author's notes: just that I do not own the Gilmore girls or any of that and it applies for all chapters after too.

Chapter One- Confessions of a Diner Owner

Lorelai stepped into Luke's despite the closed sign hanging in the window the night before her wedding after having left her daughter back at home with the claim that she needed a little time to herself on her last night as a single woman. She'd set out on foot to try to walk off the slowly growing feeling that her diaphragm was failing to force the air into her lungs. The fact that she wound up in the diner came as no surprise to her; a large portion of her time and paycheck was invested in those familiar walls. Not to mention the time and energy she'd invested into befriending and the tedious task of pulling off the tough layers that made up the proprietor and his personality. It was easily her favorite hang-out, something pretty much every one of her fellow townsfolk knew, and sliding onto her usual stool next to the cash register made the task of getting a full breath suddenly easier.

Having heard the bells jingle merrily into the stillness of the long empty diner, Luke came out from the kitchen with his hands in a towel, rubbing the grease and harsh cleaners from his fingertips.

"The diner's closed," he said.

"I know," she replied.

"I've already cleaned the grill."

"I'm still full from all the crap Rory and I ate."

"There's no coffee left and I'm not making another pot just for you."

"That's fine."

He gave her an incredulous look and glared at her from behind the protective barrier of the counter. That counter had been his savior so many times over the past four and a half years since he'd met the whirlwind of a woman and been subjected to her many different moods and bits. It had been dirty in times when she'd frustrated him to the point where only the rag he dragged across its surface had stopped him from strangling her, it had stood its ground when he'd been tempted to try to walk right through it and sweep her up in his arms and steal her breath with his lips, and it had held him up when she'd unwittingly broken his heart time and time again.

"Then why are you here?" he demanded warily, knowing he was too tired to keep up with her peculiar brand of insanity.

She tipped her chin up at him and gave him a tragically small ghost of a smile as she lifted her shoulders up around her ears before letting him fall back down. He could read the shade of blue of her eyes and he knew she wasn't as happy as she should have been the night before her wedding.

"I was just feeling a little lonely."

"And you came here? Where's Rory?"

"At home, giving me space."

"Space? Why on Earth do you need space?"

Instinctively Lorelai opened her mouth to respond but she closed it again a few heartbeats later when she realized that for once in her life she didn't know how to explain herself. She didn't have the words to describe the overwhelming feeling of change holding her head under the murky water of the lake or why change even felt that way to her. Didn't brides normally feel giddy and excited if for no other reason than the thrill of hooking the rows of tiny buttons up the back of a pearl white cloud and hiding glowing cheeks behind yards of lace? Lorelai didn't know why those feelings had mutated into a dull panic that seized her insides and held on tightly enough to make her slightly nauseous all the time. Without a better answer, she once again lifted her shoulder high and let them fall back limply.

"Are you coming tomorrow?" she asked.

"Ah geez, I don't know…" he replied.

"Why not?"

"I have the diner, Lorelai. I can't just drop everything because you're getting married."

"Everyone who eats here will be there. It will be a ghost town in here. No one will notice if you close for a little while and come over."

"I… I can't."

"Why not?" she repeated.

"I just can't. Drop it."

"Why?"

His eyes widened slightly as he looked up at her, his jaw set firmly, and the towel he'd been using to clean his hands was twisted and pulled firmly between his hands. And in one moment of irritation, one moment of weakness he would later blame on heartache, Luke let spill a secret he'd been holding deep inside for four plus years.

"Because I can't put on a suit and a tie, go into that church, and watch you promise your mind, body, and soul to some pompous creep who reads three papers every morning all while pretending like it isn't a knife to my heart."

Lorelai inhaled sharply, noting the gallant return of the defective diaphragm, as she stared down the best friend she had outside of her daughter. With a short nod she slid off of the stool and headed back out into the crisp night air, realizing she now had a logical reason to feel as though her whole life was being turned around in not good ways.

Luke just watched her walk out of the front door with a fifteen pound boulder resting in the pit of his gut knowing he'd just taken a sledgehammer to his only real friendship.