"Cover It In Chocolate And A Miracle Or Two"
Title: Cover It In Chocolate And A Miracle Or Two
Author: kellifer_fic
Rating: PG
Category: GG - Rory/Dean (Futurefic)
Word Count: 4,022
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, no offense, no money.
Notes: Title from "Candyman"
Summary: This is just how it happens.
Rory Gilmore runs into Dean Forester on a Tuesday when it’s warm and she’s thinking about sandwiches.
Not just any sandwiches, but the kind Sooki used to make and how the deli down the road from her office just didn’t cut the mustard, so to speak. How Sooki would fill two cut-thick slabs of sour dough with enough ingredients to top a family sized pizza and how the single slice of turkey and the bare scraping of cranberry sauce the deli thought constituted lunch would make Taylor Doose call a town meeting about not having enough spirit… or something.
So anyway, sandwiches it is and Rory has her head in a book so she doesn’t see the pole she’s about to walk right into or the man who notices for her, hooks her elbow and jerks her out of harm’s way and into him. She stumbles a little, drops her book and looks up into his face.
And up, and up and hey, she remembers this particular neck-crick well.
“Dean!” she exclaims and he turns, because he was about to just keep on going about whatever he’d been doing and mustn’t have recognised her. She wonders why though, because a book in front of her face was a regular Rory Gilmore accoutrement and she would often be unaware of Dean’s presence back in Stars Hollow until a finger had hooked over the top and tilted her book down.
He looks taller, if that’s at all possible and like an adult. There’s something vaguely unsettling about that and she’s almost ready to apologise because maybe she’s just run into an oddly similar-looking stranger when he smiles.
Dimples carve cavernous in his cheeks and the crinkles around his eyes are deeper but it’s him. “Rory? Geez, how are you?” he asks and a hand darts out towards her almost automatically but he corrects as if he’s realised what he’s doing and pushes hair out of his face instead.
“Good, I-”
It’s then that Rory notices that there is a pair of small arms hooked around Dean’s neck and a single hazel eye staring at her over his shoulder. “Who’s that?” a small voice pipes up and Dean jerks a little, like he’s totally forgotten he’s carrying someone for a moment.
“This is Rory,” Dean says, indicating her with a sweep of his arm. “Rory, this is my daughter, Lou.”
000
They go for coffee.
Actually, Rory says, “Do you want to-?” at the exact same moment that Dean says, “So, you maybe-?” and they both laugh awkwardly and Rory leads the way to the deli she was originally heading for. Sandwiches are the furthest thing on her mind. She’s desperate to ask Dean what he’s been doing and who he’s been doing it with more importantly considering that the evidence of his doing is sitting across from her and carefully scooping milk foam out of a tiny cup with a spoon.
“Lou?” Rory prods, because while she can’t exactly talk about unusual names, there’s a whole ‘nother level going on when you call your daughter something that is usually more appropriate for a male of the geriatric persuasion.
“Elouise,” she pipes up, smacking her spoon against the side of her cup like she’s requesting a toast. She lifts a small backpack from beside her chair and indeed Eloiuse is inscribed across it in glitter. She shakes the bag as if to emphasise her point.
“Most people call her El,” Dean says with a small shrug. “But when she was a baby she used to come out with these nasty, huge old-man burps. Lou seemed more appropriate and it kinda stuck.”
“Well, Elouise, it’s very nice to meet you,” Rory says with a nod and the little girl turns a gap-toothed grin on Dean. He pokes his tongue out sideways at her in response and she giggles.
Rory still has a lot of questions and wishes she was brave enough to ask them. She missed Dean, more than she’d ever been prepared for. She knows the idea of him appealed more than the physical him when she was younger but he left a ragged hole in her life that had never really been filled. “So, what’s with the kid?” she blurts and then grimaces. Sometimes the inner-Lorelai breaks free and does a boogie all over social niceties. “Sorry, that sounded more polite in my head.”
Dean’s chuckling though, the warm kind of rumble she remembers from being pressed up against him as she talked to her mother during movies. He was never laughing at what was going on onscreen though, rather the weird back and forth she and her mother had going. He was the audience the Gilmore women had always been looking for but never knew they needed and it was mostly why he’d been accepted into the movie-night ritual so willingly.
Luke hadn’t survived it, mostly because he’d had the gall to ask questions when he didn’t understand what the hell they were on about.
With a deftness that surprises her, Dean has Lou away from the table and safely seated at a miniature version Rory had never noticed in the corner. Colouring books, a stuffed elephant and a large box of pencils are brought forth from the seemingly depthless backpack. Dean is back, seated and rubbing his knuckles along his jaw before Rory can say anything.
“I was married,” he says, and while he tries to grin through it, his voice suddenly sounds scraped raw. He blinks a couple of times and Rory recognises the gesture. He’d done it every time he’d seen her after their break-up. Even when they were carefully rebuilding a friendship, she would sometimes see him do it. She associated it with Dean in pain.
“Was?” she asks carefully.
“Beth was…” Dean pauses, takes a breath and then swallows. He’s told this story before, Rory can tell. Probably hundreds of times and it’s never gotten easier. “There was a car accident. I was driving and the roads were wet. Lou was with her grandparents thank god.”
Rory wants to reach out. She wants to settle her hand over Dean’s where it lays fisted on the table. He’s suddenly looking anywhere but at her and she hates that he’s had to bare this part of his life so early. That Lou’s presence makes it impossible not to, probably for every person he meets.
“I’m sorry,” she offers and his mouth turns down a little.
000
“Who is this?”
“Mo-om,” Rory groans. Lorelai has on the old, crabby-lady voice which means Rory is going to have to jump through hoops to actually start a conversation.
“This sounds vaguely like a daughter I once had but I have to dredge the memories up from the mists of time as it’s been so long.”
“I’ve been-”
‘Busy? Ha! And you said that home teach-yourself-to-be-a-psychic kit was a waste of money! Or… are you becoming predictable in your twilight years?”
The only way to break Lorelai Gilmore out of this particular mood is to tell her something she will instantly need every single painful detail on.
“IranintoDeanandhehadadaughterandisawidownow,” Rory manages to get all out all in one breath because that’s the only way to get it out.
“Rory!” Lorelai exclaims. “You let me go on and on and you had something like that to tell me?”
Sometimes the Lorelai-ness defeats even Rory. She wonders how mere mortals cope. She knows Luke’s default mechanism is to simply ignore her mother, which she knows Lorelai hates more than anything in the known universe. He’s gotten really good at it now too. He can last forty-nine seconds before yelling at her that she’s driving him crazy/up the wall/to drink.
“How are the twins?”
“You’re a cruel, cruel woman. How on earth did you come from my loins?”
“For asking about the twins? And don’t say loins.”
“No, for holding out on me for even the moments it will take for me to tell you they’re fine and adorable because I made them tiny Village People outfits. Lane is taking a little convincing about having a second set of twins to fill out the group-”
“Mom!”
“Oh my god, you’re letting me do it again!” Lorelai accuses but there’s a smile in her voice and Rory settles back on her couch, kicking her feet up and imagining her mother doing exactly the same thing.
“I literally ran into him, or he at least saved me from an unfortunate nose-destroying run-in with a pole.”
“How does he look?”
“That’s your first question?”
“I’m currently wrapping my mind around the other bits so colour the picture for me sweetie while I do that.”
“He looks good. He looks…” Rory searches for an appropriate way to describe the very Dean-ness that she’d been presented with that was completely different.
“If you say tall I will disown you. I raised you better than that. Does his hair still do that flippy thing?”
“It’s still shaggy but it looks… neater which is just weird. He’s got a little facial hair but it’s not enough that we’d mock him in the street. He was wearing a suit which suited him… ha. I wonder if that’s why they named suits suit. Because everyone suits a-”
“You’re drifting babe,” Lorelai interjected.
“Sorry.”
“So, the other stuff?” Lorelai prompts and she’s got serious mom-voice on now. The tone that always means safety to Rory. The it’ll be okay as long as we’re facing it together voice.
Rory tells her mother about her afternoon and how good it was to see Dean. It really was she realises, while she’s speaking. More than she ever would have guessed. He’d been angry with her for so long that she’d been worried that if she ever ran into him again, he wouldn’t want to even speak with her. It was nice to know that wasn’t the case.
One New Year’s, Luke had had a little too much to drink. For such a usually laconic and careful man, Luke became almost jarringly talkative and honest when he’d had a few, probably why he didn’t overindulge often. Her mother had been plying him with drinks though, the girly kind that tasted like candy and packed a punch you weren’t expecting. He’d told her, and thank goodness didn’t remember telling her afterward, how Dean had warned him off her mother. Telling him in no uncertain terms that small-town guys like them couldn’t ever hope to secure the affections of a Gilmore.
000
“We’re going for ice cream.”
Rory had given Dean her number, not really expecting him to call. It’d been nice to see him but she still thinks there might be, deep down, still a little anger and resentment going on. She’s wearing the Hello Kitty slippers her mom gave her for Christmas and already has a bowl of ice cream sitting in front of her but finds herself saying, “Yeah, sure. Give me twenty minutes.”
There’s a tiny little ice cream place about three blocks up from her apartment. The owner experiments with new and fairly interesting flavours. Rory has never admitted to anyone that it was one of the deciding factors in choosing her apartment. A little bit of quirkiness to remind her of home.
Dean’s eyeing the selections behind the fogged glass of the display case with trepidation when she arrives. Lou has fully monopolised the owner’s attention, pointing to each large steel bucket and asking which flavour in turn.
“Yeah, this is about what I expected from you,” Dean says with a grin, stabbing a finger in the direction of a concoction that is a particularly violent shade of green. “How is Apple and Fun a flavour?”
“Ooh, it’s a new one!” Rory says, clapping her hands together before she realises what she’s doing. She and her mom come to this place every time Lorelai visits and it’s always a culinary adventure. Lou looks around at her voice and then approaches, stuffed elephant clutched in front of her.
“Hi Auntie Rory,” she greets, pressing her elephant to Rory’s hip briefly. Dean blinks at her and colours an interesting shade of red, much like the colour of Redberry Wow.
“Just Rory is fine, hon,” he says, rubbing a hand over the top of Lou’s head and Lou looks up at him.
“Dean, it’s okay,” Rory says with a smile. She hunkers down to accept the proffered elephant. “What’s this guy’s name?”
“He hasn’t told me,” Lou says, sounding so forlorn that Rory has to put a hand to her mouth to stop from giggling at the utter cuteness. She looks up at Dean and he shrugs with raised eyebrows.
“He hasn’t told me either,” he says and now they both do laugh, Lou looking between them and probably wondering what is so funny about her stuffed toy’s aloofness.
Dean finally decides on vanilla because he claims it’s the only flavour that he can order and actually know what the outcome will be. It’s therefore hilarious when he discovers that not even the classic is quite what he’s expecting as Rory had discovered on her third foray to the shop. “You didn’t feel the need to warn me?” he complains.
“You know better than that,” Rory scoffs, as they walk back towards her apartment. Lou has a hold of Dean with one hand and her ice cream with the other. Rory has been allowed to carry the elephant and her own Peanut Butter Mockery. Lou ends up with Calm Frost which is in actual fact the vanilla Dean was aiming for.
They’re together maybe a total of half an hour and as Dean and Lou leave her at her door, Rory watches Dean swing Lou up onto his back, getting ice cream-sticky hands in his hair for his trouble. Rory touches fingers to her mouth, unable to stop smiling.
“Oh no,” she groans, the smile falling away with her realisation. She has a crush on the boy whose heart she stomped on, not once but twice.
000
Lane answers the phone in the middle of telling someone no, don’t stick that in your mouth!
“One of the twins?” Rory hazards.
“No, Zack,” Lane says, her voice a strange mix of resignation and affection. After Rory had described her predicament, Lane asks, “Are you requiring cheerleader-Lane or the you-don’t-want-to-hear-this Lane?”
Rory knocks the phone in her hand against her temple a couple of times before answering. “Cautiously optimistic Lane?” Rory tries and hears a snort from the other side.
“Sorry, you only get wild enthusiasm with no regard for actual facts, or… the facts.”
“The facts then,” Rory decides.
“He’s emotionally fragile, has a young dependant and you’re his first love. It’ll be a good… no great idea for everyone for maybe two seconds and then you’ll both realise it’s just a disaster waiting to happen.”
“Is it too late to change my mind?” Rory asks, her voice muffled because she has face-planted into her mattress. Lane, with the power of the Best Friend, can understand her perfectly.
“I’m sorry, my words are out there in the universe now,” Lane says with real regret in her tone.
“I’m not his first love,” Rory claims, sitting up. She knows there are straws around for her to clutch somewhere. She just had to find them. He had a girlfriend before he came to Stars Hollow, probably more than one.
“Rory!” Lane snaps in her best Mrs. Kim impression and Rory tries not to shudder. She’ll be fifty and Lane’s mother will still make her feel like she’s just eaten the cookies meant for her bible group and therefore be doomed to hell.
“I know,” she groans.
“Okay, time for the painful question?” Lane asks and Rory’s not sure how this could get any worse. She doesn’t say no so of course Lane steamrollers ahead. “Are you sure this isn’t just a relapse like the last time?”
“Relapse?” Rory blinks at her reflection in the mirror and then pulls a face.
“When you’d decided that Dean was the perfect boyfriend because he looked perfect in light of the Jess-related devastation?”
“I wasn’t comparing them!” Rory claims but of course she’s lying and Lane knows it.
“Rory, every guy you’ve ever dated has been compared to Dean in your head. How could you not? Dean was a ridiculously good boyfriend. He was bad-boy pretty but completely dependant. It’s a rare mix.”
“You’re not helping,” Rory says.
“I want what’s best for you; I want you to be happy. If you can honestly tell me that this is it, that Dean is it, then I’ll dig out my old pom-poms.”
“Maybe this has always been it,” Rory says. “Maybe I’ve just been too dumb to see it.”
000
The next time she sees Dean, he’s alone.
Or, not exactly alone. Rory is at a corner bar with her friends Annabeth and Susie and Dean is treating a bunch of rowdy people to drinks. Rory realises she’s been horribly remiss in asking anything about Dean’s life currently. She doesn’t even know what he does for a living. When she turns slightly, she can see both Annabeth and Susie making wildly enthusiastic gestures that probably mean they approve of Dean.
If only they knew he was the Dean. She’s pretty sure she’s mentioned him.
“Wow, suddenly you’re everywhere?” Dean has to practically bend in half and yell in her ear. There’s live music and the band has obviously been watching too much Spinal Tap. They have everything turned up to eleven.
Rory wants to point out that their last meeting wasn’t actually random and therefore they’ve only accidentally bumped into each other twice which isn’t that huge a coincidence but she knows yelling all that is too much effort. “Yeah!” she screams instead.
“Hey, come here for a sec!” Dean calls back and takes her elbow. Rory hadn’t been able to catch the bartender’s attention yet so she abandons her wait and follows, looking back at her friends and giving them a hand waggle with a thumb’s up. She’s hoping they understand it means she’s not about to be axe murdered or anything and really hoping they don’t take it as a plea to rescue her.
She almost loses Dean in the shadows at the back of the bar but then there’s a faint burst of light and she sees him pushing through a fire door. The cable at the top that connects the door to the alarm that should sound if it’s opened is hanging loose.
“Sorry, just too loud in there,” Dean says, stepping towards her. His arms come up and hands cup her shoulders, rubbing briefly. She remembers the gesture, how he’d always known when she was a little cold. Her skin breaks out into gooseflesh under her thin sweater and she’s pretty sure she’s blushing. Dean’s got his head ducked, hair falling over his eyes and he looks so much like the boy she once knew that it’s a little overwhelming.
“Why did I give you up?” she blurts and yep, now she’s definitely blushing. Dean’s mouth drops open a little and he’s already in her space so it doesn’t take much to lean forward, hands still on her shoulders but now walking up to span her collarbones. He hesitates for just a second before his lips meet hers and Rory tips her head just enough that he gets that what he’s doing is okay.
Kissing Dean had always been… kissing Dean. All other kisses were compared to it, but nothing was ever compared to the Dean-kiss. Mostly Rory thinks it was because he was her first, her template for all kisses to come. Maybe because there was always a sweetness to Dean that she never managed to find anywhere else.
000
Rory opens her eyes.
There’s a hand stretched out across her bed in front of her face that isn’t hers, the warmth of an arm under her neck. She waits for the regret, for the feelings of dread but they don’t come. Instead, her skin tingles when she shifts, back pressed against the solid chest that’s broadened with time.
“Stop wriggling like that,” Dean grumbles, his voice craggy with sleep and his breath a warm tickle on her neck.
“Why?” Rory asks.
“Because I’m not awake enough to take advantage of it.”
“There’s a glass of water on my bedside, which, by the way, it was very sweet of you to place there.”
“I’ve always been a gentleman.”
“I would have to agree. I could tip it on you is what I’m saying. That’ll-”
“No,” Dean groans and his other arm comes up and over, dropping across her side and circling back around so she’s completely held. In those few months when their reunion had been illicit and then frowned upon, they hadn’t had much chance to just lay. Rory feels gypped because there’s something completely awesome about a man who can wrap you in his arms with more arm to spare.
“Hey, remember our song?” Rory asks, snaking one arm free so she can take up exploring the Dean hand that’s attached to the arm trapped under her neck. It feels a little cold so it’s probably asleep with her weight.
“Candyman was never our song,” Dean grunts. “What are you doing? You’ll give me pins and needles.”
Rory is pinching some of the skin on the back of Dean’s probably dead hand. She grins and says, “That’s inevitable anyway, as soon as I move.”
“Ah, see. There’s where my brilliant never-ever-moving plan comes into affect.”
“We’ll have to move eventually,” Rory says. “I have a job and I’m guessing you do too. Plus, a kid.”
“You have a kid?” Dean gasps and Rory smacks his hand, realises it’s the numb one and elbows him instead.
“I forgot you thought you were funny.”
“I’m hilarious,” Dean deadpans and that’s it, they’re both laughing.
When it subsides though, Rory says with a little awe in her voice, “You have a kid.”
“Hey, if Lorelai can do it, anyone can,” Dean says and earns himself another elbow to the solar plexus for his trouble. In retaliation, he flips them so Rory is underneath, Dean holding himself up on his arms.
“I see you’re awake now,” Rory notes, bringing her hands up to frame Dean’s face. My Dean she thinks. She’s said it before, hundreds of times, but never really got what it meant. She was young and had no idea what she possessed.
“Lou’s already given her stamp of approval,” Dean says and he’s smiling, a really genuinely happy grin that Rory realises she hadn’t seen much in their second time around. There was too much pain, too many people involved. This is the kind of grin she got when they first started dating.
“She has?” Rory prods, running her fingers over Dean’s face. His lips press to her fingertips when she skates them across. Dean slides sideways and comes up onto his elbow, face serious.
“Lou doesn’t really remember her mom,” Dean says, taking a piece of Rory’s hair and twining it about his fingers. “But she knows I’ve been sad for a long time. She’s had to deal with me being… sad most of her little life, poor kid. She likes your eyes and your hair and that I smile around you like I do with her but no one else.”
“There’s going to be… stuff,” Rory says, not wanting to break the mood but her mind has never been a linear thing. She’s already jumping ahead days, months and years.
“Of course there will be,” Dean agrees, lowering his head and nodding so his nose rubs up and down her elbow. She always loved his nose, how it was all cutely squishy. Rory leans sideways so she can get a hand between Dean’s face and her arm and presses it with a beep for good measure. “Wow, the serious talk bit of the morning didn’t last long,” Dean notes.
“We can do that later, can’t we?” Rory asks, laying back and dragging Dean with her. “We’ve got lots of later to fill.”
Author: kellifer_fic
Rating: PG
Category: GG - Rory/Dean (Futurefic)
Word Count: 4,022
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, no offense, no money.
Notes: Title from "Candyman"
Summary: This is just how it happens.
Rory Gilmore runs into Dean Forester on a Tuesday when it’s warm and she’s thinking about sandwiches.
Not just any sandwiches, but the kind Sooki used to make and how the deli down the road from her office just didn’t cut the mustard, so to speak. How Sooki would fill two cut-thick slabs of sour dough with enough ingredients to top a family sized pizza and how the single slice of turkey and the bare scraping of cranberry sauce the deli thought constituted lunch would make Taylor Doose call a town meeting about not having enough spirit… or something.
So anyway, sandwiches it is and Rory has her head in a book so she doesn’t see the pole she’s about to walk right into or the man who notices for her, hooks her elbow and jerks her out of harm’s way and into him. She stumbles a little, drops her book and looks up into his face.
And up, and up and hey, she remembers this particular neck-crick well.
“Dean!” she exclaims and he turns, because he was about to just keep on going about whatever he’d been doing and mustn’t have recognised her. She wonders why though, because a book in front of her face was a regular Rory Gilmore accoutrement and she would often be unaware of Dean’s presence back in Stars Hollow until a finger had hooked over the top and tilted her book down.
He looks taller, if that’s at all possible and like an adult. There’s something vaguely unsettling about that and she’s almost ready to apologise because maybe she’s just run into an oddly similar-looking stranger when he smiles.
Dimples carve cavernous in his cheeks and the crinkles around his eyes are deeper but it’s him. “Rory? Geez, how are you?” he asks and a hand darts out towards her almost automatically but he corrects as if he’s realised what he’s doing and pushes hair out of his face instead.
“Good, I-”
It’s then that Rory notices that there is a pair of small arms hooked around Dean’s neck and a single hazel eye staring at her over his shoulder. “Who’s that?” a small voice pipes up and Dean jerks a little, like he’s totally forgotten he’s carrying someone for a moment.
“This is Rory,” Dean says, indicating her with a sweep of his arm. “Rory, this is my daughter, Lou.”
000
They go for coffee.
Actually, Rory says, “Do you want to-?” at the exact same moment that Dean says, “So, you maybe-?” and they both laugh awkwardly and Rory leads the way to the deli she was originally heading for. Sandwiches are the furthest thing on her mind. She’s desperate to ask Dean what he’s been doing and who he’s been doing it with more importantly considering that the evidence of his doing is sitting across from her and carefully scooping milk foam out of a tiny cup with a spoon.
“Lou?” Rory prods, because while she can’t exactly talk about unusual names, there’s a whole ‘nother level going on when you call your daughter something that is usually more appropriate for a male of the geriatric persuasion.
“Elouise,” she pipes up, smacking her spoon against the side of her cup like she’s requesting a toast. She lifts a small backpack from beside her chair and indeed Eloiuse is inscribed across it in glitter. She shakes the bag as if to emphasise her point.
“Most people call her El,” Dean says with a small shrug. “But when she was a baby she used to come out with these nasty, huge old-man burps. Lou seemed more appropriate and it kinda stuck.”
“Well, Elouise, it’s very nice to meet you,” Rory says with a nod and the little girl turns a gap-toothed grin on Dean. He pokes his tongue out sideways at her in response and she giggles.
Rory still has a lot of questions and wishes she was brave enough to ask them. She missed Dean, more than she’d ever been prepared for. She knows the idea of him appealed more than the physical him when she was younger but he left a ragged hole in her life that had never really been filled. “So, what’s with the kid?” she blurts and then grimaces. Sometimes the inner-Lorelai breaks free and does a boogie all over social niceties. “Sorry, that sounded more polite in my head.”
Dean’s chuckling though, the warm kind of rumble she remembers from being pressed up against him as she talked to her mother during movies. He was never laughing at what was going on onscreen though, rather the weird back and forth she and her mother had going. He was the audience the Gilmore women had always been looking for but never knew they needed and it was mostly why he’d been accepted into the movie-night ritual so willingly.
Luke hadn’t survived it, mostly because he’d had the gall to ask questions when he didn’t understand what the hell they were on about.
With a deftness that surprises her, Dean has Lou away from the table and safely seated at a miniature version Rory had never noticed in the corner. Colouring books, a stuffed elephant and a large box of pencils are brought forth from the seemingly depthless backpack. Dean is back, seated and rubbing his knuckles along his jaw before Rory can say anything.
“I was married,” he says, and while he tries to grin through it, his voice suddenly sounds scraped raw. He blinks a couple of times and Rory recognises the gesture. He’d done it every time he’d seen her after their break-up. Even when they were carefully rebuilding a friendship, she would sometimes see him do it. She associated it with Dean in pain.
“Was?” she asks carefully.
“Beth was…” Dean pauses, takes a breath and then swallows. He’s told this story before, Rory can tell. Probably hundreds of times and it’s never gotten easier. “There was a car accident. I was driving and the roads were wet. Lou was with her grandparents thank god.”
Rory wants to reach out. She wants to settle her hand over Dean’s where it lays fisted on the table. He’s suddenly looking anywhere but at her and she hates that he’s had to bare this part of his life so early. That Lou’s presence makes it impossible not to, probably for every person he meets.
“I’m sorry,” she offers and his mouth turns down a little.
000
“Who is this?”
“Mo-om,” Rory groans. Lorelai has on the old, crabby-lady voice which means Rory is going to have to jump through hoops to actually start a conversation.
“This sounds vaguely like a daughter I once had but I have to dredge the memories up from the mists of time as it’s been so long.”
“I’ve been-”
‘Busy? Ha! And you said that home teach-yourself-to-be-a-psychic kit was a waste of money! Or… are you becoming predictable in your twilight years?”
The only way to break Lorelai Gilmore out of this particular mood is to tell her something she will instantly need every single painful detail on.
“IranintoDeanandhehadadaughterandisawidownow,” Rory manages to get all out all in one breath because that’s the only way to get it out.
“Rory!” Lorelai exclaims. “You let me go on and on and you had something like that to tell me?”
Sometimes the Lorelai-ness defeats even Rory. She wonders how mere mortals cope. She knows Luke’s default mechanism is to simply ignore her mother, which she knows Lorelai hates more than anything in the known universe. He’s gotten really good at it now too. He can last forty-nine seconds before yelling at her that she’s driving him crazy/up the wall/to drink.
“How are the twins?”
“You’re a cruel, cruel woman. How on earth did you come from my loins?”
“For asking about the twins? And don’t say loins.”
“No, for holding out on me for even the moments it will take for me to tell you they’re fine and adorable because I made them tiny Village People outfits. Lane is taking a little convincing about having a second set of twins to fill out the group-”
“Mom!”
“Oh my god, you’re letting me do it again!” Lorelai accuses but there’s a smile in her voice and Rory settles back on her couch, kicking her feet up and imagining her mother doing exactly the same thing.
“I literally ran into him, or he at least saved me from an unfortunate nose-destroying run-in with a pole.”
“How does he look?”
“That’s your first question?”
“I’m currently wrapping my mind around the other bits so colour the picture for me sweetie while I do that.”
“He looks good. He looks…” Rory searches for an appropriate way to describe the very Dean-ness that she’d been presented with that was completely different.
“If you say tall I will disown you. I raised you better than that. Does his hair still do that flippy thing?”
“It’s still shaggy but it looks… neater which is just weird. He’s got a little facial hair but it’s not enough that we’d mock him in the street. He was wearing a suit which suited him… ha. I wonder if that’s why they named suits suit. Because everyone suits a-”
“You’re drifting babe,” Lorelai interjected.
“Sorry.”
“So, the other stuff?” Lorelai prompts and she’s got serious mom-voice on now. The tone that always means safety to Rory. The it’ll be okay as long as we’re facing it together voice.
Rory tells her mother about her afternoon and how good it was to see Dean. It really was she realises, while she’s speaking. More than she ever would have guessed. He’d been angry with her for so long that she’d been worried that if she ever ran into him again, he wouldn’t want to even speak with her. It was nice to know that wasn’t the case.
One New Year’s, Luke had had a little too much to drink. For such a usually laconic and careful man, Luke became almost jarringly talkative and honest when he’d had a few, probably why he didn’t overindulge often. Her mother had been plying him with drinks though, the girly kind that tasted like candy and packed a punch you weren’t expecting. He’d told her, and thank goodness didn’t remember telling her afterward, how Dean had warned him off her mother. Telling him in no uncertain terms that small-town guys like them couldn’t ever hope to secure the affections of a Gilmore.
000
“We’re going for ice cream.”
Rory had given Dean her number, not really expecting him to call. It’d been nice to see him but she still thinks there might be, deep down, still a little anger and resentment going on. She’s wearing the Hello Kitty slippers her mom gave her for Christmas and already has a bowl of ice cream sitting in front of her but finds herself saying, “Yeah, sure. Give me twenty minutes.”
There’s a tiny little ice cream place about three blocks up from her apartment. The owner experiments with new and fairly interesting flavours. Rory has never admitted to anyone that it was one of the deciding factors in choosing her apartment. A little bit of quirkiness to remind her of home.
Dean’s eyeing the selections behind the fogged glass of the display case with trepidation when she arrives. Lou has fully monopolised the owner’s attention, pointing to each large steel bucket and asking which flavour in turn.
“Yeah, this is about what I expected from you,” Dean says with a grin, stabbing a finger in the direction of a concoction that is a particularly violent shade of green. “How is Apple and Fun a flavour?”
“Ooh, it’s a new one!” Rory says, clapping her hands together before she realises what she’s doing. She and her mom come to this place every time Lorelai visits and it’s always a culinary adventure. Lou looks around at her voice and then approaches, stuffed elephant clutched in front of her.
“Hi Auntie Rory,” she greets, pressing her elephant to Rory’s hip briefly. Dean blinks at her and colours an interesting shade of red, much like the colour of Redberry Wow.
“Just Rory is fine, hon,” he says, rubbing a hand over the top of Lou’s head and Lou looks up at him.
“Dean, it’s okay,” Rory says with a smile. She hunkers down to accept the proffered elephant. “What’s this guy’s name?”
“He hasn’t told me,” Lou says, sounding so forlorn that Rory has to put a hand to her mouth to stop from giggling at the utter cuteness. She looks up at Dean and he shrugs with raised eyebrows.
“He hasn’t told me either,” he says and now they both do laugh, Lou looking between them and probably wondering what is so funny about her stuffed toy’s aloofness.
Dean finally decides on vanilla because he claims it’s the only flavour that he can order and actually know what the outcome will be. It’s therefore hilarious when he discovers that not even the classic is quite what he’s expecting as Rory had discovered on her third foray to the shop. “You didn’t feel the need to warn me?” he complains.
“You know better than that,” Rory scoffs, as they walk back towards her apartment. Lou has a hold of Dean with one hand and her ice cream with the other. Rory has been allowed to carry the elephant and her own Peanut Butter Mockery. Lou ends up with Calm Frost which is in actual fact the vanilla Dean was aiming for.
They’re together maybe a total of half an hour and as Dean and Lou leave her at her door, Rory watches Dean swing Lou up onto his back, getting ice cream-sticky hands in his hair for his trouble. Rory touches fingers to her mouth, unable to stop smiling.
“Oh no,” she groans, the smile falling away with her realisation. She has a crush on the boy whose heart she stomped on, not once but twice.
000
Lane answers the phone in the middle of telling someone no, don’t stick that in your mouth!
“One of the twins?” Rory hazards.
“No, Zack,” Lane says, her voice a strange mix of resignation and affection. After Rory had described her predicament, Lane asks, “Are you requiring cheerleader-Lane or the you-don’t-want-to-hear-this Lane?”
Rory knocks the phone in her hand against her temple a couple of times before answering. “Cautiously optimistic Lane?” Rory tries and hears a snort from the other side.
“Sorry, you only get wild enthusiasm with no regard for actual facts, or… the facts.”
“The facts then,” Rory decides.
“He’s emotionally fragile, has a young dependant and you’re his first love. It’ll be a good… no great idea for everyone for maybe two seconds and then you’ll both realise it’s just a disaster waiting to happen.”
“Is it too late to change my mind?” Rory asks, her voice muffled because she has face-planted into her mattress. Lane, with the power of the Best Friend, can understand her perfectly.
“I’m sorry, my words are out there in the universe now,” Lane says with real regret in her tone.
“I’m not his first love,” Rory claims, sitting up. She knows there are straws around for her to clutch somewhere. She just had to find them. He had a girlfriend before he came to Stars Hollow, probably more than one.
“Rory!” Lane snaps in her best Mrs. Kim impression and Rory tries not to shudder. She’ll be fifty and Lane’s mother will still make her feel like she’s just eaten the cookies meant for her bible group and therefore be doomed to hell.
“I know,” she groans.
“Okay, time for the painful question?” Lane asks and Rory’s not sure how this could get any worse. She doesn’t say no so of course Lane steamrollers ahead. “Are you sure this isn’t just a relapse like the last time?”
“Relapse?” Rory blinks at her reflection in the mirror and then pulls a face.
“When you’d decided that Dean was the perfect boyfriend because he looked perfect in light of the Jess-related devastation?”
“I wasn’t comparing them!” Rory claims but of course she’s lying and Lane knows it.
“Rory, every guy you’ve ever dated has been compared to Dean in your head. How could you not? Dean was a ridiculously good boyfriend. He was bad-boy pretty but completely dependant. It’s a rare mix.”
“You’re not helping,” Rory says.
“I want what’s best for you; I want you to be happy. If you can honestly tell me that this is it, that Dean is it, then I’ll dig out my old pom-poms.”
“Maybe this has always been it,” Rory says. “Maybe I’ve just been too dumb to see it.”
000
The next time she sees Dean, he’s alone.
Or, not exactly alone. Rory is at a corner bar with her friends Annabeth and Susie and Dean is treating a bunch of rowdy people to drinks. Rory realises she’s been horribly remiss in asking anything about Dean’s life currently. She doesn’t even know what he does for a living. When she turns slightly, she can see both Annabeth and Susie making wildly enthusiastic gestures that probably mean they approve of Dean.
If only they knew he was the Dean. She’s pretty sure she’s mentioned him.
“Wow, suddenly you’re everywhere?” Dean has to practically bend in half and yell in her ear. There’s live music and the band has obviously been watching too much Spinal Tap. They have everything turned up to eleven.
Rory wants to point out that their last meeting wasn’t actually random and therefore they’ve only accidentally bumped into each other twice which isn’t that huge a coincidence but she knows yelling all that is too much effort. “Yeah!” she screams instead.
“Hey, come here for a sec!” Dean calls back and takes her elbow. Rory hadn’t been able to catch the bartender’s attention yet so she abandons her wait and follows, looking back at her friends and giving them a hand waggle with a thumb’s up. She’s hoping they understand it means she’s not about to be axe murdered or anything and really hoping they don’t take it as a plea to rescue her.
She almost loses Dean in the shadows at the back of the bar but then there’s a faint burst of light and she sees him pushing through a fire door. The cable at the top that connects the door to the alarm that should sound if it’s opened is hanging loose.
“Sorry, just too loud in there,” Dean says, stepping towards her. His arms come up and hands cup her shoulders, rubbing briefly. She remembers the gesture, how he’d always known when she was a little cold. Her skin breaks out into gooseflesh under her thin sweater and she’s pretty sure she’s blushing. Dean’s got his head ducked, hair falling over his eyes and he looks so much like the boy she once knew that it’s a little overwhelming.
“Why did I give you up?” she blurts and yep, now she’s definitely blushing. Dean’s mouth drops open a little and he’s already in her space so it doesn’t take much to lean forward, hands still on her shoulders but now walking up to span her collarbones. He hesitates for just a second before his lips meet hers and Rory tips her head just enough that he gets that what he’s doing is okay.
Kissing Dean had always been… kissing Dean. All other kisses were compared to it, but nothing was ever compared to the Dean-kiss. Mostly Rory thinks it was because he was her first, her template for all kisses to come. Maybe because there was always a sweetness to Dean that she never managed to find anywhere else.
000
Rory opens her eyes.
There’s a hand stretched out across her bed in front of her face that isn’t hers, the warmth of an arm under her neck. She waits for the regret, for the feelings of dread but they don’t come. Instead, her skin tingles when she shifts, back pressed against the solid chest that’s broadened with time.
“Stop wriggling like that,” Dean grumbles, his voice craggy with sleep and his breath a warm tickle on her neck.
“Why?” Rory asks.
“Because I’m not awake enough to take advantage of it.”
“There’s a glass of water on my bedside, which, by the way, it was very sweet of you to place there.”
“I’ve always been a gentleman.”
“I would have to agree. I could tip it on you is what I’m saying. That’ll-”
“No,” Dean groans and his other arm comes up and over, dropping across her side and circling back around so she’s completely held. In those few months when their reunion had been illicit and then frowned upon, they hadn’t had much chance to just lay. Rory feels gypped because there’s something completely awesome about a man who can wrap you in his arms with more arm to spare.
“Hey, remember our song?” Rory asks, snaking one arm free so she can take up exploring the Dean hand that’s attached to the arm trapped under her neck. It feels a little cold so it’s probably asleep with her weight.
“Candyman was never our song,” Dean grunts. “What are you doing? You’ll give me pins and needles.”
Rory is pinching some of the skin on the back of Dean’s probably dead hand. She grins and says, “That’s inevitable anyway, as soon as I move.”
“Ah, see. There’s where my brilliant never-ever-moving plan comes into affect.”
“We’ll have to move eventually,” Rory says. “I have a job and I’m guessing you do too. Plus, a kid.”
“You have a kid?” Dean gasps and Rory smacks his hand, realises it’s the numb one and elbows him instead.
“I forgot you thought you were funny.”
“I’m hilarious,” Dean deadpans and that’s it, they’re both laughing.
When it subsides though, Rory says with a little awe in her voice, “You have a kid.”
“Hey, if Lorelai can do it, anyone can,” Dean says and earns himself another elbow to the solar plexus for his trouble. In retaliation, he flips them so Rory is underneath, Dean holding himself up on his arms.
“I see you’re awake now,” Rory notes, bringing her hands up to frame Dean’s face. My Dean she thinks. She’s said it before, hundreds of times, but never really got what it meant. She was young and had no idea what she possessed.
“Lou’s already given her stamp of approval,” Dean says and he’s smiling, a really genuinely happy grin that Rory realises she hadn’t seen much in their second time around. There was too much pain, too many people involved. This is the kind of grin she got when they first started dating.
“She has?” Rory prods, running her fingers over Dean’s face. His lips press to her fingertips when she skates them across. Dean slides sideways and comes up onto his elbow, face serious.
“Lou doesn’t really remember her mom,” Dean says, taking a piece of Rory’s hair and twining it about his fingers. “But she knows I’ve been sad for a long time. She’s had to deal with me being… sad most of her little life, poor kid. She likes your eyes and your hair and that I smile around you like I do with her but no one else.”
“There’s going to be… stuff,” Rory says, not wanting to break the mood but her mind has never been a linear thing. She’s already jumping ahead days, months and years.
“Of course there will be,” Dean agrees, lowering his head and nodding so his nose rubs up and down her elbow. She always loved his nose, how it was all cutely squishy. Rory leans sideways so she can get a hand between Dean’s face and her arm and presses it with a beep for good measure. “Wow, the serious talk bit of the morning didn’t last long,” Dean notes.
“We can do that later, can’t we?” Rory asks, laying back and dragging Dean with her. “We’ve got lots of later to fill.”