A/N : Some people think Luke in leather is disgusting. To quote Lane – you're just close-minded and blind. :) Anyways, back to my story….
SIX: THE LAMB IS HAPPY, LORELAI IS NOT
*ding dong*
Lorelai pressed the doorbell and waited. When nobody came, she pressed it again.
*ding dong*
She was getting more anxious as the seconds rolled by. Where was her mother? Was she so angry that she wasn't even going to answer the door? What happened to her maids? Where was everybody? Maybe the doorbell was broken, and she had to press it harder…
*ding dong* *ding dong* *ding dong* *ding dong*
"Oh for heaven's sake!" The door flung open and there stood Emily, looking annoyed. Her expression immediately changed to that of curiosity when she noticed Lorelai was there. "Lorelai?"
"Hi, mom!"
"What are you doing here? Is something wrong?"
"What?"
"Why are you here? It's not Friday night. Is there a problem? Do you need money?"
"I am insulted," said Lorelai, walking past her mother and into the house. "Do you honestly think that the only reason I come here is for Friday night dinner and for money? If you recall, I was here last Saturday for no apparent reason as well."
"You left your phone here on Friday so you came to pick it up."
"Oh, that was just a happy coincidence," Lorelai said. "So, mom, what's up with you?"
"What do you mean? You never ask me that." Emily looked at her suspiciously.
"I mean, what's up with you? What's new? Anything interesting happened lately? Heard any good news? Received any strange phone calls?" Lorelai stressed the last few words for emphasis.
"Honestly, Lorelai, I have no idea what has gotten into you," Emily said. "I swear, you grow stranger and stranger each day. What do you want?"
"I just came by to chat, that's all," said Lorelai. "I was watching 'Tumbleweeds' yesterday, and I thought 'wouldn't it be cool if my mom and I were that close'? So here I am."
"You're being very odd."
Lorelai was about to say something when the maid entered. "Oh, I'm so sorry, ma'am, I was upstairs cleaning and I didn't hear the doorbell."
"That's perfectly fine," Emily replied curtly. "Although next time I hope it's not expected for me to drop everything I'm doing just to answer the door."
"Yes, ma'am," the maid replied apologetically. "Oh, yes, ma'am, I forgot. While you were out, a woman called to ask you ab…"
"I'm getting MARRIED!" Lorelai screamed suddenly, cutting the maid off.
"What?" Emily looked at Lorelai.
"I'm getting married! That's why I came over," said Lorelai. "To tell you. That I'm getting married. Woo."
"Lorelai, please stop being ridiculous," said Emily. She turned back to the maid. "You were saying …"
"Look at my ring," Lorelai put her hand in front of her mother's face. "I'm serious."
"Lorelai, it's not polite to shove one's hand in front of somebody when they're talking, and I would appreciate it if in the future you would – oh my God, " Emily stopped and took a hold of Lorelai's hand, her eyes scanning the ring. "This is a lovely ring. Where did you get it?"
"I pillaged it from the corpse of a dead hooker," Lorelai deadpanned. "What do you mean, where did I get it from? I told you, I'm engaged."
"You're engaged." Emily repeated the words skeptically. She turned to the maid and with one quick motion of her hand, ordered her to leave the room. The maid nodded and left. "Just like that. And do I get to know to whom you're engaged to, or will I have to play charades to guess the answer?"
"Luke."
"Who's Luke?"
"Luke Danes. You know him, mom. He owns the diner."
"Luke's? That Luke?"
"Would you have preferred I married another Luke?"
"When were you dating Luke?"
"Erm, well…"
"Is this a joke?" Emily put her hands on her hip. "Because frankly, Lorelai, I have more important things to do."
"I'm not joking," said Lorelai. "The minute he proposed I rushed home and told Rory, and then I rushed over here to tell you because I wanted you to be one of the first ones to know."
"Your consideration is overwhelming," Emily replied sarcastically. "So what you're telling me is, I'm one of the first people to know you're going to get married to a man you didn't even consider good enough for you to tell me you were seeing."
"I might have to break that sentence into several smaller fragments, because I have no idea what you just said."
"I don't get to know who you're dating, but I get to know when you're getting married. Now, just so I'm clear on the procedure - if you have children with this man, will I be informed during the pregnancy, or will there be a three year waiting period?"
"Mom, you're taking everything out of context."
"I want to meet him."
"Who?"
"Luke. I want to meet this man who swept you off your feet so fast you forgot to tell your mother."
"I did tell you …"
"Bring him to this week's Friday night dinner."
"But I…"
"If you're going to marry him and if he's going to be a part of yours and Rory's life now, I think I deserve the right to meet this man. Unless of course, you don't want me to. That's perfectly fine as well. I can meet him for the first time at the wedding. Unless I'm not invited, which would hardly come as a surprise, but then again I'll probably bump into him at a relative's funeral or something. We'll definitely get a chance to talk when the coffin is being lowered into the ground."
"Friday night dinner is fine," Lorelai sighed.
"Good," Emily smiled. "Is he vegetarian? If he's vegetarian I'll tell Lucy to make something special for him."
"No, he's not a vegetarian. He doesn't eat red meat, though, so you might want to avoid that. He calls it 'The Red Death'. Well, okay, he doesn't really, I just thought that would be an interesting anecdote."
"Who on earth doesn't eat red meat?"
"Erm. Luke?"
"That's just ridiculous. If he can eat white meat he can certainly eat red meat. Who has ever heard of a person who eats one but not the other?"
"I have," said Lorelai. "He's called Luke."
"Fine. I'll tell Lucy to scrape red meat from the menu," Emily said, "Which really is a shame. She makes the best lamb roast."
"Well, I'm as disappointed as you are, but I'm sure there's a lamb out there jumping for joy," said Lorelai.
"What?"
"I'll be going now, now that I've shared the good news with you," said Lorelai, void of nearly all expression.
"All right. I'll see you on Friday, then."
"See you Friday."
*
"Luke!" Lorelai pushed the diner door open and marched inside. She scanned around, but couldn't find him. She spotted Jess cleaning the counter, and walked up to him. "Jess, where's your uncle?"
"You mean your fiancé? Yup, I heard the good news. Congratulations on that, by the way," Jess answered with the usual smirk plastered on his face.
"Where is he? I need to talk to him about something."
"China patterns?"
"Consider yourself lucky that the law prohibits me from going all American Psycho on your scrawny teenage self," said Lorelai. "Point in his general direction, please."
Jess pointed towards the stairs behind him and continued wiping the counter.
Lorelai walked upstairs and entered Luke's apartment, where she found him leaning over the desk, flipping through one of his ledgers. He turned around when he heard the door open. "You know, there's a common practice amongst civilized people I like to call 'knocking before entering'."
"I'm not civilized," said Lorelai. "And now that we're engaged you're going to have to accept me for who I am. You can't change me."
"Yeah, yeah."
"You should also know I don't cook or clean."
"I thought that was a given," Luke replied quickly. "What brings you here, among the civilized?"
"Just to tell you that on Friday night, you'll be hurled into a world of darkness and despair."
"You're not going to make me watch 'The Hours', are you?"
"No, something much worse. You're coming to Friday night dinner with me."
Luke paused. "Why?"
"Because my mother said so. Her word is law."
"Why does your mother want me there?"
"Because we're engaged."
"You told your mother?!"
"Well," said Lorelai. "It was either that, or let her find out through Babette, who, by the way, I'm going to take out with a sawed off shotgun one of these days if she's not too careful. Which also brings me to a very important question : where does one get a sawed off shotgun, and does it come pre-sawed, or do you have to saw it off yourself?"
"Not answering that question. Did you tell her why we're getting married?"
Lorelai laughed. "Haha! That would be like rolling yourself in barbecue sauce and running through Jurassic Park. Are you crazy? She'll carve me up like Thanksgiving turkey."
"So I have to come to dinner of Friday night."
"Yes. And you can't wear flannel."
"Says who?"
"No one," said Lorelai, "But it's for your own good. She's like a bull … flannel would just enrage her."
"Bulls aren't enraged by flannel."
"Well this is a very special bull. Last week she gored a maid for wearing polyester." said Lorelai. "And ditch the baseball cap. Wearing it, backwards no less, is very much kamikaze like."
"So basically, I will be going there dressed as someone other than myself."
"Yes, that would be the case."
"And the bottom line is, you think your mother won't like me for who I am."
"I never said that," said Lorelai. "It's just that my mother can be very judgmental… and if you're dressed for success, then well, it'll cut down the judging time. And don't get me wrong, you'll still get judged, hey, look at me, I'm a fabulous dresser and I still get shot down like a soldier trapped on enemy territory."
"Ah."
"And," Lorelai continued. "I'm not sure what our story is, but we definitely can't say that we're getting married so you can keep the diner. I'll go home and watch some Sandra Bullock movies to get some inspiration. Now, I'm partial to the idea of you getting mugged at a train station and me saving you, but I'm not sure if she'll buy it."
"You sure? It sounds like a fool-proof story to me," Luke said sarcastically.
"Well, you don't worry too much about it," said Lorelai, "I'll think of our story. You just show up and look pretty. Ooh, maybe we can go shopping afterwards for 'meet the parents' wear."
"No, thank you," said Luke. "You might not believe it, but I think I actually have something other than flannel in my closet."
"I don't think mom will think highly of you if you show up in a Star Trek T-Shirt."
"You know, Lorelai, if you don't want to go through with this, you don't have to marry me. I'll find some other way to keep the diner," Luke said, suddenly serious. "I wouldn't want things between you and your mom …"
"It's fine. I told you, don't worry about it. We've been over this – this is possibly the only real way to guarantee you keeping the diner, and let's face it – things between my mom and I has never really been smooth in the first place… so what am I risking, really?"
"Are you sure?"
"Gosh, for the hundredth time, yes! You know, you are really insecure. You should sign up for one of those programs with the twelve steps that teach you to hug yourself everyday."
"I'll do that right after I check you into a mental hospital," said Luke.
"Good," said Lorelai. "So, you know, I figured, you could swing by my house on Friday and drive us to Hartford. Ah, when they see their daughter and her fiancé roll up the driveway in a pickup truck, they will know that they have done a good job raising me."
"Are you making fun of my truck?"
"Aw, you know I wasn't. Don't be so sensitive," Lorelai poked him playfully. "So I'll see you on Friday, then, okay?"
"Okay."
Lorelai headed towards the door. "Oh yeah, also, I'm not sure about this but I think Rory might want you to take her tobogganing."
"What?"
"I'll see you Friday, Luke."
* to be continued *
NEXT:
Only one of these is true:
a) Emily builds a snowman.
b) Sookie gives birth to quadruplets, and names them all John.
c) Friday night fun at the Gilmore household!
d) Norah Jones shows up and wins a few more awards.
SIX: THE LAMB IS HAPPY, LORELAI IS NOT
*ding dong*
Lorelai pressed the doorbell and waited. When nobody came, she pressed it again.
*ding dong*
She was getting more anxious as the seconds rolled by. Where was her mother? Was she so angry that she wasn't even going to answer the door? What happened to her maids? Where was everybody? Maybe the doorbell was broken, and she had to press it harder…
*ding dong* *ding dong* *ding dong* *ding dong*
"Oh for heaven's sake!" The door flung open and there stood Emily, looking annoyed. Her expression immediately changed to that of curiosity when she noticed Lorelai was there. "Lorelai?"
"Hi, mom!"
"What are you doing here? Is something wrong?"
"What?"
"Why are you here? It's not Friday night. Is there a problem? Do you need money?"
"I am insulted," said Lorelai, walking past her mother and into the house. "Do you honestly think that the only reason I come here is for Friday night dinner and for money? If you recall, I was here last Saturday for no apparent reason as well."
"You left your phone here on Friday so you came to pick it up."
"Oh, that was just a happy coincidence," Lorelai said. "So, mom, what's up with you?"
"What do you mean? You never ask me that." Emily looked at her suspiciously.
"I mean, what's up with you? What's new? Anything interesting happened lately? Heard any good news? Received any strange phone calls?" Lorelai stressed the last few words for emphasis.
"Honestly, Lorelai, I have no idea what has gotten into you," Emily said. "I swear, you grow stranger and stranger each day. What do you want?"
"I just came by to chat, that's all," said Lorelai. "I was watching 'Tumbleweeds' yesterday, and I thought 'wouldn't it be cool if my mom and I were that close'? So here I am."
"You're being very odd."
Lorelai was about to say something when the maid entered. "Oh, I'm so sorry, ma'am, I was upstairs cleaning and I didn't hear the doorbell."
"That's perfectly fine," Emily replied curtly. "Although next time I hope it's not expected for me to drop everything I'm doing just to answer the door."
"Yes, ma'am," the maid replied apologetically. "Oh, yes, ma'am, I forgot. While you were out, a woman called to ask you ab…"
"I'm getting MARRIED!" Lorelai screamed suddenly, cutting the maid off.
"What?" Emily looked at Lorelai.
"I'm getting married! That's why I came over," said Lorelai. "To tell you. That I'm getting married. Woo."
"Lorelai, please stop being ridiculous," said Emily. She turned back to the maid. "You were saying …"
"Look at my ring," Lorelai put her hand in front of her mother's face. "I'm serious."
"Lorelai, it's not polite to shove one's hand in front of somebody when they're talking, and I would appreciate it if in the future you would – oh my God, " Emily stopped and took a hold of Lorelai's hand, her eyes scanning the ring. "This is a lovely ring. Where did you get it?"
"I pillaged it from the corpse of a dead hooker," Lorelai deadpanned. "What do you mean, where did I get it from? I told you, I'm engaged."
"You're engaged." Emily repeated the words skeptically. She turned to the maid and with one quick motion of her hand, ordered her to leave the room. The maid nodded and left. "Just like that. And do I get to know to whom you're engaged to, or will I have to play charades to guess the answer?"
"Luke."
"Who's Luke?"
"Luke Danes. You know him, mom. He owns the diner."
"Luke's? That Luke?"
"Would you have preferred I married another Luke?"
"When were you dating Luke?"
"Erm, well…"
"Is this a joke?" Emily put her hands on her hip. "Because frankly, Lorelai, I have more important things to do."
"I'm not joking," said Lorelai. "The minute he proposed I rushed home and told Rory, and then I rushed over here to tell you because I wanted you to be one of the first ones to know."
"Your consideration is overwhelming," Emily replied sarcastically. "So what you're telling me is, I'm one of the first people to know you're going to get married to a man you didn't even consider good enough for you to tell me you were seeing."
"I might have to break that sentence into several smaller fragments, because I have no idea what you just said."
"I don't get to know who you're dating, but I get to know when you're getting married. Now, just so I'm clear on the procedure - if you have children with this man, will I be informed during the pregnancy, or will there be a three year waiting period?"
"Mom, you're taking everything out of context."
"I want to meet him."
"Who?"
"Luke. I want to meet this man who swept you off your feet so fast you forgot to tell your mother."
"I did tell you …"
"Bring him to this week's Friday night dinner."
"But I…"
"If you're going to marry him and if he's going to be a part of yours and Rory's life now, I think I deserve the right to meet this man. Unless of course, you don't want me to. That's perfectly fine as well. I can meet him for the first time at the wedding. Unless I'm not invited, which would hardly come as a surprise, but then again I'll probably bump into him at a relative's funeral or something. We'll definitely get a chance to talk when the coffin is being lowered into the ground."
"Friday night dinner is fine," Lorelai sighed.
"Good," Emily smiled. "Is he vegetarian? If he's vegetarian I'll tell Lucy to make something special for him."
"No, he's not a vegetarian. He doesn't eat red meat, though, so you might want to avoid that. He calls it 'The Red Death'. Well, okay, he doesn't really, I just thought that would be an interesting anecdote."
"Who on earth doesn't eat red meat?"
"Erm. Luke?"
"That's just ridiculous. If he can eat white meat he can certainly eat red meat. Who has ever heard of a person who eats one but not the other?"
"I have," said Lorelai. "He's called Luke."
"Fine. I'll tell Lucy to scrape red meat from the menu," Emily said, "Which really is a shame. She makes the best lamb roast."
"Well, I'm as disappointed as you are, but I'm sure there's a lamb out there jumping for joy," said Lorelai.
"What?"
"I'll be going now, now that I've shared the good news with you," said Lorelai, void of nearly all expression.
"All right. I'll see you on Friday, then."
"See you Friday."
*
"Luke!" Lorelai pushed the diner door open and marched inside. She scanned around, but couldn't find him. She spotted Jess cleaning the counter, and walked up to him. "Jess, where's your uncle?"
"You mean your fiancé? Yup, I heard the good news. Congratulations on that, by the way," Jess answered with the usual smirk plastered on his face.
"Where is he? I need to talk to him about something."
"China patterns?"
"Consider yourself lucky that the law prohibits me from going all American Psycho on your scrawny teenage self," said Lorelai. "Point in his general direction, please."
Jess pointed towards the stairs behind him and continued wiping the counter.
Lorelai walked upstairs and entered Luke's apartment, where she found him leaning over the desk, flipping through one of his ledgers. He turned around when he heard the door open. "You know, there's a common practice amongst civilized people I like to call 'knocking before entering'."
"I'm not civilized," said Lorelai. "And now that we're engaged you're going to have to accept me for who I am. You can't change me."
"Yeah, yeah."
"You should also know I don't cook or clean."
"I thought that was a given," Luke replied quickly. "What brings you here, among the civilized?"
"Just to tell you that on Friday night, you'll be hurled into a world of darkness and despair."
"You're not going to make me watch 'The Hours', are you?"
"No, something much worse. You're coming to Friday night dinner with me."
Luke paused. "Why?"
"Because my mother said so. Her word is law."
"Why does your mother want me there?"
"Because we're engaged."
"You told your mother?!"
"Well," said Lorelai. "It was either that, or let her find out through Babette, who, by the way, I'm going to take out with a sawed off shotgun one of these days if she's not too careful. Which also brings me to a very important question : where does one get a sawed off shotgun, and does it come pre-sawed, or do you have to saw it off yourself?"
"Not answering that question. Did you tell her why we're getting married?"
Lorelai laughed. "Haha! That would be like rolling yourself in barbecue sauce and running through Jurassic Park. Are you crazy? She'll carve me up like Thanksgiving turkey."
"So I have to come to dinner of Friday night."
"Yes. And you can't wear flannel."
"Says who?"
"No one," said Lorelai, "But it's for your own good. She's like a bull … flannel would just enrage her."
"Bulls aren't enraged by flannel."
"Well this is a very special bull. Last week she gored a maid for wearing polyester." said Lorelai. "And ditch the baseball cap. Wearing it, backwards no less, is very much kamikaze like."
"So basically, I will be going there dressed as someone other than myself."
"Yes, that would be the case."
"And the bottom line is, you think your mother won't like me for who I am."
"I never said that," said Lorelai. "It's just that my mother can be very judgmental… and if you're dressed for success, then well, it'll cut down the judging time. And don't get me wrong, you'll still get judged, hey, look at me, I'm a fabulous dresser and I still get shot down like a soldier trapped on enemy territory."
"Ah."
"And," Lorelai continued. "I'm not sure what our story is, but we definitely can't say that we're getting married so you can keep the diner. I'll go home and watch some Sandra Bullock movies to get some inspiration. Now, I'm partial to the idea of you getting mugged at a train station and me saving you, but I'm not sure if she'll buy it."
"You sure? It sounds like a fool-proof story to me," Luke said sarcastically.
"Well, you don't worry too much about it," said Lorelai, "I'll think of our story. You just show up and look pretty. Ooh, maybe we can go shopping afterwards for 'meet the parents' wear."
"No, thank you," said Luke. "You might not believe it, but I think I actually have something other than flannel in my closet."
"I don't think mom will think highly of you if you show up in a Star Trek T-Shirt."
"You know, Lorelai, if you don't want to go through with this, you don't have to marry me. I'll find some other way to keep the diner," Luke said, suddenly serious. "I wouldn't want things between you and your mom …"
"It's fine. I told you, don't worry about it. We've been over this – this is possibly the only real way to guarantee you keeping the diner, and let's face it – things between my mom and I has never really been smooth in the first place… so what am I risking, really?"
"Are you sure?"
"Gosh, for the hundredth time, yes! You know, you are really insecure. You should sign up for one of those programs with the twelve steps that teach you to hug yourself everyday."
"I'll do that right after I check you into a mental hospital," said Luke.
"Good," said Lorelai. "So, you know, I figured, you could swing by my house on Friday and drive us to Hartford. Ah, when they see their daughter and her fiancé roll up the driveway in a pickup truck, they will know that they have done a good job raising me."
"Are you making fun of my truck?"
"Aw, you know I wasn't. Don't be so sensitive," Lorelai poked him playfully. "So I'll see you on Friday, then, okay?"
"Okay."
Lorelai headed towards the door. "Oh yeah, also, I'm not sure about this but I think Rory might want you to take her tobogganing."
"What?"
"I'll see you Friday, Luke."
* to be continued *
NEXT:
Only one of these is true:
a) Emily builds a snowman.
b) Sookie gives birth to quadruplets, and names them all John.
c) Friday night fun at the Gilmore household!
d) Norah Jones shows up and wins a few more awards.
