Disclaimer
All recognizable Gilmore Girls characters belong to Amy Sherman-Palladino, Dorothy Parker Drank Here Productions, and the WB. I use these characters & their story without permission, but am not making any profit from the copyrighted characters. No infringement is intended.

Lorelai Victoria Gilmore raised one slender eye brow while watching her mother taking a sip from her martini glass.
She focused her eyes on the drink in the hands of the woman sitting across from her as it was placed on the coffee table. It was a martini glass; the liquid in it was transparent and there was an olive in it and still Lorelai was sure it was not what it seemed to be.

She had gotten suspicious the moment she had spotted two pitchers on the drink cart when her father had asked her what she would have. Vodka Martini with a twist, as always. Her mother usually had the same... pre-dinner cocktails were always either white wine or Martinis.

Today it was different. She had not been able to watch her father pouring the drinks, but she was sure that he had filled the glasses with liquids from two different pitchers. One of them had ice cubes in it. There never were ice cubes in a pitcher of Martinis. It would water down the drink.

It would have been too obvious for her to turn and watch him while he fixed the drinks behind her back. She didn't want her mother to notice anything. But she was sure she had heard the ice cubes clinking when the second glass was filled. The glass that now sat on the table.

Emily caught her daughter's eyes lingering on her glass, praying she wouldn't say anything.
Looking towards the drink cart, she stared at the two pitchers. There was one that held Martinis, the other had water in it. Water. She gazed down at her glass. Water with a faint taste of olive. How she wished for alcohol. It would calm her nerves. She had not had to face Lorelai without being able to drink alcohol for a very long time now and she didn't quite know for how long it would work.

Her daughter had been strangely quiet tonight and not having Rory with them only made it harder. Taking a deep breath, Emily forced herself to calm down. There was no need to be nervous, she told herself. They had been able to sit through Friday Night Dinners for months now and were still on good terms.
It was a miracle in and of itself and she was grateful for it. It seemed that Lorelai had begun to actually try to understand, or at least to try not to prod her mother's temper.
Of course they still teased each other, but it never got out of hand. It even felt nice.

"Have you heard from Rory lately?" Emily broke the silence.

Looking up at her mother, Lorelai studied her face. "Uhm... you already asked me that, Mom."

Of course she had. Mentally cursing herself, she tried to come up with an excuse for her behavior. "Well, you didn't go into much detail."

"That's because I don't have any. She finished the campaign trip, she got that strange job offer, she flew off to Europe, she'll be back in three weeks. End of information."

Strangely enough, the trace of anger in her daughter's voice calmed her nerves.

Looking up, she saw the maid entering the room. "Dinner is ready."

She turned her head towards her husband and let him lead her into the dining room.

Richard brushed his hand over her shoulder when he walked over to his chair, the silent gesture making her smile. They had found a unique way of communicating without words during their marriage. She was grateful for it.

The salad was served and Lorelai decided to keep quiet for some time. But when her mother had water instead of wine with the entrée as well, she had to speak up.
"So, Mom, have you joined AA or something?" she addressed her mother.

Emily and Richard looked at each other over the table before both looked at their daughter. "I don't know what you're talking about." Emily took another bite of potato, trying not to show her fear.

Pointing her knife towards her mother's glass, she stated what she thought was obvious. "You're drinking water?"

Resting her wrists against the table, Emily shot her daughter a look. "And that tells you I have quit drinking alcohol and have joined Alcoholics Anonymous?"

"Well, you never have water with dinner." She pulled her shoulders up slightly, shrinking back at her mother's tone of voice.

Glaring at the younger woman, her voice was harsh. "Making fun of alcoholism is very rude, Lorelai."

She suddenly had the urge to defend herself. "But you never drink water with dinner. You drink wine or port or sherry, but you never-"

"Why are you suddenly asking me about my drinking habits?" How she hated talking to her daughter when she was like this.

"Because you never have water with dinner." Why was it so hard for her mother to understand what she was saying?

Standing up, Emily threw her napkin on the table. "This is ridiculous. Excuse me."

Her husband watched as she left the room, then shot his daughter a look before standing up and going after his wife without saying a word.

He found her in the living room, her arms wrapped around herself, staring out the window, into the dark.
"Emily?" he whispered, not wanting to scare her.

Turning around, her eyes were glistening just slightly more than usual. She would allow tears to even build. "I'm sorry, Richard. I just..." She sighed, clearly frustrated.

He nodded as he walked closer, gently placing his hand on her upper arm, squeezing lightly. "I know." Looking back towards the dining room, he addressed her without turning his head. "Do you think you can get through the rest of the night without another fight?"

Emily took a deep breath. "I guess."

He looked back at her. "Emily... maybe you should--"

"--No." She did not let him finish the sentence. "I will not tell her." Stepping closer towards him, she looked him deep in the eyes. "We will not tell her."

Richard nodded in silent agreement. It was her decision; he would stand by her no matter what she decided.

They went back into the dining room and sat down as if nothing had happened.

Placing her napkin in her lap, Emily did not look at her daughter when she spoke up. "Pass the carrots, please."

Lorelai looked up from her plate and furrowed her brow. Taking the plate of carrots, she wordlessly passed it on to her mother.

She still didn't understand why her mother had flipped at her comment or why she did not drink alcohol for the rest of the evening, but she decided not to get into the topic again right now. They could talk about the weather or the latest article Rory had written but they would not talk about her mother's change of drinking habits again anytime soon.

Speaking without talking ... they were back to normal; the Gilmore way.

"Hello?" She yawned into the phone.

"Hey, kiddo," her mother's cheery voice greeted her.

Taking the alarm clock from her nightstand, Rory squinted her eyes. "Mom. It's 1 in the morning."

"Sorry, hon. Forgot about the time difference again." Lorelai bit her lip as she sat down on the bed, she really had not thought about it.

Putting the clock back in its place, Rory sat up to make sure she would not fall asleep while talking. "So, why are you tearing me out of my Lois & Clark dream?"

"You know, you should really tell a shrink about that one." She grinned into the room while Paul Anka jumped onto the bed.

"Mom." Rolling her eyes, she tried to get comfortable. "Okay. What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong. I mean ... at least not wrong-wrong. Not stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off wrong." Shrugging her shoulders, she looked up at the ceiling, hoping her daughter had understood what she meant.

Rory furrowed her brow. "But something is not right."

"Right." She smiled broadly.

"Right?"

"Hey! Don't confuse the Mommy!" Lorelai pretended to pout.

Rubbing her eyes, her daughter sat up and pulled the blanket up a little. "Sorry, I'm tired... Okay, trying to follow you here."

"Good."

After a moment of silence, Rory spoke up again. "So...?"

"So..." Lorelai was not sure what to say.

Palm up, Rory stretched her arm in a broad gesture, both eyebrows raised. "Lead the way."

"Right," she began chewing on her lower lip.

Another moment of silence passed. "...Mom?"

"Shh, I'm trying to collect my thoughts."

Rory grinned. "That could take a while."

"Mean." She pointed into the room.

"Tired!" came the griped answer.

"Yes, well." Lorelai began playing with the bedspread. "... Okay, let's start at the beginning."

On the other end, her daughter furrowed her brow. "If you are going to make that Adam & Eve joke now, I'll hang up."

"Spoilsport."

She wrinkled her nose. "Just at one in the morning." Her tone sounded defending.

"Okay," her mother admitted.

"Shoot."

Lorelai's face lit up. "That one's too easy."

"I know, that's why I thought you would leave it alone." Her facial expression matched her mothers.

"You're so smart," she cooed playfully.

Nodding in agreement, she smiled into the semi-darkness of her room. "Yes, and I'm also wide awake now ... so ...?"

"Well, I was at your grandparent's today." Lorelai pulled her legs up, sitting cross-legged.

Remembering the time, she couldn't help but ask. "Today-today?"

She rolled her eyes. "I thought you want to go back to sleep soon."

Another giggle. "Okay. So you were attending Friday Night Dinner... and ... ?"

"And your grandma acted strangely."

"If you have woken me to tell me that, then you are officially gone crazy now," Rory teased.

Her mother grinned at Paul Anka. "I thought I had already done that last time I called you." She received a confused look from the dog.

Rory shook her head. "No, that time you only confirmed my theory about you drinking too much coffee while I'm gone."

Rolling her eyes, she gently brushed her hand over the dogs head. "As if that has been out of the question at any point."

She took a look at her alarm clock again. "Back to topic, please. It's getting early."

"You mean it's getting late." Lorelai furrowed her brow.

Her daughter grinned mischievously. "No, right now it's more like I said."

"Darn, all that studying at Yale definitely made you too smart."

"Mom...?" She tried to get her back on topic again.

"Okay, so your grandma acted weird-"

"-Which still is nothing new," she threw in.

"She did not drink." Lorelai went on.

"She... what?" Now that was confusing.

Lorelai felt as if she had finally made a point. "No alcohol the whole night."

Thinking it over for a moment, Rory nodded. "...Okay, that is kind of strange."

"Exactly what I told her." Her mother pointed at Paul Anka again, who decided to ignore it this time.

Rory furrowed her brow. "You told her that she's strange?"

"I told her she is not drinking." Sometimes she wondered why her daughter seemed unable to follow her trail of thought. This time she decided it must be the strange timing.

"Alcohol," she added to her mother's sentence.

Nodding, she was somewhat relieved Rory finally got it. "Yup. And then she snapped at me."

"Well, she's Grandma."

"No excuse."

She decided to let it pass this time. "Go ahead."

Lorelai shrugged her shoulders. "That's it."

"That's it?" Furrowing her brow in disbelief, Rory sat up straight again.

"Let me think ... uhm ... yeah?" She couldn't believe he daughter didn't get the importance of her words.

"You are waking me up because Grandma did not drink alcohol tonight." Rory recapitulated.

On the other end of the line, Lorelai furrowed her brow and cocked her head to one side. "You're still asleep, right?"

Raising both eyebrows, she shook her head slightly. "No?"

"Then why do you think it's no big deal." She pouted.

Shrugging her shoulders, Rory leaned a bit forward to work some kinks out of her back. "Well, it isn't."

"But..."

"Mom. Maybe she is ill or she just didn't feel like it or she is on a weird kind of diet. There are a hundred reasons Grandma could have not been drinking alcohol tonight."

Thinking it over, she had to agree with her daughter. "I guess you're right."

"I surely am."

"Okay." She still pouted.

After a moment, Rory asked. "Can I go back to sleep now?"

"Yeah, well." Lorelai shrugged, then added, "... Okay. But if she doesn't drink next week--"

"--We are going to tackle her down and shove a bottle vodka down her throat the next time I'm there," she finished the sentence.

She could hear the huge grin in her mother's voice when she said, "Hey, can we do that no matter what?"

Giggling, she rolled her eyes. "Nice try. Go to sleep, weirdo."

"Will do, my child," Lorelai teased.

"Nite Mom."

"Nite." Pushing the end-call button, Lorelai huffed and looked at Paul Anka.

"Don't look at me like that."

He cocked his head to one side, still keeping eye contact.

"So you think she's right, huh?"

The dog made a strange noise that was somewhere between a whimper and a growl.

Nodding, she smiled. "Smart answer."

Maybe Rory and Paul Anka were right and she made too much of it, but part of her still wanted to find out what it was all about.

Standing up, she pulled her pink Hello Kitty pillow out from under the bed. She would find out.

Next Friday the latest.

Emily paced the living room, the phone pressed against her ear her, other hand wrapped around herself to keep the cardigan that hung around her shoulders from falling down while she spun around as she walked back and forth.

It was a beautiful autumn day, the warm, golden glow of the sun creating lovely colors as the soft wind played with the few leaves that still hung on the trees in the expansive garden, trying to make them fall. If she had looked outside, she would have seen the beauty of the day; she would have let the serenity of the view she had from here calm her.

She felt anything but calm. The pain had gotten worse and she just couldn't get the damn nurse to put her through to the specialist she had been seeing for the last few months. "No, I will not wait. I have paid good money to get the service I want and seeing now that you don't provide it, I can very well be upset."

Glaring at the maid when she entered the room, she didn't even see the poor creature shrinking back before she turned around again to concentrate on understanding the heavy-accented nurse.

Taking a deep, calm breath, she put on a smile, her voice taking on a sugar-coated quality. "If you would be so kind as to tell the doctor that he should come to the phone?" Her face fell, as did her voice. "Or I will have to call Mr. Kinsella so he can tell the doctor not to leave me waiting."

A triumphant grin formed on her lips. "Yes, Kinsella as in Vice President Kinsella." Gazing out of the window, she felt herself calm more and more. "Yes, all right. I will wait."

Without her noticing, Richard had sneaked into the room, watching her pressing her hand against the side of her back.

"What do you mean, he said I'd have to wait like everybody else?"

To anybody who didn't know her, her voice sounded angry but years of training let him hear that it was not because of what the other person had told her, but because of her trying to deal with physical pain. His jaw muscles clenched when he realized what this meant.

"Listen, I don't care how many people are in your waiting room." She pointed her finger at the window, glaring at her own mirror image. "I need to speak to my doctor, and I need to speak to him now." Hearing a noise behind her, she spun around, surprised to find her husband standing in the doorway.

He slowly walked towards here, their gazes locked, gently taking the receiver she still held to her ear from her hand.

Taking a deep breath, he listened to the nurse on the other end, going on about how it was not possible for her to get the doctor. His eyes not leaving Emily's, his voice was a low rumble. "This is Richard Gilmore. My wife and I will be there in thirty-five minutes. You will tell the doctor to meet us at the door. Did I make myself clear?"

She watched as he nodded and then slowly put the phone on the small table next to them, mesmerized. He had heard. Why on earth had he heard her? Why was he here? She felt her heart in her throat, the gentleness in his eyes scaring her.

She had not wanted him to know that the medication did not work. He had kept up with her over the past weeks, never complaining. She did not want him to feel bad about her being ill and yet, here he was, once again having to take care of her like he had to do so often during the last few months.

He read her face, knowing that she was too weak to keep the well trained mask up any longer. Richard stepped closer towards her, putting an arm around her shoulders, kissing her forehead. "Let me get your coat."

.

When they got home she was exhausted. It was a state of mind and body that she was not used to. How she hated it. How she hated being weak.
Her arm hurt from the injection the dreadful nurse had given her. At least the pain subsided.
Now if only she could drag her body upstairs and go to bed... she didn't really care whether or not she would find the strength to undress or not. She just wanted to sleep.

"Emily?" He walked over to where she stood in the middle of the foyer, unmoving.

Richard knew better than to touch her before making sure she had seen him. The last time the doctor had changed the dose of her medication, he had made the mistake of touching her shoulder when she was absent like this. He remembered the marks her fingernails had left on his cheek vividly.

Standing in front of her, he caught her eyes before gently cupping her cheek in his hand. "Do you think you can make it up the staircase?"

She furrowed her brow. Since when did her husband have grey hair? But of course he had... or... her head spun. Pressing her fingertips against her forehead, she closed her eyes, feeling Richard lift her up, carrying her to their bedroom.

His heart ached for her. Here she was, in his arms, depending on him. In a way she always had, but this was completely different.

He knew he had to be strong, but he also knew that he wouldn't be able to keep it all locked up inside for much longer.
It had been so much better last week. Friday Night, Emily had even been able to trick their daughter into believing everything was all right.

He gently laid her down on her side of the bed, taking off her shoes. Looking at her face, he wondered how much longer she would keep it a secret.

For now he was just glad she seemed to be feeling well enough to sleep peacefully.

Author's Note: So; what do you think? I hope it's not too awful and that you don't hate me for not giving you more information ... but hey; maybe this way I can bribe you into leaving feedback -- with promising you a new chapter soon.