Title: Shelter From The Storm.

Summary: "In starting over we could get some place different." What if Lorelai had found her way to Stars Hollow before Rory's birth?

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters of Gilmore Girls. I am in no way connected to Gilmore Girls or the WB. I also have no connections to Billie Letts or Twentieth Century Fox. This story idea is mostly my own, although it is inspired by the movie/book Where The Heart Is. (I always thought that there were several similarities between Lorelai and Novalee)

Authors Note: Voting for the Literati Fanfiction Awards has started! You can vote by going to Milo Ventimiglia Boards (there is a link in my profile).

*~*~*~*

It was growing dark by the time Lorelai made it back to the Inn. She wasn't sure why she had returned there. A small part of her hoped that Christopher would come back for her. A bigger part of her felt safe there. But she couldn't afford a room for more than one night, so where she was going to sleep was a mystery to her.

She considered talking with Mia and explaining her situation. The woman had seemed kind. Maybe she would take pity on her and let her stay there for free. More likely, Lorelai thought, she would call the cops. Or worse, her parents.

No. This was something she was going to have to figure out by herself.

Sitting on the bank of the pond, Lorelai pulled small pieces off of the teacake in her hand and popped them in her mouth. Every so often she would throw a piece to a group of ducks nearby and watch them fighting over every last crumb. It took her mind off of the question of how she was going to get back up again. She could always very gracefully roll onto her side and push herself up. No one was around to see her if she did.

But even if she did manage to get back on her feet, she had no idea where she was going to spend the night. It was getting colder as the evening progressed and she knew that sleeping outside wasn't really an option.
That's when she saw the small white building across the pond. It looked like a shed or a very small guesthouse of some kind. Whatever it was, it had a roof and could therefore be considered shelter. And at that moment, she couldn't ask for more.

Upon closer inspection Lorelai discovered that it was a guesthouse being used as a tool shed and, from the look of it, it was a rarely used tool shed. The exterior was kept clean and looked well maintained, which she assumed was for the benefit of the guests as they enjoyed the rest of the grounds. The inside was a different story.
Relieved to find the door unlocked, she gave it a gentle nudge with her hip to open it far enough to allow her, and her swollen belly, access.

With night falling swiftly it was hard to make out shapes in the dark, and there didn't seem to be a light switch anywhere near the door. She cautiously stepped further inside, brushing a cobweb from her face and hair and shuddering at the thought of a spider or any insect being anywhere near her.
Going against her fear of arachnids, she reached her hand out in front of her and approached the large rectangular object leaning against the wall to her left. She pressed against it and it pressed back with a defiant creak. It was a mattress. A lumpy and noisy mattress, but she was grateful for it all the same.
Walking from one end of the mattress to the other she used her foot to make sure there was nothing on the floor around it before grabbing the top edge, pulling it towards her and then taking a quick step backwards to watch it fall. She took another step back to avoid the cloud of dust and dirt that billowed up into the air and seemed to stay there. She wondered how many cobwebs it must be clinging to, sending another shudder throughout her body.

As she looked around her, a lump formed in her throat. How had she ended up here? That same morning she had been sitting in her bedroom, surrounded by china dolls with eyes that followed her around the room, and a dollhouse she had outgrown years ago. She missed her bed. Although strewn with sheets far too frilly for her taste, it was comfortable and she felt safe there. Now her bed was a mattress that had been sitting in an abandoned guesthouse for a length of time she didn't even want to think about, collecting enough dust to give her mother a stroke. And this was what she wanted for her baby?

It was the thought of her unborn child that pulled her out of her self pity and reminded her what it was she did want for her baby. A life different from her own. And it couldn't get much different from where she stood. And so, after a few deep breaths and silent words of encouragement to herself, from herself, she continued to make her way around the guesthouse, her hands telling her when something was blocking her path. Until her knee bumped into something cold and hard and she had to reach out the steady herself.
When she looked down to see the thing in her way she thought her eyes were playing tricks on her. But the longer she stared at it, the more her eyes adjusted, and she became more sure that it was a bathtub. It was full of. something. Something soft in a plastic bag. But it was a bathtub. And she let out a soft chuckle when she turned the faucet and, after a splutter, it let out a steady flow of water.

She had a bed, a bath and a roof over her head. And in the morning she would have light enough to see what other surprises awaited her. But at that moment all she wanted to do was crawl onto her dusty mattress and dream that she was somewhere else.

Even though she was tired and her body ached, sleep didn't come as quickly as she expected, and instead she found herself lying on the unyielding mattress and thinking of Chris. Wondering where he was. She wasn't sure if she hated him. A large part of her wanted to, but she also understood why he had left her. He was scared. She was scared too, but she didn't have the option to leave. For a moment she wondered what she would do if she did have that option, but then quickly pushed the thought from her mind. She felt terrible even wondering 'what if'. And it was pointless to do so.
* * * * *

The birds on the pond outside had woken her at a ridiculously early hour. Squawking at each other constantly until she realized it wasn't going to stop. In the morning light, Lorelai was pleased to find that a working toilet accompanied the bath. Which she could now see was full of bagged compost, gardening tools and old flowerpots.
It would need cleaning before she could use it. As she looked around, she realized that the entire guesthouse would need cleaning if she was actually going to make it her home. The only problem with cleaning was that it was something she had little to no experience with. The only room in the house she had ever cleaned was her own room. And it wasn't cleaning so much as putting away her belongings and clearing surfaces so that the maid could do the actual cleaning.

After making a mental note of what she would need to clean and clear, she started on the long and tiring task of turning what was essentially a tool shed into her new home. She stacked flowerpots in a corner and propped larger gardening implements against the back wall, stopping every few minutes to rub her lower back and catch her breath.

It was while she was clearing the random gardening supplies from the bathtub so that she could clean it, that she dropped one of the flowerpots and watched in horror as it smashed on the floor. Not only did it represent more cleaning, it made her feel guilty. Before, she had been able to explain away her actions as necessity. She needed somewhere to stay. She wasn't hurting anyone by sleeping in an abandoned shed. But now she was breaking someone else's property.
Slowly kneeling down, she began collecting the larger pieces into a pile, fighting back tears. She felt silly and girly, crying over a broken flowerpot. She knew it was more her hormones than anything else, but it made her even more frustrated at herself and the situation she had put herself and her baby in.
As she gathered the shattered pot into a pile, a sticker on a piece of its base caught her eye. It had a barcode and a price, and a name. 'William's Hardware'. That seemed familiar. She tried to recall where she'd seen that name before, closing her eyes and trying to picture it. The grumbling in her stomach interrupted her thoughts and she gave in to it, finding her backpack and pulling the last teacake from it's plastic wrapping. It wasn't going to quell her hunger, but it would give her the energy to go back into town and buy something else.
* * * * *

Making her way back through the streets of Stars Hollow, she noted how different it was from the neighborhood she had come from. Stars Hollow was smaller, but busier. It seemed that every resident of the town spent all their time milling around the town square and talking. And when they talked, the really talked. They stopped and gossiped and laughed, rather than simply calling out insincerities like 'we must have dinner soon' and 'give my love to Biddy!' as they passed on the street.

"One, two, cha-cha-cha."

Lorelai looked up to where the voice had come from. The sign above the door said 'Miss Patty's'. Miss Patty Her brow creased into a frown and then her eyebrows shot up. Miss Patty was the woman from the market! Holding her hand up to the side of her face in hopes of getting past her without being noticed, Lorelai quickened her pace. She had almost succeeded, and had she been looking where she was going she might have made it past without even a second glance from Miss Patty. But with her eyes downcast she didn't see the man in front of her until she had walked right into him.

"Hey, watch where you're going!" He barked at her.

"I'm sor."

"Sorry? Damn kids, you're always sorry for something! Did you ever stop to think that if you respected others you wouldn't need to be sorry every five minutes?"

"I."

"Louie, you leave that poor girl alone!"

Lorelai closed her eyes and sighed at the sound of Miss Patty's voice.

"Patty, I'm handling this, so if you would be so kind as to butt out!" Louie sneered.

"Don't talk to me that way, you horrible little man!" She snapped back.

"If you wouldn't stick your nose in where it's not wanted, I wouldn't have to talk to you at all! And that would be fine by me, I assure you!"

"I really am sorry." Lorelai said quietly.

Soon realizing that she was completely forgotten by both Louie and Patty, she saw her opportunity to slip away and did so unnoticed.

"Louie, if you dropped dead tomorrow I would be the first to dance on your grave!"

"I wish you wouldn't. It'd be a shame to have my final resting place disturbed by a damn earthquake!" He taunted, unable to resist a small smirk in place of his scowl.

"Why you little.!"

As Miss Patty made her way down the steps outside her dance studio, Louie stood his ground, straightening his back and holding his chin in the air. Lorelai glanced over her shoulder as she hurried down the street. She felt bad for leaving when she was the cause of the argument, but it didn't look like it was their first fight, so she tried telling herself that they probably would have exchanged not so nice words whether she had been there or not.
When she finally slowed her pace, she looked up to see 'William's Hardware' right across the street from where she was standing. At least if she could replace the flowerpot she had broken she could rid herself of some of the guilt she felt.

There was a small bell above the door that jingled to signal her entrance. She cringed. To the owner it was the sound of a new customer, but to her it was just one more person to be aware of her presence. She stood in place of a minute waiting for some middle-aged man to come over and ask her what she was looking for. But when no one appeared, she slowly proceeded into the store. She must have tripped some kind of silent alarm, because as soon as she reached the first row of tools she heard a voice.

"What do you want?" It demanded.

"I um."

"What?"

Lorelai frowned as she strained her neck, trying to see who or what the voice belonged to. She thought she saw movement, someone coming out of a door at the back of the room and disappearing behind a large display of hammers.

"I was looking for a pot."

"What kind of pot?"

"A. a flowerpot." She started uncertainly, trying to get a better view of the person she was speaking to.

"What kind of flowerpot?" He sighed impatiently. "Big, small, round, square, ceramic, plastic, polyceramic, terracotta, wooden, metal.?"

"Well, what kind do you have?" She cut him off before he could continue with his list.

"Plastic, ceramic or terracotta."

"Well then why bother asking me if I wanted any other kind?"

"Because, if you were pretentious enough to want any of the others I could have told you to find a garden center, or a florist. Or a Wal-Mart."

"Hey!" She protested. " I am not pretentious!"

Finally stepping out from behind the display, the owner of the voice made his way over to her, his head bowed, not making eye contact. He was taller than her, and at least a few years older. His dark hair stuck out from under the edges of a baseball cap. She followed him over to a shelf stacked with flowerpots.

"I don't see the one I want."

"Oh, shame." Was the sarcastic and only response she received.

"Look. I broke my. friend's flowerpot. And I know she got it here. And I need to replace it."

"Well if it's not on the shelf then we don't carry it anymore." He explained, as if he were talking to a child.

She felt tears stinging her eyes and silently cursed herself for being so over emotional, especially when she wanted to appear strong and self assured.

"I." She swallowed hard. "I just need to replace the pot. It was white and. it had purple grapes painted around the edges with a green vine."

"Sounds beautiful." He mocked.

"Listen, screw boy, I am a customer! And the customer is always right! And even if I weren't a customer, I would still be right because I am always right! So either help me, or point me in the direction of someone with a slightly higher IQ who can help me!" She snapped.

They stared at one another for a moment. She tried to keep her face as straight as possible, and balled up her fists so he couldn't see her hands shaking.

"I'll check in back." He muttered.

As soon as he had disappeared into the storeroom behind them she let out a shaky break and placed her hand over her heart. She smiled slightly as she thought of what she had said, how it had sounded. So thought out and demanding, when really it came out of nowhere and surprised even her. She felt as if she had been channeling her mother.

When he reemerged carrying a flowerpot identical to the one she had broken she resumed her straight face. He held it up for her to see and she nodded in approval before following him over to the cash register.
She watched him wrap the flowerpot in brown parcel paper and put it in a plastic bag and then she handed him a ten-dollar bill.

Another man appeared in the store, coming from a different doorway. He was older than the man serving her. His hair graying and his face wrinkled with a mixture of frown and laugh lines. He glanced over at her and offered a small smile, which she returned before accepting her change and picking up the flowerpot.

"Have a nice day." The younger man said sarcastically, a fake smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.

"Oh, you too." She muttered, leaving the store as quickly as she could and reminding herself never to break another flowerpot.

The older man walked over and watched her leave.

"Another satisfied customer?" He smiled slightly, glancing over his shoulder at the younger man.

"She started it."

"Luke." He warned.

"Dad, just leave it." He sighed.

The older man held his hands up in surrender and walked over towards the storeroom.