Chapter Ten
"Luke!" Rory called melodically, jumping out from behind the curtain and looking around. "Where are you?"
"Storage room!" Luke called.
She made her way through the kitchen and found him unloading boxes.
"Hey, Rory. What's up?"
"I was just going to see if you needed some help down here," she shrugged. "I needed a bit of a break from all the planning. Four hours on the phone with Chris and Matt is a lot."
"You have a very strange sense of taking a break," Luke chuckled. "But I would love some help. Could you just keep an eye on the front so I can get this all finished up? Cesar's in the back, he can do all the cooking."
"I'm on it," Rory nodded,
She went out front and pulled the book she had taken to keeping under the counter out, since there was only a couple people sitting at the tables. Every once and a while she walked around with the coffee pot and offered refills.
She had just put on a fresh pot when her mom came in and threw herself onto a stool.
"Ugh! Never, ever put anything in writing!" She grumbled.
"Good advice to give to a journalist," Rory nodded and set a mug in front of her mother.
"This is empty," she frowned.
"That's because the coffee isn't finished," Rory rolled her eyes. "So why shouldn't you put things in writing?"
"Because if you do, you'll end up having to do horrible things that you absolutely do NOT want to do!"
"Sure," Rory nodded and retrieved the now full coffee pot. "Because that makes complete and total sense."
"My mother came into the inn today with her little marionette children to practice for cotillion," Lorelai filled in the blanks, helping herself to a donut. "And Michel begged me to take him to the stupid thing on Friday, then he pulled out a bunch of post-it notes that I had written on to say I owe him a favour and he's cashing it in."
"Sucker," Rory laughed.
"Hey!" Lorelai frowned.
"Sorry, but you're the one who gave Michel an IOU," her daughter shrugged. "This is your problem."
"Where's Luke? Maybe he'll give me some sympathy, seeing as my daughter is an ungrateful little rat."
"He's in the storage room," Rory pointed around the corner and poured herself a cup of coffee. "But I doubt you'll get much sympathy from him."
"Yeah, but I like looking at him," Lorelai took her mug and disappeared behind the counter, leaving Rory alone once again.
"Would you put that down!?" Luke cried a few minutes later.
"But it's fun!"
"Rory, get your mother out of here!" Luke ordered, dragging the elder Gilmore back into the diner.
"Come on!" Lorelai cried. "Just one box!"
"You're not playing with the X-acto knife!" Luke shook his head. "Give it."
"You're no fun!" His wife sulked and passed over the knife.
"Knives aren't meant to be fun," Luke scolded. "They are dangerous. Go drink your coffee."
She glared at him and rounded the counter. Once Luke was gone, Rory turned back to her mother and smiled.
"Hey, I have news."
"Really?" Lorelai asked. "In the last five minutes?"
"No, before, but you were going on about post-its and Michel's evil tendencies."
"Very true," she nodded. "Alright, let me have it."
"Jess and I are going on a road trip so he can tell the world about Notes in the Margin and get it into stores all over the country."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously," Rory nodded. "It's going to be three weeks, end of July to the middle of August, and we're going to be all over the place."
"That sounds amazing!" Lorelai beamed. "I'm so excited for you! Do you want to borrow my road trip handbook? I am the resident expert."
"Thanks, but I think I've got it covered," Rory laughed. "You and me have done this enough, I've got a very good plan."
"Well I can't wait to hear all about it. This is big, your first real vacation."
"I know," Rory nodded.
"You think you're ready?"
"Well we've practically been living together since October," she pointed out. "I don't think we're going to learn anything else about each other."
"Alright," her mother shrugged. "So are you going to hit all the important landmarks in our nation? The world's biggest ball of yarn, that creepy Inn we stayed at in Boston? Oh! The Jimmy Carter peanut statue!"
"I will definitely be adding all of those to the list of destinations," Rory assured her.
"That's my girl," Lorelai beamed. "Alright, I have to go call my mother and get Michel and I into this stupid cotillion. You coming home for dinner?"
"I am, I don't know if Jess will come, though. He's doing one last read through before they give the printer the go ahead, and I don't know how long it's going to take."
"Alright, well I'm going to order Chinese, so there'll be enough to feed a small village."
"Got it," Rory nodded. "See you later."
"Bye, Doll. Bye, Luke!"
There was a muffled crash from the back room, followed by Luke cursing.
"And on that note," Lorelai jumped from her stool and ran for the door.
"Coward!" Rory called after her, then turned to check on her stepfather. "Luke? You okay?"
"I'm fine," he grumbled. "I just dropped the damn box and- don't come in here! There's glass everywhere!"
Rory stopped abruptly in the doorway and stuck her head inside, leaning against the door frame.
"Do you want a broom?" She asked, looking at the mess of glass and pickles all over the floor.
"Please," he nodded.
Rory grabbed the broom and dustpan, along with a mop from the kitchen. "You want some help?" She offered, handing the implements over.
"No," Luke shook his head. "If you could just keep things moving out there, that would be great."
"I'm on it," Rory nodded. "I forgot how much fun it was working here."
"Are there even people out there?" Luke asked.
"No, but I'm a really big fan of getting to sit right beside the coffee maker," Rory smiled brightly. "It's so cool being allowed on the other side of the counter."
"I'm glad you think so," he chuckled.
Leaving Luke to clean up, Rory bounced back out front to serve the few tables that had straggled in while she was gone, then had Cesar make a turkey burger for Jess and snuck upstairs for a few minutes.
"How's it going?" She asked, setting the plate down on the coffee table and sitting down.
"I've got about a hundred pages left," he shrugged. "So far I'm satisfied, but we both know that won't last."
"Which is why after today, you're not allowed to touch it," Rory smiled at him. "I'm having dinner back at the Crap Shack, are you going to come?"
"If I'm done," he nodded.
"That's what I told Mom. Well, I'll let you get back to work," she jumped up and pecked him on the lips.
"You do know that you don't actually work there, right?" Jess asked her.
"I do, but I also know that it's a family business, and we are now family. Therefore, I'm getting back to work."
"Alright," Jess shrugged. "Have fun."
"I am!" She grinned at him, then headed back downstairs.
She stayed to help through the dinner rush, not wanting to leave Luke empty handed and enjoying the kind of bonding time they seemed to be having. It almost felt like the 'take your daughter to work day' that she had never gotten with her own father.
"You're having way too much fun with this," Luke shook his head at her halfway through the rush. "It's like when your mom ran the place that one week."
"I helped her!" Rory pointed out. "And I don't know how you don't think this is fun!"
"Because I'm not as crazy as you are," he grabbed a couple plates from the window and passed them to her. "Go give these to Babette and Maury."
"Got it, Gertie!"
"Stop calling me that!" He yelled after her, making her giggle.
By the time the diner had cleared out enough for Cesar to take over, Jess had finished his editing and decided to join them for dinner, walking over to the house with Rory while Luke went to pick up the food Lorelai had ordered.
"So, what's the verdict?" Rory asked, wrapping her arms around his waist as they walked.
"It's publishable," he shrugged. "We'll see what the rest of the world has to say about it."
"Well, as the only other person in the world who's read it, I think it's worth a Pulitzer," Rory promised.
"I appreciate that very biased opinion," he pulled her closer and kissed her forehead. "I just hope everyone else is as happy about it as you are."
"They will if they know what's good for them."
"That sounds like a threat, Miss Gilmore," Jess shook his head.
"It was."
"And how exactly do you plan to enforce this threat?" He asked, a smirk ghosting over his lips.
"Oh, did I forget to tell you? Chris and I are putting a note in the front of the book informing everyone who reads it that not liking it is a crime punishable by death."
"You must have forgot to mention that," Jess nodded along seriously.
"My bad," she smirked. "Cynthia's agreed to be our angel of death, so we're all set. The world will love your book whether they like it or not."
"Man, you'd make a great publicist," Jess laughed. "If this whole journalist thing doesn't work out, you definitely have something to fall back on."
Rory smirked and led him up the porch and into the house.
"Mom! We're home!" She called.
"Kitchen!" Lorelai called back. "I'm cooking!"
Rory and Jess exchanged a confused look, then hurried into the other room to figure out what was going on.
"You're what?" Rory asked.
"Cooking," her mother repeated.
They rounded the corner to find Lorelai standing at the stove, stirring a pot.
"What the hell?" Jess mumbled.
"I am so confused," Rory frowned. "What is happening right now? I thought we were ordering food."
"You also thought you were coming home to your mother," Jess pointed out. "Obviously we've stepped into some sort of alternate reality, though."
"Can it, Evil Spawn," Lorelai glared at him. "I ordered food, and then I decided that I wanted Mac and Cheese and Luke taught me how to make real Mac and Cheese a couple weeks ago, so I thought I'd test it out."
"Unsupervised?" Rory scoffed.
"Listen, Kid, I fed you for ten years before we started relying on Luke," Lorelai pointed out. "The house is still standing and you didn't die, so I can't be that terrible."
"You fed me for like two years before we started depending on Luke," Rory corrected. "Before that Sookie fed us, and before that whoever Mia had hired to run the kitchen at the time fed us. And really, in that time in between, Sookie still fed us because our cooking was mostly just re-heating."
"Whatever," Lorelai waved her off. "My point, is that I don't need to be supervised."
"If you say so," Rory shrugged. "So, is this going to be any good?"
"Oh who knows," her mom shrugged. "But I thought it'd be fun to try."
"I think it's burning," Jess wrinkled his nose.
"Crap!" Lorelai turned and started stirring frantically, trying to save her creation.
"Want some help?" Jess offered.
"I can do it," the older woman waved him off.
"You want some help?" Jess asked again, when the concoction started bubbling over.
"Yes," she slumped and relinquished her spoon.
"At least you tried," Rory comforted her mother.
"I'm a failure," she sighed dramatically.
"You're not a failure," Rory wrapped an arm around her and led her to the kitchen table. "You did your best, and that's all anyone can ask for."
"Don't patronize me."
"Lorelai!" Luke's voice floated through the back door, followed by two sharp kicks.
"Who's there?!" Lorelai asked, immediately forgetting about her failed cooking attempt.
"Open the door!" Luke ordered.
"To a strange man? Not a chance!"
"Rory!" Luke appealed to the younger Gilmore.
"Coming," Rory got up from the table and opened the door, taking one of the bags Luke was trying to balance in his arms.
"Oh, hey!" Lorelai smiled innocently at her husband. "How was work?"
Luke just glared at her, putting the rest of the food on the counter.
"What's that?" He asked, inspecting the pot of Mac n' Cheese Jess had taken over.
"She cooked," Jess pointed his thumb at Lorelai.
"You what?" Luke turned to look at her.
"You taught me how to cook," Lorelai reasoned. "I thought I'd try it out."
"I didn't teach you how to cook," he shook his head. "I offered to teach you, but you refused to listen and just followed me around the kitchen pretending to be Gordon Ramsay for an hour."
"Oh, right!" She nodded. "Well, Jess stepped in so it might actually be okay."
"I don't think so," Jess shook his head. "It's turned a strange red colour. You didn't, by any chance, bleed into this, did you?"
"Let's not risk it," Luke leaned over and turned the stove off, then slammed the lid onto the pot.
"Good call," Rory agreed. "Living room?"
"I'll grab plates," Jess offered.
"I'll pick a movie," Lorelai ran out in front of him.
"Watch her," Luke told Rory, who gave him a fake salute and skipped off.
They settled on 'Hard Bodies' with minimal bickering, both in the mood for a true classic.
"I still don't understand what the big deal about this movie is," Luke said halfway through.
"That's because you have no taste," Lorelai patted his knee.
"Yeah," Jess agreed. "You're uncultured swine."
"This from the man who owns three copies of everything Ernest Hemingway ever wrote," Rory scoffed.
"Hey, I-"
"No!" Lorelai interrupted the couple. "You are not starting this argument again! Not in the middle of a classic like 'Hard Bodies'."
"Fine," they both sulked and turned back to the movie while Luke and Lorelai tried not to laugh at them. It didn't matter that they were both in their twenties and had moved away, some things never changed.