[karana]

Chapter 2: Drawings

“I see” said Emily, still with this annoying smile on her face, while Lorelai was staring at her hands again.
“So it seems I have been right all those years: the real family belongs together” Emily grinned and Lorelai looked up.
“Luke said never” she told her mother, who had no idea what Lorelai was talking about.
“He said never?”
“After the dinner with the psychologist I asked him to elope with me. I said it was now or never. He chose never” Lorelai said quietly and the sadness radiated from her words and hit Emily.
“Who does this imbecile thinks he is? Is he really thinking there will come a better woman into this greasy diner of his wanting to marry him? I always knew that he was stupid, but this goes beyond my imagination!” Emily shrieked and Lorelai looked intently at her mother for some seconds. She got what Emily was trying to say.
“Thank you” she just said and got up from the couch.
“Can I go back to sleep now?”
“I will unpack in the meantime” Emily nodded.
“And Lorelai?” she stopped her daughter when she wanted to climb up the stairs.
“Yeah?”
“I know you don't want to hear it, but I am very pleased it all works out the way it should in the end”
“Uhuh” was all Lorelai said before she went back to her bedroom.

Around noon,when Lorelai was awake again and Emily had unpacked her suitcases, the door bell rang.
While Lorelai was still trying to get her mothers tons of clothes and other things out of the way, Emily opened the door.

"Well hello Christopher!" she smiled, pleasently surprised to see him there, at her daughters house.
"Hello Emily,what are you doing here?" he greeted her, returned her smile and kissed her on the cheek.
"I decided to stay at Lorelai's for a while,while Richard is on a bussiness trip. I thought it would be nice to spend some time with my daughter" Emily told him and led him into the house, where he handed her his coat, which she hung up.
"That's nice of you. I am sure Lorelai is happy to spend some time with you" Christopher said and if Emily hadn't known Lorelai, she would have actually believed him.
"Well, come in, come in! I am sure Lorelai is already waiting for you" Emily smiled and gave him a wink.
They found Lorelai in Rory's old room where she tried to stuff her mothers clothes into Rory's dresser.
"Hey Lore'" Chrisopher said and tried to get past the suitcases, toiletries and clothes which were strewn everywhere.
"Hey Chris" Lorelai greeted him back, but made no attempt to leave the room and come to him.
"Are you ready?" he asked her over the chaos in between them.
"Do I look ready?" she shot back and sounded annoyed.
"No, you don't. But I thought you said I should pick you up at noon. It is noon now, so let's go."
"Can't you see that I have stuff to do here? Go into the living-room and watch TV, we can go when I'm done" she said in a harsh tone, which caused Emily to raise her eyebrows in confusion.
"Lorelai, why don't you go and get ready and I will organize my things myself?" she offered.
"Yeah, sure, I guess" Lorelai said, but her eyes said *Stay out of this!*

Chris was still watching TV when Lorelai came back down nearly an hour later.
"Mom, we're leaving" Lorelai yelled into the general direction of Rory's room.
"Lorelai, the shelf is broken. Someone has to fix ot, otherwise it will break down completely" Emily yelled back, then walked outside into the living-room, where she found Lorelai and Chris standing beside each other.
"Yeah, I will tell Lu... I mean, I will call Tom and tell him to fix it" Lorelai said and bit her lower-lip, which did not go unnoticed by Emily.
"Christopher, can't you take a look at it?" Emily asked.
"No, he can't. Lu... a friend made this for Rory and if Chris tries to repair it, I am sure it will be completely ruined afterwards" Lorelai said before he could even answer.
"Well, then, okay you two. Have fun!" Emily shrugged, but her eyes were fixated on Lorelai's face.
"See you, Emily" Chris kissed her cheek again.
"By Mom" Lorelai said, before she and Chris walked outside to his car.

While the two were away Emily used the time to snoop around the house.
First she walked upstairs into Lorelai's bedroom and inspected it. It was still the same since she had last sawn it. It was beautiful now that it was renovated and Emily liked the colors.
The bed was made, but only one half. The other was still unmade and Emily decided to do it. She pulled the comforter up and smoothed out the pillow. When she wanted to arrange it, her eyes caught sight of something under the pillow. She pulled it out and held a blue flanell shirt in her hands. It was wrinkled and disgusted she held it away from her with two fingers, then placed it back under the pillow.

Then she walked into the bathroom and looked around carefully. Around one sink were things scattered all around, the other one looked empty. Not even a guest-toothbrush was found there.
There were two hooks on the door, but only one bathrobe, two soapholders in the shower, but only one shampoo.
It looked strange and Emily wasn't sure if she should be happy because Luke's things were gone, or worried, because Chris things weren't there yet.

She walked back out of the bathroom and bedroom and wanted to go downstairs when she decided to look into that last room upstairs. She had always wondered what was behind that last door.
Feeling like a curious kid snooping around in his grandparents house, she opened the door slowly and quietly, although she was alone.

The room was extremely small and she saw a sewing-machine in one corner, some clothes lying around and a few boxes in another corner.
They all had the description "Rory" on the side and Emily couldn't resist to open the box on top.
Inside were old clothes, stuffed animals, craftings and pictures Rory had drawn. The clothes weren't bigger than for a ten year old and the drawings looked like from kindergarden or primary-school.
Emily took some out and looked through them: a house, a dog, some kids playing, another house, a gnome, something that looked like a car... or a train? And a picture of three people: Father, mother and child.The father had his arm around the mother's shoulder and the child was holding onto his other hand.
"So she did wish for her parents being together" Emily thought and smiled sadly.
When she turned the paper around her smile vanished though.
"Rory, Momy and Luke" the decription said in a child-like handwriting.

TBC