A/N: Yes, chapter 6 is here. Emily and Richard will make an appearance in this chapter, and things will be revealed. Yeah! If anyone's interested in the ring, you can find a link on my page. It's something like that, although the ring I imagined Jess buying had slightly smaller stones in just one row, and was made of whitegold. If there are any readers in Chile reading this, sorry for dissing your food, I just though it might be something the Gilmore's would… well… You'll see.
Disclaimer: I, the author of this story, do not own any of the characters from Gilmore Girls. That honor belongs to the wonderful Amy Sherman-Palladino. I am not making any money on this (in fact, I wouldn't be surprised it I'm losing money over it…).
Chapter 6: Confessions of a Gilmore
"Okey, so mom first?" Rory asked.
"Yes, first Lorelai, then we tackle the slight speedbump on our road to marriage that is your grandparents." Jess, sighed, having heard the "plan" ever since they began the walk home.
They were almost at the Crap Shack, and the closer they got, the more anxious Rory got.
"Rory, are you sure this is what you want?" he asked. "It just seems that since I proposed you've been more nervous and jittery than ever before."
"Are you kidding me? Of course I want to marry you, silly! It just seems that it will be everybody's business, and it freaks me out to have to take everyone else into consideration. I might actually need a list for this one."
"What, to figure out whether you should marry me?" Jess teased.
"No! Whether I should invite any of the townspeople. You know, it might just boil down to you, me, mom, Lane and Zach. And grandma and grandpa, if they behave." Rory counted on her fingers.
"You know, that doesn't sound half bad."
"You're mean, and you're playing dirty."
"I play dirty?"
"Yes! You get me thinking about all of this just so it will take us forever to get home, where my ring awaits."
"Wow, I had a hidden agenda and didn't even know about it, I do play dirty."
"Come on Jess, don't stall."
"Fine…"
The Crap Shack was empty when they came home.
"I bet mom's at Luke's, trying to figure out a way to expose Taylor."
"Or keeping Luke from remembering that Taylor almost banished me."
"Or both!" Rory laughed.
"So… the ring, right? Before you accuse me of further stalling you?"
"Please!"
Jess motioned for Rory to sit down at the kitchen table, while he snuck into her room. There, he pulled a small velvety box out of his bag, a box he had put there in Philly, while Rory was in the bathroom collecting her stuff. He had bought the ring on a whim, he had seen it, and before he knew it, he was in there buying it. It was a whitegold ring, encrusted with five small sapphires and diamonds alternately. It was… perfect. Or it would have been perfect, for the perfect occasion, when he'd have a nice speech ready. Not that he hadn't minded the place he had proposed to her at (that was actually pretty perfect…), but the driving force behind it… well… that could have been better. Jess smiled to himself. "At least I popped the question, and she said yes." he thought to himself.
When he came out into the kitchen, Rory was more or less bouncing off the chair.
"Relax, or I'm taking this back." he teased.
Rory immediately stopped bouncing, and Jess got down on one knee before her. Slowly, and he made it torturously slow just to tease Rory more, he opened the box. When she saw the ring, she let out a sharp squeal, then her hand flew up to her mouth and she got quiet.
"Is that a happy face or a 'holy crap, I should have read Ernest and perhaps I wouldn't be here now'-face?"
"It's... It's a 'Oh my god, I don't want to know how much that cost you but I love it!'-face." she whispered, still looking at the ring.
He took out the ring, taking Rory's left hand in his, sliding the ring on her finger. It felt magical, bordering on Dali-surreal. When the ring was on, they sat quiet for what seemed like an eternity.
"Should I say anything?" Jess asked after minutes of silence.
"Or should I say anything?" Rory countered.
"How about we go to Luke's to celebrate?"
"What, and proclaim to the entire town that we're engaged? And yes, if Miss Patty or any of her gossip mill-affiliates are there, they will see the ring."
"You can take the ring off if that bothers you. I still know you'll marry me."
"No! I don't want to take off the ring… It's mine…"
"Okey, Gollum. Try the 'Sweet Home Alabama'-tactic and slide it around to hide the stones."
"Because that worked out so well."
"Hey, at least I came with a suggestion."
"Fine, but I'm hedging my bets by putting it on the wrong finger as well, and if we don't get home tonight on account of the entire town shanghaing our future wedding, I'm holding you responsible, Mariano."
"I'm scared witless, Gilmore."
With that, Rory took off the ring, sliding it on her right ringfinger, turning it so the stones faced the inside of her hand.
At Luke's, they found Luke and Lorelai at the counter, arguing seemingly wordlessly.
"It's so fascinating." Kirk said, when he noticed that they were looking at Lorelai. "It's like a new form of communcation, I wonder if they invented it to keep me out of whatever they're talking about, because I'm so good at reading lips..."
"I wouldn't put it past them, Kirk." Jess told him, chuckling on the inside.
"Mom!" Rory yelled, effectively breaking Luke and Lorelai's heads apart.
"Fruit of my loins, there you are!" Lorelai exclaimed, getting off the stool. "Where did you two lovebirds go off to?"
Jess could see Rory cringe the slightest at the mentioning of "lovebirds", but she quickly recovered.
"Not far, we just walked around, reminiscing about… stuff."
"Yeah?" Luke cut in. "You reminisce anything that I could use against Taylor, since the pascifist here forbade me to use violence?"
"Maybe…" Jess answered michievously.
"Oh come on, Jess. Spill it. You despise Taylor almost as much as I do."
"I don't despise him, he's just fun to pull pranks on."
The two of them got into a row about whether Jess should tell Luke about Taylor or not, so Lorelai and Rory left them at the counter, and seated themselves by the window. Rory was careful not to put her hands on the table.
"So, I take it you and Rocky-boy there are ready for tomorrow." Lorelai began.
"Tomorrow?" Rory asked, confused.
"Honey, after seven years of 'no plans for the happiest day of the week', I'd think you'd remember…"
"Oh man, Friday night dinner!"
"Amazing, you leave town for almost two years, sure, you pop in a few times, but you still manage to forget the one day of the week when we actually have to struggle to get through a door."
"And not because of the slightly pornographic fountain in the driveway…"
"If things would only be so good." Lorelai sighed. "My mother somehow caught wind of the fact that you were here, and yes, I might have been involved in that, but only to make her stop talk about me."
"Mom!"
"Hey, you gave up my Renoir-girl!"
"Well, perhaps I did it because I unconsciously knew you ratted me out to grandma! When did this happen?"
"After I left work earlier today. I sort of got lost…"
"You got lost? In Stars Hollow?"
"Shush you. So, I was driving around, and my phone rang, and of course it was my mother, hassling me, so I more or less screamed your name, and she didn't talk about me for the rest of the call."
"You have no shame."
"You're silly beyond anything! I can't belive we're actually standing here like a couple of nitwits…"
They were standing outside the Gilmore residence, Lorelai stalling them all by blocking the doorbell.
"Is he always like this?" Rory asked her mother, nodding towards Luke.
"Oh yeah," Lorelai answered. "I offered once to go ten minutes in advance, because then he'd arrive just in time for me to actually ring the doorbell, but I only got a 'ridiculous' from him, so I took it as a no."
"Yeah, and once she told me this story…" Luke grunted.
"What, there is a story for the actual entering?" Jess asked.
"Oh no, mom, don't tell me you told him the cowherderess-story."
"I was desperate! It was the night I…" Lorelai said, then noticing Luke's dark look. "Okey, it was the night we…"
"The night I had to tell your parents that we were seeing each other again, because you were too busy with an avocado-pea battle to talk any sense." Luke corrected her.
"Your mom's a fruitcake." Jess commented with a laugh.
"A fruitcake that looks good in heels." Lorelair quipped.
"That you do." Rory agreed.
"Don't encourage her!" Luke reprimanded her, jostling Lorelai aside and then rang the doorbell.
"Oh well, there's no turning back now. Prepare to drop dead, yet again, from an overdose of cutlery."
The door opened, revealing a scared-looking maid. Lorelai had already taken off her coat, as had Rory, and they gave them to the maid.
"Mom?" Lorelai yelled.
"Lorelai. There is no need to scream, we're in here!" came Emily's voice.
"Ah, the livingroom. Why change the M.O, when you've got a good one going."
"Come on, mom, she'll be to busy talking to me and scowling at Jess to notice any of your vegetable battles." Rory said, taking Jess' arm just as he came up to them, and walked off toward the livingroom.
"One can only hope…" Lorelai muttered, before taking Luke by the hand, following the two youngsters.
Rory was right. Emily and Richard were too engaged in picking Rory's life to pay notice Lorleai, and once Rory mentioned Jess' new book, at least Richard was very interested, while Emily merely looked like she had bitten a sour apple. Lorelai was happily sitting quietly through drinks, fidgeting nervously with her drink, which she hardly even sipped from), humming now and then.
"Are you okey?" Luke whispered, as they were moving toward the dining room.
"Sure. Fine. Superfine. Above and beyond." she whispered back.
"Sorry I asked…"
"I do hope you are hungry, we had Anna-Perenna cook something called Bistec a lo Pobre. It's a Chilean dish, and is supposed to be delicious." Emily told the party when they were seated around the table. "Of course I had her swap the fries for something more apppropriate."
"Sound nice mom, but really, I wouldn't have minded the fries." Lorelai tried to joke.
"Yes, I could have guessed."
"Is Anna-Perenna Chilean?" Jess asked, in an attempt to be mildly interested.
"No, I think she's from the Honduras, or something around there."
Jess had to try hard to suppress his laughter, and Rory hit him over his knees.
"Ah, here comes the food!" Richard said, looking over toward the kitchen door.
What was set before them looked like nothing remotely resembling food. A slob of meat in a sick yellowish-grey hue was neatly placed in the center of the place, surrounded by baked potatoes, a fresh salad of tomatoes, lettuce and something (it may have been a fruit) neither of them recognized (save perhaps for Luke, but he was too busy staring at the slob of meat), and finally, there were two fried eggs.
"Really mom, I would take the fries now." Lorelai pleaded.
"Lorelai, stop being picky and eat your dinner."
"No, seriously mom…"
"Lorelai, you are acting like a child. Eat your dinner, and do not play around with it this time."
Lorelai sighed, picking at the meat slob before cutting it into tiny, tiny pieces and blending it with the contents of her baked potato.
Rory was sitting to the left of Jess, concentrating on not looking at her food (she found that once you didn't look at it and tried to ignore the lasting image of it, it didn't taste half bad), and occasionally she took Jess' hand under the table, giving it an encouraging squeeze whenever his facial expressions became tortured enough. Rory constantly reminded herself not to do it too often, because then her mom would surely notice and it would end with Rory telling her that she was engaged. Looking up at her mother, Rory saw that her mom was now greedily eating, but not the baked potato. Lorelai was stuffing in mouthful after mouthful of the salad. Not once in her life had Rory seen her mom relented to the salad of Friday night dinner without a fight.
"Mom…" she said in a low voice.
"Hmm?" Lorelai asked, mouth full of salad.
"You're… You're eating the salad."
"So?"
"You're eating the salad. Sans mocking, playing or any other non-eating procedures. That's not…"
The same thought seemed to hit Lorelai as well, and she dropped her fork, not quite managing to hide her guilty face in time. Seconds later Rory squealed, a high-pitched noise that made Luke cover his ears, her hand flying up to her mouth.
"No way! You…"
Lorelai's eyes bulged, zooming in on Rory's hand. Too late, Rory realized that it was her right hand that had flown up. What worse was, she could feel how the ring had shimmied its way around, so part of the row of sparkling stones was clearly visible. "Oh, man…" Rory thought, before her mother let out an equally high-pitched squeal.
"You..!" they both began, stopping mid-sentence to look wildly at each other.
The rest of the dinner party was completely lost at this outbreak. The girls looked like they were about to explode, when they simoultaneously shouted out:
"You're pregnant!"
"You're engaged!"
A/N: Sorry again for dissing the food, I feel so condescending and mean, hope anyone who may have been offended can forgive me. So, I'm off to punish my condescending self with a bit of thesis writing (yes, right now it's a punishment), hope you enjoyed the chapter. Review please!