Author's Note: Could it be? Is it even POSSIBLE???! Oh, it is!!! I have finally finished A Season To Remember! happy dance. I have some more L&L fic ideas I've started working on, so be looking out for me (although, knowing me, I may not get the first chapter of any of them finished for two years! lol.) Hope you like the ending (and hopefully it's not too cheesy, I did my best to make it not so), I hope you've liked the rest of the story as well, and I hope you enjoy this last little bit of Christmas in March! ;-


"How've you been?"

Lorelai was the one who broke the few seconds of silence.

"Good, good... I was just about to, uh, go over to the festival, you know, get my small dose of holly-jolly crap for the year."

"Oh, well, I'll just let you..."

"No, no. How about we go, uh, for a walk, Lorelai?"

She smiled and gave a sort of half-nod as they began to walk down the street, in the middle of the road (seeing as the streets were deserted since everybody was at the festival), away from the nosiness at the square.

They walked slowly in the cold, icy-feeling weather. Conversation started slowly at first, but it soon picked up, just like old times.

"Oh, by the way, I forgot to ask, you didn't happen to leave this hat on the steps of the diner, did you?"

"Well, don't be silly Luke, of course I didn't leave the hat on the steps. It'd get blown away or stolen if I left just the hat. I left a box on the steps, with the hat inside of it."

He laughed. "I figured it was you."

"Yeah, I figured you'd figure it was me."

"Why didn't you just give it to me?"

"Well, I... after I left the other day, I thought things were... well, I didn't know if things would be ok in time for me to give you the hat by Christmas, so I imagined leaving it at the diner would work well enough," she said, finishing quickly to avoid feeling awkward any longer.

"Oh." He knew there was more behind what she said, but he didn't want to push it right then. He was enjoying just being with her too much.

"Yeah... I saw it at a store, and just thought that I should get it for you, you know, seeing as how you lost your other one, or whatever..." She knew he didn't loose it, but she had thought she was going to be able to come up with a better reason as to why he hadn't been wearing it, and the only other reason she could think of was the real one.

She didn't need to think any further.

"I- I didn't loose it. I stopped wearing it after we broke up because... well, it reminded me of... everything, of... you, too much, and back then that was- too much to handle."

"Yeah." She paused. "Well, that's not nearly as crazy as what I did."

"What?"

"I...," she inhaled deeply, already feeling embarrassed for the ridiculousness of what she did. "... I got rid of every single thing that reminded me of you. Or that actually was yours."

"Really?"

"Yeah. My house looked like that tornado that Dorothy dealt with came through it, it was," she laughed, "really bad."

"Did you actually get rid of it all?"

"Uh, well, I tried, but Rory knew better than to listen to me, and she stowed it all away in an unused shed at the Inn."

"Oh man."

"Yeah, I get a wee bit crazy sometimes," she said, quickly remembering who she was talking too, "but you already knew that."

"Yes, yes I did," he smiled jokingly. "You're not alone, though... in what you did."

"Now Luke, don't tell me you went completely nutty like me? You're one of the few sane people I know I can never turn crazy on this planet!"

"Well, I didn't go to the extreme you did. I mean, if I did, I would've had to get rid of the whole diner. But uh, I did the whole box thing, you know, and stuck it far away in the back of my closet."

"Oh my my, how cliché you've become, Luke Danes."

"Hey, better than being a nut like you and getting rid of half my house."

"That's true." She giggled. "So you really got everything and put it away, never to see the light of day again?"

"Actually..."

The stopped walking, still in the middle of the street, and Luke dug into his back pocket, searching for something. He took out his wallet, and pulled out a small, faded piece of paper. Newspaper, it looked like.

He switched it to his left hand, and held it up for her to see.

The horoscope.

She took in a short, sharp breath, her eyes widening in surprise and admiration.

"Oh, Luke."

He had kept it. After all that happened, after all this time, he had kept it. The scenarios she had in her head of him ripping it to pieces in anger and disgust weren't true. He had kept it, possibly just a piece of memorabilia from the good times, but she knew it meant more.

He had kept, if even just the tiniest amount, some hope.

She completely forgot all about her surroundings, what was happening, everything. She stood, looking at the horoscope. Luke stood, looking at her.

She stared, trying to remember everything she could about that day so many winters ago. She observed the paper, how it was ripped along the edges, her handwriting from many years past. She could hardly believe how much time had passed between that first day they met and now. How much wasted time had passed.

It was beyond time for this.

Pulling half-way out of her daze, she reached into her purse. She unzipped the inner pocket, and pulled out their engagement ring.

She held it up for him to see.

He had the same reaction she did to the horoscope just moments earlier, the same overwhelming feelings of shock and awe.

He found words.

"The ring."

"I kept it. I threw out everything else, but... I kept this. I had it in the bottom drawer of the nightstand, away, but, but still there, and then I just decided to... keep it with me."

She kept it. After everything they had been through, she kept it. And he knew in a second what it meant. Yes, it was a nice, valuable ring, but she wouldn't have kept it this long, let alone have kept it in her purse, if it didn't mean something.

And even beyond those reasons, he could tell simply by the look on her face when she took it out.

They were quite a sight to be seen there, one holding up a piece of paper, the other holding a ring, both doing nothing but looking into the eyes of the other like they had wanted to for so many seemingly endless months.

And then, something of true amazingness happened. Something that seemed too cliché to even be plausible, let alone actually occur. Something that was simply right.

Luke reached out and gently wrapped his hand around that of Lorelai's that was holding the ring.

At the same instant, snow began to gently fall from the sky.

There was a commotion coming from the town square down the street as a flake fell softly on their conjoined hands and they both looked up at the sky.

"It's... It's snowing!" Lorelai said, smiling like a kid in a candy shop.

"Yeah." Luke was smiling as well, although not quite as big.

"Finally."

"Yeah, I mean, this whole winter, it's felt like there's been something-"

"-wong, yeah, I've felt the same thing. It was just so weird not having it snow, it seemed like something was majorly wrong in the world,"

"Yeah, I know, and I don't even like the stuff that much."

Lorelai let out a chuckle at his statement.

Then they both looked down at their hands, which were still conjoined as they had been when it started snowing.

"Lorelai-," he said, ready to protest.

"Luke." She took the hand of his that had been holding hers in both her hands and held it between then, the ring still pressed between her thumb and finger. "Please," she said, half-whispering. "You know. I know. We both know now."

"This time, though, we need to do it right, we-"

"I know, and we will. We will talk through everything, even if it is a little difficult at first, and we will make sure we make it this time. I mean, we've already started, that itself proves we're ready," she said, her bright blue eyes wide, teary-eyed, pleading with his.

Those eyes.

He took his free hand and brushed a flake of snow out of her hair, let his fingers gently caress her cheek, then rested his hand on her shoulder.

"I... I missed you."

"Right back at you, buddy," her words being the opposite of how seriously true she was about it. She let out a hard breath, getting a determined look in her eyes. "Luke, we can do it this time."

He looked at her long and hard. "I know." He paused, so she knew that he really mean it. "But Lorelai, I really think we need to-"

"All that matters right now is that we both know. We will figure this all out, but we don't need to tonight, Luke. I mean... it's snowing."

He took a breath and smiled.

"It's snowing."

His hand slid down her body and stopped at her waist, as he gently pulled her toward him. She paused for a moment, looking down, then looked back up as she started to release her left hand from his and brought it up to his head, tenderly wrapping it around the back of his neck.

Neither one could wait another second.

They both released the hands they still had conjoined, Luke's reaching for her back, Lorelai's reaching for his shoulder. Their lips met, the moment they had both envisioned for so long finally happening. Their kiss was a bit tentative at first, almost like their first time, but their was a deliberate softness to it, both taking their time. This grew too much for them, though, and it quickly deepened, her bringing her hands to his face, him clutching her to him, both sharing this like it was the first and last time they would ever kiss.

There was one more factor worth mentioning in this scene that gave it the little bit of quirkiness that had always been so Luke-and-Lorelai. On the ground, being slowly covered in snowflakes, was a ten-year-old Scorpio horoscope cut out from a newspaper, and not far away was a beautiful engagement ring, both of which had fallen from the hands of two people whose love had proven unstoppable.

Oh, what a sight it was.


I suppose I could tell you about what happened next. I could tell you how, once they finally broke away from their embrace, they went searching through the snow for the lost horoscope and ring (since by that point so much snow had fallen the items in question were out of sight), Lorelai laughing and joking about it the whole time, Luke being serious and upset at first, then giving in to her lightheartedness about the whole thing, just as it has always happened. I could tell you how they went back to the festival for a few minutes, only to be greeted by a shrieking, excited Sookie who could tell what had happened just by the looks on their faces. I could tell you about what happened after they left the festival (although if I did, the rating of this fanfiction would have to be changed). I could even go on and tell you what happened the following days, how they worked through everything, and how their voyage together set sail once again.

But, alas, I am not going to get into all of that. There are many reasons as to why, but I think the biggest one is that it's simply not needed. This part of their lives had it's beginning and it's end, and to go further would be devaluing this special part of their life together in a way.

And now, it is time to go back to those two oh-so-special words I mentioned earlier.

Christmas magic.

Tis true, my friend. I told you I would prove it to you.

Of course, Christmas magic cannot work by itself. On this particular expedition, it was greatly helped by fate, because, you see, if any of the random occurrences that did happen, didn't, things could have gone down a much different road. What would have happened if Luke had decided to take the other road on his way to Hartford? What would have happened if Liz had not borrowed Luke's car? The list continues on and on.

Now, before you think I've gone off the deep end, obviously it wasn't all fate and magic and crap that helped them find their way back to each other. They used the opportunities they were given, and no matter how much fate was involved, if they hadn't done that, then none of this would have happened.

They made it happen.

But it was the holiday magic that helped them through it, that pushed it just a little further, that helped them realize what was supposed to happen, what was the right thing, what they truly needed: each other.


They smoothly broke their kiss apart, him rubbing her stomach, as they continued to watch the snow fall outside, feeling the same magic that had helped them come back together almost a year before.

The holidays can be the best and the worst time of year. They can also change everything, and make the seemingly impossible happen.