Going for coffee the next morning had definitely been a bad idea, but, given the choice between coffee and no coffee, Lorelai always chose coffee.

Luke was disturbingly Luke. She ordered, he grunted, she teased, he responded.

She knocked over a chair. He wasn't so amused at that.

She made it through the door and back to the Dragonfly half-awake and without any major mishaps, and it wasn't until nearly nine that the ache began to gnaw at her again, under her sternum and behind her eyes.

She picked up the phone to call Rory.

She couldn't reach Rory when she arrived in Washington. She'd packed her up that morning with the best luggage and her favorite clothes out of both closets and said goodbye to her at the airport, after tucking the cell phone into her pocket and making her swear to call the minute she landed at Dulles.

Rory didn't call.

An hour went by, and two hours, and by the two-and-a-half hour mark Lorelai was scanning the channels for reports of bizarre phone outages in the capital and praising the cable gods that the Extra Movie Plus package included CNN.

And MSNBC.

And Fox News.

This was what motherhood had done to her. She was watching Fox News on a Saturday waiting to hear about the terrible no-phone conditions which were surely covering half the Eastern seaboard.

Rory called fifteen minutes later, rushed and out of breath and apologetic. She said she forgot to turn off her phone on the plane, in blatant disregard of FAA rules, and when she arrived in Washington, it was dead. She was rushed to a cab and to the dorm, and then out of the dorm because Paris needed to ensure that they located the nearest Metro stop and checked the accuracy of her downloaded copies of the Metro maps before any activities started, so they could be certain to make it there on time. And by the time she finally located a payphone and scraped together the change for a long-distance call, Lorelai was on her fifth minute of hell with Brit Hume.

She remembered Rory being away, alone, out of touch.

She didn't remember it being this hard.

She walked by the front desk, stopped, turned, and walked by again. Michel was standing there, holding the phone, in tears.

"Michel? You okay there?"

Michel held up a hand to shush her as he finished his call, then turned toward her slowly, with an air of great importance.

"I," he announced, "am going to become a grandfather."

"Um, don't you need to give that whole 'father' thing a spin first?"

Michel was undeterred. "Chin-chin is pregnant!"

"Well, that's very nice Michel, we wish her a nice…litter."

"So naturally I'll need off the second week in July."

"You are not taking off in the middle of tourist season so your dog can have puppies!"

"Yes, I am, I will be claiming my rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act."

"Chin-chin is not covered under the Medical and Leave—"

"Family and Medical Leave Act. As an employer, you should be more familiar with it."

"You're not taking off, Michel."

"Well, then, Chin-chin will have to have the puppies here."

"No dogs in the Dragonfly!"

"I'll call my vet."

Michel was still giving her the cool treatment (at least she thought so, with Michel it was rather hard to tell) two hours later when he buzzed her new extension to tell her Richard was on the line.

Unable to come up with a suitable illness in three seconds, Lorelai was forced to take the call. Damn, I'm losing my touch.

"Lorelai, this is your father."

"The imperious greeting was a giveaway."

"I'm just calling to tell you that you and Rory will not be expected at dinner on Friday. I know you have the grand opening."

"That's…nice, Dad, but Mom called to tell me the same thing yesterday."

"Well, then, now you know."

"Dad, what's going on? Are the two of you even speaking to each other?"

"Lorelai, I simply called to deliver a message."

"Dad—"

"I'm sure I'll see you next week. Goodbye, Lorelai."

And he disconnected.

Lorelai decided she'd spent entirely too much time this week listening to dial tones. Without much thought, she picked up the phone again and began to dial, then froze, drew a sharp breath, and disconnected mid-ring.

What the hell am I doing? She couldn't just call Luke in the middle of the day for no reason.

Well, that made it official. She'd officially cracked up. Next thing you know, she'd be sitting at home eating salads and renting Battlefield Earth.

She sat back and contemplated whether the mock factor was high enough to overcome John Travolta in a codpiece.

Luke's had been open for two years before she and Rory ventured inside. When the sign went up, Rory was still young, just making the transition – thank goodness – from things you eat through a strainer, and eating out wasn't exactly in their budget. It was microwave dinners and mac and cheese and extras from the Inn and, on the occasional dinner out, Al's Pancake World.

Sure, it could kill a person, but it was the only restaurant in town with 'pancake' in the name, so Lorelai considered it their only option.

Luke's didn't seem all that exciting, and Mia was always coming back from there with – shudder – salads.

But the night Lorelai received her promotion to receptionist, they needed to celebrate. Mia suggested Luke's, promising Lorelai would find coffee and grease to her heart's content, and reminding her it was child cruelty to subject Rory to Al's twice in the same month. So Lorelai packed Rory in the car and it was off to Luke's.

"I've got money and time to celebrate, so we'll need everything fried off the left half of the menu. Oh, and same for her."

The man staring down at her (who she could only assume was Luke) took down the order while watching Rory from the corner of his eye, like she was a jack-in-the-box that might go off at any second. "What do you want to drink?"

"Coffee, all of it. However much you have, that's what I want."

"Death in a cup, coming up."

Lorelai didn't find this funny.

He delivered the food several minutes later with a scowl. "You know you'll kill that kid feeding her that way."

"I know I'm her mother and can feed her any way I want to. And her name is Rory, not 'that kid'."

Luke scowled further and stalked off. Lorelai was tempted to grab Rory's hand and leave, but at that moment she made a life-altering decision.

After all, she couldn't be expected to let a perfectly good cup of coffee go to waste.

She took the first sip and very nearly gasped. It was perfect. It was better than perfect. She hadn't felt this good since nine months before Rory was born.

Well, damn.

This got her nowhere. If she wanted coffee, she was going to put up with Grumpy.

She took another sip. One of the seven dwarves was a small price to pay for coffee that good. Hell, for coffee that good, she'd move in with all seven and start eating questionable apples.

Well, maybe not the apples.

And Lorelai got her revenge. She came in before work the next morning, sat at the counter, and grinned.

"Hey, Duke, can I get a cup of coffee?"

He poured a cup without glancing up. "It's Luke."

"Thanks, Duke."

She grinned. He glared. And so it started.

This went on for, well, about two years. She came in every morning (and occasionally at lunch) (…and some evenings), called him Duke, and ordered coffee. He poured a cup, ignored her, and pointedly lavished attention on the next customer, even when that customer happened to be Kirk.

Lorelai made it a habit to sit by Kirk.

This pattern went along fairly well until the night of Rory's sixth birthday. Lorelai had a bash planned for the weekend – cake and junk food and every movie they could get their hands on – but every time she asked Rory what she wanted for her birthday dinner, Rory would simply look up at her with bright, unblinking eyes, and say, "Luke's".

At six, she had never once called him Duke. She was showing disturbing signs of growing a conscience.

So, at the end of the day, Lorelai gave in with a deep sigh and took Rory's hand as they walked over to Luke's.

Rory was unnaturally jumpy, aided no doubt by the steady stream of candy and special extra-chocolate cake, courtesy of the kitchen staff. So just after Lorelai sat down, ordered coffee, and got her "Duke" in, Rory grabbed too enthusiastically for a napkin and knocked the whole table setting off onto the floor. Luke, who had been looking even more cranky than usual, nearly roared.

"Can you be careful for five minutes?" He whirled around, took in the mess, and glared at Lorelai.

Rory's eyes went even wider, and two tears rolled down her cheeks. Lorelai grabbed her hand, seething, and stormed out the door.

It was late, much later than usual, and Lorelai didn't care.

She'd had a mini-celebration with Rory, bought an extra cake, taken enough time to get her spirits back up, and eventually lulled her to sleep. Then she'd grabbed a coat and marched out the door.

Luke was inside, wiping down the counter. Lorelai yanked on the door, a little surprised to find it unlocked.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Luke looked up, surprised, but made a quick recovery. "I was just about to ask you the same question."

"It was my daughter's birthday, her birthday, and all she could say to me all day is that she wants to go to Luke's. She gets here, and because she's a kid, you make her cry. You haven't liked us from day one, and I don't need you to, but you will not treat my daughter that way, especially not on her birthday."

"You have come in here from day one and done nothing but try to piss me off!"

"And it's working."

"Yeah, it is!"

"Well, good!"

"And you're wrong. I've never had a problem with your kid, she's quiet and neat and says 'thank you' – where she learned that from, I don't know – which makes her better than 90% of the kids that come in here. But I have one crappy day after my sister runs off with some asshole and I have to come in here and get yelled at by a woman who's spent two years making a game out of pissing me off. In my own diner! Where I live!"

He stopped, breathing heavily, face red with anger. Lorelai stared at him, for once in her life uncertain what to say. After a moment, he added, more calmly: "I didn't know it was her birthday."

"Well, it was, and she went home in tears thanks to you." Her voice was more quiet, but with the same bitter edge.

"I thought Kirk knocked the stuff off; that was why I yelled."

His voice was quiet, now, and Lorelai could feel part of the anger beginning to ebb away. "Rory didn't know that."

"I'll make it up to her next time she comes in. She can have free cake."

Lorelai looked at the ground, the walls, out the window, and at the ground again. It took her some time to answer.

"I'm sorry about your sister."

"Thanks." Luke nodded. He regarded her for a minute, then: "Any chance you can cut the Duke crap?"

"Any chance you can let me raise my daughter?"

"You'll clog your arteries with that stuff."

"Says the man who owns the deep fryer."

"Are we calling a truce here?"

In reply, Lorelai stuck out her hand.

"You'll quit calling me Duke?"

"You'll keep feeding me coffee?"

He gave her hand one quick, firm shake. "Done."

Lorelai nodded, then stood in the doorway for a moment, surveying him. "You know, the grunge look is getting popular."

"Huh?"

"That's what I thought."

She gave him another nod and turned toward the door.

"Hang on."

She watched, curious, as Luke crossed back to the counter. He lifted the glass pie cover, pulled a small box from beneath the counter, and scooped the last two pieces into it. "I'd have to throw this away, anyway." He held out the box. "Since it's her birthday."

And as she took the box, Lorelai smiled at Luke for the first time.

Lorelai let her head rock back against the wall, suddenly aware she'd spent several minutes musing on her history with Luke.

That couldn't be it – the way something starts. It was thorny and unromantic and just all wrong.

He'd started as her pet project, her special annoyance, and now he was her coffee dealer and her confidant and her investor and her friend. He was someone she'd come to rely on: it was what Luke did best, being reliable.

Well, after torturing Taylor.

And Kirk.

And possibly the kissing.

Maybe that was what Luke did best.

Who would have known?