A/N: Insert Strong Bad voice:
Like a Phoenix, from the ashes
...she rises again!
DIRTY!
Written in the Stars
By Gilmoregirl1979 (the reigning Quote Queen)
Rating: PG-13
Hi this is your friendly disclaimer: Once again, I don't own (DAMN IT!), No Harm No Sue. WE just use the Gilmore Girls dolls during our slumber parties…. It's fun (shirtless Luke: with coffee pouring action, and the "Fry it and Buy it" Luke's Diner Play Set sold separately!)
R/R: yes please I love reviews; I wanna marry them (as previously stated, I have strange passions.)
Summary/ The Q: What if LL hooked up when they first met? What if things had moved … a touch more quickly…?
Luvz: miss ya!
JEEPY: hey there thanks for the beta...
A/N: so what did you do with your extra hour? Oh I don't mean daylight savings time... i mean the hour that GG was a RERUN!
not that I'm complaining... it's pushes the EVIL EPPY back a week! GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
One more thing... I'm proud of this chapter... tell me what you think...
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Chapter 13:
One Down, One To Go
When Lorelai picked Rory up from Kim's Antiques, she hurried Rory out the door. "Thanks Mrs. Kim, what I pity… I already ate…" As soon as the Gilmore pair was at the end of the sidewalk, Lorelai asked, "Were those pancakes?"
"From sprouted wheat with tofu chunks," Rory winced.
"But they were like… grey … and runny."
"I think it's a new recipe, she's still working out the kinks."
"Poor Lane … well to make it up to you, I got you a real breakfast. Someone sure must think you're special," Lorelai handed her a take-out bag.
"It's my mommy!" Rory completed the bit. Upon examining the bag, Rory's eyes went wide. It was a Luke's bag. Rory swallowed her guilty conscience; she could honestly enjoy it for the first time, since she hadn't really eaten anything during her secret diner visits. However, Rory decided to play dumb and let her mother think she hadn't been obsessing over the mystery diner, "Luke's? Isn't that your friend who makes the coffee?" finally trying to get information out of her mother.
Here we go. Lorelai tried to keep her nerves in check. "Yes, he not only makes coffee he… makes real pancakes and bacon."
"Cool, I'm in." Rory eagerly opened the bag and pulled out a hash brown.
Lorelai could hear Luke nagging her in the back of her mind, and she knew she should do it now while her daughter enjoyed her special Luke's breakfast, get her to like his food first; the way to her heart is through her stomach… right? "Hey hon, sit down for a minute," Lorelai suggested as she looked for a free bench in the square.
"Why?" Rory asked with her mouth full of potato.
"I wanna talk to you."
"Okay, Can I eat while you talk…?" Rory begged, struggling to keep the fried goodness in her mouth.
"Of course…" They sat down and Lorelai took a deep breath. Just treat her like an adult… "Well, how would you feel if... I started… dating?"
Rory swallowed the potato goodness hard, "What?"
"You know, like they do in all those movies."
"You mean like go out with a boy? Dinner and a movie?"
"Well, yeah," That's the general idea…
"You mean like … kissing and stuff too?" Rory looked at Lorelai as if her mother had grown a second head.
"Well … yeah?" That's sort of part of the deal.
It didn't add up to Rory. "But… what about Dad?" Rory asked; the question was out of the blue for Lorelai, Rory usually only worried about Chris around holidays and birthdays. Like any young girl, she only wanted to spend as much time as she could with her father.
Oh boy! "Umm, what about him?"
"Well, aren't you two… you know…gonna get back together?"
"Rory," Oh boy! Lorelai sighed to herself.
"But you two have never really given it a chance."
"Rory," Lorelai sighed again, "Don't you think if your father wanted to be with me …to be with us, he'd be here? Or in the same time zone at least?"
"But he has to work!"
"Not on the other side of the country he doesn't!" Like any kid with estranged parents, Lorelai had sensed these feelings in her daughter before, whenever they would visit Chris. A parent trap vibe surrounded the visits, fortunately there was only one Rory, and as clever as she was, she wanted it to be her parents' idea to get back together. Lorelai kindly said, "I'm not looking for a replacement for your dad, okay? Chris will always be your dad. He is free to call and visit as much as he wants," not that he ever has, "you know that. He knows that. I'm just looking for someone for me, okay? After all, someday, when you're off dazzling them at Harvard, I'll need someone to keep me company, right?"
"What about Sookie? She can keep you company."
"Rory, I can't do what they do in the movies with Sookie." I don't swing that way. Rory made a horrible face as the idea of her mother dating sunk in further, and Lorelai knew her daughter hated the idea of Lorelai dating anyone that wasn't Chris. "Honey, I'm just asking you to think about it, okay? Just… please, for mommy's sake… think about it."
It suddenly all made sense, the change in coffee provider, the going to the diner every day, "Has he asked you out? This Luke guy?" Rory asked harshly.
She's too smart. Rory Holmes had figured it out again. All of a sudden, he went from being mommy's friend Luke who made great coffee, to the Luke guy who was a threat to her parents ever getting back together. "Well, yes. And since we are being … honest, he … and I have already had a few dates."
It was then that Rory jumped up from her seat "What? When?"
"Some of the nights I told you I had to work… I went to have dinner… with Luke."
It was the first time her mother had lied to Rory; that I know of, "And you didn't tell me?"
"I know… I know it was wrong not to tell you before, but I'm telling you now. I didn't say anything because I didn't even know if I would like him. I didn't know how you would react, or how he'd react when he … found out about you," Lorelai hoped that didn't sound as insensitive out loud as it did in her head.
"Does he … know about me?" Rory was concerned and curious as to why her presence would suddenly be an issue.
Lorelai smiled and took that, mistakenly, as an encouraging sign. "Yes, he does. And he wants to meet you."
Rory's face furrowed up again. "Well I don't want to meet him!" she shouted.
"Rory..."
"What about Dad?" Rory cried again.
"I told you, your father will always be special to me, but he's not willing or ready to take us on full time yet."
"Yet, yet, you said yet," the tween latched on to any small ounce of hope.
It was strange to see Rory have a tantrum; even as a young child, she'd always been such an angel. "Rory, please…"
"No!" With that, Rory ran off, throwing the bribe of a Luke's bag, to the ground, and chucking the hash brown as far away as she could. She was no doubt running to the lake, or back to Lane's, just somewhere she could be alone and think.
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It wasn't going to happen, she couldn't let it happen. Rory was going to call in the big guns. She ran home, the air burning in her lungs, her short legs taking her as fast as they could, and she hurried up the porch stairs, through the front door, and into her room. Rory hastily pulled off the useless school reminders from her bulletin board to find the faded number that was buried beneath. She dialed the long-distance number… without asking permission first.
Before Rory could even beg for her dad to pick up, or get impatient over the ringing, a monotone voice took over: "We're sorry, the number you have dialed has been disconnected. Please hang up and try again…"
Frustrated, Rory fell on her bed, burying herself in her blankets, and curled up in a fetal position. Rory didn't even know where Chris was now. He hadn't left word that he had moved… again. All she had now was another obsolete phone number, tears on her pillow, and a wish in her heart.
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"Lorelai?" Luke was surprised to see her back at the diner so soon.
"She didn't take it so well," Lorelai confessed as she put her purse on the counter, and took a seat on the far end, away from stray gossips.
That was quick… "Okay? So … where is she?"
Lorelai slumped on her stool, "I don't know; the book store, the library, back at home."
"Shouldn't we go look for her?"
Luke's concern touched Lorelai, "Wait until closer to lunch time… she's bound to get hungry sooner or later." Ha! Maybe I'll bring her too Luke's for dinner, Lorelai mocked herself.
"How can you be so calm?"
"I know Rory, she'll be a little upset at first but she'll pro/con it out and all will be well again."
Luke was worried he would never get the seal of approval from Rory, that she would never accept him. He saw the same concern on his girlfriend's face, "Lorelai?"
Lorelai replayed the scene in her head again. "She was actually upset, she was yelling at me like a two year-old. She's never yelled at me before, not even as a two year-old." Lorelai felt obligated to tell Luke exactly what he was up against. "She said … she wants me and her dad back together."
"Oh," and Luke hated to ask, "Do you want that?" he focused on the saltshaker as if it was the most fascinating thing in the world, anything form looking Lorelai in the face.
"Are you kidding?" Lorelai scoffed. "He's been out of the picture for so long, we don't even know each other anymore … when ever he wants a visit…we have to go to him … I can't even remember the last time he called, or sent Rory a gift for Christmas or a birthday." And just as suddenly changing the subject, "Hey, your birthdays are around the same time… There's some common ground, anyway."
"I guess it will just take some time…" and he shifted uncomfortably behind the counter.
"Hey, don't worry; wait until she tries one of your burgers. She'll love you."
Luke smiled at that, and then outside something got his attention. Lorelai turned to see. Oh, no!
Babette and Patty were standing outside the diner, pointing and whispering, obviously discussing Luke and Lorelai.
"Well that's that," Lorelai sighed, wondering if they had seen Rory's outburst, or if her questioning about Luke's absence had been enough to tip them off.
"What?"
He really is clueless. "They know…"
"They know?"
"They know…" and Lorelai gestured between the two of them.
"How could they know…?"
"Rory's little outburst outside? My little outburst while you were gone? Or, oh yeah, they could have just seen us together… you have to admit we give off a vibe."
"We do not give off a vibe…" Luke dismissed, because he hated that word.
"Yes we do…" a vibe of people having great sex.
Then her comment just registered in Luke's head. "You had an outburst, while I was gone?"
"Maybe … a wee one."
It was then that Taylor came bursting into the diner. "Excuse me Lorelai…"
"Please… not now Taylor…"
"Well, I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but your daughter blatantly littered in the square…"
I was there Taylor… you saw me!
Taylor continued, "… I mean we just finished cleaning from the flower show…."
"Send me a bill, Taylor…"
However, Taylor persisted. "You have to nip this behavior in the bud, Lorelai. You don't want Rory to start down a delinquent path?"
Lorelai shot Taylor a look; he was seriously giving her parental advice, unable to believe his nerve, for a man who had no children of his own. "You seriously think that because she threw a hash brown she's gonna what… grow up and steal a car?" she asked incredulously.
"…And she dropped a paper bag," Taylor pointed out. "Lorelai, this is the first sign, disregard for rules, standards sliding…well you might as well kiss Harvard goodbye," he practically pleaded.
Luke could tell Lorelai was in no mood for this; she only wanted to think of Rory, "How much Taylor?"
"What?"
"The fines… how much…?" Luke asked again.
"Well, the standard littering fine is 25 dollars…"
Luke pulled out his wallet. "Great, here's 50 for both offenses… now get out Taylor."
Taylor took the money, and walked off almost as if his suspicions had been confirmed. He was now outside and conversing with Patty and Babette.
Luke agreed, "Oh yeah… they know…"
"You didn't have to do that," Lorelai smiled.
"I wanted to… anything to get Taylor out of my diner…"
"I'll pay you back…"
"You don't have to," he assured.
"Well I want to…"
"How about you buy the next time we go out to dinner?" Luke countered, then both became silent, not sure if there will be a date anytime soon with Rory's reaction. To break the uncomfortable silence, Luke asked, "She didn't go for the breakfast, huh?"
"Once she found out who it was from… no…"
"Sorry."
"No, you meant well."
"You want coffee?"
"You have to ask?" As she watched him, Lorelai sighed. "That's what started it all, isn't it…?"
"What?"
"Your coffee." And they shared a small smile. "Make it to go, I'll wait for her at home."
"You want me to come too? Maybe if she met me…"
"Not yet… but soon. It's gonna have to be soon."
"Alright."
Lorelai hesitated getting up from her seat. "Luke?"
"Yeah"
"Are Patty and Babette still behind me?"
"Yeah."
"I thought so…" and Lorelai got up, rounded the counter, and kissed Luke square on the mouth for the entire diner and anyone pressed up against the window to see.
"Lorelai!" Luke exclaimed when he pulled away. "What are you doing?"
"Giving them something to talk about… I'll call you later," and she didn't even look at the gossips' gaping mouths as she left.
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"That was all God given talent..." why thank you Luke!
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R/R: PLEASE, I like to better myself. To quote The Princess Bride,
"...Remember this is for posterity, ... so be honest."
Please be specific with R/R; name one (or as many as you can think of or want to mention..…) At least one specific thing you liked
Please! It makes me feel good...inside (Dirty!)
Hence the Rant option below.
Insert Rant here V
A/N: if not completely satisfied with this chapter, please return unused portion for a full refund …