Disclaimer: I didn't invent the Gilmores or the world they live in. Evolution, God and Amy Sherman-Palladino worked together to create them.
I Swallowed a Map - Chapter 1: Transition
Sitting on the edge of her bed, Lorelai lets her bare feet dangle. At the sight of her toenails she finds that a new layer of polish cannot hurt them, especially now that they are much easier to reach. So she makes a mental note – Paint toenails first thing tonight. Midnight Blue - and even wiggles her toes a little in anticipation.
In her right hand she holds her walkman. It still contains the tape from last week. 99 Luftballons, R.E.M., some Thompson Twins. She begins chewing rhythmically on the piece of gum she has found somewhere in the depths of her handbag, listening to the same songs over and over again. Why didn't she ask Christopher to bring her another tape? Right, because after his first visit he did not come back and somehow she cannot blame him.
That is what teenage life is all about. Boyfriends, nail polish, music, chewing gum the most obnoxious way possible, waiting for your parents to come and pick you up because you don't have a driver's license yet.
Well, that is what it used to be all about, before the zipper of her debutante gown would not close any more, before pâté smelled like Clorox to her. And now there is a new 'all about'. Perhaps she will get her driver's license some time next year, though.
A smile tugs at the corners of her mouth as she turns her gaze away from her feet and redirects it towards the huge fluffy pillow next to her on the bed. On the pillow, fast asleep and clutching Lorelai's left index finger with a sense of strength until then unknown to mankind, lies her daughter.
Her tiny, pink-smelling daughter. Whenever she woke up in the middle of the night during the past week and there was no baby in her room she still thought she had dreamt it all, but then she remembered a nurse wheeling the bassinette to the nursery for the night and it all came back to her.
Little Lorelai. Baby Lorelai, Lorelai Junior… She still hasn't figured out what the third Lorelai is going to be called in everyday life, but she is sure that eventually she will make up her mind, because admittedly, it does feel weird to call someone else by her own name. Or maybe she just has not gotten used to it yet.
She shrugs her shoulders at that and the smile on her lips grows to a wide grin as she remembers the expression on her mother's face right after she told her the baby's name would be Lorelai also. She pops her gum. What a sight. Priceless.
-
"There you go, mom! Congratulations!" with that, the doctor lifts a wailing pink bundle up from where it has been lying between her legs and places it on Lorelai's chest.
At first she thinks she doesn't know what to do, now that someone just out of the blue has handed her a warm, slippery newborn, but then she realizes that her hands are already all over her baby. Talk about maternal instincts. She strokes its back and marvels at the tiny fingers and toes. Carefully she runs a hand over the wet hair on her baby's head and cannot hold back tears when the small person on her chest opens its eyes at her for the first time and she sees how blue they are.
"It's a girl, right?" It simply has to be a girl.
"Yes. You have a daughter, Miss Gilmore!" cheers the nurse who is still busy at the foot of the bed.
"Good", she sighs and then devotes her attention to her daughter again. Her eyes are still open and although Lorelai knows that during the first weeks of they lives babies don't see very well, she feels that she is scrutinizing her with that gaze of infinite wisdom. "So that's the weird girl I'm gonna have to live with now?" -"Hey, don't judge me! Wait til we go home and you meet some really weird people."
Unfortunately, childbirth is not really over once the child is out, and so Lorelai goes through some more uncomfortable minutes and also has to let go of her daughter so she can be checked over and dressed. But she is determined to remain brave through all of it, knowing that once she is done here, her daughter will already be waiting for her.
"Do you know what you're gonna name her?" the nurse from before interrupts the silence that begins to spread in the room now that the baby has been taken to the nursery.
Huh. She hasn't really thought about that yet. Of course, the average Amy and Jessica have come to mind every now and then, but aside from that… And does Christopher have a say in all of this? She remembers that when she brought the subject up some weeks ago during a phone conversation, he seemed less than enthusiastic to start a discussion about that matter. But he's her father, after all. Ah, what the heck.
Lorelai decides that since she is the one who has gone through excruciating pain and nine months of discomfort and humiliation, the right to name her daughter is to remain hers alone. And so, being her proudest and most defiant self, she opens her mouth to speak.
Immense satisfaction fills her at the sound of her words.
Only much later the realization dawns upon her that the medication she was given during the birth has probably had considerable influence on the naming-process as well. Twenty yearsfrom nowLorelai will find herself silently thanking the good people who invented pain medication all over again. If it had not been for Demerol, perhaps she would have named her daughter Lindsey.
"I think I'm gonna call her Lorelai."
"Isn't that your name also, hon?" the nurse asks, the tone of her voice betraying the slightest hint of amusement. It is the same nurse she threw ice chips at earlier, by the way.
"Yeah, it is. Men name their sons after themselves all the time, so why shouldn't I do the same thing with my daughter?"
"Good point", the nurseadmits and then goes on about some business at the foot of the bed that Lorelai decides better not to pay any further attention to.
So she sighs somewhat exhausted and lies back against the bed with her eyes closed and the image of her baby daughter in her head.
Lorelai - something is still missing there, a middle name. Preferably something a little less pompous than 'Victoria'…
"Excuse me, what's your first name?" unable to read the nurse's name tag, she decides to give it a try. Later in life this will make a fabulous story to tell her daughter. "Do you wanna know how you got your name?"
"Marjorie. Why're you asking?"
Marjorie. Eww.
"Uh, just curious. You know, I like to get to know the people around me." She smiles at the nurse. "You got a favorite movie?"
"Ah, let me think- yes, I think that's it. Have you ever seen Gone With The Wind?"
"Sure, who hasn't?"
Scarlett. Nah. Melanie. Double-no. Aunt Pittypat? Hee, that'd be fun.
"You know, that Vivien Leigh, she's my all time favourite actress. I even named a daughter after her."
"You did?"
Vivien. Uh-uh.
"Yes. She's got a differentmiddle name, though. Vivien and Leigh, that'd have been cruel. Or at least not very imaginative", the nurse chuckles as she strips off her rubber gloves and pats Lorelai's right leg, "and we're done here."
"Thank you", Lorelai reaches out her hand to the nurse, "for everything."
"You did all the work", comes her reply, "I'll just go now and see how little Lorelai's doing. I'll be right back with her."
Leigh. Lee?
"Oh, before you go – her last name, how's it spelled?"
"Whose?"
"The lady who played Scarlett."
"Ah, let me see. It's L-E-I-G-H, I believe. Yes. I'm, pretty sure it is."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome. See you in a minute." With that, she pulls the door closed behind her.
Lorelai Leigh. An alliteration. How very stylistic-device of me. She likes what it sounds like in her head and also when she says it out loud. Decision made. Deal with it, Christopher.
Then Lorelai dozes off for a while, tired and satisfied and also a little mad at Christopher, but she decides to save that last feeling for when she sees him the next time. Whenever that will be. During the last weeks of her pregnancy he seemed to have developed an abnormally high interest in everything connected to school. A school she stayed away from, with her uniform not being suitable maternity wear and everything.
Not much later, Lorelai is woken by the nurse touching her shoulder. In her arms she is holding little Lorelai Leigh, "healthy as can be and freshly bathed on top of that."
The nurse – Marjorie, as Lorelai now refers to her privately – gently places the baby in Lorelai's arms.
"Miss Gilmore, your mother asked to come in, but I told her you'd probably like to have some time alone with your daughter, so you two can get to know each other."
It takes her a second to distract herself from the newborn in her lap and to process the information just given to her, to put it in context with all that has happened in the past hours.
Ah, her parents. Right, they stayed. In some waiting room, her mother most likely still mad as hell and her father a walking-talking complaint about Italian shoe fashion. A sigh escapes her lips at the thought.
"Yes, thanks a lot", she then mutters in a rather toneless voice. "Was she- I mean, was my mother mad when you talked to her?"
"In fact, no. She wasn't."
"Oh."
"I can leave you two alone for a while now, if you like. In case you need me, or anyone else, simply press that button over there and we'll be here." she points at a bright orange button on the wall next to the bed.
"Alright."
"Okay then. I'll be back in half an hour to help you freshen up a bit any maybe then the grandparents can come in."
From the way she is putting her words and by the sound of her voice Lorelai can tell that Marjorie must have picked up on some of the difficulties between her and her parents. Or maybe she's just not the first 16-year old to have had a baby under Marjorie's care and that is why she seems to know what Lorelai wants and does not want to happen.
Lorelai smiles at Marjorie gratefully one more time and then she is out of the door again, leaving Lorelai to be what this day has made her: A mother.