SUMMARY: Rory/Logan bubblefic for Em Meredith's birthday bubblebook.

Rory hit the door to her house at full speed, jarring her shoulder into the wood when she realized it wasn't unlocked. Frowning, she shifted her bags, dug out her key, and let herself in. "Mom?"

Silence. Mom must be out with Luke, Rory figured, half-disappointed, half-relieved. After studying for hours upon hours, then taking an excessively long essay midterm, and then driving all the way back to Stars Hollow for the long weekend, Rory wasn't sure she could handle a caffeinated Lorelai Gilmore. Dragging her bags behind her, Rory stumbled into her room and dumped her bags near her bed. "Close enough," she mumbled, too exhausted to unpack yet.

Heading back to the hallway, Rory belatedly noticed the brightly colored note taped to her bedroom door. Below Hello Kitty's purple feather boa, her mother had scrawled, "Dinner at Luke's?"

Rory checked her watch, figuring she had more than enough time for a nice long bubblebath before meeting up with her mother. Leaving the note where it was, she grabbed her comfy old bathrobe and a fresh towel (hot pink -- her mother had bought them for cheap because, really, who wants hot pink bath towels besides the Gilmores?), then retrieved her bubblebath from the small bathroom downstairs. Halfway up the stairs, Rory groaned and retraced her steps, grabbing her cellphone out of her bag, just in case her mom called to give her a more precise time for dinner at Luke's. Dinnertime for the Gilmores, after all, ranged anywhere from 3:30 to midnight.

When she finally made it to the upstairs bathroom, she tossed her bathrobe onto the counter and placed the towel on top of the hamper, within easy reach when she was done. As she twisted the handles to start her bathwater running, her cellphone trilled. Startled, Rory nearly dropped it into the tub.

Jumping back, she fumbled to answer. "Mom?"

"Sorry," Logan answered cheerfully. "Hardly anyone calls me that anymore."

Rory smiled in spite of herself, straightening up and leaning one hip against the bathroom counter. "Do I want to know why anyone would have called you that in the first place?"

"Probably not," he admitted. "You standing near the edge of a waterfall, Ace?"

"Oh!" Rory turned back to her bath. "Hang on," she told Logan, placing the phone on the counter so she could dump some bubblebath into the water. She tilted her head, judging how quickly the bubbles were starting, then added another dollop. "Better," she decided, screwing the top of the bottle back in place and retrieving her phone. "Sorry."

"What are you doing?" he asked, sounding bewildered.

"I had to add bubbles to the water," she explained absently, concentrating more on making sure the bottle wouldn't end up tumbling off the counter and hitting her in the head while she soaked. "I'm about to take a bubblebath." When Logan failed to answer with some smartass remark, Rory paused, wondering if her cellphone had dropped the call. "Logan?"

"Just a sec," he told her. "I'm still savoring the mental image."

"Logan!" she admonished, but she couldn't help grinning at his antics even as her cheeks flushed pink.

"C'mon, Ace, you can't tell a guy you're taking a bubblebath and not expect him to take some time picturing it." He lowered his voice a few registers and sounded positively lecherous when he asked, "What are you wearing?"

Rory rolled her eyes, wondering, yet again, how he could lift her out of her exhausted funk so quickly. Logan never took anything seriously, a characteristic that fascinated Rory, who took everything seriously. "My old Yale sweatshirt and some jeans," she answered honestly.

"Spoilsport," Logan muttered, but she could hear the grin in his words.

"Would it be better if I lied and said I was wearing a silk bathrobe or something?" she queried, her tone dripping with exaggerated innocence. She wondered just what it was about him that brought out her playful side. She'd never been like this with a guy before, and it was really kind of refreshing.

"Hell, yes," Logan answered, and it didn't sound like he was joking. "Though you're pretty sexy in jeans, too, Ace."

"Thanks," Rory answered lamely, pressing her palm to her flushed cheek. The way he treated her felt deliciously grown up, so different from how it'd been with Dean or with Jess. She wondered, sometimes, if that was the difference between teenage relationships and adult relationships. To be quite honest, she was still a little thrown by Logan's frank appreciation of her and his easy manner when they were together, since she was still adjusting to the idea that she could have a boy sleepover if she wanted to. A boy. In her bed. It was heady stuff.

"I think we should work a bubblebath into our next date," Logan commented, and he actually sounded like he was working out logistics in his head. Knowing him, said logistics would include a helicopter ride to some secluded spa that offered couples massages followed by an hour in a private Jacuzzi.

"We should?" Rory asked, doubtful. Because the idea was definitely... intriguing, but it was something that she would never have come up with herself. It was an adult thing, and not in a Pleasure Island Bookstore kind of way. In the this is how adults have a relationship kind of way.

"Sure," he confirmed, all nonchalance.

"Somehow I can't picture you in a bubblebath," Rory told him. In a gilt-edged Jacuzzi at some resort in Kennebunkport -- that she could imagine. Probably there would be rich, bikini-clad blondes there, too, a thought that did not please her.

"Didn't say I'd be in the tub," Logan answered, breaking her train of thought. She could tell he was smirking by the tone of his voice.

"So, what, I'm just supposed to strip down and take a bubblebath while you watch?" Rory asked, sounding far more flip and flirtatious than she felt. She was just like her mother in many ways, but Rory had never quite achieved her mother's sassy manner with men.

"God, yes," Logan confirmed with considerable gusto.

Rory told herself that she was in a relationship with Logan, and maybe it was okay to say the things on her mind. Maybe it was okay to tease him back. "How about I just strip down right now and torture you?" she suggested, her tone coy. It actually sounded like he may have choked. Grinning, Rory tried to make herself sound concerned when she asked, "Logan?"

"Are you seriously getting in the tub now?" he asked in a hushed voice.

"I could..." she teased. "Hang on a second." Placing the phone back on the countertop, she chuckled at the audible groans from his end while she turned off the water. "Just let me get out of these clothes," Rory said loud enough for him to hear. Stripping quickly, she grabbed the phone and stepped into the water. "I'm back."

"Are you seriously in the tub?" Logan asked.

"Getting in, yeah," Rory confirmed, hissing a little at the heat of the water as she carefully sat down, stretching her legs out along the length of the tub. "Ohhhh," she moaned, leaning back, settling in. "This is wonderful." It was, but she wasn't above exaggerating to get a rise out of him.

"I'll say," Logan choked. "How's the water?"

"Hot," she answered promptly. Sighing, she felt her shoulders begin to drain of tension; she let her eyes drift shut. "Almost too hot, but really relaxing."

"And the bubbles?" he asked in a strange, tight voice.

"There's a mountain of them," she reported, lifting an eyelid to peer at her kneecaps where they stuck up from the bubbles. "They smell great," she added, inhaling the scent of lavender and comfort.

"I bet," Logan breathed.

"How was your final?" Rory asked conversationally.

"Who cares?" Logan shot back, sounding a little exasperated. "I don't want to talk about school right now."

The edges of her lips turned up. "What's wrong with school?"

"Far less interesting topic than you in a bubblebath," Logan pointed out.

"Okay, then tell me a story," Rory prompted, lifting the end of her ponytail as she scooted further into the water. It really was heavenly. And talking to Logan while sitting naked in a bathtub -- she would've thought it would feel awkward or forced. Actually, it was kind of fun.

A moment of silence, then, "You expect me to be able to think while you're naked in a bubblebath?"

Rory smirked. From the day they'd met, Logan had kept her off-balance and unsure of herself, yet she'd never quite felt like she was able to do that to him. Apparently, she could if she stripped and stepped into a tub first. "Why don't you read to me?" she suggested.

"Read... what?" he asked, still sounding odd.

"I don't care," she answered. "Whatever you want."

There was noise on the other end, like he was scrabbling for something and knocking things over in the process. "How about some Fitzgerald?"

"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past," she recited. She loved Gatsby.

"You really want me to start reading at the end?" Logan asked, sounding amused. Still, Rory could hear that undercurrent of attentiveness in his voice, that reassurance that she made him think crazy thoughts just like he did to her. "I thought you called Henry James a pretentious old--"

"No," Rory interrupted, laughing, "you can start at the beginning."

"Once upon a time..." Logan started, sounding entirely too pleased with himself.

"Logan--"

"Just kidding, Ace," he interrupted. "You comfortable in your tub? You all warm and good and settled?"

"Yup," Rory confirmed, smiling stupidly at the tiled wall opposite her. This was fun. Really and truly fun.

"I only ask because Stars Hollow is maybe thirty miles from here," Logan answered piously, "so if you needed anything and didn't want to move from your bubblebath..."

Rory merely laughed. "Read to me, Logan."

"Whatever you say, Ace," he answered, chuckling. "In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since..."

THE END