Sugar and Spice
By Misha

Disclaimer and Notes in Part One.

Chapter Thirty-Four: A Day With Emily

"Is Emily here yet?" Christa asked, when she arrived in Stars Hollow the next day.

"No." Rory told her. "She should be here soon."

Christa nodded. There had been something tempting about the idea of seeing Emily in Stars Hollow, so she'd decided to tag along. Just then, Emily's car pulled up in the driveway.

"Grandma." Rory and Christa greeted at the same time.

"Rory, Christa, hello. What a lovely day to..." Emily began, then her heel got caught in the grass. "Ugh. I guess putting in a walkway never occurred to your mother."

"Oh, actually it occurs to her every day on the way to work." Rory said with a grin.

"Here." Christa said, helping to pull Emily's heel out of the grass.

"Thank you." Emily told her.

Christa thought this might be the nicest exchange she and Emily had ever had. The three of them started walked towards the house.

"Are your shoes okay?" Rory asked as they got inside.

"They're fine." Emily told her. "Just a little muddy, that's all."

Christa waited for another comment about Lorelai's negligence, but before that could happen, Rory reached out for the shoes. "Here, give 'em. I'll clean them for you." She volunteered, holding out her hand for the shoes.

"Oh, you don't have to do that." Emily protested, even as she handed the shoes over.

Rory took the shoes into the kitchen, leaving Christa and Emily to trail her. "Mom found this great shoe clearer." Rory explained. "It gets out pretty much anything."

"It's true." Christa volunteered. "She's cleaned my boots several times."

"Do I want to even want to know what you do to them?" Emily asked.

Christa just smiled. Usually it was horse related. Christa was passionate about horses and while the transient nature of her father's lifestyle didn't allow her to own one, a lot of her friends often did and she went riding as often as she could. Juliet one of the girls in Colin and Logan's circle, had horses and she'd invited Christa to go riding wit her.

"Do you want something to drink?" Rory asked. "There should be some iced tea in the fridge."

"Iced tea would be nice." Emily said with a smile. She went to the fridge and opened it. "Oh my God! There's nothing in here."

"I know, it's a little sparse." Rory said, as she cleaned Emily's shoes.

"It's the Grapes of Wrath!" Emily exclaimed.

"Don't worry." Rory assured her. "We eat fine."

Christa chuckled. Somehow, she didn't think Emily would feel better if she knew how Rory and Lorelai usually ate: by living off take-out for days.

"No food, no drink." Emily muttered shaking her head. "Do you at least have plates?"

"Yes, we have plates." Rory said patiently.

Emily went to the cupboard and pulled out a plate, then she frowned. "There are women in bikinis on them."

"The original Charlie's Angels." Rory said enthusiastically. "It took us years to get a complete set. You can find the Kate Jackson's and the Shelly Hack's pretty easily. Even the Cheryl Ladd's. But the Farrah Fawcett's and the Jacklyn Smith's are a little harder to come by, but still accessible. The real trick however is to find the Tanya Roberts. We have three."

Christa smiled to herself, this was exactly why she had volunteered to come along, this was too entertaining to be missed.

"You have three Tanya Roberts?" EMily repeated.

"Yup." Rory confirmed.

"And I was worried, silly me." Emily said, putting the plate away. "How are you doing with those shoes?"

"All done." Rory said, handing the shoes back.

"That's amazing." Emily said, inspecting them. "What is it that you used?"

"I don't know." Rory told her. "We got it off one of those late night TV ads. Apparently it also gets rust off nails and hinges, waxes your car perfectly, and weatherproofs windows and doors."

"Well, isn't that nice." Emily said in a polite tone.

"Okay, about today." Rory said after a minute. "I think I should just give you the grand tour of the town. So we can start by walking to Kim's Antiques, which takes us by all the good sites."

Christa saw that their grandmother didn't exactly look enthusiastic about that idea.

"Well, uh, Rory, I don't think I wore the right shoes for the grand tour." Emily protested, which Christa thought might be the closest she'd ever come to refusing Rory anything. "Why don't we just drive?"

"Come on Grandma, it'll be fun!" Christa said, jumping in to help her sister out.

"Yeah, you can borrow a pair of Mom's shoes." Rory volunteered eagerly.

Christa had to surpass a giggle at the idea of Emily wearing anything in Lorelai's shoe collection.

"Uh, no, I don't think so." Emily told her, but it was too late Rory was already walking up the stairs. "Rory, hold on a minute!"

"Grandma, you will be missing the true Stars Hollow experience if you don't walk." Rory told her. "Trust me."

Christa followed her sister up the stairs, wanting to help pick the shoes that Emily would have to wear.

She heard her grandmother sigh warily. "All right, but I won't wear anything with rhinestones or zebra stripes or anything that has batteries or that sings or make animal noises or moves on its own." She called up the stairs.

"I've got it." Rory assured her as she continued heading up the stairs, Christa on her heels.

"Can I pick?" Christa begged.

Rory sent her a look. "No."

Christa pouted. "You're no fun."

"And you're mean." Rory replied.

Christa just shrugged and trailed her twin into their mother's room. Oh, well, even if she couldn't pick, it would still be amusing...

Rory let Emily and Christa into the Independence Inn. The morning had been successful. Emily had bought a few items and she and Mrs. Kim had hit it off, watching them had been better than TV in Rory's opinion.

After that, they'd continued to walk around Stars Hollow. Rory had even gotten her grandmother into a pair of sneakers. Also, Christa was being good, for her at least, not doing anything to deliberately provoke their grandmother.

"So what do you think?" Rory asked, referring to the Inn.

"Well, I think it's very nice." Emily told he, looking around.

"Mom's office is right back there." Rory told her, motioning. "Oh, and you have to see the dining room. They got the chandeliers from one of Martha Washington's houses."

"Do you a spend a lot of time here?" Emily inquired.

"Yeah." Rory told her. "I work here a couple afternoons a week, and I help out with special occasions. They have a lot of weddings here."

"I help out sometimes, when I'm around." Christa spoke up. "Mostly with weddings and stuff."

Emily nodded.

"I wonder where Mom is?" Rory wondered out loud, looking around.

"Oh, don't bother your mother." Emily told her. "I'm sure she's busy."

"Oh, no she'd want to say hi." Rory assured her, though she wasn't actually sure that true. Well, it was too bad, Emily was in Stars Hollow and Lorelai had to at least say hi.

Rory lead Emily and Christa to the front desk, where Michel was. "Michel, where's Mom?" She asked.

"Off with her boyfriend." He told her grumpily.

"Boyfriend?" Christa asked. "What boyfriend?"

"Small, dark, wanted in four states." Michel told them.

Christa and Rory exchanged looks, what in the world was he talking about?

"Okay, well do you when she's coming back?" Rory asked. "Because our grandmother's here and we wanted to say hi."

"Your grandmother?" Michel said with interest, looking over at Emily.

"Emily Gilmore." Emily introduced.

"Michel Gerard." The two of them shook hands and then began to speak in French.

"Okay, well, we better go find Mom." Rory said after a moment, putting her hand on Emily's arm.

"It's been a pleasure meeting you." Emily told Michel with a smile.

"The pleasure is all mine." Michel told her, returning her smile.

Christa and Rory exchanged looks.

"Was that Michel?" Christa whispered to Rory. "Or did he get taken over by aliens?"

Rory repressed a laugh, she'd been wondering the same thing.

"What a charming man." Emily exclaimed.

"Um, okay." Rory muttered, then smiled when she caught sight of Lorelai. "Mom!"

Lorelai turned in their direction. "Hey." Lorelai greeted, then turned to Emily. "Mom, hi."

"Lorelai, it's quite a nice place you've got here." Emily complimented.

"Oh, well it's not really my place." Lorelai told her. "I just work here, so... I thought you were gonna go antiquing?"

"Yeah, we did." Rory told her. "And then we had lunch."

"Oh, really? Where?" Lorelai asked.

"Teriyaki Joe's." Emily said cheerfully.

"You're kidding." Lorelai said in obvious disbelief.

"She picked." Christa said with a grin.

"It looked festive." Emily told her.

"I can't picture you at Teriyaki Joe's..." Lorelai said, shaking her head. She looked down at Emily's feet. "Or in jogging shoes, for that matter. What's up working girl?"

"Well, Rory decided that we should take the grand tour of town, that meant walking." Emily explained. "I hope you don't mind, I borrowed your socks also."

"I don't mind." Lorelai assured her. "I wish I had a camera, but I don't mind."

"I'm gonna go show her the grounds." Rory told her mother.

"Ok." Lorelai said.

"Bye." Rory said, before leading her grandmother and Christa away.

For the next few minutes, she showed Emily all over the grounds, and then lead her towards her favorite place, the potting shed. She'd really enjoyed the day, showing her grandmother all around her home, and she wanted to show Emily the first home she could remember.

"And this is my favorite place." She announced.

"The tool shed?" Emily asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No." Rory told her with a smile. "This is where we used to live."

"What?" Emily asked in disbelief.

"When Mom and I moved here, this was our apartment." Rory explained with a smile.

"But..." Emily began, looking startled.

Rory opened the door and walked in, lost in the memories. Emily stayed by the door, Christa at her side.

"I know it looks small, but it's really pretty." Rory told her. "Come on. See we had our bed right over there, and mom put up this really pretty curtain around the tub so that it looked like a real bathroom. And we would just sit outside at night when the Inn would have parties and we'd just listen to music and feed the ducks and..."

She trailed off as Emily walked away. "Grandma? Grandma, wait, what's the matter?"

"Nothing." Emily told her and then turned to Christa. "What about you? Did you ever live in a potting shed?"

Christa looked taken aback. "Um... No." She said. "I did live in a few basements and above a garage once, but no potting sheds."

Emily didn't look pleased, in fact, if possible, she looked more upset. "I need to go." Emily told them and then walked away, leaving the twins staring after her.

"What was that?" Christa murmured to Rory.

Rory shrugged. "I have no idea." She'd thought the day had been going well...