Pity

She should have been happy. She should have been excited. She should have been something other than confused. But she wasn't happy, not excited and she definitely was confused, and possibly a little angry. She just wasn't really sure why. This is what every kid dreams of happening when their parents have long been estranged. But she wasn't a kid anymore, and she certainly didn't kid herself into believing that this had anything to do with her or her happiness.

For the first time in her life, Lorelai Leigh Gilmore pitied Lorelai Victoria Gilmore. For the first time in her life, Rory Gilmore saw her mother without the blinders that a child's love for a parent provided. Even during their estrangement the previous year, Rory still held Lorelai up as a paragon, someone to be reckoned with, a force of nature. Now she saw only a broken woman, clinging desperately to whatever scraps life threw her way. The stunning, vivacious creature from whom she had received her name and her life's blood was no longer there. Her sparkling eyes were nervous and uncertain. The bright smile rang false. The laughter was hollow, and her innate joy had been squashed.

It would be easy to blame others for her mother's demise. Luke, the man they both trusted to take care of them, had hurt her deeply. Cutting out her heart as he cut her from his life, and Rory had stood by and watched it happen. She alone, knew the agony Lorelai was going through. She alone, knew what had happened when her mother had finally reached the breaking point. She alone, knew what her mother's ultimate betrayal had done to Luke. Yet, she hadn't tried to counsel either one, and she couldn't console either of them. Her mother's denial was deep and fierce. Her heart bruised beyond recognition, and her fire snuffed. Luke was shell shocked, reeling from the disaster his life had become, and finding refuge on the same river in Egypt that Lorelai was floating. They just weren't floating it together.

And then there was Christopher. Rory loved her father in the way that one loves a slightly errant child. She tolerated his weakness because she had never known anything else from him. She appreciated his optimistic zest for life, but resented his opportunistic timing. She knew that he loved her mother. He always had. She also knew that he wanted Lorelai for his own, and not for any reasons remotely connected to the child they had created so long ago. Rory was used to her peripheral role in the continuing saga of Lorelai and Christopher. Contrary to the words he says, she knew that her thoughts and feelings did not play into his decision making, never had, never will. He had proven that repeatedly over the years with broken promises, and requests ignored when they didn't give him what he ultimately wanted, Lorelai. She couldn't really blame him, because he hadn't done anything that she hadn't expected him to. He saw his shot, he took it. She smirked as she thought, You gotta kind of respect that.

Frankly, she didn't really care which of the men in her life Lorelai chose to marry. In reality, it made very little difference to Rory. What mattered to Rory was the difference in made in Lorelai. Would Lorelai ever come back? Would she laugh again and really mean it? Would she smile and let it light her eyes? Could Rory ever forget this stranger her mother had become? Could Lorelai ever stop compounding the pain she had been going through by making rash decision after rash decision? Did she still want to be Lorelai after seeing what Lorelai could do to herself? Could she ever forgive Luke for hurting her mother so badly? Could she ever reconcile what her mother and father had done while, technically, Lorelai was still engaged to Luke? Could she ever look at her father and see anything but a spoiled, opportunist who would push and push to get what he wanted? Would they take her down with them when they fell?

The questions plagued her night and day. Lorelai had come to the apartment needing to talk to Rory, pleading with her to understand this disastrous decision she had made. Rory nodded and smiled and made up some excuse about being hurt that she wasn't there to see them marry. Lorelai seemed relieved, needy, and desperate for her daughter's validation. Rory was happy to give it to her, if only to spare her mother more pain. She felt owed it to her, especially after turning her back on Lorelai's pleas for reason when she had made her own horrible decision a year before.

So, she played along. She agreed to a trundle bed for a room in a house that she would never live in with both of her parents. She gave up exclusive rights to her room for a little sister she hardly knew. She played the daughter for the happy family Friday night dinners, knowing that it wouldn't last long. She would support her mother's sincere efforts to make her marriage work, even if she could see it for the sham it was. Better than anyone, Rory understood her mother's need to make a decision and see it through. Rory knew that Lorelai believed that this was it, that this was what was meant to be all along. Rory knew the Gilmore tunnel vision well, and knew the power that it could wield.

She was just going to feel so bad when it all fell apart, as she knew it would. She would hurt for both of them. Sorry for her Dad for the loss of his lifelong dream, and sorry for her Mom for the loss of her illusions. Because, more than anyone, Rory knew how crushing reality could be for Lorelai. All she could do was wait, and watch and be there when it all came down. She would be there to help Lorelai find herself again, even if she was never quite the same as she was.

Rory stared out of the window at the house she had grown up in. She slowly removed her keys from the ignition, dropped them into her purse, and opened her car door as she heard Lorelai thundering down the stairs calling, "The redcoats are coming! The redcoats are coming!" Rory saw her mother appear in the doorway, a big smile plastered to her face. She greeted her and then, in turn, greeted her father and Gigi while Lorelai babbled about saving Christmas until she had gotten back from England. Rory looked at her mother, and listened to her desperate attempt to make them into a family. She smiled and nodded while all she could think of was that it was just such a pity that it wasn't real.