A/N: Let's do the time warp again! It's November now, because life is boring when you live in Michigan and don't have any friends around (trust me on that one). I ran out of lyrics from the last song, so the chapter titles are now from Automatic Loveletter's "August 28th 3:30am". Thank you so much to those of you still following along with me, and an extra thank you to those who leave reviews! This story's been a bit harder to work out logistically, but I think we're getting somewhere.

For a moment when she was talking to her mom Rory forgot that she did have one thing that wouldn't end: her job. Before long she had fallen into a tried and true routine when it came to work. She became used to going into the office every day and coming home to her own apartment to either heat up leftovers or cobble together some approximation of a meal. Even though she would probably never admit it to Lorelai, she actually liked sitting down with a big salad after a long day of work sometimes. She even took to ordering pizza every Friday night since she didn't have dinner with her grandparents. Normally pizza wouldn't hold a candle to her grandmother's menus, but the deep dish pizza from a local chain called Jet's was infinitely better than some of Emily's more creative dishes. Of course, any food would be better than quail with tequila cactus sauce.

Rory didn't mind leaving Jet's pizza behind when she headed home for Thanksgiving, though. Since Lorelai hadn't seen Rory since the summer she had planned a huge bash at the inn for everyone they liked. Sookie and Lane's families would be there, along with Liz and TJ and Rory's grandparents. Rory had no idea how it would go with all of them together in one room, but she was definitely excited about it. By the time her plane touched down in Hartford on Wednesday evening she could practically smell the turkey roasting already.

"My wayward daughter, home at last!" Lorelai said, practically tackling Rory near the baggage claim. Luke stood off to the side, wisely avoiding the collision path. He smiled and waved and Rory waved back, and then hugged him too.

"Who are you calling 'wayward'?" Rory asked her mom. "I'll have you know eventually I will be a features writer for the Detroit Free Press."

"How long are those losers going to make you do that rookie stuff?" Lorelai asked, taking Rory's bag from her and handing it to Luke, who dutifully took it.

"Until I'm not a rookie anymore," Rory said, wishing there was an actual end date in sight. She loved working for the paper, but she couldn't wait to get some real bylines soon. "It is kind of frustrating," she admitted. "It reminds me of Hell Night at the Daily News, although they don't make me wear a stupid paper hat at the Free Press."

"Well, you could always wear your World's Best Reporter hat that you accidentally left on your bed," Lorelai suggested.

"Right, accidentally," Rory said. "I'll think about it."

After that Rory could hardly get a word in. Lorelai kept up a monologue the entire way home, occasionally asking Luke to chime in, about all the things Rory had missed in her absence. Rory knew about most of the things already, but it was still nice to hear her mom repeat them in person. It hadn't felt right hearing about the birth of Sookie's baby over the phone, or to get texts about town happenings days after the fact. Despite subscribing to the Stars Hollow Gazette, Rory felt very out of the loop in Michigan. She had adjusted over the months and no longer spent all her time feeling lonely, but being back in Connecticut really hammered home how much life changed, and continued to change.

Luke had moved in with Lorelai (again), which wasn't really surprising. Despite their time apart he and Lorelai seemed to move as one unit. Rory was happy that he was back in their lives, though she was a little bummed to not see their relationship play out in front of her. In a way it was good, though. They had the house to themselves and could be all domestic and gooey without nauseating anyone. When Rory walked into the kitchen after putting her things away she caught her mom fluttering her eyelashes at Luke as he poured her a cup of coffee. It was the same thing Rory had been witness to at the diner for years and it filled her with all those ridiculous happy feelings Thanksgiving was supposed to evoke. "Not everything changes," she said under her breath, pouring coffee for herself.

Since dinner would be at the inn, Rory had expected the weekend to be relatively hassle-free in the cooking department. Sookie and Luke would take care of all the food and she and Lorelai could kick back and enjoy a little wine. It was the perfect arrangement, and one Rory had been looking forward to. So when Lorelai interrupted her book sorting to tell her they were going to make a cheesecake from scratch, Rory nearly laughed hard enough to rupture something. It wasn't until Lorelai showed her the cream cheese that she realized her mom was serious. Lorelai had never baked anything in her life so the idea of making a cheesecake seemed almost impossible. Rory could've handled one of the instant no-bake cheesecakes, but constructing a dessert that needed to be baked from the ground up was intimidating. Luckily, there was wine.

"I can't believe you like moscato," Rory said as she crushed graham crackers to make a crust. That part was actually kind of fun, even though they didn't have a rolling pin so she had improvise with the bottom of a coffee mug. "It's so sweet."

"I can't believe you like red wine! Red wine is for pretentious people."

"Even if it comes from a box?" Lorelai nodded. "But you drink red wine at grandma and grandpa's," Rory insisted. "I've never heard you complain."

"Hooch is hooch, Rory. You do not look a gift horse in the mouth when it comes to my parents." Lorelai paused in her mixing. "Who came up with tat saying, anyway?"

"I dunno," Rory said, staring at the butter she was melting in the microwave. It wasn't doing anything. "You can tell how old a horse is by looking at its teeth, so it'd be rude to see how old a horse is if someone gives it to you as a present."

"Like if you're on a blind date and they go to the bathroom so you look at their ID to see how old they really are, because even though they told you they were 30 they're really 42 and look a lot closer to 50," Lorelai suggested.

Rory stared at her with concern. "Did that happen to you?"

"Maybe," Lorelai said, pouring herself more wine. "It was a long time ago. You were too young to appreciate the story back then."

"You know that has nothing to do with gift horses," Rory said. "Who gives someone a horse as a gift, anyway?"

"Rich people."

"Oh, them. Hey, why didn't you get one of those no-bake cheesecakes?" Rory asked, nearly scalding herself on the butter she was adding to her graham cracker crumbs.

Lorelai shook her head. "So the Contessa could jump out of her TV and stab me with a shiv?"

"You think the Barefoot Contessa just walks around with a shiv on her at all times?"

"Hey, you've seen those giant shirts she wears," Lorelai said. "Who knows what she's got under there?"

"I bet Jeffery does," Rory offered.

"Okay, no more wine for you," Lorelai said, pulling the bottle closer to herself. "You've gotten so blue out there in the world."

"Hey, they pay me to be worldly at the Free Press."

"Do they ever call it the Freep? The website is Freep, after all."

"No, no one calls it the Freep," Rory said. "Most people there just call it the paper."

"How presumptuous," Lorelai said. "There are dozens, if not hundreds of other papers in Michigan."

"None that matter."

"There's the egocentric girl I know and love."

Rory grinned, sticking her finger in the cheesecake batter. Was it called batter if it wasn't a cake or brownies? She wasn't sure. Either way, she was definitely on board with liquefied cream cheese mix. "This is going to be good," Rory said, passing the slightly uneven crust to her mom so she could fill it. "I think people will like it."

"We'll just have to cut small slices," Lorelai said. "Besides Sookie and Lane's kids, there are going to be 12 of us."

"Twelve?" Rory asked, doing some quick mental math. "I thought it was 11, since everyone is currently paired up but me."

Lorelai meticulously spooned the cheesecake batter into the pan, not meeting Rory's eye. The kitchen was quiet for a few moments while Lorelai finished off the dessert, taking her time smoothing out the top of it. "Did I not tell you?" she said at last, bending down to put it in the oven. "Jess is coming too."