Hey hey it's Luce……you've probably already read this…..but it might be new to some……
Hope you like it :-}
The marble, gold, and brocade of the apartment sparkle in all their creamy glory in the early morning light.
It's when she makes breakfast for Margot, lays out the girl's uniform, gives her the schedule for the day, and drives her to school in the Lincoln.
She grins, thinking of what Lorelai would say if she knew she was cooking.
Luckily, Margot doesn't really eat. She likes Rory because she can't make anything appetizing. After all, she is on the swimming team and has to maintain her weight. She is a fiercely independent child, derisive and scornful towards her mother, but respectful and mannered in public. She does her homework, participates in minor, girlish scandals, wears cowboy boots with her plaid skirt sometimes, and smokes Parliaments all by the ripe age of twelve. She calls Rory Nanny, and hates it.
"I'm too old to have a nanny, I'd just like to let you know," she had informed Rory the first day they had met. They both sat stiffly on the chintz couches in the living room after her mother had left. "My mother is simply paranoid because Ashcroft Hannon got into that huge scandal with that eighteen year old from St. David's. Ashcroft is thirteen, which I will be in December, and she can damn well do as she pleases."
Rory had tried to suppress a smile, letting the girl rant on in that queer, plaintive (yet snotty) tone of hers.
"I mean, now she wants me to be drive to school like those British children. Quel ridiculous! Everyone I know taxis or walks. It's the best part of the day. We all go Jackson Hole and get coffee and smoke, and now I can't, simply because you have to drive me. You do realize I will resent you. I'm just simply too old to have a nanny!"
Rory had smiled gently.
"And I'm simply too young to be one," she had whispered. "Why don't we see if I can work something out, maybe still drive you but drop you off at Jackson Hole instead of at school?"
Something had sparkled a little in the girl's eyes before they returned to their usual dullness.
"Ok," she said, somewhat unsure. "I suppose."
She looked at Rory suspiciously.
"You're not doing this so you can pin me, like my last nanny, are you?"
Rory had recoiled in horror.
"Of course not!"
The girl's wan, rather sharp face had actually melted a little. A small smile broke out.
"Maybe we shall get along, then," she had conceded. "I'll call you Lorelai, if you don't mind."
"Rory's ok."
But the girl had shook her head, uncomfortable with the informal, and Rory had not wanted to seem to personal or to cross the line between servant and master.
For the most part, they get along. Margot is rather careless with other people's feelings, but has fits of generosity when she gives Rory an old Kate Spade purse she is sick of, or gives her permission to take food home.
This morning, Margot's sharp face has dark circles under her eyes.
"You look like you haven't slept much," says Rory, broaching conversation gently.
She waves an impatient hand in the air, sipping her orange juice.
"Oh of course not. Me and Ashcroft and Selden and Julia went to Adriane Feynman's house, and her brother and two of his friends were there, and we all got a limo and went downtown and ate, and then went to a party. Of course, you mustn't tell Mum."
Rory hid her smile. Margot has these small, sophisticated airs that make her seem as though she an adult already. Rory thinks a little sadly about the fact that she might as well be, and feels sorry for her lost childhood.
"Oh yeah? Were any of them cute?"
The girl looks at her furtively, and feeling reassured, nods a little.
"Some were quite handsome."
Rory gives her an incredulous look, and the girl actually giggles.
"There was this one named Andrew and he was sooooooo cute!" The small girl comes alive, gesticulating, and Rory laughs, knowing it wouldn't take long for the outburst that followed. "He kissed me in the limo and said I had killer eyes and told me he thought I looked kinda like Heidi Klum! Selden was crazy jealous!"
"Nice work," grins Rory in response, ushering the girl towards the door, giving her her backpack. She tries not to wonder what Margot means by kiss.
Sometimes, in small moments like these, Rory doesn't mind what she is doing. One Friday night, when her parents leave for another charity event, Margot, who has an ugly cold watches a movie with Rory. The younger girl brings out some organic fat-free vegetable chips to snack on, and that's when Rory decides it's time to interfere.
"Margaret Anne, have you ever had Red Vines?"
They call the concierge, and half an hour later, Rory spreads out a collection of candy on the living room table. Margot is frankly shocked.
"Mum would kill you," is all she says, wide eyed.
They watch Heathers, and she thaws to the point where Rory can barely recognize her. She tells Rory about random, insignificant things, things she might regret the next morning. Shifting, she props her feet up on the coffeetable.
"So, Lorelai, do you have a boyfriend?"
Rory nods consent, chewing on a Milk Dud.
The child clings excitedly to this prospect.
"Is he hot?"
Rory nods again, with a sly smile they both delight in.
"Do you do it all the time?"
She stops mid-chew, choking a little.
"Do what?"
"You know, sex."
Rory closes her eyes.
"Margot….can I call you Maggie?"
The other girl considers this for a second.
"Like the Rod Stewart song?"
"Sure."
"Ok."
Rory takes another deep breath.
"Well, Maggie, I think that's a little personal, don't you?"
"Not really. I mean, Ashcroft does it, and she's only thirteen. My mum does it all the time and not always with the same person, if you get my drift. Everybody does it, so do you?"
Rory, disturbed, tries to think of an answer, but can't really. All she can think about is the child, and how she came to know this. She guesses twelve isn't what it used to be.
"Yeah, we do," is the only answer Rory can think of.
"I thought as much. Is it good?"
Another shocker. But there is no use pretending chastity with a twelve year old who probably knows more about sex than you do.
"I guess so," she answers, and weirdly, feels a blush coming on. This is too strange. But the girls smokes. She smokes.
"Ok, Lorelai, there is not maybe. It is or it isn't. So? Does he pack extra mileage?"
"Maggie!"
She other girl scrunches up her nose.
"Sheesh, you'd think you were still a virgin."
Rory's tone is very odd.
"Do you mean…..you….aren't?"
Maggie looks at her scornfully.
"Of course I am. I'm waiting until fourteen at least. I mean, Ashcroft is a slut. She's not just thirteen, she like Thirteen the movie." She chews meditatively on a Red Vine. Her voice is almost shy. "Lorelai?"
"Yes," replies Rory, wondering what shocker would come out next.
"I kinda wish someone had explained these things to me better. No one's ever really discussed them. Mum says it's improper to discuss it with your child. She says that's what nannies are for."
Rory clutches her heart.
"What do you want to know?"
The girl settles down comfortably on the couch, popping a sour gummybear.
"I kinda wanna know why guys always try to grope you. Is it because they can't help themselves? Oh, and how come if you sleep with them they don't call you? And can you get a disease by kissing? Cause Selden said she heard about these little bumps or something. Oh, and I'm not really sure but there is this thing……I heard that guys sometimes kiss you….down there…."
"Those who grope and don't call are sleazeballs. Yes, you can get herpes, and yes, …sometimes they kiss you…in other places."
"Ok. And Heather Wellington said that she heard that you're not supposed to take birth control if you're really young because it makes you get huge boobs?"
"Lie. You're not supposed to take birth control young because you're not supposed to have sex young."
The small girl in the bathrobe looks at her quizzically.
"I bet you're a Republican," is all she says.
Jess laughs for an hour after she tells the story, while she pelts him with pillows. The early evening settles in closely around them, and they turn on one lamp, count the money, and store it away. She's learning to make things by now, so she cooks some mac and cheese from the box and he declares it fabulous. They feed each other on the living room floor among piles and piles of books. She reads to him from an old copy of Perrine's Literature, the college text, and he lays down with his head in her lap, nestled into a quilt.
There is a tranquility present that neither have felt for a long time. He feels as though he's almost painted into this scene, and something warm moves in his chest, gripping his heart. She looks like a picture of the Madonna, blue eyed and virgin lipped. The dark, terrifying, sensual things that happened on the road, the nights of thwarted longing seem a distant memory. The night when he was afraid that she didn't love him.
He's still afraid sometimes.
He has picked up the phone also, to hear a silence on the other end.
He knows who it is. He's just waiting for them to come back and get her.
What will happen after this? When she finally goes to Yale? Where will he fit into her world then? He knows he was mistaken to believe for so long that she could be his. He is aware it is only a matter of time before circumstances take her away from him. This is what Dean must have felt, was the thought that flashes into his head.
It shocks him. What Dean must have felt.
Surely he didn't think Rory would belong to him. Surely he knew, from the first moment he had met the grandparents, that it couldn't possibly work. If her dream comes true, he thinks, she'll never belong to anyone. Correspondent in a foreign country. The only person she will ever belong to is someone who is lucky enough to be in her way, someone who will match perfectly situation wise and will facilitate a relationship by providing the means to keep her pursuing her dream.
Jess wonders if she'll be lonely.
To go this far out of her way, to sacrifice that much, it does not seem possible for her. She was nobody's long before she belonged to any man.
He knows he'll never follow her, just hang around waiting for her. He knows he should have left her, let her go on the track she had planned, not thrown this unexpected interlude in her life.
But he couldn't help it.
He's almost sure he is in love with her, whatever that means. He's certain he must be, to do this insane thing that seems to be working out in such a strange way.
I'll always be below her though, and this is what will take me away, he thinks.
He knows there is only one solution.
Money. For him to possess her he needs money.
For her to stay free, she needs money.
He knows if he was successful, in some way, it would be his single chance.
