A/N: Love reviews, love them! Thank you all! Now, to be honest, this chapter got away from me a little bit. I wanted to do a L/L Christmas (since Gilmore Girls cheated us out of that particular delight), I wanted to see Luke giving Lorelai a romantic gift that he actually took the time to pick out (*cough cough* Vineyard Valentine), and I wanted to talk about the books Rory mentions in 7x01 (since that's the point of this story). The result is this loooong, dialogue-heavy account of the L's first Christmas as a couple. Enjoy! x
(P.S. I'm entering a busy stretch of life these next few weeks, so it might take me a little while to get the next few chapters up. But fear not - they are coming!)
"So all these books remind you of Luke?"
"Yeah. Those are books I gave him to read, but he never did."
"Oh, Cormac McCarthy, good call. In Cold Blood, he would've loved that."
"Well, we'll never know now."
"And you wanted him to read Hammerhead Sharks: Demons of the Deep?"
"He recommended that one for me."
Season 5 - First Christmas
Lorelai stumbled into Luke's, struggling with the weight of about 15 colorful shopping bags. "Luke! Luuuke!" she called out into the abandoned room as she attempted to close the door with her foot.
"We're closed!" she heard his grumpy voice come from the kitchen.
"Luke!" she cried adamantly. "I'm not a customer, I'm your GIRLFRIEND!"
He emerged from the kitchen and, seeing her feeble attempts to close the door, rushed over to help. After several of the bags had been placed on the nearest table and the door had been successfully closed, Lorelai turned to Luke with hands on her hips. "'We're closed?'" she asked scathingly.
Luke just rolled his eyes and headed back to the kitchen. "We ARE closed."
Lorelai seated herself at the counter. "Yes, but you're not closed for ME!"
"Look, I couldn't hear who it was over the fryer," he said.
"Oh yeah, a likely excuse!" she grumbled. "Why are you frying stuff anyways? If you're closed - and, after the conversation we've had thus far, there is no doubt in my mind that you ARE, in fact, closed - then you shouldn't have any food left to serve."
There was a pause. Lorelai heard a few noises that she vaguely recognized as being related to cooking, and then Luke emerged from the kitchen with a cheeseburger and fries. He placed the plate in front of her and said simply, "This is for you."
"Oh." She picked up a single fry and bit it, smiling timidly at him. "Sorry?"
"It's fine," he responded in typical Luke fashion as he poured her a cup of coffee. "I would have expected nothing less from you after a long day of shopping."
"Oh yes, the shopping," Lorelai said, her eyes lighting up. "The shopping was so successful, Luke, you would not believe the things I found."
"I bet I would," he said distractedly, punching some numbers on his calculator.
"Why is that?" she asked, taking a humongous bite out of her burger.
"Because every single year at Christmas, you come in with all of these bags, you drop them all over the tables, and then you tell me that you found Rory the perfect book that she doesn't have yet or at least you don't think she has it yet. Then you tell me that you bought Sookie whatever cooking thing they told you to get at that fancy cooking store -"
"Williams-Sonoma."
"Sure, fine. And THEN you explain to me that because you've been shopping there for Sookie for so many years, you've struck up a friendship with a flamboyantly gay man -"
"Paul."
"Who helps you decide what to get Sookie each year. Then you tell me that you found something acceptable for your father and something that your mother won't like anyways. But it's ok because you just have to drop the gifts off at the Christmas party and then you don't have to personally witness the look of disappointment on your mother's face."
"Not that I'm not used to it," Lorelai responded.
"You say that every year, too," Luke said dryly. "Then you say that this year might just be the year you'll slip something dirty like edible underwear or a sex toy into the gift for your mother."
"But I never do."
"Exactly," Luke said, throwing his hands up. "You see, you're predictable. You say the same thing every Christmas."
"Hm, maybe," Lorelai said, tilting her head. "That particular speech, however, just made me realize that you really needed a life for the last 12 years. You seriously had nothing better to do than memorize my post-Christmas shopping explanation?"
Luke shrugged. "I was pining, remember?"
"Ah, yes. Ava Gardner and such."
Luke rolled his eyes and walked around the counter. He seated himself on the stool beside her. "Hello, by the way," he said, kissing her gently.
"Hey," she responded quietly. She tucked her head into his shoulder as he enveloped her into his arms. "You smell good."
"I smell like a diner."
"You smell like Luke," she countered.
Luke smiled and kissed her hair. "I missed you today. Why did you have to go all the way to New York for your shopping?"
"Can't you just queue up the instant replay of my Christmas speech? I'm sure I've explained it before," Lorelai said, pulling back with a grin.
"Well, I could do that, but I think I've deprived you of enough fun today," Luke said.
"You go to New York for the atmosphere, Luke, the atmosphere!" she explained as if it were the most obvious answer in the world.
"And here we go," he said, carrying her plate back to wash it off.
"It's the people and the places and the stores and the smells," she began happily. "Shopping in New York is much different than shopping anywhere else, Luke. The people in New York are pros, they shop the way we breathe, like it's the most natural thing in the world. And in a way, it's nice to put on a fancy outfit for a day and walk through the crowded streets with all these shopping bags, like you regularly blow hundreds of dollars on pointless items. It's just a good feeling to run with the big city folk for a few hours." She paused to sip some coffee. "And that, my friend is why I go to New York."
Luke reappeared. "Nothing you just said makes any sense to me personally. But I guess as long as you had fun, it doesn't matter."
"Story of us, don't you think?" she said, holding her cup up for a refill.
He frowned. "Do you really need a second cup this late?"
"Uh… yes," she said, shaking her head at his naiveté. As usual, Luke sighed and obliged. "Hey, Luke?"
"Hm?" he asked, going back to the register to finish totaling some bills.
"Shopping was a little different this year than it has been in the past."
"Why is that?"
"Well… because this year I have a boyfriend who makes me extremely happy and I felt like I had to get him something extra special."
Luke looked up. "You really didn't have to get me anything special."
"I know, Luke, but I wanted to. And if you will help me carry these bags up to your apartment, we can have a pre-Christmas tonight!"
"What the hell's a pre-Christmas?"
"Is that a serious question?"
"Does this face look like I'm joking?" Luke asked, completely deadpan.
"I keep forgetting what a sad life you've had," she sighed. "Ok, well, Luke, as it has fallen to me yet again to explain a basic holiday to you, I will do my best to convey the joy that is pre-Christmas."
"Goody," he muttered.
"The first rule of pre-Christmas is that you cannot be surly," she said, narrowing her eyes.
"This doesn't sound like a good holiday for me."
"Ignoring you now. The second rule of pre-Christmas is that you cannot say anything negative about pre-Christmas."
"Yes, Fuhrer," he said, making an odd half-bow.
"Are you insinuating that my rules are akin to those of Hitler?" she asked in disbelief. "Actually, you know what, I'm still ignoring you. Moving on. Pre-Christmas is essentially a day which functions as Christmas for those groups of people who will not be together on the real Christmas day."
"Like us?"
"Precisely like us," she said, smiling kindly. "I knew you would catch on eventually. Now, because I am being shanghaied by the Gilmores all day and you are attending Christmas dinner with Liz and TJ -"
"A dinner which we set up for the sole purpose of me missing Christmas with your parents," Luke supplied.
"That's the one," Lorelai said cheerily. "Because I'll be in Hartford and you'll be here with Liz and TJ, we will probably not see each other all day on Christmas. So, the solution to this terrible predicament is to have pre-Christmas now!"
"I see," Luke said, "and what does a pre-Christmas entail?"
"Oh, you know, the usual," she said, nodding. "We have to give each other our presents, and then we have to make those terrible yet delicious Pillsbury cookies shaped like Christmas trees - don't worry, I brought some - and then we have to watch It's a Wonderful Life. Oh, and you have to swap your handy dandy baseball cap for this!" she finished, pulling a Santa hat out of one of her bags with a flourish.
Surprisingly, Luke did not even protest. He just sighed and, taking the Santa hat, jammed it onto his head. "Let's get these bags upstairs," he grumbled.
Lorelai squealed happily and launched herself at him. "Thank you thank you thank you!" she cried, hugging him fiercely.
"You're welcome," he said, disentangling himself. "But no more coffee."
"Mean!"
"Get the rest of these bags before I change my mind."
An hour later, all of the packages were relocated, the smell of Christmas cookies was wafting through Luke's tiny apartment, and Lorelai was rummaging through Luke's dresser.
"What are you doing?" he asked as he emerged from the bathroom in sweatpants.
"I am looking for a shirt that will match my Santa hat."
"Your Santa hat is purple."
"I know that, Luke."
"I don't have any purple shirts," he said, flopping onto the bed with a groan.
Lorelai turned away from the dresser with a sigh. "Yes, I'm noticing that. I guess I'll have to wear my First Date Floor Show Flannel." She grabbed said shirt and headed into the bathroom. "One day, though, the sheer sexiness of seeing me in this shirt is going to wear off and you are going to wish that you had more variety of colors in your wardrobe."
"Purple is probably the only color I don't have in my wardrobe."
"Psh, oh, really?" she said, throwing herself onto the bed beside him. "Pink? You have pink?"
"You know I don't have any pink flannel shirts."
"Precisely. How about yellow?"
"Yellow isn't practical for the diner," Luke said defensively. "If you spill something on it, you see it all day!"
"Luke, you don't have any shirts that are girl colors, just face it."
"As hard as it is for me to admit, that is probably because I'm not a girl," Luke said in exasperation.
"Well, that's good. Otherwise our relationship would be very modern," she said with a frown. "Hey! Where is your Santa hat?"
"Oh, I thought I could… take it off now," Luke said dodgily, fumbling with the handle on his nightstand.
Lorelai's mouth fell open. "Luke! You have got to be kidding me! You hid your hat in your nightstand and thought I wouldn't notice."
"No, I... didn't," he said with a forced laugh.
Lorelai squinted menacingly. "Luke," she said slowly.
They stared at each other for a moment before Lorelai let out something that could only be described as a war cry. She threw herself on top of him in a fierce attempt to reach the nightstand, but Luke was ready; he grabbed her in a tried and true defensive wrestling position and flipped her back over to her side of the bed. She struggled in vain for a few moments before finally slumping dejectedly onto the pillows.
Luke held himself above her, smirking. He released one of her arms long enough to brush the hair away from her eyes. Lorelai's frustrated expression melted away as she met his eyes. "You are pretty beautiful, you know that?" he whispered.
"As long as you think so," she said quietly. He lowered his body, push-up style, and gave her a sweet, long , lingering kiss.
"I definitely think so," he responded after a few moments, and then rolled over onto his side, capturing her waist with his right hand as his left formed a cushion for her head.
Lorelai smiled brilliantly as she nuzzled her body closer to his. Somehow it never seemed like they were close enough. He layered kisses down her cheek and neck, his right hand roaming higher, gently squeezing random parts of her side.
"Mmm," she moaned quietly, languishing in his touch. Luke responded by raising his mouth from her neck and kissing her mouth passionately. She wriggled herself even closer to him, involuntarily pushing her hips forward to meet his.
Luke groaned. "God, you are… the sexiest person," he mumbled as he pulled her waist towards him roughly. He returned his mouth to her neck, biting and sucking the area just below her ear lobe that she liked so much. His hands wandered down and he began unbuttoning his own shirt, the one currently concealing her perfect body from view…
"Wait, wait," she gasped suddenly. Luke didn't stop; instead, he placed a long kiss on her collar bone, then lower, lower, inching towards her breast. "God that feels good," she gasped, momentarily distracted. But then –"Ok, Luke, seriously – wait."
He groaned in disappointment, but he obeyed. "You're going to tell me to stop so that we can do pre-Christmas, aren't you?" he asked, flopping back onto the bed.
Lorelai laughed shakily, still trying to catch her breath. "Something like that," she responded as she placed one more light kiss on his lips. "Ok… presents!"
Luke glowered at her. "I was ok with this holiday until it interfered with us having sex."
"Oh please, you were tolerating this holiday, at best," she replied distractedly, rummaging through her bags and removing a few gift-wrapped packages. "And besides, when have I ever denied you sex?"
Luke pondered this question as he climbed off the bed and pulled his own wrapped bundles from the top shelf of his closet. "Good point. Never."
Lorelai grinned at him from her spot on the bed. "Aw, Luke, you have my presents!"
"Of course I have your presents. It's December 23rd."
She frowned. "Well don't say it like that. I look like a slacker for just getting yours today."
He rolled his eyes as he sat back down in front of her. "You are exhausting."
"I know. Ok, you open yours first."
She pushed three bulky wrapped boxes towards him and he shook one suspiciously. "You didn't go over the limit?"
"I did not go over the limit," Lorelai said, raising her hand in an attempt at a Scout's Honor salute. They had, after much debate, decided to set a $50 limit on what they could spend on each other for Christmas and other major holidays. This was in large part because Lorelai had publicly threatened suicide if she had to hear Luke's "holidays-are-just-excuses-for-wasteful-consumeris m" rant one more time. However, her acquiescence to the $50 limit was also self-serving, as Luke was the least materialistic person alive and choosing gifts for him was a struggle even for Lorelai Gilmore.
"Ok," Luke responded, satisfied. He tore open the first package and removed a thick book. "No Country for Old Men," he read aloud.
"Yeah, it's the perfect book for you!" Lorelai interjected happily. You told me you liked Cormac McCarthy and this is one of his new ones and it's got everything you like – guns and drugs and criminals and murder!"
Luke burst out laughing. "Those are my interests?"
Lorelai shrugged. "Well, yes. You like thrillers and true crime stories and reading those profiles of serial killers. Which, now that you mention it, does disturb me the tiniest bit."
Luke kissed her quickly on the lips. "Well, thank you. I need some new things to read."
The present-opening continued, as Luke unveiled another Cormac McCarthy novel, The Road ("It's got guns and cannibals and a post-apocalyptic wasteland!") and Truman Capote's In Cold Blood ("Seriously, Luke, that is a classic, oh my god. I read it when Rory was 15 and I didn't sleep for weeks.")
"Thank you very much," he said honestly, collecting his new books and placing them on his nightstand.
"You like them?"Lorelai asked earnestly.
He was sometimes still amazed at her hesitance around him. She knew him better than anyone, and yet she still doubted her ability to pick out a present he would like. "Yes," he said, squeezing her arm. "I really, really like them. I can't wait for tonight, when you are rotting your brain with late-night talk shows, and I can read my new books. Now, here." He pushed three packages towards her.
"Ooooh," she said, shaking them excitedly near her ear.
"Are you five?" he asked flatly.
"Maybe," she replied indignantly.
"Just open the presents."
"Which one should I open first?"
He gestured towards a flat square shaped one, which she immediately seized. "Gotta be honest, Luke, I was really hoping for some flannel wrapping paper," she said in faux-disappointment as she ripped off the multi-colored Santa wrap to reveal a large coffee table type book called Hammerhead Sharks: Demons of the Deep. She clapped her hands together joyously. "Oh my God! You remembered," she laughed.
Luke nodded, happy with his own success at making her smile. A few months prior, they had been watching some Discovery Channel special about sharks and Lorelai had become briefly obsessed with hammerheads, staying up long after he was asleep to watch the newest program about sharks.
Luke had spent several weeks of breakfasts half-listening to recaps of the previous night's show. "The British guy with the ugly ears? Yeah, well he was trying to track this one shark named Lola to see if she was going to return to the same place in Australia, but Lola like, figured it out, and was purposefully going all these weird places to confuse him!"
The end result of this had been Lorelai's insistence that she wanted a pet shark and Luke's utterly rational response that sharks were predators and, more importantly, couldn't possibly live in a bathtub like Lorelai's fish had that one time. So, when he saw the book sitting on a display in the middle of a bookstore, Luke could not resist picking it up.
Lorelai laughed again, pushing the book to the side. "Oh wow, I can't wait to read that. I think you have reignited my shark obsession."
"Oh good. That was exactly what I wanted to happen," he said dryly.
"Which one do I open next?" she asked eagerly. Luke pointed towards one covered in "Happy Hanukkah!" paper that had been sitting in his closet since Christmas 1999. Lorelai had seen it a few weeks earlier and insisted it be used to wrap her gifts.
"The big one."
"The BIG package," she smirked, raising her eyebrows. "Dirty!"
Luke rolled his eyes at her, as she had fully expected. But she was already opening the second package, which turned out to be a foot spa. ("Score!")
They discussed this gift for awhile, and then finally Lorelai began to unwrap the small, square box, covered elegantly in silky red paper and a tiny white ribbon.
"This looks fancy," she teased him as she pulled at the loop of the ribbon. "I would guess jewelry but there's no – ," she trailed off as a black velvet box revealed itself under the paper. "– no way it could be jewelry. Luke." She looked at him, perplexed.
"I didn't go over the limit," he said quickly. "Promise," he added, doing the correct Scout's Honor symbol.
Lorelai took a deep breath and pushed open the box. "Oh, my," she murmured, removing a delicate silver locker. The face, a slim, shiny oval, was dotted with cut-out stars and a teeny half-moon. "Luke, it's beautiful. I… it's beautiful."
"Open it," he replied in a gravelly voice.
Lorelai did. She had to lean in close to read the minuscule words printed inside of it.
And the moon's never seen me before
But I'm reflecting light.
"It's the song we danced to at Liz and TJ's wedding," Luke explained quietly.
"Luke," she said again, staring at him open-mouthed. She wanted to tell him that she knew the song, that she had downloaded the song two weeks after the wedding, that she and Rory had spent hours analyzing the lyrics while he was on his ever-extended trip to Maine. But she said none of this, as his name seemed to be the only word she could formulate.
"Liz made it for me," he explained. "So I didn't go over the limit. It was free. I designed it and I told her exactly how I wanted it, but it was free."
"I… uh... I honestly don't care if you went over the limit," she said, beaming at him.
"Here," he said gently. "Let me put it on." She turned herself around and sat with her back against him as he deftly fastened the tiny clasp behind her neck.
Lorelai ran her hands down the chain. "Luke, this is the most romantic gift I think I've ever gotten."
He wrapped his arms around her and placed his chin over her right shoulder. "I'm glad you like it."
"You totally win pre-Christmas," she laughed as she felt her heart rate returning to normal.
"Well this isn't my first rodeo," Luke responded, hugging her tightly to his chest. "$50 or not, I know you have to have jewelry in order for a holiday to be complete."
Lorelai sighed contentedly. "Maybe."
"Maybe?"
She pulled away from him, grinning when she felt his hands gently clinging to her waist in an attempt to keep her still. "Jewelry is great," Lorelai said as she faced him. "But other things," she trailed off, running her hands over his arms and down his chest. "Other things are better," she whispered into his ear.
Luke groaned lightly and leaned in to kiss her. She felt his smile against her lips. "I think we should do pre-Christmas every year," he said as they fell backwards onto the bed.