A/N: I can't afford to foot the bills for the depression clinics (I'm saving up for a class ring, people.), so this update is more upbeat. But, keep in mind that what goes up must come down. This takes place about two weeks after Raincoats and Recipes; Luke and Lorelai have already had their movie date.

Brownies to Stephanie, who despite my whining and complaining about how I hated this chapter, managed to keep a positive attitude and constructively helped me out. Thanks.

Chapter 3 – { ... education ... }

Education (noun) - The knowledge or skill obtained or developed by a learning process.

Awkward. That was the only word Lorelai could think of to describe the recent movie date between herself and Luke. It wasn't that she'd expected anything over-the-top, but when she felt the need to ask for permission to kiss him, she knew there was a slight problem; they weren't comfortable around each other. Luke had spent the entire movie wringing his hands in his lap while Lorelai held onto the arm rests of her chair as if her life depended on it. She didn't have food or drink to distract her either; when Luke had offered to buy her something, she felt as if she would throw up from the nervousness and declined.

Dinner afterwards hadn't been much better. She could swear that they carried on more conversation with their waiter than with each other. He commented on the fact that she wasn't eating much, but she raised an eyebrow, pointed to his nearly full plate, and his eyes returned to the fork with which he was so artistically moving his shrimp. Once in a while they caught each other's glances; he smiled and she blushed. When they left, their waiter couldn't help wondering why almost three-fourths of their meals had been left behind.

Needless to say, neither Luke nor Lorelai remembered what the movie was about, and when they returned to Stars Hollow, both were starving.

"Cheeseburger and pie. Got it. If you can get off from work for the day, do you want to go somewhere on Saturday?" he asked, nonchalantly leaning on the counter.

The ask-out sounded so normal, like they'd gone out a million times. She wondered how he could be so unfazed after their previous outing, which she now deemed the "I felt like I was dating my cousin" date. In all honesty, his confidence surprised her.

"Um, sure. I can take time off. What about you? Do you have someone covering?"

"Caesar said he wants to work some extra hours this week since he's going on vacation next week, so he said he'd cover."

"Oh, okay. Then, sure, I'd love to. What do you want to do?"

"I had something in mind..." He turned around and passed her order through to the kitchen.

"Like what?"

"I think it'll be more fun as a surprise."

"I don't like surprises."

"You'll like this one."

"Someone's confident." Lorelai spun around twice on her stool. "Is where we're going loud, blue, or furry?"

"What?"

"Never mind, I was just trying to confuse you." She grinned. "I'm very proud of the fact that I am successful ninety-nine percent of the time."

"Now who's confident?" he teased.

"Oh, be quiet."

"I'll pick you up at 12:30. That okay?" He smirked. "Will you be awake?"

"I will be awake and ready. I promise."

"Good. Dress casually and eat beforehand."

"I know now! We're going to ride camels through the desert!"

"I'm just going to let the fact that we don't have deserts in Connecticut slide and tell you that no, we're not going to ride camels."

"Elephants?"

"You're hopeless."

Lorelai pulled a black hair tie from her teeth and brushed her hair back into a low ponytail. She modeled herself in front of the mirror, turning left and right, and hopping on one foot for good luck. She was finishing applying her lipstick when the doorbell rang. She slipped her feet into a pair of white flip-flops, grabbed a package of pop-tarts from her dresser, and flew down the stairs. Through the door window, Luke could see her hastily shoving a pop tart in her mouth. He chuckled. The door swung open to reveal a very guilty-looking Lorelai.

"Hey," she muffled through her pop tart. "You're right on time. Come on in for a second; I still have to get some stuff together."

He stepped inside, closing the door behind him. "I thought I told you to eat before I got here."

"Yeah, maybe you did, but I was busy doing other stuff, like putting on my makeup and finding this fantastically adorable shirt that I forgot I had," she said, gesturing to her light blue v-neck. She turned to grab her purse, but was distracted by something underneath Luke's arm. "Is that...?"

He folded his arms tightly and looked around. "What?"

"You have a safety-pin in your armpit." She was giggling now.

"I do not." He thought he was being indignant, but his flushed face told a different story.

"You do! May I ask why?" Lorelai stepped towards him and he balked.

"It's nothing. Got your stuff?"

"No changing topics!" She calmed and tilted her head at him. "Do you have a hole in your shirt?"

He narrowed his eyes. "So? What if there is?"

Lorelai clapped and walked over to him. "It means that I get to sew it back up."

"No, it doesn't. It means that we're going now. We can't waste too much time or else it won't be worth the drive." Luke apprehensively looked down at his watch, desperate for it to move its' hands about four hours fast, four hours that in an imaginary world, would give him the advantage in this discussion.

"The faster you take off your shirt, the faster we can get going." The words flew out of her mouth carelessly, her sense for proper phrasing completely gone. "Well, that certainly didn't come out the way I had hoped, but you know what I meant. Cough it up. It'll only take a second."

He sighed and began to unbutton his shirt. He could feel her eyes wandering over his chest and it made him uncomfortable. He met her stare and held his now completely unbuttoned shirt closed. "Will you stop that?"

"Stop what?" Lorelai threw her hands in the air with a flourish. "I'm not doing anything," she said innocently.

He grumbled, took his shirt off, and quickly threw it at Lorelai before sitting on her couch and pulling a pillow tightly to his bare chest.

She retrieved a miniature sewing kit from beneath her coffee table and draped the shirt over her arm as she walked over to him. Lorelai giggled. "And they say teenage girls are insecure about their chests. You'd think it'd be less awkward for you now that we're dating."

Luke shot her a look. "Okay, okay, wrong time for that." A worried expression crossed his face when Lorelai sat next to him, spreading the shirt and sewing materials in front of the two of them. "Lorelai, what are you doing?"

"I'm helping you get an education. I'm going to teach you how to sew."

He nearly screeched, but men, and especially not Luke, just don't screech. "Are you kidding me?"

While delicately threading a needle, Lorelai replied, "Nope. It's a useful skill."

He buried his head in the pillow he was hugging, absolutely miserable. "Sewing is something that women do."

"Now it's women and Luke." She took the safety pin out of the shirt with one hand and gently pried the pillow away from Luke with the other. "Come on, buddy, you can do it. Watch me." Luke groaned and watched her move the needle skillfully between the folds of fabric, making a flawless pattern of cover stitches. She finished about three stitches and handed the needle to him. "Now you try."

"I don't think I can do this." He clumsily stuck the needle through the shirt and ended up poking his own fingers. "Ow. Geez. My fingers aren't as small as yours."

"S'okay. Keep going. You're doing pretty well for someone who hasn't done this before." She placed a hand on his shoulder and leaned on it. "Uh, watch that. Now you're going crooked." He finally completed a decent looking stitch and Lorelai was ecstatic. "Aw, that's a good one."

"You think so?"

"Yeah, I think so. It would help if you did this, though." Her hand covered his and adjusted it to where his steadying hand wouldn't get in the way of the sewing hand as much. Her touch made his hands shake, and he nearly dropped the shirt. "There. You're almost done." She beamed and resumed her position on his shoulder. When he finished, Lorelai knotted the end of the thread and held the shirt out to admire his work. Of course, the beginning of the stitching looked better than the end, but from far away, it wasn't noticeable because both shirt and thread were white. "That's better than a safety pin, isn't it?" she asked pointedly.

He tried to hide his grinning. "Sure, whatever."

"You know you love it. I bet you're proud of yourself. You should be. You're such a good student." Lorelai was beside herself with the smiling. She got such a kick out of Luke and his mantra of never trying anything new.

He admitted, "Okay, so I think it looks cool, but I'm never doing it again. I can already hear the wheels turning in that head of yours; don't even think about ripping your clothes on purpose so that you can watch me sew them back together."

In a redneck accent, she responded, "Now why on earth would you think I'd do anything like that?"

He rolled his eyes as he put his shirt back on. "Because I know you."

"No, you don't. You don't know lots of things about me. I bet you don't know what my favorite color is." She placed the needle and thread back into their box and snapped it shut.

"Red."

"You asked Rory."

"Did not!" He stood up and handed her purse to her. "You ready?"

"Yeah, and you so did! Admit it. You have no idea what I like." She teased him relentlessly as he headed for the door.

"Well, you have no idea what I like, so we're even."

He pushed her towards the door lightly and she protested. "Hey now! This is not fun!"

"Come on, out the door."

She whirled around suddenly and stopped. She peered up at him and hesitantly placed a kiss on his lips. After pulling away, she placed one hand at the base of his neck, while the other remained hugging his waist. She met his eyes and flippantly remarked, "See? I do know what you like."

He ran a hand through her hair and kissed her forehead in response. "But, see, I swear that displays of affection aren't allowed between teachers and students, so it doesn't count. It was a nice effort, but it doesn't count." He attempted to keep a stern expression on his face, but the way Lorelai's mouth was gaping weakened him, and he laughed as he continued to push her outside.