Forty-five minutes later, Rory pulled up to the house with an assortment of food from Al's. Dragging a massive suitcase as well as the bag of food, Rory walked up to her childhood home, noting that Luke's truck was parked behind her mother's Jeep.

"Mom?" she called out as struggled into the entryway. "Luke? I brought food."

"I'll help her," Lorelai cried out, sliding into view in the doorway. "Let's put that in the kitchen." With a slightly manic energy, she grabbed the bag of food out of Rory's hands and herded her toward the kitchen.

"What? Mom, I—" She glanced back at the living room and stopped short.

What was Jess doing here, standing in her living room in a leather jacket? His expression was inscrutable, as always.

Her mother pushed her the rest of the way into the kitchen before she could finish processing his presence.

"It was a last minute thing," Lorelai said in a hushed tone. "Jess just sort of showed up, wanting to spend the holidays with Luke and his mom and his sister. I think Luke is secretly glad, since April's spending Christmas with her mom."

Rory didn't respond, pulling her suitcase into her old bedroom. Most of her stuff was gone, replaced with her mom's sewing machine and April's microscope and a variety of generic guest room furniture. The only traces that Rory had lived there were a few books, a Yale pennant, and the lamp she'd picked out when she was seven. She felt like she was washing away in the tide.

Lorelai stood in the door to her room, looking terribly concerned. "Are you alright, sweetie?"

"Yeah, of course. It's fine. He's Luke's nephew, it's Christmas, they're allowed to spend the holiday together."

Lorelai didn't look convinced. "Are you sure?"

Rory gave her mother a wide, if not totally sincere, smile and said, "Yes. It's fine, it's been years. Besides, it's family."

"Okay, good. I just want you to feel comfortable. No matter how old and gray you get, this is still your home."

Something about that just made her want to cry, but she deflected by giving an exaggerated gasp and touching her hair. "Gray! I'm only 26."

"Maybe she's born with it, maybe it's Clairol."

Not wanting to look at the room any longer, Rory shoved her suitcase in the corner and slid past her mother into the kitchen. "That's not how it goes."

"Hmm, that's how I remember it." Lorelai pulled out a few to-go boxes and gave Rory a long look. "So we're good, then?"

"Totally good." But she couldn't help but ask, "Is he staying here?"

"No. He usually stays with us when he's in town, but since you're here, he'd have to sleep on the couch, and it'd be a whole thing with Liz if he chose our couch over hers. I think he's going to crash at Luke's old place above the diner."

He usually stayed here? Her mother had alluded to his visits before, but she'd never said he stayed here. In her bed probably. The thought of her ex lying in her bed, under her blanket, touching her things, was almost too much. Suddenly she was glad Lorelai hadn't preserved much of her childhood bedroom. It was more like staying in the same hotel room, impersonal, with boat paintings and bleached sheets. Still…

Rory helped her mom with a few more to-go boxes. "I only got enough food for the three of us," she said hesitantly. "I wasn't even sure Luke would be here."

"We've got some leftover Chinese, plus like half a pizza. It can be an international buffet thing."

"Okay, good. That's good. We're good."

Lorelai nodded, an annoyingly knowing look on her face. "Yeah, we're good."

"Hey," Rory said as she entered the living room. It wasn't Dorothy Parker, but she'd gotten the words out and looked Jess in the eye and everything.

Laconic as ever, his response was a simple, "Hi." He had his hands in his pockets, so he must have been at least somewhat uncomfortable, but he gave her a smile that seemed genuine. Well, she supposed it made sense—it had been five years since the open house.

Luke was looking back and forth between them, ready to jump in on behalf of either of them. When it became clear the conversation had stalled, he said, "Well," and gave an uncomfortable little cough. "Lorelai made us get some Christmas 'classics,' so we were thinking we could get started on those now."

"They are classics!" Lorelai called from the kitchen. "Just because you've never heard of them and one has a killer mall Santa doesn't mean they're not classics."

Jess smirked. "Sounds swell." The words were almost the same, but the tone was so much kinder than she was used to. He'd been like that the last couple times she'd seen him, but it still hadn't sunk in that he could actually be nice to people that weren't her.

It wasn't as weird as she'd thought it would be, sitting with Jess and her mom and Luke in the living room, eating leftover pizza and Al's finest doro wat and watching Santa And The Ice Cream Bunny. It reminded her of old times, when they were dating and would try to have a movie night with her mom.

It had always been so easy with Dean, but with Jess, Rory had usually spent most of the night on edge, ready to smooth over her mother's ruffled feathers when Jess said something a little too snarky or to soothe Jess when her mother's suspicious stare would have him ready to bolt.

It was different now, of course. Her mom and Jess were almost chummy these days. Like when Jess brought a beer back from the kitchen, Lorelai snagged it from his hands and said, "Oh, for me, hey, thanks," and pretended to take a drink before handing it back with a smile.

But still, there was something nice about it, familiar.

Jess was just sitting back down beside her on the floor in front of the couch when her phone chimed. It might be Lane. She was half hoping for some sort of normal text—a song of the day or a Spinal Tap meme—but also half nervous that Lane was still angry. But it wasn't Lane at all, it was Jenn from work, asking if she was alright. Rory switched off her phone and tossed it onto the coffee table in front of her.

"Everything alright?"

Jess was looking at her with a concerned expression. It was so unfamiliar it almost made her want to confess everything to him. Almost.

"Yep."

He raised his eyebrows skeptically but didn't press the issue.

"So, how long are you here for?"

Jess gave a little shrug. "I don't know, probably a week. It depends on how long I can stand T.J."

"That idiot?" Luke said. "I give it a day."

"I mean, compared to some of the gems Liz has dated, he's practically Descartes, but if he tells me one more time that he's thinking about learning to fire dance…"

"T.J.'s learning to fire dance!" Lorelai sat up from where she was slouched on the couch. "We didn't start the fire, but when we are gone, it will still burn on and on and on," she sang, off-key.

"Billy Joel, really?" Rory asked, taking a bite of food.

"He's underrated," Jess chimed in. "'All For Leyna' is legit."

"Exactly!" said Lorelai victoriously. "And he used to come eat at the Independence Inn, which shows he has good taste."

Rory felt like she'd entered some kind of parallel universe. Since when did Jess like anything Top 40, and since when did he and her mother side together against her?

Luke rolled his eyes. "You can't rate musical ability based on where someone eats."

"People with Jimmy Buffett t-shirts in their closet shouldn't throw stones." Jess waved a cold slice of pizza at Luke.

Giggling, Lorelai lightly smacked Luke on the chest. "He's got you there."

"So, T.J. fire dancing," Rory said, ready to return to a less surreal topic, "that sounds dangerous." Not that she even knew T.J. very well—she'd probably met him a total of six times.

"Liz should definitely pre-dial 9 and 1, just to be safe," Luke said.

"He's a menace," Lorelai agreed. "I had to live al fresco because of that guy. But Liz loves him, and he's a great dad to Doula. You know he spends hours just having tea parties with her and running around with her in the yard? Not every dad is like that."

Her words were met with a very heavy silence. Rory glanced over at Jess and saw that he was giving her a slanted look. They'd never talked about their fathers when they were dating. She knew the gist of his relationship with his dad, but only because Luke had grudgingly filled in some blanks after Jess had fled to California. She'd at least gotten some Wednesday night phone calls and a debutante ball from her dad.

Lorelai could tell the mood had shifted, so she quickly changed the subject. "Hey, stop talking about T.J. and pay attention. This is the best part—the Ice Cream Bunny is about to show up in his fire engine!"

"Spoilers!" Jess said, holding his hands to his ears, and with that, everything returned to normal. Or as normal as it could be, hanging out with her mom, Luke, and her ex-boyfriend.