1 – Anywhere but here

"When'd you find out?"

"I just found out."

"Just? When just? She's in there filling salt shakers, it doesn't feel that new to me."

"Two months ago."

"Two months! That's a hell of a long time to go without telling me."

"I know I should have told you."

"Look, I need to digest this, and you have to get back inside so I'm just gonna go someplace where I can digest this and we will just talk more later, OK?"

"Sure, whenever you want."

"OK."

"I'm sorry."

Lorelai replayed the words over and over in her head as she walked away from him, not sure where she was going, where this 'place to digest' was. The only thing she knew right now was that she could not be anywhere near him, or she might tell him how keeping this from her for two months made her feel. Mislead. Deceived. Lied to. Angry. Hurt.

Stupid, because she knew that there had been something going on. She knew it, but when she asked him and he told her everything was OK, she didn't push it, even though she didn't believe him.

Yes, he should have told her. But maybe she should have tried a little harder to find out what was really going on. She had been too wrapped up in the wedding plans, in Rory's return, in the inn, in everything but Luke over the past couple of months. She had figured that whatever it was that bothered him, he'd tell her when he wanted to talk. And boy, had he.

A daughter. Luke had a daughter. A twelve-year-old daughter. How had that happened? Well, of course she knew how it had happened...

She still couldn't grasp the concept, and she wasn't sure if she ever would. She just needed... time. Time to figure out what she thought about the situation, time to figure out how... what was her name? April, right, Luke had called her April. How April would fit into their lives, and, maybe the most important one of all, how this would affect her and Luke's life.

She just needed some time. Just like Luke had last year.

Realizing she was in front of her house, Lorelai unlocked the front door and immediately headed upstairs. She got a sports bag out from her closet, and started throwing clothes into it, not even looking at the things she was packing. She didn't know what was going to happen tomorrow, or the day after that. She didn't even know if she and Luke would make it through this thing. But she did know that she needed time to think, and she wouldn't be able to do that here.

Zipping the bag shut, Lorelai thought about where she could go. Uninvited memories of a summer when she was about nine came to her.

They had spent a month in a cabin by the sea, Lorelai vaguely remembered it. It had belonged to Trix. Which must mean that her dad owned it now. She would go there. The ocean used to calm her and help her think when she was younger, maybe it still would.

Hurrying down the stairs, Lorelai put the bag in the jeep before going back inside the house to leave a note for Luke. She couldn't talk to him right now. She would call Rory from the road to tell her what was going on. She just needed to be anywhere but here.

"Two months! That's a hell of a long time to go without telling me."

"I know I should have told you."

"Look, I need to digest this, and you have to get back inside so I'm just gonna go someplace where I can digest this and we will just talk more later, OK?"

The words echoed in Luke's head, and he wondered what he could have done differently. Except the obvious thing, which would have been to tell Lorelai the moment he found out. But it was too late for that now.

The problem at hand now was to make Lorelai believe that he was sorry, and that he hadn't kept it from her on purpose.

Sighing, he got out of bed. Figuring Lorelai still needed time to 'digest', he had stayed at the apartment. But he knew that he wouldn't be able to sleep, not until he had talked to her. He needed to explain, make her believe him, just needed to... do something.

Deciding that he might as well go over to the house so they could talk first thing in the morning, Luke wandered through the dead streets of Stars Hollow. It was almost two in the morning, and the only one he met on the way to the house was a stray cat.

Turning the doorknob, Luke was surprised to find the house locked. Lorelai never locked the door at night, only when she wasn't home. Using his key, he let himself in and closed the door behind him.

The house was dead silent. Which wasn't a big surprise, seeing as it was the middle of the night. Lorelai would be asleep. But as soon as he stepped over the threshold, Luke knew he was alone in the house. He looked out through the window, and found the driveway empty. He hadn't even noticed that the jeep wasn't there.

Hoping to prove himself wrong, he walked up the stairs and into their bedroom, where the bed mocked him with its un-slept-in appearance. Where was she?

Going back downstairs, he checked the living room, wishing beyond hope that he'd missed her sleeping form on the couch in his hurry to get upstairs. But the couch was as empty as the bed, and slowly Luke realized that she really wasn't there.

Going into the kitchen, he slumped down at the table, staring into thin air. Where could she be? Sookie's? At Yale with Rory? Getting his cell phone out of his pocket, he pressed the speed dial for Lorelai's cell, but paused in mid air, his finger hovering above the 'call' button.

Wherever she was, she wouldn't appreciate being woken up at two thirty in the morning, that he knew for sure. He would just have to wait until morning and call her then.

As he put the phone back in his pocket, his eyes fell on the fridge, and he spotted a white envelope with his name on it pinned to it with a smiley face magnet. He quickly walked over and tore the envelope open.

Dear Luke

By the time you read this I will, hopefully, have left Stars Hollow far behind. I meant what I said outside the diner, I need time to digest this, to figure out... pretty much everything. And I realized I can't do this here, with everyone hovering over me, wondering what I'm going to do and asking questions. So I decided to take a little Stars Hollow free time, so to speak. You if anybody should know how I feel. How many times has this crazy town of ours driven you to the edge of insanity over the years?

Anyway, back to the subject. I'm going to a place, possibly the only place, where I was happy as a child. I am going to ask you, and I know this will be hard, to not try to find me or contact me. I am bringing my phone in case of emergency, but please, respect my wishes and don't call me. I need to figure this out on my own, just like you have for the past two months.

Oops, that sounded a little angry, which it probably should, because I am angry. How could you not tell me, Luke? Remember your little speech about not keeping secrets last year? Whatever happened to that? Or did everything we have together just fly out the window the minute she walked into your life?

OK, I am going to end this here before I write something I might regret later. Just one more thing. Please don't pull Rory into this. She knows where I am, and what's going on, and I know she'd tell you where to find me if you ask her, because she'd want to fix everything between us, so please don't.

Love, always

Lorelai

PS. If you could keep an eye on Paul Anka, I'd appreciate it. Otherwise, ask Babette to check in on him.

The paper was stained by what he knew was tears, and he re-read the letter two, three, four times before her words finally sunk in.

She wasn't there. She wasn't even in Stars Hollow anymore. He wouldn't be able to talk to her the next day, explain everything and beg her to forgive him, because she didn't want to talk to him. She didn't even want to be in the same town as him.

Dropping the letter on the table, he buried his face in his hands. How had everything gotten this screwed up? No, how had he screwed them up so much? As much as he tried to convince himself that the only reason he hadn't told Lorelai was that he hadn't found the right time, he knew that it had been because he'd been afraid of how it would affect their relationship. He was scared that she'd want to call the engagement off, or that she'd want out of the relationship all together. As long as he didn't tell her, he didn't have to find that out for sure, so he kept putting it off.

Of course, that little rational voice somewhere deep down had been saying all along that the longer he waited, the harder it would be when he finally told her. And why would him having a kid that he hadn't known about until recently affect their relationship? He knew that Lorelai wouldn't have a problem with it. Of course things would be a little awkward in the beginning, but it would get better.

But he had let the louder voice, the one telling him to keep it a secret just a little longer, win, because it was easier that way. And now he might have lost her. Not because of April, but because he had lied to her. He couldn't really blame her if she wanted out, after all, he had been the one to insist on 'no secrets', and now he had gone completely against his own words.

She was gone. Gone from Stars Hollow, gone from him. He had no doubt that she'd come back when she had thought everything through and figured out how she felt, but would she come back to him?

Looking around the dark kitchen, he realized that there was no point in sitting there all night. He should at least try to get some sleep, though the thought seemed distant to him right now.

Walking through the empty house, he climbed the stairs and was once again in their bedroom. For a moment, he just stood there, trying to picture her lying in the bed, asleep, but he couldn't.

Sighing, he pulled the covers down and crawled into the bed, not bothering to take his clothes off. Her smell was all over the sheets, and he hugged her pillow close to him, imagining that it was her body and not a life-less piece of fabric. Before he let his eyes close, he looked at the alarm clock3:12. He had already asked Ceasar to open the next day, so he didn't need to set the alarm. But somehow he knew that he'd be up before dawn anyway.

The moment he closed his eyes, images started flashing by. The look on Lorelai's face as she realized who April was, the disbelief and hurt in her eyes. God, how he wished he could erase that look.

Then the image was replaced by others. Her tear-stained face as she drove down a dark higway, a look of terror on her face as she lost control of the car. Her life-less body on the side of the road.

Forcing the images out of his head, Luke opened his eyes. He had to stop imagining the worst case scenario. Lorelai was fine, she had to be. Closing his eyes again, he tried to remember the good things, happy occasions. Her smile at Liz and TJ's wedding, the way her lips had felt against his on the porch of the Dragonfly, their first date at Sniffy's, her parents wedding renewal, the pain in her eyes at Doose's when he'd told her he was out. Somehow he couldn't keep those images away, and he ended up where he had started, on a highway somewhere.

What if something happened, and the last thing they ever did was fight? What if he never saw her again and the last thing he had done was lie to her?

Realizing it was pointless to try to keep the thoughts away; Luke surrendered and let them run free. He finally fell asleep from exhaustion, only to dream of empty highways and carwrecks.

He managed to keep himself from calling Rory until eight thirty, even though he'd been up since five. He had busied himself around the house, fixing some things he'd noticed needed fixing over the past couple of weeks. But he had convinced himself that he couldn't wait too late to call her, either, or she might be in class. So at eight thirty he dialled the number to Rory's cell phone.

"Mmhmm." Her sleepy vice came over the line.

"Oh, God, Rory, I'm sorry to wake you." He said, realizing she had been asleep.

"Luke, hi, it's not a problem, I need to get up soon anyway." She replied, and he could hear that she wasn't surprised to hear from him. As she continued, he realized that Lorelai must have told her that he'd probably call looking for her. "Look, I can't tell you where she is, I promised I wouldn't. I'm sorry."

"No, that's not why I'm calling." He said.

"It's not?" She asked in a surprised voice.

"She doesn't want me to know, and I have to respect that." He explained.

"Oh, OK." Rory was quiet for a moment. "So why did you call?"

"I just... I need to know that she's OK."

"I think I can safely tell you that she will be." Rory replied.

"She got to... wherever she was going OK?" Luke asked.

"Yup, I talked to her last night." Rory confirmed, and Luke sighed in relief.

"Thanks, Rory." He said. "I'll let you get back to sleep. Could you just tell her to call me? I mean, if she wants to talk she can call me whenever."

"I'll tell her that." Rory promised.

"OK, bye."

"Bye, Luke."