Disclaimer: If only I had the power…but I don't
Author's Note: Huge thanks to the amazing CineFille and the incredible Lula Bo for always figuring out what my stories are missing and telling me how to make them better.
She's not sure why this particular memory is nagging at her. Sure, it wasn't one of her prouder moments, but put up against adultery and felony charges, playing hooky hardly rates a notice at all. And yet, as she approaches the Connecticut state line on her way home from getting Lorelai settled at the consulting job in Vermont, this is the event that's on an endless loop in her mind.
She doesn't see the connection at first to what's happening now, but as the ache of remembered pain settles in, and as she recalls the disappointment in her mom's eye, she thinks that she's starting to understand some of what Lorelai might be feeling right now. For weeks after she'd missed her mother's graduation, there'd been a knot of guilt in her chest. She'd begged her mom to ground her, give her chores, punish her, anything to make up for her behavior, to make up for disappointing her mother. She'd wanted to do some kind of penance that would make it better, that would help loosen the knot.
But Lorelai's graduation had happened without Rory, without the one person she'd wanted there to support her, and there was no way that Rory could change that. Even if Lorelai had chosen a spectacularly awful punishment, nothing could have been worse than looking that disappointment in the eye and knowing that she'd caused it. That was the first time she'd realized that sometimes you just screw up so badly there's no way to fix it.
So Rory thinks that she might understand at least the essence, if not the severity, of how much Lorelai hates herself right now.
That understanding complicates everything, because it clashes with the part of her that keeps asking what is wrong with her mother that she'd let herself be derailed like this. She can't reconcile it with her resentment at the thoughtlessness of the act.
Because of all the conflicting and confusing emotions, everything from compassion to shock, she can't figure out what to do with the anger. It's there, and she can't turn it off. But she can't bring herself to dump all of that fury on her mother either, if only for the selfish reason that she's not prepared to damage what they've been repairing over the last six months.
And because she knows her mother needs her.
She decides then, that she wants to try to be Sports Night's Dana Whitaker for a bit. Not the neurotic Dana with the stupid dating plan, but the Dana that pulled her steroid-using brother aside and after telling him how stupid he'd been, she told him that she was going to try to be the one person in his life who wasn't pissed at him - the one person who was going to be there just for him.
She wants to try to do this for her mother; she thinks she needs to do this. She's just not sure how to let go of all the anger and frustration.
It's not until she passes a sign for Hartford that she's hit by the realization that she hasn't given any thought yet to her dad. She's spent so much time being shocked and disappointed by her mother's behavior, and so little time considering that she's not at all surprised by her father's.
The thought strikes her so matter-of-factly that she has to mull over her feelings on that for a moment. To chew on the fact that her expectations for her father have fallen to the point that even this is no surprise, and that she's almost forgotten to be disappointed in him as well. And so, when she pulls off the highway and heads off toward his new Hartford place, it's his failings as a father as much as his indiscretion that fuel her frustration and allow her to temporarily deflect her anger from Lorelai.
She's not sure who he thought might be behind the door, but based on the wide eyes, the stunned silence, and the tiniest hint of guilt in his expression, her dad was not expecting her to show up on his doorstep. "Rory! What's…?"
Rory glances around the house as Christopher ushers her inside. "Is Gigi here?" she asks, feeling the agitation in her voice.
"No." He gives her a confused look. "She's at preschool. I need to pick her up at three."
"Okay," Rory says, taking a breath and crossing her arms across her belly as she begins to pace.
"Rory. What's going on?"
"How could you?" It comes out anguished and furious and heartbroken all at once.
"How could I what?"
She glares at him. "You cannot be this dense. Oh my god, Dad. You and mom. How could you?"
He looks suddenly like an injured animal caught in a trap. "How do you…did she tell you?" Before she has a chance to respond, he goes on, "I can't believe she told you."
Rory just stares back at him, incredulous. "You can't believe she told me? God, Dad. I can't believe you." She looks down and away, shaking her head, then she rounds on him with renewed strength. "Just, how could you?"
"She came to me, Rory," he says, as if that explains everything.
"I know that, and don't think it's not killing me that she didn't call me, or come find me." Rory closes her eyes, wishing for the millionth time that her mom had chosen a different night for her meltdown. "But you slept with her."
His response is immediate, as if he's a child accused of having his hand in the cookie jar. "She kissed me."
"So that's it? She kisses you and you have no responsibility for your actions?" Rory snaps, staring him down for a moment before letting out a frustrated sigh. "You should have said no. You should have known better than to sleep with her when she came to you like that."
"Rory, what do you want from me?" he asks helplessly. "I thought that's what she wanted. I thought I could help."
The weak, defensive replies are irritating in their feebleness and she wants to make him hear his words, make him hear how absurd they sound. "You thought you were helping?" she cries, her voice rising sharply. "You thought sleeping with someone who may have just broken off an engagement was a good idea? Is that really what you thought she came here for?" The thoughts are coming faster than her brain can process them, but she's so angry that she lets herself voice them unfiltered, cutting off his responses before they can become words. "She needed you to be her friend. Just for once to be there without some stupid ulterior motive."
"That's not what I was doing," he retorts, anger starting to win out over explanation. "Damn it, Rory, you weren't there. She came to me."
There's something about the way that he emphasizes 'me' that adds an extra note of combativeness to the argument, and Rory finds herself stopping to try to figure out what it means as he continues. "I didn't push her into anything she didn't want."
Rory lifts her eyes and looks her father straight in the eye, her voice strained as she says, "But what she wanted was Luke."
Christopher shakes his head, his expression almost a sneer. "Luke wasn't making her happy. He had his chance, but he doesn't deserve her."
"And you do?" Rory asks, spitting the words out bitterly. "You thought you'd finally won her, didn't you? Like it was a fucking contest or something." She feels angry tears threatening to run down her cheeks. "Does it even matter to you what she wants? Do you even know how destroyed she is?"
"She was destroyed when she came here, because of him," he protests, and she can hear a touch of self-righteousness creeping into his voice. "I didn't do that to her. I'm not the one who let her walk away."
"But you did your best to make sure it was really over, right? Because if it wasn't already, having sex with her would most certainly end it." She can feel how angry she is; her whole body is humming with the heat of it.
When he responds, she can tell his arguments are wearing thin, and can hear the defensiveness returning to his voice. "If it's over, it's not because of me. He wasn't making her happy, Rory."
"And did you, Dad?" Rory shot back. "Did you make her happy? Is she happier now?"
He doesn't answer, but the way his shoulders fall and the defeat that comes across his face tell her that he's heard her and he can't come up with any way to further defend his actions.
She sighs again, her voice softer. "I just don't get it. Why haven't you ever been able to let go of her? For God sakes, Dad, it's been 21 years. When are you going to give up on being high school sweethearts?" She can see his expression hardening, and when he responds, his voice is firm.
"This isn't some teenage crush, Rory. Your Mom and I get each other. We always have. She and I have a connection."
It's so juvenile, his insistence about having some sort of 'special bond' with Lorelai, and what's even more ludicrous is how much he seems to believe it. She can't imagine how he can think that what he has somehow surpasses all the relationships Lorelai has with people who've been constant in her life.
The thing that sticks out the most to her though, over and above his ridiculous fantasies, is that in all of this talk about having a connection with Lorelai, he hasn't once mentioned his daughter at all.
And so, when she speaks next, her voice sounds vicious, even to her own ears, though it's covering her pain. "What, because you can relive your glory days by arguing about Offspring and Metallica?" She can see that he's shocked by her tone, and before he can summon a retort, she's throwing his protestations back at him. "You're right," she says, fighting back tears, "it's about you and Mom. That's what always mattered to you. It's always been about wanting her and getting her to want you back. That's all it's ever been about."
"What are you talking about?"
Rory just stares at him for a moment. "You don't even get it. What's so sad is that you don't even see it." She glances up at him and can't quite tell if the blank look on his face is real or pretended confusion, so she goes on, "Every time you visit, it's an excuse to see Mom, or talk to her."
"That's not true," he argues weakly.
She meets his eyes, and when she speaks again, she can hear the desperation in her voice. "Even when it's just me, you're just waiting for an excuse to be with Mom. Even when it's just us, it's never really about us."
"Come on Rory, that's not how it is. We've been hanging out." He gestures toward her. "I'm paying for your school. That has nothing to do with your mom."
"Yes, you are, but when you came into the money, did you come to see me? No, you went to Mom." Her voice breaks a bit. "I'm your daughter, Dad, not just your pretext for talking to her."
"Rory, you can't possibly think that's all you are to me," he pleads.
"Why wouldn't I think that? What reason have you given me to think otherwise?" She's crying freely now, tears streaming down her face and words getting caught in her sobs, because it's no longer about what he's done now, but what he's not done for the last twenty years.
"Do you know what I used to wish for?" she cries.
He simply shakes his head, apparently sobered by her tears.
"I used to wish so hard that she'd want you back, that she'd want to be with you, because that way I'd have you too-"
"Rory," he starts, but he seems to not know how to respond.
"I stopped hoping for that a long time ago, because no matter what I wanted, you can't make her happy." She lets out a frustrated huff through her tears. "I actually thought that we were starting to be just us, that we could get together and have it not be about anyone but you and I. And then," she chokes out the words, "look what happens. We let you back in and you screw it all up. Again." She throws up her hands. "But that's it. I'm done. I'm sick of being your conduit." She lifts her eyes to his and takes a few breaths to still her shaky voice before speaking again. "Goodbye, Dad."
She can hear him calling, "Rory, wait…" as she walks out and pulls the door closed behind her, but she doesn't let it prevent her from walking away.
Later, she's curled up on the couch catching up with Logan, warmed by his voice, by the simple frustrations he's sharing with her. It's comforting to know that he's calling because he misses her, and that all he's asking of her is that she listen.
But when he asks what she's been up to, she's evasive. It's too soon to talk to him about what's going on here. She can't tell him about fiancées sleeping with old ex-boyfriends, even if said fiancée thought the relationship was over. It hits too close to home and reminds her that deep down, she and Logan never really confronted that situation head on. The guilt and anger got brushed aside by fear and worry in the wake of Logan's accident. It's one of the reasons, she's realizing, that it's good for her to have this distance. As much as she misses him, she knows she needs to think about where they're going, and what they have to do to get there.
She hangs up, having not confided in him about anything, not even the fight with her father, from which she's still catching her breath. It makes her lonely, but for now she's holding onto that loneliness, keeping her anger all to herself.
There've been precious few things that she and her father have shared over the years, and she's rarely done anything but follow her mother's lead with respect to him. She's welcomed him back when he's popped into their lives and cut him out when Lorelai did. This time though, she owns the fight. The frustration and the sadness belong to her and she's going to hold onto them for a bit. So that she can savor this one little thing she shares with her dad.
To be continued…