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Begins with Luke/Lorelai outside of Richard and Emily's for the Christmas party. Chapter will contain Emily and also another familiar character that you may or may not expect to pop up. Also, I don't own Rachel Ray, the Godfather, Tom Cruise, or anything else I may reference in this story. Gets funnier, if I do say so myself. (Hypnotism begins:) You want to reviewww... You will reviewww...

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A lot of people might say that, if you grew up in a place, it would be fairly easy to approach the door, and even easier to, say, step inside. But it is guaranteed that none of these people would be Lorelai Gilmore. And especially not Lorelai Gilmore with her fianceé in tow.

The second the two of them stepped out of the truck, a chorus of imaginary moviegoers screaming Don't go in there popped into Lorelai's head. Luke didn't seem too thrilled either, because he had a look on his face that seemed to say death row.

"All right," Lorelai managed when they stopped in front of the massive doors. She went over the checklist. "Coat off, rolled in a ball?"

"Coat is off, rolling as we speak."

"Hostess gifts?"

Luke held up the box of Ferrero-Rochér dark chocolates they'd just picked up in Hartford. "If you mean bribery, then yes."

"And what will become the story at exactly nine-fifteen?"

Luke sighed. "I am not telling people that you need an immediate kidney transplant."

"Come on! If you don't like the kidney story, just use the 'Sookie-in-a-plane-crash' one I suggested."

"Lorelai...."

"Or food poisoning, but that's kind of a last-effort old standby...."

"Lorelai, can we just get inside?" He really wasn't looking forward to what awaited him in there, but it was December in Connecticut. They'd be lucky if the barometer said five degrees.

"Fine, fine." She took a deep breath, did a quick adjustment of her black-and-green cocktail dress, and pressed the button for the doorbell. She tried adjusting Luke's tie for him, too, but he swatted her hand away.

"Leave it."

A maid was quick to answer, pulling the door open with a sligtly condescending look on her face. "The Gilmores are entertaining in the family room," was her icy greeting, and snatching their coats, she hurried off to tend to the salmon puffs.

"Ohhhh-kay then. I guess we'll show ourselves in." Lorelai glanced at Luke with a 'here-we-go' face and stepped into the house.

"Lorelai! Good, you're here." The voice made its way to her like it had its own radar system.

"How did she find us that quickly?" She whisper-hissed. Then, putting on her 'cheerful' voice: "Mom, hi! Great party. You remember Luke."

Emily seemed stressed beyond belief, something that she'd never let on to her other guests. Lucky me, Lorelai thought. "Of course I remember Luke, Lorelai, you're engaged for God's sake. I'm not an invalid."

"Emily," Luke cut in, pouring on the charm even though sucking up in this house got him nowhere, "great to see you again. You're looking wonderful. And this is a great party, really, thanks again for inviting us." He handed her the chocolates.

Emily, of course, put her hostess face right back on. "Why, thank you, Luke, that's so kind of you. And how thoughtful to bring a gift---you can't imagine how often Mr. Gilmore and I get tired of fine, imported desserts, so this will really be a nice change of pace."

Lorelai, behind her, had of course been doing the slash-across-the-throat motion over and over again. When that failed, she switched to the club-her-over-the-head motion. Emily turned. Lorelai pretended to be pointing out the chandelier. "You see, exactly what I told you, it's a nineteen...thirty...five...diamondy...thing...."

"Twenty nine. And stop that," Emily corrected. Lorelai did as told. "Everything's been in chaos since that damn snow. You'd think a storm could wait a few measly hours," Emily grumbled. "Now, make sure you make the rounds, there are very imortant friends of ours here, and I don't want the two of you sulking in the corner all night. We hired a barista this year, so cocktails are on the left, and for God's sake Lorelai, there had better be apple tarts left over. I'm checking your purse before you leave."

Emily turned on her Christian Louboutins then and walked off to greet another guest, leaving a trail of Chanel No. 5 in her wake.

"Wow."

"Yeah."

"I feel like one of those munchkins with the lollipops."

"Well, just think," Lorelai consoled, "that was only the first three minutes. You've got seventy-two more ahead of you, so there's plenty of time to get even shorter. Then we can just leave through that crack in the floorboards." She grabbed his arm and headed for the buffet. "Come on, I'll be damned if I don't get an apple tart out of this. And I'd start drinking if I were you."

Just before they made it to the buffet table, a young woman to the left broke off from her group and headed straight for them. "Mom! Luke!"

Lorelai was completely shocked---they both were. "Rory! Oh my God, what are you doing here?" She wrapped her daughter in a hug.

"I told you I was coming for Christmas."

"Yeah, but you said you weren't getting in till Sunday."

Rory hugged Luke next. "Well, I just got here. My schedule cleared up, so I wanted it to be a surprise. Surprised?"

"Very surprised. And happy. Seriously, Oprah, just find me a couch and the jumping will commence."

"It's great to see you, Rory," Luke cut in.

"It's great to see you guys, too. It's great to be back here. I can't wait to see everybody."

"Yea yeah yeah, now let's get to the important stuff," Lorelai said, lowering her voice. "Did you get a peek at the gifts?"

Luke doubted it. "She said she just got here, I don't think---"

"Better than last year," Rory answered. Luke stood corrected by a Gilmore yet again. "I even managed to open them this time. She goes to the bathroom, I snag the presents, sneak off to the study, and bada-bing! Nothing a little Scotch tape couldn't fix."

"Ah, I'm so proud of my little Costanzia," Lorelai squealed. "So, what's the verdict?"

"Well, I got an original binding of Tolstoy's Ressurection printed entirely in French, which is great 'cause it's impossible to find now, all though I was kind of hoping there'd be a French-English dictionary in there too...."

Lorelai waved the thought away. "That's great, Rachel Ray, but cut the monologue---what did I get?"

This time Rory gave her an amused, sly look. "Oh, you'll just have to wait and see this one."