Disclaimer: You know they're not mine.

Author's Note: As always, cinefille, bridges, and lulabo made me think more deeply about the story I want to tell, and with their fabulous feedback and a lot of tweaking, this chapter is much better for their help.

"Hey, do you think I'll need to bring both of my black skirts?" Lorelai asks from where she is sitting at the table in Logan's apartment.

Rory glances at her mom, who is alternately scribbling on a notepad and chewing on the end of her pen. She can hear the brittleness in her mother's voice, can hear how much she is forcing the enthusiasm, trying to pass herself off as fine. They're both pretending it's working. "Depends on how close the dry cleaner is."

Lorelai smiles weakly. "And I have no idea about that, so I guess they're both coming."

Rory watches, unsure exactly why they're playing this game – why they're trying so hard. When Luke and her mom had broken up last year, Lorelai let herself collapse, let herself wallow, and most of all, let herself lean on Rory. That she's not doing that now is like some sort of signal but Rory can't figure out what it means, except that there seems to be something her mom isn't telling her.

"Hey, Mom?"

"Yeah?" Lorelai already sounds wary and Rory wonders what it is in her own voice that gives her reason to be.

Rory takes a breath and asks softly, "Does Luke know that you're leaving?"

Lorelai's head snaps up, and she stares at Rory for a long moment. Then she gives a few small shakes of her head, watching her finger fidget with her pen as she whispers, "No."

"Are you going to tell him?" Lorelai shrugs and Rory continues, her questions gentle, but insistent. "Don't you think you should?"

Her mother's eyes are narrowed and defensive. "Why?"

"I don't know." Rory finds herself taken aback by her mom's resistance, unable to understand why that's not a reasonable question. "Because he'll wonder where you are. Because he'll worry."

"He doesn't need to worry about me anymore," Lorelai responds sharply.

The finality of her words startles Rory. There's such resignation in her mom's voice. "I just don't understand how you can give up so easily. One ultimatum and it's done? Over?"

"We're not going to fix this," Lorelai insists quietly.

"You can if you talk to him."

"I just…I can't, Rory."

"But why, Mom? Why you don't even want to try to work it out?"

"Rory." It's a protest, possibly meant to be forceful, but it's really just weary. The fatigue in her mother's posture and the beaten expression are just so uncharacteristic, Rory can't let this be the end of the conversation.

"No, Mom, I don't understand. You love him. I know that he's hurt you, but are you really going to write him off like that? Has he really been so thoughtless that you don't even want to marry him anymore?

Her mother closes her eyes and ducks her head, shaking it from side to side. "No, it's me. I'm the horrible one."

"How can you say that?" Rory asks, incredulous. "You've been so patient. More than you should have been. Luke should be apologizing to you."

Lorelai's head is still moving in slow, silent disagreement, and when she speaks her voice is so soft that Rory can't make out the mumbled words. Except for the last two: "…your dad."

Rory feels her entire body freeze, and she closes her eyes as she wonders if she's heard her mother right. "No," she says, shaking her head. "Please tell me you didn't. Please." She's trying not to notice that her mother isn't saying anything, that she's just staring at her clenched fists. "Please, Mom. Please tell me you didn't throw it all away." All she hears is a choking gasp, and a profound sense of dread settles over her. She asks, in a horrified whisper, "You slept with Dad?" Lorelai doesn't respond, but brings one hand up to cover her eyes, and it's confirmation enough.

The ferocity of her anger takes Rory by surprise, but before she has a chance to think, she's spitting words out at her mother. "What the hell were you thinking? How could you be so stupid?"

"I didn't mean for it-"

"What? It just happened?" Rory snaps, her words taking on a sarcastic bite. "You just went there because you needed a friend? Don't give me that. You know I would have dropped everything for you."

Lorelai gives her a plaintive look. "It was your last night with Logan."

"No, don't you dare lay this on me. You did this all on your own." Rory shakes her head in disgust. "God, Mom, I thought you'd grown up. I thought that you at least had moved beyond whatever it is that makes you and Dad repeatedly crawl into bed together. I mean, you had Luke. Why would you do that to him?"

Lorelai closes her eyes in shame, but then moves her head slowly back and forth. "I'm not sure I really had Luke."

It sounds a little too much like an excuse and Rory's not willing to let her mother explain this away. It's too big a screw-up to justify. "Because he wouldn't jump in a car with you and elope? You know Luke doesn't work like that. You know him." She stops for a moment and looks at her mom, taking in the defeated posture, and the way that she's buried her face in her tightly clenched fists. It's the giving up as much as the indiscretion that rankles. When she goes on her voice is quieter, but with a hard edge. "For years, Luke has done almost anything you wanted, even before you were together. And now, he's not right there all the time, instead of fighting for him, you just give up and go to Dad? As soon as he's not at your 24-hour beck and call, you just go find someone who will be?" It's harsh and she knows it, but she's having trouble getting a grip on her anger.

"It wasn't like that," Lorelai answers softly, from behind her hands.

"What was it like then? Because you're wearing Luke's engagement ring. You're engaged to Luke and you slept with Dad." As soon as the words are out of Rory's mouth she knows she's crossed a line, and she waits for her mother to throw the words in her face, the way that she'd done when Lorelai had confronted her after she'd had sex with Dean. She waits for the bitterness and anger that always accompanies their most emotional fights.

But Lorelai just looks up at her, two tears rolling slowly down her cheeks. "I know," she says quietly.

Rory just stares back at her mother, unsure what to make of this broken person in front of her. She wants to rage against the foolishness of Lorelai's actions, but it's hard to fight with someone who's not fighting back, and it's hard to berate someone who's agreeing with you. Most of all, Rory thinks, it's hard to point out all of her mother's faults and bad habits when she isn't acting like her mother at all.

It's that thought most of all that makes her anger falter, and makes her stunned, "Mom?" more a question than a reactionary outburst.

"Rory, don't. You don't have to play nice with me because you're my kid."

"Who am I to talk, though? What right do I have to judge you?"

"You're right. About all of it." Lorelai looks down at her list, but then, without warning, her jaw tightens as she crumples the paper and drops the pen.

"Mom, I'm sorry."

"No, you can't take it back. You were right." Rory steps from behind the kitchen counter and walks toward her mom, prepared to try to offer comfort or apologies. "Please, Rory, I just need to…" Lorelai looks around, but Logan's apartment, for all it's comfort, doesn't have rooms to hide out in, so her mother heads to the powder room and closes the door. It's a clear signal that the conversation is over, at least for now.

Rory can imagine her closing the door, leaning back against it and sliding down to the floor, can actually picture her mother sobbing on the bathroom floor. And, for the first time, since her mom arrived, Rory realizes that she doesn't recognize her. This isn't the Lorelai that she knows, not because of the huge mistake she's made, but because even when she's made mistakes before, her mom has always defended them or even pulled the 'adult' card.

They've fought before, fiercely, saying things they didn't mean, and things they did but were usually careful not to voice, but she can't remember ever seeing her mom like this, defeated, resigned, hating herself. It's sad, but more than that, it's frightening. Lorelai has always been the strong one, always the one Rory looked up to and admired, and she can't help but wonder if that strength was just a façade, masking an underlying fragility. Or if perhaps Rory's seriously underestimated how much these last few months have hurt her.

Rory regrets the severity of her words, remembering her mom's understanding in the aftermath of the 'boat incident.' She hadn't yelled, or berated. She'd just listened, and though she teased, she hadn't judged. And yet, when confronted with her mother's own mistake, she'd acted as judgmental and bitter as Lorelai had when she'd caught Rory with Dean.

Feeling the tips of her fingernails bite into her skin as she closes her fists, Rory walks over to the bathroom door, and holds her hand, poised to knock, trying to figure out what to say. After a few moments, she sighs and drops her hand. Taking a breath, she calls through the door, "Hey Mom?" She pauses, waiting for a response. When none is forthcoming, she settles down against the wall next to the bathroom door.

After another long pause, she starts again, hesitantly, but loud enough to be heard through the door. "It's okay if you don't want to talk to me. I wouldn't want to talk to me right now either. I just hope that you're not answering because you don't want to talk and not because you're asleep. Because that would be gross. Don't get me wrong, Logan has a very competent and thorough cleaning service, but, and I won't get into specifics, I know that people have thrown up in there. So, I just really hope you're not sleeping."

Rory pulls her legs into her chest, clasping her arms around her ankles, and rests her chin on one knee. "I want you to know that I understand that you're hurting. That might not have been obvious from the way that I yelled at you. I'm sorry about that." She takes a long breath, trying to make sense of all her conflicting emotions.

"I just don't understand why you let this happen, why you let things get to the point that you'd go off the deep end like this. I mean, Luke is different, and you are different with Luke. It's almost like you've never really done anything just for yourself, until he came along. You weren't with Luke because he was 'the right guy' or because he was 'the wrong guy' or because you thought I might like him. You just love him, and you don't care who knows it. I've never really seen you like that with a guy." Rory bites her lip and shakes her head in sadness when she thinks about what her mother may have thrown away.

"I was so glad that you were finally doing something just for you, that you let yourself be happy. I never had to wonder if you were happy either. I could see it. Everyone could see it. And, I know that I wasn't around when you proposed to Luke," she swallows back the memories, "and that's my fault, but I know you didn't need a pro/con list to figure out whether to marry him."

Rory stops to rub her palms over her sleepy eyes, in a futile attempt to give her mother a chance to respond. When Lorelai doesn't speak, she says, her voice apologetic, "I'm not sure why I'm going on about this. I guess I needed you to know that I can see this is killing you. I've seen how hurt you've been about Luke leaving you out of things with April, and I don't understand why you haven't told him that, but I have seen it. I'm sorry if the way that I yelled at you makes you think that I don't know how much you care about him." This time she gives her a longer silence, in the hopes that they can mend some fences tonight, that she can say she's sorry to her mother's face instead of through a door.

But there's not a sound at all from inside the bathroom, and Rory's beginning to wonder if her mom is, in fact, asleep. Finally, she pulls herself up to a crouch and says, "I'm going to go to bed now. If you were up to arguing, I'd try again to convince you to take the bed, but at this point I'm not sure I could convince you. So, I'm going to leave you some pillows and blankets and I assure you that I'll be asleep soon, so you don't have to worry about me waiting around to pounce on you when you come out of there." She stands up all the way and stares at the door for a bit before turning around and heading toward the second bathroom.

True to her word, and thanks to her late night with Logan the previous night, Rory is asleep very soon after her head hits her pillow, but during a middle-of-the-night bathroom trip, she is relieved to see a telltale Lorelai-shaped lump on the couch.

They pass the next morning mostly in silence, conversation limited to the mechanics of packing. Lorelai has abandoned specifics in her list-making, and is instead focusing more broadly. It's not a terribly long list. The time away will be no more than the time they were in Europe, and so they both know that Rory's car is not really needed for the trip, that Lorelai could fit everything she'll need in the Jeep. Lorelai has even suggested as much out loud. But she lets Rory insist otherwise, pointing out that Paul Anka needs space during the drive, and the lack of argument is one more signal that her mother is not herself.

In truth, as glad as Rory is that she'll be able to help her mother get settled into the consulting job in Vermont, she's relieved that they'll be driving separately. She needs more time to process this, to make sense of the 'whys' and the 'hows.' To be able to really get over the shock and anger so that she can be there for her mom.

She recognizes disappointment in the puzzle of emotions, disappointment about plans changing, about her mother not being able to make things work with Luke. It's something she's gotten used to – the idea of Luke in her mom's life, of him being a part of their life. And she can't help resenting the fact that even with him, even with someone she loved as much as Luke, her mother couldn't keep from falling back on her old self-destructive tendencies.

There's another element to the disappointment – the fact that her mother has let her down, that she isn't the energetic and fun person who, in spite of the difficulties of being a young single mother, has always made the best of things. Her mother is the person who deals with setbacks and moves on; she doesn't let them paralyze her. At least she never did before now. Rory knows it's not really fair, to put all that responsibility on her mother, making it so that by falling off her pedestal, she's actually taken away Rory's role model, but it still hurts all the same.

It's harder to pinpoint other emotions, to explain the intensity of her anger. What she knows is that it matters that it was her dad. That the fact that Lorelai made this colossal mistake with Christopher means something. And Rory doesn't want it to mean anything.

She's always been a little embarrassed by the part of her that dreamed of her parents being together. It had felt like a childish, selfish wish, especially in the face of overwhelming evidence that her father wasn't prepared to be with them in a responsible, permanent way. It had taken time, but she'd grown out of that wish, had exorcised that part of her psyche, and she hates the fact that her parents have reminded her of those silly hopes. That they've let this happen again, seemingly without giving a thought to how it would affect her.

These are the thoughts that bounce violently around inside her mind as she follows her mother's Jeep to Vermont, as they silently move Lorelai's belongings into her room, as they banter politely over their take-out dinner, and as they distract themselves with the DVDs Lorelai has chosen to keep her company.

The next morning, in spite of the way that Rory's words have made the air thick and stifling between them, they cling to each other in their goodbye hug, and Lorelai looks genuinely sad to see her daughter go. It's a complex stew of feelings Rory carries home with her as she pulls out of the parking lot of the inn, and the only thing that she's sure of is that she wants to go back to the time with she was the one making mistakes and her mom was always right.

To be continued…