Meet Again

Festivities

One afternoon in December Rory was in the kitchen, drinking coffee with Honor and watching Nicky and his friend Ben who were racing remote control cars around the first floor of the house.

"He seems to be doing well" Honor said.

"He hasn't had chemo in over a month" Rory said.

"When do you get his test results back?" Honor asked. The day before this Nicky had gotten a few tests done.

"Hopefully before Christmas" Rory said. Christmas was less than a week away so she was expecting to not get the results until after, but she did hope they'd get it before.

"What were the tests for anyway?"

"Just to see what's going on. Figure out what's next" Rory said.

Just then Sammy ran into the kitchen. "Mommy, Grace is tickling me"

"Why is Grace tickling you?"

"Because I tickled Grace" Sammy said. Honor laughed.

"Oh, well if you tickled Grace first then you started it. Didn't you?" Rory said

"Yes, I did" Sammy said.

"Right. Well Grace tickled you because you ticked her" Rory said

"Ok" Sammy said and ran back upstairs.

"Your kid just snitched on himself" Honor chuckled.

"Gotta love four year olds, right?"

"Mom, can we move the couch so there's more space?" Nicky asked.

"What if you just took the cars out to the driveway?" Rory suggested

"Ok"

On December 23rd 2021, Rory and Logan were sitting in the hospital with Nicky, waiting for the oncologist.

"I don't think we should do chemo again" Nicky said. He was definitely not shy about the fact that he hated the chemo. It made him sick and drained his energy.

"We're gonna do whatever the doctor says" Logan said. He knew that Nicky hated the chemo, and he hated that Nicky had to go through it, but if that was the best thing for Nicky, then that's what they would do.

A few minutes later Dr Johnson walked into the room. "Good morning" he said. "Nicky, are you feeling good today?"

Nicky nodded.

"Good. So I've looked over all the scans, and all the test results, and now Nicky, I have a question for you" Dr Johnson said. "You know that thing that hangs on the wall by the nurses station?" He asked. There was a bell that hung on the wall in the cancer center at the hospital. The idea is that when someone completes their treatment, they get to ring the bell.

"The cancer bell" Nicky said.

"Right" Dr Johnson glanced up at Rory and Logan before looking back to Nicky. "How would you like to ring it today?"

"Really?" Nicky asked with a huge smile on his face.

"The scans are clear, the blood work is normal, there are no signs of cancer" Dr Johnson said. "We'll do scans every 3 months to make sure it doesn't come back. After 2 years the likelihood of the cancer coming back decreases significantly so at that point we'll be able to switch to one yearly scan. We can schedule the procedure to remove the port from his chest, probably soon after New Year's, but in the meantime, you get to go home and have a cancer free Christmas"

"Thank you" Rory said. "So much"

Once they were done at the hospital, Rory and Logan took Nicky to pick up a little surprise for everyone before going home where Lorelai was watching Grace and Sammy.

"Hello?" Rory called out as they walked through the door.

"Kitchen!" Lorelai called out.

Logan, Rory, and Nicky walked into the kitchen where Lorelai, Grace, and Sammy were eating lunch.

"How was it?" Lorelai asked.

"You wanna tell them?" Rory asked and nudged Nicky's shoulder.

"I don't have cancer" Nicky said a huge smile.

"What?" Lorelai asked, surprised.

"Cancer free" Logan said.

"Show them the cake" Nicky said. Logan and Rory had let him pick out whatever he wanted, to celebrate, and he wanted a cake. Although they weren't sure if it was because he wanted to eat it or just because he associated cake with celebrations. Either way, he picked a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting and they had the guy in the bakery write 'I beat cancer' on it.

"Here" Logan said. He came the white, cardboard box to Nicky who put it in the table and opened it

"Come here" Lorelai said. She pulled Nicky onto get lap and hugged him tight.

"Grandma, you're squishing me" Nicky said

"I'm sorry" Lorelai said and loosened her grip on Nicky.

"Can we eat that cake?" Sammy asked.

"Yeah, but we have to get a some plates first" Logan said.

"No, wait" Nicky said. He climbed onto a chair to whisper something in Logan's ear.

"That's what you wanna do?" Logan chuckled. Nicky nodded. "Ok then. It's your cake"

"What are we doing?" Grace signed.

"No plates" Nicky said and signed. "Everyone gets a fork and we're just gonna eat it like this"

While everyone was eating cake, Rory went upstairs and a moment later Lorelai followed. She found Rory sitting at the top of the stairs. "You ok?"

"I'm fine" Rory said.

"You don't seem fine" Lorelai said. "Especially not for someone who just found out that her son beat cancer"

"I spent the last 2 years thinking I'd have a plan a funeral for my son" Rory said. "I just...needed a minute"

"You wanna talk or listen?" Lorelai asked. If Rory wanted to hear what she thought, she'd tell her. But if Rory just needed to vent, she'd listen.

"Listen"

"Take a trip" Lorelai said. "Take your kids. Go somewhere. Have fun. Make memories. Nicky's gonna have a lot of not so great memories from his childhood. That's not your fault and you couldn't control it. But you can make sure that he has some good memories too"

"What kind of trip?"

"Whatever makes you guys happy"

——

A few weeks before Christmas 2027- Nicky is now 15, Grace is 12, and Sammy's 10.

"I let you win" Logan said as he walked to the car with Nicky. They played basketball together at the gym every Sunday morning. Sometimes with other people that were there and sometimes just the two of them.

"You did not" Nicky said. "You're just gonna have to accept that I'm faster than you now"

"Oh, are you?"

"Yeah, because you're getting old" Nicky teased.

"Excuse me" Logan chuckled. "I'm forty years old. That's not that old"

"You're 44"

"Nobody asked you" Logan said.

Nicky laughed and took the hair tie out of his hair. After his cancer treatment ended, his hair started growing back and in the 6 years since then, he didn't cut his hair once. He had beautiful, waist length, blond hair that he planned on donating to make wigs for kids with cancer. He was gonna do it a few months before but Grace decided that she wanted to do it too, so he was waiting for her hair to get long enough so they could do it together. Usually he wore his hair in a bun, but sometimes he'd let Grace practice braiding with it. "Hey, can I drive home?"

"Absolutely not" Logan said.

"Why?"

"Because you're 15, and I wanna live" Logan said. "Plus, your mother would kill me"

"Yes, she would"