Chapter 2: Any Which Way She Can
When Lorelai came downstairs the next morning, Rory was standing there with two boxes of Pop Tarts in her hands.
"Cinnamon or cherry?" she asked, shaking the boxes at her mother. "Or both?"
"Thanks, Kid, but I'm going to the diner," Lorelai said bravely.
"You know you really don't have to do that," Rory insisted. "Give yourself a day or two. No one's going to think any less of you if you step back for a little while."
"Rory," Lorelai sighed, pulling her ponytail out from under her jacket, "I need to go. For one thing, I told Luke I'd be there. I told him this wasn't going to change anything. And for another, if I don't go today, I'm afraid it will just get easier and easier not to go at all. And I don't want that."
"OK," Rory grudgingly conceded. She could see her mother's logic. "Just let me put these in the kitchen and I'll go with you for backup."
They spent a few minutes scurrying around for coats, purses, and backpacks, but were soon on their way.
"You look nice," Rory said, as the Jeep was approaching the center of town.
"Thanks," Lorelai mumbled. For some reason she once again felt as though she needed to dress in tip-top serious businesswoman style, so today she had on dark brown trousers and a beautifully soft caramel-colored sweater. She wanted to make sure she didn't look the least bit flirty.
She parked the Jeep and they headed towards the diner. Right before she pulled open the door, an attack of jitters and regret made her pause.
"There's always Weston's," Rory murmured to her.
Lorelai gave herself a shake and smiled at Rory. "It's fine," she stated, and opened the door.
The breakfast rush was still in effect, but they were able to find a table. Lorelai was grateful to feel the firm chair under her, supporting her. She looked around warily, wondering how many of the townspeople knew about last night. Neither she nor Luke had broadcast the fact that they were going out, but she figured that the news had made the rounds anyway.
Luke straightened up from taking an order at the table by the front window and registered their presence. His face went from shock to irritation to panic in less than ten seconds. He nodded at them curtly and headed for the kitchen.
"See? Not so bad," Rory said to her mom, reassuringly.
"Yeah," Lorelai agreed, happy to have the first response over with.
A sudden commotion from back in the kitchen made everyone fall silent, listening as Luke and Caesar yelled at each other. Something crashed to the floor. The next second Caesar popped out of the doorway into the dining room, almost as though he'd been pushed. Breathless, he looked around, trying to get his bearings. Finally, with a shrug, he picked up the order pad and ambled his way over to the girls.
"Good morning, lovely senoritas," he said to them, trying hard to be jovial and charming. "What can I get for you this morning?"
"Um, pancakes, I think," Rory said, shooting her mom a worried glance.
"Yep, pancakes," Lorelai seconded, a little too heartily. "And coffee, of course! Can't forget that!"
"Be right up!" Caesar said, sounding just as cheery as Lorelai, and hurried off.
As soon as he was gone, Lorelai swung her head around to her daughter. "Oh, yeah. Not bad at all," she mocked.
"It'll get better," Rory said encouragingly, trying not to sound as anxious as she felt.
She was wrong.
The next morning Lorelai dressed in an olive green pencil skirt, a crisp white blouse, black jacket and sensible black heels. She straightened her hair and tucked it back behind her ears. As she put on her good wool dress coat, she told herself that this morning at the diner couldn't possibly be as bad as the day before.
She and Rory took their seats as more yelling erupted back in the kitchen. The other diners all looked around apprehensively, shifting in their seats. Lorelai raised her eyebrows at Rory and shook her head. "Here we go again," she sighed.
But today Caesar apparently won the argument. Luke appeared and shuffled over to their table with about as much enthusiasm as someone being sent to the principal's office.
"What do you want to order?" he asked them gruffly, his face full of misery.
"Jack-omelet-side-of-bacon-and-toast," Lorelai responded at once. "Coffee." She tried to summon up a smile.
Rory blinked at her mom's rapid order. "I'd like some scrambled eggs this morning, Luke. With some cheese on them please. And could you toast me a bagel?"
He scribbled it all down on the order pad, nodded, and fled back to the kitchen.
"This isn't getting better," Lorelai said, smiling through clenched teeth.
"No, it's not," Rory agreed, sadly. "Are you sure you didn't offend him, somehow?"
"No!" Lorelai was affronted. "We were equally miserable! We agreed to just let it go! This is not him letting it go," she pointed out, unnecessarily.
"I guess you'll just have to give it more time, then," Rory sighed. "You know you really can't hurry Luke into change. He'll have to do it at his own rate."
They sipped at the coffee that one of the other workers had brought them. Eventually Luke returned with their orders. He sat the plates in front of them with another brief nod and hurried off.
"What is this?" Lorelai asked in alarm, poking at whatever was on her plate.
"Uh, hash, maybe?" Rory suggested, eying it warily. "Is this oatmeal?" she asked, dipping a spoon into the glutinous mass on her own plate.
"Oh, man, this is bad," Lorelai groaned. "Do we send it back?"
Rory looked around at the incomprehensible items on everyone else's plates. More to the point, she noticed the angry glares being aimed at her mother.
"I think we just make the best of it," she advised.
"Best being a relative term, right?" Lorelai questioned doubtfully, trying to hack off a piece of whatever it was on her plate.
"Right." Rory sighed as she stared at the gray lumps on her plate. "Those Pop Tarts are sounding pretty good right about now, aren't they?" she said, her voice full of regret.
"Lots of things sound pretty good right now," Lorelai groused, "including having my head examined for wanting to date Luke in the first place!"
There was no way Lorelai could face another breakfast at Luke's the next morning. She scrounged up some scones in the kitchen at the Inn and happily drank Sookie's coffee. She felt guilty avoiding the diner, though, so she convinced Sookie to go with her there for lunch.
Having Sookie at her side somehow made the tense atmosphere disappear. Sookie greeted everyone with her usual sunny smile, and instantly started going over the menu, weighing her choices.
Luke appeared, still looking ill at ease, but Sookie was unaware and happily gave him her order, advising him exactly on how she wanted each item cooked.
Lorelai said, "Burger. Fries." She smiled at Luke, trying her best to show him things were still normal. She was trying, damn it! Why couldn't he?
"So, Lorelai," Sookie said, as soon as Luke left their table, "what do you think this means? Last night, while we were at dinner, Jackson asked me how I fried chicken."
"I think it means he wants to know how you fry chicken." Lorelai observed.
"No, no. You're not getting it," Sookie insisted. "He wanted to know how I fry chicken!"
Lorelai frowned. "Is that in code, or something?"
"Yes! Don't you see? He wants to know how I fry chicken!"
Lorelai shook her head. "Sorry, Sook, still not getting it."
"Well, I think it means, because fried chicken is sort of a family-type meal, you know, that he's hinting that maybe we should meet each other's family."
That was serious enough to tear Lorelai's focus away from her Luke problem. "I think you might be reading too much into that," she observed.
"No, no, you don't understand!" And Sookie took off, explaining in great detail the emphasis a fried chicken dinner had in American culinary history.
Luke served them their meals, and Lorelai was relieved to see that the food on them looked edible. Maybe yesterday had just been a bad day.
Sookie stopped talking long enough to take a big bite of the grilled chicken sandwich she'd ordered. "Oh, Sweet Jesus!" she said, her eyes huge. She inelegantly dug the offending bite out of her mouth. "What is that?" she asked, horrified, poking at the thing that might have at one time been a piece of chicken that was currently occupying the space between the bun on her plate.
With a sigh, Lorelai lifted up the top of her own bun and despaired at the shriveled hockey puck residing there.
Miss Patty appeared at their table. "Lorelai, you have to do something about this, and soon!"
"About what, Patty?" Lorelai frowned.
"About whatever you did that knocked Luke off his game."
"I didn't do anything!" Lorelai hissed, dismayed.
"Well, then, maybe that's what the problem is," Patty speculated. "Although, Lorelai, dear, I always had complete faith that when the time came, you'd know just what to do with Luke."
"Look, we went out," Lorelai admitted, keeping her voice as low as possible. "But it just didn't work out, Patty. It was a mistake, but it was no big deal."
Patty's eyebrows rose and she poked at the desiccated hamburger disc on Lorelai's plate. "You think this looks like it was no big deal? Please, darling. It's obvious you broke the poor man's heart."
"It wasn't―" Lorelai broke off her sharp retort, and took a moment to count to ten. "It's understandable that both of us are going to feel a little awkward for a few days, but it isn't like either of us is pining for the other, OK? Things will be back to normal soon."
"They'd better be, or the town's going to revolt," Patty said. "There's already a watch on to pass the word when you're in the diner, so everyone knows when to avoid coming in here. It takes 27 minutes after you've left before he can cook anything decent, and frankly, I don't have that much time between classes."
"Someone's watching for when I come to the diner?" Lorelai was stunned. She knew Stars Hollow had quirks by the dozen, but this was a whole new level of weirdness.
"Please Lorelai," Patty begged. "Take care of this. If you don't care about how hungry the rest of us are, then do something to put poor Luke out of his misery." She nodded at Lorelai firmly. "I'm counting on you to do the right thing."
Lorelai watched Patty leave, her mouth gaping open. "Did you hear that?" she asked Sookie, completely appalled and horrified.
"Yep." Sookie was trying to salvage something edible from her plate. "Jackson was telling me this morning that people were avoiding Luke's."
"And you didn't think to tell me that?"
"Um, no, not really," Sookie said, munching on a carrot stick. Suddenly she stopped chewing, her face creasing in confusion. "Wait. You went out with Luke?"
"Oh, for the love of…" Lorelai let her face smack against the table, realizing that her best friend was so involved in her own love life that she apparently hadn't heard anything else for the past week. "Come on," she sighed, getting up and tugging Sookie up with her, "I'll explain it all again on the way back to work."
The next morning Lorelai arranged to go into work late. She made toaster waffles in her own kitchen, and then she dressed in her oldest pair of jeans, her favorite ones that felt like a second skin. She put on her old B-52's t-shirt. She swiped on just a little mascara and some cherry lip gloss, and tied a scarf around her head to hold back her curls. She pulled on her blue puffy jacket and headed towards the center of town.
She sat in the gazebo for maybe 20 minutes, watching as customers left the diner. Eventually even Caesar left, apparently taking his morning break. That was her cue and she hurried over to the diner, making herself rush up the stairs and pull open the door before she could change her mind and back out.
Once again she went over and stood by the cash register, waiting for Luke in the empty diner. She hoped he'd appear before any other customers came through the door. But then she remembered the neighborhood watch keeping track of her diner time, and figured they were safe.
"Be right there!" Luke called out, having heard the jingle of the bells. He came out of the kitchen quickly, wiping his hands on a towel. He froze for a split second when he saw it was her, but pushed himself to keep walking until he stood before her.
"Hey, Luke," Lorelai said, as cheerfully as possible.
He nodded, looking down at the counter.
"Look," she started. "I'm really sorry that I'm making you uncomfortable. I hate that things are like this between us. This is really not what I wanted at all."
"I know," Luke said quickly. "It's me, and I'm sorry. I just …I feel so bad about that night. I really feel like I let you down."
"No!" Lorelai quickly reassured him. "That night was a disaster, but it was both of us, OK? It was just as much my fault. I don't blame you."
Luke shook his head, looking away. "But I could have been better."
Lorelai blew out a big breath. "So, here's the thing. I've been thinking about this a lot. And we said that we were going to still be friends, right? Well, I'm not sure that we really are friends."
"You don't think we're friends?" Luke said, hotly. It would have sounded like he was angry, except Lorelai saw the hurt in his eyes.
"Well, what do friends normally do? Don't they do things together? Look at our relationship, Luke. It consists of me coming in here and you feeding me. And sometimes, I wheedle you into coming over to my house to fix something. Does that sound like friendship to you?"
He folded his arms tightly across his chest, and the muscle in his jaw got a workout as he tried to control himself. "So you don't want to be friends," he finally said, his voice low and vibrating with restrained anger.
"No, that's not what I said at all!" Lorelai hastened to explain. "I do want to be friends! I just don't think that we are right now!"
He made an effort, loosening his arms and rubbing his hands down along the sides of his jeans. "So what's the solution, then?"
"I think we need to find some things to actually do together. You know, like friends do."
A deep crease furrowed into his forehead. "You want to date again?" he asked in disbelief.
"No! No! God, no," Lorelai said at once, chuckling ruefully. "No, the date word shall never again be uttered between us."
Luke glanced down at the counter, thinking, then looked up at her from under his lashes, just the slightest of mischievous smiles touching his lips. "You're not talking about that foyer thing, are you?"
His illicit suggestion, so un-Luke like, coupled with the sexy look, completely stunned Lorelai for a second as something caught and sizzled deep inside her. Then she hooted with laughter, completely delighted that Luke could keep up with her.
"Well, we can always keep that as a backup plan," she winked at him. "But I really thought that we could just figure out something to do together. You know, hang out."
"Like what?" he asked, somewhat apprehensive at what her suggestion might be.
"I don't know." She thought for a moment. "How about a movie? Do you want to come over and watch a movie with me tonight?"
"Just you?" he asked, his eyebrows rising.
"Probably," she shrugged. "Rory's going to the high school with Lane tonight for her band concert. She'll probably be around later. Is that a problem?" she challenged him.
"Probably not," he said slowly, contemplating. He put his hands on his hips, staring out over the empty diner. "You're not going to make me watch some sappy chick-flick, are you?"
She smirked. "No, I'll find something dripping with testosterone for you. Something that even Tim the Tool Man Taylor would approve of."
He smiled a little at that.
"So do we have a deal?" Lorelai asked.
"Deal," he agreed. "What time?"
"7:30 work for you?"
"Yeah, that'll work," he decided.
"OK," she said, sounding much happier. She turned to leave, but she paused as she opened the door. "Hey, Luke? We're going to fix this. I promise."
He nodded, then cleared his throat. "Thanks, Lorelai."
"See you tonight, pal," she reminded him with a smile, then practically skipped out the door.
It was closer to 7:40 when Luke knocked on Lorelai's door.
"Sorry," he said, stepping inside. "Kirk," he sighed, knowing that no further explanation was necessary.
"No problem," Lorelai replied, reaching to take his jacket. She pointed at his head. "Do you want to take off your cap? Although, I gotta tell you, it sort of unnerved me the other night to see you without it."
Luke grinned. "I'll leave it on, then."
"Okey-doke." She pulled him into the living room. "Wait till you see what I got for us to watch!"
She grabbed up the video boxes and hid them behind her as she hopped around in excitement. "I went into the video store, determined to find the most manly movie that I could. And I scored, big time!"
Luke folded his arms and looked at her impatiently.
"Go on, Luke, guess! Who makes the most manly movies, huh?"
He sighed.
She stopped hopping. "Guess," she ordered.
He recognized the look on her face, and he knew she wasn't going to be happy until he played along. "I don't know." He rolled his eyes. "Sylvester Stallone."
She frowned. "Really? That's your answer?"
"Lorelai!" he warned her. "Just get on with it!"
"You're no fun," she pouted, but just as quickly her good mood returned. "Clint Eastwood!" she crowed, in triumph.
"Oh." He nodded thoughtfully. Maybe this night wouldn't be so bad, after all. "OK," he added.
She brought out the first video from behind her back with a little flourish. "First, we have one of his newer efforts, which may go down as one of his very best: 'The Unforgiven!'"
Luke nodded again, feeling even better about the evening.
"Then," Lorelai continued, "we have something classic from his early years."
Luke expected to see one of the 'Dirty Harry' movies, or maybe one of his spaghetti westerns.
"Ta-Da!" Lorelai whipped out the next video.
A laugh burst out of Luke. "You're kidding!"
She looked hurt. "Come on Luke, what's better than Clint in a tight white t-shirt, beating guys up, and bonding with an orangutan? And to top it all off, you've got Ruth Gordon with a shotgun! What more could you want?" She shook the 'Every Which Way but Loose' tape at him, still looking peeved.
"You're right. It's a classic. My mistake," he appeased her.
She looked satisfied. "Then, to complete tonight's Eastwood trilogy, we have Clint in a romantic mode." She displayed the last box, 'The Bridges of Madison County.'
"Are you crazy?"
"Seriously, Luke, don't you want to see what convinced him to do this movie?" She grinned at him. "Meryl Streep as a lonely Iowa farm wife? Clint as a moody photographer? Think of the mocking potential for us!"
Her smile was forcing one of his own. "OK," he said grudgingly.
"Which one first?" she asked, holding out all three.
He was finding it hard to look away from her bright eyes. "This one," he said, pointing at the middle box. "It's been a long time since I've seen it."
"Clyde it is," she said, happily. "Here, you get everything set up and get comfy. I've got a special treat to whip up for you, in honor of Clyde."
Luke wanted to protest that she didn't need to do that but she'd already dashed off to the kitchen. He put the tape in the VCR and tried to find a comfortable spot on the incredibly lumpy couch. He listened with increasing worry to all of the noises coming from the kitchen, and it took every ounce of his willpower not to go out there and help her.
Eventually she returned, proudly bearing two tall glasses, one of which she handed to him.
"What is it?" he asked, unable to keep the note of suspicion out of his voice.
She rolled her eyes. "Just try it!"
He sniffed it first. "Bananas?"
"It's a banana smoothie," she confirmed, as he took a tentative sip.
"This is good," he declared, shocked.
"I have a blender, Luke," she groused. "I know stuff."
"Yeah, but you…You and cooking aren't exactly known for your compatibility."
She fixed him with a level look. "You know, don't you, that some of the stuff I say and some of the stuff I do is just for show, right? You may be underestimating my abilities."
He raised one eyebrow. "So you're telling me that you're actually a first-class cook?"
"No, but I might not be as helpless as you think. I mean, someone kept Rory alive for the first eleven years of her life, right?"
He smirked. "I thought that was Mia and Sookie."
She chuckled. "They helped," she conceded. She reached for the remote to start the movie, but felt something in her hoodie pocket.
"Oh, here!" She handed him a small bag of almonds. "Apparently these are considered a healthy snack now."
He sat down his drink to open the bag. "You want some?" he asked.
"Got my own," she grinned. She showed him a much larger bag of Hershey kisses.
"What are you drinking?" he asked, pointing at her glass, suspicious again.
"Chocolate shake," she said, looking at him in triumph. "My house, my rules."
"Of course," he agreed, and settled back to enjoy the show.
Lorelai was pretty sure that Luke was having a good time. He seemed relaxed, he laughed occasionally, and he didn't even yell at her when she sang along with the movie's theme song. He appeared pleased when Rory came home and joined them for the last 20 minutes of the movie. She observed him as much as she could, without making it apparent that that was what she was doing.
When the movie ended, Rory said goodnight and went to her room to do some reading.
Luke stood up, too. "I need to get going," he said. Lorelai thought there might be a slight note of regret in his tone. "Someone's got to open up the diner in the morning, and unfortunately, it's my name on the place, so I guess it's me."
"Oh, OK," Lorelai said, disappointed.
He put on his coat and turned to look at her. "This was…fun."
"That was hard for you to say, wasn't it?"
He smiled, but didn't respond to her teasing. "Do you think that maybe…You know, another night…We could watch one of the others?"
"Sure!" Her pleasure at his words was making her bounce on her toes again. "It's always movie night at the Gilmore Theater! Just let me know what works for you."
He nodded as he opened the door and stepped out onto the porch. "Well, thanks, pal," he told her, dryly.
"You're welcome, buddy!" she trilled back at him.
She closed the door happily, relieved that her plan was apparently going to work. Luke might not be "it" for her, but she damned well wasn't going to lose him as a friend.
She headed for the kitchen to clean up the ungodly mess she'd made there, still humming the music from the movie.