"You had dinner with Francine?!" Lorelai's mouth dropped open as she stared at her daughter questioningly. "Here?" she continued, standing in Rory's kitchen, still in disbelief.
"Yes," she replied, handing her a cup of coffee, hoping she would relent once the liquid poured down her throat.
"Dad said she had asked and I was going to invite him over for dinner anyways so they all came, GG too," Rory added.
"What did she want?" Lorelai asked, defensively.
"Well I guess a chance to know me, the baby," she replied carefully.
"The woman has some nerve!" Lorelai huffed.
"I told her it was fine," she replied.
"You what? Did you get abducted by aliens or something? Should I call Mulder and Scully?" she blabbed.
"She apologized and told me those things that happened were mostly Straub, she was just too passive back then to speak her mind. And I sort of believe her," she replied.
"And you forgave just like that?" Lorelai asked.
"The Huntzbergers have been far worse than the Haydens to me, I just don't think it would be fair to tolerate them and completely ignore Francing just because of something her husband said more than 15 years ago," Rory explained. "And frankly I don't want to start my son's life off with a complex family setting if it doesn't have to be that way," she added.
"So now it's my fault?" Lorelai overreacted.
"Mom, that's not what I mean and you know it," she argued.
"Fine," she muttered, clearly still not fine.
"Mom, I didn't do this to hurt you, things with the Haydens sucked, he said nasty things, behaved horribly, but what's the point of holding a grudge, especially when she's the one who reached out. Besides it's not like I am shipping off my newborn to live with her or something. I might visit or have her visit on occasion. That's all," Rory clarified. Maybe it was her way to nest, to find a comfortable surrounding, not just the physical, for her unborn child?
"So what you are saying is that you want to make an algorithm that can filter out fake news?" Logan asked, summing up her much more complex pitch, raising his eyebrow. This was way advanced even for him, but he had no trouble imagining what something like this would mean to the field.
"That's right, and most importantly I want it to be a self-learning algorithm," she stated. "Ideally I want it to work with all available news resources but I admit that maybe as a thesis I might have to stick to a smaller sample," Zoe added, almost modestly. She'd walked into Logan's office in a short black high neck dress, a biker jacket thrown over it, and knee-high combat boots twenty minutes earlier, oozing confidence. Logan observed her with curiosity during the entire pitch. Sure she was pleasant to the eye, Finn would've adored her, but what Logan really wanted to know was whether she actually could do what she had just suggested. If she did, that'd be something else altogether. This would be beyond just any Yale graduate thesis. This would be groundbreaking.
"But why me? I'm mostly a marketer, sure I have some experience in digital technologies, social media, but this sounds like something for the mathematics department," he asked.
"Because I don't want it to just collect dust at some professor's shelf after I am done," Zoe replied.
"So you want to market it? I am sure you are aware that I am currently working here, and even that not very permanently. It's not exactly the release platform this would require," he added.
"I don't want to sell it per se, but I do want to build something bigger from it. I am not that good with the business side of this frankly, and well, I know you by reputation - it seemed like a good opportunity to work on this with someone who knows that side," she added, a little more humbly.
"But wouldn't you need another supervisor who's good with the maths side of this?" he asked.
"Oh, I've worked with this type of thing before, I've just never combined it with the linguistics and news aspect of this. I already have some code written and I just could use access to some news databases, to start testing this. I thought this would be something you could help me with," Zoe explained.
"Alright. I'll get you access," he agreed. "But you really should go ahead and tell Prof. Meyer they should make your defence a closed one. I'd also recommend you speak to a patent lawyer at some point. But for now just keep your work backed up safely," he said.
"Thank you," a wide smile lit her face up.
As she left, he noticed the way his colleagues looked at her. For once he was glad his office had glass walls, to avoid any irrelevant gossip. Brushing that thought aside, he opened several search browsers, both academic and regular, and spent the afternoon reading and learning as if it was his thesis in question.
"Where are we going exactly?" Rory inquired, heading out with Logan a long overdue date night. They'd been so busy with work recently, time seemed to be getting away from them. She'd dressed up, wearing a sitted sheath dress with lace sleeves. It made her feel a little special too.
"You should know by now that if I don't tell you, it means that it's a surprise," Logan replied with a smug smirk. "Did you finish the chapter you were struggling with?" he asked, trying to take Rory's mind off his plans.
"I did, two actually. Just a few more to go now. Oh and the Brick started with the promotional activities. I have an author page on Facebook and everything now," she commented, feeling mildly proud of this minor achievement.
"So what else do they have planned before you go on maternity leave?" he inquired.
"They want to film a series of teaser videos of me speaking about the book, so they can spread out the posts, keep the interest up, while I am out of the picture," she added.
"That's good," he commented.
"Did you ever finish grading those papers?" she inquired, having seen him pick up the pile several times, yet it seemed that the pile at the corner of his desk at home was not getting any smaller.
"Barely started, it's like everything else keeps taking priority. I still have a week to get to them, I'll do it, even if it means a sleepless night. But I never quite expected teaching to take so much of my time, you know," he said.
"Hate to say it, but I told you so," Rory laughed.
"You did, didn't you," he smiled smugly as they pulled up next to an Inn in Essex. Rory had hear mother speak of this place. One of their main competitors, but rightfully so. The place was thematically 19th century, sticking to much of the original furniture and decor in the dining hall.
"Like a trip back in time, isn't this," she commented as they stepped through the doors.
"Well, I thought we'd do something different," he said, leading her to their table, hand at the small of her back.
"It certainly is that," she noted, taking a seat by the window.
"Hey, what ever happened with that student of yours, did you decide on supervising or not?" Rory inquired while she was browsing the menu a few minutes later.
"I am, the topic is just too huge to miss out. I think she actually might want to turn this into a business, and well I'll wait for her to finish of course and get her patent sorted, but I might want to invest in it actually," Logan explained.
"I didn't know patents were commonly involved in the Yale journalism scene," she commented curiously.
"Well they aren't. She's got a background from MIT, apparently has most of the code written already, I just gave her access to the major news databases. Apparently she thinks she can build a self-learning algorithm that can filter out what can be trusted and what not," he explained.
"Sounds difficult, and like something that would again be taking the jobs of common reporters," Rory noted a little bitterly.
"You know what the field is like, Ace," he replied. "The field needs to keep up. If we can't sell the news, that's already floating around for free, we can sell the software to help people evaluate or sort out what can and can't be trusted in the midst of the overflow of news," he added.
"You've really thought about this, haven you?" Rory continued.
"I have, I'll have to wait and see what she figures out, but it certainly sounds promising," he said.
"Do you miss HPG?" she asked a few minutes later.
"The influence, maybe, the work, not really," he replied. As he said that his phone rang.
"Shira," he said to Rory, as he saw the name flash on the screen. "I'm sorry, I better take this," he added. It wasn't really like her mother to call him for chit-chat.
AN: So what do you think Shira is calling about?