A/N: This chapter ended up really long but I just couldn't seem to bring myself to break it into two chapters... so take a coffee break in the middle if you feel the need and just PRETEND that it's two chapters.
Happy reading!
The door to Luke's Diner clanked shut with a not so welcoming ring as if even the familiar tinkling of the bell over the entrance had gone a bit out of tune with the recent sourness emanating from the vicinity of the kitchen.
Jackson glanced around the homey diner but found it strangely desolate for midday on a cold, frosty Saturday. Missing were the usual hangabouts laughing, chatting and sipping their steaming cups of coffee with laconic molasses like torpor that lasted until Luke threatened mutiny with muttered whispers and eye thrown daggers. Gone were Lane's habitual garage band french-fry begging associates. More notable perhaps was the absence of the habitual gaggle of Stars Hollow characters littering the homey dining room with their banter and gossip and unsolicited relentless good neighbor acts (that would be Taylor of course).
It seemed the recent rumors of flambéed hamburgers, half cooked fries and customers being tossed unceremoniously arse over teakettle out into inhospitable winter snow were not simply fabrications of Taylor's pernicious little mind after all. Jackson began to feel that perhaps despite his initial hesitation this little machination of theirs was coming just in the nick of time.
There was one hardy soul hunkered down at the counter who Jackson did not immediately recognize from the back of the tan overcoat and a flitting Lane who was fasting approaching him with startled darting eyes that whispered their dire warnings from ten feet away.
She grabbed him by the arm as soon as he took a step towards the counter and steered him a step back towards the door with a quick glance back at the kitchen as she hissed in a muted voice "What are you doing here? Go away immediately before you get hurt."
He shook off her small yet surprisingly strong hand with an admonishing look "I'm here to see Luke."
She shook her head in denial as her eyes widened even further and she took a step back involuntarily as if the speaking the name aloud might have summoned some heinous devil from sleep. "What about Sookie?"
He gave her a perplexed look "What about Sookie?"
She pushed ineffectually at his shoulder as she darted another glance back towards the kitchen from whence a loud clanging sound had just emanated. "There is no time for questions. Just trust me on this. Leave now while you still have the chance. Do it for the good of your family, little Davey and Sookie pregnant with the new one. It would be such and unnecessary tragedy for them to be without their..." she waved a vague hand at him as she darted another glance towards the kitchen " head of the household."
Head of the household? He liked the sound of that even though he knew he'd lost claim to that title some time ago and held no bitterness towards his conqueror, after all not every takeover was hostile. He patted Lane on the shoulder and shook his head sadly when he got the gist of her warning. "It's nice of you to say that but you trying wresting the scepter of sovereignty from a pregnant woman and then maybe we'll compare war stories. You think I'm crazy enough to brave the lion's den on anything but a mission handed down by the highest power? I may be eccentric but I'm not suicidal."
Lane gave a surreptitious look around again as if searching for spies and eavesdroppers then leaned towards him slightly "Does that mean you have a plan?" her tone was edged with a hysterical kind of hopefulness that bore witness to the burden of her silent suffering.
Now it was Jackson's turn to glance around in search of hidden eyes and ears before he gave her single secretive nod. "Go see Andrew at the bookstore and ask to see the copy of Moby Dick, all the answers will be there. Now I have work to do so run along so you don't blow my cover."
Lane gave him a knowing nod and then scampered towards the door as Luke's gruff voice echoed from the back as he cursed at some sort of kitchen appliance.
She gave Jackson a hopeful double thumbs up before she grabbed her jacket from the hook by the door and made a dash for the door. "I'll just give you some space then and a parting warning; if smoke starts coming out of his ears run as fast as you can in the other direction." She gave a cursory wave and then the sickly bell was singing its mournful melody in her wake.
Jackson headed for the counter and plopped unceremoniously down on a stool next to the other man who he had only just now recognized as Kirk who was either aiming for incognito or going through another of his phases of impersonating Sam Spade from the Maltese Falcon. It was often difficult to ascertain the exact motivation behind Kirk's particular brand of crazy.
He was about to comment when Kirk leaned over subtly and spoke in a thoughtful tone without ever taking his eyes off the glass of water he was rolling between his hands with measured strokes. "Meditation and water are wedded forever."
"Huh?" Jackson regarded his strange compatriot with a perplexed look for a long moment before suddenly the light switch flipped and Jackson goggled in shock tinged with injured pride. He scooted a little closer, speaking in a somewhat plaintive whisper "She called you?"
Kirk gave him a haughty glance and a tiny shoulder shrug as he contemplated the entrance to the kitchen as if perhaps he were expecting the second coming "...I am quick to perceive a horror, and could still be social with it."
Jackson pursed his lips in a sulk and he stared at his hands "Geez, I wonder how many OTHER people she called before she called me. Certainly makes a man feel less than useful. Apparently I'm not even her first choice of arm-twister." He gave a little snort of indignation.
Kirk looked ready to retort when there were sudden heavy footsteps from the kitchen. His eyes widened and he reared back slightly as Luke advanced towards the counter looking decidedly more beastly than even his usual unfriendly demeanor might lead one to anticipate. "There she blows!--there she blows! " Kirk said in a voice that went a little squeaky on the last note. He stood up swiftly from his stool and made a quick exit with a last parting comment "I am the Fates' lieutenant; I act under orders."
Jackson wasn't sure whether this parting remark was an explanation, a plea for clemency or simply the final bow in a quirky one-man show. His preoccupied analysis was swiftly diverted from the vagaries of the town clown when something slammed down on the counter next to him and he whirled in surprise coming abruptly face to face with one of Luke's more threatening scowls.
He swallowed and went a tiny bit cross-eyed as he followed the jabbing finger that was now only inches from his nose on it's course towards the departed soubrette. Luke's voice was edged with impatience "What was all that babbling about? He's been driving me batty all morning with his questions about whales and marine knots and I swear to god if he calls me matey one more time I'm going to stab him with a fork."
There wasn't a doubt in Jackson's mind that Luke had just such a dining implement all sharpened and gleaming in the back just waiting for such an opportunity. He gulped air around the walnut sized knot in his throat that felt decidedly like fear. He straightened slightly and pushed the accusing finger gently to the counter before he cleared his throat and tried for an authoritatively dismissive tone. "Who knows...its just Kirk. Understanding Kirk is like trying to cross a beet with an artichoke. You end up with nothing but purple hands and a big thorny mess." He trailed off when he saw that Luke had lost interest in his analogies of the vegetable variety.
Luke's gaze was locked to left of the door where the escaped Kirk stood posed outside the plate glass windows with his hand on his chin as he looked thoughtfully at the boat parked in front of the diner. "Now what the heck is he doing?" Luke waved an exasperated hand and marched towards the door wrenching it open with a great deal more force than was absolutely necessary and setting the besieged bell to clanging again.
He stopped on the front steps with his hands on his hips just as Kirk patted the boat with what appeared to be a sympathetic look on his face and said in mournful tones "A noble craft, but somehow most melancholy! All noble things are touched with that."
Luke growled "Kirk!"
Kirk gave him a mouse who's just spied the big mean tomcat kind of look before he pulled up the wide collar of his tan overcoat, pushed down the brim of his brown fedora and scuttled off at a quick pace across the town square.
Luke slammed the door behind him still muttering under his breath in irritation as he swiped a used coffee mug of a near by table and rounded the counter. "What do you want?" he asked after a moment as if he had only just remembered that he had an audience.
Jackson stuttered a little as he grabbed a menu trying to buy himself a bit more time to figure out how best to broach the subject of his assignment. He perused the list of sandwiches carefully holding the menu as a barrier between him and Luke in case the two feet of Formica countertop weren't enough. "How is the turkey club?"
Luke gave him the special look he usually reserved for people like Kirk who he considered to be one step from the door to the Looney bin. "I don't know, you tell me. You've been ordering it for the past eight years, give or take a few."
"Hmmmm, now that you mention it I think I remember that the club is quite good." Jackson nodded seriously as if this were all news to him and then considered the menu again "How about the Roast Beef and cheddar...what comes on that?" he looked up at Luke and blinked his eyes innocently as he had seen Lorelai do on countless occasions, although he did note that usually when she did it Luke didn't glower with quite this amount of sheer animosity.
Luke gave him a surly look and ground out the answer through clenched teeth "Roast beef and cheddar."
Jackson frowned as if highly concerned by this information "Oh...so no tomato? I always think that roast beef is better with tomato."
Luke's patience snapped with a nearly audible cracking sound and he snatched the menu out of Jackson's hands and slammed it down on the counter between them. "Hey..." Jackson shut his mouth quickly on the tail end of that sentence when he saw Luke's stony expression and followed his pointed finger to the sign that said 'We reserve the right to refuse service.'
"You have ten seconds to tell me why you are here or to vacate the premises before I give you a helpful boot to the rump." He braced his hands on the counter and leaned forward with a menacing look "What's it going to be beetchoke boy?"
"Beetchoke? That's a good one..." He trailed off at Luke's sinister growl and his mind went blessedly blank as he stared up into Luke's face. He coughed once as if this would restart his brain like lawn mower that has idled.
There was a silent pause and then he tried to think again...nope, nothing surfaced. Best to try back another time when Luke didn't look quite so Jeffrey Dahmerish. Not even thoughts of a hysterical pregnant woman could keep him rooted to this stool. "Uh, I just realized that I'm not all that hungry after all. Maybe I'll just come back later."
"Here let me help you." Luke said with false pleasantness and followed uncomfortably close as Jackson stumbled towards the door. He even held the door open in all pretense of politeness but Jackson felt the whoosh of air blow past him when it slammed solidly a mere inch from his back. He glanced back surreptitiously and observed Luke as he crossed his arms, assuming what Lorelai called his Paul Bunyan pose. Then he turned tail and ran.
Luke watched Jackson retreat, nostrils still flaring with intimidation then he sighed in exasperation. This town and its incessant meddling were going to be the death or at least the insanity of him.
His shoulders slumped a little and with no curious Johnny-on-the-spots to witness it he gave in to defeat and slid on to the stool that Jackson had recently vacated and put his elbows on the counter. He stared blindly at the familiar wall in front of him until his eyes landed on the cell phone sign that had so often engendered a sort of ritualistic banter with the woman he considered the love of his life.
He wondered when his life had come to this shell of an existence, like an old house torn down by weather and humanity board by board until nothing was left but the bare framing, the skeleton of a structure held together by nothing but a few rusty nails and some crumbling mortar.
The loss kept at bay for so long by sheer stubborn will came to rest on his shoulders and they lost any strength to hold up the burden as he dropped his head to his hands and let himself feel the sadness, the anger, the ache of loss that he'd seen so clearly mirrored in Lorelai's startled blue eyes just this morning.
He didn't know what to do but he knew he couldn't go on much longer like this, lashing out at customers, burning orders, holding himself together by will alone. And apparently doing a rotten job of it. He'd thought that some time and space was the answer. That clarity would come with distance but all that had brought was loneliness and pain. His reasons for walking away, the reasons that had seemed so rational and justifiable only weeks ago were fuzzy and indistinct now and only one thing stood out clearly in his mind.
He needed her. Here, now, in his life for good...and the look in her eyes this morning had put the cold seed of doubt in his heart that whispered that maybe he was too late to rectify the mistake that he had made. The mistakes they had both made. He realized that a part of him had just been biding its time, waiting for the sting of pride to subside so all could be made well.
The thing that he had never thought about, the possibility he was only beginning to see with frightening clarity was that Lorelai might just do something that was entirely foreign to her personality. She might walk away without a fight. He shuddered now to think about the cause of this revelation. Behind the illusory shimmer of angry heat and the flush of embarrassment this morning he'd seen a hopelessness and defeat in those liquid pools that made his blood run cold and his resolve crumble like ancient plaster.
Miss Patty caught Jackson a block from the diner, took one look at his drooping shoulders and downcast eyes and shook her head in disgust as she clicked her tongue in disapproval. Jackson gave her the sad eyed look of a whipped puppy dog and looked at her pleadingly "I tried Patty, I really did but Luke is in serious ogre mode today and now I'm afraid to go home. Have you ever seen what hormones can do to a perfectly sweet tempered woman? Now add a knife block full of sharpened steel to that and you've got my life. I feel like I'm going home to one of those wheels of death where they pin you up and spin you around and throw knives at you."
"Oh now honey, don't you worry my little brussel sprout, Miss Patty will fix everything." Miss Patty gave him a soothing pat on the cheek with her warm plump hand and then smiled "Sookie is well intentioned but she miscalculated when she sent a boy to do a woman's job." Her smile took on a hint of the predatory. "You just scuttle on home with some good chocolate and a nice bouquet of flowers and leave this to the resident expert." Jackson nodded enthusiastically at this idea and was off down the street like a startled hare having scented a predator.
She called after out to his disappearing figure with a wicked afterthought "Don't forget to wear protection if she starts in with those knives." She rubbed her hands together and set her sights on the now empty diner with the gleeful look of a predatory female in heat. "Now for the dirty work."
She sashayed towards the diner as only a flamboyant entertainer accustomed to the limelight could. She got to the door just in the nick of time to intercept an emboldened looking Kirk before he could venture again into the bear's den. Kirk gazed in and muttered to himself "This whole act's immutably decreed. 'Twas rehearsed by thee and me a billion years before this ocean rolled."
Miss Patty's hand shot out just in time to halt his forward progress and push him gently aside as they both stared in at the sad tableau in front of them, an empty diner, a dejected heartbroken man with his ball cap crowned head bent in submission.
"It's not your show this time Kirky. Why don't you just run along and tell our mistress of ceremonies that the things are going just swimmingly and our white whale will be there right on time."
Kirk gave her a skeptical look and quoted again in a pious tone "If the gods think to speak outright to man, they will honorably speak outright; not shake their heads, and give an old wives' darkling hint." Head held high he headed down the steps with Miss Patty's deep chuckle following at his heels.
Miss Patty focused back on the man hunched over the counter in misery. A man that she had known since he was rangy teenager shouldering the burdens of the world at far too young. She remembered him then, quiet, contained, a hunk of a boy who barely had eyes for the girls who strew themselves like rose petals at his feet. No this one was patient and he had eyes for only the rare treasures. Treasures like the blue-eyed brunette currently moping in her own little bubble of despair across the town. A treasure that their hero Luke had coveted for a long time before he got to touch it and taste it and believe it was his own. She couldn't' believe that a little bump in the road would derail this pair, not after all they'd gone through to get where they were.
They belonged together; everyone knew it, most of them long before the pair in question had an inkling of the state of their hearts. Miss Patty liked to claim that she was the first one who had seen it but even she knew that was an exaggeration. They'd all seen it, with the exception perhaps of old Mrs. Bailey who had been blind as a bat for ten years and even she had claimed the hair on her arms had stood straight up and saluted like General Lee himself had entered the room, truth be told Mrs. Bailey was still a southern belle at heart despite the fact that she hadn't been in Georgia since the great depression. Suffice it to say that everyone within the tri-state area had probably felt the shift in the air the day their two star-crossed lovers had met.
Lorelai had been hard to miss even for a habitually oblivious guy like Luke, with her mahogany curls and sapphire eyes. If that wasn't enough she hit you with the one two punch of a sweetly animated smile and a mile a minute wit.
She bounced into the town like she was on a breathless adventure and she was irresistible with her laughing eyes and the pixie like clone of herself in tow. Like a magical being somehow imbued with the force of life at its zenith. The pair were as agile of tongue as a talented thief with his hands and before anyone in the quiet little berg had blinked they'd stolen the very heart of the town, enchanted the gruff, the officious and the quirky alike. By the end of that very first day, they belonged.
They'd come looking for kindness from strangers and made them all into instant characters in their merry play, even Luke the practical man who preferred to keep his feet solidly grounded in reality hadn't been able to resist the lure of their enchanting world.
Miss Patty remembered that day with a wide smile on her face as she recalled seeing the pair skip happily into the very diner she stared into now on their exploratory jaunt through the village proper. The place had been bustling and Luke was mid-tirade about some inane new rule imposed by Taylor the Terrible. She'd been watching the show with Babette, from their usual front row seats when she'd seen Luke still, mid finger point, and watched his eyes flick to the woman who had just blown into the diner like a breath of fresh tantalizing air to a man deprived of oxygen for far too long. Patty was no stranger to electricity and these two had it in spades, it was a wonder that they didn't incinerate the place in that first glorious burst. The protagonists were clueless and the audience walked away with singed eyebrows. She hadn't felt so alive since her Broadway days. Living vicariously had never been better.
Luke and Lorelai had become an instant hit as a town past time. It was voyeurism at its best. There was no better way to start the morning or end the night than to watch two completely clueless but totally enamored people flirt with the dangerous edges of attraction. She loved junk food, he was a health nut, she was the verbal equivalent of a hummingbird on six cups of coffee, he preferred his sentences kept to monosyllabic grunts, she threw herself into the town's zany customs with gusto, he avoided them like the plague. In short, despite their combined emotional baggage, they were perfect for one another.
No one doubted it not even Taylor, the town cynic.
How could you when you watched them together? The wicked little smiled she saved just for occasions when she'd made him smile despite his best efforts at surliness or driven him to spout off in some rant about the evils of grease and caffeine even as he refilled her fifth cup of coffee. You only had to see his face when he spied her across the square or walking down the street and for that split second everything he dreamed about lay naked in his eyes.
They had their faults, but who didn't? He was afraid to love because too many people that he had loved had left. She was afraid to rely on anyone but herself because too many people she had relied on had disappeared when she needed them most. He always stayed and she always ran but in the end the whole town had seen them turn to each other time and again over the course of the years in friendship and in love. Bets had been won and lost many times over about how long it would take them to face what everyone else saw everyday in every nuance.
No bets had been made about when it would end. No one wanted to bet against them. This was Stars Hollow, Connecticut, not exactly the birthplace of Montagues and Capulets. They liked their oddball town customs and their happy endings served with pie and coffee.
As far a Miss Patty was concerned this story had no other possible ending. Happiness was just a matter of persistence and the right attitude and she had just the plan in mind to give Luke's attitude a little tune up. She pushed through the door with a resolute set to her shoulders.
Luke didn't lift his head and his snarl was more of a muffled growl "Go away immediately or I'm going to toast YOU and cut off the crusts."
Miss Patty settled onto a stool next to him with a deep chuckle "Now doll that's no way to talk to a lady." Her voice went low and sultry "Lucky you I'm no lady and I'm always up for a good toasting."
Luke's head jerked upwards as he identified the voice and a slight flush crept up his neck despite his best efforts to control it. He cleared his throat a little self-consciously. "Sorry Patty, I thought you were Kirk."
"Well that's not one I get often but I suppose I can understand the mistake. I stopped him inches from your door just now and shooed him off to work his special brand of inanity on someone else."
Luke slid off the stool and rounded the counter, setting a cup in front of her and pouring coffee out of pure habit. He gave her a look of gratitude. "Well then it sounds like I owe you one. What'll it be?"
Miss Patty leaned an elbow on the counter in a languorous pose and eyed him suggestively "Well..." she let the syllable draw out all smooth and seductive like oil on the body of a sinuous young Brazilian "Now that you mention it." She let the intimation dangle for a heartbeat. No one could ever accuse Miss Patty of not having a perfect ear for timing.
At his small sputtering cough and darker flush she laughed "Luke Danes you always were a tease, dangling all that deliciousness out there just to tempt a girl and than snatching it back just when she's ready to sink her teeth into it." she figured she'd had her fun with him when he turned a startling shade of crimson and looked ready to choke. She waved a nonchalant hand at him "Now handsome don't gets your boxers in a twist. Tell you what, I'm in a benevolent mood so I'll settle your debt for a slice of banana cream pie."
He cut the pie and slid the plate towards her leaving it mid-counter as if her were afraid to actually get too close to her. She chuckled deep and sultry before she took a bite of the pie and made a sound of approval. "The food of the gods." She took another sinful bite "You learned that from your mom. I remember her pie. Her pie was poetry, it might have lingered only a moment on the lips but it was well worth it." She pointed a fork at him and allowed her eyes to go a little distant with the haze of memories " I remember you back then too. I remember watching you run, a sight for sore eyes I'll tell you me. You ran like you were out to catch something that was just beyond your reach and you never gave up, lap after lap without stopping or slowing, it was a thing of beauty to watch and not just because of that butt in those short shorts." She chortled a little at his uncomfortable look but then continued. "You had drive and you never stopped until you reached that finish line. I admired that about you." She subsided her commentary and seemed content to savor another bit of creamy pie.
Luke waited for a moment and then narrowed his eyes when nothing more was forthcoming from the usually talkative Miss Patty "What's your point Patty? Are you in on what ever numbskull plot Jackson and Kirk are up to?"
Miss Patty gave him a wide eyed innocent look as she finished off her last bite of pie and laid her fork primly on the edge of the plate. "Point? I don't believe I had a point. Can't a woman just reminisce every now and then over a piece of truly superb pie?" She was up and off the stool neatly ignoring the comment about a plot. "Thanks for the indulgence Luke. You're a good man but you should really work on that paranoia. Pretty soon you'll be ascribing to Kirk's conspiracy theories." He narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms but she ignored this gesture as she gave him a smile and turned for her grand exit.
She headed for the door at a leisurely pace but only took a few steps before she stopped and turned in the doorway as if a question had only just occurred to her "You know that despite Taylor and his blustering we would never run you or Lorelai out of town just because you things didn't work out between you."
It was more of a comment than a question. Luke's forehead wrinkled in confusion "Of course, I never listen to anything that old wind bag has to say, especially about a relationship that is none of his business."
"Good." She took two steps towards the door before she hesitated and looked back over her shoulder again. "Lorelai knows that too right?"
Luke shrugged to show his lack of ability to act as Lorelai's mouthpiece but then answered when the Miss Patty's face crinkled with worry. "I'm sure she does. Lorelai isn't the type to scare easily or to let anyone else run her life."
Patty looked at him for a moment as if weighing his answer and then gave a relieved sigh. "Yeah, you're probably right. I'm sure that nonsense I overheard about her father finding a buyer for the Dragonfly is nothing but a red herring. I best be off now before Taylor finds me and ropes me into another planning meeting for the snowflake festival. That man will kill you with his meetings. " She was blathering on merrily but she didn't miss the flare of Luke's eyes as they went wide like a horse startled out of the gate by the starter's pistol just as she swung her considerable girth towards the door and made a hasty exit. "Thanks for the pie love."
She waited until she was halfway down the street before she let loose with her Cheshire Cat grin. Never underestimate an aging starlet's ability to read the audience and zero in for the kill.
Luke blinked and she was gone, for a woman more given to strolling Miss Patty could move like lightening when she wanted to. He was still reeling from her off hand words despite the fact that he was certain that there was some trick up her sleeve.
Lorelai would never sell the Dragonfly. Would she? No, of course not. Emphatic period at the end of that mental sentence. There was no doubt some completely logical alternate explanation for whatever conversation Miss Patty had overheard through her spy network. Of course there was really only one way to find out. Ask someone close to the source.
Miss Patty congratulated herself on the effort as she watched Luke shrug on his coat and storm out of the diner moments later as if a band of wild hyenas were nipping at his heels. The plan was working to perfection. They had just cast off the anchor and set sail. She pulled out a cell phone and when a voice answered on the other end she spoke softly into it "The white whale cometh."
A gust of wintry wind pushed the heavy door closed behind Rory with a resounding thud and rippled over the back of her neck causing an involuntary shiver and wreaking havoc with the flyaway strands of hair not covered by the blue knit hat with the poof ball dangling from the top.
None of this bothered Rory though, nor did it do anything to dampen the beatific smile that graced what you could see of her face above the tightly wound scarf. She was free, free at last from the fetters of studying...at least for a few weeks and a little snow and ice wasn't about to keep her from enjoying every precious second of it. She skipped down the cement steps feeling as light and unencumbered as Maria had when she'd cast aside her wimple and danced away with nothing to weigh her down but her satchel and guitar.
She did a happy little jig that served the dual purpose of keeping her warm and evincing her current euphoric not a test in sight and two gallons of coffee still coursing in her bloodstream high. There was never so great a feeling as the one experienced when you finished your last final and were staring into three weeks of blissful free time where you were required to do nothing but read books purely for enjoyment, watch movies, eat massive quantities of junk food and sleep... sleep like you were Rip Van Winkle and didn't care in the least if a good century or two passed you by. Pure heaven.
The snow was coming down softly and the breeze swirled it idly in soft patterns that brushed the icy crystals against her cheeks and left them snow kissed and slightly numb. It was a perfect day to enjoy a winter wonderland. She felt like a little kid again kicking the new drifts of powdery snow in front of her feet as she ambled towards her dorm. Then suddenly a thought dawned on her. Lorelai was too far away to come out and play in the snow with her but she knew someone who wasn't. She made an abrupt turn and grinned as she picked up her pace. Now all she had to do was talk Logan into coming out to play.
Alone in his dorm room sans his usual peanut gallery of friends who had departed earlier in the day for sundry vacation destinations scattered about the globe. Logan plucked a brown shirt back out of the bag lying open on his bed and tossed it in a drawer before selecting an alternate of nearly the exact shade and cut and throwing it at the growing pile next to the bag. He let out a disgusted sigh as he surveyed the lack of progress.
He was supposed to be packing. To the idle observer it might even appear that he was doing just that but in reality he'd been staring blankly at the bag on his bed for thirty minutes and this was the fourth time he had unpacked and repacked the brown shirt for no apparent reason.
He was sulking and he knew it but that did precious little to redirect the mood that that had veered in the direction of a brood after he was awakened less than pleasantly by the insistent ringing of a phone at the ungodly hour of ten. The mood had gone down a steep incline from there when he found the voice on the other end of the phone belonged to his father. As if he wouldn't be tortured soon enough with his overbearing patriarch's agenda for the holidays it seemed that dear old dad had decided to start in with the festivities early this year, probably making up for lost time as Logan had cleverly managed to beg off on the last few social gatherings since Thanksgiving with a myriad of paltry excuses about the demands of his academic calendar.
He'd know it was only a matter of time before his father would tighten the reigns and Herr Huntzberger hadn't disappointed. If there was one time of year that his father loved to put on a good show for his underlings it was the holidays and this year was clearly no exception. Logan grimaced as he remembered the not so gentle reminder from this morning, he was expected for the annual holiday gathering at the office of the Hartford Tribune this evening promptly at nine pm and there would be hell to pay if he was late. Logan planned not to get there a second before ten just to see the look on his father's face when he came strolling in so fashionably tardy. Just another part of the endless game they played.
The reminder had been nothing new and although cause for irritation was no reason for the current stew. No, rather it was the pointed remark from his father about the promised presence of certain eligible female companions of the appropriate age and his own inability to shake loose the cat that had managed somehow to sink it's claws into his tongue and allowed no mention to Rory to slip pass his teeth that had him scowling. It only served to remind him of the current unfinished business weighing on his conscience.
It wasn't unusual for him to feel less than enthusiastic about heading home for a vacation. The Huntzberger version of the holidays held little resemblance to the Burl and Ives version of a winter wonderland filled with holiday spirit. There was no Santa Claus or merry elves where he came from, no doubt had Santa ever ventured near the Huntzberger estate he would have been arrested on trespassing charges and hauled straight away to be jailed with the rest of the silly sentimental creatures that people outside his cold world chose to believe in.
Normally this didn't bother him, in his mind the less merriment that was expected of him when in the company of his father and his father's cronies with their glasses of scotch and their simpering eligible daughters, the better.
He dropped the sweater he was holding and slumped into the chair opposite his bed, letting his head fall and rubbing absently at the back of his neck trying to loosen the tension that had crept into his shoulders like a stealthy unwelcome guest at his father's first hint of matchmaking. Their history of disagreement about worthy consorts went back into the far deep past and had its roots around the time he'd first learned to speak and their first argument had ensued. Things had been in a lull of late and the conversations he had with his parents at the holidays recently amounted to the small talk one might have with a distant acquaintance over highballs of scotch at a cocktail party, nothing more, nothing less.
He'd know the armistice was temporary. What he hadn't expected was that he would be the one to drop the bombshell that would split that tidy peace wide open.
This bombshell was a big one. A girlfriend. A girlfriend that he cared a great deal about, a fact that would all but insure that his family would judge her less than suitable if only because they hadn't personally picked her out and had their chance to brain wash her before throwing her into the shark tank.
Normally this would have secretly thrilled him and he would relish the fact that he had in his grasp something that would ruffle the smooth surface of his father's facade but normal was seeming along way off just now and he was feeling uncharacteristically reticent about dropping this stone through the deceptively calm surface of the pond and watching the ripples carry off into the distance.
Therein lay the dilemma at the root of his current bad humor. A bugaboo neatly summed up in one word.
Rory.
He was unmoved by what his family thought of him but he had a sinking feeling that Rory wouldn't be so cavalier about their opinions of her no matter how unfounded they might be. He'd seen with his own eyes that despite her sassy, fast talking exterior she was tender underneath and he had no doubt that a seasoned battle veteran like his father would manage to expose her soft underbelly in bare seconds and rip her to shreds with a few well placed words.
Logan had ridden out worse storms and was none the worse for the wear but this time the course he chose to sail was going to affect someone other than himself and he wasn't sure if Rory was ready for the kind of rippling his family employed to rearrange the world to their liking.
Truth be told he wasn't sure he was ready for the perennial critics who called themselves his parents to start casting aspersions on something that was still so new to him or tarnish it's shiny luster with a wash of doubts and half spoken threats. He wanted to keep her to himself, for himself and out of harms way. He wasn't ready for open season on their relationship, not until he could be sure that his father didn't hold the power to drive them apart.
His father would say it was the wrong strategic move. He would say that any play made with the heart ruling supreme over the mind was like trying to fight a battle with hot steel before it was plunged into the ice bath that gave it strength. Mitchum Huntzberger thought of love... or really any human emotion other than ambition, as a weakness; a fatal flaw to be ruthlessly wiped from your soul lest it stand in the way of loftier pursuits, like building an empire.
As a child he'd watched from a distance and he'd thought that love must be one of those deceptively simple phenomenon in the pantheon of human emotions. That once you figured out that your only job was that of a woman in a waltz, to accept your role as dance partner and allow your heart to lead, then everything else...the swelling music, the shimmer of light off crystalline superfluities, the steps that carried your feet in endless twirls on polished oak would come as natural as breathing.
Of course he'd understood even then that those rules didn't apply to a Huntzberger. Huntzbergers didn't like to let anyone lead, even if it was just their own less emotionally crippled hidden half doing the leading. Love was something to be admitted only in hushed tones and dark hallways lest enemies and friends alike who might exploit the weakness as just the opening they had long sought to bring you to your knees overhear it.
That wisdom had been ground into his very soul for as long as he could remember by his father and his grandfather, once the uncrowned monarch of the LDB himself, who had no shortage of fanciful tales to be told with great pride of the sheer hard headed pugnacity that had helped the Huntzberger name prevail over weaker, softer fools.
He'd wondered secretly why anyone who called himself a friend would deny a person such a great pinnacle of human experience as was worshipped by poet and politician alike.
That was before he had understood how the Huntzberger universe worked. Before he had realized that friends and enemies stood across a very thin line and the distinction wasn't always a matter of reality. Then he one fateful day he had become aware of the role he was expected to play in this grand game of eternal one-upmanship and the battle field had become crystal clear. Like the immortal battle of the Jedis his worst enemy was his own kin.
There was one infallible truth that had stood the test of time in the Huntzberger manifesto, come shipwreck or front page story, honor roll or incarceration Logan never reached that pinnacle of his youth's highest hopes...his father's approval. He told himself that he'd given up trying a long time ago when he'd seen that this was his Everest and decided that he no longer cared to scale the highest peaks but the truth of the matter was there was a tiny part of him that never stopped holding it's breath at each new juncture, never stopped stinging at the inevitable reproof and never stopped trying to rebuild that burned bridge between them despite his pride. He feared in his heart that this tiny unnamed part of himself might never quite be vanquished or silenced.
This was the part of his psyche that was whispering, gibbering actually in the far dark reaches of his mind with the fearful mutterings of an enslaved man seeing the light of freedom but unable to take the step into that enlivening radiance that might be love.
Logan had thought a lot about love back then when he still hoped to see it revealed in his father's iced steel eyes. He'd thought about it some more when he was still digging the shrapnel from his heart after his first and only relationship exploded in his face to satisfy his father's politics of control.
He'd always thought of it as an elusive thing. A prize that was eternally just beyond his grasp. After those early scars he'd stopped thinking of it all together and insulated himself in a bulletproof microcosm where he convinced himself he was better off without it. Then Rory Gilmore had shown up with the silver bullet that tore right through his supposedly infallible barriers.
Lately he'd thought of nothing else.
Logan was lost in the depths with his elbows on his knees and his forehead in his hands feeling the first pounding drumbeats of a headache begin their march into his skull when the pounding took on a surreal authenticity and echoed through the room. It took him a moment to drag himself from his thoughts and realize that it actually was not a figment of his imagination but the rat a tat tat of a real fist on the outside of his door.
He glanced at the clock at his bedside but wrinkled his brow in confusion when he saw the time; it was early still although not as early as it should have been given his wasted hours of retrospection.
He was baffled further when he swung the door open and came face to face with a rosy cheeked, wickedly grinning likeness of the apparition that haunted his thoughts. Rory had a look on her face that could only be described as exultant and a shine to her eyes that made them dance and caper with barely contained joy. She had her hands clasped behind her back and was rocking back and forth on her toes in an antsy two-step. He was a bit concerned that she might hit the ceiling any second if she wasn't anchored by something strong.
She cocked her head to one side when he stood their frozen with his hand still on the door knob and took in the baffled look and the messy spikes on his head that were the usual aftermath of his frustrated habit of running his hands through his hair. She bounced up lightening fast and placed a little kiss on his lips before he could react.
"You're early." He said uncertain about why he was suddenly overtaken with the joint urge to smile and to scowl.
"You're grouchy but don't worry I'm immune." She said with a shrug remaining where she was and still smiling, seemingly unperturbed about this less than enthusiastic welcome.
"I was packing." He said tersely by way of explanation.
She stuck her head around the doorjamb and took in the massive pile on his bed. "Did you actually get anything into the bag or are you just planning to use some kind of space age transport machine to zap your whole bed on over to Huntzberger Manor?" She looked around again as if contemplating "Or maybe you have a magic genie in here somewhere who is just going to nod his head and whisk all your worldly possessions away. That would be a great use of a wish in my book. I hate packing."
He felt a little smile coming on despite his sour mood. "Me too. Unfortunately I think the magic carpet is out of service so I'll have to find away to narrow my wardrobe down a little."
"Sounds like a job for the pack master." She said confidently as she strode towards the bed.
He raised an eyebrow but couldn't help the little quirk of a smile "Ace, I never made you for the den mother type."
She rolled her eyes "Clearly you've never experienced the Gilmore method of packing. You see Gilmore's don't believe in packing light. Packing light is for the unimaginative. You have to picture every possible situation that you might have even the teensiest chance of encountering and then pack accordingly; this must always include a swimsuit, an umbrella, an extra toothbrush and at least three pairs of shoes. One never knows when one might break a heel or be caught in a freak snowstorm even if it's June in New Mexico. It never hurts to be prepared." She spoke animatedly as she grabbed shirts and started rolling, into the bag went three sweaters, five shirts, four pairs of jeans, three pairs of shoes and his bag of toiletries in five minutes flat. Then she cast a sideways glance at him "I really hope you're taking notes I'd hate to repeat all this."
He couldn't help but tease back "Is there going to be a test later?" Logan raised an eyebrow and his face took on a comical expression of skepticism. "If so I'm going to call for some amendments to the doctrine because I'm pretty sure I've never broken a heel to my knowledge. Well, except for that one time in Bermuda with Finn but that hardly counts as a normal circumstance."
She rolled her eyes dramatically and yanked out the pair of shoes sticking out the top "Fine. Two pairs of shoes then but I'm not taking responsibility for any calamities that result from your lack of proper footwear and you have to promise never to tell me the story of whatever transpired in Bermuda."
"It's a deal." His lips quirked despite the black mood still threatening like a distant storm cloud. "I'll be sure to make it clear to all in attendance should such a Cinderella moment occur that you, the official packer, had nothing to do with the decision to come unprepared to the ball."
She shook her head in exasperation and the stopped her movements and put her hands on her hips as she surveyed the depleted pile on the bed and then poked it with one hand as if perplexed by the situation. "Okay what else?"
"What else?" he parroted still staring at the bag and the vanished mountain of clothes. "That's it."
She looked aghast at this possibility "What about music and snacks and..." her eyes widened as she registered the most offensive missing ingredient "books."
He shook his head at her comically shocked face "Believe it or not Ace some people actually like to just relax on their vacations."
She looked at him blankly "What does that have to do with not taking books?"
He sighed giving up on convincing her of this particular difference of opinion "First off all I hardly need provisions for an army, it's only a thirty minute drive and I hardly think I'll starve in the limo on the way there. I'm not a Gilmore girl after all " he ignore her playful pout at this remark "As for reading material, the Huntzberger Estate is like a bibliophile's Mecca, my father has a entire library at the house that would make the library of congress look like a corner bookshop so I will never be more than a couple hundred feet from literary greatness, I promise."
She looked relieved at this and he couldn't help taking a step closer and wrapping his arms around her waist for a quick kiss. She pulled away slightly flustered after a moment "What was that for?"
He kissed her on the cheek and then gave her a little chuck under the chin "You're cute when you're in Super Rory mode." He looked down at the well-packed bag "Besides I'm feeling a little inadequate after that demonstration of skill so I had to remind you why you keep me around."
She raised an eyebrow suggestively "Don't worry it's hard to forget why I keep you around, you are singularly talented in that particular arena."
His eyebrows went up, a brazen Rory was something out of the ordinary. Then he saw the tiny sparkle of laughter in her eyes and he got it. He gave a mournful sigh "I see. All I am to you is an Espresso Cart."
She patted him on the cheek and smiled brilliantly "Hey it's not just every Tom, Dick and Harry that gets to be a Gilmore girl's coffee man. It's a little like being made king."
He pondered this honor for a moment "Are we talking King of England here or say Pharaoh of Egypt?"
Rory looked insulted "Here we offer you a place of honor in our kingdom and you scoff at it? We don't just crown any old guy we meet you know...we have standards."
Logan rolled his eyes "Come to think of it I think I would prefer to be a Brit. All the pomp and circumstance with none of the responsibility. I'm thinking being the one to blame in a universe run by you and your mother wouldn't be the wisest position to be in."
She just rolled her eyes at him expressively.
He waved at the bag "Well, now that the packing is done I guess I'm all yours. What do you want to do tonight, being as it is our last night of freedom before the holiday festivities commence?"
She gave him an odd look but then began to fish around in her pocket with a concentrated look "Well, I had a few ideas, so I made a list."
He nodded solemnly "Of course you did."
She gave him a little glare "Hey, I will have you and my mother know, there is nothing wrong with planning things out ahead of time and being organized."
"Sure Melvin whatever you say."
She pulled the list out of her pocket and narrowed her eyes at him as she unfolded the scrap of paper. "Let's see, cross off Seduce Logan...after that last comment it would be like fraternizing with the enemy and that's clearly against the rules of engagement."
He wiggled his eyebrows at her and took a step forward "Come on now breaking the rules is half the fun."
She sniffed and held the list up between them with an officious look and began to read "Pack. Check. Study for final. Check. Take final. Check..."
"Very thorough." He raised an eyebrow and tried to look at the list over the top of her hands "You didn't put drink coffee on the list? That seems like a glaring omission."
She shook her head seriously "Gilmore short hand. The coffee part is implied. Never has to be noted, it would waste too much space in the date book."
He nodded knowingly as if this were perfectly logical "Makes sense." He craned his neck as if trying to look at the slip of paper to which she responded by clasping it to her chest haughtily "So is there anything about having dinner with your leading man?"
She consulted the list and looked thoughtful "Well there is something on here about Johnny Depp, could be dinner, as yet to be determined."
Logan raised a skeptical eyebrow but otherwise ignored the comment. "So, the usual?"
She cocked her head to one side again and considered, then shook her head slowly "Too early for dinner, caffeine level is topped off and still holding, I promised my mom I'd have dessert with her tonight when I get home... what does that leave?'
His lips curved in a salacious smirk and he reached out a hand and glided it down the back of her hair to her neck where he pulled gently to bring her lips to his. His voice was soft and warm against her mouth "You know Ace there is always another kind of dessert that we could partake in."
She felt her heart give a traitorous leap and looked up at him with limpid eyes that hinted at capitulation. Their lips met and their tongues dueled for a long moment where Logan felt the heady soar of his spirit from the depths in which he had been mired for the last hours. It was hard to be too down on the world when you were in presence of such insatiable effervescence.
Rory finally pulled back slightly and her lips quirked "Tempting as that offer is I have another idea."
He clasped his hands around her waist and cocked his head "A better idea than spending a lazy afternoon in bed with me? Now you've got my curiosity up. So what is this brainstorm of yours?"
Her smile went mischievous at the edges and she backed up slightly breaking his grip around her and then backed towards the still open door. "Too hard to explain, I'll just show you."
She vanished around the door jamb just as his forehead wrinkled in mystification. She was up to something that was for sure. Her voice carried from the other side of the door just as her head popped back into view. "I think this plan of mine has great merit. Not only is it entertaining but it is also the Gilmore cure for a bad mood."
He gave her a suspicious look "Is this something like the hair of the dog that bit you adage?"
She grinned as she came fully into view and his eyes were averted instantly from the wicked dance in her eyes to the two clumps of packed snow that sat in her now gloved hands. Before he could so much as blink or react one of them smacked him dead in the chest and the other managed to smash into the top of his shoulder and dribble icy remnants down his neck. He gaped in shock and Rory's eyes widened instantly with glee before she took off running.
He stared at the melting remnants of the first missile in pure astonishment for a split second and they his own lips curled into an evil smile as he took off after her shouting as he went. "You better run Gilmore because when I catch you there is going to be hell to pay. No one ambushes a Huntzberger and lives to tell the tale."
He had just burst through the still half open entrance when the second lobbed missile hit above his head with a loud thwack and a rain of icy crystals cascaded down from above showering his neck and head with their tiny pinpricks of artic chill. He saw a dart of movement across the courtyard and picked out his prey. He smiled wickedly now as he bent to scoop a small mountain of fresh snow, warming to the game. "This is war Gilmore."
Her voice carried from somewhere off to his left "War seems a bit uncivilized for a few little snowballs."
He shook his head sadly as he formed another ball of snow and stood slowly surveying the territory with a critical eye. His tone was conversational "You started it and not even in a sporting manner. Guerilla warfare, that's what that was, an ambuscade in my own bedroom, as truly dastardly deed. Now you'll have to pay the price."
He stood and lobbed a quick missile in her direction after one sailed from her direction but missed him by a good two feet "I think you need to work on your aim Ace. You're never going to win this battle if the only way you can hit me is if you are in point blank range. Why don't you just surrender now before this gets ugly."?
"Keep dreaming Huntzberger." came the gleeful answer carrying across the mounds of blinding white. "Gilmore's never lose a war."
He grinned, wide and evil, as another snowball splatted harmlessly into the stone archway behind him "Just don't say I didn't warn you. Didn't you ever hear the story about the big bad wolf and little red riding hood?"
There was a laugh and then a dart of movement from the corner of his eye. ""My mom's version ended with the wolf succumbing to little red riding hood's undeniable charm."
He let sail a monster snow ball and heard the tiny thud of impact and a little shriek as the chilled droplets hit his target. He smiled. "Guess your mom left out the part about the wolf coming back for dinner when it realized it had been tricked."
There was a flurry of snowballs thrown with much laughter and shrieking as Logan crept stealthily closer to where he had last seen the blue puffball disappear behind a stone column.
Then she came into view conveniently facing the other way, peering around a rather large shrub in search of his elusive form. He chuckled silently to himself before he nailed her dead in the back with a large snowball and then ducked behind a big stone column again.
Rory turned just in time to get nailed in the stomach with a snowball and gave a little playful growl "That's it Huntzberger, no more Miss Nice Rory, you're going to get it."
Logan taunted her from his hiding spot "Sure, right, I'm shaking in my boots, Come on Ace, I've seen you throw, my four year old cousin has a better chance of hitting me."
She was off and running scooping up snow as she went "Oh yeah, well, it doesn't take much aim if you are right next to the person now does it?"
He walked out from behind the stone wall with his arms held wide "Tell you what, I'll give you a free shot just so I don't feel so bad when I pummel you. How's that for sportsmanship."
She took the offer at face value and lobbed a big snow clump at him, which he neatly sidestepped. She glared and advanced on Logan trying to look menacing, but failing utterly and ending up more on the side of adorable. Like an angry chipmunk or a squirrel with a grudge. The truth was she was as bad a shot as he claimed but it galled her a little that he felt the need to bring it up.
They circled each other cautiously and he nailed her with another snowball, he managed to duck her next throw and she grabbed another handful of snow and inched closer to him. She swatted it his direction and this time she managed more by accident than design to smack him in the shoulder.
Logan nonchalantly brushed the snow off his shoulder and then gave her a playful smirk, "Come over here and do that again Ace, I dare you." The last words were said in a taunting lilt and she felt herself inching closer. She managed to barely avoid the next shot from him but wasn't so luck y with the large pile of snow he dumped on her head as he danced past.
She shivered as the ice-cold shards hit her warm skin at the back of her neck. "That was a cheap shot." She said with a pout.
He smiled a few feet away knees bent in the agile stance of a tennis player ready to dodge the next shot. "Cheap shot? That's rich coming from the original Brutus. I can't believe you bushwhacked me in my own room."
She shrugged nonchalantly "At least you're not in Grumpy Gus mode anymore. I count it a mission accomplished."
He narrowed his eyes and stealthily glanced at the snowy mounds behind her. He circled slightly to his left as he talked and she moved in sync away from him just as he had intended. "You might be right but I'm sure you won't be too surprised when I do this. All's fair in love and war."
He lowered his shoulder and ran at her catching her over his shoulder and toppling her.
She felt her mouth go round in an O of surprise as she fell. Her body in free fall for a brief second in time. Then she hit and the landing was a great deal softer than expected as she fell into a soft deep drift of newly fallen snow. Logan laid half on top of her laughing as she tried to catch her breath. He managed to gasp out between wheezes of laughter "God, you should have seen your face, that was hilarious. You look just like Wiley Coyote when he gets thrown off a cliff."
She pushed at him ineffectually unable to budge his heavier weight from on top of her as he shook with laughter. She tried for a sulky look but couldn't quite contain her rebellious lips that wanted to grin and laugh with him. Logan's warm cocoa eyes cavorted with glee as he finally slowed his laughter to a mere chuckle and leaned down to whisper in her ear his breath steamy against her iced flesh "So you think you've learned your lesson? Or do I have to teach you some more consequences of war with a Huntzberger?"
She widened her eyes in mock consternation and pulled her hands up from their warm cave between their bodies holding them out in a gesture of surrender, she tried for a solicitous tone "I say we call a truce."
He smirked as he nipped her lips with is teeth and made her shiver from a sensation that had nothing to do with the icy blanket of snow enfolding them. "I always knew you could come around to my superior wisdom. Now all I need is a formal apology and you will get your reprieve. After all my pride has been injured."
She rolled her eyes and held out her arms in an expansive gesture "I surrender. You win. You are the master of the snow and I am but your humble acolyte."
He nodded and smiled down at her as his lips descended. He whispered against her lips "Music to my ears dear apprentice and a kiss to seal the surrender."
Logan felt the shudder of something deep inside him as their lips met and the laughter died. There was a flooding pleasure that over took him as their tongues danced and their bodies melded together in their ice cocoon. He felt his heart race and his breath quicken as he drowned in her warmth. He started to let out a satisfied groan but it quickly turned to a squawk as a shower of ice hit the hot skin of his back.
Rory's triumphant crow of delight rang in his ears as he shot upright and danced a quick jig trying fruitlessly to dislodge the handfuls of snow that Rory had managed to shove down his sweater.
She pushed herself quickly to a standing position and then bent over in laughter at his colorful curses and monkey like cavorting "Oh ...my ...god" she managed between gasps of laughter "talk about funny. What is that some new sort of dance or something?'
Logan narrowed his eyes at her. "You are into living dangerously today aren't you Gilmore."
She gave a little shrug as it if to say 'what can you do' "I told you that Gilmore girls never lose. I never claimed we played fair."
He eyed her for a moment considering the wisdom of continuing this little contest; her hair was disheveled and was still covered in tiny crystals of snow that glittered like diamonds. Her cheeks were rosy with the cold and those deep blue eyes looked soft and warm as a Caribbean sea lapping softly at the shore as they danced merrily with her joy at her triumph. He found suddenly that he felt ten pounds lighter than he had only an hour before. He felt happy and carefree and he had her to thank. Maybe winning wasn't all that important this time. Of course she didn't need to know that.
He smiled benevolently as he shook the last remnants of snow from his shoulders. "Tell you what Ace. Lets call it a draw. Lucky for you I have a soft spot for pretty girls with rosy cheeks so this time I'll let you off easy. "
She rolled her eyes at his exaggerated tone of condescending good will, as if he were doing her a favor but secretly she was relieved that the unhappy shadow had lifted from his eyes and the slight worried crease in his forehead had relaxed back into his usually smirking countenance. She stepped forward assured now of a peaceful reunion and laid a hand on his cheek smiling up at him. She said what came to her tongue naturally as she watched his eyes crinkle at the corners with humor. "Now there's the Logan Huntzberger I love. "
She jerked with recognition the second the words had left her lips. Had she just said she loved him? Out loud? For something that had seemed so natural on the tongue that simple little sentence had a pretty strong punch once it hit the air between them. Upon reflection much much later after the shock had worn off and her heart had started to beat again she wasn't sure whether she could say who was more surprised by the declaration.
There was a beat of what seemed like echoing silence. She blinked sapphire eyes gone wide; he blinked back, for once at a loss for the words.
Logan felt like he had been slammed flat in the chest with a sledgehammer at those simple little words. Words had always been his forte, his art form. He'd learned early, at his father's knee the skill of a consummate wordsmith. The power that could be held and wielded with the right manner could string together syllables into more that the simple sum of their parts. In the face of anger, fear, danger, happiness and all manner of unanticipated circumstances words poured their healing balm into wounds or soothed the beast within or calmed the trepidations of those wiser than he. He stretched them, molded them, and used them as both weapon and olive branch. They were the one constant that he could always fall back on when things seemed uncertain. Words were the one thing that never failed him.
Except now...when a girl had said such important and clearly unpracticed syllables and he stood mum as if his muse had gone mute and left him floundering in unprecedented speechlessness. He'd contemplated the idea of the words many times yet hadn't anticipated the powerful wallop of their echo. He was quite certain that if a stranger happened upon them still gasping and blinking like beached carp and asked his name he would have been without an answer to that or any other pressing question.
They were frozen in this tableau for a split second that felt like an eternity and then his mouth was opening in reply and even he was unsure of what words would fall from that strangely uncooperative tongue but knowing that something had to be said to break the silence that had stretched just beyond the edge of acceptable.
Fortuitously Rory's cell phone chose that exact moment to give a loud attention getting chirp and the seeds of his incipient sentence were left unsown and he was perhaps saved from severe lapsus linguae. He took a belated calming breath as the sound seemed to echo in their frozen world and they were released simultaneously from the spell that had held them in suspended animation.
Rory stepped back from him and averted her eyes quickly as she dug in her pocket and came up with the small white phone. She opened it and self consciously pushed a straggling strand of wet hair behind her other ear as she greeted the caller.
There was a moment of silence where Logan could see she was listening to a rambling commentary and then she smiled wryly and spoke. "Don't worry Sookie. I'll be there."
She nodded again as if agreeing with the unseen speaker "No, don't worry I won't tell her. See you a the house."
She flipped the phone closed and was suddenly all business as she stuffed it back in her pocket and looked at him as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened. Her voice was calm and belied the slight flush that still stained her cheeks. "Change in plans, I'll have to take a rain check on dinner, I have an intervention to go to."
He quirked his eyebrow in confusion but she was already spinning on her hell and walking with a quick purposeful stride back towards his dorm. It took him a second to gather his thoughts and then he was tramping after her.
He caught her arm as she reached the top step and reached for the door. "Wait, Rory, I..."
She turned back towards him with a politely expectant face that he knew was all a facade. He felt like he was experiencing de ja vu because he'd seen this act before. She was upset and she was hiding it behind her cold mask of cordiality. He suddenly felt like they had taken a huge leap backwards to a time weeks before when she still used this exact look as a barrier to keep him at arms length. He cursed himself silently as he considered the options. Obviously she was determined to answer the summons of whoever had called and just as determined to leave him behind and he was going to need a bit of time to extricate himself from the hole he had dug himself. He made a split second decision. "I'm driving."
She looked shocked "What? Where?"
"Wherever you are going, I'm driving." He paused "Well actually Frank is driving."
Her eyebrows knitted in confusion "Who is Frank?" then she waved a hand impatiently "No, wait, it doesn't matter. You're not going with me to Stars Hollow, you have to go home. You said you had..." his finger on her lips stopped her rambling.
His eyes spoke volumes as he leaned forward as if imparting a great secret "Don't argue Ace, Gilmore girl or not this is a battle you can't win." He swung open the door and strode briskly towards his dorm room as she stared after him wondering what exactly they were going to talk about all the way to Stars Hollow to avoid the real subject that she had no intention of discussing while her heart was still getting over it's shock.
She imagined it was going to feel a little like riding in a car with a giant pink elephant. Oh goody. She sighed and followed Logan into the dorm feeling like was a giant Rory sized helium balloon that was sinking low with all its buoyancy lost.
The Gilmore love curse had struck again it seemed and now a good day had gone so very wrong with just a few innocent words. She only hoped her mom and Luke had better luck.
