Chapter 19
The week passed at a steady rhythm of hard work - Yale was hard, no doubt about it - giving Rory very little time to dwell in her thoughts either on the topic of the Life and Death Brigade beyond her story she'd finished by Monday afternoon, or calling Logan. Not that she didn't want to hear from him, but right now she was nearly pondering that delaying it was probably coming off as keeping her cool and not seeming too eager, which almost felt like a perfect protection mechanism.
It was however, as she'd arrived at her grandparent's driveway, fifteen minutes early, when she was contemplating about just getting the call over with. She was early because she'd made a little stop at the mall realizing she might be needing some fresh lingerie now that she was actually having something resembling a sex life, most of her bras and panties being the boring kind. She hadn't gotten anything too extravagant, just a small step forward her formerly practical tastes, so far still trying to manage without using the recently received credit card.
"You can do this," Rory mumbled to herself, and dialed Logan's number on her cell phone, still sitting in her Prius.
"This is Logan. Leave a message! And if this is Finn! Your voicemail is full again! We went to Marcus' for the evening, call if you don't have the address," his voicemail said.
In a way she was relieved, but then again a little intimidated by how popular Logan clearly was.
Then she heard the beep.
"Um, hi. This is Rory. Just wanted to hear what you were up to and I guess I kind of got your answer. Anyways… Give me a call when you get this and maybe we can hang out sometime over the weekend? Bye," she conveyed her message quickly and perhaps sounding a little more nervous that she would've like. But at least it was done. And she did generally hope she would see him soon - the thought of him making her a little giddy.
She was shaken out of her giddiness by the arrival of her mother, the Jeep making a worrisome growl. It wouldn't have been the first time the Jeep's service was overdue.
"Hey," she said, both of them stepping out of their cars.
"Hi, did you just get here or were you hiding?" Lorelai asked.
"No, I wasn't hiding. I was just making a call…," Rory replied.
"Oh… who did you call?" Lorelai inquired, teasingly.
"Logan…," Rory said, somewhat reluctantly, not bothering to hide her smile.
"Ah-ah… Are you seeing each-other tonight?" Lorelai inquired.
"Probably not tonight… just got his voice mail. But we'll see," Rory said, excitement showing through her tone, as they made their way to the back of the house towards the pool house, knowing they were supposed to have drinks with her grandfather first.
"What? No more deets?" Lorelai inquired, disappointedly.
"Well he and his family know grandma and grandpa…," Rory said in a whisper.
"Why are you whispering? I am sure they know they already know him?" Lorelai inquired a little short-sightedly.
"We don't exactly want them to know about us…," Rory whispered. She really wasn't sure what to end that sentence with. We're dating? Having sex?
"Ah… well… now you know how I feel most of the time when they are asking about my lovelife," Lorelai teased.
Rory didn't bother to argue - it wasn't the same. In fact she was more than certain that her grandparents would love the connection - even her grandfather had spoken about how many of the young men at the present LDB showed great promise, many becoming leaders of the world someday. Clearly he prefered to be oblivious to their naughtier and frivolous ways. It was more the pressure she feared - with her mother it was usually the judgment of the guy not being suitable that her mother feared.
As they approached the pool, the light smell of chlorine was soon replaced with the delicious aroma that of barbequed meat. A rare occasion for the Gilmore household.
"I smell meat. Is that meat?" Lorelai exclaimed as they approached the deck of the pool house.
Why, yes, miss, it is meat," Robert, Richard's valet, said with a broad smile.
"Oh, he called me 'miss'," Lorelai chimed, sounding flattered. "There's meat and a miss. I'm happy," Lorelai added, continuing on towards the table.
Meat was indeed a promising outlook, making Rory's mouth water.
"What's the occasion?" Rory asked.
"Well, I thought we might like some appetizers with our cocktails tonight," Richard announced, coming from the poolhouse, carrying a tray of drinks. Two martinis, clearly, and a club soda - as they were accustomed to. Being around the LDB had certainly normalized casual drinking to Rory somewhat, despite being underaged, and for the first time she did think that maybe it would've been nice to enjoy a cocktail. It was in no way something she couldn't do without, but it just symbolized how she was beginning to feel more like an adult and less like a child.
It was strange seeing her grandfather since last weekend, knowing the two of them shared a secret.
"Would we ever," Lorelai encouraged.
"The first batch is ready, Sir," Robert said.
"Wonderful! On the table, please," Richard requested.
"I love a good steak on a stick," Rory commented, approvingly.
"Me too," Richard replied.
"We should form a club," Rory commented, almost unknowingly hit very close to their secret. They did have a secret club.
"Steak on a stick club," Lorelai added, but it spoiled some of the sentiment for Rory. It felt like she was trying too hard.
"We could have t-shirts made up," Richard played along.
"Grandpa, I've never seen you wear a T-shirt," Rory pointed out.
"Well, I've just never found a proper occasion," Richard replied.
"To the proper occasion," Lorelai suggested a toast.
"Ah, I'll drink to that," Richard agreed, raising his glass.
It was at that moment that their little moment was interrupted by Emily, blaming them for having dinner with Richard. Rory hated seeing grandpa and grandma fighting, making the setting almost unbearably uncomfortable.
Having the extra course of skewers, several of them, really didn't feel like the brightest of ideas once they got to dinner at the main house, however, the first few courses having by no means been the light kind. Bacon wrapped-figs and goat cheese salad, and hearty serving of tarragon chicken Kiev with carrots and mushrooms following it.
"Something wrong?" Emily asked, about five minutes after the course had been brought to the table.
"No. Why?" Lorelai responded, worriedly, as if fearing she'd get caught for having had one too many skewers before.
"You're not eating," Emily pointed out.
"No, I'm eating," Lorelai replied.
"You've taken two bites," Emily argued.
"Two really big bites," Lorelai tried to defend herself.
"Rory's taken none," Emily added. Rory really wasn't used to eating the way her mother had trained her anymore - life has just gotten too busy for big meals.
"I did. You just missed it," Rory attempted to defend herself, shrugging her shoulders innocently.
"You're full," Emily pointed out the obvious.
"No," Lorelai said.
"He can't stick to a simple agreement. He makes deals all the time in business, but 'drinks there, dinner here' - somehow that's too difficult for him to manage," Emily exclaimed, gesticulating with her utensils, sounding upset.
"He was just…," Rory tried to defend her grandfather.
"He was trying to upstage me," Emily said, interrupting her. "He was trying to make his part of the evening the fun part. He's a child. A spoiled 4-year-old. I should take his dump truck away and send him to bed without supper, or as he calls it 'appetizers'," she added, offendedly.
"Mom, seriously, we are starving," Lorelai made a final attempt to save things and put a small piece of carrot into her mouth, demonstratively. "Hmm… look… mmm… wow," she added, while urging Rory also to eat some carrots.
"Umm.. carrots, delicious," Rory half-heartedly pretended to enjoy her meal, not really seeing there much point by this stage.
"Well, if you're both that hungry, you must want more. Olga, good timing! The girls are famished. Load them up," Emily said to the maid, who appeared with several more trays of food.
Suddenly Rory's phone rang and she nearly jumped out of her seat.
"I have to take this. I promise I'll be quick," Rory said, hoping it to be Logan. She didn't want to be the one calling him again. And also she just wanted a chance to do something other than eat.
"Hello? Hi," Rory said, going out into the foyer to speak.
"Hi, I hope I didn't catch you at a bad time," Logan said. It sure sounded like he was somewhere with lots of people and music around.
"No, now is fine," Rory said.
"So how have you been? Good, I hope," Logan said, not sounding like he was in a hurry.
"Yeah, pretty good," Rory said, unable to stop smiling. She wanted to hear what his take on her article was, though she knew right now wasn't an idea moment to ask about it, having promised to return to the table quickly.
"So how's your tomorrow night? You could come over... We could maybe watch a movie or something, you know...order some pizza," Logan suggested, catching Rory by surprise that he'd want to do something so simple. Thought she was catching on that the proximit of the bedroom probably had something to do with his suggestion as well - be she really didn't mind that, truth be told.
"That sounds great actually," Rory replied, a broad smile creeping onto her lips.
"Okay, just drop by whenever. M310 at Berkley," Logan replied.
"Okay, I'll do that. Bye," Rory replied.
"Bye, Ace," Logan said, and Rory could just hear his smirk in his tone.
As Rory returned to the dining room, she caught the tail of one of her mother's sentences, making it clear to her that her absence had not been appreciated by her grandmother.
"Sorry, grandma. Hey, that won't happen again," Rory apologized.
"That's all right," Emily said politely. "So, who were you talking to?" she asked, catching Rory by surprise.
"Um… Marty, you remember Marty right? From the Yale and Harvard game," Rory found herself fibbing.
"The boy you referred to as the 'naked guy'?" Emily asked, some mild contempt already evident in her tone.
"Um… yeah. We sometimes hang out," Rory replied, wanting to keep things as close to the truth as possible. They had done that a lot last year, but now it was pretty much radio silence, he barely talked to her. But the lie seemed innocent enough. Having all these secrets were not what she enjoyed.
She also didn't really want to look at her mother, fearing what she'd thought of it. Lorelai, you see, knew about that whole dynamic - Marty getting a crush on him, Rory telling him she wasn't interested and how horribly he'd taken it.
"Are you seeing this Marty?" Emily asked, putting Rory in a really difficult position. Just saying that she was friends with him probably wouldn't have sufficed for answering his phone call at the dinner table.
"Um, well… it's recent," Rory replied, shrugging lightly, hoping it wouldn't seem like a big deal.
Her mother's gaze was drilling holes in her already.
"Really? That must be exciting," Emily commented. "Isn't it, Lorelai?" she added, casting a rather annoyed look towards her.
"I know. I'm floored," Lorelai replied, not even having to fake it.
"He's been working crazy shifts lately, and I've had so much school work that we keep missing each other, so I told him to call me tonight," Rory explained. This, thankfully, could've actually been the truth as she did know he still worked seversal jobs.
"Well, thank you for telling me," Emily replied. "I'm just glad I got to hear it from you and didn't have to pick it up on the street somewhere," she added, again casting a nasty look towards Lorelai.
"'Cause you hang out on the street so often, mom. You and Merlose Larry Green," Lorelai chimed, rolling her eyes.
"So, what does Marty do for work?" Emily asked.
"Um…," Rory began, already knowing her grandmother was not going to like her answer. "He bartends mostly, some landscaping and sometimes catering," she listed, now for the first time wondering whether Marty actually knew about the LDB but had signed the NDA Logan had mentioned.
"That's nice," Emily commented, it being very clear to everyone at the table that she had plenty of opinions she was keeping to herself.
Thankfully, Emily didn't really say much more about it, just urged the daughter and granddaughter to eat up, saying there was a fish course coming.
"Grandma's mean…," Rory groaned as they made it out of the door, leaning against the iron gates. She meant it in more ways than one.
"If it flew, swam or crawled on this Earth, we just ate it," Lorelai commented.
"I can't breathe," Rory complained.
The next moment Lorelai pinched her arm, and not gently.
"Ow! What was that for?!" Rory exclaimed.
"What was all that about you seeing Marty? Don't you think you've used him enough?" Lorelai accused her, her choice or words coming especially hard on Rory in that moment.
"I panicked. I'll just tell her next week how it didn't work out or something… I just knew I couldn't explain the phone call otherwise," Rory explained, quietly and angrily. Her arm still hurt. She didn't bother repeating why she hadn't mentioned Logan.
"Alright, fine," Lorelai replied reluctantly.
"And I am not using him. He's just going on with his life... This doesn't involve him. I never meant to lead him on in the first place, we talked about this. I'm sorry if you didn't think I told him I didn't like him soon enough but I did it, didn't I? What more do you want?" Rory huffed in whispers, having hoped last spring's drama to be over by now.
"Hm-hm, fine..." Lorelai agreed, "It's just not like you to lie like this. But clearly, being this full seems to be influencing my sanity... I'm sorry...," Lorelai replied. "Uh... Now I'm actually hungry," she added.
AN: Keep those reviews coming and thanks for reading!