**Note: I'd just like to mention once again that the amazing Barb has had a huge hand in writing this as well, and it wouldn't be here without her! So when giving credit please include her as well. Okay, now let's move on to the story.**

[This story takes place after the episode "It Should Have Been Lorelai" in which Lorelai has a fight with Christopher in the diner.]

Lorelai carefully balanced her purse and now empty Styrofoam coffee cup from work and opened the door to the diner, only to get her coat caught in the door. Perfect. She freed herself and sat down at the usual table and waited for Luke to bring coffee.

Luke was taking an order from the counter when Lorelai walked in. Well, stumbled in. He couldn't help but smirk to himself as she got stuck in the door. After he finished the order, he quickly grabbed the coffee pot and headed over to her. As he flipped the cup over, set it down, and poured the hot liquid of heaven, Luke tilted his head to get a good look at her. "Long day?"

She could have sworn he was pouring the coffee slower than usual. It could have just been her being impatient, but he probably was doing it to torment her. No surprise. "Believe me, you have no idea."

"Work?" He continued to pour the coffee ever so slowly. When he eventually finished, he lifted the pot gently and looked at Lorelai's flustered face.

"Yes, and unless you work with a best friend that often drives you insane and an annoying French man, then you have no idea." She slid the cup over as he finally finished pouring it, and took a rather large sip. "Oh, thank God. It took you long enough."

"My hand hurts. I'm refraining from any quick movements." Luke threw a sarcastic glare at Lorelai. "Want anything else?"

"My apologies. Leave the pot and I won't have to bother you for coming back again." She looked crabbily at her watch and remembered Rory was staying after school to work on the newspaper.

Luke instantly regretted his sarcasm. He mentally cringed, and tried to salvage this moment by being serious. "Lorelai... is, is everything ok? Are you sure you don't want to talk about it?"

"Just a bad day." Lorelai sighed and looked out the window, thinking he would go away, but he was still standing there. "Have you ever had one of those moments, where you thought you were saying the right thing at the right time to the right person, but when you said it you instantly knew that you shouldn't have, and it just. lurks in the back of your mind, not sure if anything will ever be quite the same again." Feeling awkward after she'd blurted out what she was thinking, she picked up the coffee cup.

Luke tensed up. He knew exactly what she was referring to. If he didn't know Lorelai so well, and how she can handle herself, he would have given that man a good, hard whack right to the... it infuriated Luke seeing that asshole embarrass and hurt Lorelai like that. And now look at her. He eased the tension that was mounting within his clenched muscles and took a deep breath. "You mean ... Chris. Right?"

"I just... I never meant for him to take it that way. But no, naive Lorelai thinks hey, let's tell him how we felt all along so we can all honestly move on with our lives with the past done with, while when I'm saying it it's hey, Chris, I forgive you for being the cause of all my unfinished relationships."

Luke glanced around the diner and noticed that the place was dead. Caesar was serving the one man at the counter and Luke decided to take a seat next to Lorelai. He sat down, stumped as to what to say to her, especially since he didn't hear the entire conversation- or, uh... argument. "If you don't mind me asking ... what exactly did you tell him?"

"That I was happy for him and that he had a new life, and just... I felt like I could move on, you know? Because my entire life, there's always been Christopher, in the back of my mind it had always been him; I could see us together. Somehow I always thought that when he got his life on track, we'd be together. And because of that I could never really completely give myself to any other person." She stopped, partly because it was hard to talk about, and partly because it sounded even worse now than it had then. "I thought that for one minute I could open up and be totally honest, be one of those people that hold nothing back. And I was, and then I was sitting there looking at him, and he was looking at me, and it hurt."

She looked back at him and noticed he was looking away a little, probably waiting until she was done so he could back to whatever it was that he did back there. There was an awkward silence once again that she didn't know what to say.

Luke sat there, soaking in the information. So she always saw herself with Chris? Is that the reason she didn't go through with her engagement to Max? Is that what was holding her back from... well... who was he kidding? "So ... you don't think things will get better between you two? I'm sure neither one of you want to make this difficult for Rory, so I would imagine he would have the decency to act like an adult for her sake."

"Well, we've certainly faced bigger issues, so I'm sure it will be fine. We've... Chris and I, we've been through so much and we know each other so well. Except this, of course, because he obviously didn't see this one coming. And as far as being an adult, whatever that means, I'm not sure I've got it down anymore than Chris does. I mean hey, he's the one that's got his life together, a new job, new car, a stable relationship, and I'm back where I started." She held up her now empty coffee cup as she finished rambling.

"What are you talking about? Are you kidding me? Back where you started... Lorelai, you're accomplished. You're happy. You have no reason to think you're behind in your life. Give yourself some credit." He lifted up the coffee pot from the table and poured her another cup.

Lorelai looked over at him as she took the refill. "Are you happy?"

"Am *I* happy?" Luke paused, slightly flustered at the question and whatever Lorelai was implying along with it. "Of course I'm happy. I mean ... business is good, as always. Things with Jess are getting better. Sort of. Taylor has been a little more... *non-existent* around the diner these days. And, well... I'm... happy." He glanced at Lorelai. "Why do you ask?"

"Life is more than business, Luke." She paused for a minute, not really sure if her next question was appropriate - but then again, nothing she seemed to say lately was. "You were happy with Rachel, right? When she came back? I mean. you seemed happy."

Luke looked away, paying unneeded attention to the flowers in the center of the table. He took a deep breath. "Actually... no."

Lorelai looked at him curiously; that wasn't what she'd expected to hear. "But I thought... I mean, you wanted her to stay."

"When did I say that," Luke questions her with a soft tone to his voice.

"You said it was what you wanted to happen." She studied him carefully, knowing that somewhere along the way the conversation had turned into something else she hadn't quite figured out.

"I never said I wanted her to stay. I didn't ask her to come back in the first place. But she did. And... I don't know what I wanted then. But I do know that now... I don't miss her."

"Did you ask her to leave?" Lorelai asked him, trying to make sense of the conversation.

Gulp. Luke had dreaded this moment. But somewhere deep that he rarely if ever acknowledged - he knew it would come up. He knew she would want to know why Rachel left. "No. That night of the town meeting... I went back to the diner and she was all packed."

She'd always wondered if he was going to say why she left, after all the times he'd discussed Rachel with her. Well, when she'd discussed Rachel with him. Lorelai figured this was as right as the moment was ever going to get, since apparently he was never going to tell her on his own. "So, um, why exactly did she leave?" She looked over at him, hoping he wouldn't mind her asking, because she couldn't have everyone mad at her all at once. There was an awkward silence as the only customer walked out the door. Caeser was nowhere to be seen.

"She... well, she said I didn't have my heart in it. And, well... considering what I just told you, I can't really go disputing that fact."

"I don't understand. I mean, you... you loved her, right?"

"At a certain time, yeah. I loved her when we were young. But, like with a lot of things... it just... changed." Luke's wandering and nervous eyes settled on Lorelai's inquisitive face.

"Is there someone else?" She asked him, confused.

Luke's eyes widen a little at her question. He fidgets in his seat. *Don't ruin this. Don't say something completely stupid. ... What do I say? What do I say?*

"I... well, I'm not really..." Something smacks Luke right in the gut. Some people call it instinct... others call it insanity. "Yes."

Lorelai was running possibilities through her mind of people it seemed that Luke would want to be with, but she couldn't come up with anyone he seemed to like in that way. "You should tell her..." Lorelai looked over at him and he looked kind of uncomfortable; Luke wasn't really the kind of guy that went around talking about his feelings. "I just. with Chris and all. you can't let things hold you back from how you feel. I know that now. If you want to be happy, I mean." *It was a little weird talking to Luke like this,* she thought- *but why should it be? He was a friend, like Sookie. She talked with Sookie about things like this all of the time.*

"Yeah. You can't let things hold you back." Luke laughed sarcastically. "But look who you're talking to." He mockingly pointed to himself. "The man with absolutely no impulse. I hate change. I hate chance. I honestly don't know what to do with myself." He paused and got an odd look on his face. "There are so many things I'm afraid of, Lorelai, you have no idea..." Luke was getting lost in this conversation. This strange conversation that developed not from his own will, but something underneath. And now he sat there looking directly at her, absolutely frozen.

She looked across the table at him sympathetically. "Then things will always stay the same, Luke. Sometimes you just have to take a chance. If she says no, you're still right where you are. But if she says yes...You're a great guy, Luke. Don't be so hard on yourself."

She'd known Luke for, well, years now. And it was occurring to her that she'd never seen him truly happy, and if giving him a little push might help him get there, it looked like she was going to have to be the one to give it to him.