Chapter 7: Undone

Ok everyone - here it is, after much editing and scrapping and re-writing. I hope you all enjoy this very emotional chapter. (Lyrics excerpted from "Starving" - Hailee Steinfeld). Please, please, comment/review! Your feedback keeps me going, y'all! -Allie

"You know just what to say
Shit, that scares me, I should just walk away
But I can't move my feet
The more that I know you, the more I want to
Something inside me's changed
I was so much younger yesterday, oh"

Rory heard the floorboards creak a good thirty seconds before he knocked. She sat on the bed, staring at the door and dangling her feet off the edge nervously. Three knocks cascaded softly on the hardwood, causing her heart to jump straight up into her throat. It was spending quite a bit of time there recently. There was a pause, a few steps, more creaking.

"Ace?" Said the voice in the hallway. Rory's breath quickened.

"Logan?" She replied timidly, rooted to her spot on the bed.

"Well, yeah." She could hear the faintest smile in his voice. He tried the handle. "Can I come in?" He asked.

"Um. Sure." Was all she could manage. Her legs moved of their own free will, carrying her quickly across the antique rug. Her heart was still lodged a foot above where it should be, but a strange sense of calm washed over Rory. She had grappled every day with her decision to never see Logan again, and yet somehow all that separated them now was a few inches of solid oak.

*Click*

The heavy brass lock disengaged. Logan quickly ran a hand through his messy blond hair, a sure sign that his nerves were starting to get the better of him. He looked up just as Rory opened the door, and their eyes met for the second time that day.

"Hey." He said softly, a comfortable smile spreading across his face.

"Hey." Rory replied. She stood in the doorway, wearing her usual kind of easy lounge attire – black leggings, fuzzy purple socks and an oversized gray sweater. Logan's eyes flicked down to her stomach before he could stop himself. Despite only lasting a fraction of a second, Rory picked up on it.

"I'm not showing yet. Nothin' to see." She said with a cheery nervousness, her hands retracting into the garment's baggy sleeves. Talking about her pregnancy was still uncertain territory to Rory, let alone talking about it with him.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to...," he started. "Can we talk? Inside?" He noticed a maid folding towels halfway down the hallway and didn't think this should be a semi-public conversation.

"Right, of course." Rory motioned him inside the room, shutting the door behind him. She studied him for a second while he set down his bags. His hair was more tousled than usual. A seven hour plane ride will do that, she reminded herself. He was wearing the majority of a business suit, although the jacket and tie were probably stuffed in his carry-on. He had probably gone straight from work to the airport, and yet he still looked so damn good. Her skin prickled and her lips suddenly felt very full. The pregnancy hormones intensified everything, but especially...No. This was not the time for that. She swallowed.

"You look good." Logan turned, standing three feet away from her. A safe distance.

"You, too." She said, more easily than expected. How good she really thought, she would keep to herself. "I didn't know you were going to be stateside for the holidays," she began. "But, I guess, why would I, huh?" She added quickly, reminded that she was the one who insisted on their total separation. She had relinquished any right to know how he spent his time these days.

"It was kind of a last minute thing," he replied. Truthfully, Logan had called in more than a few favors to get a seat on a fully booked plane during one of the busiest traveling days of the year. He shoved his hands down into his pants pockets. "I, uh...got your messages after I landed in Hartford," he said quickly. Rory winced, the embarrassment of sending that photo materializing on her cheeks. Before she could help it, the words came pouring out.

"Logan, I am so, so sorry. I shouldn't have blindsided you like that. It just took me so long to actually psych myself up enough to tell you, that when you didn't answer I got a little...dramatic," she pleaded. "That was not the way I wanted to do this. Any of this." He cut in before she could say any more.

"Ace, it's okay. I'm here now, right? So, tell me now. Tell me everything." He took a step towards her out of habit. He wanted so badly touch her, to hold her. But he remembered where they had left things after New Hampshire. Rory had been very clear that there was no more 'us', and the last thing he wanted to do was make her uncomfortable.

Rory considered his words. Obviously she couldn't take back what was already said and done, but a do-over didn't sound so bad. She nodded.

"Should I be sitting down?" He winked.

"Probably not a bad idea." She laughed. After all the drama and crying over the last few days, a little bit of laughter felt pretty great. He settled down on the edge of the bed. Rory could tell he was tense, but trying not to let it show. His left knee bounced almost imperceptibly.

"Logan," she began, thinking about how exactly she wanted to tell him the news. He waited. She coughed. "Logan..."

He chuckled and ran a hand through his hair.

She threw her arms in the air. "Ahhh," she groaned, "I feel like I'm on an episode of Springer right now!" She shook her head, her now cheeks a bright crimson.

"Hey, why not go with it?" He shrugged and smiled. Rory loved that particular smile – the one that made his eyes shine and his whole face light up. It was one of the little things she had mourned never being able to see again after they went their separate ways over a month ago.

Inside Logan's head was surprising quiet. The little voice from before had subconsciously convinced him that Rory was definitely carrying his child, and he had started getting used to the idea. The math added up, and either way, he desperately needed to hear her say it.

Rory paced a few times in front of him, furrowed her brow, took a deep breath, and finally said with as much conviction as she could muster, "Logan Huntzberger, I'm pregnant, and you are this baby's father." She immediately covered her face with her hands, daring only to peek out from between a space in her fingers.

Slowly she dropped her hands, waiting for the fallout. Logan was standing almost right in front of her now.

"You're smiling. Why are you smiling? Are you having a stroke? Why are you smiling?" She said in quick succession.

"You're adorable when you're nervous, Ace." She really was – that bewildered, doe-eyed look combined with her rosy cheeks and the way she anxiously fingered the hem of her sweater melted Logan's heart.

"Logan..." She huffed.

"I'm smiling because I'm happy, Rory." He said simply.

"What?" She said, incredulously. Rory considered this piece of information before forming her next words. The pause must have been too long, because Logan spoke again.

"You're not." His voice took on a heavy quality as he said the words.

"It's exactly not what I'd call a great situation." She scoffed.

"You jump, I jump, Jack." He caught her gaze and held it. His eyes were determined, yet there was a gentleness in them.

Rory was silent for a minute. The phrase brought back memories of a time in their relationship when things were much less complicated.

"Don't say that if you don't mean it." She said quietly.

"I'm dead serious. Rory, I've got you, both of you. If you let me." He replied, still not looking away.

"Logan, you've got a life of your own, thousands of miles away," she reminded him.

"You can come live in London, or I can figure something out here. I'll make it work. We'll make it work. Ace, I love you," He said, taking a step towards her. "That's why I had to get on that plane. I couldn't stand being apart from you for another minute. I know you wanted our goodbye to be forever, but I couldn't accept it. I had to try to win you back."

Rory's head swam. The things that Logan was promising her were like lines from a fairy tale, and it made her angry. Angry that he could say things like this so easily; angry that all she wanted to do was take his hand and jump. Together, just like old times.

"I know the fact that this baby exists is going to change things. But, Logan, listen to yourself. The things you're saying...you're breaking my heart, and you don't even seem to care."

"Rory-"

"You're getting married!" She roared, tears welling up in the corners of her eyes.

"Odette and I are over. She moved out. The engagement is off." He gestured towards her.

She put up an arm protectively. "I don't understand."

"I should have ended it long before now," Logan admitted. "I just didn't have the balls to deal with the fallout from the old man. I'm more sorry than words can describe. I let you walk out of my life again, even when every cell in my body was screaming not to let you go." His voice was raw with emotion.

Rory stood there, momentarily dumbstruck. Again, he said. She flashed back to her Yale graduation, when she had made the difficult decision to reject Logan's marriage proposal. That day had haunted Rory ever since, always wondering if she made the right decision, if she had gone about it the right way and for the right reasons.

"Rory, please," he began. "I want us to be together. Beyond just having a child together. I just...hope that it's something that you want, too." Logan held her gaze the entire time time he spoke.

Rory swallowed, her expression far away as she began to process this deluge of new information. Logan was quiet. He did what he came to Stars Hallow to do: lay everything out in the open, and then let her choose.

"You could have led with the part about not being engaged anymore," she said wryly.

"Jesus, Ace. You're killing me here."

"Having a baby was definitely not what I pictured myself doing seven and a half months from now. I know it's still so small and so much could happen but...I love it, Logan. I don't even know if it's a he or a she, but I'm already in love with our child." Rory put a hand on her still-flat stomach. "I want to jump with you. So much, you don't even know. I just have to be one hundred percent certain that I'm doing the best thing for this little person I've got growing in here. I have to put them first." Her eyes were so big, so blue, so earnest.

He couldn't hold out any longer. Logan pulled Rory into his arms until their foreheads touched.

She trembled slightly at his touch. Closer than they'd been in weeks, Logan's scent was almost intoxicating. Sexy, familiar, warm. Rory breathed it in, steadying herself as he spoke.

"I promise you, Ace. This is it. I know it in my bones that you are it. I'm done with games and ultimatums. I'm here and I'm not going anywhere." He lowered his lips to hers, unsure of what kind of reaction she would have in response to his boldness.

"I didn't know that I was starving till I tasted you
Don't need no butterflies when you give me the whole damn zoo
By the way, by the way, you do things to my body
I didn't know that I was starving till I tasted you"