Lorelai's frostbite was mild, as far as Luke could tell, but he didn't envy her the pain she had to endure as her lifeless feet slowly returned to body temperature. At first, she had been surprisingly stoic. Not just stoic-compared-to-her-usual-hysterics, but she was really trying to hide her pain. They sat side by side on the bench and she told him stories about her childhood, growing up in the Gilmore mansion. As the pain intensified, she talked faster and faster. She started to run out of material about her own childhood and moved on to talking about Rory. Like any mother, Lorelai could usually talk for hours about her child, so he knew that she must be having trouble holding it together when she started to falter on some of the details.
"So, where was I? Oh yeah, it was the summer that she was seven… um, no six. Yeah, six. And she decided she wanted to be a famous artist after she read a book about Van Gogh. Or, uh… no, it was one of those other guys…" She was rocking back and forth by this point, rubbing her feet back and forth on the floor in front of her as she talked so fast that anyone besides Luke probably wouldn't have understood a word, "…um, but I can't remember the name… it was a famous artist-guy, anyway, and she painted the most god-awful whaddayacallit… uh, mural on the side of the garden shed that was supposed to look like haystacks or water lilies or something… and oh, ow. Ow, ow, damn, Luke, ow… this really, really hurts…"
"Okay, it's okay", he murmured, and sat on the floor in front of her. He took both of her feet gently in his hands, rubbing them slowly between his palms, "This is going to be over before you know it, and you can tell everyone how brave you were." Lorelai whimpered. The only thing that he could do was distract her, so he started telling stories of his own. The problem was that he really couldn't think of anything all that entertaining to tell Lorelai about his childhood. His dad had encouraged him to play a lot of sports when he was young, and the only stories he could think of were sports-related. Luke doubted that she would be very interested in hearing about his baseball or football heroics, and he couldn't think of anything else. Before he realized what he was saying, he was telling his own stories about Rory's childhood – the daily glimpses that he'd had of it in the diner, anyway. The time that Doose had caught him playing Barbies with Rory at the counter and teased him for two months about his choice of evening wear, and the long debate that he and Rory had had when she was in the fifth grade and decided to personally save the dolphins by persuading Luke to stop serving tuna…
An hour later, and the worst was over. At some point, Lorelai had joined him on the rag rug in front of the fire, leaning back against the wooden bench with her feet in his lap. He'd removed her damp socks during the Barbie story, and laid them in front of the hearth to dry. During the dolphin/tuna story, he'd noticed that the skin was rough and broken along the outside edge of her left foot – he avoided massaging that area. Eventually, he realized that her feet were the same temperature (actually, much warmer) than the rest of her, so he'd laid them gently in his lap. Her eyes never left his face. He knew she was still in pain, but she stopped complaining. If he had known that talking about Rory would hold her attention (and keep her quiet) like this, he would've started doing it years ago. The kid was gem, he honestly hadn't realized until she went away to college, how much he'd come to rely on seeing her every day. "I'm probably never going to have any kids of my own, but…" he looked at her sheepishly, "Well, you know what I mean."
Lorelai smiled. She did know.
That smile did things to Luke Danes. It always had, and he fought instinctively to avoid the way it made him feel. To Lorelai's dismay, he chose this moment to recover his usual gruff manner – he took only a second to set her feet gingerly on the rag rug before mumbling something curt about the firewood not dancing into the cabin all by itself. He was on his feet and out the door before she could make any reply, letting it close behind him with a punctuating bang.
If it had been anyone but Luke, Lorelai would've wondered what the hell was up. But, after decades of his moodiness, she was pretty sure what the problem was. 'He thinks about kids, and thinks about he's never going to have any, and that makes him think about Rachel… and Nicole, and so he feels…' she paused for a moment. 'Oh, who the hell knows what that man feels!' She grimaced as she reached for her socks and checked to see if they were dry. Every time she'd ever gotten remotely close to finding out what was going on inside of Luke, he ran away.
She was still struggling to stretch her sock wide enough to fit over her swollen foot when Luke banged his way back into the cabin. He deposited his armload of firewood onto the floor beside the fireplace without saying a word and immediately left again. Lorelai raised her eyebrows, and stifled her urge to make jokes of the I'm-a-lumberjack-and-I'm-okay variety. There was no way that these tiny socks were going to fit on her gigantic balloon feet! Even Sookie's feet had never swelled to this size. She frowned. This was going to go away, right?
When Luke reentered the cabin with another load of wood, the strong wind held the door open behind him. With his arms full, he couldn't do anything about the door until he could put down the firewood. Lorelai jumped up to get the door, and immediately regretted it. Her swollen red feet turned out to be a little too tender to walk on just yet, and she collapsed in a very ungraceful heap on the floor. Luke sprang to the door, latching it shut, and knelt beside Lorelai. "What are you doing? Are you nuts?!"
Lorelai had had enough of this. First he runs off to the woodpile at the first sign of bonding, and then he yells at her for being unable to walk! "Yes, Luke!" she spat at him, "I'm nuts. For trying to shut the door in a blizzard, I must be certifiably insane! I am deliberately trying to keep the stupid cabin warm, so lock me up!! The excruciating pain is just an added bonus at a time like this!!"
Luke just looked at her for moment. "Uh, right. I just meant that you need to stay off your feet for awhile." She was looking at the floor. "Til the swelling goes down. I didn't mean to yell." He cleared his throat and waited for her to say something. She didn't. Instead, a tear slipped down her cheek, followed by another. Oh, no. No! Damn.
"Hey, uh…", he swallowed, "Don't.. uh… don't do that." She didn't look up. Another tear. "Come on, Lorelai. You're tougher than this." Eye contact, but not good eye contact – she was glaring at him. Alright, bad choice. Be supportive here. "I mean, you're strong. This is nothing you can't handle." He scooped her up in both arms, a little awkwardly, but he wasn't going to leave her there on the floor. She didn't protest, she just dropped her head down onto his shoulder. He brought her over to the bunk on the wall, and set her down on the mattress. He sat beside her, facing her.
She looked at him with big, teary eyes. He knew that she was embarrassed about falling, and probably feeling pretty unsure of this whole situation. He wasn't usually much of a talker, but that didn't mean that he didn't know what to say to her.
"Hey, this is going to be fine. Your feet are going to be back to their usual gargantuan size by this time tomorrow, and just think of the swollen-feet stories that you can swap with Sookie!" It was working, she had stopped crying. He shrugged off his flannel shirt, which was warm from wearing, leaving him in his white thermal long-sleeved undershirt. He wrapped the flannel gently around both of her feet as he talked. "In fact, I guarantee it! If your boots don't fit you by tomorrow night, I promise that I'll trade with you and you can wear mine for the hike back to the truck!" She smiled and wiped her cheeks. "Besides, now you can finally write that entry in your diary about me sweeping you into my arms and carrying you off to bed!"
It was a moment when they both should have laughed, but instead they smiled. Luke couldn't help but notice that it wasn't a smile that said 'Gosh, you're amusing'. It was a twinkling kind of smile that seemed to be telling him secrets that he wasn't sure he wanted to hear. He laughed awkwardly and got up to pile firewood in the grate. The glow of the coals was hot enough to convince him that they were the reason his face felt like it was burning. Lorelai continued to smile to herself. This was weird, but it was good-weird. It felt nice, even though it felt strange.
"So, I don't suppose you found any good take-out places when you were at the woodpile?" she quipped. He must be as hungry as she was.
"Oh yeah, what do you feel like having?" he played along, turning to the trunk full of canned food. "There's Chinese, Italian, Mexican… what are you up for?"
"Oh, you know me. Just give me all of what you have most, and a side dish of everything else!" He smirked. She really was feeling better. He grabbed several cans at random and headed over to the table. His survival kit had a multi-tool can opener gadget in it, and he perused the contents of the cans that would be their dinner.
"Our Mexican specialty of the house, Spanish rice! " He set the can down in the glowing embers of the fire. "For our second course, our chef has prepared his world famous spaghetti and meatballs!" Another can set into the coals. "And for dessert, madame will be delighted to try our Far Eastern delight… mandarin orange slices in delicate syrup!" Lorelai applauded wildly from the bunk beside the fireplace.
"Bravo! I always said that I couldn't understand why anyone would watch a show about cooking, but I think I can see the appeal in it now!" He didn't look half bad in that snug-fitting cotton undershirt, even though she couldn't believe she was noticing. "You should get a show of your own, Luke. You would be great at that kind of thing! Like a… a male Martha Stewart!" she crowed, knowing it would irritate him.
But he was on a roll, and he wasn't going to be distracted from the fun he was having. "Hmm. I thought Martha Stewart was male, but I guess I only saw that one picture of her… and she was being arrested at the time, so maybe it wasn't a very flattering angle or something." They both laughed. In a few minutes, the food on the hearth was hot, and Luke produced a 'spork' from the survival kit multi-tool for them to eat it with. There were no dishes, so he used one of Lorelai's socks as a makeshift oven mitt, and held the can with it while he spooned rice and beef-a-roni for them both. They ate the oranges with their fingers, slurping up the juice and enjoying every bite.
"Thanks for dinner, Chef Boyardee" she said, as he cleared the cans away. "Not only does he cook, but he does the dishes too!"
"Yeah, well, it's a service business. We thank you for your patronage. I'll put this on your tab back home, don't worry!" They drank melted snow out of the water bottle from the survival kit, and Lorelai rummaged through its contents until she was absolutely satisfied that there was nothing in the kit that resembled a toothbrush. Luke offered her a stick of pine needles, and they both laughed.
"Without any coffee, I don't think you need to worry about your breath" Luke joked. And Lorelai threw her hand across her forehead.
"Don't even JOKE about there not being any coffee, you wicked Yankee!" she cried tragically, a la Scarlett O'Hara. "Seriously, Luke. You said that thing was a survival kit, didn't you? There's gotta be coffee in there!"
Luke shook his head.
"And none in the trunk thingy? Let me look!" She made a move to get off the bed, but Luke set her firmly back on the mattress.
"Nope. No coffee. I would never kid you about thing like that." He was amused, she could tell. "How about you promise not to whine about it, and I'll promise to give you free coffee for a week when we get back home."
"You give me free coffee all the time anyway!" she countered.
"I do not! And besides, you have no idea how much secret decaf I've given you over the past few months!!" he laughed. He was really going to get it now!
"Oh yeah, like I would believe that! You don't think I can taste the difference between decaf and regular coffee? Puh-leeeze. You could never get that past me!"
"I've been doing it since you got back from Europe – with Rory's cooperation. My own special recipe, and I fooled the biggest addict in town! I could make a million on this stuff, I swear."
"You're going to need it." Lorelai giggled, "To cover your medical bills! Because when I get over this frostbite, the first thing I'm going to do with my 'gargantuan' foot is plant it right in your a-"
"Now, now, don't blame me! Ask Rory! It was all her idea! She was worried about you getting a stomach ulcer or something without her around to remind you not to O.D. on coffee. And you've got to admit… if you didn't even notice the switch, why be mad about it now?
Lorelai laughed again. He was right, of course. It was Rory that she'd have to take it up with. She yawned.
"Okay, now you've done it." Luke said, breaking out in a yawn of his own. "I guess we're going to have to figure out the sleeping arrangments."
"No problem." she replied. "Honest, forthright people can sleep in the bed, and all others must sleep on the pull-out bench!"
"Alrighty then, scootch over!" Luke made for the bed with a big grin.
"Oh ho ho, I don't think so, Mr. Decaf!" Lorelai put up both hands to repel him. "That bench has your name all over it!"
"You're kidding, right?" he lifted an eyebrow. "This is nothing remotely sexual, Lorelai, but if you don't let me sleep with you in this bunk, I'm tossing you out in the snow!"
"So you're saying that I have no choice? This bed is hardly big enough for me! And you snore!"
"Well, let's see… So far today, I've chopped down an 18-foot tree and loaded it into my truck, for you. I've practically carried you through the woods to find this cabin, and I've hauled twelve armloads of wood in here from the woodpile. For you. I made a fire, massaged your feet, and cooked dinner. For YOU. Do you really think I deserve to sleep on the floor?"
She gave in. "Okay, okay, okay, Matlock. You've made your case! Judgment for the plaintiff, we share the stupid bed."
"And I only snore if I sleep on my couch, for the record."
"How would you know? Am I supposed to take the word of your former girlfriends?"
"No, but how about my nephew? He hated it when I would fall asleep on the couch reading a book! I used to do it once in awhile just to bug him – that couch is pretty comfortable."
Luke started to lift one end of the bench to move it out of the way of the bunk, when the seat lifted off to reveal a storage compartment underneath. Packed in heavy zippered plastic bags, there was a pillow, sheets, and a thick wool blanket! Luke and Lorelai looked at one another, realizing what they'd stumbled on, and smiles spread across their faces.
With Lorelai sitting on the edge of the bench, she unpacked each container for Luke as he made up the tiny bunk. The bedding smelled a little musty from being shut up inside the cedar bench for so long, but it was such an unexpected luxury that neither one of them really even noticed. The pillowcase wasn't all that clean, but Luke turned it inside out and figured that was just about as good. On top of the scratchy wool blanket, Luke spread out the old quilt from the back of his truck. When he finished, they both looked at the bunk in awe. It was amazing the difference that a few musty bed linens could make! In a few minutes, the rough-hewn bunk with its sagging old bare mattress had been transformed into something that looked to them like it was ready for the cover of Bed & Breakfast magazine!
Luke looked down at his jeans, and noticed the snow crusted around the hem of both legs from his numerous treks out to the woodpile. Lorelai noticed too.
"Um, you are wearing something underneath those jeans, aren't you?" she asked.
He took the hint. He turned his back to her (for privacy, she guessed) and dropped the jeans to reveal his white cotton thermal leggings that were a match for the long-sleeve undershirt he was wearing. Not that she was looking. Before she averted her eyes, she noticed the outline of what she was sure must be his flannel boxers underneath his long johns, and she chuckled softly to herself.
"No laughing!" he warned sternly, hearing her suppressed mirth. "Or these jeans go back on and I don't give a damn how much snow I get in the bed!"
Lorelai put on her most serious face, "Sorry. I was… thinking about something funny."
"Well, quit it.", he grumbled. He hung the jeans over the bench so that the cuffs could dry out in the warmth of the fire. Lorelai shifted herself from the bench to the edge of the bed, wincing at the pain that shot through her feet when she stood on them, even briefly. She handed Luke his flannel shirt. Now that she had blankets to put her feet under, she wouldn't need to swaddle them in Luke's shirt. He laid it on the bench beside his jeans and tried hard not to watch as she expertly removed her bra from under her shirt.
"I could never figure out how the hell you girls do that." he remarked conversationally.
"Practice" was her only reply. She pitched the lacy, underwire garment onto the bench without further explanation. Let him wonder, she thought. A girl has to have some mystery.
Although it wasn't discussed, Luke climbed onto the bunk and past Lorelai, taking the side of the bunk that was against the wall. Either he wanted her to be closer to the warmth of the fire, or he wanted to make sure that she couldn't steal all the blankets. Maybe a bit of both, for that matter.
Lorelai settled in beside him, trying to give him as much space as possible without tumbling off the edge of the bunk. It's Luke, for heaven's sake. Big deal if you touch him. It's only Luke. She turned her back to him and settled into position less than an inch away from him.
Boy, he was warm. What was it about men that made them so warm in bed? Like a personal space heater. Her eyes slid shut. She was so tired, and this bed was suddenly so comfortable. As she drifted off, she was vaguely aware of Luke arm around her waist, pulling her against his warm body. She didn't give it a second thought. It was Luke. She laid her arm overtop of his, and laced her fingers in his. They fell asleep.