The Aftermath - A Gilmore Girls Revival Fan Fiction

Chapter 26

Logan was at the office late finishing up some last minute things before leaving to go to Vegas for the weekend. 

He came inside and sat down in his luxurious, soft, brown leather office chair and looked at the daily calendar on his desk.  Today was Thanksgiving.

It didn't feel much like Thanksgiving to him; holidays have seemed irrelevant to him for a quite some time now.  All the days sort of blur together, without any breaks or time outs or ENJOYMENT.  He was becoming more and more like his father every day, burying himself in his work.  He knew it, and he hated it, but he didn't fight it.  It made living with his decisions so much easier to bear.  And the McKellen.  Well, the McKellen doesn't hurt. 

He sighed, frustrated with thinking how his father was actually insisting that every day be this cumbersome, this mundane, for the rest of his life.  He was trying to place bets against himself, on how long it would take him to feel the need to wake up one day and put a pistol in his mouth like his sister was so worried about.  Today that option actually seemed a bit more viable. 

His laptop powered on as soon as he opened it.  Truth was, he really didn't have anything he HAD to do, he just didn't want to go home until he absolutely had to.  He looked at his watch which read 1030pm.  He was all packed up and ready to go at home, and so he had about another hour to kill before needing to head to the airport for their midnight flight.  He had told Odette that it was smarter to set the flight for a midnight departure, to make sure their arrival time was around 6pm Friday evening.  That was only part of the reason.  In reality, he was just really hoping she'd sleep through the flight and leave him alone. 

Laughing at the realization that he shouldn't be having thoughts like that about someone he was supposed to marry, he shut his eyes and took in a deep breath.  He wasn't sure how much more of this he could take.  He was slowly killing himself, and he hated who he had become: Mitchum.  When would the numbness kick in?  And when would he have the sweet release of just going through the motions?  The irony of how horrible that sounded wasn't lost on him, but in fact it was he who was lost.

He put himself back to work, making edits to posts that he probably had no business editing, rewriting pieces that were already finished, choosing articles to use as filler for a project he was working on, when all of a sudden, one in particular caught his eye: 'I Am Ace' by R. G.

What!?  R. G...  No...  There's no way...  Right?  His breath turned jagged as he thought for sure this was some sort of a mistake, or a cruel joke.  Well, it wasn't funny.  He tried to tell himself that this was just all in his mind, and the scotch surely played a part too, and they were just playing tricks on him.  But there were her initials, and her nickname that he missed calling her so much, staring right at him, plain as day, written in black and white.

He acted as if he wanted to say something out loud, but, what?  And to whom?  Obviously this couldn't be any sort of prank, or else there would be someone standing behind him, laughing, mocking his reaction right now, but no one else was there.  It was just him, in an empty office, alone with an email claiming to be his 'Ace'.

He brought his hands to his mouth and exhaled deeply, still not able to take his eyes off of it for fear that somehow it would just magically disappear, but still he was not yet able to will himself to click it open to read it, either.  No matter how badly he wanted to.

Slowly, his mind started to shut down and disobey his better judgement, his impulses began to take over, and soon the file was opened.  He tried to convince himself one last time it was a joke, but everything was legitimate.  Rory Gilmore was R. G., and R. G. was Ace. 

His breath caught in his throat as he finally allowed the truth to sink in.  Slowly, he began to read her words.  He was sucked in, entranced, absorbed, and his love for her burned within him.   She was Ace.  HIS Ace.  And she was willing to fight for what she wanted.  And this time, she was planning to KEEP him.