She needed time to get everything in order before she could focus on any kind of planning.
There was a soft knock on the door, interrupting her thoughts.
"Rory?" It was her mother's voice and Rory opened the door to let her in.
"Are you okay?" Lorelai slipped in through the bathroom door and closed it behind her. "You seemed so…distracted in there" Lorelai offered a smile that was meant to be comforting. "If you feel she's deciding too much, just tell her to but out of it"
"No, that's…that's not it." Rory hesitated.
"Are you sure?" Lorelai raised her eyebrows. "'Cause Franck Eggelhoffer in there seems to be more excited about planning this wedding than both you and Logan combined"
Rory bit her lip for a few seconds, before she blurted out: "I went to see Jess."
"Oh." Lorelai looked shocked. "Okay…so how did it go?"
Rory shrugged her shoulders and answered with a neutral voice. "He signed the papers."
"That's good, right sweetie?" Lorelai nodded. "That's what you wanted?"
"I guess so." Rory nodded too.
For several moments, none of them said anything; they simply stood there in silence, each of them lost in their own thoughts.
Eventually, Rory broke the silence. "Could you imagine the look on grandma's face if I told her to 'but out of it'?" She giggled, which made Lorelai do the same.
"Please do" Lorelai pleaded. "It could be my Christmas present, you wouldn't have to get me any other present – ever – if you go in there and tell her to 'but out of it'"
Rory rolled her eyes at her mother. "We should get back"
Lorelai nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah. We should get back and tell her to 'but out of it'"
"Could we stop by a mail box on the way home?" Rory asked as Logan was pulling the car out of the Gilmore's driveway.
"Sure" He nodded.
"Good" Rory placed her hand on her purse, which contained the divorce papers. There was no time like the present.
"What's the rush?" Logan asked with a sideway glance at her.
I should tell him now, Rory thought as she drew a breath to start talking. Right now. I should tell him, right now.
She turned to Logan, but lost her momentum as she saw him smiling and humming along to a song on the radio. He looked so happy. And he had just gotten back from a business trip. And it was rather late. Telling him would lead to talking – and really, wasn't it to late at night to start up a conversation like that? For his sake. He must be tired from travelling.
Rory closed her eyes for a few seconds and made a rush decision. "Just some of Paris' papers that accidentally got mixed up with my stuff when we packed" She lied as she opened her eyes. "You know how Paris is, it's safest to get them back to her as soon as possible before she accuses me of plagiarism"
"Isn't she studying medicine?" Logan raised his eyebrows.
"It's Paris" Rory offered and Logan nodded, satisfied with that explanation.
With an envelope, destined for a New Haven address in his hand, Matt approached the mailbox a couple of blocks from Truncheon with a determined look on his face. He placed the envelope inside the mailbox and smiled, obviously very content with himself.
"My deepest apologies to you Logan…" He mumbled to himself as he placed the envelope inside the mailbox. "…but I have a different ending in mind for this story"
With a smug smile on his lips, Matt turned around and picked up his walk home, certain that the envelope he'd just sent would have the desired effect on its receiver.