Song used in the last chapter was My Happiness by Powderfinger, a band from my home town. And the bit at the end was from Walk Away by Ben Harper. This chapter lyrics are borrowed from Dashboard Confessional, The Best Deceptions (even though the song drives me nuts); and Train, Drops of Jupiter; with Ben Harper again on the end.
Part two
I heard about your trip
I heard about your souvenirs
I heard about the cool breeze
In the cool nights
And the cool guys
That you spent them with
"And that concludes tonight's meeting." Taylor banged his gavel.
"And not a moment too soon," Lorelai breathed a sigh of relief.
"Amen to that." Luke turned around from where he and Nicole were sitting in the row in front of Lorelai and Rory. "I thought he was never going to get over that bit about introducing more squirrels to solve the problem of too many nuts lying around on the ground. Taylor is a nut."
"I heard he slipped on one," Lorelai said conspiratorially. "There's a great joke in there somewhere. Hi Nicole. Is this your first town meeting?"
"And quite possibly my last."
Luke and Nicole turned back to the front as Miss Patty took over from Taylor at the podium. "Thank you Taylor, dear. And now, for anyone who wishes to stay, we have a special treat, with our very own Lorelai and Rory Gilmore bringing us back a piece of Europe. Oh, it's so romantic; I remember when I was in Europe last. It was 1969, I was young and gorgeous…"
As Miss Patty reminisced, Rory glanced around the room semi-nervously. "Why is everyone still here?" she asked Lorelai. "I'm sure we don't know half these people by name."
"Sure we do."
"Okay then, who's that guy over there in the yellow jacket?" Rory challenged.
"That's, erm, weird yellow jacket guy."
"Hah!" Rory said triumphantly. "You have no idea who he is!"
"Sure I do. Everyone just calls him Weird Yellow Jacket Guy. Like Eminem."
"What's his real name then?" Rory asked.
"Pete. His name is Pete," Lorelai answered confidently.
"You totally made that up," Rory accused.
"Well with the number of guys named Pete in this town I figure I have about a 30% chance of being right."
"Lorelai? Rory?" Miss Patty called.
Lorelai pushed Rory along. "Don't
worry about the people, just get your cute little butt up the front."
"Only if you promise to stop checking out my butt," Rory retorted as they moved down the aisle to the front of the room.
"But then how will I know which
one of us has the better butt? I'll have to ask the good townspeople to vote."
Rory didn't think that warranted a response and began setting up the equipment for the slide show.
"Wow, I get to stand behind the podium, I bet this is just killing you, huh Taylor?" Lorelai asked with a smirk.
"Don't break anything," Taylor grumbled.
"I'll do my best," Lorelai said. "So, hi everyone. We missed you guys. Especially you, in the weird yellow jacket. What's your name?"
"Pete," the guy answered.
Lorelai shot Rory a triumphant grin.
"Save the victory dance for later," said Rory. "I'm ready."
"Okay, well thanks for all being so interested in our trip," Lorelai addressed the crowd once more. "We've gone high tech. Rory's somehow managed to connect my digital camera to her notebook and get the pretty pictures displayed up there. I have to warn you though, Rory took about 300 pictures of old churches, which after the first five or so really all look the same."
"Well mom took about 500 photos of cheese and various other edibles," Rory interjected.
"I wanted to show Sookie!" Lorelai defended herself. "Anyway, this is our trip. In kind of a random order."
The slide show began with a photo of Lorelai and Rory wearing berets with the Eiffel Tower in the background.
"That's the Eiffel Tower," Rory announced.
"In France," Lorelai added.
"Thanks, I never would have guessed," Luke said dryly.
"It looks like Disneyland," said Kirk.
"See," Lorelai poked her tongue out at Luke.
"You've never been to Disneyland." Luke said to Kirk.
Kirk looked like he was about to cry.
"His mom won't let him go past Hartford." Babette put an arm around Kirk. "Don't worry, Sugar, you'll make it there some day."
"Ahem," Lorelai cleared her throat to regain the crowd's attention. "You're missing some of the best photos."
"That last one was of your shoe," Luke said.
"It was of the, um, soil in Southern France where they grow the grapes that make some heinously expensive French wine," Lorelai improvised.
"Hey, where's that?" Babette asked.
"That's Johnny Depp's place," said Lorelai.
"Either that or the local milkman's," said Rory. "We had some communication issues after Mom left our phrase book on a bus."
"I told you we should have learnt them before we left," Lorelai told her.
"Lorelai, Rory, honeys, who's the fox?" Miss Patty asked as the next photo of a tall, dark and handsome stranger appeared.
"That's Carlos, our Spanish pack horse," Lorelai explained as the pictures continued to flash by.
"And that's Roberto, our Italian one," said Rory.
"He also made the best coffee in
the world," Lorelai added, closing her eyes momentarily and smiling at the
memory.
How many times had she said that about his coffee? Luke wondered as a ridiculous pang of jealousy shot through him. He wasn't surprised Lorelai had made friends everywhere though; she brought a unique kind of fun to any situation. Although he wasn't planning on admitting it any time soon, Luke was glad the Gilmore girls were back. Life just wasn't the same without them around.
The next photo showed yet another young, good-looking guy. This time Lorelai was in the picture as well, sitting with him on the steps of a tour bus, posing in his Oakley sunglasses.
"That's Jason, the Australian tour guide who let us join his group in Germany," Lorelai said.
"Oh Doll, you did have a good time," Miss Patty commented with at wink.
"And Rory didn't believe me when I said we'd find sexy European men to carry our bags and tell us how beautiful we are."
"You really did Europe, huh Lorelai?" Nicole chimed in.
Stung, Lorelai took a minute to respond. "Was that a really catty thing to say?" she whispered to Rory.
"Uh huh," Rory confirmed.
"Hold the fort," Lorelai said, walking over to Nicole. "You, me, outside, now," she hissed.
Nicole wordlessly followed Lorelai outside, leaving Luke wondering what he'd missed.
"This is at Santorini," Rory continued. "There's this myth about the Greek Islands…"
"What?" Nicole asked as she and Lorelai faced off on the steps outside.
Lorelai cut to the chase. "I don't appreciate the insinuation that I whored my way through Europe. I just wanted to tell you that now while I've go the anger thing going. If I waited until later I might have been distracted by those cheese photos."
"Look, I didn't mean anything by it," Nicole said defensively. "You don't have the monopoly on witty comments, you know."
"That wasn't witty, it was just nasty."
"I'm just trying to fit in to this town. So the locals can all talk whenever they want but I'm not allowed to say anything? Is that the way it works?" Nicole challenged.
"We don't bitch about each other."
"Hey," Luke joined the women outside just then. "What's going on?"
"Nothing, Honey." Nicole looped her arm through his and looked pointedly at Lorelai.
"Yeah. We're done." Lorelai stalked back inside to help Rory fend off questions from Kirk about the training required to become a bullfighter.
"What was that about?" Luke asked Nicole.
"Nothing," she repeated.
"Coming back in?"
Nicole shook her head. "I'd rather just go back to your place."
Luke agreed. He didn't really feel like seeing any more photos of Lorelai's 'sexy European men' right now.
Tell me, did you fall for a shooting star?
One without a permanent scar
And did you miss me while you were looking for yourself out there?
"I can't believe Luke's marrying someone who hates me," Lorelai complained to Rory over breakfast at the diner the next morning. "She'll probably make him change the entire menu to just salad so we'll never be able to eat here again."
"Luke wouldn't do that, he'd lose business," Rory said sensibly.
"What did I ever do to her, anyway?" Lorelai continued. "Merely existing is not a legitimate reason to resent me."
"I think it's obvious why she resents you."
"Huh?" Lorelai asked.
"Starts with an L, ends with an E and has flannel in the middle?" Rory prompted.
"L'flannellee?"
"You know exactly what I mean! Ooh, don't turn around," warned Rory, "it's your new best friend."
Lorelai looked over her shoulder to see Nicole coming down the stairs. She quickly turned back to Rory and pulled a face.
"Lorelai," Nicole called out.
Lorelai spun around guiltily and Nicole motioned her over.
Lorelai gave Rory a plaintive look. "Do I have to go, Mommy?"
"Be brave and I'll buy you an ice cream later."
Lorelai reluctantly approached the counter. Who did Nicole think she was, standing behind the counter like that, as if she owned the place? It wasn't like she was making herself useful by actually working or anything. "Hi Nicole."
"Lorelai, I'm glad you're here. Hey, do you want some coffee? On me," Nicole offered. "I hear you're a fan."
"I'm good." Lorelai gestured to the table where her half-full cup sat, but Nicole was already pouring another one. Lorelai immediately regretted her previous thought that Nicole should be working; it just didn't seem right to watch her serve Luke's coffee.
"I just wanted to say that I'm sorry about last night. I'm not usually that bitchy, really." Nicole said as she handed Lorelai the coffee.
"Oh, well, apology accepted," Lorelai replied. Far be it from her to hold a grudge, especially when there was free coffee involved.
"You're Luke's friend, so I'd like for us to be friends too," Nicole continued.
Maybe if you didn't have such an attitude problem, Lorelai thought. "Uh, okay. We seem to have gotten off to a bad start. Luke mentioned that I was a sore point between you and him and I don't want to be."
"When did Luke talk to you about this?" Nicole asked, her friendly demeanor fading.
"Oh, this was ages ago," Lorelai
dismissed. "The night I stayed over and…" she stopped, noticing the look on
Nicole's face. "Oops, you don't know about that. Okay, I think I'm going to say
thanks for the coffee and go eat my breakfast before I make things any worse."
Nicole nodded. "Good plan." She turned her back on Lorelai and walked purposefully into the kitchen. "Luke!"
Lorelai winced as she returned to her table.
"What did she want?" Rory asked immediately.
"To be friends."
"Really?"
"She apologized and everything."
"I wonder if Luke told her to?"
Lorelai shook her head. "I don't think he knew anything was going down. Although if he did put her up to it he's going to regret it now."
Lorelai and Rory watched as Nicole stalked out of the kitchen with Luke close behind.
Luke shot Lorelai a look that said 'what did you do?'
Sorry Lorelai mouthed back.
"Someone's in trouble," Rory commented.
Luke and Nicole exchanged a couple more hushed words, then she headed back upstairs to the apartment and Luke walked over to Lorelai and Rory's table.
"Have a nice chat with Nicole?" he asked Lorelai.
"Sorry, Luke," Lorelai apologized. "I have this problem with talking…"
"I've noticed," Luke said wryly. "It's not a big deal, it's just, you know, Nicole's a little touchy when it comes to you. Plus I think she doesn't know how to fit into the town. Although why someone would want to fit into this crazy town is pretty much beyond me."
"Well I still feel bad. Hey why don't you and Nicole come over for dinner tonight?" Lorelai suggested. "I'll invite Sookie and Jackson as well so Nicole can get to meet some more people."
"Okay, that would be nice," Luke agreed. "I'll just go check with Nicole."
"If you don't bring more coffee, don't bother coming back," Lorelai called after him.
"That was nice," Rory said approvingly to Lorelai.
"Better watch out, I might steal your halo," Lorelai warned. "Then whack Nicole over the head with it."
"She doesn't really hate you, she's just a jealous." Rory analyzed the situation.
"She's jealous?"
"What, you're jealous?" Rory arched her eyebrows.
"Yeah, I am a little jealous. Nicole's a big part of Luke's life, and that means less room for me. I mean, I won't be able to ask him to fix so much stuff around the house. We'll have to hire Kirk to do it, and last time he wore those short shorts - not a pretty sight."
"Your friendship with Luke doesn't have to change," Rory said. "Maybe you and Nicole will even end up being friends. You like Rachel, remember?"
"Yeah, but-" Lorelai broke off when Luke returned, coffeepot in hand.
"Nicole can't make it tonight, she has to go back to the city," he said.
"Oh, that's too bad." Lorelai tried her hardest to sound sincere. "But we'd love for you to come anyway." This time she had no problem with sincerity.
"Okay," Luke agreed to dinner.
"Great. Around seven?"
"See you then." Luke went to serve another customer.
"Ugh, I'm gonna be late for my first day back at work." Lorelai realized, taking a final sip of coffee. "Let's go."
"Thanks for letting me borrow your car to visit Grandma and Grandpa today," Rory said.
"I still say it's a big conspiracy that their trip was cut short and suddenly they return the day after us. It was an elaborate plot by my mother to avoid picking us up from the airport."
"Why would she want to avoid that?"
"I don't know, like I said, it's a conspiracy. Logic need not be involved."
"I'll say. Welcome to the I'm-not-paranoid-who-says-I-am? club."
"There's a club? Is there a badge with that slogan on it?" Lorelai asked as she followed Rory out the door.
* * * *
"Knock knock," Luke called, entering the Gilmore house via the kitchen door that night.
"Hey, come in," Lorelai greeted him. "Sookie and Jackson already had plans so it's just the three of us."
"Hey, mom, is it still okay if Lane and I go to the movies tonight?" Rory called from her bedroom.
"Sure, Honey. Hey, where does her mom think you're going?"
"Public forum on the evils of popular culture," Rory replied as she emerged from her room. "Hi, Luke, welcome to a Gilmore family dinner."
"Pizza on the couch?" Luke guessed.
"Close, Chinese. But in honor of your presence, we ordered vegetables and intend on eating at the kitchen table."
Lorelai began clearing the table while Rory unpacked the takeaway containers. "Are we using plates?" she asked her mom.
"Hush, child. Can't have our guest thinking we're barbarians. We always use plates. And cutlery. And we never eat whipped cream straight out of the can for breakfast."
Luke practically turned green at the thought. "Can I help you with anything?" he asked.
"Sure, just transfer this mess from the table to the bench over there. Or the floor, or basically wherever there's a free space," said Lorelai.
"So what is all this stuff? Groceries?" asked Luke, moving a bag filled with toothpaste.
"We're still unpacking," Rory explained. "Mom discovered they sell toothpaste in Europe and stocked up. So in addition to the three tubes she took with her, she collected another seven along the way."
"It's yummy! And you weren't complaining when you were starving on the train from Prague."
"You ate toothpaste?" Luke asked.
"Starving," Lorelai repeated. "Famished."
"Ravenous," Rory added.
"Hey, here's one of your presents." Lorelai tossed Luke a plastic bag.
"You didn't have to get me anything." Luke opened the bag and pulled out a baseball cap with London printed on the front.
"We got you one from every city we went to," Lorelai said proudly. "An entire European collection of what I assume to be an American invention."
"Except in Milan where we couldn't find one," Rory said regretfully. "Apparently they have too much style for tacky souvenirs."
"But the one from Dublin has Leprechauns drinking pints of Guinness on it," said Lorelai. "It's the best."
"You don't have to wear it in public," Rory assured Luke. She finished setting the food on the table and the three sat down to eat. "Oh, we got deep fried ice cream!" Rory took two scoops before passing the container along. "You want some Luke?"
He looked at it suspiciously. "Sounds unhealthier than normal ice cream. And shouldn't it be for dessert?"
"We have to eat it first or the ice cream will melt."
"Put it in the freezer," Luke suggested.
"You have obviously never had deep-fried ice cream before." Lorelai said it as though it were a serious personality flaw.
"The outside is warm, it would go all soggy in the freezer," Rory explained.
"You have to try it." Lorelai tried to feed Luke some ice cream.
He responded by spearing a piece of broccoli and waving it towards her. "Eat this first."
"Never."
"Right back at you."
Rory watched as Lorelai's spoon full of ice cream fought with Luke's broccoli laden fork. This was not going to end well.
Just then there was a knock on the door. "That'll be Lane, I'll get it." Rory jumped up.
"You're contaminating my ice cream," Lorelai complained.
"Well you're contaminating my broccoli."
Luke and Lorelai continued to play-fight with their cutlery until both items of food fell to the table with a splat.
"Look what you did," Luke and Lorelai accused each other at exactly the same time.
"You have to feed me," Lane begged as she followed Rory into the kitchen. "Dinner in the Kim household tonight consisted of carrot flavored tofu. Why would you make a meat substitute taste like a vegetable? Why?"
"We have ice cream covered broccoli," Rory offered.
Lane looked at the mess on the table between Luke and Lorelai. "Tempting."
"Grab a plate and help yourself," Lorelai told Lane.
The meal was full of animated chatter and good-natured teasing and Luke loved the atmosphere. Even with Nicole around, things at his apartment seemed too quiet sometimes now Jess was gone. But the moment was short-lived. Rory and Lane ate quickly as they were anxious to make the movie, Luke ate quickly because he wasn't the type to waste time, and Lorelai ate quickly because, well, she always did.
"Thanks for dinner," Lane said to Lorelai and stacked her plate by the sink while Rory grabbed her purse and jacket.
"Bye, Luke, bye Mom."
"Bye girls, have fun. And remember, don't talk to strangers unless they're really hot, and then only if they're driving a convertible."
"Because it's a cooler car?" Lane questioned.
"No, easier to escape from."
After the girls left, Luke began clearing off the table.
"Leave it for the maid." Lorelai said languidly.
"You don't have a maid," Luke reminded her.
"Leave it for the fairies, then.
Luke, you're not at work tonight. Sit back down," Lorelai ordered.
Luke sat down but kept looking at the leftovers on the table and fidgeting. "I keep thinking a customer is going to complain that their table hasn't been bussed," he admitted.
"Come on," Lorelai pulled Luke up, led him into the living room and pushed him down onto the couch. "Sit there and relax," she said sternly.
Luke looked up at her. "I missed you," he said suddenly. "But you're still the same."
"Yep, no foreign body piercings here." Lorelai flopped down on the couch next to him.
"Did you really miss us all?" Luke asked, unsure of why it mattered so much to him.
"What's to miss about Stars Hollow?" Lorelai asked jokingly.
Now that she's back in the atmosphere
I'm afraid that she might think of me as plain ol' Jane
Told a story about a man who is too afraid to fly
So he never did land
"…by this stage we tired, wet, hungry and absolutely sick to death of new languages, so we ended up doing the ignorant American thing and the stuck up guy refused to serve us! Then we put on these really bad accents - like Dracula, I vaaant to zuck your blood," Lorelai demonstrated, "and suddenly he understood perfectly what we were trying to say. I think he was Michel's long lost twin." An hour later, Luke and Lorelai were still sitting on the couch. She had been entertaining him with stories from Europe. "Anyway, tell me about your trip. I've been blabbing about mine all night."
"It's interesting," Luke assured her. "And I don't really have any stories."
"Well at least tell me about you and Nicole. How did that happen?" asked Lorelai.
Luke shrugged. "She said we should get married, I didn't know what to say so I said yes."
"Okay, you cannot use that in your
wedding speech."
Luke gave a short laugh.
"Maybe it's just a Luke thing, but you don't seem excited about the engagement."
"I don't do excited."
"It's more than that, you don't seem…" Lorelai trailed off, searching for the right word.
"Happy?" Luke suggested.
"I was going to say sure. You're not happy?" Lorelai asked.
"I'm not sure," said Luke.
"If you're not happy?" Lorelai asked.
"Huh? Are you trying to confuse me again?"
"You started it by interrupting me."
"You left a pause, I have to take every opportunity in a conversation with you."
"I'm not that much of a monopolist, am I?" Lorelai asked.
"No-" Luke began.
"Really?" Lorelai cut him off.
Luke rolled his eyes. "Where were we?"
"I was asking – in a perfectly logical manner – whether you were not sure about marrying Nicole, not happy about marrying Nicole, or not sure if you were happy?"
"When I asked Nicole out, it wasn't supposed to go this far." Luke tried to explain.
"Then why did you ask her out?"
"Because I was tired of waiting."
Lorelai didn't ask what he was waiting for.
"I mean, it's not that I don't like her, but I like baseball and that doesn't mean I want to marry it." Luke was suddenly in rant mode. "What was I thinking? I can't get married!"
"Already married?" Lorelai asked.
"No."
"Secretly belong to a cult that prohibits it?"
"No."
"Then why not?"
"I'm not ready. Not now. Not with Nicole."
"You don't want to marry Nicole?"
"I don't know. Maybe in a year. I just never expected the relationship to go so far so fast. Then suddenly you're pushing me to go on the cruise and now I'm engaged!"
"So this is all my fault?" Lorelai asked.
"No. Yes. Ugh."
"Luke, calm down," Lorelai placed a hand on his arm. "You're probably just nervous. I felt the same way when Max and I got engaged."
"You didn't marry Max."
There was a long pause.
"No, I didn't," Lorelai finally said softly.
"Why not?" Luke asked, just as quietly.
"I didn't love him. Enough. That way. I could just feel that something wasn't right."
She didn't ask if he loved Nicole and they lapsed into silent contemplation.
"Okay, here's my advice," Lorelai said finally. "Trust your instincts. But not too much. Don't let your gut scare you off from something that could be really great."
"Thanks, that's very helpful. Clears things up a lot."
"I am the relationship guru. And I have the coffee mug to prove it."
Luke smiled and shook his head slightly. "I should get home, it's late."
"Yeah." Lorelai walked him to the door.
"Thanks," Luke said to her. "Your advice pretty much sucked, but thanks for listening."
"You've done it often enough for me," Lorelai replied.
Luke nodded. "Night," he reached out and patted her upper arm in a typical Luke display of affection.
"Hey Luke?" Lorelai called just before she closed the door behind him. "I missed you too."
Luke smiled again. "Good."
But you put the happyIn my ness
You put the good times
Into my fun
* * *
Woah, long chapter. I'm really starting to like this fic. You know what else I like? Reviews. *hint hint*
