Acme Presents: 7 ridiculous deaths of Chris

Disclaimer: I don't even own the DVDs, let alone anything else.

Summary: In the spirit of total insanity, here's how Chris dies. One bit per season in this oneshot. I need a hobby.

Rating: T

Genre: Parody/Humor

AN: One vignette per season, actual episodes mentioned, unrelated to each other. These are all utterly ridiculous, and none are meant to be taken seriously, or as suggestions for ways to be rid of anyone in real life. Title comes from... You'll see.

GG

Season One: Christopher Returns

"Okay, that's it!" shrieked Lorelai Gilmore, wielding a cleaver from the knife block in the kitchen of the Gilmore mansion. "I officially hate Friday night dinners!"

"Are Grandma and Grandpa okay?"

"Kid, we're ten steps from the front door and total freedom here, how about we focus?"

"On what?" wailed Rory, wringing her hands around the handle of a broom. "Imminent gory death?"

"Oh for... How many times have we seen zombie movies?" chided Lorelai, skulking through the foyer. "Perky, brave heroines never die!"

"Neither do virgins," agreed Rory, calming slightly. "Okay. But we can't run very fast."

"Have I taught you nothing?" hissed Lorelai, stepping out of her heels. She handed one stiletto to her daughter. "Go for eyes."

"I thought we have to behead them?"

"Do you see an axe around here?"

"Or shoot them in the brain?" provided Rory, hyperventilating.

"Again with the choice of weaponry available to us, so sorry Richard and Emily don't keep medieval halberds or machine guns around!"

"But what happened?"

Lorelai stopped short, blinking at her daughter in shock. "You're kidding, right? I told you this town was full of zombies!"

"I thought you meant voodoo ones, not creepy George Romero ones! And we gotta get Grandpa and Grandma!"

Lorelai paused, calming her breathing. "Rory, honey, they have a safe room. That's where they went, okay?"

Rory's lower lip wobbled. "They didn't take us?"

"My fault," said Lorelai grimly, "it used to be by the kitchen, but they must've moved it when Mom wanted a solarium. Okay, okay, let's be calm. We're Jamie Lee Curtis, we're surviving this, got it?"

"I hate you," mumbled Rory.

"Hey, once again, not my fault, and your grandmother's the one who hired a maid who wants brain matter for an entree. Now, I open this door, I whack 'em, you get in that car, and you drive, you hear me?"

"Wait, I can't drive!"

"Turn key, push stick to D, press right-hand pedal to go, do not stop till you get to Luke."

"Why Luke?"

Lorelai smiled. "If anyone can handle zombie apocalypse, it's Luke."

"What about you?"

For a moment, Lorelai cupped her daughter's cheek. "I love you, sweets."

"I love you too, Mom." After a moment, she added, "Uh, but what about Dad?"

"Oh, Emily probably took him to the safe room," sighed Lorelai. "She always did like him. Now, we got Zelda the Zombie in the kitchen, but there's a gardener unaccounted for... On three, and no looking back. If I get to the car okay, then okay. If I don't... You go to Luke, got it?"

Rory nodded, white-faced. "Am I gonna wake up soon?"

"You bet." Heart pounding, Lorelai flung open the massive front door and heard a grunt. The somewhat stunned-looking gardener stumbled into the shrubbery, arms flailing.

Rory ran, screaming, "Die, you gray freaks, die!" despite the absence of any such creatures, and flung herself into the car.

Lorelai was nearly there when a figure popped out of the shadows of the house and lurched forward. "Mom!"

Lorelai turned, saw, and gave a startled shriek. The cleaver forgotten, she kicked the recently-returned-from-the-dead Christopher in the groin. It didn't seem to have any effect, other than puzzling him.

"Oh crap," yipped Lorelai, and then swung the cleaver with both hands. "Hi-yah!"

Rory blanked out for a moment.

Then her mother was in the jeep, yelling, "Doors locked, seat belts!"

"Mom?" whimpered Rory as she reversed out of the nightmare of Gilmore mansion. "Was that..."

"Yep, kid. Sorry," said Lorelai grimly, eyes tightly focused on the road. "I always figured I'd take his head off someday, but I didn't think it'd get that literal."

Police cars rushed toward the Gilmore mansion they'd just fled. And that was the start and the end of the Great Hartford Zombie Apocalypse.

Season Two: Presenting Lorelai Gilmore

A certain softness crept over Lorelai Gilmore's face, watching as Christopher stood atop the crappy staircase with its crappy banister to escort their daughter down. He'd finally come through. This once of the many times, he'd come through.

She could tell Rory was asking him to not let her fall. She smiled, eyes tearing, ignoring her mother's bitter comments about Lorelai's past failures.

He'd blown into town and asked her to marry him last year. She'd said no, and of course it turned out that his business was failing. What was it with Chris? Why was it he showed up begging for her love when he'd failed at something?

It was a disease with them, she concluded. A childhood having dreams beyond their parentally-decreed fates, an adolescence shared in rebellion... Then nothing. Only random visits when Christopher needed consolation. It worried Lorelai, that he planned to stay around the area, more or less. She was glad for Rory, but anxious that she'd get back in the habit of fleeing to Chris when she was overwhelmed. She'd let him into her life too many times when Rory was a tiny baby because of that. He'd never stayed. She had to remember that. Chris was like a tornado. It was exciting, but it always caused damage.

She held her breath until they reached the bottom of the staircase and Dean took over, guiding Rory aside.

"Oh thank God, now there's just the stupid fan dance," she sighed to herself.

She beamed at her daughter, who mimed wiping sweat from her brow, and was startled by Chris sliding an arm around her. "Hey."

"Hey yourself," she said warmly, but stepped clear of his body.

"Problem, Lore?"

"Lorelai," she said wearily. "Three syllables, Chris, try to catch up. Even Monosyllable Man in the diner can figure it out. Lor-e-lai. Can you say Lorelai, boys and girls?"

"Hey, sorry, stand down, just asking, wow, I forgot the effect Emily has on you."

"Wish I could," grumbled Lorelai.

"So, you, me, champagne, sound familiar?" he coaxed.

It did. Soothingly familiar. Enchantingly familiar. Here was the one refuge she'd had in childhood...

Which ended when the stick turned pink, and he said "Yes" to anything their parents yelled, and not once changed a diaper or handled a feeding or even been at the hospital.

Why that thought overrode the others, Lorelai wasn't sure. It was unlike her to retain her maturity in Christopher's presence.

Then again, their daughter was at a debutante ball. It was shaking Lorelai's faith in her own youth.

"So, uh, I should... Get a drink!" decided Chris. "Martini?"

She opened her mouth to say yes, and said instead, "No, ginger ale, I have to drive."

She could smell it now. The deceit. The not-quite-telling-the-truth thing. There was more to the Volvo than met the eye. Much more.

He hadn't grown up. Someone had changed him.

He wouldn't do it for terrified teen Lorelai and baby Rory, but he'd do it now.

Her mother grabbed her elbow. "Hey! Ow!"

"Talk to me this instant, what is going on, is he staying, are you finally going to marry him and do the right thing? Well? Tell me that just this once you haven't screwed up, Lorelai!"

Christopher appeared, carrying a drink in one hand, and said quietly, "Emily. Uh. I was kinda not gonna mention this..."

"Oh here we go," growled Lorelai, arms folded, foot tapping, rather like an elegantly clad Fury from legend. "I knew it. Volvo? Suits? Well?"

"I, uh, in Boston, there's, uh... Her name is Sherry, she's great, and, uh..."

So much for Chris's oft-declared undying devotion to her and that niggling hope of a back-up plan she'd held onto for all those years. "Oh my God, I'm such an idiot," she groaned. "You finally come through, and of course now it's when... And... God, Chris, why couldn't you do this for me and Rory? Say, ten years ago?"

Chris flushed. "Lore, I'm..."

"Lorelai!" she snapped. "That's it, I can't do this, you come into town like you're gonna be here as in really, really be here and it turns out once again you're leaving, and I can't believe I let myself get all hot and bothered by you in a tux just because this one damn time you didn't bail on Rory!"

Emily scowled through a tiny smile. "Lorelai, don't be crude! Christopher, come with me, please, you shouldn't drink after driving."

"I'm staying at..."

"No, no, I think it's best you come with me, and stay in our guest house," purred Emily.

"Oh no, Mom, don't," whispered Lorelai intently into Emily's ear. "Do not try to force this. Please!"

"Leave him to me, Lorelai."

In despair, Lorelai found a chair and sat down to watch the fan dance. Why did she ever think Christopher could be counted on? Why did she ever think he'd end up Prince Charming instead of Mr. Right-for-the-Moment?

Now she understood why the other mothers cried. It was the death of youth and Disney-inspired dreams, when a daughter became a debutante.

It was a thought she almost shared with her mother, who was gardening happily the next afternoon, when something occurred to Lorelai. "Mom? I don't remember this being a flower bed."

"Oh, I thought it'd be a lovely spot for something bright and colorful, don't you agree?" said Emily serenely. "I was inspired, so at breakfast I told the gardener to make sure he made a good deep bed, and see it was clear of tree roots and all other impediments."

Disturbed by her mother's glowing eyes, Lorelai ventured, "How deep?"

"About six feet, I believe." Emily tittered. "I originally planned on some fairly mature trees, but I reconsidered. So Jorge filled it back in, and now I can't decide. Tell me, what was, is, Christopher's favorite color?"

"Yellow?" guessed Lorelai wildly, pretending she didn't hear the verb tense change.

"I have just the thing, a lovely coreopsis I saw at Bitty Shelton's last garden party." Emily stood, smiling at the rectangular patch of earth. "Oh, and Lorelai?"

"Yeah, Mom?"

"I doubt you'll see Christopher again. He seemed quite serious about this Sherry."

Lorelai looked from her mother's face to the fresh-turned dirt. "Yeah, he does. Good for him."

"Exactly, and much better for us all. Now where is that maid with the iced tea?"

Season Three: Dear Emily and Richard

Memory Lane sucked.

Debutante dresses, screaming parents...

A diversion down the highway of the present in the form of Luke dating a lawyer who was super-skinny and pretty and all that Lorelai was not because Luke smiled at her even though she was a lawyer whereas Lorelai probably couldn't get Luke's attention that way if she did give the man a lap dance...

And here sat Lorelai Gilmore watching Christopher Hayden rush to be at Sherry's side during the birth of their daughter, and where had he been for Rory? For Lorelai? Hiding in his room from Francine and Straub, dancing to their tune, doing whatever he wanted while she scrubbed tile grout in order to afford diapers.

Rory cuddled against her. "Mom?"

"It's okay, hon," said Lorelai absently. "All women scream bloody murder in labor. It's normal."

Her daughter cringed into a tiny ball of fear. "That's normal?"

"Yep."

"Oh God, I'm never having kids. Or sex. Or... Never."

"Hang onto that thought," counseled Lorelai, and stroked Rory's hair. "I can't believe she wanted you to fax stuff for her."

Rory mustered up a wan giggle. "Yeah, kinda awkward."

"Kinda? Try giraffe-on-roller-skates awkward!"

From beyond the double doors a blood-curdling scream rose. Lorelai instantly hugged Rory to her, protecting her daughter's ears. She wished she could protect her own.

It was Sherry, shrieking, "I hate you you did this I hate you die you son of a..."

"Happy Birthday to someone!" yodeled Lorelai hurriedly to cover the rest of that scream. "Happy Birthday! To someone! Happy birthday, dear, um, someones..."

There was a crash, a metallic clatter, and much yelling.

A few moments later, a nurse rushed out. "Haydens?"

"Us," sighed Lorelai forlornly.

"Are you relatives?"

"No," said Lorelai as Rory said, "Yes."

"I'm not, she's the half-sister to the newborn," Lorelai clarified. "Why?"

"Are there grandparents?"

"Yes," said Lorelai slowly, standing with a sense of dread. "Um. Is Sherry okay?"

"She's fine, but Mr. Hayden isn't," said the nurse. "I'm sorry, I have to go."

"Mom?" asked Rory, plainly baffled.

"Don't look at me, sweets."

The matter was clarified somewhat when hospital security, then the police, arrived. Wide-eyed, Rory and Lorelai overheard one suited police detective mutter, "...broke his hand, then she punched him in the, ah, y'know, and..."

The other police officer, that one in uniform, gulped audibly. "Oh man. My wife's due in two months!"

"Yeah, don't go in," said the detective, unaware of the audience with very good eavesdropping skills. "That last push? She punched him so hard she snapped his neck. Dropped like a rock." The detective grunted. "I tell you, one woman on the jury, they'll be lucky to get a conviction for misdemeanor assault."

Season Four: The Fundamental Things Apply

Flummoxed, Lorelai pondered the puzzle of movie night with Luke. Gut versus dating. His gut versus her dating. Gut telling him instantly if it'll work. Yet, if so, whence Rachel? Why Nicole? On the other hand, her dating... Yeah, an infinite store of bad date anecdotes, more than she ever wanted to imagine, and worse than any she ever told her daughter.

Luke's gut told him right away if he'd be comfortable with someone.

He had never asked Lorelai to anything. He had never asked her to hang out. Hell, Lorelai grumped to herself, he hadn't even asked her to cross the dang street. Years of flirting and almost-maybe-moments... And it turned out she and his gut didn't get along. Luke's gut hated her. She had misread him more than she'd misread Christopher, and that said quite a lot. Apparently, Lorelai mused, the closer she got to knowing a man, the less she actually understood them, and the further from her they wanted to get.

She was moping about this fact when Rory called to tell her that a guy in a laundry room had turned her down for a date, and suddenly, mid-pout, Rory shrieked, "Oh my God turn on the news!"

"Why would I do that?" Lorelai replied, trying to decide between Passionate Pomegranate and Black Velvet for her toenails. "It's always depressing."

"Mom, just turn it on, oh my God! Mom! It's Dad!"

"Whoa, wait, what channel?"

"All of them!"

"Great, what did Chris do now," mumbled Lorelai, and turned on the TV. She surfed to an all-news channel, and dropped both nail polish bottles. Fortunately, they were tightly capped. "Oh my God. Rory, honey, is that his Volvo?"

"Yeah! Mom, that's Dad's Volvo! Oh my God! That's Dad's car! I know the license plate, they always tell you to know your parents' license plates so in case of emergency police will know what car to look for and..."

"Rory, honey, I'm on my way to your dorm, don't move," said Lorelai, and shoved her feet into the first shoes she found. Purse in hand, coat more or less over an arm, she flew out the front door and covered the miles to Yale in record time.

Rory was crying on the sofa, and Paris of all people was patting her shoulder. The blonde looked relieved to see Lorelai. "Oh thank God, I have no idea what to do with all these sticky excretions." With a nod at the TV, she added, "Gravity. Fundamental force of the universe. Don't mess with it."

"Thank you, Paris," said Lorelai tightly, and cuddled her daughter. "I'm here, babe, I'm here, it's okay, it's okay."

Rory wailed and pointed at the TV.

There was the rear end of a silver Volvo. The front end of it was completely hidden under what appeared to be an anvil. A very large anvil. Lorelai did a double-take.

The anchor said, "Acme Products has not yet returned our calls, but sources insist that the six-ton anvil was secured properly to the semi tractor-trailer transporting it to the Looney Tunes theme park due to open next year outside Warner, Massachusetts. At this time, only one fatality is known, the driver of the gray Volvo that was approaching the overpass when the anvil snapped free and fell to the highway below. Police have not yet released the identity of the victim, pending notification of family, and..." There was a silent yet somehow audible shudder. "Recovery of the body. Stay tuned for more on this bizarre accident on Interstate 95 outside Boston."

Lorelai turned off the TV. She cradled Rory. She took out her phone, and with a little help from directory assistance, tracked down Sherry. "Is GG okay?"

"What? Yes, of course, she's with the nanny," said Sherry. "Oh God, what do I do? I can't plan a funeral, I'm too busy!"

Lorelai mumbled a pleasant, "So sorry for your loss," and hung up. She had a distraught daughter to console, and a very sudden urge to yell, "Beep-beep!", which would do no one's sanity any good whatsoever.

Season Five: Jews and Chinese Food

The horrors were rapidly piling up for Lorelai Gilmore. Her daughter halfway to Nookie-Ville with that Huntzberger slimeball, Christopher drunk, Luke angry, Emily scheming, Luke breaking up with her in Doose's... It was definitely more than one woman could stand in a short period of time.

She couldn't blame Luke, really, for wanting out. She wanted out.

Luke had a point, of course. She should've seen it coming. When didn't Christopher decide that she was his savior and his one-and-only when he was, frankly, without anyone else to lean on? Sherry left him, one of the few things for which Lorelai could applaud her, and dumped GG on him, for which Lorelai despised her. Not because Sherry had no right to whisk off to France for whatever reason. Because only a damn fool would ever leave Christopher in charge of a child. Everyone knew that. Everyone. And naturally she'd walked right into the "Oh I need help with GG" trap. Not to say Christopher didn't need help, but he could hire a really good team of nannies. He could afford Nanny McPhee and Mary Poppins and Fran Fine, too.

No, it was her fault. Yet if she turned Christopher away, two things could result. One would be that he'd back even further out of Rory's life, if such a thing was possible. The other was that GG would suffer.

If Luke could just grasp that Lorelai was doing this for Chris the way he'd taken in Jess for Liz...

Not that it mattered. They weren't talking. She'd successfully dodged him at the production of The Fiddler on the Roof, and that had taken skill, determination, and a lot of ice cream. Watching those other women flirt and bat their eyelashes at him? Torture. Karma was, truly, a witch with a capital B.

She poked forlornly at a carton of leftover kung pao chicken. Why, precisely, was it always kung pao chicken? Who or what was kung pao? She never remembered ordering kung pao chicken, yet some ended up in her fridge every time.

Pondering this mystery, as well as the chances of not crying herself to sleep, Lorelai almost didn't hear her phone ring.

"Lorelai, pick up, it's your mother, it's important."

Lorelai moaned, but picked up. "Hey, Mom, I'm screening everyone, not just you, please not now, is Dad okay?"

"Your father is fine, why wouldn't he be? I just had the most distressing news from Bitty Shelton, and she heard it from the chief of the Hartford police department himself, and, well, Lorelai, I really don't know where to begin!"

"Happy honeymoon?" suggested Lorelai rather too acidly for her mother's taste. The vow renewal would forever be marked in Lorelai's memory on her list of Top Ten Worst Days Ever.

"Lorelai! Be ridiculous later! You have very bad news to tell Rory."

Scowling, Lorelai asked in confusion, "I do?"

"Yes. Oh, and do you have a decent black dress? I mean for an actual daytime occasion, not some sleazy little..."

Lorelai bit down on a curse and said through her teeth, "I have some very nice clothes, Mother, what is it?"

"Apparently, Christopher was at Francine's, with that adorable little GG..."

"Yeah, adorable," mumbled Lorelai, rolling her eyes. GG shrieked at a pitch that could shatter crystal.

"And he choked to death!"

Abruptly brought back to the moment, Lorelai yelped, "What? Who? How? Mom?"

"He was showing GG that sweet-and-sour pork was good to eat..."

"What was he doing showing a kid that young how to eat Chinese food!"

"How would I know?" shrilled Emily, and Lorelai could almost see her mother wave a dismissive hand. "The point is, Lorelai, you have to tell Rory her father died."

"Of sweet-and-sour pork?"

"Yes, Lorelai," droned Emily in that too-patient tone, "of sweet-and-sour pork. No, of asphyxiation!"

"By sweet-and-sour pork," repeated Lorelai numbly. "Uh. Okay? But what about GG?"

"Oh, Francine's swearing she'll raise her."

Lorelai winced. Poor GG. "Yeah. Okay. I'll, um, I'll go to Yale and find Rory and..."

"Good, I'm sure someone will call with the details as soon as they're arranged."

"Mom?"

"Yes, Lorelai?" crooned Emily, suddenly sympathetic.

"Is this a prank? Joke? I mean... There's a lot of idiotic ways to die, but seriously, all those servants and no one knew the Heimlich maneuver?"

"Francine's never had any judgment in hiring employees," her mother verbally shrugged, "I'm sure it never occurred to them."

It was a small thing, a superstitious thing, but before she left for Yale, Lorelai first cleared all old Chinese food out of her refrigerator. She threw out all the menus relevant to Chinese food. Then, and only then, did she decide the house was safe from the marauding ghosts of Chinese take-out past.

Season Six: Partings

Lorelai felt altogether too numb to be crying, and too warm to be clothed, and too drunk to be stoned like Demerol-named-my-kid-after-me-stoned. Yet all were true. Danger. Warning! After-school special and movie-of-the-week alert!

Her arms were floppy as she pushed at Chris. "Wait. Hold on. I don't feel good."

"Shh, relax, I've got you..." he purred, pushing his mouth at hers and trying to maneuver her back into the cushions.

Lorelai squinted. Tequila. Chris, tequila, her. Bad. Always bad. Worse than bad. In fact, it was bad like a Roger Corman late-night movie bad. Attack of the Giant Leeches bad. It Conquered the World bad. Battle Beyond the Stars... No, wait, that one was almost mockably good.

She leaned forward, making Chris chortle with triumph, and focused her blurring vision on...

An orange-hued pill bottle?

"Whazzat?" she mumbled.

"The stuff for your headache."

A surge of nausea hit Lorelai a split second after her fuzzy brain realized that was not an everyday over-the-counter medicine bottle.

"Oh no!" she yelled, and vomited before she had a chance to free herself from Christopher's grasp, or his couch.

While he was cursing in disgust, she was scrambling for the bathroom. She locked the door. Her stomach kept heaving. Christopher pounded on the door, calling her name, but Lorelai hung onto the toilet for dear life, shuddering and retching for what felt like eternity.

She rinsed her face, mouth, and rubbed toothpaste over her teeth with a fingertip. She rinsed her mouth again, drank some water from her cupped hands, and felt her head clear. Grief? Intact. Loss? Right there. Self-worth? Where it always was, firmly in the cellar. But through it all arose a burning outrage.

She unlocked the bathroom door, pushing Chris away from it by pointing his own nail scissors at his eyeball. "You doped me!"

"What? No! I had painkillers, you said you had a headache!"

Lorelai snatched up her cardigan, her purse, and hopped into her shoes. "Guess what, genius? If you'd been around the last twenty years, you'd know something. Demerol makes me loopy. Percocet makes me throw up! Who the hell gives Percocet to someone with tequila? Oh wait! You!"

"Hey! I didn't mean anything by it!"

"I can't believe I trusted you! I can't believe I ever believed you'd be a friend!" screamed Lorelai, and when Chris touched her arm, she slapped him.

He reared back, wide-eyed.

"Is that how you get lucky? They ask for plain Tylenol, you give them freaking Percocet? You pervert!"

She slammed the door hard, and ran for her life. The drive home passed in a blur.

She crawled into her own house, pushed chairs against the doors, hugged Paul Anka to her, and burst into tears. "I've ruined everything, everything," she told him, and sobbed herself to sleep curled on the floor with her dog.

She woke to find a cup of tea by her nose, and she was in her bed.

She screamed. Her mind babbled OhmyGodChrisfollowedmeandgotmeand...

"Geez!"

Chris never said "Geez." Not like that, anyway.

Shaking, Lorelai stared trembling at Luke, who rose from the chair in the corner.

"What happened to you?"

She curled away, crying again.

"Lorelai, damn it, you can't just talk to Anna about my daughter and have some sort of psychotic break in the middle of town and not explain yourself!"

Somehow, Luke's anger cut through her fear. She gulped the tepid ginger tea, felt herself recover a tiny shred of her courage, and she snarled, "Why do you care if Chris tried to rape me? Aren't you too busy processing something from six months ago?"

Luke stumbled back a step.

"That's right," spat Lorelai, tugging her bedcovers to her chin. "Chris was the only person who had time for me! And I asked for Tylenol, Luke, just regular old aceta-whatever, and he gave me freaking Percocet with tequila, and I throw up if you give me Percocet, or I'd have passed out cold! And never known! What he did! So, come on, Luke!" Her voice rose to a hurricane's scream. "Tell me how awful I am! Tell me how it's all my fault! Tell me how you not loving me is my fault! Tell me how I betrayed you by thinking I could trust someone I've known for thirty years! Go on! Why aren't you hating me!"

Luke recoiled, hit her dresser, and almost fell down. "Are you okay?"

Lorelai gestured energetically. "Do I look okay? I am so far from okay I'm kayo!"

All at once, flannel-clad arms were around her, and her face was smothered against a flannel-clad chest. "Oh my God. We have to call the police, we have to... Oh my God... I can't... This is too much..."

"Whoops, it's too much, there's your cue to leave," mumbled Lorelai resentfully. "Just go, okay? Can we pretend I don't exist? Please?"

Luke squashed her again. "I was so scared, Lorelai..."

"Can we play Dr. Phil later? I really just want to shower about eight thousand times and..."

He pulled back, eyes boring into hers. "He didn't..."

"I told you," sighed Lorelai, flushed with shame. "Two shots of tequila, I started to feel really bad, worse than two shots of tequila should make me, and then I threw up. On his couch. And in his bathroom. I slapped him and came home. Okay? Wait, how'd you get in? I blocked the doors!"

"It doesn't work if the chair has wheels."

"Oh," said Lorelai. "Just go, okay? He kissed me. He had a hand on me. You're right, I should've seen it coming, I'm a terrible cheater, just like you always said I'd be, why do I keep thinking he's still that dorky kid who played cops and robbers with me?"

"I have to..." said Luke abruptly, and left her alone on her bed. She heard him go downstairs, and heard the front door bang shut.

She cried in the shower, and climbed exhausted into clean pajamas before she wrapped herself up in blankets on the bed. Warm weather notwithstanding, she was cold.

She woke to find Luke stroking her hair, soothing her out of a nightmare.

"Why're you here? You don't even like me anymore."

"The police need to talk to you. About him."

Lorelai blinked at Luke in dreary expectation.

"Uh, well, he must've tried to follow you and he had an accident."

"Oh my God, GG!" she cried.

"No, she's okay, I mean, not okay, he left her alone, but he must've... How much did he drink?"

"Couple shots? Same as me. Minus the pills, obviously. Save me the lecture, I will never ever take pills from anyone again, even people I know." She held up her hand in what she hoped was a scout-ish salute.

Luke grimaced. "Can I finish?"

She shrugged, mouth downturned.

"You know the sign that says Welcome to Stars Hollow?"

"Sure."

"He ran into it."

Lorelai flinched. "Oh. How..."

"And it snapped in half."

"Oh."

"And it sort of, uh, it went through the windshield." Luke shut his eyes and babbled out, "And the signpost impaled him in the chest."

"What?"

"Coop said it's one of those freak accidents, one in a million chance."

Lorelai dropped back into the pillows. She wasn't sure why, but it seemed somewhat fitting that Stars Hollow had been the death of Chris.

Season Seven: The Long Morrow

There were infinite numbers of ways to die.

Lorelai Gilmore contemplated some.

She had to tell Luke she'd gone to see Christopher.

She plodded toward the diner, frowning as she saw flashing lights.

Her heart jumped and fell. A car had driven into the diner.

"I'm fine!" yelled Kirk like he'd won a race, as he waved at the wreckage.

Luke was standing on the sidewalk with a stunned look on his face. It said: I lost my life here, why am I still alive?

When he saw her, he stiffened, going into what Lorelai had dubbed his combat mode.

"What..." She asked, then followed up with, "Are you okay? Are you hurt, I mean, physically hurt?"

"No."

That sounded far less than glad.

"What..."

"Traffic light. Taylor. Kirk. Behold," added Luke bitterly. "A few feet over, it'd be the damn ice cream shop, but no, had to be my diner."

Lorelai gasped as she saw a black body bag being toted toward an ambulance. "Oh my God, April? Lane? Caesar? Zach? April?"

"You said that already."

His arms were folded. His mouth was a thin line. His face was stone. Lorelai had a bad feeling she'd not only lost him, she'd really truly and completely lost. Period.

"Who?" she asked at last. "Taylor?"

"No such luck."

She flinched and cowered away. Right. She pushed, he didn't jump, and both those things were both true and false at the same time, but what mattered now was...

"It's Rory's dad."

The world whited out.

Lorelai looked up, wondering how she'd come to sit down on the sidewalk. "What?"

"He came in, first thing, sat down at your spot at the counter like he owned my diner," growled Luke, eyes dark with rage, "and said he'd come to Stars Hollow to show you how much he loves you."

Lorelai gagged. "Oh no. No. He doesn't... Didn't... It's not..."

"Why would he think he could do that"

The accusation startled her into one of her own. "We're going to argue about this when we're broken up and he's dead?!"

Luke's face said that yes, they were.

"After you said no, I didn't want to be alone. I do really stupid things alone. I've known... I knew?" Tears sprang to her eyes. "Since we were little. He's Rory's dad and Sherry left him so I thought he'd understand how I felt, and we talked, and I know you'll never forgive me, I broke the rules, I didn't... Wait, no, you didn't want me anymore, I don't have to obey your rules about who I can talk to... Gah!" she cried, and buried her face in her arms, curling her knees to her chest.

"You didn't sleep with him?"

"What?!"

Luke opened his mouth, as if uncertain how to undo what that question had done.

Lorelai flew to her feet. "Thanks for thinking I'm a tramp, no, I went to talk to him! Talk! That thing you don't do with me anymore! Oh wait, right, sleeping together is another thing you don't do with me anymore, I can see how you'd confuse the two!"

"Geez, again?" grimaced Luke. "Can't you do this in private?"

"You just called me a tramp in public, you can get called a selfish jerk in public!"

With that, Lorelai wheeled around and marched to the ambulance. "I need to see him."

The poor underpaid shmuck asked, "Are you..."

"We have a kid together."

They unzipped the black plastic ever so slightly.

Chris seemed to be smirking. Even in death, he was so very Christopher.

She exhaled, wishing she could stop crying. She'd cried nonstop for far too long.

"C'mon, doll, let's get you home, that's one helluva shock," crooned Babette, hustling over. "Who'da thunk a traffic light would kill someone, right? Right. C'mon now, shh, it's okay."

"Yeah, that's why I'm going to die single, surrounded by stray animals and singing duets with my mirror," said Lorelai, then stopped. "Wait. Kirk!"

Kirk looked at her like a whipped puppy expecting worse.

"Good aim," yelled Lorelai.

Confused, Kirk sat back down on the trunk of the car.

"Y'know, doll face, you're taking this pretty good," commented Babette.

"Well, let's see, in the last forty-eight hours I lost my self-respect, my fiancé, and someone who was my friend for thirty years. How should someone take that, exactly?"

"Well, you ain't screaming naked down the street like Mrs. Cassini when she found out about her son's affair with her daughter's husband."

"Huh," said Lorelai. "Naked?"

"Not even a pair of granny panties, hon, it was awful."

AN: So, the tally is: Death by cleaver while a zombie; death by Emily; death by angry woman in childbirth; death by giant Acme anvil (see Wile E. Coyote cartoons if the reference is unknown to you); death by sweet-and-sour pork asphyxiation; death by Stars Hollow sign; and death by Kirk. I'm not sure which of those is least likely, to be honest. I'd put my money on Emily for most likely.

Again, not a Chris-hater, so much as "Chris is a convenient target because the show made him one" sort of thing.

END