To Family
She looked down at her sleeping Luke, letting the memory of his reassurances tonight wash over her. He's already home, he said. I've been running around like a madwoman, thinking about nothing but the Dragonfly, taking advantage of him, and he's letting me abuse him without a single complaint. I come home at night worn out, worthless to him, but he's there with food, coffee, love, hugs, and encouragement. I'm the luckiest woman in the world.
She brushed a stray hair back into place on his head, letting the curls on the back of his head wrap themselves around her fingers. Those curls were her favorite part of his hair, but it was their shared secret just how much she liked the smooth skin of his receding hairline. He wore his cap pretty much everywhere-except when he was alone with her. She liked watching his scalp when he wrinkled his forehead while deep in thought, or when she had really exasperated him. The latter occurred more often. One of her favorite hobbies was to invent new crazy things to say to him, just so she could see him go through the cycle: confusion, disbelief, exasperation and finally relief as he figured out that she had been teasing him all along. By then she could see the smile in his eyes and the promise that he would get his revenge one day, but her favorite phase came just before it: the exasperation. His eyebrows would pop up, then he'd work his jaw, getting the idea that something fishy was going on, finally opening his hand (those hands!) as if he could pluck the solution out of thin air. While all those emotions were flying across his face, his scalp stayed smooth and quiet. He could go bald tomorrow and it wouldn't matter one iota to me. Rather the opposite, actually. My sweet balding husband sitting next to his gray-haired wife sounds like a dream come true. It would be an accomplishment, staying together long enough to fall apart.
She looked at the clock on the nightstand. After 2 a.m. It's Friday already. In 24 hours the test run starts, and here I am, dreaming about retirement. The funny thing is, there isn't really that much to do today. Mom is coming in for her consulting gig; Sookie will make the final kitchen checks and preparations. Michel and I have been over every room, every front desk process so many times we can do them in our sleep. Sleep. This would be a good time to finally get some. Sleep that is, not that other 'some,' she giggled witlessly.
Lorelai tucked her feet under the comforter and lay flat on her back in bed. She squeezed her eyes closed and willed sleep to come. Every cell of her body was wide awake, and Luke was asleep. As usual he'd taken over the sweet spot in the bed when he was in his deep sleep phase, arms and legs going every which way.
The sweet spot was sleeping heaven. It was the perfect mix of broken-in mattress and room to spread out. She could line up pillows on both sides of her body, get the comforter just right. An extra pillow at her head would be flipped over as soon as she needed to feel the cool fabric on her cheek.
His body weighed a ton like this, but she couldn't wake him with anything short of a bomb when he slept so deeply. Mostly it didn't matter, because they slept with limbs entangled anyway, often enough collapsing where they'd finished their enthusiastic lovemaking. Tonight had been different, they'd made love slowly, deeply and deliberately rather than the urgent coupling that had been their way in recent days. "I'm already home," echoed in her brain as they held each other, moving in the same rhythm, loving each other in their home.
We can make love any time we want, in our home.
None of that mattered at (she looked at the clock) 2:26 in the morning. He was hogging the sweet spot and she couldn't sleep. Moving his arms and legs was useless. She tried pushing on his shoulder, but couldn't budge him. He didn't react. Dead weight. Handsome, sexy dead weight.
Our home. How well had Luke settled in? Her whole body started as she realized they'd had very little time to move Luke into the Crap Shack. He moved his clothes over in the first days, but Lorelai honestly couldn't remember the last time they'd gone to the apartment to pack up and bring over his stuff. She hadn't even thought about where to put Luke's things.
Time to start making some more space for him. Past time, actually. She slipped on her pajamas and crept silently down the stairs, even though Luke had proven repeatedly that he would sleep through almost anything, like the night she made a midnight snack run to the kitchen. Actually forgetting that she wasn't alone, she turned the radio on and danced and sang loudly and off-tune to the Jackson Five while the toaster pizza toasted. When she caught herself, she quickly turned off the radio and listened, but heard nothing but snoring in return.
Tonight she left the door open so she could hear him if he woke. Truth be told, she enjoyed the snoring. It let her know she wasn't alone. Flipping on the hallway light, she looked around, trying to figure out where to begin. Water. I'm thirsty. She went into the kitchen, opened the fridge and reached past the cheese and grapes to get a bottle of water. Idly looking at the contents of the refrigerator, she concluded that it was time to clean it out again; it was too full to handle any more half-empty pizza boxes. Her sleep-deprived perception at this moment was so foggy that Luke's food filling the fridge might as well have been invisible.
Starting with the entrance, Lorelai tried to remember what Luke had that belonged in the foyer. She toed his work shoes back onto the mat in the corner where she and Rory had always taken off their dirty shoes, and there was plenty of room for all three of them to leave shoes when needed. She picked up a brown umbrella that she didn't recognize in the stand. Must be Lane's umbrella. Luke needs to bring his over. Oh! I ought to leave a jacket or a sweater at the apartment. A list. I need to make a list of things to move to both places. She went to the telephone desk and searched in the drawer for a notepad and pen. Looking at the basket she noticed that Rory had left her address book behind. Funny, I thought she had a beige address book, not a brown one.
The living room was messy, but otherwise OK. The magazines had multiplied in these last weeks before the Dragonfly opening, and a small stack of quilts at the far end looked out of place, but she could put them away later. Must check to see if Luke's leather sofa would be a better fit for this room. Oh! And maybe I should put my sewing stuff in the back of the office. I could leave my projects out, OK, I rarely put them away in the first place, but the best thing would be that I could sew there on the weekends while Luke works. We wouldn't be far apart at all. Second-best thing would be the endless supply of coffee. I could sew forever there. OK! Sewing stuff goes on the list!
The hall closet held Lorelai's darkest secrets and, as Lorelai would soon discover, so did the one in Luke's apartment. She opened the door, several items in the pile on the bottom of the closet floor rolled out. The fisherman's hat she decided to throw away – it would be too easy to hurt Luke's feelings over Alex, despite the fact that the latter never crossed even her mind. The girls' Rocky Horror Picture Show shoes fell off the pile as well. Lorelai paused, assessed the increasing probability that she would get Luke to finally dress as Dr. Frank N. Furter (that black dress seems to be pretty effective), and tossed the shoes back into the closet. Her ice skates were still there, uncleaned since she wore them skating with Rory, still dangerously sharp as the small scar on her little toe proved. Sighing, she shook the hangers, guessed that they could still shove a few more jackets into the space and closed the door, pleased that it closed without the assistance of white-gloved Japanese subway pushers.
In the kitchen she crumpled the hat and shoved it into the bottom of the trash can. The kitchen is a great place to make room for Luke's things. After all, he knows how to cook and has purchased actual cooking utensils and uses them for the purpose they were intended, unlike her and Rory, who tended to use spatulas for Tater Tot ping-pong. He deserves to have the kitchen just as he wants it. All of our stuff was either handed down from Sookie or bought at a flea market. I'll just take it all out and put it in the next town rummage sale. We won't be eating at home for the next few days anyway, so it's not like we need the stuff. After the test run, I can move Luke's kitchen in one trip-well, more like two. Possibly three.
She went out back and grabbed some empty boxes that were lying on the porch. Placing a box on each chair, she started looking through the drawers to decide what should go. The first drawer stunned her. Where in the world did we buy some of these things? What are they even used for? We really have to stop watching those cooking shows, it just makes us buy crap that looks cool and efficient, but never gets used. She decided to simply throw away everything that was in the drawer. Luke surely has everything we need.
Everything went much faster once she'd made that confident, forward-looking decision. The contents of one drawer after another were dropped into the boxes, generally with a loud clatter. Very satisfied with her performance on the cabinet to the right of the stove, she moved to the other side. The top drawer contained an alarming amount of spatulas and spoons. Before she could pick them up and add them to the 'dispose of' pile, a haunting "Lorelai" came ringing through the house.
Luke? What was he doing up? He can sleep through anything. She went to the stairs, discovering a sleepy Luke scratching his belly and coming downstairs toward her.
Lorelai felt a twinge of lust when she saw her sleep-rumpled boyfriend, eyes half closed, wearing nothing but his T-shirt and sweats coming down the stairs. She wriggled her hips and climbed the first stair, about to tug on the pieces of his clothing that desperately needed removing, which in her opinion was all of them, when he abruptly killed the mood.
"What the hell is going on down here? Are you all right? Do you know what time it is?"
Apparently it's a short jump from sexy sleepy Luke to grumpy sleep-deprived Luke.
"I was just making room for your things. It's way past time to get you moved. I need to know what you want to bring over here. You know, furniture and stuff." She was bubbling with an eagerness to take care of this man who rarely needed taking care of-and certainly never asked for it even when he did.
"What are you talking about? Why aren't you in bed? Did you sleep at all?" Seeing her manic expression, he came down the stairs, sat heavily down on the lower landing and pulled her to him. She was fruitcake-level nutty tonight.
"You are so great and so loving, but I've been so busy with the Dragonfly, we haven't had a chance to bring your things home. You need your stuff." She'd never be able to move someplace with just a few clothes. A Gilmore girl needs her things around her to make a home. It was only logical that a significant other of a Gilmore girl would require the same.
Luke rubbed his face, trying to decide where to start. "I don't understand, Lorelai, I'm almost moved in. There's nothing left in the apartment I want to bring over except for my trophies and some photo albums."
"Oh, no no no, there must be more. I've made a list." Her eyes darted around the room, trying to remember where the list went. "Come here, I'll show you."
She led him into the foyer. "See, you have a place for your umbrellas, and your shoes when it's muddy. That's good, right?" Continually assessing her mental state, he stared first at her, then at his own brown umbrella in the stand.
"Now in the living room, there's nothing of yours yet. Do you want to bring the leather sofa over? It may not be really comfortable, but it's certainly better than this old lump of a sofa that I have. Once I get rid of these excess magazines and put these quilts away, there'll be room for your books and pillows, and all of the stuff that makes your apartment so cozy."
"Lorelai."
Touching the letter holder on the phone desk, she continued, "Over here, there's enough space for your address book and charger for your cell phone. Don't look in the hall closet yet, it's kind of messy, but I think we can find room for your coats there as well."
Luke took matters and Lorelai's shoulders into his own hands. Pushing her gently to the sofa, he made her sit down and sat himself down on the coffee table.
"Lorelai, you know this quilt, right?" he asked, taking the top quilt off the stack and putting it in her hands.
She looked at it and said, "Not really, I don't remember having this quilt in the house before. Oh! Oh! Wait! Isn't this the quilt from the end of your bed in the apartment?"
He nodded.
"That means you brought it over already?" Another nod came from Luke.
"There's more, Lorelai, look. See this stack of magazines?"
"Yes, sorry I let the stack get so large; I'll throw out the older ones."
"No, those aren't all your magazines, some are mine." He waved a sports magazine in front of her face. "See? You haven't started reading about baseball yet, have you?" He stood up and took her to the phone table.
"Notice that my phone is plugged in already, and that brown book there is my address book. Already moved."
She smiled, a glazed, distant look in her eyes betraying her sleep-deprived state. "That's great. Now all we have to do is the kitchen. And find a place for Bert. Where should Bert live? Come look at the kitchen, I've got so much space ready for your cooking utensils and gadgets."
She jumped to her feet and move toward the kitchen, waving at him to follow.
"Here you go. Look at how many drawers I've emptied for you. I'm going to throw these things out tomorrow, and we can get your favorite tools from the apartment. Won't it be great for you to cook here?"
"Oh my God, Lorelai, what have you done?!" All of the careful organization he'd brought to the kitchen was ruined.
"I know! Great, isn't it!?" She bounced up and down, her hands on his shoulders as he stared at her open-mouthed.
"It was all perfectly organized! Now everything's in boxes! Geez, I'm gonna have to start all over again."
He put his hands on her hips and applied enough pressure to bring her back to Earth. Perhaps getting her back into bed would help her come down from this panic. He recognized it as her stress over the opening of the inn. Where he ran back to the storage room, threw up, fainted, and hit his head, she was going into compulsively organized overdrive.
"You know what, sweetheart," he said, "We need to toast the move. I thought I saw some tequila here somewhere." He grabbed two shot glasses out of a cabinet she hadn't emptied yet (is that Daffy Duck?) and poured a generous shot for her and a smaller one for himself. Going back to sleep was not going to be a problem for him, but he thought she would benefit from a good stiff drink.
"Hey," he said, "you haven't seen the photos yet. Let me show you."
He took her gently by the waist and guided her to the mantel, where Lorelai kept her favorite photographs in small frames.
"See? Here's my favorite photograph of you two, back when Rory was just 12. Another one, after she started at Chilton and over here are pictures of Liz and Jess." Liz and Jess each had their own picture, Liz at age 21, and Jess shortly after he turned 17.
Seeing these things that she'd missed earlier, these precious treasures of Luke's, Lorelai calmed down, leaning up against him as he pointed out the ways he'd enriched her home without her even noticing.
He pulled a small faded photo in a silver frame from the far side of the mantel. "This is my family back when I was eight: my parents, Liz, me and Uncle Louie." Next to that one was a slightly larger picture of the three of them from last Thanksgiving: Luke, Lorelai and Rory, the girls hamming it up around Luke while he was caught mid-eye-roll.
"That's my family today," he said quietly, squeezing her shoulder affectionately. "Let's toast to family."
"It's not right," she whispered. "We need to fix it before we toast."
"Here," she continued, "This will give us a start." She tucked the picture of Jess just behind the Thanksgiving picture. "Now our family is complete. We'll have a better picture taken the next time we're all together."
He wrapped his arm around her shoulder again and buried his face in her hair, blinking fiercely. He couldn't have spoken for a few moments even if had found the words to say.
One deep breath and one deep kiss later, Luke and Lorelai were ready to toast.
"To family."
They drained their glasses, placed the tiny Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck glasses on the mantel next to the picture of their family, and went back to bed.