Orange Crush Pt. 4
Dan looked to each adult as they sat in dead silence around the dining room table. He took his sipper cup of orange soda and sipped at it.
"Dad?"
"Yeah?" Jess asked, glancing at him from his plate.
"What's that?" Dan asked, pointing to a bowl on the table.
"What have we said about pointing?" Jess countered, raising an eyebrow at him.
Dan snatched back his hand. "Sorry."
Jess nodded. "S'okay. Rephrase, please."
"What's the gloopy stuff in the clear bowl?" Dan asked.
Jess studied the bowl and then shook his head. "No idea."
"It's Mashed Cauliflower," Emily said quickly. "It's very good."
"No, it's not," Lorelai whispered to Dan. "It'll turn you into a-"
"So!" Richard cut her off. "Jess! What have you been reading for The Times?"
"Ah, mostly garbage," Jess replied, picking a raison off of his salad. "We get a few gems here and there…a Christopher Moore occasionally, but nothing special."
"That's a bit judgmental," Emily commented. "Especially coming from someone who never graduated high school."
"Excuse me?" Jess asked.
"And we're leaving," Rory said, getting to her feet.
Richard sighed. "Rory…"
"I wasn't throwing you guys a bluff when I said that if things went sour we would leave," Rory said.
Emily gave her granddaughter an innocent look. "I don't know what I said. It's true, isn't it?"
"Mom, stop it," Lorelai snapped. "Rory, come on, Sweets. Just…one more chance."
Rory sighed and looked to Jess, who gave a nod. She slowly took her seat again.
The table resumed its silence for a long time, until Richard tried to make conversation once more.
"What grade are you in, Dan?" he asked.
"Kindergarten," Dan replied, drinking more soda.
"Ah, and how is that going?" Richard asked.
Dan nodded. "Good! I go in the morning and I wake Dad up and make sure he remembers all his stuff for work and then he drives me to school, and I play with Nate and Calvin and Jack, and then Dad picks me up and we have lunch, and then he works the rest of the day from home and I sit and do homework and watch movies and color and then at night, sometimes he goes out with Rory and then I get a babysitter, and that's really fun, cause…cause…Dean and Lindsay are fun and Dave and Lane let me stay up late and sometimes I wake up in the morning and Rory's there, and she spends weekends with us and I like to play fire engine at school!"
The entire table stared at him.
He blushed and looked down at his plate. "It's fine."
Jess grinned a little, and patted Dan on the shoulder. "We're gonna look up the word 'tangent' when we get home tonight, okay?"
"Word-look-up?" Dan asked, brightening up.
Jess nodded. "Word-look-up."
"Word-look-up?" Richard asked, confused.
Jess nodded. "Every time he discovers a new word, we go and look it up, and we add it to his big list of words."
"Show 'em," Rory encouraged, nudging the little boy.
"Can I?" Dan asked Jess.
Jess nodded. "Go on."
"Here we go," Luke muttered with a wry smile.
Jess cleared his throat. "Discombobulate."
"To throw into confusion," Dan recited.
"And in laymen's terms?" Rory asked.
"Make things go crazy," Dan replied.
"Rotunda," Lorelai said.
"A circular building with a dome roof," Dan said.
"Laymen's?" Jess asked.
"A building that's a circle with a bubble roof!"
"One more," Jess said. "Balalaika."
Dan thought for a moment. "A Russian instrument with three strings that sounds like a Mandolin."
"That's very nice that you know all of those big words," Richard smiled. "It's always wise to start their schooling early," he said to Jess.
"Well, this is more for fun than anything else," Jess replied.
"But he's learning and that's important," Richard smiled. "You know, Dan, when Rory was your age, she already knew which college she wanted to go to. Where are you thinking of going?"
"Jupiter!" Dan smiled.
Jess smirked. "We're not quite there yet."
"So, Dan, do you and Rory get along?" Emily asked casually.
Dan nodded. "She's my friend!"
Emily nodded back. "That's very nice. I'm sure your father thinks so, too."
"Uh…yeah, it's great," Jess said slowly. "It'd be a little awkward if they hated each other."
"Yes, of course," Emily replied coldly.
Silence fell over the table once more, and it was Lorelai's turn to look over the group gathered. Her eyes wandered past Rory's head, and out the window. "Oh, no," she whispered.
Luke blinked at her. "What's wrong?"
Lorelai got up and moved to the glass doors. "It's snowing."
"So?" Richard asked.
"It's…blizzard…ing," Lorelai said. She turned to Luke. "We can drive in this…right?"
Dan slid out of his chair and joined Lorelai at the double doors. "Can we make snow-people?"
"Maybe tomorrow morning," Jess muttered, turning to stare out the window. "Since it doesn't look like we'll be going anywhere anytime soon."
"We have the room," Richard said. "You all can stay the night."
"No," Lorelai replied nervously, turning back from the window. "That's okay. I'm sure it'll let up in an hour or so. And we'll be extra careful…Luke drives like an old lady anyways."
Luke rolled his eyes.
Rory bit her lip. "It looks pretty bad."
"Its fine," Lorelai snapped. "Really, it's fine."
"We can't drive in this, Mom," Rory said. "We'll get killed."
"At least we won't have to stay here," Lorelai hissed.
Emily narrowed her eyes. "I'm so glad you're grateful for our hospitality, Lorelai. I'll make sure and remember it."
Lorelai rolled her eyes. "It's not that! I have to work in the morning, and Luke has to work in the morning, and I'm sure Jess and Rory and Dan have plans."
"Sleep," Rory offers weakly. "We were going to sleep."
Emily raised a very suspicious eyebrow. "Sleep?"
Dan nodded. "They always sleep in on weekends, and I have to wake them up because Dad won't let me cook breakfast."
Jess grinned. "Last time I slept in and let you make breakfast, I wound up on the floor, because you'd spilt orange juice everywhere."
Richard chuckled.
Emily shook her head, her expression stony as she got to her feet. "I'll go ask Illyana to make up a couple of rooms."
"Thanks, Grandma," Rory said. She glanced at Jess, who looked slightly awkward. This was going to be a longer night than she'd expected.