RORY

Rory was having one of those days. One of those bad, bad days when she would make up songs about how bad her day was. Her favorite was, "I Hate the World, And the World Hates Me". It went like this:

I hate the world, and the world hates me/I hate the world, and the world hates me/I hate the world, and the world hates me/So I just hate the world.

Catchy little tune.

There was some shindig going on in the town square that was very busy and very loud. Taylor was conducting some people to do something that they too must have seen as vague, as shown by their puzzled faces and unsure body movements.

Rory could have gone home, but her mother was there, and she would make her stay and eat junk food and watch movies. She could have gone to Luke's, but Jess was there, and he would only make her day worse in a weird convoluted sort of way that Rory was not going to think about.

She was standing near the "library". The library with no books, no helpful librarian (Kirk), really no nothing except the title of library. Maybe when it was younger, it had been a quaint spot for lovers to study and children to learn about the world. But now the place was old and decrepit, sort of like Margaret Thatcher, and really of no use.

It was air-conditioned, however, and it was a hot day. And it was quiet. At least it could be contend that much.

Nothing had changed since the last time Rory was in the library. The twelve books were still in their same spaces. The librarian, Rory noted, was new. A girl with whom she had attended Stars Hollow High. But Kirk, the ever-possessive, was still there, perhaps just checking to see that everything was running smoothly.

Kirk was just standing up from his computer to leave as Rory walked in. He marched over to her and gave her a stern look in the eye.

"You smutty, nasty, horrible girl. If Lorelai knew what you've been doing… I think she would be very disappointed. I know she's a 'cool mom' and all… but what you did… not cool." He pushed past her and walked out into the Stars Hollow day, where the sky was turning a bleak shade of trouble.

If only Rory could have had the least bit of an idea what he was talking about, then she could add that to the list of items that made her day so terrible. Suddenly Kirk burst back inside.

"I'm sorry, Rory, that was highly inappropriate," he said.

"Are you okay, Kirk?"

"I'm fine. I know you didn't mean all those things. If you love someone, well, then you should be free with them."

"Yeah, okay, sure…" she said, trying to play along.

"Just remember… wrap it up, every time."

"I'll try to remember that, Kirk."

"There's something more important at hand, however. I once loved a girl. Her name was Sally."

He paused.

Rory looked around.

Kirk cleared his throat.

"Well, anyway, Sally was a great lady. Beautiful, strong, smart. And she loved me."

"Wow," Rory said, genuinely smiling. She knew that the world must have been a different place back then when someone was in love with Kirk. Maybe it was the sixties during the eighties.

"But I could never tell her I loved her. I could never even get up the nerve to speak to her."

"Gee, that's… terrible."

"She was the one that got away."

"I'm sorry, Kirk. That's horrible."

"You say that now, but you'll be singing a different tune when it happens to you, my friend."

"What?" Rory asked, though the first thought that popped into her head was actually Jess's pleading face.

"I know," Kirk said ominously.

"You know?" Rory repeated skeptically.

"Yes. This whole masquerade of being in love with Dean—"

"Excuse me!"

"I read the stories. Now, I'll give you that some of them weren't very good. But through the filth, the murder, the love-torn insanity, there was one running theme: Jess is your soul mate."

"I think not."

"Well, that's what the stories said."

"What stories?"

"The stories about you. About me, though not very many. Everything was 'Gilmore Girls' this, and 'Gilmore Girls' that. What about the Gleason Guys!" he shouted. "What about us!" And he ran out of the library as fast as he could.

Now Rory could add something to her list of Top Ten Reasons Why She Was Having a Bad Day: Because her mother chose Stars Hollow.

Her mother was stupid, her mother was stupid, her mother was stupid. But her mother wasn't really stupid, and Rory knew that. But she had to blame someone. And she had to stop thinking that everything she did concerning Jess was a mistake. And the same for Dean.

She stepped outside of Stars Hollow Public Library and walked out into the street. She could see Luke's, where it would probably always be. Keyword: probably.

As expected, Lorelai was sitting on the couch in sweats, watching The Three Stooges.

"Mom!"

"Living room!"

"Hey."

"Hey," she said through laughter.

"Better every time, huh?"

"Oh, totally. How was your day?"

"Sucky, icky, nasty."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well." Rory sat down beside her mother on the couch and dropped her backpack in front of her. "Hey." She turned to look at Lorelai with a serious expression.

"Hey," Lorelai said puzzled.

"Have you heard about some stories about us on the Internet?" she began cautiously.

"Uh, no," Lorelai said, sitting up and facing Rory completely. "What stories?"

Lorelai looked really concerned. She looked worried, which was justified, but now Rory knew that she would have to continue telling Lorelai something that already had no direction or definite meaning.

"Well, Kirk said that he saw a bunch of stories about all sorts of bad stuff I'd done, and it was talking about Gilmore girls and—"

"And Big Brother is apparently live and in effect, now. Oh, shush," said Lorelai, rolling her eyes and turning back to Larry, Curly, and Moe. "I wouldn't worry about it, hon. After all, Kirk is the one who thought that Katie Couric was sending a telepathic message to him when William Shatner was on The Today Show a few months ago. Kirk's… Kirk." She gestured with her hands to prove her point.

"But what he said…" Then Rory remembered what he had said: something along the lines of "You're in love with Jess." What if he was right?

What concerned Rory was that she was concerned about what Kirk of all people had said: that Jess would get away from her. Never mind the fact that someone was writing stories about her all over the Internet. What if she lost Jess? Or what if all this time she had been imagining things, and he didn't really care?

Either way, she couldn't prove anything to her mother, nor did she want to. Lorelai was too absorbed in the television to understand anyway.

"I don't know," Rory finished lamely. "He just told me some things that it seemed like I'd been thinking, and—"

"Rory, come on," Lorelai gave her a you-know-better-than-that look.

"What? You don't know."

"This is the most insane thing I've ever heard. What people?"

"I don't know."

"Well, there you go."

Lorelai wouldn't let herself understand. Rory was so frustrated. She didn't know why she felt frustrated, but she did. She herself had no idea what Kirk was talking about, and what he had said was total nonsense… but it made too much sense to ignore.

"There's probably stuff about you, too, you know," Rory blurted.

"What?"

"Yeah, there's probably stuff about how you and Luke are so madly in love with each other, but you're both too scared to do anything about it."

"Okay, that's enough." Lorelai turned off the TV and walked even steps up the stairs and towards her room.

"Mom, if it's true, I want you to read those stories."

"What stories!" Lorelai shouted from the top of the stairs.

"I don't know!" Rory shouted back.

"Well, okay then!" Lorelai yelled.

"Well, okay then to you, too!" Rory yelled again.

Lorelai stomped into her room and slammed the door, and Rory did the same.