Chapter 12
September 25th, 2021
"Mommy!" came a loud squeal and Rory was almost knocked down by the little girl, currently dressed in a fairy princess costume.
"Hey, Em," Rory greeted her, giving her a kiss and hug. "I see you've been playing dress-up, what a pretty dress!" she commented, almost biting her tongue. "Did you have fun? What did you do?" she asked, wanting to focus on the more important things than that. Rory was trying to watch her comments with Em, not wanting her to grow up believing she was just valued by how pretty she looked, rather emphasizing her brain, skills and what she did. It was something she'd picked up from the Mighty girl Facebook page. And the feminist within her truly believed that a little girl should grow up not craving for approval, especially that of men. Rory was pretty sure that while Lorelai's household had been very feminist, the latter had always not come as naturally to her as she would've liked, looking back.
"We watched Peter Pan! And then we called daddy and he said he...he's going get me the book," Em continued to speak excitedly.
"You did? That's great!" Rory replied.
"And then this little one decided she wanted to go as a Tinker Bell for Halloween," Lorelai said, appearing on the doorway, her measuring tape still hanging around her neck, indicating she'd been in the process of sewing the dress in question. "The wings need a bit of work," Loreli added.
"Well I do think it's a great choice," Rory replied, rising and stroking Em's back. Em hopped off to the other room to play with her toys for a bit more.
"It's a little early for Halloween, isn't it? She'll probably change her mind ten times by then," Rory said to Lorelai as she followed her to the kitchen. Rory's room was now set up as Em's room, when she or April stayed over, and also as Lorelai's sewing room.
"It's never too early for Halloween, I've started planning months ago," Lorelai rolled her eyes as if it was self explanatory.
Rory should've probably known that, but living on her own had distanced her from her mother's quirks and sometimes she would slip and suggest something borderline abnormal in comparison to what this household considered normal.
"So how was Yale?" Lorelai asked, as she was turning on the coffee machine.
"Good, Lexi got third place," Rory began. "Made me a little nostalgic to be honest, you know… Met someone I knew from back then too. It was good to catch up," she added, not elaborating much.
"Who?" she asked, curiously.
"You don't know him, a friend of a friend, rather an acquaintance really. We didn't hang out much, just a couple of times," Rory added briefly. "He joined us for dinner, talked a little about what Yale was like these days," she added.
"Is he hot?" Lorelai didn't mess around.
"Mom!" Rory objected. She was beginning to get a little tired at her attempts to find her a man. She knew she probably should be lucky that suggesting was all that she was doing though.
"What? It's an honest question. He clearly showed enough interest to stick around and talk, not just a casual 'hey, how are you, bye'," Lorelai shrugged, not understanding why she wasn't even humouring the thought.
"He's fine.. I don't know… I don't really think of him that way," Rory commented reluctantly, knowing what she was about to tell her next was probably going to shut her up about Seth.
Rory had already given Lorelai a short and simplified version about what had happened with Finn - naturally not going into so much detail that she'd actually having kissed him - that was embarrasing enough. She'd just told her that they'd talked and he'd assured that there was nothing there. She had also neglected to tell her what she'd learned from Finn about Logan.
"Did you know that Mitchum Huntzberger died? Yesterday, apparently," Rory said, fidgeting with her phone on the kitchen table. She hadn't really had time to even consider googling it nor had she followed the news these past few days, as she had been busy and the one driving the girls back and forth to, everybody being anxious to get back to their homes.
That was certainly a last name neither had said out loud for a while.
"I didn't...," Lorelai replied, shaking her head.
"Harris Fellows mentioned it in his speech today," Rory explained.
"He was pretty old..," Lorelai noted with a light shrug, glancing back towards the living room to check on Em, but she had already helped herself to rewatch her favourite part of Peter Pan.
"He wasn't that old," Rory commented. The last time she'd seen him - 2016. Just five years ago he'd seemed fit, energetic as usual, the lunch with Logan in London popping into her mind. She'd been so sure Mitchum had known she was having an affair with Logan, she was able to tell just by the way he'd spoken, looked at her, making sure to pop in Logan's engagement into the small-talk. It was the first time she'd truly felt ashamed about that - his words had had that affect on her.
"Here it is," Lorelai began, having already quickly googled the fact while Rory had been staring at a blank spot in front of her. "Car crash, he wasn't wearing a seatbelt in the limo…, what a stubborn way to go," Lorelai noted.
"Sure sounds like him," Rory agreed.
Lorelai was almost about to say 'good riddance' or something equivalent, but it was then Em joined them in the kitchen and insisted on climbing onto Rory's lap, taking a cookie out of the cookie jar left of the table.
Rory felt relief in a way - the man who had been one of the few who had truly derailed her for a period in her life, was out of the picture. But she was also relieved that Lorelai didn't have a chance to ask her what she was thinking. She knew Lorelai would caution her not to go there in her mind.
September 30th, 2021
The week passed quickly. Rory had a lot of work to get done. And Em had a bake sale in her school and Rory had had to organize 30 cupcakes from the Dragonfly last minute, which had taken her an added return trip to Stars Hollow which she could've done without, while having huge piles of book reports to read through which left her working well past midnight on at least three nights that week.
The word about Mitchum Huntzberger's death also gotten around Chilton. It really was no wonder since at least half of the parents involved with the school were also either part of the same country club as the Huntzbergers or belonged to the D.A.R which was certainly the hub of gossip in this particular high society. They were also friends, aquaintances or related through business ventures. He was a big name.
She heard some of the older teachers talking about it in the lunchroom, while she'd been eating her leftover pasta. She'd been trying to not check the death announcements, knowing it was too close to actually typing in another first name into that search field. She was curious - that was for sure. But above all she was just apprehensive about getting tempted to go to the funeral just to get a glimpse of him. But she knew that'd be crazy of her. It would've been like opening the pandora's box - both with Logan, but also with the part of society she wanted nothing to do with. While she might have admired Mitchum Huntzberger's work, there was little about the person that would've explained her being there. The last thing she wanted was someone hinting that she was pining over Logan.
But it was as a third teacher, Mrs. Duncan arrived, also a member of the D.A.R, and said - "They moved Mitchum's reception to the Rose Room, so we'll be painting in the Elizabeth Park Conservancy on Saturday."
There was a united grumble from the two others. But the locations definitely rang a bell for Rory, making it clear to her that the funeral was at least in Hartford.
"I know, it's not ideal, but it was the best I could do on short notice," Mrs. Duncan added. "The reception starts at 2 PM, with no possibility for change due to international visitors flying in especially. Apparently the man's ego is too big to fit in the Gold Room," she added with a snort, while the two others laughed.
The man clearly didn't have many deep-hearted fans.
But this had certainly given Rory all the details she needed on the timeline, whether she wanted or not. The funeral service was likely going to be at noon. And where else would he be buried if not their family plot in Cedar Hill. Emily and Richard were also buried there, not too far from them actually. It was where all of their reserved plots were, not that one liked to think about it.
As much as Rory would've liked to stay oblivious, she no longer was. She had the time and the place. But it wasn't her place, was it? She shouldn't be tearing apart that old wound, even if just for the self-proclaimed reason of wanting to see if he was okay, should she? She shouldn't want to see him, should she?
Logan probably didn't even want to see her, they had said their goodbyes and that was that. Showing up out of the blue would've made her look like a stalker almost. Things hadn't changed all that much, if anything they were even more complicated than before, involving kids and wives. Rory didn't have a lot of detail on Logan disappearing - was it something he'd done by himself or with Odette. Maybe there were kids on his side as well?
Thankfully, then rang the bell, jolting Rory out of her thoughts. A teacher couldn't be late for her next class, could she? At least that she knew the answer to.
October 2nd, 2021
Rory had a day to herself, Jess having taken Em already since last night, Rory having dropped her off with him when she'd been to Lorelai and Luke's for Friday night dinner. No point driving the kid back and forth and Rory knew Jess would be happy to take her.
Jess had sounded a little annoyed with Rory, perhaps even offended, since their last phone call, and Rory couldn't blame him. But at least this had stopped him from his flirty jokes and questions about her plans. At least for now, and that did feel like a relief. She didn't know what he was thinking, she didn't read him that well… she never had. But at least he was giving her some space.
Rory was doing some shopping. She actually liked shopping with Em usually, but she hadn't had the time this week. Em was the one usually lecturing her about getting some veggies and fruits as well, her school, Luke and Jess having' given her a craving that Lorelai and Rory lacked. But she took her tastes into account just the same. She was lifting a bag of apples into the basket, when her phone chimed, but she didn't recognize the ping, which was not her usual messenger announcement.
It was a message from Bumble. She'd occasionally browsed a few profiles but she hadn't gotten around to chatting with anyone, her mind having been occupied with more urgent things lately.
As she opened the message, she was for a moment taken aback, having not expected to see someone she knew writing to her.
"Hey, look who I found! I was just in the neighbourhood visiting my parents. And the first profile I see is yours. What a coincidence!" Seth wrote.
Rory continued a few more steps, pushing the half-full shopping cart in front of her. The fact that there was someone actually contacting her, and it was Seth of all people, was actually making her a little giddy. She was flattered, naturally, even if that was not really the way she'd originally thought of him.
"Hey," she typed back, having lost the train of thought about what she was about to get next. She could've thought that it was not the most admirable for him to be texting the first person that came up on Bumble, he could be chatting with any number of women just the same after all. But the fact that he was, certainly meant that he was at least kind of interested and available, and her presence on the app also made it clear that she too was looking.
"So is this app any good? How busy is your dating schedule?" Seth asked, really not holding back.
Rory began to type but then retracted, picking her words.
"I just set this up a few weeks ago, I sort of forgot I had it," she typed, adding an innocent smiley.
"It was great seeing you the other day. I'd love to go for coffee, if you're interested," Seth spelled it out for her.
Rory continued down the aisle, having lost track of where she was supposed to go in the store. Could she really date him? He wasn't bad looking, he was friendly and could hold up a decent conversation. He was well educated and he certainly knew how to have fun. The Life and Death Brigade was the college of fun. She should at least give the guy a chance, shouldn't she?
"Maybe," she replied honestly. "I'm in the middle of doing my shopping right now. Can I think about it?" she added. She hadn't really thought about it, and quite honestly she just wanted a minute to browse through his profile. She knew that perhaps not being able to give a direct 'yes' was a bit of a turnoff, but she just didn't feel comfortable making that decision right then and there - too many conflicting things going through her mind.
"I'm in Hartford until tomorrow evening if that 'maybe' begins to lean towards a 'yes'," Seth wrote.
"I'll keep that in mind," Rory replied, adding a smiley. She really should've added a slightly blushing smiley, as that was how she felt. Someone at least kind of liked her. Someone, other than Jess, liked her.
Rory pushed the cart towards the register, only realizing as she got there that she was yet to find several items for what she'd come into the store for. She went back, for the moment pushing the thought of Seth to the back of her mind. She couldn't just make this decision on a whim of feeling flattered, couldn't she?
She made her way back to the meat section, getting a few packs of bacon, from there onwards to the milk and then to the cereals. She craved something new, and she knew Jess had been suggesting she should mix some less-sugared options into Em's cereal every once in a while so she wouldn't only eat Cheerios and Froot Loops.
There she stood, browsing a whole wide selection she usually never looked at. She took her time actually reading the nutritional facts, taking one box after another off the shelf, while putting most of them right back. She was in no real hurry. The next box, however, stopped her in her path. It was a blue box, definitely something orientated for the boys - outer space themed. The box had a rocket on it. She knew a lot about rockets. She'd spent hours and hours looking for the meaning behind one particular rocket. That was not something one forgot that easily.
She tossed the package and another random one into the shopping cart and made her way hastily to the register, while glancing at the time. Seeing bouquets of flowers there, just by the register, she grabbed a large handful of white buttercups.
Twenty minutes later she was at Cedar Hill, but as she wasn't really dressed for it, she didn't even attempt to get close to the Huntzberger gathering 200 ft away, Emily's and Richard's graves providing the most natural excuse. She felt a little bad for using their grave for this purpose, but then again the two of them had always liked Logan. She wasn't thinking about getting him back or anything of the sort - she just needed to see he was alive, and okay. When else was she going to get that chance?
She stood in front of their grave for a while, as if having a silent conversation with the deceased, not quite darting to directly stare at the funeral party. They finished and she observed quietly as the guest began to leave, placing half of the bouquet on Emily's grave. She saw Shira from the corner of her eye, veiled and dressed to the nines as she had expected, surrounded by a group of women, consoling her. Rory would've liked to just assume it was all a charade - that the minute she was alone she'd just laugh her evil laugh and enjoy the wealth that Mitchum left her with, but Rory knew better - after 40 years of marriage anyone was allowed to grieve, even if it was just the loss of something one was used to but didn't really love.
She saw a number of people she knew from a few social events, from years ago, and hid her face by crouching down by her grandparents grave again, setting down the other half of the bouquet in front of Richard's grave.
As she rose again, she could see another blonde woman, Honor, with Josh and her two sons, now somewhere in their pre-teens, already looking almost as tall as their father, walk away.
But as the funeral party scattered into their vehicles - luxury sports cars, limos and a few vintage automobiles, Rory having remained unnoticed, she sighed. No Logan.
Where was he? What had happened that he would've missed this?
