"You told Jess what!?" Luke asked Lorelai, after she'd casually mentioned she'd offered some friendly advice to Jess about his relationship. Sure Luke had known that Lorelai had invited the two to her Inn for a few days some time ago, but it had only now, almost in passing, come up why she had done it.
"Celeste told me that he was trying too hard, so I hinted to him that he might be doing that. I see two people not talking, heading for the cliffs, I took the role of the middle man...woman," Lorelai replied, sitting cross legged on the couch, having hoped to spend a quiet evening watching The Crown, while Leo was in his room reading a book for school.
"Are you really that bored?" he asked with a frown, hating the sound of this, as he stood his hands on his hips somewhat defensively.
"I'm not bored!" Lorelai argued. She really was - at least mentally.
"What if that ends up being the reason they split? Ever thought about that?" Luke huffed.
"Well if they don't talk, it's likely going to happen anyways - or have you forgotten when you didn't talk to me about things that mattered?"
"Lorelai, we've been through this!" he raised his voice, glancing momentarily towards Leo's room, not wanting him to really hear them arguing.
"I'm sorry," she replied, regretting what she'd said the moment she'd sait it. Luke not telling her about April was ancient history, but the results of it had been devastating.
He forgave without further thought - they'd both made mistakes, Lorelai was the kind of person that spoke too much, and he was the one that didn't speak enough.
"But still - it's their relationship - it's for up to them to fix whatever they have going on - not for us to meddle with," he added.
"I get that - but Celeste doesn't really have anyone else," Lorelai added, having recognized some of herself in her, after she'd left the Gilmore house home with Rory, if there hadn't been for Mia, she'd felt all alone as well. And while she might not have had many relationship issues back then, just everything else, she knew how important sometimes these small life-lines were. And it was obvious that Rory clearly wasn't around enough right now.
"So you talk to her, if you feel that's what you want to do - not go telling what she told you in confidence to the other partner," Luke argued, knowingly.
"Fine! You're right," she relented, having already regretted saying anything to Jess while she'd sat at their breakfast table those weeks ago.
"You tell Celeste what you did and I'll go call Jess," Luke said demandingly.
Jess was in Chicago, just getting out of a casual Mediterranean eatery, where he'd hastily eaten his dinner while watching people walk by - eating dinner alone like this really had been something of the past. But while it left him lots of time to ponder about his novel, and he'd already gotten another chapter done in the day that he'd already been there, his mind mostly kept going back home to Celeste. Sure, he'd texted and called the night before just before Evie's bedtime, but he could just sense her being distant - just going through the motions, pretending things were fine. And while he wasn't really worried about Evie's safety or anything like that, he did worry about the two of them. They'd had a series of tiny victories, but they seemed to be followed by losses of the same magnitude, overall not really improving.
He was surprised to see Luke's name on his phone, as he noticed it vibrating.
"Hi," Jess picked up, crumpling up his napkin as he'd just finished his meal.
"Hey, Jess. How are you?" Luke began, clearly feeling a little nervous.
"I'm pretty good. I'm actually in Chicago right now, just for a few days - work," he replied briefly.
"Oh," Luke reacted. "Listen, can you talk right now?" he asked, hesitantly.
"Sure," he replied as he walked out of the eatery, having already paid in advance, onto the busy, slightly dusty, street. He realized that within the crowd like that wasn't probably the ideal place to talk, but on his defence he didn't really know what Luke wanted to talk about.
"Lorelai told me about what she told you when you were at her inn and I just wanted to check in to see how you were doing," Luke began, adding, "she really shouldn't have stuck her nose in it at all."
Jess came to a halt in the middle of the street. He had the same feeling of course - it wasn't Lorelai's business, but she had been right about one thing - the less he seemed to be trying to less Celeste seemed to be bursting into tears - perhaps she was onto something after all - though not really bringing them closer to significant improvements.
"Uh-uh," he reacted, not really knowing what to say, and continued to walk slowly.
"She just figured you guys were not really talking and she thought she needed to be the messenger or something," Luke added.
"Luke, I appreciate what you're doing, but I really would rather not…," Jess said. Talking about these things with anyone wasn't his thing, but somehow it felt especially awkward with Luke. The best type of communication that had anything to do with relationships that they'd had was Luke throwing the bloody self-help book at him all those years ago.
"I figured," Luke exhaled in relief - this was weird for him too. "Just, Jess, try to remember that not talking really does not solve anything. Marriage can be hard work and whatever you do or don't do, is up to you. If you need to talk, call me, okay?" he offered.
"Okay," Jess replied, wanting the awkwardness to end and after the 'goodbyes' ended the call.
He walked down South State street for a while, then turning right towards Millenium park to head for the Radisson. He was almost there when he paused and texted Celeste, having almost thought that perhaps he wouldn't that evening, giving her her space.
"I'm almost at my hotel. If you want to talk tonight, just us, let me know - I can call," he texted.
He kept nervously looking at his phone as he took the elevator upstairs but there was no reply. He didn't think much of it as it was just around Evie's bathtime, so she might just be busy, and headed to his turquoise carpeted room kicking his shoes off on instinct, Celeste's habits having rubbed off on him. He opened his laptop and dived into his novel, wanting to use his time productively.
It was nearly 9.30 when Celeste finally texted back.
"Sorry, I'm so beat tonight. It took me ages to get her to bed. She misses you," the text said.
He read the message at least five times, each time everything that message lacked hurting him more. It was all about Evie, nothing about her - she didn't miss him, and she must've known that he wouldn't be able to argue with her arguments - Evie could sometimes be a handful and she'd been doing that all on her own right now.
He began to type "I love you" in return, but deleted it, not wanting to push it. But inside he really missed her. Instead he poured the hurt he felt into his writing - at least there he felt like he had some control.
Lorelai waited until the next morning to call, wanting to do it when Luke was at work and Leo in school. She didn't need to be at the Inn before noon, hence the morning providing her a good moment for it.
"Lorelai? What a surprise!" Celeste picked up cheerily. Her evening had passed reading in bed, enjoying the feel of her time being her own, or being able to forget her issues for those brief hours.
"Hi, sorry, is this a bad time?" she asked, hearing some cooking noises in the background.
"It's fine, I'll just set you on the speaker if that's okay," Celeste replied, having been in the midst of cooking some meals in advance for Evie, while the toddler played with her busy board.
"I wanted to call and apologize actually," she began, picking her words carefully.
"About what?" Celeste replied confusedly.
"I know it's not exactly recent, but sort of might have mentioned to Jess that he, maybe, shouldn't try so hard with you, when I saw you last. I realize now that it wasn't my place to say, it just sort of slipped out. I don't know what's came over me, and I'm sorry," she explained.
"Oh," Celeste replied, placing her wooden spoon down for a moment. This information did explain a few things about his behavior in the past weeks.
"You probably won't want to talk to me after this about your personal stuff, but if you feel you need to, you can. I promise I won't meddle again," she offered, apologetically.
"It's fine honestly," she replied, brushing it off. With the explanation to Jess' behavior she actually felt a little calmer, knowing it was just him trying in another way. "I mean, I'd rather you didn't talk to him about stuff like that, but right now I don't think there's any major harm done," she replied. Things were weird without it just the same. But frankly, she preferred him trying less - it hurt less - and while she felt guilty for thinking it - having been alone for the past two days, had in many ways felt good - she was self-sufficient, she felt free, there were no remainders of the connection that she didn't feel. And as much as she hated saying it out loud - and she hadn't - she was beginning to think that perhaps it was their relationship that was standing between her and her happiness. Maybe their time was just through? Maybe it was easier to just let it go?
"Oh, okay," Lorelai sighed, feeling a little relieved by her reaction.
"But thanks for calling," she replied.
"Okay, bye," Lorelai replied.
It was a couple of hours later. Evie had fallen asleep a little sooner than Celeste had hoped, after enjoying the playground at Prospect Park, usually aiming to get her to her own bed before she dozed off, but the kid wasn't exactly punctual. She'd already killed an hour by walking around the neighbourhood a few times then deciding to go to the store before she planned to attempt to carrying Evie to her own bed with a good chance of waking her mid-nap.
Celeste was just stepping out of the grocery store just a few blocks from her house having grabbed a box of her favourite cookies, to bring home for herself - preparing the enjoy the last night alone before Jess returned, pulling Evie after her in her stroller as the store's door was not exactly the stroller friendly kind.
"Oh, sorry," she said, as she stumbled into someone, stepping onto his shoe, her attention having been on getting the stroller out without bumping it too hard so Evie would wake, instead of fully paying attention.
"It's fine," he added as he noticed the stoller.
"Oh, it's you! Hi!" she said as finally glanced up at him, then quickly checking to see if Evie was still sleeping. The person in front of her certainly had been the last person she'd expected to see.
"Hi," Noah said, having not really been paying much attention either, having had his eyes on his phone.
"You okay? I'm sorry," she said again.
"Yeah, I'll be fine," Noah replied, not minding the dusty footprint on his Chukkas.
She knew from his background check that he actually didn't live very far from here, hence his presnce in this neighbourhood wasn't too surprising and she didn't need to ask or ponder why he was there. But it had certainly been the first time she'd ever seen him around.
A brief silence lingered, both seeming doubtful about what more to say or whether they should just part ways.
"I'm sorry to hear about your mom," Celeste said suddenly, only then recalling that perhaps she wasn't really supposed to know this.
"Thanks," he replied, running his hand over the back of her neck, awkwardly. He did look a little down, like he hadn't been sleeping much, but that was understandable.
She wasn't sure what else to add, somehow inquiring into how his mother was doing seemed too personal, and jumping right into discussing the book seemed too self-centered, small-talk having lost it's appeal to her.
He sensed the awkwardness but before he had a chance to say anything she managed to get a sentence out. "I'm also sorry about the way I reacted at our meeting, it wasn't anything you said as such. I just haven't been doing so great these days myself," she said, surprising herself by saying that out loud, suddenly feeling a little embarrassed. Why was she telling this person she hardly knew that she was having issues?
"It's fine, really - your book, you're free to react however you feel," he replied with a supportive, yet weak smile, having not expected her to admit something that personal either. "So have you given any thought to my idea?" he asked, dissolving the awkwardness a little.
"You really don't have to discuss this now, I'll e-mail you once you're back to work. I'm sure you've got enough on your plate right now," she suggested.
"Well actually, I really could use a change of discussion topics. I'm just dealing with the aftermath here - she died on Sunday," Noah added. It was Thursday now.
"I'm sorry," she replied.
"So really, if you can give me something else to think about I'll be grateful for it," Noah said, humbly.
"Okay, if you're sure," she replied. "But I guess I was going to write to you that I'd like to talk more about this - I'd like to try," she confessed.
"Really?" he asked, having not expected it, raising his eyebrows. Based on her reaction he'd been fairly sure she wasn't going to trust him with something like that. "Do you want to grab a cup of coffee and discuss it now - I'm not sure how your daughter would take that idea but I have a little time right now, if you want?" he said glancing into the stoller briefly, noting the sleeping child.
"She should be out for another hour or so," she replied, feeling a little shocked by this rapid development.
They walked a block or so, noticing a small cafe Celeste had been to a lot over the past summer, thanks to it's outside terrace that seemed to have opened just recently for their summer season, the terrace providing a convenient place to have the stroller while she sat there. They ordered their coffees real quick and Celeste settled the stoller so she could observe Evie and move her stoller a little if she stirred.
"So, what are you concerned about?" Noah jumped right into the discussion, desperate to forget everything else he had going on.
"Obviously if we're going to do this we still need to go through some juridical procedures," she began formally.
"We'll split the authorship - say 70-30?" he suggested, clearly dealing with these things professionally.
That was pretty much what she'd anticipated, and also Jess had suggested.
"That sounds fine, perhaps with the possibility to change once we get further along with this?" Celeste suggested.
"Fine," he replied. What else?" he inquired, not really needing to wait for a reply, and replied himself, "you want an NDA or something?" He couldn't help but to chuckle a little at this - he couldn't believe they were still discussing this. Maybe it was the grief or just being out of the office that made him not bother with hiding the way he really felt about it?
"I have a legal obligation to ask for it," she explained briefly.
"God, now I am genuinely curious what is it that you are so afraid of," he exclaimed, beginning to briefly wonder if this wasn't such a good idea, if every topic was going to be this formal.
"You know I can't tell you that," Celeste replied, picking her words carefully.
"Right," he replied, feeling a little disappointed.
"I'm sorry, but this is the way I have to do it," she replied.
"Why come to me at all if you don't trust me? What changed in between?" Noah asked, curiously.
She stared at the coffee cup in front of her, not quite daring to look him in the eyes.
"You ran a check-up on me or something?" Noah asked.
Her silence replied the question for him.
"This is so messed up, you realize that, right?" Noah exclaimed, seriously considering for a moment walking away from this. He was offended, and he didn't even want to think how many of Jess' decisions were based on the same information.
"It's not personal. But it's my life - this is what I need to do to protect it," Celeste explained. "And this is also one of the reasons I think co-authorship might be a good thing. I can't really ever be out in the public to promote if that's what we'd need to do," she added, explaying the other layer she'd began to see in this. While she didn't really need to do it for the money, any publisher, Truncheon included, still needed a book to pay for the workhours they'd put into it.
"But I already have an NDA with Truncheon. And clearly as the background check, or whatever, you ran on me came up clear - why do you need more? Have I proven to be untrustworthy?" he repiled, feeling offended. He didn't know the full story but he couldn't quite wrap his head around the fact that saying simply that he recognized her from while back would cause so much trouble.
Celeste was surprised by how openly he expressed himself. He didn't seem to be at all concerned with what she thought of him and in a way she appreciated it - showing her the real person behind the professional cover she'd mostly seen until now. Celeste didn't feel good, she did feel guilty for not trusting him, and she couldn't really help the lump in her throat that was beginning to form. She looked up, desperately wanting not to cry. This seemed to be some sort of a strange physical reaction for her in certain situations these days - and she hated it.
"It's because of her, okay? I'm protecting her," she burst into tears, trying to hide her face, gesturing towards the stroller. It was half-truth in a way - there were other things - like financial aspects of this and the family control that she'd escaped, but the underlying cause was Evie. She never wanted her family to know of her, so that there would ever be a chance that they'd tried to take her from her. She didn't have a good reason why they would, but she could imagine ways how they'd be able to do that. Manipulation and discrediting people was what they did, and that fear lived on strongly within her. These fears were mixed up with her own insecurities and all of this was rather difficult to distinguish from the other.
"I'm sorry," he replied quietly, offering her a clean paper tissue. He hadn't expected her to react quite as strongly.
"You see - I'm a mess," she shrugged, as she wiped her tears, taking a few deep breaths trying to calm herself. "So I really don't blame you for not really wanting to do this with me," she added.
"I didn't say that. I just wish we wouldn't need to pay some bloody lawyer a few grand to get us a contract that we could do without. Don't you think if I had wanted to expose you or something, I would've just quit my job and done it anyways? I don't even have contacts that would want this information," he added, needing to take a breath to calm his tone again, adding, "I'm sorry," again.
Celeste looked at him, and honestly she was beginning to believe him. He had so much going on himself, and he really didn't need someone expressing that she didn't trust him. She was almost about to say that she was willing to consider doing this without it and just watch what she said, as he beat her to it.
"Fine, I'll sign it," Noah said.
"Thank you," she replied quietly, his words gaining her deepest respect.
Somehow this already felt like overcoming the one major obstacle stopping them from getting to work on the book. But with the conversation having been quite overwhelming neither really felt like continuing on to the book itself right then and there.
"Do you need any help with your mom's funeral?" she offered, hesitantly, somehow feeling some need to do some gesture of good faith in return. It wasn't her place to bud in, but she did know a thing or two about event planning.
"It's all done, she set everything up herself. I basically just have to show up on Saturday," he replied, with a deep sigh.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Celeste asked, sensing a certain loneliness in him.
"I'm okay, really. Jess sort of insisted I take a few weeks off but frankly I'd rather just dive into work. It was a long time coming - she was sick for 3 years - it wasn't like I didn't know this was going to happen," Noah explained.
Celeste almost wished she could say that she could relate, but she really couldn't - her father's passing hadn't made her shed a tear or anything. She wondered whether that made her an uncompassionate or unemphatic person- was she able to feel grief as such? - she really didn't know.
"What did she have, if you don't mind me asking?" she inquired. It really didn't matter, not now, but somehow she felt weird not asking either.
"Melanoma," he replied.
"Sorry," she replied again.
He nodded appreciatively, but didn't really want to continue this topic.
"So, about the book," he began, trying to change the pace a little. "How about you sort through that thick binder of yours of everything that is in the same style as the ones you showed me and any you'd be willing to consider publishing. Then next week maybe we can meet and we can go through them together," he suggested. He had a pretty good hunch that she had a lot of good drawings still hidden away for one reason or another.
"Okay, that I can do," Celeste agreed, making a mental note to get the contract set up as soon as possible as well. While she barely wanted it anymore, she knew it was still the wise thing to.
"Is there any thematic you'd like the book to carry? So I can maybe take it into account already as I began to think about the texts?"
"I sort of liked the 'hiding in plain sight' idea, but maybe it could refer to the feelings and skeletons people hide from the public, the things that are too taboo to speak of," she replied. She had a list in mind - pretend marriages, hidden families, extortions, what people had referred to as 'good PR' down to the personal thing such as mental health, the latter being still a little fuzzy. But she didn't want to elaborate on these until she had that contract.
"Okay, I think I have a few ideas for that already," he replied. "How's your next week looking?" he asked practically, after glancing at his watch, nothing that he needed to get going soon.
"I have Evie most of the week, so that sort of limits it to her nap times or...," Celeste began to explained, having not really planned to need April next week, except for the few hours she went to pilates.
"Well, I guess we can try to work with these nap times then - what time? Where?" he asked.
"I wish it was that easy," she laughed - clearly the man had little experience with babies. Evies naptime ranged from 11.30, like that day, until 4 PM on other's, and the place varied grately and could easily change while she was putting her to bed. "Actually, if you don't mind, maybe it'd just be easier if you came to the house? It would give some more flexibility on the time," she suggested, surprising herself a little.
"Sure," he agreed, feeling again surprised by how she seemed to be fluctuating between the trusting and untrusting. "Monday?" he suggested, as he rose to leave.
"10ish? I'll send you the address," she replied, and waved him off.
With Evie still asleep, she finished her coffee and tried to wrap her brain around the whirlwind of things that had just happened. She almost felt like she should've said something more to him, knowing he was going to a funeral soon, but now it was too late. But frankly, she wouldn't really have known what more to say, if he had been there. But either way - this seemed to be a step forward.
AN: I know it might seem like I'm killing C/J relationship off right now, but trust me, I'm not done with it.
