Guess whose back? Yep it me. I'm still trying write a bit a head but since I was gone for about a week I thought I'd give you all another update. Thank you, thank you to everyone reading and reviewing, and just reading. I really appreciate it. I hope you enjoy where i"m taking this story. I have plans.. lol
disclaimer: ASP and Universal own Gilmore Girls
Chapter 11 - *If I Knew
Oh, oh I, I was a city boy
Riding to danger's where I'd always run above and is hurt
I wouldn't have done
All the things that I've done
If I knew one day you would come
Now, baby, now, baby, now, baby
Oh, oh, oh, I, I know it breaks your heart
To picture the only one you wanna love
In someone else's arms
Logan leaves the boys in the waiting room to go back and see Rory. Finn is frustrated that he can't see her immediately, but Logan isn't sure just how welcome they are especially considering the situation.
Logan knocks on the open door to her door. Emily and Lorelei sit next to Rory.
"Twice in one week. Wow that's got be a record Logan. Should we be thanking you for stopping by?" Emily says venom seeping in her voice.
"Mom," Lorelei tries to interject
"Don't 'Mom' me Lorelei. He hasn't exactly been a fixture in their life during this pregnancy. He married another woman for goddess sake, who I might add doesn't hold a candle to my granddaughter."
"Nice to see you've kept up on me Emily."
"Don't flatter yourself son."
"Grandma." Rory interrupts.
"You don't have to make excuses for him Rory. "
"He didn't know."
"Excuse me?!" Emily looks like she might pass out.
"He didn't know Grandma. I never told her. We broke up and I just… I never…He didn't know." Rory looks ashamed as Emily looks at her granddaughter with a look even he can't describe.
"Well, my apologies then Logan. Please excuse me I need some air." She leaves the room.
Lorelei however does not.
She stands next to Rory's bed, her hand on the lifted back, the protective mother bear standing over her cub.
It seems like the room is filled with weighted air. It feels thick, and the intake and exhale of breath from the three is the only sound.
"I held him." Logan finally breaks the silence.
Lorelei looks like she's going to lose her cool.
"You what?!"
"I held my son Lorelei. There's nothing wrong with that. I just wanted to come say thank you to Rory for allowing me to see him." He wants to say more but he's always had a hard time talking in from of Rory's mother.
"How dare you?!" Lorelei says.
"Mom…"
"He hasn't even been held by his mother yet and you're in there taking over already?!"
"Mom…!"
"You haven't held him?" Logan says in surprise.
"I've got this infection that just won't go away. So no, I haven't been able to hold him."
"I'm sorry." He says. " I didn't know."
"Mom can you please give us a minute." She says, and it's not really a question
After Lorelei leaves the room Rory makes eye contact with him and says, "What was it like?" It's a whisper of a question on her lips.
"He's amazing Ace. He's so small, but he's got this amazing grip that surprised me." He's excitedly making his way closer to her.
"There this sweet smell of him and the little weight in my arm felt like nothing I've ever imagined. But Ace, he's so small and there's these tubes helping him breath. I'm so scared for him." He says before he can stop himself from confessing.
"I'm scared too." She says
"You are going to be an great mother Rory. That's one lucky kid." He says as he sits and takes her hand in his.
She looks down at her hand in his and he realizes what he's done and pulls back.
"So, Emily must be thrilled that you passed on Richard's name."
"I don't think she's too happy with me right now. She always liked you and it has killed her to be mad at you." She giggles.
"It's ok. I can take it, Ace."
"But you shouldn't have to."
He just shrugs it off as he walks over and looks at the flowers around her room. He notices a card and raises an eyebrow at her, "Marty? You two still friends?"
"We never stopped, you know that."
"I thought after the whole Lucy drama you stopped talking."
"We made up. That's what friends do, Logan."
He snickers, "As if that guy ever wanted to be just your friend Rory."
Logan's phone rings in his pock. It's a text from Finn. He shows the phone to Rory.
"The boys want to know if they can come in?"
"They're here?!" She says with excitement.
"Come on, Ace, you know once they found out you were here nothing was going to keep them away. They love you."
He text Finn the ok and the boys all rush in full of hugs and kisses for the new mother. It feels like they are back at Yale. He watches the guys interact with her and it's so easy between them. He knows that now that Richie's in the picture there's no way they are going to let her out of their lives again. It makes him a bit melancholy as it will be so much easier for them then it will be for him.
His phone rings again, its Odette and he takes the call in the far corner, unable to make himself leave her room.
"Hey.."
"Hey babe. I thought we had dinner plans tonight, but you've been MIA all day. Please tell me Finn hasn't gotten you drunk before 9pm." She sounds so happy.
"I'm not drunk, but honestly I wish I was." He says
Odette can hear the strain in his voice. "Is it Rory? Is she ok?" She says concerned.
Logan's heart hurts. She's worried about Rory. How shitty is this whole situation? He married such a great girl, someone he's able to be totally honest with, and yet he's sitting here at Rory's bedside. He wants to stay here with her and yet he wants to go home.
"She's going to ok, but there is some very new information that I need to tell you."
"Oookay." She drags out.
"Not now, but meet me at Galli on Mercers Street in hour. We are both going to need some red wine and a lot of carbs." He kids.
"I never need a reason for Carbs, Logan. I'll be there."
Before he hangs up he says, "Hey, O?"
She mummers back, before he continues, "Thank you for being you."
"I couldn't be anyone else if I tried. See you in an hour."
They disconnect and Logan looks up to see Finn deep in conversation with Rory about his nursing date. She's laughing at Finn but her eyes dart back to him as he hangs up the phone.
"Odette?" Colin asks.
"Yeah. I've got to tell her about all this. But how am I going to explain something I don't even understand?"
They look back at Rory who has once again turned her attention back to Finn.
"I don't know man. I really don't." Colin adds
Logan sighs. He knows if he doesn't leave now, while the room is full of their friends and laughter that he won't be able to leave her alone. So he makes an excuse about business and give the brunette a quick squeeze of the arm before leaving. He walks out with his head high, but his heart is in a million pieces. He has Odette, a son and his Ace all depending on him and he doesn't want to let anyone down.
but I wouldn't have done
All the things that I have done
If I knew one day you would come
Now, baby, now, baby, now, baby
Oh, baby, please, let's leave the past behind us
So that we can go where love will find us
Yeah, will find us
I know once girls would leave me
But I know that you believe me
Odette hangs up the phone. In the past few days everything she has come to depend on is suddenly hanging by a thread.
It had been only on a whim that she had decided to meet this THE Logan Huntzberger. Her father was worried about her. Since James had died she pretty much just walked though life with a black cloud over her head. She went through the motion, job, friend, daughter, etc etc. It was all bit of a joke to her now.
James had been the best thing to ever happen to her. He was rich, of course, as were most of the people she met, but he'd rather be on a basketball court then in a conference room, and he'd rather wear cleats than couture. He worked hard, but he played hard too.
They had met when his beach volleyball rolled onto her blanket. He called her on her queen bee behavior immediately. She was a bit of bitch when she was younger. It was a safety device, as all the men she'd know were either asses or only wanted one thing from her, and it wasn't her money.
Most guys saw her as a nice piece of ass that gained them status in society. They didn't care that she had a brain. But James was different. He pushed her and called her a downright bitch when she was being one. Which really just made him laugh at her more because he knew it wasn't the real her.
They were inseparable and for the first time in her entire life she felt loved for just who she was. He had asked her to marry him and she had said yes. However, on the way to pick her up for a no muss no full courthouse wedding he had blown a tire on his truck, which flipped and rolled down a ravine.
She was told he had died on impact. There was nothing they could do. And so she went back to the bitch she had been. Sleeping with whomever she wanted, because really none of it mattered, none of their opinions and none of the money. She simply didn't care about anyone or anything. The day James died was the day Odette lost a part of herself.
So when she agreed to go out with Logan, it was all a bullshit agreement. She figured she'd meet him, have a good dinner and then she'd either scare him off with her bitchiness or he'd decide that it was his business to fuck the bitchiness out of her. Either way she'd be gone by midnight and her father would leave her alone for a few more months.
However things hadn't gone exactly as planned. Both she and Logan had been complete jerks that night. He'd already had several drinks before she'd gotten there and then she drank him under the table in only a few minutes.
She insulted him and he agreed with her observation but added that she wasn't as good a bitch as she thought she was. So, ok there was chemistry, but it had been about a month she'd gotten laid so what was the harm.
And just about on schedule they landed back at his place, drunk and on the way to naked. But right in the middle of scrambling to take off their clothes they bumped his answering machine and someone named Rory had left a message.
That brought everything to a screeching halt. Which sent her into full on bitch fit mode. How could he bring her here and not screw her now!? She needed to forget. She needed a few minutes where James wasn't fully encompassing her head and heart. She needed to fuck.
But suddenly Logan, that she had heard many sexual rumors about, was saying no. After she broke a vase against his wall she looked at him and suddenly she saw herself reflecting back at her. He wasn't yelling at her, or fighting back or stopping her. He just stood there. His head down his shoulders forward.
"Logan?" She stepped in from of him.
"What?" He snapped.
"Are you ok?"
"Me?" he chuckled, "You're the one throwing things."
"But I'm a bitch, and that's not what I asked. Whose Rory?"
He snuck a glance at the machine that now lay on the floor next to her tantrum vase.
She walked over to the bar and poured him a glass of the nearest alcohol.
"Here. Drink." She ordered. She led him to the couch where he sat. He suddenly looked like a lost little boy. She let him sit and sip the drink in silence while she cleaned up her mess.
When she finished she went and sat next to him on the sofa. "You want another?"
He shook his head and sat the glass down. "God help me I love someone that doesn't love me back."
"Ain't that always the way?"
"Not once upon a time. Once upon a time she did love me back. This intelligent, amazing woman loved a guy like me, and I felt like it set me free, but somewhere along the way I ruined it. How do you get back from that?"
Odette knew exactly how he felt. How do you get back a piece of you that doesn't belong to you anymore. It remind her of her favorite poem, **Happiness Is… which says:
Happiness is like a crystal,
Fair and exquisite and clear,
Broken in a million pieces,
Shattered, scattered far and near.
But there are so many pieces
No one ever finds them all.
And so instead of leaving by midnight she stays, and tells him all about her lost happiness and how she may never find all the pieces again.
And he in turn tells her all about his Ace, and she sees a man that doesn't want anything from her, and in turn she begins to want to give him everything. He becomes her best friend, her confidant and yes her lover and again as time goes on and she agrees to marry her best friend the same poem rings in her head:
Yet the wise as on they journey
Treasure every fragment clear,
Fit them as they may together,
Imaging the shattered sphere,
Learning ever to be thankful,
Though their share of it is small;
For it has so many pieces
No one ever finds them all.
And so over the years they have rebuilt their shattered crystal together, yes there are pieces that will always be missing, but happiness hasn't been a mystery to her or him or their life and that has made all the difference, and tonight she fears her crystal may shatter again.
Baby, I, I wish we were seventeen
So I could give you all the innocence
That you give to me
No, I wouldn't have done
All the things that I have done
If I knew one day you would come
If I knew one day you would come
*Lyrics are If I Knew by Bruno Mars
** Happiness Is… by Priscilla Leonard
