Gilmore Girls

Wu Feng Qi Lang

A/N: As the summary says the title means 'creating waves without wind.' It's Chinese. I just thought you should know that this story has taken a rather different turn than I had planned but its okay because I don't hate it. Sorry it's been so long for an update. We're moving and things are crazy here. I'm trying to clean out a house that has two houses worth of furniture in it and things aren't going so well because I have run out of boxes. Whoopee! Hope you like. Gen. xx

Summary: Rory doesn't want to do this anymore. (Creating Waves Without Wind.)

Disclaimer: I do not own Gilmore Girls nor am I affiliated with it in anyway. I have taken the title from 'Falling Leaves' by Adeline Yen Mah.

Chapter Five: All Doors Open

"Make believe
that you don't see the tears
Just let me grieve
in private 'cause each time I see you
I break down and cry
And walk on by (don't stop)
And walk on by (don't stop)
And walk on by."

Walk On By written by Burt Bacharach

"If I asked you to stay, would you?" Logan asked.

"Probably," she replied, too tired or too unwillingly to lie. She rolled over onto her stomach so she was facing Logan. "But you wouldn't ask me to stay."

"Probably not," he agreed. "Not for lack of not wanting you to stay."

"I know that," she answered. They lay in the near-dark staring at each other. (Not trying to memorise each other. They had already done that). She felt for Logan in the dark and when her arm hit his hard, sculpted chest and when her head moved onto the space her arm had just been, she felt that his breathing was shallow and quick. He was tense and he was scared. "What is it?"

"Ace, are you trying to tell me that you love your parents more?" he asked, tentatively. Rory almost smiled. She knew he had rehearsed the question over and over in his head and that he had been dying to ask her for ages. But she couldn't smile. (The love she felt for him and the love she felt for them was so different. Entirely different).

"Huntzberger, I can't believe you would even ask that," she replied. She kissed his chest and sat up so she could look down at him. "If it were you in Europe, I would have been on the first plane I could."

"Yes, but I wouldn't abandon you, Ace," he told her.

"Ouch," she whispered. She lowered herself back down and rested her head against his chest. She liked to hear his heartbeat before she slept. It almost convinced her she was real. Tonight his heartbeat was erratic but she knew hers was too.

The words hurt. (They stung). But she knew they were true.

-

"Are you sure you have everything?" he asked. He sounded weary. Weary and panicked and concerned. How someone managed to sound all three of those at once was a mystery to Rory but nonetheless, Logan sounded weary, panicked and concerned. She assumed it was an act and that he was actually trying to cover up his true feelings. He was gutted and he knew it and he knew that she knew. Or so she hoped. (Her wise mother had once told her that 'assuming makes an ass out of you and me' but all things considered, maybe Lorelai wasn't the best person to be taking advice from).

"Everything I need," she replied. "And if I don't, I can always buy it."

"Yes, I think your salary has ensured you can afford to buy anything you've forgotten. Heaven knows we don't need the money," he reminded her.

"I know," she said. "It's not about the money."

"I know but I wish it was. Maybe that way you wouldn't have to go," he whispered.

-

"Don't roll away from me like that," Logan said, his voice breaking the silence like a gunshot or a cracked whip. Lorelai Leigh Hayden whimpered slightly but didn't move away. "Please don't spend our last night all the way over in the South Pole while I lie here in the North Pole. It's cold here. I need you."

"I won't go," she whispered. She felt him stiffen and she sighed. "I won't roll away from you in this bed, in this our bed. I'll stay close."

"I almost can't bear touch you," he said. "But I can't bear not to touch you. I don't want to let go of you. Not now, not then, not ever."

"Please don't ask me to stay because I don't think I could say no," she replied. He heard the tremor in his voice and he responded by placing kisses in her hair. She sighed and lay there, awake and unsleeping, wrapped in his arms.

She thought back to the morning, barely two weeks ago, when she had been thrilled to think that she and Logan were falling apart. The morning when they had woken up, separated, the sheets acting like a flimsy white barrier (soft and flowing, a little leeway). What an idiot she had been. So sure she wanted to leave him, so sure she wanted to be herself, so sure she didn't want to be a trophy wife.

She still didn't want to be a trophy wife but she only had herself to blame. But she didn't want to leave him now. She couldn't believe she ever had. At first, it had been a pride thing. At first it had just been a job (a job she wasn't going to take) but then when she realised it was Paris and the possibility of seeing her parents had screamed at her and had made itself known, she knew she had no choice but to take the job that had been offered to her. At first she had lied even to herself. That it was just because she wanted to work, wanted the chance to make her mark on the cosmetics world (when had her priorities changed? Even she didn't believe it. It was the world, not the cosmetics world she wanted to leave her mark on) but then slowly, minute by minute, moment by moment, second by second the truth started to sink in.

She didn't care about cosmetics. Didn't care about re-branding and re-packaging, didn't care about her job (she'd have been happy as a secretary at the paper, that's how much she wanted to work) all she cared about was finding her parents, getting the answers to her questions. She had become a woman obsessed, a woman consumed. She needed to know now and she was going to find out and bless her husband.

Because he wasn't stopping her. Was he?

(No because he wanted to know too. He wanted Rory back).

-

"Bye, bye house," Rory whispered as she hiked her cabin bag up on her shoulder. She looked over at the lift where Logan was waiting. He was watching her intently and sighed when she held up her finger asking for one more moment. She walked over to the closet and opened the door. After that, she opened the bathroom door and most of the cupboard doors in the pantry.

"Ace! Come on, let's go. You're going to miss your flight," she heard her husband call.

"And I'm going to miss you," she whispered to the empty space, the tears welling up in her eyes. She backed away to the door and smiled, looking at the swinging pieces of wood. "There. Now there'll always be a door open for me."

-

"Maybe when I come back, I'll change my name to Huntzberger," she murmured.

"Really?" he asked. A smile split his face in two and made his eyes twinkle.

"Sure," she said. She moved closer to him and played with the lapels of his coat, lifting them up and then smoothing them. She pecked him on the cheeks. "You are my husband, my most reliable family. I should have done it a long time ago."

"It would make me happy," he admitted. "I never really liked the idea of us having different last names but I know how much it means to you to finally have the same last name as both of your parents."

"Have I always been so selfish?" she asked. "I was willing to give up my marriage just to track my parents down."

"You were?" he asked, stepping away. (News to him but not news to her).

"I thought I could use the excuse that we were growing apart, that we wanted different things in life. I wanted to work and you wanted to work and we both wanted to work so that wasn't really true," she admitted.

"What you really wanted was an excuse to go to Paris without feeling guilty," he said.

"Yes," she sighed. "That is what I wanted. I didn't want to be tied to anything. What if I find them? What if I don't want to leave? I wanted the option of being able to stay, of being able to run away like they did."

"You still can," he offered. "I'll let you. I just wish you had of told me earlier. I could have had some divorce papers drawn up and you could have taken them with you and signed them whenever you felt the need. I would have been okay with that."

"Logan!" she yelled. "Why? Why do you always have to do that? This was going so well. Why did you have to ruin this?"

"Ruin this? Ruin saying goodbye to my wife for two years. And don't say it isn't two years that we'll see each other soon because no matter what way I look at it, its still two years and its still two years without you. We only have eighty years in a life and it took me twenty of them to find you and another five to bag you," he said. He paused and looked down at the ground. "I want to spend the other fifty-five years of my life with you, so what's two, right? But then I got thinking. What if when you get there, you realise you feel differently about me than I feel about you? Or you fall in love with some guy name Henri or Georges Luc? What if you don't want to be alone in the city of love? I mean I get it. I really do. I just wanted to leave all the doors open for you, give you options like you gave them to me. Boyfriend or bust, you know?"

"Stop it," she ordered. She stepped towards him and although he grabbed her hands, he was using them to push her away from him. She gripped his hands and wouldn't let him go. To his credit, he didn't struggle. (And to her relief). "I don't want to divorce you. I feel differently now. I just need closure, Logan. I need closure. I need to say goodbye face to face. And when I've done that, I want to know that I'm coming home to you because I love you. I love you, Logan. I love you. If I don't want to be alone in the city of love, I'll buy myself a dog. A poodle and I'll call him Georges Luc because that is the closest I am getting to falling in love with a guy with a fake-sounding French name."

"You always have been this selfish," he whispered, answering her earlier question. (And it has always killed us). "Spoilt too. It comes with being an only child."

"Ah, but I'm not an only child. I have a half sister," she argued. "A half sister. She only belongs to one half of my parents and yet they took her. I belong to them both and they left me here. Left me here with you."

"And I'm eternally grateful if not a little devastated and worn-down," he replied. She rolled her eyes and walked towards him and threw her arms around him so quickly that he didn't have time to walk backwards or push her away. "This wasn't how our goodbye was supposed to go."

"I know," she said. "I'm sorry, Logan. I really am. For telling you I thought about leaving you and for actually leaving you."

"It's what you have to go," he shrugged. With great difficulty and a shuddering voice, he continued. "If you decide you want me to come too, just call me. I'll drop everything and I'll be there in an instant."

"Thanks but I think I have to do this on my own," she whispered. She looked up at him and smiled. They kissed and kissed and kissed and kissed, pressing into each other as if they could leave a permanent imprint of themselves on each other. When they finally wrenched away, Rory could see blood on Logan's lip. She wiped it away and pecked him quickly one more time. "I should go."

"I guess you should," he agreed.

"I love you, Huntzberger."

"And I you, Ace."

She turned and squared her shoulders. She made it to the gate before she turned around and ran back to him, throwing herself into his arms. He held her tight and breathed in the floral scent of her hair.

"Why haven't you asked me to stay?" she sobbed.

"Because I want you to do this," he said. "Because you need to do this. I want you back and it's the only that is going to happen."

He lowered her to the ground and tenderly wiped her face of the tears that had stained it. She nodded and struggled to smile.

"Don't try to smile. Just turn around, square your shoulders and get on that plane. Don't think about it and don't turn around. I'll be here when you get back and I'll be waiting for you," he said.

She nodded and bravely turned around. She felt his eyes watching her as she showed the hostess her ticket. She took the ticket back and looked down to see it fluttering. She tried to steady her hand because she knew Logan was watching and she wanted him to think she was being brave when really she wasn't. She walked slowly towards the plane (as if walking through cement) and she fought so hard the impulse to turn around and see him one last time. (What if he had left already? Unable to watch her go). She turned at the very last minute to see him watching her intently. She bit her lip and his eyes lit up. She raised a hand in goodbye and he mirrored her move.

They stood there, watching and looking, as long as they could until the hostess moved towards her and told her she could not stand there any longer, she had to get on the plane. Rory couldn't physically move, couldn't turn herself around. She said this to the woman and she looked from Rory to Logan (at least he assumed because he saw her lips moving). She must have seen something there, something in their eyes and she nodded. She gently put her arm around Rory's shoulder and guided her, walking backwards to the plane. Eventually, Rory had to turn around and when she did, Logan felt his heart collapse through the door.

"It's only two years," he whispered to himself, eliciting looks from the other non-first class passengers. "Only two years."

(Right?)

But he knew it would be less because he had told her not to turn around, not to look at him one last time and she had.