MAYBE TOMORROW ... gilmore girls

chapter thirteen

She holds them under my nose and for a second all I can focus on is the gorgeous smell coming from them. They smell like apple pie. For a moment, I'm transported somewhere else. A memory that doesn't feel like mine at all. So far away I can barely place it. I never had a childhood with apple pie in it, so Evie made me some a few weeks ago, horrified that I'd never tasted the sugary sweetness of the warm fruit in pastry. I'd melted with the taste and she'd promised to make me apple pies for the rest of my life.

I think of her every time I see apples in the store.

"Look!" I open my eyes and the cookies have been iced and set up perfectly to say WELCOME HOME in dripping white icing. Home. My home. All mine. The back of my eyes sting and I blink over and over and over until the pain disappears.

I am surrounded by people and I am happy.

Who would have thought?

We sit on the green velvet sofa that came with the house and eat the cookies. The boxes sit, mostly unopened, around us and it is a mess. When I moved into my old house, Harrison on my arm, everything had already been unpacked and put into position by the movers. We were not needed. It wasn't our home. We were just placeholders for a house, to keep the cold from getting in, to put on a show for watching eyes. We couldn't have filled that house with love, or children, or warmth even if we wanted to. It would have choked every single one of them to death.

I like the mess.

"You want us to help unpack?" Lorelai asks. Evie clears away the empty plate. I can hear the water running in the kitchen for a moment and then it stops, a little clatter as the plate is placed on the rack. I like my house being full of sounds. Full of people.

"No. It's okay. I'll let you get home."

I want to make it mine, all mine, with my own hands. I want to build it from the ground up. I want to place the beating heart beneath the floorboards and have it be mine.

So they leave, trickling out one by one. Luke leaves first, offering me a stilted smile and welcoming me, quietly, to the town. He's only here because my sister made him come. I get the impression that all she has to do is smile and he will drop everything to be at her side.

She deserves someone who will drop everything for her.

She leaves next, bundling me into a hug. "I'm still getting used to this," she whispers as she squeezes me close. I cling to her and hope she realizes I never want to let go. Lorelai pulls away first but I am not cold without her.

In this house, I don't think I'll ever be cold.

"I'm gonna buy you plants."

"I think I would kill a plant."

"I'll buy you fake plants."

I laugh and watch her leave and, for once, my heart doesn't sink. She'll be back. She waves at me from her car and I wave back and it is normal. It is a thing that we've always done. We've always been sisters who wave at each other, who hug, who buy each other fake plants.

A warm hand lands on my shoulder and I turn to Jethro.

"You sure you don't need any help?"

I shake my head. There are boxes sitting haphazardly everywhere. Just past his shoulder, I can see Evie placing kitchen utensils where they will be easiest for her to reach. I smile. I know I will barely use the kitchen, but, it will be nice to invite Evie over to try recipes, to make it smell just like her home.

It will be nice to have visitors.

Jethro nods and his thumb carves a pattern into my collarbone. I want it to brand me. To scar me. I want to hold the truth of you on my skin forever. I stare into his eyes and smile and realize I do not want to look away. I want to be held in your gaze for the rest of my life. I want to be reflected back at me forever.