One Less Mistake

Summary: What if Lorelai hadn't gotten pregnant until she was 20? What if she had agreed to marry Christopher when she did? AU.

Pairings: Rory/Dean, with Lor/Luke later on

Disclaimer: All of these characters belong to Amy Sherman-Palladino and the WB

Dean woke up to the incessant ringing of his cell phone. He groaned and flipped it open.

"Whoever this is should know better than to call at three in the morning, so this had better be good." he snapped.

"She said yes!" a familiar voice trilled.

"Jess?"

"Yeah, who else?"

"Since when are you giddy at three in the morning? Hell, since when are you 'giddy' at all. I've known you for almost six years, and not once have I heard you use a tone that could be considered giddy, even in the loosest sense of the word. And no matter how strictly you define it, that was giddy."

"But she said yes."

"Lindsay?"

"Yeah. Have you always been this slow?"

"At THREE IN THE MORNING? Yeah, I'm actually pretty quick on the uptake for the time right now. So good going. You finally asked her to marry you."

"Yeah."

"You said you were going to about three weeks ago."

"I wanted the time to be right."

"Wait a second, you just proposed?"

"Yeah."

"As in JUST proposed."

"Yeahhhhh."

"You waited three weeks for the right time to propose to her, and you JUST proposed to her."

"For the last time, YEAH!"

"AT THREE O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING?"

"YES! My god, you've never been such an idiot in your LIFE!"

"The best time you could find to propose in three weeks was at three in the morning. Nice. I'm going back to sleep."

"Wait, will you meet me at that club near your dorm tonight? So I can tell you the details without you yelling at me."

"Yeah, sure, why not? Goodnight."

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"Come on, Rory, you never have any fun." Madeline whined.

"I have fun, I just don't go to to clubs, get wasted, and make out with random guys." Rory shot back.

"Yeah, Rory, come with us." Louise begged.

"No. I don't want to go any more tonight than I have for the past year, which is how long you've been begging me to go for."

"Right, so you owe us." Louise grabbed Rory's arm and started dragging her to the closet.

"But...but...I don't want to!" She whined.

"If you go, we promise not to ever ask you again." Madeline offered.

"Okay, fine. But just for the record, I hate you both."

"And the other part of the deal is that you have to wear whatever we choose for you, in exchange for never harrassing you about DuGrey." Louise quickly added.

"As long as I don't have to drink, and you don't dress me in anything sluttier than you're wearing."

"Deal." Madeline and Louise agreed together, and turned away to search for something to make her wear.

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Dean glanced at his watch. Jess was late again. Great.

Rory adjusted her skirt again, trying to pull it down enough that it covered more of her legs.

"Okay, Rory, we need to go over the rules again." Louise said, pulling Rory's hands away from the hem of her skirt.

"Rules? What rules? You didn't say anything about rules!" she cried.

"Okay, rule number one: no fiddling with your clothes." she said firmly.

"What? No! That's not fair! I want something else in exchange for that!"

"Rule number two: you have to have fun. Rule number three: you have to have at least one drink."

"No, to both. I can sit here and make you miserable for making me come if I want, and one of my conditions was that you couldn't make me drink anything."

"Okay then, you have to dance at least one dance."

"No. Louise, I don't want to dance."

"We snuck you in here."

"Against my will."

"You agreed to it."

"Reluctantly."

"But this means no more harassing about Tristan DuGrey. And no more begging you to come with us."

"Doesn't mean I didn't come reluctantly." she grumbled, sliding down in her seat, then yelped and pulled herself back up. "My skirt got caught on the chair." she said quickly, trying, and failing, to get Madeline and Louise to stop laughing.

Dean looked at his watch again. Maybe Jess was standing him up because he was mad that he'd yelled at him. Or maybe he was with Lindsay, and had lost track of the time. Dean didn't even feel awkward thinking about them possibly going farther than he and Lindsay ever had. He was completely over her. And completely into a seventeen year old. Stop thinking about Rory. he mentally chided himself. Even if she were over 18, you wouldn't have a shot in hell with her. Damn it, why he couldn't make himself stop thinking about her? He glanced at his watch again. Damn Jess for being late and giving him time to think.

"Look at that guy over there. He's hot. And tall. Really tall." Louise said, pointing towards the bar, where Dean was checking his watch again. "I'm going to go dance with him."

"No you're not!" Rory yelped. Louise couldn't dance with Dean, he was her Dean!

"Oh, how are you going to stop me?" she asked with a sultry pout as she stood up. Rory gulped. She could only think of one way.

"I'm going to dance with him." Louise looked at her, shocked, then grinned and sat down, gesturing with her head. There was no way to get out of this. She grabbed Louise's drink, and gulped it down, then Madeline's, and stood up tipsily, almost falling over in the heels she had borrowed from her mother, and started walking over to him.

Dean looked up towards the door again. "Jess, where are you?" he muttered.

"Who's Jess?" a feminine voice asked behind him. He whirled around.

"Rory? What are you doing here?"

"They made me come." she said, gesturing wildly behind her.

"All of them?" he joked, trying to think of some way to get her out of here. She was four years too young to be here.

"Who's Jess?" she asked again, not acknowledging that she had heard him.

"Old friend."

"Wow. That sounded really grown-up. You can't have old friends when you're young, because you're making all your friends, so they're all new."

"Um, yeah, sure. How are you getting home?"

"Was Jess your girlfriend?" she asked suddenly, her eyes widening so that it looked like that would be the worst thing on earth.

"No, he wasn't. I don't really swing that way." she looked confused, then started laughing.

"Dance with me." she pleaded, her eyes opening wider than he thought it was possible for eyes to open.

"I don't really dance. Let's get you out of here." he could explain to Jess.

"Please?" she whispered, tugging on his hand. He sighed.

"Fine. One slow dance, but then you've gotta let me get you home."

"Okay!" She nodded exhuberantly, her face lighting up like a christmas tree, leading him onto the dance floor. He tried to keep from looking at her, tried not to think about how her body felt pressed up against his. "Hey Dean." she whispered.

"Yeah?"

"Are you mad at me?"

"What?"

"You won't look me in the eye." she sounded so sad, he had to look at her. He met her eye, and she rose up on her toes and kissed him. He pulled away, but not before he tasted the alcohol on her breath.

"You've been drinking, haven't you?"

"Only a little."

"Rory." he unclasped her hands from behind his neck.

"You said one dance." she whimpered. "If you don't finish it, I won't leave." He sighed again, and let her pull him close. Now he had to figure out how to get her into her house without Lorelai figuring out her angel daughter was drunk, and blaming him for it.

Jess walked into the club and looked around for Dean. He wasn't sitting off by himself anywhere, and it wasn't like him to be late, or dance with anyone that would be at a nightclub.

Dean pulled away from Rory as the music ended, and started leading her towards the exit. She stumbled and fell into him, so he scooped her up and carried her the rest of the way to his dorm. He laid her down on his bed, sound asleep, and grabbed a spare blanket and pillow from the closet for himself. He got an old oversize shirt and boxers from his dresser and changed her into them, forcing himself not to look at her. He eased her under the covers, turned out the lights, and laid down on the floor, covering himself with the blanket, and fell asleep.

Jess paced by the bar, looking for Dean. The guy had never stood anybody up in his life.

"Hey, handsome." a sultry voice purred from behind him.

"Okay..."

"Louise." she offered.

"Okay, Louise, first of all, there's no way you're old enough to be in here. Second, I'm engaged. Goodbye." he shook his head and walked out of the club. He was not going to stand around waiting for Dean all night while some underage slut flirted with him.

Louise stalked back to Madeline. "This sucks. There have been two hot guys here all night who weren't already with some girl. Rory took the first one, and the second one's not only engaged, but faithful."

"Where is Rory, by the way?"

"Off with tall, dark, mysterious stranger, probably. Let's go."

"Wait, don't you think that maybe we should make sure she's alright? Tall, dark, mysterious guy could be a rapist, or serial killer for all we know." Madeline asked, panicing.

"Oh, come on. Let's go." Louise groaned.

"Whatever you say."