Author's Note: I am in no way associated with ASP, the WB, Dorothy Park Drank Here, etc. This is for entertainment purposes only. Please R/R. Enjoy.
A House is not a Home
Chapter 3
Playing House
"Have you completely lost your mind? Telling the whole damn town we are engaged! This is going to be bad," Luke screamed as he and Lorelai entered his apartment and he slammed the door behind them.
"Come on, Luke!" she shot back as she placed her purse down on the table. "This was the only way you were going to be able to keep Isabel with you. We'll play house for a little while. It'll be fun!"
"Fun? This is a disaster waiting to happen!" he said as he paced back and forth. "You just got out of a relationship with Trigger or whatever the hell his name was, I just got divorced and was out of town for a few weeks, and now people are supposed to buy that we're engaged? This is going to blow up in our faces, Lorelai! People in this town talk and gossip like crazy! It's only a matter of time before it gets out that this is a sham!"
"First of all, it was Digger. Secondly, you're not giving Stars Hollow enough credit," she said shaking her head. "They don't want you to lose Isabel as much as I don't. They would never do anything to jeopardize that. They will play along with our 'Leave it to Beaver' bit as long as we need them to."
"Aw, geez!" he cried out in frustration.
"You'll have to be June though," she teased. "There's no way in hell I am going to vacuum. We'll also have to get you a strand of pearls to make it really authentic."
"Does reality piss you off or something? Is that why you shun it?" he asked as he sat down at the table and sighed. "You really think this could work?"
"Yes, Luke," she said as she joined him at the table. "I really believe in the small part of my brain that occasionally embraces the horror that is reality that we can make this work. You've lost a lot the last few weeks, and I can tell already the kid has you wrapped around her finger. I couldn't take seeing you lose her, too."
"She hugged me," he said softly. "That's how she got me."
"What?" Lorelai asked.
"I went to the reading of Bobby's will with my sister and everyone," he said as he leaned back in his chair. "When I got back I was in shock. I was expecting to inherit a couple of baseball cards or an old fishing rod, so you can imagine my reaction when they told me I was guardian of a three year old kid."
"Did you break out in hives?" she joked.
"Anyway," he said as he shook his head at her and continued. "She was in her room coloring. She'd been quiet the whole week and kept to herself. She's pretty young so she didn't fully understand what she had lost, but she was hurting. She reminded me of me when my Mom died."
"That must have been hard," Lorelai said as she looked down at her hands. She was doing everything she could to avoid his gaze as he told this story in a very shaky voice.
"It was," he continued. "I told her that I knew it was hard and that she was upset and that it was okay to feel that way. I told her about my mom. She had stopped coloring and was just looking at me and listening. I was so nervous. I mean, here's this kid who had her whole world turned upside down and I'm the one who has to try and make things semi-normal for her again. I asked her if she knew she was supposed to come live with me and she nodded. Then I asked her if she was okay with that and she hesitated for a second and then got up from her seat. I thought she was going to run from the room crying or something, but she came over and she just wrapped her arms around me and said 'it's okay'. That's how she got me."
Lorelai felt herself fighting back tears as she watched him tell this story. He was smiling as his eyes wandered off in remembrance and he thought back to the event that had melted some of the ice he tried to pretend encased his heart. He may have had a reputation for being a curmudgeon diner owner, but his actions showed that his generosity and need to help those he cared about were second to none. He was the guy who helped his sister out of every mess she got herself into. He was the guy who took his nephew in and tried to get him on the right track. He was the guy who baked a cake and blew up balloons for a 16 year-old girl's birthday. Now he would be the guy who did whatever he could to put the broken pieces of an orphaned girl's shattered world back together.
"Rory's right," Lorelai said as she cleared her throat and rubbed her eyes before he had a chance to see the tears that had formed there. "You are an old softie."
"Maybe I am," he said as he swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat. "I can't let anyone else take her, Lorelai."
"I know," she nodded as she reached out and put her hand over his. "We're not going to let that happen, I promise. We're going to be so convincing as a fake couple that we will erase the bad name Liza and David gave to all fake couples."
"We do have the fighting thing down," he said with a smile.
"Definitely! Now we just have to convince people we have amazing make up sex," she grinned.
"Aw, geez!" he exclaimed as he pulled his hand away from her and got up from the table.
"Come on, Luke! It will be easy," she insisted. "You just think about how you'd feel if the Red Sox won the world series and I'll think about how I'd feel if the mall was having a 90 off everything in Sephora sale while the Starbucks right next to it was giving out free coffee. That should plaster satisfied smiles on our faces."
"Your mind is a scary place," he said with a chuckle.
"Hey, you're engaged to me," she replied. "Besides, I am going to enjoy seeing how many times a day I can elicit an 'Aw, geez!' from you with my inappropriate and crazy comments once you and Isabel move in. I'm gonna shoot for five today. I'll pace myself."
"This is a lot to take in," he sighed. "I was still married to Nicole on St. Patrick's Day, divorced from her before Easter, and now I have a kid and new fake fiancé before Mother's Day. It's surreal."
"It is, isn't it?" she grinned. "Your life has totally become a country music song. You're the next Johnny Cash! You'll be known as the 'man in plaid'!"
"Aw, geez!"
"Yes!" she exclaimed as she threw her fist in the air. "That's three so far today and it isn't even noon! Damn, I'm good!"
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"So how was your day?" Rory asked her mom as she plopped down on her bed and went through the notes she'd jotted down in her Economics class.
"Well," Lorelai started as she adjusted her cell phone under her chin and placed the bag of groceries she'd just purchased from Doose's in the back of her Jeep. "I spent most of the day consoling Michel when he lost WJBL's contest for front row tickets to the Destiny's Child concert, then Sookie made me a delicious new omelet she wants to serve at the Dragonfly. I have no idea how to pronounce half the stuff in it, but it was cheesy and delicious. Hmmm, what else? Oh yeah, Luke and Isabel moved in about two hours ago, Luke and I got engaged, and now I just bought some ice cream and cookies at Doose's. Nothing too exciting."
"What?" Rory exclaimed in shock. "You and Luke? Engaged? Living together with a kid? I only left Stars Hollow twenty-two hours ago! How did all of this happen? Should I expect you to announce that you're pregnant when I get home Friday?"
"You're hilarious," Lorelai responded as she sipped her coffee. "Luke's cousin didn't think he could raise the kid alone, so she sent in some lawyers to contest the will, and I being the fabulous friend that I am, stepped in and announced that Luke and I were engaged and raising Dizzabel together."
"Dizzabel?" Rory asked confused.
"Yeah, that's the nickname I gave her," Lorelai explained.
"Let me add being replaced by a newer model to the list of things I have missed out on in less than a day! I should sue for ageism! It's not fair, I can't pull off preschool cute anymore!" Rory exclaimed as she cleared up her notes and stuffed them into her backpack.
"Then you probably aren't going to want to hear that she's sleeping in your room," Lorelai said as she started up her Jeep. "Don't worry, Lane said you can stay with her when you get home this weekend. I'll fill you in on anymore life altering events on the way to Friday night dinner."
"Unless you move away by the time I get there! You still have a few days!" Rory joked.
"Anything is possible," Lorelai grinned. "Okay hon, I gotta go. My husband to be is making dinner for me and my new favorite daughter."
"I am so going to pull a Christina Crawford and write a tell-all book about your evilness," Rory threatened. "Then I'll sell the movie rights."
"Ah, I can see it now! Me screaming 'No decaf coffee!' as I pelt you with Sanka packets," Lorelai laughed. "Talk to you later, kid."
"Good night, mommy dearest."
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"Honey, I'm home!" Lorelai called out as she opened her front door.
"In the kitchen!" he replied.
"I got dessert!" Lorelai exclaimed as she entered the kitchen and saw Isabel folding napkins at the table as Luke poured a packet of pasta into a pot of boiling water on the stove.
"Ice cream?" Isabel asked excitedly as she looked up from her napkins and smiled brightly at Lorelai.
"Strawberry, just like you asked for, Dizzabel," she smiled back as she pulled out the container and put it in the freezer."
"Hey Isabel, why don't you go wash your hands for dinner?" Luke said as he stirred a pot of marinara sauce. "Dinner will be ready when you get back."
"Okay, Luke!" she nodded as she hopped down off of the chair and ran to the bathroom.
Luke waited until she was out of earshot to speak.
"Don't think just because I said she can have ice cream tonight that you're going to corrupt her with your gluttonous eating habits," Luke warned as he grabbed a towel and took the pot of pasta off of the stove to be strained.
"Fine, but when she asks 'pretty please?' with those blue puppy dog eyes and a pout, you're saying no to her," she retorted as she grabbed a wooden spoon from the counter and sampled the sauce. "Hey Luke?"
"Yes?" he replied as he walked back towards the stove with the pasta and ladled some of the sauce on top of it.
"If you keep cooking this good, I may have to start putting out," she teased.
"Aw, geez!"
"Four down, one to go."
To be continued...
