"Nope, I'm good," Luke hollered back. "Turn off all the lights, will ya?"
"Sure!" she called up the stairs.
-----
Lorelai came out of the bathroom, ready for bed, comfortable in fleece sweats. Luke, already in bed, sat up, wondering when he'd have to show her his list.
It didn't taken him long to write everything down. He had gone over each item in his mind a thousand times in the past few months. It was a good list, he thought, not too long, not too short. Only needed two hands to count all the items.
As Lorelai got ready to climb into bed, she placed a piece of paper under her pillow.
"What the…?" Luke asked.
"Told you I was going to sleep on the list…" she replied.
"You're kidding."
"Most definitely not. You can sleep on yours, if you want," Lorelai assured him, "but you don't have to," she hastily added.
Luke placed his list on the nightstand, turned off the lamp and wrapped himself around Lorelai. Her head safely tucked under his chin, he fell asleep thinking of all he'd heard on the phone that night.
------
Mornings were Luke's favorite time of day before he became involved with Lorelai. And there were still some mornings, like this morning, when he could enjoy arising at an early hour. For one, since he'd been so foolhardy as to think they would elope this weekend, he'd arranged to be away from the diner all weekend. He looked over at Lorelai, who was still in a very deep sleep. A flood of feeling cascaded over him as he tenderly brushed the hair away from her face and watched her sleep.
He was so proud of the way she had faced the town last night. But as surprising (and moving) as that had been, he was even more surprised by the revelation that she'd felt he had shut her out of his and April's life. That had certainly not been his intention. Had he really hurt her that much?
Luke's attention turned to the nightstand, where the notepad with his list caught his eye. The list! It seemed like a silly idea and he'd only gone along with Lorelai's idea because he loved her and wanted to do something she wanted. But a funny thing happened as he placed each item to paper: the sheer stupidity of every item on the list except for one.
Luke looked at his list and reviewed each item. Yep, everything, except for the last entry, was still a stupid reason not to marry Lorelai. He quickly glanced over at her. She was still sleeping, now turned on her side. He rolled over and pulled her in close to him. Even in her sleep, she had a powerful influence on him. Calming, and energizing. He wondered how she would react to the list. Maybe he should re-write it, make some of the entries less stupid, he pondered.
Luke wondered what was on Lorelai's list. She probably had a much longer list than his. He chuckled, thinking how silly it was that Lorelai was literally sleeping on hers, having tucked it under her pillow the night before. Luke watched in morbid fascination as his hand somehow feigned fluffing Lorelai's pillow, and then reached underneath to retrieve her list. Luke quickly held it up; it was easy to read in the early morning light filtering into the room.
There were two items on the list. And one was a date. Underlined.
Luke guiltily looked at the first item. "Meet April, and maybe her mom. For real."
He could fix that one. That one was up to him.
The second entry was more perplexing. It was a date, in 2007, roughly seven months from now. It was underlined at least four times.
Luke had no idea why that date was there. It wasn't his birthday, it wasn't Lorelai's or Rory's either...Luke hated that. Now he'd have to ask Lorelai, and she'd make him guess, and when he couldn't, the explanation would take forever.
Luke tucked the list back under Lorelai's pillow, and then looked at the woman who still slept in his arms. Poor Lorelai, she was still so sleepy and tired.
Paul Anka stirred; time to let the creature out, Luke thought. He gently placed Lorelai's head back on her pillow and covered her. He quietly slipped out of bed and opened the door, following Paul Anka out and down the stairs.
-----
Coming back into the house with Paul Anka, Luke set about making coffee. Lorelai's purse was on the counter next to the coffeemaker, and as Luke moved it, her day timer beckoned to him. Curiosity about the date caused his hand to once again move without his wanting to. Opening the calendar, he turned to the end, where there was a page for the next year. The same date he'd seen on Lorelai's list was circled there, with a tiny asterisk to the right.
His eye slowly followed the asterisk to the bottom of the page. Nothing. Leave it to Lorelai to not follow the rules. His eye moved to the left. Also nothing. Then to the right margin. Next to another asterisk, Lorelai's flowery handwriting spelled out the words "Baby D."
"Baby D."
As if struck by lightening in the middle of a lake, Luke suddenly was galvanized into action. He put down the coffee filters he was holding and flipped to today's date and started looking at the entries for the past few weeks. And there, just yesterday morning, was the entry: "Hartford, Dr."
Even when he'd run cross-country, his heart had never beat so fast. He flipped through more of the day timer, and turned to the section where Lorelai stashed business cards. He dropped the day timer and at least fifty business cards spewed forth onto the floor.
Damn! He picked every single one of them up and looked at each.
And then he saw Lorelai's writing on the back of one card. Another date, with a time. Six weeks in the future. Flipping it over, his heart nearly exploded as he read the words: "Hartford Women's Clinic."
-----
Luke didn't like it when people ran inside houses. It was too dangerous, for one thing. In the diner, there were of course insurance issues. Sometimes Lorelai ran up the stairs in the house and he'd have to remind her about things like broken ankles and legs and slipping and cracking one's head.
But on this Saturday morning, he didn't give a damn.
Bursting into their room, any noise he'd made didn't awake Lorelai. Luke grabbed the notepad from the nightstand and quickly crossed out every entry except the last. "Introduce April to Lorelai." And then he turned his attention to his sleeping fiancée.
Suddenly everything about her seemed more important. Was she warm? She was wearing sweats. Were they too tight around her waist? Was she getting enough sleep?
Luke slipped into bed and gently kissed her on the shoulder.
"Mmmm…'morning," Lorelai murmured.
"Good morning," Luke replied in a solemn tone.
"Sleep well?" she continued murmuring.
"Yeah." Luke rubbed her arm as he answered.
Lorelai opened her eyes. "Hey."
Luke could not answer.
Lorelai blinked as she looked at Luke. Then blinked again. Something wasn't quite right…he had on his proud Daddy face, for one…yet April wasn't with him. And was his hand shaking?
"Luke, you OK?"
When he did speak, his voice was shaky. "How long have you known?"
-----
A few hours later, Luke and Lorelai still lay together in bed. Lorelai, once again tucked safely under Luke's chin, felt safe and happy and sated. Luke's hand rested possessively on her abdomen; she sighed, wondering when the pregnancy food rants would begin.
But then again, she wouldn't have it any other way. Because this time, it would be different.
For a lifetime, she would get to see Luke be a father to their child and his daughter. Both would know a father's love. For a lifetime, he would be with them. For a lifetime, she would watch Luke follow through on all his promises to the new baby and April.
For a lifetime, Luke would be there. In the morning, during the day, and in the evening. His presence in their lives would be motivated by wanting to be there for all of them.
For a lifetime, the new baby would know the security of a loving and caring father. "Dada," their baby would vocalize. "Dada, Dada," Lorelai would repeat, handing the baby to Luke. "Who's my daddy?" their three-year-old would ask, and Luke would say "me" and play with the kid. And the questions would not stop there; they'd only escalate through the years. "Why does Daddy have a boat in the garage?" "How long have you lived in Stars Hollow?" "Can we have my birthday party in the diner?" "Mom, did you like Dad when you first met him?" "Mom, why won't Dad let me wear this?" "Of all the daddies in the world, how did you become mine?" "Tell me about the day I was born?"
Luke stirred. "Let's talk to April this week and find out her schedule…"
Lorelai chimed in, "then check with Rory…"
And Luke finished: "then pick a date to be married."
Fin