Spoilers: Up through "Dear Richard and Emily" 
Rating: PG 
Disclaimer: Ain't mine. Ain't makin money. 
Soundtrack: Live - Distance to Here 
Fault: Mostly Amanda's. 
Note: Rationalization on my part in regards to Daniel Palladino's character assassination of 
one Ms. Lorelai Gilmore.

*** 

Hysterical Blindness
by A.j. 

*** 
 
She likes to watch it spin, the light bouncing on her face and all around. It's soothing, she 
thinks. A repetition that's so simple to recreate. Just a crystal in your hand and rapid 
movements of waves and bang. 
 
Dancing light on your face. 
 
She thinks that people - definitely her mother - would be amused to know that she finds 
comfort in this. It's trivial and small, but stability is a rare gift. Sometimes she thinks that 
she wouldn't know what it would be like to stand on solid ground. Maybe it would be worse, 
because she knows she's adjusted to this. Would it be like landsickness? Illness from 
standing completely still? 
 
She hates herself sometimes. It isn't an active thing, just a pressure where there usually is 
none. When she's moving, or living or acting or even eating, she can distract herself from 
the elephant on her shoulder, but in the quiet places, when there's nothing but her, it 
comes out. All the niggling little doubts and insecurities and something that could be guilt. 
 
She doesn't do this often for that very reason. 
 
But she has to, sometimes. Let everything fall down around her ears and stay silent. 
Sometimes, she doesn't want to be this person anymore. To walk this house, and 
unconsciously check for soft breathing. Nights like this, she lets herself stop being who she 
is, and think about who she could have been. 
 
To be someone who makes her parents happy. 
 
She feels raw on these nights. Lets herself be raw and open in places. Like something sliced 
apart and left to reknit itself; a jigsaw girl in a messed up world. 
 
Or maybe a patched tent nailed out in the sun. Faded, but somehow still something like 
whole. 
 
Bits and pieces from so many things. Her mother. Her father. Rory. Christopher. Sookie. 
Luke. 
 
She doesn't remember what's just Lorelai anymore. Worse, she doesn't really know what 
ever was. 
 
No, that's wrong. She can remember. With light bouncing in her eyes, she can see the 
things and places she had before this person started to be her. Dreams of rock stars and 
roller rinks. A quiet moment in her room, away from Emily and Richard and everything that 
she wasn't, isn't, and never will be. Smiling because numbers aren't really that hard, and 
putting them together like *that* makes the whole thing work. 
 
She remembers those things. 
 
But as much as she wishes she could hold just them, turning each over in her mind until the 
thing she was becomes clear, they crumble. Forced down by a thousand other things, some 
good, some bad. All her daughter. 
 
Because absolutely everything comes back to that. 
 
And it's as it should be. Because her child, her baby should be the center. 
 
Should be. Is. 
 
It hurts sometimes. Like the breaking of ice on a glacier. Quick. Hard. 
 
Because she can remember standing in that dim hallway, head loopy and body still hurting, 
staring down at this little tiny thing that was so much bigger than herself. And him, next to 
her. "I guess we should get married." 
 
She'd felt the cracking then.  
 
It hadn't been big, but she could feel it there, in the important place that isn't supposed to 
be shifted or moved, because that's where the thing that you are lives. A tiny thing. Small. 
Just like the little girl in the bassinet across the way. 
 
Just a little bit of hate. Because right there, right then, he left her. Shut something off inside 
himself that could have been hers. Might have been. 
 
Isn't. 
 
She's seen him in another hospital recently. Another big window with lots of little tiny things 
behind it. Big tiny things. Listened to him laugh and smile like he'd never done. His eyes 
and heart and mind wide open, and that thing that wasn't hers, not ever, it was there. 
"She's just... perfect!" 
 
She didn't think it would hurt so much anymore. 
 
It's surprising, really, just how wrong she can be about things. 
 
That's never stopped her before. And as she watches the little bit of clear glass spin and 
spin, she'd pretty sure it won't stop her in the future. 
 
She knows it like she knows other things. 
 
She could love him.  
 
Luke. 
 
The man behind the counter. 
 
Everyone believes that she doesn't know he loves her. Despite some popular opinions, she's 
not stupid. "It's right there..." Sookie told her, eyes soft, begging almost, in understanding. 
But she didn't. No one does. She knew, and has known for a very long time just what's in 
those eyes. The promise that would be hers if she just reached out. 
 
Reaching out is what got her here in the first place.  
 
She broke herself reaching out. No one did it for her, or to her. She cast her arms wide and 
the only thing she has to show for it is this house. This place. This life. 
 
She can't stand to let him pull away like she knows he will. Because there's something here 
inside that will make him do that to her. She won't live through it again. She can't. 
 
And despite the fact that everything always seems to be about her, it never is. Not once. 
Not about what she really needs. So she fills it up with all the things and jokes and laughs 
and bravado that never will be her. 
 
There's a crack that keeps growing with every lost promise and flat tone. Something deep. 
A spider web of tiny lines, spreading until just the slightest touch... One day it will break her 
again, this time for good. But that can't be now, or yet. There's Rory to think of. Always her. 
 
Because right there in that hospital hallway with nothing but ashes and bitterness beside 
her, she made a promise to be the things for her child - her perfect baby - that no one had 
been for her. Rory would be first, not an afterthought. She would not be left, or lost, or 
ignored, or something that wasn't wanted. 
 
She would be herself and nothing but. 
 
So even here, with nothing but a crystal and little tiny rainbows playing in her hair, she isn't 
alone. One day, it won't be enough, but for now? 
 
Well. It's now, isn't it? 
 
And she closes her eyes.

-fin-