A/N: Wow, this is actually it. It's over. Truly over.

I want to take up this space by just thanking you all. You've been such wonderful readers and I can't begin to thank you enough. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, favourited, and followed. It's been a crazy ride for me writing this and you've made it all worth it. Well, actually, I want to thank simply every single person who read and enjoyed this story. Not just those who reviewed and all that. If all you did was read and decide to keep reading, that's all you needed to do. You're all forever in my good books. Thank you, really and truly, thank you!

Feel free to listen "The Calendar" all throughout this final chapter.


Put another X on the calendar,

Summer's on its deathbed.

There is simply nothing worse than knowing how it ends.

And I meant everything I said that night,

I will come back to life,

But only for you.

Three Years Later

I Will Come Back to Life

Rory's stomach was cramped. It had been for a couple of days. She blamed it on eating poorly and not exercising enough. Her job had her running around like a mad woman for the past week, so stress could be a factor as well. Regardless, when she woke up on Monday morning after a weekend of bliss with her husband, she was not happy.

Head swimming, stomach churning, tightness everywhere.

Logan dozed next to her, unaware of her extreme discomfort. She stared daggers at his back and smiled when he rolled a little bit as if to get away from her sharp glare. Reaching over to slap her alarm off, Rory stepped out of bed and reluctantly got her things ready for the day.

It was hot in Connecticut at the moment, August bearing down on them like it had some personal vendetta against the state, so Rory abandoned her trousers and decided on wearing a skirt that day instead. She grabbed a powdery pink blouse to match her navy blue skirt and went to the bathroom.

After they got married, Rory had insisted on redecorating the place. They were nowhere near short of money and since the town house was more of a bachelor pad than anything, Rory felt it was the right thing to do. She planned and planned it, running her inspiration dry until they'd agreed on what to do. Simple paint jobs and knocking down a wall or two for some extra space. Her favourite addition was the bathroom. Before, it was a simple shower, toilet, and sink. Now it had grown two times in size with the addition of a sink and full size bathtub. Stony grey tiles lined the floor and a wide stretched mirror was shoved above the basins.

This morning she decided a bath would soothe her aching tummy best. She slowly removed her clothes, peeling the sweat-drenched items from her body and flinging them at the door. When she got to her underwear, Rory slid them off carefully, checking to see if her monthly cycle had finally gotten itself together. It'd been very radical as of late, the last couple months had brought only two days of barely there anything. The doctor said it was likely due to her switching her birth control, but something nagged at the back of her head telling her that was a lie. Sure enough, there was only a spot of redness and nothing more. Sighing, Rory threw them in the laundry basket they kept in the bathroom and started running herself a bath.

When the water was scalding and had reached the desired depth, Rory switched on her iPod to Panic! at the Disco and sunk low into the tub. The liquid sloshed over her creamy skin and she noticed that her torso seemed to have gained a slight amount of weight. Nothing too noticeable, but when you're as thin as Rory Huntzberger it was difficult not to notice the gentle increase in size.

After bathing for quite some time, letting the time slip away from her, Rory vaguely heard the bathroom door creak open above the soft music. Keeping her eyes closed, knowing it was Logan come to "surprise" her, Rory pretended not to hear anything and continued lazing in the water, her body already reacting to her husband's presence. Through her slitted eyes, the young woman saw Logan strip his clothes and approach the tub. He dipped a finger in to test the temperature, standing back up and gently slipping his whole body into the tub the other side of Rory.

Rory snapped her eyes open in playful shock, realising that the aching in her belly had been taken over by another ache entirely, and watched Logan's smile spread.

"Morning, Ace," he said casually, tracing a fiery finger along Rory's leg.

She shivered despite the heat of the bath and shuddered out a breath. "Good morning, ass. I was enjoying a nice quiet bath, thank you very much."

"I can make it a nice loud bath if you want?" Logan raised his eyebrows and continued his trek up Rory's leg. She flinched against his fingers, pressing her thighs together as if to squish the desire running through her.

"Or you could get out," Rory challenged, smirking when Logan's sexy smirk disappeared and was replaced by a pout.

He recovered quickly, "You don't really want that, Ace, do you?"

Maybe it was true. His gravelly voice mixed with the way he was attempting to coax her legs apart was really waning her resistance. It never did take much from him to get her to give into temptation. And she was both annoyed and thankful for that.

Logan slid forward, pulling Rory's legs either side of his hips and shuffling her onto his lip. She felt him against her and couldn't contain the gasp that escaped her, or the blush that immediately followed.

"Still, after so many years, I have the ability to make you blush. It's just a penis, Ace. Nothing to be too scared of," he teased, smoothing his calloused hands up her thighs and resting them on her waist. He brushed his thumbs across her stomach leisurely, clearly enjoying the way she squirmed at his touch.

"Yeah, well, maybe it is something to be scared of. I mean, it's big and intimidating," Rory argued pathetically, only realising what she'd said after the words had left her mouth. She brought her hands up to her face when Logan started giggling childishly.

His hands snaked around her wrists and tried to pull her mask away, but she refused. "Thank you, Ace. I'll take it as a compliment."

Sighing in frustration at herself, Rory slammed her hands against his chest. "Well, you shouldn't. . ." she began, but either her hit was more powerful than she originally thought or Logan was more than pleased to get her on top of him because before she knew it his mouth was caressing hers and his hands were dancing up and down her spine.

"I have work," she tried to insist against his lips, moaning into his mouth.

He brought his hands to her breasts in retaliation and she let out a high pitched squeal. "Oh, God," she groaned, removing her lips from Logan's and instead focusing on the feel of his gentle giant hands.

She'd given in and Logan knew it. She knew he knew it too, because he grinned against her cheek and left sloppy, crescent shaped kisses down her throat.

"God, Ace," Logan said when he'd propped them up so his mouth could reach further down her chest. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say these things were getting bigger."

Rory tugged at his hair when he said it, eliciting a curse from the man beneath her, but paid no more attention to the comment after. She got too lost in the touches, the neediness. Everything was heightened, it was like she'd never been touched before and was only now discovering the joys of foreplay.

When he finally stopped teasing and she couldn't tell where she started and he began, she could've sworn no feeling on earth was better than that one. Her sensations were overcrowded, bumbling with energy and corrosive acid. It was almost too much.

They tumbled down together in breathy sighs and cries, the others name spilling haphazardly from their lips.

Work was forgotten, they both lied through their teeth and called in sick. That whole day was spent in carelessness of love and lust, that wonderful combination that had kept them together for years and years, that kept them apart and then brought them back, sealing them forever with kisses and devastating, zealous need.

And when she awoke the next morning, a glow on her skin, she again called in sick while Logan took off for the work day, smiling at her and jokingly saying it wasn't his fault for making her ill. Rory laughed through her nausea at that, not realising how true his words were.

O-O-O

"Rory, I don't know why you're calling me," Lane exclaimed. Rory could hear her best friend running around even though she couldn't see her. She missed Lane, truly, but she was slowly getting fed up with her.

Huffing, Rory stood up just as another wave of sickness coursed in her stomach. "Ugh, Lane, I just told you!" She squealed, slowly making her way to the bathroom and leaning her head over the toilet bowl.

"No, no, you didn't 'tell' me anything. You screeched and ran through your words like it was a marathon. Hey, who can get the most syllables out of their mouth in ten seconds! Rory Gilmore, of course."

It was a false alarm. No more vomit at the moment.

"Come on, Lane. You're the only one I could think to call about this."

"Rory, I still have absolutely no idea what 'this' is," Lane complained. Rory decided the woman must be cooking, the clanging in the background matching the bumping of pots and pans.

Clutching her hair, Rory repeated her words. Slower this time. "I was wondering what I should do because I've been throwing up for two weeks straight. Logan thinks it's just a bug, but he doesn't know how long I've been sick. Also, I don't really think it's that. . ." she let her voice trail off, hoping her best friend would figure it out herself.

Rory could have laughed when Lane gasped loudly if it weren't for the sudden onset of dizziness that washed over her. She reached out a hand in search for the sink and rested her head against the marble countertop, letting the cooling rock seep into her pores.

"You don't mean. . .?" Lane gulped.

Rory nodded her head stupidly and was about to answer yes, but it seemed as though her and Lane had some form of psychic link because she spoke again, "So you really do think. . ."

A breathy laugh retreated from her lungs and Rory stood at her full height, reaching down and bringing her shirt up to reveal an almost perfectly flat stomach. There was no fat, not really, but it felt as though a smooth, level rock had been inserted inside her stomach without her knowledge.

She kept looking for some scar, a small part of her hoping, and kind of wishing because it would be cool, that it was really just aliens who had simply abducted her and put a rock in her. Somehow, though, she doubted that even more than Logan's 'you're just sick, Ace' talk.

"What do I do?" She asked helplessly, running a hand down the hard surface of her belly.

Lane laughed harshly, a loud cackle that banged against Rory's eardrum with force. She held back a frown. "Rory, take a test. It's not that difficult."

"Well, I know that. But we go to the same pharmacy all the time and all the workers know who I am," Rory answered lamely, a blush creeping to her cheeks.

"Bullshit, Rory. Just find another pharmacy."

Rory could hear Zack in the background chastising his wife for swearing and couldn't stop the grin that spread across her face.

"Look," Lane started. Rory could almost see the food being chewed in Lane's mouth her speech was so slurred by the stuff. "I get that you're nervous, but you and Logan have been married for three years and I know for a fact that you've had the kids talk because you phoned me for that as well. He's great with babies. You've seen him with Rachel. That face of his lights up every time he sees that girl."

Rory knew her friend was right. But damn it, they weren't ready for this. Not yet anyway. Sure, they'd talked. Said maybe in a year or two. It was her fault this was happening. She'd been transitioning from one pill to another. Her OB/GYN even warned her, several times, to not have sex (or "intercourse" as she so lovingly put it) for a while until her body had gotten used to the change. But her hormones and Logan's persuasiveness were too damn much.

She'd remember that night forever. Candlelight dinner during a particularly long city-wide blackout, no work to worry about, no phones or any other electronics to keep them occupied. He'd sat her down after the delicious meal and massaged her tense shoulders. She'd been stressed about some article, but with every twitch of his strong fingers any thoughts about writing, or any thoughts about anything, disappeared.

It was her who initiated the sex part. She'd twisted her head and captured his surprised lips with force and zeal. Who was he to say no? Protection was forgotten as their movements got frenzied and frantic. The whole ordeal wasn't lengthy or soft. It was rough and hard against the wooden floor of their living room. Her back had marks for weeks. But it was the most love-filled love-making ever.

Heat pooled over her entire body when she realised Lane was still talking about how wonderful Logan would be as a father. ". . .and he'd be great with discipline. Another good reason he's a teacher. So just go get the test from somewhere no one knows you and call me as soon as you tell Logan."

Rory had to smile at her friends selflessness. If she'd called Paris with her worries, the blonde would've been here in a flash and probably tasted her urine to see if she could sense any changes just with her tongue. The thought made Rory shiver.

"Okay," she said finally, a new nauseous feeling twisting at her insides. Although she knew this was nerves biting at her and not the potential thing growing in her. "I'll go and find one. Thanks, Lane. You're such a big help."

"I know, I know. I'll remind you of that sometime in the future. Now go! I wanna know if my best friend's got a bun in the oven."

"Okay, okay. Geesh." Rory laughed as she hung up the phone.

It's okay. She told herself. Again. And again. And again.

-O-

Rory checked her phone for the seventh time in one minute, unsatisfied each viewing with how little the seconds seemed to be passing. She'd always hated how time appeared to move slower when you desperately needed it to move quicker.

"Time flies when you're having fun," Lorelai would always say. "And then it drags you through the mud like you're its kill when you're not having fun." She'd finish off with a lighthearted smile.

Sometimes she hated her mother.

Her phone beeped, signaling that three minutes had indeed passed since she very awkwardly peed on a stick. On a little piece of plastic that was going to either completely and radically change her life or crush the dreams she'd only realised she had in the last hour.

Because the more she thought about it, the more excited she became. What if there was a little Logan/Rory rolling around inside of her?

Her hyperactive brain started planning everything. Names, how they'd tell family and friends, the baby shower, her birth plan, where it would sleep, how much time off work she'd be forced to take.

And now that the answer was right in front of her, she couldn't bear to look. A part of her wanted it to be negative. But a bigger, much more aggressive part, wanted it, needed it, to be positive.

She was shaking uncontrollably, her body jerking and fizzing as if she were coming down from a caffeine induced high. God, if she was pregnant, she'd have to give up coffee! Coffee! She liked to lie to herself and Logan about her sheer need for coffee, but it was all bull.

Deciding that holding off looking at the test was just going to cause more anxiety, Rory swiped the stick-like life-changer and stared at the little screen.

One look at the tiny mark and it was ingrained permanently in her mind. She could see it when she closed her eyes; it plastered itself on the walls, the mirror, her hands.

And that was when she threw up.

O-O-O

Logan liked to believe he could read his wife. It was a selfish thing, something Jess had once called a testosterone-induced need to assure himself that Rory was in fact his. Almost anything Rory did, Logan understood why. Every aspect of why. Why she did it, yes, but also what made her do it, what it meant, and what was to follow. But when he got home that evening, something was different. His Ace was different.

Nothing scary. She rambled, but that wasn't anything new. There was a nervous energy thrumming in the undertones of her voice and it, in turn, made him nervous.

She'd cooked them dinner and he tried to smile all the way through it, but there was something she wasn't telling him and he couldn't figure out what it was or why she felt the need to omit facts. He could tell she wasn't scared, of telling him or whatever the news was. She was happy. Jumpy. Thrilled even.

They were sitting at the table, her hand in his. He rubbed his thumb absently across her knuckles as she jabbered on and on about some article that she'd already written. Eventually his patience wore thin enough that he interrupted her. "Ace, what's going on?"

Her body spasmed and she placed a hand over her heart, laughing excitedly. "You could always tell when something was wrong. Wait, wrong word. Nothing's wrong. Something it up, though."

Logan lifted an eyebrow. "I know." They sat in silence for a moment longer, both just staring at each other like they tend to do, just getting lost in each other. But he needed an answer. "Ace," he warned gently.

She sighed and let go of his hand, bringing both of them to her cheeks and rubbing furiously at the reddening skin. "I know I need to tell you, I just don't know how." Rory was a thirty odd year old journalist. Her job was to tell the truth in the most creative and interesting way possible. And she was stuck saying two simple words to her own husband.

"Just spit it out."

"I can't just spit it out."

"Well don't leave me hanging, Ace."

"I'm not trying, I didn't think this far ahead."

"How long have you been thinking about this?"

"You don't even know what this is, Logan."

"Then tell me!"

They'd started yelling, voices rising in frustration. Him at her for not spilling and her at herself for not knowing what to say.

"Calm down, Logan. I need to breathe."

"Not until you tell me what the hell is going on!"

"I'm pregnant, okay! There. And we can definitely lie when people ask how I told you!" Perhaps it was the new hormones raging in her, or perhaps she was just too tired to talk anymore, but Rory scraped her chair against the floor, threw her napkin on the table, and slugged off to their bedroom. The last thing she saw was Logan's jaw hitting the table and his eyes blowing up twice their normal size.

He stood there, mouth open, catching flies. Pregnant? Had he heard her correctly? There was no way. . .

His mind rushed back to the night of blackout. Sensual touches, soft moans, brushes of lips, tightening of pants. No condom, just the two of them in the heat of the moment.

Logan didn't know how long he was there in their kitchen, alone. It could've been hours, days, years, but really it was probably only minutes. When he'd gathered his tongue back, he rushed off to find Rory.

He could hear her crying before he even stepped over the threshold into the bedroom. His heart seized knowing he aided in upsetting her. He tried, he tried so damn hard to keep her happy. And now, when she needed him the most, he'd snapped.

Moving quickly, Logan sat down beside Rory on their bed. It squeaked with the addition of his weight. He was worried that maybe she wouldn't take his embrace, but she turned her body and collapsed into him. He leaned back and they lay like that, her in his arms, until her cries became soft whimpers and her soft whimpers became evened breaths.

Logan couldn't shut his brain off that night, the warmth and bubbling excitement brewing in his belly enough to make him want to stay with Ace entwined in his arms forever. He smiled against her hair, brushing soft kisses along her cheek while she slept gracefully, swiping the tear tracks away with his lips.

They'd talk tomorrow, when their tempers were down and their minds clear.

They'd talk tomorrow. About their baby.

O-O-O

Eight Months Later

She had been standing too long and she knew it. The security guard manning the gate stared at her with malice. He must have been new. He was taking his job too seriously.

Admittedly, one reason her feet were unmoving was because she was toying with him. Did he think she was going to pull a gun on him? Offer him some drugs? Blast through the iron gate with her laser vision?

Ziggy Stardust began playing and it caught the bull-like security guard and the woman taunting him in her red coat off guard. He jumped and she jumped. Smiling at the man as her heart sped up along with the tempo of David Bowie's song, she remembered that morning when they met for coffee and he saw her in the Ziggy Stardust shirt. She wished she still fit in that thing.

Picking up the phone, cutting David off cruelly, she took a deep breath and forced her stomach to stop churning.

"Is it safe to enter, Jack?" She asked in a mock Italian mobster voice.

"Sure is, Ace. Get in here."

Rory's face pulled into a smile against the late April air and she headed towards the gate. "See you in a minute."

She hung up the phone and moved her eyes to the guard. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, to warn her away, a clanging bell rang through the courtyard, signaling the end of a school day.

The man gruffly pulled out his keys, flashing his gun towards Rory, and opened the gate.

"Thank you, sir," Rory said, lifting her voice in praise. He mumbled something and turned away, but she was too happy to care.

The woman wanted to skip her way to the building, but the bulge in her belly caused her to stop the thought before it entered her head. Instead, she walked, or waddled as Logan would call it, to the front door and pressed her hands to the glass. Peeking inside, she watched students young and still young but not as young as the others bustle about their ways, searching mindlessly for salvation.

A student, one of Logan's Rory recognized, ran up to the door and smiled brightly at her. His teeth shone with money and she fought the urge to cover her eyes, returning the grin he so graciously gave her. She stood back and let him swing the door open for her and strode past him, thanking him for his help. Something snuck its way around her waist and Rory noticed the same boy curving his hand to her stomach and guiding her to Logan's room.

"Stephen, you don't have to help me. I can walk on my own," she soothed, a gurgle of laughter popping from her throat when he held on tighter.

"Mr. Huntzberger told me to come find you and bring you to him," he defended cooly. The way he said Logan's name constricted Rory's heart and she tried her best not to cry, the hormones swimming away in her body making that task incredibly difficult.

Rory stopped them for a moment and he retracted his arm. Dabbing at her eyes, the overwhelming pride at her husband leaking through her tear ducts, Rory smiled again. "I'm pregnant, not handicapped," she said in an attempt to be firm, but her voice came out soft and whimpery.

"Mr. Huntzberger said," Stephen sighed as if Logan were the leader and he the follower. What Logan said was law.

Rory wanted to argue more, tell Stephen that Logan could shove his stupid rules up his ass to join the stick that got lodged there when she told him she was pregnant, but decided that submission was best in the situation at hand. She let Stephen wrap his arm around her waist again and lead her to Logan's classroom. Students waved at her and she grinned back, nostalgia washing over her as she walked the familiar halls of Chilton.

When Stephen and Rory made it to Room 4, he let go of her, whispered a fleeting goodbye, and sped off down the hall. Rory wondered for a moment if she should be worried, but Logan had sounded happy on the phone, so she squashed that singular thought immediately.

Standing in the doorway Rory caught sight of Logan bent over his desk with a red pen in his hand, his reading glasses sliding down his nose. His hair stuck up from the obvious amounts of hand-running-through he'd committed that day, blonde wisps spiking out in all directions. Maybe some thought he looked disheveled and improper, but Rory thought the term ruggedly handsome fit him well at this moment.

He scribbled some words in messy writing on a kids paper and Rory felt bad for whoever screwed up, thinking now would be the best time to interrupt him.

She cleared her throat loudly. Logan startled, dropping the pen and flinching up to where Rory was leaning against the door frame just inside the room.

"Hello, dear," she crooned, pushing herself off and walking to where Logan was still seated. She went behind his chair and ruffled his hair even more than he had already, slicking her fingers through the soft fluffiness of it all before kissing his temple.

"Mm, don't tempt me at work," he groaned as he leaned back against his chair. Rory took the opportunity to kiss him on the lips and was about to release her hold on him when his hand pulled on her neck and he deepened the kiss.

When they came up for much needed air, Rory's head was spinning. "Damn you and your hot flash inducing kisses," Rory said as she swiped at the sweat coating her forehead.

"Don't curse. The baby can hear you," Logan reprimanded. Rory just stuck her tongue out at him. "Such grace. I hope she's just like you," he said, turning his chair around and pointing to her stomach.

Shaking her head dramatically, and subsequently paying for it when the room started spinning, Rory cleared her throat. "Okay, well I just wanted to drop off this," she said as she handed her husband a flash drive where all his test answers were kept. He took it and nodded his head in thanks. "I've got to go back home and finish some of the folding. Why so many people thought we needed all these clothes for her, I will never know. She's not going to fit any of it after a few months. What's the point?" Rory blurted, throwing her hands up in defeat.

"I can do that when I get home," he said quickly, but Rory held a finger to his lips. It calmed him immediately.

"No, no. I'm going to do it. This baby isn't coming for another month and I plan on doing everything I can in the meantime. I won't be one of those bed rest crazed wives who complains all the time just because their pregnant."

Logan tapped his leg and Rory took the invitation to sit on his lap. She tried to not put all her weight on his legs but he pushed her down so she had no choice. "Right, you've decided to embrace pregnancy. All the good, none of the bad."

Rory turned her head up and caught his eye. "Well, there's no use in complaining. I won't remember half of this, so I want to enjoy it. Some of it's been hell."

Rory felt Logan shudder at some memory. "Mm, I agree. Now go, sexy temptress. I've got work to do." He gently slid her off his legs and helped her gather her purse.

"I'll see you when you get home. Eight, right?" She asked. He nodded his head.

Just as she was about to step outside the door another pain shot through her stomach. She stopped moving and gripped the wall with one hand and her swollen belly with the other. Logan's hands were on her in an instant, his questions spilling like an uncontrollable hemorrhage from his mouth.

"Calm down, it was just a Braxton Hicks contraction. I've been having them all week." Granted, she excluded the part about how they'd been more severe today, but she wasn't due for four weeks. Everything was fine. It was all going according to plan.

Logan frowned. "That looked a little more like an actual contraction, Ace."

Rory huffed in annoyance. "Well, it wasn't. Now go work. I have to get home."

He didn't argue, which surprised Rory. But she took it and drove off home, the sun following her and pressing against her dewey skin with happiness and warmth.

Another Braxton Hicks hit as she slowing by a red light, the powerful shockwave of pain forcing her foot down on the break hard enough to jerk a little. She leaned back against her seat and breathed, telling herself over and over that everything would be all right.

O-O-O

"Are you sure you don't want me to help?" Katherine asked, the fifth time in the whole hour she'd been at the Huntzberger town house.

Rory laughed lightly, just recovering from another what Kathy had dubbed "trainee contraction". "I'm absolutely positive. You and Jess have helped so much since we found out about the baby, please take a rest. I feel some responsibility here. She is my child, remember?"

Kathy smiled and moved to sit next to Rory on her bed. She gave the pregnant woman a soft side hug and leaned her head on her shoulder. "I can't wait for Rachel to have someone to play with. They're going to be best friends, I can feel it."

"And if not, we'll force them into it," Rory reminded her friend. Katherine bumped her forehead onto Rory's shoulder and stood back up.

"Of course. I need to find Jess and ask him something. Will you be all right for a moment?" Katherine's eyebrows were raised in the same concerning way that Logan's always were. She was beginning to fear all her loved ones would look permanently shocked if they kept it up.

"I'm fine. Everything will be all right," Rory said as she slid off the bed. She took a moment to get to her full height, the aftereffects of that last trainee contraction still wearing on her. When she was finally upright, mouth hanging open so she could say something else, though she'd never remember what, she felt it.

It was like a train, a big and heavy and fast train, had rammed into her. Shock billowed down her spine and pooled in her pelvis, a gush of wetness spilling down her legs. Pain laced in her bones.

She looked down and then back up at Katherine who was standing by the door, waiting to go downstairs. Rory's lips formed an O and she moved back to sit on the bed. Katherine sidestepped the mess on the floor and held Rory's hands.

Was this what catatonic shock felt like?

She couldn't hear Katherine speaking or feel her grip on her hands. She could only think about what was happening. She was going into labour. Four whole weeks early.

Her head started shaking and the word 'no' tumbled past her lips a dozen times before a distant shouting brought Jess upstairs in a hurry. He spied the liquid on the floor and came to join the twosome on the bed. The mattress sunk at the combined weight and Rory's head spun with words, sensations, worries.

"Rory, Rory, you need to call Logan," Katherine said, handing some device to Rory, clamping the pregnant woman's hand around the object.

It had been years, decades even, since she dated Jess, but she knew when he was touching her. His hand trailed along her hair and cupped her cheek. He moved her face so she could look at him. Eyes warm and grip soft, he spoke the words she needed to hear, the words to wake her up. "Everything will be okay. We need to get you to the hospital. For the baby."

Taking a deep breath, Rory dialed Logan's number. She waited and waited and waited. It felt like eons until he finally picked up the phone.

"Miss me already, Ace? I promised I'd be home by eight and then I can do all these wonderful things-"

Rory didn't let him finish. "I'm in labour." She blurted. Logan's breath caught, she could hear it. He coughed and then coughed again, spluttering a little like he'd just swallowed something too acidic.

"What?"

"The baby. My water broke." Tears began spilling down her cheeks and no matter how many times Jess swiped at them, they came to meet his busy fingers just the same.

"Are you sure you didn't just pee your pants?"

"Did I what?"

"You know, it happens sometimes."

"I think I can tell the difference between pissing and the breaking of my amniotic sac. Bastard. No, I didn't mean that. You're not a bastard. Just-oh, God, okay, these are definitely contractions. I'm so sorry, Logan. I must've been working myself too much." Rory cried, the painful clinch of another "definitely not trainee" contraction pulling at her muscles.

"Sweetheart," her ears perked up. He never called her sweetheart. It sounded so personal and desperate. "You're okay. I'll meet you at the hospital, okay? Go, you need to go."

Rory looked up to find that Katherine had disappeared. Jess was rubbing soothing circles on her back, trying not to look absolutely terrified.

"Okay. Hospital. Good plan," Rory agreed. She pulled the phone away and was about to hang up when she heard him yell. It brought back the sudden memory of the night before their wedding. "What?" She asked in a rush, her breathy voice annoying her.

"I love you, Rory Gilmore," he said as if it were a fact of life.

She smiled. "It's Huntzberger. Tonight, it's just Huntzberger. I love you too. And so does your daughter." She couldn't help saying the last part. She hung up the phone immediately after, leaning back into Jess. He flinched and she nearly slipped off the bed.

"God, I'd hate to have been Katherine when she was going into labour with Rachel," Rory said through clenched teeth as another contraction ripped through her.

Jess giggled nervously. "I was not there for that part. She called me from the house just as I'd stepped off a flight in tears. I used to think it was unlucky that I only got to see the birthing part, but I'm changing my mind. Definitely glad I didn't see this."

Rory grabbed his hand when another contraction hit and his face ignited in pain. "You're such a girl. To think you were my bad boy."

"Good to know you can still bite," Jess retorted.

"Don't tempt me, Moriano," Rory warned.

Katherine entered the room again, holding up Rory's overnight bag for the hospital. She looked out of breath. "I've got everything. We'll go in my car. I've checked the traffic and we should be at the hospital in less than seven minutes if we drive just a little faster than the speed limit. We'll be okay, Rory. We'll be okay."

Rory thought Kathy was talking more to herself than the pregnant lady, but she didn't mind. She just wanted the pain to stop.

O-O-O

To say the hospital was busy would be the understatement of the millennium. They'd rushed. Gotten there in record time with Rory seething as she clamped her hand down on Jess'. He didn't seem to mind so much anymore after Katherine had poked fun at his manliness.

Nurses and doctors had whizzed by as Rory was whisked off to a room. She was told to strip and change into one of the gowns and that her doctor would be there soon. She was apparently on a higher up list because of how early the child was and how far along she seemed to be into labour.

Katherine and Jess came in after signing a few documents, saying Logan had phoned to tell them traffic was being a bitch and he wouldn't be there for a little bit, but they were to hold her and keep her happy.

Her OB/GYN came in not long after, but still there was no sign of Logan. She was beginning to worry. The contractions were getting worse.

"When can I get the epidural?" She asked as the woman stuck her head in a very intrusive way under her gown. Katherine had the decency to cover Jess' eyes.

"It looks like you're too far along for that, sweetheart."

Unlike when Logan had called her that earlier, the way her doctor said it sounded more like an insult.

"What?" Rory gulped, yet another flaw in her birth plan. First the baby decided to come four weeks early, as if that wasn't scary enough, and now this. "No, no," she started, shaking her head from side to side to side to side. "I need it."

The doctor smiled warmly. She was starting to piss Rory off. "I'm sorry. There's no time. If you could try and relax, you're going to feel some pressure just down here. I need to see the baby's position."

A sharp pain emanated from Rory's cervix as the doctor stuck her fingers inside.

When she pulled away, Rory noticed the doctor's face had fallen. "What?" She asked, her voice shaking. Something wasn't right. Nothing was ever right when a doctor looked like that.

"Rory, Rory, God, you're okay!" Logan's voice startled her from her worries and a fresh bout of tears started streaming down her cheeks. He ran to her and hugged her, his arm getting caught up in her I.V.

"Mr. and Mrs. Huntzberger," the doctor interrupted the happy couple's reunion and they stared at the woman with wide eyes. All the fear and pain came crashing back down around Rory. "It appears that your baby has yet to turn face down."

One of those stupid contractions fled through Rory's stomach and the blinding pain mixed with the doctor's confusing words made Rory want to shut everything down and go to sleep. Her breathing steadily increased in speed and stars started flashing in her vision.

"What does that mean?" Logan asked, oblivious to Rory's distress.

"It means that your baby is in a breech position. I'm afraid the only safe option at this stage in labour would be a cesarean section."

A C-section. At the word, Rory's breathing escalated in tempo. Everyone noticed, turning to face her, when she began to gulp for proper air.

"Lo-gan. Ma-ma-m-make it s-s-st-sto-stop." She whined, pain constricting her chest, her belly, her head. The world around her spun in circles. Intricate, almost beautiful circles. It was so dizzying, she could imagine just closing her eyes and falling asleep.

So she did. She closed her eyes, hearing muffled shouts around her. Something beeped radically next to her and in the back of her mind she knew it was her heart, she could feel it thrumming like a hummingbird's wings in her chest. But she was beyond caring. She floated instead, settling down and listening to the whispered arguments falling on her deaf ears.

"Ace, everything will be okay. I love you. You'll both be okay."

"Somebody get in here! I've got a pregnant woman going into shock!"

"Logan, you need to get back."

"Logan, they need to take her now."

"No! No! I need to be with her."

"Son, step back or I will be forced to detain you myself."

"We need to get this baby out now."

"I love you, I love you, I love you."

O-O-O

He heard a lot of words. Big words. Like hemorrhaging. And complete breech. And endometriosis. And we need to remove those things after the baby comes out.

After he'd been slapped around by Jess a bit, the doctors told him that because of the baby's position and the anxiety attack Rory had they needed to put her under general anesthetic. He wouldn't be allowed in there.

He felt like his life was ending.

He saw the room when they pushed her and her protruding belly inside. There were big bright lights everywhere that hurt his eyes. He was tired, but so on edge. His Ace was lying on a slab with needles in her arm and knives in her stomach. His daughter, his daughter, was being pulled out of his wife by men in masks.

This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. It was supposed to be simple. There wasn't supposed to be worry about the baby's health until after she was born. They weren't supposed to be scared what being born four weeks early would do to her. Rory was supposed to have an epidural, deliver the baby vaginally. They were supposed to rejoice and be happy.

Now all he wanted was to run away. And it shamed him, but it was what he did. He always ran. It was always Rory who would lure him back. But ever since they started dating, before they started dating, before they even kissed, he was always the one who bolted.

Decades, lifetimes even, may have passed, but it was a carnal instinct inside of him, something that had been so embedded in him that it was still the first thing on his mind when confronted with a problem.

But he stayed. He stayed even through the big words like hemorrhaging and endometriosis. Because he loved her. He loved them both. And he couldn't run away, not when they both needed him. He was a husband. A lover, a fighter, a warrior. He was a father. A father, god dammit. When did that happen? When did Logan Huntzberger become a family man?

He just hoped the title wouldn't be ripped from under him before he even got a chance to bask in its glory.

Jess and Katherine sat with him in the waiting room, everyone tapping their feet in nervous energy. Jess had been the one to call Lorelai and Luke due to Logan's inability to speak at the present time. They were driving now.

A lot of people zoomed by him. Some wore white coats, others donned disgusting green scrubs. Some were hurt, bones sticking out and blood dripping everywhere. One person passed out, their head crunching on the floor. Another vomited, sending a spray of acid and dinner across the walls.

Logan couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. He saw only darkness and felt only ice.

"Mr. Huntzberger!" A voice called.

Someone pushed him. He got up, zombie mode taking over, and walked toward a pretty nurse. In a former life, he'd have been swayed by her beauty. He almost smiled at the thought.

"Can I see some I.D.?" The nurse asked calmly, clearly sensing his sickening daze.

He nodded, pulling out his walled and flashing the card. She read his name and held his arm, guiding him through the crowd.

"Ready to see your daughter?" She asked.

Logan couldn't speak. He just followed.

-O-

She was small. Barely there small. The tip of his middle finger to the inside of his wrist. She weighed nothing. She cried. She smelled like sweetness and new life. She had Rory's nose and his blonde hair. Her skin was wrinkled and red.

She was healthy. Rory was okay. They were okay.

Logan held his daughter while he waited for Rory to be woken up from the surgery. He was captivated by the creature in his arms. She was currently asleep, her mouth drooping open and her hands curled up by her chin. She had the tiniest fingernails Logan had ever seen. That fascinated him the most. How small those fingernails were.

Nothing could've prepared him for the moment they handed her to him. The minute his skin came into contact with hers, his world exploded. The past eight months came whooshing back, the future, things that had yet to even happen, slipped into his mind. A warmth like no other spread through his veins. That was true love, right there.

Different from the way he loved Rory. Because he was very much in love with Rory. But still, a love no book could have explained to him. Paternal instinct kicked in immediately. This little girl was his world and he would do anything to protect her.

They were a family now, even more so than before. Now they were complete.

And despite the pressure, the absolute terror inducing way this baby, his baby, was born, Logan couldn't wait to do it again.

O-O-O

Emily.

Emily Lorelai Huntzberger.

Rory finished writing the name on a random slip of paper, the aching feeling still throbbing in her belly. Logan had taken Emily to get her 24 hour check up, which left Rory alone with nothing to do but stare and wish she could walk.

Lorelai said they were natural parents. She wasn't sure if she could believe it. She'd done everything wrong. They say that it was stress induced labour. Her fault. She had worked too hard. Almost killed herself and her baby.

A knock on the door pulled Rory from her darkening thoughts. Logan swept through with Lorelai and Luke trailing behind. Lorelai had Emily wrapped in her arms, barely looking where she was going. If it weren't for Luke, Rory noted, she probably would've crashed into something.

Logan took his place by her on the hospital bed. It was wide enough for the two of them despite the nurses urging that he sleep somewhere else. Logan had laughed at that. Even Rory managed to get out a strangled giggle.

"How was it?" Rory asked, eyeing Emily. Luke nudged Lorelai as an indication that the older woman should probably hand back the child now. Lorelai chuckled and went over to press Emily in Rory's arms.

A warmth she'd never get used to spread through her veins when Emily came into contact with her skin. The child, as if it could sense whose arms it was now in, opened her eyes and let out a muffled cry. Rory looked to Logan who had already started unsnapping the clasps on her gown to reveal a breast for the babe to suckle.

"Everything was fine. She's perfectly healthy," Logan beamed, staring down at his daughters blonde head.

Rory leaned her temple against Logan's and they both watched in mutual, awe-filled silence as their daughter, their creation, drank her mother's milk.

"Well, I think we should go grab some lunch," Lorelai piped up, barely disrupting her daughter and son-in-law's attention from the baby currently sucking her mother's breast dry.

"Yeah, bye kiddos," Luke called as they exited.

Rory sighed, moving her head to look Logan in the eyes. She knew she had had life saving surgery just the other day, and that her daughter was just now attached to her nipple, but she wished she didn't have to wait to have sex again.

Logan had already been sweet talking her unknowingly, making her itch for something more than the chaste kisses he'd been giving since the morning.

Deciding she couldn't wait any longer just to really kiss him, Rory leaned in and captured his lips. She caught him off guard, she could tell, but she refused to release him and after a second of trying to pull away, he gave in and kissed her back.

A different warmth tingled down her spine as Logan wrapped an arm around her neck and started caressing her shoulder, sweeping away tangled matts of her hair in the process. Her tongue goaded his lips apart and they deepened the kiss in a haste, trying to get as much of each other as they could before they had to run back to real life. They needed this escape right now, they needed to forget.

So she kissed him with all the love she could muster, moaning into his mouth when he gently bit down on her lower lip. If she weren't holding a baby, she would definitely had not stopped at just kissing him. Logan's thumb began pressing against her cheek and he smoothed circles against the puffy flesh, running along her cheekbone and down to where their mouths were connected.

He pulled away first, gauging her reaction, flicking his eyes all around her face. Nose, swollen lips, eyes.

"I love you," he whispered, the sound almost painful.

"God, I love you too." She leaned in to kiss him one more time before eyeing Emily again, who was oblivious to her parent's discrepancies.

"We did good, Ace, you and me." Logan chimed happily, running a padded index finger across Emily's fluffy head.

"I like to think so," Rory admitted.

"But," she said after a moment of silence, "you did not have to deliver her, so I think I did better."

"You didn't have to deliver her either," Logan defended, raising his eyebrows in challenge.

"She came out of me, right?"

"But not out of your vagina."

"No, she came out of a hole in my stomach. Hey, at least we don't have to lie about where babies come from!"

"At least. But still, I think I got the short straw here. I had to wait and wait and wait while you were pleasantly dreaming."

"You don't dream when you're under anesthesia, Logan. And hey, I almost died!" Rory cried in the most Gilmore way possible.

"But you didn't. And I will love you forever for that, but trust me, after hearing Katherine tell me about when she gave birth to Rachel, you were fine." He insisted, grasping her head with his hand and leaning in to kiss her lips lightly.

"Eh, whatever," she said, a clear sign that she'd given up the argument.

Just then, Emily's mouth detached from Rory's breast and, with a yawn, fluttered her eyelids and went to sleep.

"My precious," Rory soothed as Logan snapped her gown back up.

Logan stifled a laugh. "Gollum's the creepiest character in that series. Did you have to call her your precious?"

"It's a good description," Rory challenged. "I most likely can't live without her already. I need her to live just like she needs me. I love her like I love food."

"Uh-huh," Logan nodded his head disbelievingly.

Rory sighed and rested her head on Logan's shoulder, reveling in his scent and holding back an elated moan when he started trailing his fingers up her arm lazily.

"I got it wrong," she said after moments of silence. Logan waited for her to finish. "Our precious."

Logan chuckled in agreement. "Our precious, Ace."

"I still think I win," Rory concluded and Logan decided not to argue further, instead choosing to kiss his wife's temple and thinking about it all.

About how he had fallen in love with Rory probably before she fell in love with him. About the time they jumped together, hand in hand. How they continued to take those leaps of faith. "You jump I jump, Jack." She said that whenever they needed to do something together, something life changing. He remembered everything. And maybe to some it seemed too trivial, their life. But it was theirs and it didn't need to be crazy. They'd had enough crazy. Never in his life did he imagine himself in this situation, with a wife and a child he could call his own. It would never cease to shock him. He'd always wake up, a part of him believing it had all been some dream. Like when he would wake up after they went their separate ways years and years ago. He'd look to his right in those hazes, and see a sleeping woman. The most beautiful woman. His heart would swell and he'd drift back to sleep with her in his mind.

It was real. All of it. He'd never wrap his head around it, he'd always walk through the days ahead feeling as though he had been stuck in some permanent hallucination. But it was all his. And he couldn't have wished, hoped, dreamed for anything more. He'd always come back to life for her, though. He'd wake up for her. But only for her.


A/N 2: Writing that took so much out of me. I didn't stop until I finished. I spent a while trying to figure out how I wanted to go about the whole baby thing, and I hope I ended this story well. Sorry it kind of jumped around a bit.

I'm a nanny and the family I work for currently just got a new addition. I've been with the family since it was just two kids and now it's up to four. And yeah, my favourite thing about a newborn is their fingernails. I don't know why, but it's always intrigued me at how small they are.

So, I dedicate this story to all of you joyous readers. Thanks for making this worth it. And thank you to Panic! at the Disco for writing such wonderful songs. I thought it was fitting to call this "I will come back to life". Get what I mean? How clever am I? And of course, thank you to the writers of the show for making these characters and to Matt and Alexis for bringing them to life.

I've got another Rogan fic going at the moment. Darker and more depressing, but if you wanna check it out by all means do so.

But again, just thank you. Thanks for sticking through the cliche endings and my weird obsession with adverbs. They're literally my favourite words.

That's it for me with this story. Say goodbye, ladies and gents!

(insert name here)

"Can't repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!"