"Rory, you don't know what you are talking about… I can't go back." she said, sitting cross-legged on a brown wicker chair with a white cushion on a beautiful cherry wood deck.
"Mom, if you wanted to… you could. You should. Everybody thinks that you've been checked into some upscale mental institution and that you're suffering from a major mental breakdown! You have to go back!" exclaimed Rory, trying to coax her mother, Lorelai Gilmore, to go back to her life in Stars Hollow.
"Does this," Lorelai gestured to the scene around her, "look like a mental institution?" Rory looked around at the stunning orange sunset, the crisp blue waves beneath the sunset, the swaying beach grasses, and the warm comforting sand. Martha's Vineyard was very beautiful. "I know that you want to stay, Mom. However, we've run away for a month now! This sweet house on Martha's Vineyard is only a hide-away. I've got the paper, and you've got the Dragonfly. We just can't afford to stay—"
"Rory—don't. This is so much more complicated than you think." Lorelai exasperatingly said. She could feel tears coming on… and coming on quickly. She got up and sat in a different chair, rested her head in her hands and stared out at the reflection in the water. "Mom do you want to talk about it?" Rory asked.
Lorelai shook her head, and Rory left it at that.
Meanwhile back in Stars Hollow, Luke was sweating bullets. He didn't know how many calls that he had made to Lorelai in the past month, only to have every one reach her answering machine and mailbox.
Today had been an unusually light day at the diner and April wasn't supposed to come today, so Luke's mind had ample time to wander. Almost every time it wandered to Lorelai. It replayed the night when they last saw each other. Lorelai hadn't been acting in her normal fashion. She had just come from her parent's. I should have known that she'd be down to her last button. And I pushed it. I was so mad. That wasn't a good night for me either. I HATE ultimatums, thought Luke, I just wonder where she is…if she's ok… if she knows that I still love her.
He concluded that the more he thought, the more frustrated he became, and the more trouble he got into. Already that month, he had broken a good lot of his dishes out of anger at himself. And then he realized that that was a stupid thing to do, because Lorelai wasn't there to help him pick out a new pattern for the diner. She is the only one I know with a knack for things like that, he thought to himself, chuckling a bit.
A few days previous, he had gotten a catalog from Kirk's new venture (his third this week) for dishware patterns. Kirk's girlfriend, Lulu, supposedly painted dishware now. Luke had a good mind to throw it back at Kirk and kick him out of the diner, but he didn't (which surprised Kirk). He just stood there looking at the catalog. He saw a set of 36 modern, bright colored mosaic porcelain plates. Kirk offered the set at $50.00. Everybody in the diner, including Luke himself, was surprised when Luke had handed Kirk a $50 bill out of the safe in the back and gave it to Kirk. "What?" he yelled across the diner and everyone went back to eating their food. Luke had been in a bad mood since Lorelai left.
Luke thought that the plates would be good to show April and Lorelai; especially Lorelai. April would like the colors and the pattern. And eventually, she'd probably measure all of the angles on the plates. She liked math… and science, which is how April found Luke. Luke thought that Lorelai would like the spontaneous-ness of picking out a random pattern… plus the colors would make her happy. Hopefully, it'd make her happier when she ate on them; if she would come back to eat on them.
Subconsciously, he gave the counter a wipe down. This was his habit. He was a habitual neat-freak. It was something that complimented Lorelai's lack of organization. Once again, his thoughts turned back to Lorelai.
They always went back to Lorelai. Sometimes his thoughts went back to April, but almost always Lorelai, his one true love, his soul-mate, his best friend, and the person who he was going to spend the rest of his life with. He was determined to marry her; he just had to figure out how to get her back and win back her trust.
Luke loved her, he always had. Caesar went home and ten minutes later, Luke gave the counter a quick wipe, and went upstairs for the night and a beer.
The sun had already set and the stars had come out when Lorelai started to talk again. She had lost a lot of the color in her face over the past couple of weeks and her eyes had lost their trademark Lorelai sparkle. Whatever was bothering her had completely broken her; a break that Rory didn't think she could heal.
Rory had gone inside for about a half hour to make some spaghetti to eat and to fix Lorelai some chamomile tea with milk and honey to calm her nerves. She also flipped on the deck's light. When she came back out, she had a steaming mug of the tea. "Do you want to talk now?" said Rory, smiling a caring smile.
Lorelai looked at her and shrugged her shoulders. Rory handed her the mug, and sat near her mother on the closest chair.
"You ok?" Rory asked Lorelai.
"Yeah. I'm fine," she replied, "it's just been rough these past month, ya'know?"
"Don't worry Mom, it'll get better."
"How do you know? I've lost everything. I don't deserve to be happy. I let everyone down. Always."
"Let's get off of this subject, why don't we?" Rory said, trying to change the subject. She figured that this wasn't the best time to bring up Logan, and how her relationship was going with him.
Rory looked at her mother. Lorelai still had her engagement ring on; she loved that ring. I've got to do something, thought Rory, I can't just let her sit her in a beach house. I've got to get her back to Stars Hollow.
Reinforcements needed to be called in to get her mother back home. But not yet. She decided on calling her father and Sookie in a few days if she couldn't get her mother to agree to go home.
The ocean relaxed Lorelai. Ocean waves made such a soothing sound. Everyone should just take time to listen to them, she thought listening to the ocean and gazing at the stars. Rory joined her, "Ok. Well, we'll start at the beginning. Ok?"
"Ssh." Was all that Lorelai replied.
"Ok… we'll play 20 questions. I'll ask you twenty. Then, if you want, you can ask me twenty. Is that alright Mom?"
"I guess." she replied staring off into the distance.
"Ok," Rory threw her legs over the arm of the wicker chair she was sitting in, "number one; the most important. Do you still love Luke?" Immediately, Rory wasregetting that she had asked the question.