Recap from last chapter:

Rory sighed as well. "Logan..." she pleaded. "...don't read too much into this."

There was nothing but silence between them for a long time before Logan sighed again. "I found the letter. I was packing up some boxes...and I found the letter from your friend Matt."

Rory had heard the expression 'being lost for words' before, but she had never actually been lost for words before. Not until now.

Logan shook his head. "I should have known a spur-of-the-moment Vegas wedding wasn't really you, but I guess I just really wanted to believe there was nothing more to it." He reached for her hand and took it in his. "And in some way it felt good to believe that I was not the only one with drunken, stupid mistakes in my past."

"Logan..." She tried, but didn't know how to continue.

"But this wasn't a drunken, stupid mistake, was it?" Logan's eyes looked red and watery and Rory felt her own eyes stinging with tears.

"No." She admitted.

Neither of them said anything further and they both sat in silence for a long time, just looking at each other.

"You're still in love with him" Logan finally said, breaking the silence. "You haven't forgotten." His voice sounded constrained and his face hardened, but he still didn't look angry – only hurt. "That's why you've been so distant these last couple of days."

Rory felt tears burning behind her eyelids and pressed her lips together to stop them from shaking. "I'm sorry."

Logan took a deep, long breath. "So am I."

Rory took a deep breath and stared out through the windshield. She'd been sitting in the driveway for ten minutes and she still hadn't gathered the strength to leave the car.

She knew her mother would be kind, supporting and understanding. Just like Logan had been...

After her confession, they had cried together in silence and then agreed that it was best that she went and stayed with her mother until it was time for her to leave with the campaign trail. Logan had been so calm and almost serene about the whole thing. She appreciated it, but somehow that didn't feel right either.

Why wasn't anyone screaming at her and telling her what a complete idiot she'd been and how many she'd hurt in the process of being an idiot? Why was everyone so calm and understanding about this?

Rory jumped in her seat when she heard a soft knock on the window. She turned to see her mother standing outside the car and opened the window.

"Hi." Lorelai said and Rory nodded in response.

"Hi."

With a worried look on her face, Lorelai hesitated for a few seconds. "Everything okay?"

Rory nodded again. "I think it will be."

Lorelai nodded as well.

"I broke up with Logan..." Rory confessed. "...or he broke up with me, I'm not quite sure what really happened."

"Because of the job?" Lorelai asked hesitantly.

"No...or maybe yes...I don't know." She felt tears stinging behind her eyelids again and took a deep breath and forced a smile on her lips. "I'm going to be a reporter." She announced again and Lorelai forced a smile on her lips as well in return.

"I know and that's great honey."

"Yeah, it is, isn't it?"

Lorelai examined her for a few seconds. "You don't look happy."

Rory sighed. "I don't know if I deserve to be." Lorelai looked confused and so Rory continued: "I've hurt so many people along the way. Logan, Jess, Matt..." She trailed off, but then added in a very small voice: "...you..."

Lorelai shook her head. "Don't worry about it, kid." She opened the car door and Rory stepped out and Lorelai pulled her in for a hug. "Of course you deserve to be happy. This is something you've worked for your entire life, sure it took a couple of detours, but you've made it and you deserve to be happy and proud about it and you deserve a real Gilmore celebration!"

At her mother's words, Rory finally relaxed and tears started flowing from her eyes. She wasn't sure whether they were happy tears or sad tears...maybe a little bit of both, but it felt good to let them all out.

"I can't believe you're married!" Lane shook her head as Rory had recapped the events of the last couple of days to her best friend.

"Was" Rory corrected her, but Lane didn't seem to hear.

"And I can't believe you didn't invite me...or at least told me about it. Sure, there was this whole no speaking thing going on, but getting married – that's huge!"

Rory laughed. It felt good to laugh and she could almost convince herself that she actually deserved to laugh and be happy. Her mother had been right to talk her into hanging out with Lane for a night while she was preparing for some big celebration/farewell party.

"So...what happens now?" Lane turned her head to look at Rory.

Rory shrugged her shoulders. "Now, I'm going to work on the campaign trail."

Lane rolled her eyes. "I know, but what about Jess? I mean, you broke up with Logan. What did he say about that?"

Rory shrugged her shoulders again. "He doesn't care"

"So you've told him?" Lane raised her eyebrows.

"We're divorced. I asked for a divorce and he didn't contest it"

Lane nodded. "But does he know you're broken up with Logan?"

"It doesn't matter. We're divorced. He didn't contest, so I'm guessing that's what he wants too."

Lane started to say something, but cut herself of before any words came out. "He didn't contest." She repeated Rory's words after a few moments of silence.

"No." Rory confirmed.

Lane looked at her for a couple of moments, but didn't say anything.

"So..." Desperately wanting to change the subject, Rory ventured onto something she knew would lead Lane's thoughts away from Jess, Logan, marriages and divorces: "...how's Zach handling fatherhood?"

She was right. It didn't take long before Lane was indulged in stories about Zach and the twins and Rory relaxed and enjoyed listening to her friend talk about her life. It almost made her feel normal again despite the emotional turmoils she'd been through the last couple of days.

Paper work was the down part of owning your own business, Matt thought as he sat at his desk, staring at a bunch of receipts in front of him. He suppressed a yawn and looked around the office, hoping that Jess or Chris would show up out of nowhere and offer to take this sleep-inducing task out of his hands like they so often did.

When the phone rang, he practically jumped at it, thrilled to get an excuse to put the receipts away, at least for a little while. "Truncheon books and coffee, this is Matt speaking."

"Hello Matt" a female voice that he didn't recognize greeted on the other end. "You probably don't know who I am, But I'm Lane, a friend of Rory's, and I 'm calling because I need to..."

"Lane Kim?" He interrupted; Rory had told him enough stories about her best friend from back home to allow him to connect the dots.

"Yes" the girl confirmed energetically. "But it's not Kim anymore, I'm married and..." She stopped herself. "How do you know my name?"

Matt sat himself down behind his desk. He wondered whether a call from Rory's best friend meant good news or bad news. "She talked a lot about you" he explained.

"She did?" He could practically hear the girl smiling on the other end of the line.

"Yeah" he nodded, although he knew she couldn't see it. "She missed you a lot."

There was a long silence on the other end and Matt was just about to ask if Lane was still there when she spoke. "She misses you a lot now" she said with a serene voice.

Matt let out a sigh and smiled. This had to be good news, right? "We miss her too" he informed her. "All of us."

"Yeah?" There was a moment of hesitation on Lane's side before she continued: "Jess too?"

Matt closed his eyes for a few seconds while deciding that whether Lane's call to the store meant good news or bad news, there was no point in hiding the truth. "He's crushed."

"That's great!" the girl exclaimed, suddenly sounding very excited. "I mean, it's not great that he's crushed..." she tried to smooth things over. "...but she's crushed too and she thinks it's because she hurt Logan when she broke up with him, but she kept repeating how Jess didn't contest the divore and..."

"Wow, wow..." Matt jumped up from his chair, almost knocking it over in the process. "...hold on! You're saying she broke up with her fiancé?"

"Yes" Lane confirmed, sounding a little annoyed at having been cut off. "And the one thing she kept repeating when I asked her about Jess was that he didn't contest the divorce. That means something, right?"

A smile spread across Matt's face. "She broke up with her fiancé." Maybe the letter he'd sent before deciding to stop meddling had had the desired effect on its recipient.

"Yes." Lane confirmed again. "She got this job as a reporter, following a campaign trail, so she couldn't move with him to California and then he..."

Matt's smile quickly faded and he interrupted her: "She broke up with him because of a job?"

"Yeah, that's what she said." Lane sounded impatient on the other line. "But...the way she went on about Jess, I really think there's more to it than that."

"You think?" Matt sat down at his chair again, all enthusiasm, gone from both his voice and his posture.

"Yes!" Lane exlaimed with enough enthusiasm to make up for the lack of his. "...and she's leaving for the campaign in three days so we're having farewell party in the middle of town Saturday and I think it would be great if you and Jess and Chris could come. I really think...

Matt sighed and interrupted her again. "I'm sorry Lane...but if you're not sure and if she's leaving in a couple of days...I'm sorry, but I don't think he could take it."

"But..."

"He's ." Matt's voice sounded harder than he had intented to and he tried to soften it as he continued: "I've never seen him like this and another setback would destroy him. I need to look out for my friend and as things are now, I don't think bringing Rory back into his life is the right way to do that. I'm sorry."

"But..." Lane started again, but Matt cut her off.

"I'm sorry." He offered again and then hung up the phone.