Chapter Nine
"Hey, Taylor, what happens if there's more than one couple left at the end of the twenty four hours?"
"Well, Patty, then I guess we'll have a dance-off of some kind. Maybe in fifteen minute increments, maybe only fast songs. Maybe even another Runaround."
"Now that would be just cruel."
"Well, we've still got a forty five minutes to go. And Kirk's not holding up so well this year. It looks like Lorelai and Luke have a real good chance of winning this thing."
There were three couples left – Lorelai and Luke, Kirk and Miranda, and a couple originally from Woodbury who had move to Stars Hollow several weeks before and weren't very well known.
"I think we've got ourselves a trophy this year," Lorelai said happily. "We can share it – a couple of weeks at the diner, and a couple at the Dragonfly."
"I don't want that stupid thing in my diner."
"Oh, you have to have there for a while, just to piss off Kirk."
"I'll tell you what, why don't you just bring it whenever you come, and then you can take it with you when you leave."
"We'll work something out."
As it got down to the last half hour, everyone started to get excited again. Many of those that had dropped out earlier were back. All four members of the band were awake and playing. And Rory was sitting up and giving Lorelai encouragement every time they exchanged glances.
Then suddenly, the mood of the room changed.
"Well, well, well. Will you look at that?" Miss Patty said.
Luke and Lorelai looked across to the entrance of the gymnasium, and Rory's eyes followed theirs.
Standing in the doorway were Anna and April.
Luke immediately yelled out 'Yellow card!" and hurried over to them.
"What are you doing here?"
"We went to the diner looking for you, but it was closed. Then we saw the signs and the cars, so we came here." Anna explained.
"I meant here, in Stars Hollow."
"Well, I've got a bit of a situation. A very dear and very old friend of mine is going into the hospital for some tests. And I promised her I'd go with her. It's going to be a day-long thing, and April doesn't like hospitals very much, so rather than stay home all day by herself, she wanted to come stay with you. If that's all right."
"Uh, yeah, sure. We'll be finished here in a little while. How about I give you the key to the diner and you two can wait for me there."
"I can't stay, I'm just dropping April off."
"Oh. Well, April, how about if I give you the key and you can let yourself in and . . . ."
"What if I just wait here? I can go sit by that girl over there."
"Uh, I'll tell you what, I know you must be really tired, getting up so early. So, why don't I take you to the diner myself. I've got two beds upstairs and you can go back to sleep for a while."
"Well, okay, I am kind of sleepy."
"Hey, Luke," Anna said. "Who's the woman you were dancing with?
"Oh. That's Lorelai. She needed a partner and somehow I let her talk me into being hers."
"She's very pretty. Anything going on between you two?"
"Uh – well, we've gone out a few times, and she comes into the diner a lot."
"I've only seen her there one time," April said.
TBC