Family and Fruit

Summary: Random one-shot where LL discuss things that should never be heard… Set when they were happy, at some mythical point we weren't allowed to see on the show. T for vulgar references.

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Disclaimer: We know I don't own it, or the timeline would work.

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Friday nights were a highlight of Luke Danes's life. Lorelai Gilmore came in after a Gilmore family dinner. They talked. She babbled, rather, and he muttered and gave her pie, and eventually commented.

That Friday night, he was particularly anticipating Friday night's coffee and pie and chatter. His mind was blank and yet full of horrifying images. He needed to hear an imperative "Kiss?", and feel a warm soft hug, and know that all the teasing talk didn't diminish a real concern and caring, and…

The bells jingled.

Luke set down a plate of pie, and turned to pour a mug of coffee. "You're early!" he said happily.

He heard a tiny groan, a whimper, and a thump.

Lorelai was not at the counter. She sat at a table, her head on her arms.

He rushed to her, pie and coffee at the ready. "Lorelai? What is it, is Rory okay, what…"

Her face was white. Her hands trembled as they bypassed coffee to grab Luke's fingers.

Luke dropped. Lorelai ignoring coffee ranked as a severe crisis. What else, he wondered, would his horrible day bring?

"I…" Lorelai gulped. "I had to hear the words."

"What words? Lorelai?" He rubbed her hands, startled by how cold they were. "What happened?"

Lorelai's eyes were wide, distant, shocked-seeming. "I saw my mother's butt."

Frowning, Luke replied, "Okay?"

"She needed an enema."

Luke cringed. "Ah geez."

"And she made me help. I mean she didn't give me an option. My dad opened the door and said…" She tried to imitate the stately grave way Richard Gilmore spoke. "Lorelai, your mother needs an enema, go upstairs."

Luke tried to absorb that. His brain refused to accept that he'd heard those words. "What?"

"And I go upstairs, thinking, no one should hear those words in a sentence…" sniffled Lorelai forlornly against his sleeve. She used it to dab at her mascara-laden tears. "Mom. Enema."

Nodding, Luke agreed. Words like "mom" and "enema" did not belong in the same paragraph, let alone the same sentence.

"So I go upstairs, and my mom's in this… Oh God, this position…" Lorelai buried her face into his chest, her words muffled. "Like evil porn. All out there. Hello, Emily. Hello, Emily's girl parts. Oh God."

Stomach churning, Luke patted her, his own mind steadfastly rejecting the images conjured by Lorelai's words.

"And I was a good kid, I did it, I gave my mother an enema, some stupid cleansing pro-biology thing…"

"Probiotic," said Luke dimly, stroking Lorelai's hair with gentle fingertips.

"Whatever! So she can be less bloated! Some bug-balancing thing and she makes me put it up her butt and then she told me to eat with my dad and we couldn't eat and here I am and… Why? Why did I have to do that? Why do I have to know what my mom's butt looks like?!"

Luke blurted, "TJ came in today and said my sister has great, uh…" He blushed. "Breasts."

Lorelai's head lifted. She gulped tepid coffee. "Did you punch him?"

"Had plates in my hands," recalled Luke ruefully. "So he's telling Kirk and I forget who else all about my sister's chest and what it looks like, and the sizes and the shapes and the colors and…" He shuddered hard enough to rattle his teeth. "I don't want to hear the words sister and breasts in the same sentence! And I can't punch him, because he's… She's… And…"

He found his head cradled against his girlfriend's chest, a whole different matter than his sister's, and far more comforting. "Oh Luke, I'm so sorry. Oh, babe. You let TJ live?"

"Liz came in and got him and I think she yelled at him, I was trying to wash out my ears."

Lorelai kissed his temple. "My poor Luke," she crooned. "Yeah. Moms, butts, sisters, breasts. Never in same sentence."

"Never in same book," corrected Luke passionately. "I can't eat peaches again. Ever."

"You like peaches."

Luke said darkly, "Not anymore," and heard Lorelai's small gasp of comprehension.

After a time, during which pie grew cold and coffee grew mysteriously absent despite Luke not actually seeing Lorelai drink it, Luke offered, "Most people take those probiotic things by way of mouth, not, uh, the other end."

"Well, God forbid Emily do things the way common people do them," was Lorelai's response.

"And most don't work. Like those body-building shakes, most are scams, it's…"

Luke let the rant go. He had no heart for it.

He picked up the fork and ate a bite of apple pie. "I have cinnamon ice cream."

"Do you have a Vulcan mind-wipe?"

Luke started to protest the Star Trek reference, and shrugged. "No. You?"

"Not even tequila, babe."

"I can never see peaches again," said Luke forlornly.

"I can never unsee my mom's butt," said Lorelai mournfully.

They ate the pie, trading fork back and forth, until no crumbs remained.

"Do I remind you of fruit?"

Luke jumped. "What? God, Lorelai, I'm not going to compare you to fruit!"

"Melons? Berries? Apples? Something better than an umlaut?"

He stared at her, certain she was insane, and then considered that she'd had to give her mother an enema for some health fad.

Insane was probably a safe state of mind, after such an encounter.

"Nah," he said, and settled back down, comfortably pulling Lorelai into a sidelong cuddle. "You, you're, uh…" His mind scrambled for words. He blurted, "Whipped cream and raspberry sauce."

Lorelai choked out a sobbing, "You hate whipped cream!"

"Okay, fine, vanilla ice cream!"

"You don't like ice cream! Why am I dairy? Is it that I'm too fat?"

Luke wondered if banging his head into a wall would help.

"Why not Greek yogurt? You like that!" wailed Lorelai, and dropped her head into her arms again. "Oh God, you don't like the foods I remind you of! You're supposed to like me! TJ likes peaches, I bet!"

What that summoned up in Luke's mind could not be described, nor should it have been. He growled, "Never. Say. Peaches. And. TJ. In the same sentence. Ever. Again." His voice slid to a whine. "Please."

Lorelai placated him with a kiss on the cheek. "I just… I can't get it out of my head. Mom's butt. All up in the air like… And… And… And…"

"And what?" snapped Luke, losing his patience by habit.

Lorelai's tear-drowned eyes met his. "And the enema smelled like…" Her body shook with revulsion, frail-seeming against Luke's. "It smelled like suntan lotion. The cheap kind."

By reflex, Luke said, "Probably had coconut in it. They use coconut oil in some cheap suntan lotions."

Lorelai exploded, out of her chair and her funk. Her hands flew through the air. "Why the hell does my mother's enema smell like suntan lotion? That's literally where the sun can't shine!"

Lorelai had a good point. So good that Luke didn't dare laugh, despite a hysterical, maniacal desire to do so.

He barked gruffly, "Lorelai!"

She calmed, inasmuch calm could be achieved, her lower lip quivering.

He opened his mouth to give a lecture on how good it was that she had her mother to help, and she should be grateful, and what wouldn't he give to have his mother alive and eccentric.

He said, "Mom butt sister peaches."

Lorelai drew back, in the manner of someone seeking a quick exit.

Cursing himself, Luke elucidated, "Not said. In same sentence. Ever. Again."

Lorelai relaxed, shoulders dropping. "Deal."

Luke exhaled heavily. "Deal."

"Pie?"

Luke looked under the counter. He froze.

"Luke? Babe?"

"Uh… All that's left is… Uh… Oh geez."

"Luke?" repeated Lorelai anxiously and hurried to his side.

There before them were the two remaining pies. One peach, one coconut cream.

They traded a look.

Luke asked, "You have any issues with tacos?"

"Nope. You?"

"Not so far."

Lorelai retreated from the offending pies. "So. Tacos and movie night."

Succinct as ever, Luke summed up, "Yep."

He locked the diner door behind him. He really did look forward to Friday nights. He would continue to look forward to Friday nights. He'd simply have to remember to take peach and coconut off the order forms for a while. There, thought Luke happily. Problem solved.

So long as he never heard mombuttsisterpeaches ever, ever again.

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AN: Not great, but I'm swamped in real life, including actually giving (medicinal) enemas to my elderly mother. You can't unsee that. Two more days, and it's all done except the nightmares…