Chapter 39

Each time Rory pulled up at the familiar red-brick apartment building in Boston's North End she was met with a flush of memories. The excitement of having first gotten the keys to this place, having fibbed to Tucker a little about the precise cost of the residence. It had been the first big thing Rory had ever bought and that alone had held value to her, giving her the feeling of becoming truly independent from anyone else in terms of money. Considering it was a result of her grandmother passing, however, the feeling came with its bitter notes. She'd bought the residence herself and yet signed half of the property over to Tucker so he wouldn't feel insecure about not contributing enough. University pay was what it was back then, not that it was much better nowadays, the jobs being more about the academic prestige than anything else if they included a fancy Ivy league name.

The building held memories of moving in, showing Corinne her room for the very first time, the moments when Rory had gotten home, exhausted only to be met by Tucker's grumpiness or at other times with loads of homework to grade as well as housework to handle. There were glimpses of the fights they'd had too, especially in the very end.

It was easy to paint Tucker in dark shades, thinking back, the good parts about that relationship having faded into the background. But they had been there, and every now and again Rory forced her to remember those days in order to keep things civil. They'd even once had a very rational discussion about healthy co-parenting in case they ever split up. That was what they were trying to go by, even if on occasion it could've worked more flawlessly.

Rory buzzed the intercom bell downstairs, ringing up to the apartment she'd once called home. She was tired from her drive, yet it was here she'd come before her intent to crash over at her dad's, who had more than enough spare bedrooms in that townhouse of his.

It was, however, Corinne, not Tucker, who answered the intercom.

"Mom, what are you doing here?" Corinne exclaimed, causing Rory to sigh. Tucker hadn't talked to her yet.

"Will you just let me in?" Rory asked.

The familiar buzz sounded and the lock clicked open, allowing Rory access. It was kind of degrading not having access to the place she in her mind kind of considered as hers. But since it had been her who'd wanted to move away, and she was all for wanting Corinne to keep her childhood home intact, she'd willingly given Tucker the place, not wanting it to become a source of a fight. At that point the fact that her place in Hartford wasn't anything glamorous and smaller than this place, hadn't mattered to her.

The elevator was occupied, and Rory put her leg muscles into good use, not wanting to wait, and made her way up to the third floor.

Corinne let Rory inside, just as Rory reached the floor, and considering she'd climbed the stairs at a healthy pace, eager to work things out, she was left a little out of breath.

"Where's your dad?" Rory asked, wondering if he was around.

"Work, I think," Corinne replied.

Rory felt confused and also disappointed in Tucker - had he seriously left Corinne alone after everything he'd said? Or had this whole thing been some ploy to get her away from Logan? Surely he wouldn't - she thought, and hoped she was right.

"What are you doing here? I thought I wasn't coming back until Sunday. I was…" Corinne began, but didn't finish her thought.

"Well, I hoped your dad would've told you…, I don't know if you talked about it or not," Rory began, trying to think of a good way to approach the sore subject. She'd spent the drive thinking about how to do it - but now, having been caught off guard by Tucker's absence, many of those had disappeared from her mind.

"You mean about the thing that happened at his work?" Corinne replied, doubtfully.

"What thing?" Rory replied, feeling confused.

"I guess he got into some trouble or something. The dean reprimanding or something…," Corinne explained vaguely, leaving Rory pondering seriously what in the world had Tucker ended up doing. She remembered glimpses of the employee handbook, having perused it once, but between arising ethics dilemmas, issues with substance use or fraternization of students and professors she couldn't really pinpoint one specific thing that it could've been. It seemed to be reason enough though for the two of them to have a conversation beyond parenting. It seemed crucial as she needed to know whether he was influenced financially, but she was just as reluctant to do it, not wanting to make it her business.

Rory shook her head, shaking the thought away. It was a discussion for another time. She wanted to focus on more important matters for the time being.

"I came because I was worried about you," Rory confessed, brushing the former topic aside with a dismissive hand gesture.

"Oh, mom!" Corinne groaned, turning around on the spot and every fiber of her being wanting to escape this conversation and it showed in her body language, her arms remaining crossed in front of her.

"Then please explain to me what you are doing with my old sleeping pills!?" Rory requested, more seriously.

At that Corinne's face turned white, looking like she'd been caught red handed.

"What? What are you thinking? You don't know how strong they are? You're never ever supposed to take anything not specifically prescribed to you. You know that, right? That's just incredibly stupid! So please tell me - why?" Rory insisted.

"Because I just wanted my mind to stop! Okay?" Corinne yelled, feeling ambushed, her eyes turning reddish as she said it. It was clear she was fighting tears.

Rory's heart broke at the sight of her daughter like that. She knew what hurt looked like, and she'd had her share of that herself. The time Dean had yelled at her for not telling him she loved him too, another time when Jess had just left town without so much as a goodbye, and a handful of other times… there were just few cases from her college days when that hurt had been linked to embarrassment and she desperately tried to think what could make a situation like that better. There was very little.

"So, it wasn't...?" Rory began, not knowing if she even wanted to ask the most serious question of all.

"I've been having trouble sleeping, that's all," Corinne explained, sensing where she was going with this.

"Oh, honey," Rory exhaled, in part from relief, and wrapped her daughter into her arms, needing a moment to gather her thoughts.

Corinne didn't cry, but just continued to be held, allowing her mother to sooth her.

"Whatever happened with Theo… it's not your fault, okay? Whatever it was… whenever the heart's involved things can just come out all goofy and awkward. We are allowed that - both someone your age and mine, believe me!" Rory assured, recalling her mother's once spoken words - "I'm afraid once your heart is involved, it all comes out in moron." There were few truths that had been more accurate.

"Did he say something?" Corinne asked, clearly referring to Theo.

"No. He's been just as tongue-tied as you. But I wasn't born yesterday, I can deduce a thing or two," Rory explained, trying to remain obscure about how much detail she knew.

"I guess it's not really a big deal for him then," Corinne replied, sounding discouraged.

"I wouldn't say that. Besides, I think you underestimate how tough it can be being a teenage boy," Rory replied.

"Yeah, right," Corinne rolled her eyes.

"No, I'm serious," Rory replied, guiding her daughter towards the couch that was a recent addition by Tucker. The item looked very far from the style she would've liked in this space.

"And I get that he's a nice guy. I think he is too," Rory continued to explain. "He's just moved here, he's left all his friends behind..," she added, carefully threading, knowing she knew a secret too. At least a 'maybe' secret.

"My mind just keeps playing that night over and over in my brain. What was it that I said or did wrong," Corinne confessed.

"That night in Portland?" Rory asked, realizing she was threading a little too close to the danger zone. But mostly she just wanted her to relax and open up, to tell her the story in her own words.

"Yeah," Corinne sighed. "We were having such a great time, talking. And he took my hand and I was like, now this is it - something might actually happen," she added.

Alarm bells went off in Rory's brain. Her 13-year-old daughter was hoping for 'something to happen' in relation to a guy. Was she really that mature or was the definition of 'something' still very different for Corinne and herself?

"I don't think I can… it's too embarrassing," Corinne hid her face.

"It's not, I promise," Rory assured. "Let me tell you a story, okay?" she began, taking a deep breath. "One time in college, I met this pretty cute guy in the laundry room and we talked a little. I saw him in class too and he was nice looking, smart… and I figured I might show some girl-power, you know, by asking him out," Rory continued. "So, I did. And he declined. I felt like I wanted to sink to the ground," she added.

"That's your embarrassing story?!" Corinne snorted.

"That's not all. That was just a little awkward, nothing much. But then weeks later I hear this rumor going around that this guy, the same guy, keeps telling people this story about how he has a stalker. That some girl keeps asking him out, following him to class and so on. I honestly thought it was some exaggerated version that he was telling about me," Rory explained.

"Was it?" Corinne asked.

"Oh, hell no!" Rory responded, lightening the mood a little. "But at the time it wasn't as obvious, clearly I was pretty self-obsessed at the time and making a way bigger issue of this in my head. So, I confronted him in the dining hall one day. And I didn't hold back on volume, believe me. And once I found out it was someone else entirely he'd been talking about, then I really could feel like I wanted to just burrow my way to China," Rory explained.

The story didn't sound half as embarrassing now, thinking back, but it was one of the few truly genuine things she'd experienced instead of read about. She had life experience, but it wasn't terribly versatile. She was definitely the girl who more often than not took the safer route in life, and it was now - after knowing Logan for a little more than a month, that she felt like that was somehow a negative thing.

"And for weeks I kept thinking back to how horrible that situation made me feel," Rory continued.

"Mine was worse, though," Corinne replied, almost sounding like she was seeing this as a competition of sorts. "I am not even sure if I want to go back to Freeport this summer. I can't face him," she added.

"So, what happened? What was so bad?" Rory inquired, trying to say it as gently as she could.

"I kissed him," Corinne exclaimed, hiding her face in her palms again.

This much Rory had already deduced.

"And he just stood there. I guess... he didn't kiss me back? And I just kept going, thinking I was not trying hard enough and I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong," Corinne explained, her throat swelling up from fighting her tears. It was evident she was deeply embarrassed.

"And he rejected you?" Rory sympathized.

"He just stood there and then just… yeah, then he just left. He never said a word after that, no explanation, nothing. Was I a bad kisser? Did I taste or smell bad? Did I do it wrong? Wrong time? Wrong length? What? I figured he liked me, you know? He acted like he liked me. He took my hand, I don't understand what that was. I wasn't imagining it! Or maybe I am just going insane!" Corinne exclaimed.

"You're not," Rory assured.

"How do you know!?" Corinne asked, rhetorically.

Rory took a deep sigh, but then decided to do something, she hadn't meant to do as she'd come here. But seeing Corinne like that just broke something in her.

"You know… I don't know for sure. But I think the issue might not be anything you did. I just got this vibe off of him, and I am not sure if I'm right or not. Maybe he doesn't even know it himself just yet? But have you considered that maybe he's, you know, gay?" Rory said, biting her lip as she did. At least she'd left Logan out of it. But was this any better, she wasn't sure.

Rory realized that this could backfire - while a freedom for one's sexual orientation was widely accepted, it was still something a girl in a fragile age could potentially take offence too. No-one wanted to be the girl that made a guy swore off women, did they?

"What? How is that any better?" Corinne exclaimed dramatically, as Rory had anticipated. The thought was a little too big to fit into her head all at once, however, having already thought of every other scenario which would have resulted in more personal rejections.

"Maybe it's not. But if that's the case it means there's nothing you could've done," Rory exhaled, pulling her daughter into her side. Maybe there really wasn't anything else she could do to help but just be with her.