A/N: Okay, I'll admit I got a bit more emotional/ramble-y on this chapter. But Gilmore Girls ramble, so it has to happen once in a while. Deal with it. :) (Though in all seriousness, if it's too ramble-y, emotive, tell me in the reviews...)
I hope you all enjoy this. I think this is an important interaction for Lorelai and Rory to have and something that I thought they'd need to cover if they went further with Gilmore Girls and with the Literati relationship, so I'm really curious to see what you think. And on that note...
I'm not dead. I did not die. I am very much alive. Hopefully this story will be much more alive. Trust me, I hadn't forgotten it. Things got busy and instead of writing it, I thought it. So the good news is I know a lot of where I want it to go (though still no end ever in sight) and what I want to do with it. Hopefully this all translates into more stability again. I know a lot of people probably stopped reading (understandably) when I stopped posting regularly, but I hope you consider starting to read again. I'll keep posting it whether or not the old readership returns, but I have to admit I loved reading your reviews and thoughts and that it was a huge motivation for me. You are very important to me, so important to me that when two major reviewers stopped reading or at least reviewing, I noticed and was sad.
Either way, the point is that I hope you want to return to this story as much as I do, and I look forward to seeing reviews if that's the case. As always, please feel free to favorite or follow if you haven't already. I do not own Gilmore Girls or any of its characters or concepts, although I do possess a hefty sense of guilt about the prior neglect of this story.
Chapter 101
"So you two seemed very Claire-and-Bender-post-closet-scene today," Lorelai observed, glancing at her daughter as they walked down the street towards the first of the wedding shops.
"Really Mom? I can promise Jess has never gotten me high, or worn my earring," Rory rolled her eyes, still unable to stop smiling.
"You know what I mean," her mother pressed, "You two are…awfully couple-y today. Something happen? Or is it hoodlum-daughter stuff?"
Rory looked at Lorelai. "Mom, you're not…"
"No! You're an adult. Your personal life is your business."
"Yes, because that's always been the rule in this household," Rory rolled her eyes, "Seriously. Do you feel like I'm shutting you out or something?"
"Well, now that you mention it," Lorelai sighed, "Look, I am really happy for you, kid. Really, insanely, dancing-Oompa-Loompas happy. Grinch's heart almost exploding at the end of that movie happy. I just…I guess I know it's serious, because other than that awful time when we weren't talking, you used to tell me everything when you were dating someone. And yes I know that it was probably dysfunctional and resulted from my stubborn choice to let you eat ice cream as a baby or something and that Dr. Laura wouldn't approve but I just kind of miss that. Don't get me wrong, I love that you come to me when things are rough, and I know it's not like you don't trust me, but I just miss the being involved. I guess it's just something I have to get used to."
Rory was quiet for a minute. Finally she turned to face her mother.
"I'm sorry," she said, "I'm doing that thing where when you're absolutely, totally in love with a person you kind of forget about all of your friends and ignore and neglect them, but it's way worse than normal because you are my best friend, and you're also my mom. I don't mean to shut you out, I'm just so wrapped up in it, in being in it, and I think what's different is that when I was with all of the rest of them...I was always thinking."
Lorelai looked at Rory, confused. "You're not…"
"I'm not thinking. That's the craziest thing. I'm happier than I've ever really been and I'm just…going with it. Doing it, living it, whatever happens is happening. And I know I should be worrying and planning and thinking and analyzing and calculating and doing my thing, the Rory thing, that's my thing! But since things have started again with him, my mind's just kind of…shut down. Which is weird, because my writing is better than ever and I'm less stressed and more organized and getting more done when I want to do things and things that would normally totally overwhelm me don't even really worry me for more than a couple of minutes. Do you remember the box of cornstarch?"
"I still have it," Lorelai admitted, the corners of her lips curling into a smile. Rory laughed.
"Of course you do," she rolled her eyes, "And you're right, now I'll probably be happy for the memory. But when I kissed him and I stole that cornstarch, all I could do was think. When was I going to tell you, how was I going to tell you, what would Lane think? What did it mean? Would it happen again? Were we dating? And it just kept going. When we broke up, it wasn't really him and me that upset me so much. It's was this all it was? All this whole dating thing is? Was that what love is and if so, I got cheated and I hate Mom for showing me all those movies that made me think it was more and I hate all the books I read that made me believe in it and oh my god, I can't hate books, I'm Rory! Who am I if I hate books? When Jess first showed up in town, my brain started to turn off. I stopped thinking. I went to New York, I kissed him while I was with someone else, and a million other things. Back then I wasn't ready for it and he wasn't ready for it either. But now, I'm not thinking again but it's safe to. You know what I mean? Well, mostly safe to. Until I forget that my best friend in the world has feelings that are probably being hurt by the fact that her daughter is quickly morphing into a different person and totally neglecting her in the process."
"Wow," Lorelai exhaled, "I think we need another cup of coffee before we go on to dresses." She pulled Rory into the café next to the wedding dress store and they got in line. After getting their coffees they sat down and Lorelai looked at her daughter carefully.
"It's amazing," she started, "What love can do. It made you calm and me stable and that alone is proof that it's everything that everything has always told us it would be. But there's something that I never thought to teach you about love. I remember when you stole that boat all I kept saying was "This isn't Rory, this isn't her, this isn't you." I think you thought that you'd lost yourself in the process of being with him. And I think you were right, in a lot of ways. But love, real love, the love that you end up with, good love…that changes you too. And it can change you drastically. But it doesn't mean you're losing yourself or that there's something wrong with that. You aren't Rory because you analyze or even because you read. You're Rory because you're Rory. Jess brings out the happiest side of you I've ever seen, and you weren't a sad kid. It makes you even more beautiful than you are just by virtue of being born, and it makes me feel like you're getting everything I really wanted you to have in life. Yes, I wanted you to go to Harvard (well, Yale eventually) when you were a kid, and I wanted you to have a house and I wanted you to have an amazing career. But what I wanted most for you, from the minute I found out you existed, was for you to be sublimely happy. And that's what he makes you. This isn't like the cornstarch, hon. We're not going to sit on your bed and dissect your relationship, because the difference is, this time I'm wrong. It's better the way it is, that you two have your world, and that you let me into it sometimes in some ways but really it's just this place where you two exit where cotton-candy-bunny-rabbits would probably feel right at home. And I think it's wonderful that you have something that you can close the door on now at the end of the day, something of your own. It does have to change us, you and me, that you have him. Just like it changed us that I have Luke. But that's okay, and that's something that I don't think I fully processed until you said that it was safe to stop thinking. Don't start now, hon." Lorelai stood up and kissed Rory on the cheek. "Now, what do you say we go find a dress that doesn't make me look like Morticia Aadams?"
"Morticia Aadams in a white dress?" Rory questioned, standing up and smiling widely at her mother, wiping a tear from her cheek, "Where in the…"
"I had a dream."
"Oh god, not this again. Alright, the doctor's in…"
