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CHAPTER 12: Blasts from the past

Luke walked up to the Gilmore's and saw a figure walking down the driveway. He couldn't make him out but as he got some closer he saw who it was and could feel his anger building as he walked faster towards him.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"I needed to talk to Lorelai"

"Why?"

"I just needed to tell her some stuff, not that it's any of your business" Dean said. He hated having to explain himself and people knowing what he had done to Lindsay and Rory.

"Rory and Lorelai are my business"

"Well this has nothing to do with you Luke, so just leave it" Dean said as he turned away from Luke and started to walk away.

"How could you do it? Cheat on your wife and use Rory to do it." Luke said getting angrier every time he thought about it, part of his anger coming from what Nicole had done for him.

"I love Rory." Dean said defiantly.

"So that make's it okay?"

"No, but you're one to talk" Dean said as he mumbled the last part.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Well you were married and you were in love with someone else too"

"What?" Luke said angrily as he grabbed Dean's shirt.

"The whole town knew you still had a thing for Lorelai, so you're no 'great' husband either... in a way you were kinda cheating on your wife as well"

Lorelai had emerged from her house a few minutes later when she heard a shriek from Babette. She came out and saw two figures fighting in the middle of the street, as she walked down the steps of her porch she saw who it was.

"LUKE! DEAN!" Lorelai shouted as she ran towards them. They didn't appear to have heard her or else they were just ignoring her as they continued to wrestle on the ground. Dean had heard Lorelai but Luke appeared to be in a rage and wouldn't let him go. Lorelai got between the two to try and pull Dean away. Just before Luke had moved to hit Dean Lorelai had jumped in front of him and before he realised it he had accidentally hit Lorelai on the side of the face.

"Ouch" she shouted loudly as she felt the pain rush through her face and fell to the ground.

"O jesus" Luke said as he realised what he had done. Dean jumped up and stood between Luke and Lorelai, he knelt to check she was okay, Luke just stood there in shock not believing what he had just done.

"Are you okay?" Dean asked, very concerned because it really had looked sore.

"I'm fine Dean" Lorelai gasped as she held her face. She sat on the grass in disbelief as she turned her gaze to Luke, he looked as if he was about to be sick.

"Sugar, are you okay?" Babette asked as she ran across to her.

"Morey hurry with that ice!" Babette shouted loudly back in the direction of her house.

"I'm fine" Lorelai said in a monotone voice as the realization of what just happened hit her. A few moments later Morey ran over with some ice and handed it to Babette. She turned Lorelai's face towards her, it was already swelling up.

"That looks nasty sugar, how about we get you inside?" Babette said as she started to lead Lorelai back to the house. Luke stood there, he didn't know what to say to her, 'I can't believe I hurt her' Luke thought as he looked at the hurt in her eyes. Before he got a chance to talk Babette had arrived, this would be around the town within the hour and no doubt the story would be very different once everyone had changed it a bit.

"Lorelai" Luke managed to gasp out. She turned round to him and looked back at him before she walked back into the house. Dean stood watching Luke, not knowing what to say or do, things had gone worse than either could have imagined.

"Are you okay?" Dean asked.

"I'm fine" Luke mumbled as he hung his head in shame.

"I'll take you back to the diner" Dean said as he looked at Luke, he looked like he could collapse. Dean walked back with him to the diner, Luke didn't say a word the entire walk. He didn't know what he could possibly say, he had hurt Lorelai, nothing he said or did would undo that.

Lorelai sat down on the sofa as Babette continued to fuss over her. She put her head in her hands as she sat down, she knew in her heart that it had been an accident but she still couldn't just forget about it.

"I'm fine Babette, I just think I'm going to bed" Lorelai said quietly.

"You sure doll? I can stay here if you want. " Babette said as she stood over Lorelai.

"No Babette that's fine, I kinda just wanna be alone"

"Okay well I'll see you tomorrow sugar" Babette said as she touched her hand and left. Lorelai sat there for ten minutes holding the ice pack just wondering what Luke was thinking at this minute.

1am

Luke sat on one of the stools in the diner and leaned on the counter. He had a bottle of beer in his hand, it was his fifth of the night and he was starting to feel the effects as he tried to stay awake. He needed to talk to Lorelai but he had no clue where to start.

The next day...

It was around 9 when Lorelai woke the next day, though she hadn't got much sleep that night but was awoken by the phone ringing.

"Yeah?" she mumbled into the phone.

"What way is that to answer a phone Lorelai? Didn't I teach you anything? I mean as if you're answering machine messages are bad enough..."

"Hi Mom" Lorelai interrupted as she sat up, she rubbed her temples, 'You're the last person I want to deal with today' Lorelai thought frowning as she rubbed her cheek.

"So how is everything?"

"Fine mom, and you?" Lorelai said just trying to make conversation.

"Very well, Rory and I are having a lovely time" Emily said smiling.

"That's great mom. Anyway I was just on my way to the Inn so I have to go" Lorelai lied.

"You don't even have five minutes to talk with your mother?" Emily as sharply.

"What do you want to talk about Mom?" she asked impatiently.

"Well anything new in your life?" Emily asked, she had head Rory mention that she had gotten together with the diner man and was digging for information.

"We hired new staff at the Inn which is good"

"And?" Emily asked, prodding her for information.

"... and I finally got to see the finale of Sex and the City the other day which I have been waiting to see for soo long. It's so obvious that Carrie and Big would get together in the end, I mean what kinda accent was that guy putting on anyway...it didn't sound Russian to me..." Lorelai said, she liked to talk until her mother became so impatient that she left her alone.

"Lorelai" Emily said impatiently.

"Um hmm" Lorelai said smiled as she knew how much she was annoying her mother.

"I can't even have a serious conversation with you Lorelai!"

"What? I just told you I finally saw the finale of Sex and the City, how is that not serious?"

"Fine I will talk to you later" Emily said as she sighed.

"Okay bye mom...stay away from the red light district" Lorelai added sarcastically as she hung up. She smiled in glee, she loved when she was able to annoy her mother so much that she just gave up talking to her.

Luke had fallen asleep on the counter just before dawn, he woke up to a knock on the door of the diner. He jumped up from his sleep and it took him a few seconds to get his bearings, he looked at all the empty beer bottles on the counter and groaned. He heard more knocking on the door as he turned round, he walked over to the door and opened it slowly.

"Nicole?" he said as he looked at her strangely.

"Hi Luke"

"What are you doing here?" he asked coldly.

"Can we talk?" she asked nervously.

"Now's not really a good time" he said, still looking at her strangely. He had the worst headache and he couldn't figure out why she was here, they hadn't spoken since the divorce and even then they had barely uttered a word.

"I know I shouldn't have just turned up but I just wanna talk, I have a meeting with Taylor in a while anyway"

"Fine, come in" he said gruffly as he opened the door wider so that she could come in. She walked in, he could see her eyes widen as she saw all the beer bottles sitting on the counter and turned to him with a concerned look on her face.

"Is everything okay Luke?"

"It's fine. So why are you here Nicole?" he asked gruffly.

"I brought you these" she said as she took out two small boxes from her bag "... I know they were you're dad's and they meant a lot to you".

"Uh thanks" he said as he took them and set them on the counter, relieved that he hadn't lost them. They were high school medals that his dad had given to him when he was younger, he had been looking for them for ages.

"I'm sorry" Nicole blurted out, he looked up from his medals and just stared at her.

"I'm sorry for what I did to you, I know there's nothing I can really say to excuse myself I just wanted to tell you"

"It's fine Nicole" he said gruffly.

"I really am"

"It's fine, I'm over it" he said looking at her.

"Okay ... well good, that's good for you. So are you okay?" she asked as she looked over at the beer bottles and then back at time. He looked like he hadn't slept in days and he stank of beer.

"Yea I'll be fine" he said as he sat down on a stool and looked down at the floor. She wasn't sure what exactly had happened but it was plainly obvious that he didn't want to talk about it. She went into the kitchen and got him a glass of water.

"Thanks" he grumbled as she set the glass of water down in front of him.

"So you wanna talk about it?" she asked.

"Not really" he said gruffly, he didn't know what to say to her. Even when they had been together he had spoken to Lorelai about most stuff, as he thought about her he remembered the previous night and felt like he needed to throw up.

"Okay. Well I think you should maybe go to bed. You can't open today, it smells like a brewery in here and you look like you need some sleep" Nicole said.

"Yeah I guess" he said with his head hanging as he made his way to his apartment stairs. He needed to get some sleep and think about what he could possibly say to Lorelai.

Lorelai picked up the phone, she needed to ring Sookie at the Inn and say she would be in late.

"Hey Michel, get Sookie would you?"

"You are late"

"Congratulations on being able to tell the time now please get Sookie" Lorelai said impatiently. About thirty seconds later after a lot of grumbling from Michel she heard Sookie.

"Hey hon" Sookie said brightly

"Hi Sook"

"So what's up?"

"Something happened last night and I'm gonna be in a bit later today?"

"Why what happened?"

"Umm I'll tell you later hon, I just really have to do something first"

"Any clues?"

"Well it involves a bit of WWF action on the middle of the street"

"Okay well hurry up and get here" Sookie said wanting to hear what happened.

"Bye" Lorelai said. She looked at her face in the mirror and examined the bruise on her cheek.

"I look like a Dalmatian" she grumbled as she tried to cover it with make-up with little success. She had come to the decision last night that she needed to talk to Luke, she knew it was an accident and he looked horrified last night, she knew he would never purposely hurt her. She got dressed and decided to drive to the diner, the less people who saw her face the better and no doubt it was around town by now.

She parked the truck just outside the front of the diner, she didn't see anyone about luckily and walked up to the front door. She looked in when she saw the 'closed' sign, she stood there for a moment staring and wondering where Luke was. He must have really felt bad that he didn't open the diner she thought. She saw movement and looked in as she saw a figure coming down the stairs, she pressed her face against the glass and saw Nicole. 'What the hell is she doing here?' she thought. She was instantly annoyed and curious as to why Nicole had been in Luke's apartment at all and especially at this time of the morning.

Nicole came to the front door of the diner and opened it to find Lorelai standing there.

"Lorelai hi" Nicole said with no emotion, she had never really approved Luke's relationship with her and didn't like her very much because of it.

"Hey Nicole" Lorelai said with a fake smile plastered on her face.

"How are you?"

"F-Fine, Good, I'm fine and you?" Lorelai managed to get out.

"I'm good"

"That's good" Lorelai said, not knowing quite what to say or how to ask why she was here.

"So why's the diner not open?"

"I told Luke to take the day off, he's in bed, he didn't get much sleep last night."

"Oh okay, is he okay?" Lorelai said, feeling like she had just been slapped across the face.

"Yeah he'll be fine, I left him in bed so he'll be fine when he gets some sleep. Anyway I'm late for a meeting, bye" Nicole said as she gave her a small smile and walked past Lorelai.

Lorelai stood there in shock for a few minutes just trying to process everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. She felt the tears coming to her eyes as she stood in the doorway, 'How could he be with her? How could he jump into bed with her after what had happened last night?' she thought as she wiped the tears from her eyes and stared up at his apartment window.