Chapter Two: What to Wear

"Mom! I have nothing to wear!" Rory wailed as soon as the elder Gilmore answered her phone.

"Wow, that must be embarrassing!" Lorelei fired right back. "I can't imagine wandering around, stark naked, trying to get a quote for your article like that. Unless the article is about naked people, I guess. Is the article about naked people?"

"Mom!" Rory whined, dragging the one syllable out into three.

Undeterred, Lorelei kept going. "Aren't you cold? You're always cold when you're at home and fully dressed. I bet being stark naked is freezing!"

"Why is Rory naked?" Luke's voice filtered through the phone's speaker, quiet but still intelligible. Although, he didn't sound particularly worried about the apparent state of undress of his girlfriend's daughter. But then, Luke never sounded particularly worried about much.

"I don't know yet," Lorelei told him before turning her attention back to the phone. "And if you're naked, what are you clipping your press pass to? Where are you keeping your pen and paper for taking notes?"

"Mom!" Rory snapped.

"Well, I guess you could still be carrying a purse even if you were naked." Lorelei carried blithely on. "Wow, hun, I hope it a really, really big purse. Big enough to hide behind big. I bet Gucci sells that size."

"MOM!" Rory bellowed into her phone in a desperate bid to derail her mother's running gag.

"What? You started it."

"I have a date tonight, but I didn't pack any date clothes. All I have is professional, business clothes. Why didn't I pack any date clothes?" Rory flung a handful of tasteful button-ups across her room and collapsed onto her bed.

"Uh, because you needed to live light and on the move, so you only packed the essentials," Lorelei reminded helpfully. "You even left behind the complete dictionary that your dad bought you. We both know how much you love that dictionary."

"Yeah, yeah. Yay for me being a practical, professional adult." Rory groused. "That doesn't change the fact that I have no date clothes. None of my work clothes are cute enough for a date. What was I thinking? One, one, little black dress wouldn't have weighed me down."

Unseen by her daughter, Lorelei smiled. "Do you still have the teddy bear I gave you?"

"Mr. McStuffins?" Rory blinked. "The toy you insisted I take with me even though I'm an adult and when you knew I was traveling light? The stuffed animal that embarrasses me every time a co-worker comes back to the room to work on a shared project. That Mr. McStuffins?"

"Mmm," Lorelei agreed happily. "Very special stuffin'. There's Velcro in his back."

Rory sat the phone down to investigate the toy. The secret pocket opened to reveal that most of the stuffing was in fact a gorgeous little, black dress. "Mom!" she exclaimed in surprise.

"The perfect little, black dress," Lorelei informed her. "Classy enough to be formal. Simple enough to be casual. Made from this alien material that can shake out the wrinkles on short notice. Throw in some pearls and you are go to go, kid."

Rory squealed in delight. "Have I ever told you that you are the best mom ever in the whole wide world?"

"Yeah," Lorelei sighed happily, "but you can always say it again."

"Thank you, thank you, thank you! You are the best mom in the whole wide world!"

"Uh-huh. And don't you forget it!" Lorelei chirped. She shoveled a fork full of dinner into her mouth. "So big date tonight?" she slurred around the food.

Luke pulled the plate away.

Lorelei glared.

"Eat or Talk. Not both," he ordered.

"Yep, another reporter." Rory's voice came through muffled as she shimmied out of her pant suit and into the dress, unaware of the Luke's Diner Drama.

"Does this reporter have a name?" Lorelei demanded while trying to spear another bite from her plate as Luke tried to fend her off.

"Sam Jameson. He works for The Daily Bugle, which I've never heard of before."

Lorelei grinned. "Ooh. So is Mr. Jameson of The Daily Bugle cute?"

Luke snorted loud enough to be heard over the phone. "There's some irony for you. I wonder if he did that on purpose."

"What?" both Gilmores demanded.

"Applied to a place called Daily Bugle." At Lorelei's blank look he felt compelled to explain. "You know, Jay Jonah Jameson, editor of The Daily Bugle. Its from the Spiderman comics."

Lorelei gasped in mock horror. "You, Luke Danes, the single most grounded guy I know, are a closet comic book nerd? How did I not know this? Did you have the whole collection in your mom's basement? Do you still have it?" With another gasp, as though the thought just hit her, she leaned forward to ask in a stage whisper, "Do you ever wear a spandex body suit and a cape?"

Luke shot his girlfriend an unappreciated look. "I have work to do," he deadpanned and walked away with her dinner plate.

Lorelei reached towards the half-eaten plate with a useless whimper. Deprived of the rest of her food she called to his back: "I want to see you in those spandex later!"

"Mom!" Rory scolded. "I did not need that visual!"

"Sorry, sorry. Where were we? Oh, yeah. Is he cute?"

"Soo cute," Rory gushed. "And a really hard core investigative journalist."

"Ah, but is he a good writer?" Lorelei asked.

"I should Google him."

"Yeah, do that," Lorelei agreed. "It's called 'date safety' instead of 'cyber stalking' when girls do it."

Rory rolled her eyes even as she typed. "Huh. That's weird. All I'm getting are Spiderman references. No mention of a Sam Jameson by-line anywhere."

Lorelei shrugged. "So he's either a comic book nerd who started an on-line paper or he hasn't made a name for himself yet. Ask him about it on the date."

"Right. Conversation point." Rory nodded to herself.

"Oh, and hon?"

"Yeah, mom?"

"Don't freak yourself out too much. Try to have fun."

Rory huffed a relieving laugh. "I will. Love you, mom."

"Love you, too. Call me with the juicy details after."

"Naturally."

Lorelei hung up her phone. "Luke? LUKE! Bring my dinner back! Luke!"