AN: My initial thoughts for this story when I first got the idea was showing how to get a role-reversed Rory and Jess together. But it seems that my brain isn't letting that happen, not just yet anyway. Instead I'm focusing more on fixing the damage I seem to have inflicted on Luke and Lorelai, which may be even more fun than the Lit love. So bear with me, this will eventually be Lit, but I guess I just can't write any GG fics without my JavaJunkie fix. I'm addicted to them, I admit it.

Also, I don't own anything; Gilmore Girls is ASP's, A Change Would Do You Good belongs to Sheryl; Crow, and Every Night Is Another Story belongs to The Early November. The Great Gatzby is Fitzgerald's, or who ever's in charge of his estate.

As the phone behind the counter rang, Luke spared Jess and Rory one last glance; they were clearing a table together, arguing good-naturedly. Things had been better the last few days, despite Rory's nicotine withdrawal induced mood swings she had been getting on well with Jess, which was something at least.

"Luke's," he spoke into the phone, choosing not to look anymore. After a few comments from Liz, he'd been put on teen watch, but decided they would be fine left unsupervised for a few minutes.

"He thinks it's a date." Cried out a voice on the other end.

"What? Who is this?"

"Joe thinks this is a date." Sookie replied, now in a whisper.

"Sookie, what are you talking about? Joe... Joe's there now?"

"Yes! I don't know what happened," she confessed. Earlier in the week they had been in Hartford and ran into an old friend. Sookie had spent a summer working with Joe Mastoni in the Berkshires, years ago, and Luke had visited for a fortnight, joining in for a few nights of crazy partying after long days of work. "You were there – it's not a date, is it?"

"No. The two of you were gonna go bust Feldman's chops. Busting chops is not a date." Luke replied, adamant. "Plus, Bung. You can't really consider any conversation involving Bung to be flirtatious or date-like.

"That's what I thought. Help! Please Luke."

"What did- Where are you right now?" Usually when Sookie called from the inn, there was a little noise around, but all was silent on her end.

"I left Joe in the kitchen to go hide in a closet. I don't understand how this happened."

"Just let him know you're married," Luke replied, resisting the urge to chuckle; Sookie wouldn't appreciate that right now. Later, when she was feeling better, he would remind her of this and they would laugh about it, but not now. "And if he still wants to, go for lunch."

"Can I do that? Is it ok? I mean, he said he'd always wanted to ask me out, but never worked up the nerve."

"I know. I watched him trying to psych himself up to do it everyday that I was there."

"Well why didn't you tell me?" Sookie demanded.

"Because I knew that one day you'd meet Jackson? What does it matter, you love your husband!"

"Right. You're right, I'm sorry. So I should just tell him that I'm married?"

"Tell him that you're married. If he doesn't believe you, give me another call, I'll bring down the wedding photos. Hell, I'm sure my best man duties would apply to this sort of thing."

"Thanks Luke." After they hung up, Luke turned around to find Jess looking at him curiously.

"What was that about?"

"Sookie's got her very own Jay Gatzby over at the inn right now. And since she's Sookie..."

"She's freaking out? Figures. That's nice though, or it would be, if it weren't for her also having a Tom. A nice, good Tom."

"She lucked out not noticing Redford and going for the other guy; trust me."

"If you say so."

"Did you really just say that?" Rory asked, and they both turned to look at her. She'd stopped working and was sitting on top of a table, watching them. "I mean, seriously, Gatzby, Tom, Robert Redford? I can't believe that you two talk about that sort of thing."

"Hey, The Great Gatzby was a really good book. And the movie wasn't bad either." Jess replied in defence. "It's really my mom's fault anyway. We have movie nights all the time, and nine times out of ten, she'll force Luke to join us."

"What a sweet family tradition." Rory muttered, dropping to the floor. "Well, I'm going for a walk."

"When will you be back?" Luke asked as she headed for the door.

"Later,"

"At least you asked," Jess told his uncle sympathetically.

"No, really, I think if you made you're hair just a little bit taller, and carried a pack of smokes and a switch blade, you'd look so much hotter." Rory explained to Jess, glancing up at him as she scrubbed at a beetroot stain on a table by the window. "Whether they admit it or not, every girl has had that James Dean fantasy; even the snotty ones at your fancy school."

"You just want someone else to procure your addiction so you'll have an excuse to bum smokes off of them." Jess replied, desperately fighting to keep his voice level. Why did she have to do that, say those things? "But I'm sorry, I can't help you there."

"Rory, go upstairs and do your homework!" Luke ordered, cutting off any further communication between the two. "And make sure you do biology and trig before English, alright?"

"Yes, sir!" Rory mock-saluted before tossing the dish towel she'd been using at the smirking boy beside her.

"Why'd you do that?" Jess asked, once she was gone and he'd returned to his task. She made him so uncomfortable at times, but that didn't mean he didn't like having her around.

"You're supposed to be working; that's what I pay the two of you for. But I'm pretty sure that wherever you were headed wasn't work."

"Oh, jeez! Why would you say something like that?"

"Because I have eyes and ears, and I was your age once too. And thanks to your mom and Sookie and- I... I mean... They made me sit through a lot of movies, including everything James Dean ever did. So I'm pretty well educated on the subject of-"

"Let's never speak of this again, ok, Uncle Luke?" Jess interrupted, his discomfort level shooting right back up again.

"Sure. Whatever." The older man replied, distracted. He wished he could stop himself from bringing up those thoughts. But it was pretty hard, given all the people in his life connected to that particular time he tried so hard not to remember.

And Rory living in his apartment really did nothing to help with the forgetting.

"Why do you always act like such a dad?" Rory demanded, poking at the vegetables on her dinner plate. Vegetables sucked, but Luke insisted that she eat them.

She'd come down for work that morning, wearing jeans, one of Luke's flannel shirts and a spare baseball cap she'd found in a closet. He had immediately ordered her to change, to which she had responded, 'I thought this was the uniform,' Later in the afternoon when a customer was flirting with her, completely of his own volition, Luke had once again commanded her to go upstairs.

Luke didn't like her talking to any guys, including Jess. Or especially Jess, she hadn't worked that out yet. But it seemed he couldn't stand to see her speak to any male, aside from Taylor; and she couldn't stand talking to Taylor.

"I mean, I know I never really had one, but I figure they're about as annoying and controlling as you. You're always trying to tell me what I can and can't do and I-" He didn't like her talking to his nephew, he was always referencing her mother the way that divorced and separated parents did. He acted like a total dad. "Oh my God! You're him aren't you?"

"What?" Luke looked up confused.

"He's you. She always told me his name was Christopher and he was from a rich family like her, but if that were true there is no way we would have spent the last sixteen years living in the conditions we did." Rory ranted, moving from her chair and now pacing in front of the couch. "This makes so much sense! I knew she wouldn't just dump me on some stranger, although, you know it would have been nice to get a little heads up. And, oh yeah, why the hell have you left me with her my entire life?"

"Rory, slow down. I don't understand what you're talking about."

"You're my father!" she replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Luke blinked at her for a moment. "No, I'm not."

"What?"

"There was a time that I wished I was; days, weeks even that I could convince myself that you really were mine. But I'm sorry, I'm not you're dad. Believe me, if I were your father you wouldn't be in the situation you are now, but… I'm not."

"Well… Then, I don't understand. Why am I here? That would have made sense, but if we're back to you having no connection to my family, then I just don't get it."

"I-" Luke was cut off as the phone rang, and not being entirely sure how he was supposed to have this conversation, or, even if it was his place, he gratefully moved to answer it. "Hello?"

"What do you think you're doing keeping my grand daughter with you?" demanded an eerily familiar voice.

"What?" he asked perplexed. Why does everyone have to confuse me tonight?

"I want to know what rights you think you have, keeping my daughter's child with you, instead of alerting me to the fact that she's in this city. Explain yourself!"

"…Emily?" he asked uncertainly.

"Of course it's Emily! How many other people's children do you have living with you right now?"

"Uhh, just the one, um, how do you know she's here?"

"A friend of your son told us. Now I demand that you let me speak to her this instant!"

"My son…" Luke scratched his head, trying to make sense of what was being yelled at him. He turned around to see Rory sitting on the couch, looking a little numb, he felt the same way. Jess he thought, that's who she meant. "Sorry, uh, Emily, I'm sorry, but could I maybe get her to call you back? This isn't really a good time."

"You most certainly can not have her call me back! Luke Danes put Rory on the phone immediately."

"Thanks…" he put the phone down, not having listened to her answer. "Rory, are you…"

"Who was that?" she asked, shaking thoughts out of her head.

"Oh, that… On the phone, just now?" she nodded and he moved to sit at the other end of the couch. "That was your grandmother."

"My… Oh, of course it was. What did she want?"

"To talk to you," Luke replied. He couldn't think of anything else to say, this was all just… too much.

Rory nodded chewing her bottom lip as she processed this information. "You're not no one, are you?"

"No. I'm not no one." He knew what she meant even without her having to explain.

"Well, can you tell me what… can you tell me about whatever you know?"

"Don't you think you should ask your mom these things?"

"She's not here, and even if she were, I'm not sure if I would want to listen to her. You on the other hand haven't screwed up my entire life, so I think I'd be a little more inclined to take your version of events. Please, Luke?" she looked up at him with the same deep dark pools of blue that had driven him to act on impulses he wouldn't have dared to otherwise when he was just a little older than her.

"I'll stop whenever you want, just tell me when you've had enough, ok?" he questioned and she nodded, shifting in her seat and bringing her legs up underneath her body. Once she looked comfortable he sat back and closed his eyes, calling back all the memories he'd been trying not to keep in the front of his mind. "I met your parents when I was just a little younger than you are now. Sookie and I had known each other since we were eleven, when her family moved here. Both her parents and mine scraped together everything they could when she got an academic scholarship and I got an athletic one to the same school that your mom and dad were at. Our first day there, your mom invited us to sit with her and her friends. I couldn't stand those people; she was the only decent one there. Even your dad was…"

"I know he's a dick. I may not know him per se, but I've figured that much out from the very little Mom's said about him." Rory interrupted and Luke smiled. She had that right.

"Ok, well, yeah, he didn't like me, he tolerated Sookie, I guess, just because her presence seemed to please your mom so much. But the two of us never got on very well. Despite that, we were all four, always together; we did a lot of stuff together, movies, road trips, sneaking out late at night. I never actually thought that what we were doing was that bad. But then your mom found out she was pregnant-"

"Thanks a lot!"

"No, what I meant was, I thought we were all, you know, we weren't as wild as some of the other kids at school. At least, I guess I wasn't and Sookie was pretty tame too, but we weren't always with your parents, so they were obviously getting up to a little more than we knew about. After she found out she was pregnant, as I'm sure you know all hell broke loose. There was a family dinner called to discuss options, minus the two people it would affect the most, and then, when all of the plans had been finalized, Christopher turned around and said, he'd changed his mind. He wasn't up for a kid right now. He just disappeared after that. I heard he'd gone to California to stay with relatives, but I haven't gotten confirmation on that, even now. Your mom stayed at home with her parents, until you were born, and the three of us were still really close, Sookie and I both drove her to doctor's appointments and anything else she needed, I was even there the night you were born."

"Four oh three…"

"Yep, at four oh three in the morning, I was right by her side, having the bones in my hand crushed as she screamed at the nurses. Things were good for about a year and a half… good is a relative term, I guess. There wasn't so much screaming and biting off of heads at the Gilmore house, probably because Emily and Richard wanted to keep appearances as normal as they could. But it was pretty tense around there most of the time. I guess that was why the two of you were spending so much time at my house. It was in those first few months of your life that your mom and me realized that there was something between us, more than friendship. We'd been dating just under a year when one day I got a call. Richard was frantic. I'd never heard him like that before, ranting and raving about missing and Lorelai and the baby, and what did I know? It was so surreal. Sookie and I both got there as quickly as we could, but all that greeted us was a still hysterical Richard, clutching a note. Emily was nowhere to be seen; I found out later that she was in bed, so ill that she wouldn't be able to get out of bed for an entire month. We were informed that your mom was gone, she'd taken you with her, and she would call when she got where she was going, not that she knew where that was yet.

Rory took a deep breath, nodding her head as she took everything in. Luke paused, thinking she wanted him to stop, but she waved him on.

"I never got a call. Sookie did. She came to my house late one night, asked me to sit down, and explained that she'd just had an important phone call. The two of you were fine, and she was sorry. That was it, all I got. I didn't hear from her at all for fourteen years, I got bits and pieces from Sookie, but nothing major until she came and asked me to take you in. Now you know why I agreed." He concluded, looking up at her again.

"Because you still love her." Rory stated. She could tell; the way he spoke about that time in his life, the time he spent with her mother, it was as if he was still holding onto something very precious.

"Well, I wouldn't say-"

"You do. You always have." Rory insisted, Luke didn't say anything to that and she realized she needed to stop. Usually torturing Luke was fun, but the way he looked in the moment, fun was about the farthest thing from Rory's mind. "Ok, so what did Emily want?"

"She said that a friend of Jess' told them you were here, so, now I guess that means that they want to see you."

"Nice that they want to meet me now; not at any point in the last, what did you say, fourteen years that I've been gone. That's really lovely, isn't it?"

"Yeah, well, the Gilmore's are… the Gilmore's." Luke replied, by way of explanation. "From what I remember, Emily pretty much always got what she wanted. So I guess, if she wants to see you…"

"Looks like I'll be going to Hartford." Rory nodded, resigned to her fate

"I could come with you. I mean, if you wanted,"

"Would you really be up for seeing them again? It sounds as if you weren't that high up on their favorite people list. Or them on yours,"

"Well, no. I don't think any one of us would enjoy that reunion too much. But I'm supposed to be taking care of you, so if you needed me there for support then… I wouldn't have a choice."

"That's true. You are, in a way, obligated to help me. Yeah, I think that would be a good idea. Thanks Luke." He smiled a little and she nodded. "Should I call her back now?"

"Uh, yeah, if you want." Moving to the table that the phone sat on, Luke rifled through the drawers until he found a small book. Opening it and flipping through the pages, he paused for a moment before he brought it to the couch. "Here, this should still be their number," he pointed to a name and number on the page and Rory took it and moved to the phone/ "I'll go downstairs, give you some privacy."

Rory smiled as Luke shut the door and then, took a deep, calming breathe. This wasn't supposed to be how it went. Rory had been thinking that all the time she spent in Stars Hollow she'd hate everyone and push them away. But Jess and Lane were both getting to her; even Luke, after that story he'd just told her, was going to get in, no doubt. It would probably be impossible to continue being horrible to him now.

'I should have grown up with these people,' she thought angrily. 'She shouldn't have done this to us.' As she dialed, Rory added this to her list, yet another thing to hold against Lorelai.

"Gilmore residence, Hillarie speaking," a woman answered and Rory gulped. Part of her had been hoping Luke had the wrong number so she wouldn't actually have to do this. Now she was stuck.

"Who is it Hillarie?" asked another woman's voice after a moment while Rory debated hanging up. This sucks! New York Rory has never been scared of anything, not really. Why am I so terrified?'

"I'm not sure Mrs. Gilmore."

"Well, just hang up then. There's no point encouraging that sort of behavior."

"Emily!" Rory squeaked. In her minds eye she could see the maid about to put the phone down and she was pretty certain that she didn't have the strength to make this call again. "I- I need to speak to… Em—Mrs. Gilmore." She explained and then the phone was changing hands.

"This is Emily Gilmore," the clipped voice from the other side of the room announced and Rory blinked back tears.

'Tears? I'm crying now? What the hell!' "Hi, I'm um… I…"

"Speak up young lady. Who are you calling for?"

"I'm Rory. Rory Gilmore, your-"

"Rory? Oh my, dear, how are you?"

"Ah, you know. I'm… well, my life is pretty crap, to tell you the truth." She bit her tongue, thinking she was making a horrible first impression. To Rory's surprise, her grandmother actually laughed.

"Yes, well, I can imagine. Forced to live with that man… Honestly, what was your mother thinking?"

Rory felt anger surge through her at the older woman's words. She wanted to defend her mother, explain about how great a guy Luke was, she had so many things to say, all right on the tip of her tongue, but none of those came out. Instead, she asked: "I was wondering, if maybe, you'd want to see me?"

"Of course! Yes, your grandfather and I would love to see you. Do you have plans this Friday night?"

"Well, I'm probably supposed to work, but I'm sure the diner would survive without us for a bit,"

"Wonderful! You'll come to dinner and we'll catch up on… Everything!"

"That sounds great," Rory replied. "Are you still at the same house?" She asked, looking at the page; her mom had written out an address for a house in the ritzy part of Hartford.

"We are, but how do you remember where that was?"

"I don't. I didn't even know until tonight that I'd lived there. But Luke has it written in his address book. That's great, though. So, we'll see you Friday night, around seven?"

"Yes, seven sounds good. Who do you mean by 'we'?"

"Oh, well, Luke, of course. He is, technically my guardian, so I figured it would be ok if he came with me. Plus I don't exactly have a driver's license as of yet."

"Alright then. We'll see you and Luke for dinner on Friday," Emily replied. This was the first time Rory could remember ever hearing the woman's voice, but she could just tell that something was not right with her tone. She really was not a happy lady at the moment.

"Great, ok. Bye." Rory hung up quickly and brought her hands up to cover her mouth as she chewed her lip. 'Did that really happen?' she wondered. "Oh God, this is going to be awful…" she muttered, walking over to the apartment door. It was probably time to tell Luke about the plans for Friday, 'give him time to think up a few excuses', she thought.

"She's what?" Lorelai demanded "She's going to my parent's house for dinner?"

"Um, well, yeah. Your mother called looking for her the other night," Sookie explained. "Turns out that one of Jess' friends at his new school knows them pretty well. After he mentioned meeting Rory, Emily called and now Luke's taking Rory to meet them."

"Luke's going too? Crap! Why would they do this? Don't they realize how horrible it would be? For every single person involved? Including the maid, I'm sure, who would have no idea about the history that any of these people share, given the fact that she's probably only been working in that house for two hours."

"Lorelai, it won't be that bad."

"Sookie, do you remember my parents?"

"Yes, of course I do."

"And do you remember how long it's been since Rory and I saw them, and the reason that it's been that long?"

"Uh huh…" Sookie frowned as she finally grasped the point her friend was trying to make. "Ok, it's gonna be catastrophic. But they've already made the plans and for the first time since she got here, Rory actually seems mildly excited about something. You wouldn't make them cancel would you?"

"I don't really think I can. You know my mother; once she starts planning for a dinner party nothing short of a holocaust can get in her way. I just really don't like this."

"I know. But I'm sure they'll be on their best behavior."

"Who are you talking about?" Lorelai asked, confused.

"Your parents?" Sookie replied, uncertainly.

"Well, they'd better be or I swear to god, I'll come up there and kick both their butts back to the freaking American Revolution."

"Should I let them know that, or would you like to surprise them?" Sookie asked, giggling.

"I think it would be more fun surprising them, don't you?" Lorelai asked before taking a deep breath. "Ok, just keep me posted. I want to know exactly how the dinner goes, so tell Rory and Luke to both take notes, that way I can compare and contrast and decide how severe the punishment should be."

"Deal."

"God, what I wouldn't give to be a fly on that wall,"

"Ditto, I'll see what we can do about that, and I'll call you back later, ok?"

"Sure. Talk to you then." Lorelai hung up and looked over at a photo of Rory on her seventh birthday. She was holding up a gift card from Barnes & Noble, a huge grin on her face. They hadn't had much money, but Lorelai had wanted to get something Rory would really enjoy, which naturally translated to books. But picking the right book was difficult, so she'd left it up to Rory. "They're sneaky sons of bitches, good luck, Kid." She muttered smiling sadly at the image.

AN2: Let's just blame this one on Tristan. His fault for mentioning he knew them. I hadn't even really had this planned, but it's fun. Well, at least it was for me. Please review!