Anna, Lorelai, and Rory were having the time of their lives eating cakes. "Oh my God, here!" Lorelai put a fork up to Anna's mouth.
She took the bite. "Wow."
"With a crunch and a zing and a hm hm hm hm, hello!" Lorelai greeted the fork that Rory put in front of her face before eating it.
"Okay, our house is burning down, and you can save the cake or me. What do you choose?" Rory asked her mother.
"Well, that's not fair. The cake doesn't have legs." Lorelai pouts. Anna laughed at her answer.
"So, how are we coming here?" Fran, the baker, came to ask them.
"Oh Fran, so good. This cake is amazing." Lorelai took another bite.
"Beyond amazing." Rory stuck her fork into a piece of cake.
"Beyond and Back." Anna hummed.
"Well, I should hope so. We've been doing this for 112 years." Fran went behind the counter.
"Well, you don't look a day over a 106." Lorelai points a fork at her.
"No, I meant my family's been doing it for that long." She shook her head.
"Right. Okay, well, I'm glad we got that cleared up." Lorelai nods slowly at her joke not landing.
"The raspberry, the raspberry, the raspberry!" Rory bounced in excitement. Anna used her fork to get a taste and hummed in agreement.
"So, when is the big day again?" Fran smiled at the girls before looking at their mother.
"Two weeks from tomorrow." She smiled.
"Have you picked a flavor?" She asked.
"Oh, I don't know. They're all so good." She looked at all the mini cakes.
"Well, you have to try them again." She told her.
"Oh no. I've already eaten so many." She pretended like she couldn't.
"This is a very crucial decision, young lady. The cake is the glue of the wedding, so you will stand here and eat until you decide." Fran's eyes light up with a passion for her work.
"Okay, if you insist." She took another bite of a cake.
"I do. After all, what's more, important than your wedding day?" She asked.
"Well, it ain't Guy Fawkes day." She smiled.
"Yes, well, I'll just go and see if there's anything else in the back." Fran nodded, but her face showed she had no idea what Lorelai was talking about. She walks into the back to get away from her.
"So, how was Max last night?" Rory asked.
"Well…" She smiled.
"No gory details." Anna cut her off.
"Like I've ever shared that part of my relationship with you." She scoffs.
"You've alluded, you've insinuated, you have tiptoed to the brink of impropriety." Rory agreed with her sister that her mom likes to gross them out.
"That Chilton has taught you some big words." She moves along the counter to take a bite of another cake.
"That's kind of the point." Rory and Anna follow along.
"It was really great. I'm glad he's back." She smiled.
"And he's on board with the whole smallish wedding thing?" Rory asked.
"Oh yeah. We want fun, we want simple, we want fast. We've been completely in sync, without the slight boy band affiliation." She added the last part when she saw Anna ready to make a joke.
"Oh, we printed up some sample invitations for you. We made them on my computer." Rory points between her and her sister.
"Aww." She coos.
Rory took them out of her bag. "All you have to do is pick out a quote for the front page, and I'll print 'em up."
"Okay. Um…What is love? It is the morning and evening star. Ugh." She pretends to gag.
"Told you she wouldn't like that one." Anna snickers.
"It's Sinclair Lewis." Rory defends her choice.
"Sinclair Sappy Lewis." She corrects.
"Next is mine," Anna said as Rory flipped to the next paper.
"And all went merry as a marriage bell. But hush! Hark! A deep sound strikes like a rising knell! What is it with poetry?" She scrunched up her nose.
"Poetry is romantic and it's Lord Byron." Anna pouts.
"Byron and Lewis, together again." She sang.
"Okay, last one. We chose this together." Rory flipped to the last quote.
"We have buried the putrid corpse of liberty. Perfect!" She slapped her hand on the joke quote.
"Mussolini it is. Um, can I ask you an ethical question?" She put the papers back in the bag. Her mom hummed in response. "Is it right to be sampling wedding cakes when Sookie's making yours for free?"
"What is right anyway, you know? Who defines right? And if eating cake is wrong, I don't want to be right." Lorelai spoke in riddles.
"I'm bringing out a mocha crunch cream," Fran called from the back.
"Please Rory, can we eat it?" Anna pleaded with her sister's sad face.
"So, ethics?" Lorelai asked.
"Highly subjective and completely overrated." Rory put on a small smile.
"That's my girl." Lorelai patted her head and Anna cheered.
Max is cooking dinner in the kitchen with Anna. "Why won't you let me help?" Lorelai was sitting on the table watching him cut up vegetables.
"Because you're a danger to the process." He watches as she eats a carrot.
"That's not true!" She denies.
"Yes, it is." Anna turns the broiler on.
"My flesh and blood over there be quiet. " Lorelai points at her.
"I've got numerous scars to prove that you are." Max insisted.
"I cut you that one…two times, and I've helped you tons of times." She looks at his hand to see that he didn't have the bandages anymore.
"You helped me twice and both times you cut me." He corrects her.
"Well, I do like watching you cook." She looks him up and down.
"I like you watching me cook." He winks.
"Okay, that's enough." Anna shut her eyes when she saw them kiss.
"What's that weird smell?" Rory walks into the kitchen.
"It's food!" Lorelai yelled back.
"It smells weird?" Max asked.
"No, just weird for this house. It smells great." Rory reassured him.
"Hey, I cook in here." Anna glares.
"Anna, can you open the broiler for me?" He nods to her.
"Sure." She opens the bottom of the stove.
Rory and Lorelai stared in amazement. "Ugh! Did you know we had that?" Lorelai asked.
"Not a clue." Rory's eyes were wide.
"Oh come on." Max shook his head. He bent down to put the pan in.
"Hey, it's on fire!" Lorelai yelled when he got close.
"It's the broiler," Max told them.
"Wow." They gasp.
"What fallout shelter have you guys been living in?" He closed it and stood up.
"You have to excuse them, I normally ban them from the kitchen when I'm cooking," Anna explains their childlike curiosity.
"He has much knowledge." Rory turns to her mom.
"We shall form a cult around him." Lorelai nods.
"Build a statue many stories high." They stare at him in amazement.
"We shall grow our hair long and stop bathing." Lorelai teased.
"Please, don't do any of that." Max played along with their silliness.
"Are we eating at the table?" Rory asked.
"Wherever you want." He shrugs.
"TV?" Lorelai did their normal routine. She didn't want them to think everything was going to be changed because Max was around.
"I'll get a tape." Rory ran into the other room.
"You chose last time." Anna ran after her.
In the end, they settled on the movie, The Born Losers. The Gilmore Girls were sitting on the floor in front of the TV while Max was sitting on the couch. "'You don't learn very fast, Injun.'" The bad guy walks into the room.
"How fast do you learn, Billy Jack?" Lorelai asked the character.
"'Fast enough.'" Bill Jack said as if he was answering her.
"Billy Jack, I'm gonna kill you if it's the last thing I do," Rory said the line with the bad guy.
"Ugh, he so jinxed himself with that one." Lorelai shook her head.
"Yeah, he should've said Billy Jack, I'm gonna kill you or buy myself a lovely chenille sweater.'" Rory said, making Max laugh.
"Ooh, yeah, either way, he wins." Anna nods.
"How many times have you seen this movie?" Max asked the girls.
"I'm out of digits." Lorelai didn't even try to count, it was useless.
"You can't see a Billy Jack movie too many times," Rory told him.
"Who's the guy Billy Jack's. . ." Max pointed at the bag guys, but he got hushed by the girls.
"'Alright you cats. Very slowly now." Anna said with Billy Jack.
"Let's do some jumping jacks." Lorelai joins her in the line.
"Spread out. One." Billy counts.
"Oh, it's the counting part," Rory said in excitement for the best line.
"'He means it, Daniel.'" A character and Anna warn the other guy.
"'Two." Billy went on.
"Ooh, here comes my favorite and my least favorite line all rolled into one." Lorelai dances in her seat.
"I'm gonna cut your bowels out." Daniel threatens. The girls cry out in disgust.
"Ooh, comeuppance time!" Lorelai shouts as Billy shots him.
"You guys talk throughout the whole movie and then when I say something, you shush me." Max stares down at them.
"That's because you're talking through parts we talked through last time, so we haven't seen those parts in awhile," Lorelai explains.
"Ah, well now it's clear." He rolls his eyes.
The phone rings, they turn to look at Max. "Max?" Lorelai called since he didn't feel their stares.
"What? The phone?" He asked.
"Whoever's closest answers," Lorelai told him.
"House rule," Rory added on.
"All three of you are closer." He points out.
"Oh, but I'd have to walk around the coffee table so my path would be farther." Lorelai pointed at the table between her and the phone.
"It would take more effort for me to get off the ground than it would for you to get off the couch." Anna put one hand on the ground and the other on the couch to show the height differences.
"And my foot's asleep." Rory looked down at feet that were asleep since she was sitting criss-cross.
"Plus you're taller." Lorelai looks up at him.
"With longer legs," Rory adds on.
"Yes, so even if we all left for the phone at exactly the same time…" Lorelai proves their side of the argument.
"I got it." He goes to answer the phone.
"I'm gonna like having him around." Lorelai smiled at them.
"You want a refill?" Lorelia looks over at her daughters.
"Yes, please." Anna held out her cup.
"Sure, same thing." Rory did the same.
"Max?" She turns back to look at her fiance.
The girls looked back at him when they got no answer, "Uh oh." Max was sleeping on the couch.
"We wore him out," Lorelai told them.
"We tend to do that." Rory nods.
"Well, we are ElectraWoman and DynaGirls." She smiled.
"ElectraWoman," Max spoke up.
"I think it's time to turn in," Rory said.
"I'm awake." He protests.
"You don't look like it." Anna looks at his closed eyes.
"No, I am. I'm just waiting for the guy with the thing on the…" He nods to the TV.
"Mom, get him to bed." Rory stood up and helped Anna get up.
"Yeah, okay. Come on hon." Lorelai got up to help him off the couch.
"What happened to Billy Jack?" Max asked.
"I'll explain it to you later." She told him.
"Goodnight." The girls waved.
"Goodnight." Lorelai nods.
"Goodnight." Max walks up the stairs.
"Is this weird?" Lorelai mouths to them before following him up the stairs. They shrugged, watching them leave.
"Hey." Lorelai shook Anna in her sleep
"What?" She groans with her eyes closed.
"I just realized I never asked you how you felt about Max moving in. How do you feel? Don't worry about hurting my feelings." She pulls the blanket off her.
"Go bother Rory with this." She turns on her side.
"You aren't bothered at all by it." She looks down at her.
"Mom, you know me if something was bothering me about Max moving in I would have said something when he proposed." She glares at the woman bothering her sleep.
"Did you think everything through? His moving-in is going to be life-altering. Nothing will be the same." She went on.
"It sounds like you're projecting your issues onto me." She shot her mother with an unamused look.
"It's good that you're okay with it. I'm going to see your sister." She walks out of the room.
Anna rolls her eyes at her mother before going back to sleep.
"Over there." Luke pointed the girls over to a small table.
"Uh, can you clear that one off?" Lorelai points to the bigger one.
"Why?" He asked.
"Because we are four, today," Anna told him.
"Four?" He looks, counting only three of them.
"Yeah, Max is with us." Lorelai points outside.
"Max, huh? So when did Max become invisible to the human eye?" Luke looks outside to see no one standing there.
"He's on a paper hunt," Lorelai explains.
"Max likes his three papers in the morning: The Hartford Courant, the New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal." Rory sits down at the table with her sister and mother.
"Three papers." Luke made a face as he cleans the table.
"He likes to be well informed." Lorelai defends.
"Yeah, well, reading three papers all reporting the same news is a terrific use of trees." Luke gave his thoughts.
"You be nice Luke, I mean it." She warns him.
Max walks into the diner. "Hey there." He greets Luke.
"Max, buddy, top of the morning to you! Hey, you look good today. Brown is your color, my friend." Luke pats his back.
"Thanks." Max nods before walking over to the table.
"So?" Lorelai asked.
"I got two out of three." He put the newspapers down.
"Not bad." Rory nods.
"No one has the Wall Street Journal." He told them the paper he was missing.
"Well, this isn't a very financially oriented town," Anna explains the missing paper.
"Yes, it's more oriented to coffee." Lorelai put her empty mug into the air.
"I've got the blueberry pancakes this morning." Luke came over to fill up the mugs.
"Bring 'em." Lorelai nods.
"Bring 'em twice." Rory put her hands up.
"Bring 'em thrice." Anna put up three fingers.
"And you?" Luke looks over at Max.
"I'm gonna need a minute." He told him.
"Oh. Well, then, hold off." Lorelai nods to Luke.
"Same here." Rory agrees.
She nudged her sister when she didn't say anything. "Me too." Anna pouts.
"I might run out of the pancakes," Luke told them.
"Go ahead, order. I'll just be a minute." Max told them.
"Okay, get my blueberry pancakes." Anna orders getting a glare from her mother and sister. "What, he might run out? I'll wait for Max's food to actually eat it."
"I'm almost out and I can't make more," Luke told the other two.
"Set some aside." Lorelai hisses.
"You can't do that, it's first-come, first-serve. Diner rules." Anna spoke for Luke. "You think I wanted Kirk to have the last piece of strawberry shortcake over Miss Patty. No, but I did it in the name of customer service."
"We'll take our chances." Lorelai huffs.
"Yes, we'll wait." Rory nods.
"Whatever." He walks away.
"You didn't need to do that," Max told the two.
"Aww, happy to." Lorelai smiles. Max reads over the menu while Rory and Lorelai state at him. "Okay, yeah, that's still eggs and all your basic breakfast stuff up there." She points to the part he was looking over.
"Hey, don't rush the man," Anna smirks.
"Just order." Max sighs.
"We're fine." Rory insisted, even though they were clearly eager for him to order so they could.
"I want you guys to go at your normal pace. My rhythm might not necessarily be your rhythm." Max didn't want them to bend to his way. He wanted their lives to naturally melt together. Luke walks over to hand Max another menu. "What's this?" He asked.
"It's the lunch menu. I stop serving breakfast in an hour." He told him.
"Luke." Lorelai scolds. Anna put her hands over her mouth to hide her laughing. Sometimes Luke could be such a mean girl.
"I'll have poached eggs." He orders.
"And blueberry pancakes!" Lorelai and Rory yell.
"Did we make it?!" Rory asked.
"I already set 'em aside," Luke told them.
"Love ya!" Lorelai smiled and stuck her tongue out at Anna.
Luke notices a work crew outside. "What the hell are they doing out there?"
"What? Who is that?" Taylor got off his stool.
"What are they doing, Taylor?" He turned to the man.
"Looks like they're coning off the street." He pretends like he didn't know.
"Taylor." He growls.
"Well, if you must know, they are a county work crew here to install Stars Hollow's first traffic light and metered crosswalk." He told him. Luke rushes outside. "Luke!" Taylor chased after him.
"That wasn't at the town meeting." Anna shook her head.
"I'm going to be noisy." Lorelai got up and went outside.
"Hopefully, she stops him from hitting Taylor." Rory looks out of the window.
"Hopefully, not." Anna watches. Sadly, there wasn't any action.
The Gilmore Girls were having a night out with Max and Dean. Lorelai insisted that Anna came along, even though she felt like a fifth wheel, the spare tire. They were walking along the sideway. "Ugh, I can barely walk." Max groans.
"Bad shoes?" Lorelai looks down at his feet.
"I ate a cow," Max told her.
"You had a steak." She rolls her eyes.
"Plus the sides." Dean reminds.
"Five people, eight baked potatoes." Max was so full he was in pain.
"Uh, you always exaggerate." Lorelai laughs.
"Am I exaggerating?" He looks over at the other male in the group.
"Nope." Dean shook his head.
"Ooh, ice cream!"Rory ran to the ice cream parlor.
"Ooh, I'm right behind you!" Lorelai and Anna ran after her. Anna got herself a mocha nut fudge. Lorelai and Rory got ice cream for themselves and their men. "Hey, chocolate chip." Lorelai hands Max an ice cream cone.
"Thanks." He grabs it.
"You're welcome." She smiles.
"Ugh, I'm so full. Why'd you let me eat so much?" Lorelai complained to Max when they were walking up the steps to the house. He looks back at Dean confused. He laughs at the man's expression.
"Goodnight." Anna walks into the house to go up into her room. It was the first night in a long time she couldn't help but think of Tristan. It was a weird tug of war feeling inside of her. While she felt like she was missing him tonight, she was sure it was because it was a date-like setting. Besides he would have complained about how lame it was to go on a triple date with her mom, her future step-father/their teacher, her sister, and her sister's boyfriend. He was right when he said their interest didn't match up.
She grabbed a cookbook off her shelf and a notebook to write down the ingredients for recipes she wanted to try.
Lorelai, Sookie, Rory, Anna, Miss Patty, and Michel are standing in line outside a nightclub. "Oh, this place looks like fun!" Miss Patty looks at the drunk couple coming out of the club.
"They're never gonna let me in." Rory whines.
"I told you to pick a dress that shows cleavage or a bit of leg, but no. You have to be modest." Anna scoffs.
"They will let you in." Lorelai put a hand over Anna's mouth to say.
"This is a felony, you know, corrupting a minor. We'll all end up in the bookie." Michel pouts as he stares at Rory and Anna.
"He's right. We're all going to the bookie." She nods.
"Sweetie, don't say bookie. It's creepy." Lorelai shook her head.
"Just try to look older," Sookie told her.
"How?" Rory asked.
"Cleavage and leg." Anna pushes her mom's hand away to say.
"Look like you're thinking about retirements or 401Ks and stuff." Sookie advises.
"Yes, you should've brought your fake beard and mustache." Michel mocks.
"Who invited Mister Schnickelfritz?" Lorelai points at him.
"He heard us planning and wanted to come," Sookie explains.
"I did not know the evening included babysitting." Michel gave the teens another distasteful look.
"They're going to get in." She told him. Her cell phone rings. "Sorry. Hey!" She turns away from the group.
"I'll put more makeup on you." Anna took some blush out of her purse to put it on her sister.
After their mom got off the phone, she rejoined the group. "Okay, new rule for the evening. No calls to fiancés or boyfriends or anything else like that. It's girl's night out. Plus Michel." Sookie points at her coworker.
They reach the club entrance. "It's twelve bucks. And it's eighteen and over." He looks at the two young girls.
"Oh, they're eighteen." Sookie nods.
"That's right. Last week. So it's a new eighteen, but it's eighteen, yup." Rory told him.
"You got some ID?" He asked.
"Here you go." Anna hands him two fake IDs
"Alright, twenty bucks." He gave the IDs back.
"Pay the man." Anna nods to the adults while pulling Rory in.
"Give me those." Lorelai took the fake IDS from her when they were in the club. "These look real." She stared down at them.
"How do you get them?" Rory asked.
"From Thomas, who has a hookup." She explains.
They walk inside to see all the men dressed as beautiful women. "This is a drag club." Michel looks at Marilyn Monroe walk past them with a tray of drinks.
"It's called Queen Victoria. What did you expect, tea and crumpets?" Sookie looks back at him.
"Aw, you guys, I guess we're gonna have to stand." Lorelai looks around at the crowded club.
"Wait, that one looks open." Sookie points to a table.
They walk towards the table to see Emily is sitting there. "Oh my God." Lorelai gasps, seeing her mom.
"Grandma." Anna ran over to sit next to her.
"Hello, Dear." She smiled.
"Excuse me, sir, you look just like my mother." Lorelai walks over to the table with the rest of the group behind her.
"Hi, Grandma. Come here often?" Rory kissed her on the cheek.
"I should say not. How did you two get in?" She looks at her two granddaughters.
"Fake IDs," Anna told her.
Emily nods before looking at her daughter, "Happy bachelorette party, Lorelai."
"Thank you, Mother." Lorelai pushed her lips together.
"And in the future, when you plan one of these things, and you tell a person to show up at eight o'clock, it is considered good manners for you to also show up at eight o'clock." Emily scolds hers.
"Well, I didn't exactly invite you, mother, Michel did." She points to the man.
"Ah, well, I feel much better now." She sips her drink.
"Huh, let's drink." She was going to need one now that her mom was here.
"Looks like Emily's gotten a head start. What are you drinking, honey?" Miss Patty asked.
"Manhattan. Good too. Not too sweet. I ordered it from that nice fellow dressed as Joan Crawford." She explains.
"So, is there no dancing here? I was hoping there'd be dancing." Michel sat down next to Sookie.
"You need to strut Tony Minero?" She pats his shoulder.
"It is a weekend and on the weekend I like to move, and the ladies, they like it too." Michel winks.
"Especially when you move out of town. Ba zing!" Lorelai slams her hand on the table.
"Has she eaten?" Emily asked Sookie.
"Yeah. About a quart of wine." Sookie let her know that they pregame before they got here.
A waitress comes to the table "Hmm, hi Mae West." Lorelai greets.
"What can I get for you?" She asked.
"My dignity back." Michel orders.
"We'll have rum and coke, a margarita no salt, a martini with olives, two Shirley Temple…" She points to the person as she gave their order.
"Love her!" Mae West nods.
"I'll have her on the rocks please." Rory orders.
"And uh, I will have a giant Long Island iced tea." Lorelai points to herself.
"Coming up." She went to the bar.
"So Lorelai, how are you feeling?" Emily asks her daughter.
"Um, well, I'm tipsy but just short of seeing pink elephants," Lorelai explains her current state.
"No, I mean about you getting married. It's only a week away." She made it clear.
"I'm fine. Everything's fine. I figured once I got the shoes to match the dress, the rest was just gravy." She ate a pretzel.
"I must say, I admire your composure. The week before my wedding, I was a wreck." Emily told her.
"So was I, before all of mine." Miss Patty nods.
"How many was that?" Sookie asked.
"Well, uh, there was Sinjin, John, Sergio, Sinjin. Three men, four times." She used her fingers to count.
"Do you regret any of them?" Anna asked.
"Well, Sinjin was a let down the second time, but he was my Burton and I was his Taylor. Just wish I could've found a little Mike Todd there in the middle." Miss Patty put her fingers together to show how little she needed Mike.
"You know, I can't believe it was 34 years ago that I married Richard. I remember it so distinctly." She looks up at the ceiling with a dreamy look on her face.
"Ooh, this is gonna be a romantic story." Sookie claps her hands. Anna perks up to hear it.
"My stomach was not my friend. It was full of butterflies, I couldn't eat a bite the whole week." Emily remembers how nervous but excited she was.
"Hmm, what a bummer." Lorelai kept eating the table snacks.
"I was actually weak in the knees. Trembling all the time, can you imagine?" She was such a mess, she barely got anything done that week.
"Really?" Rory smiled.
"When I wasn't actually with Richard, I was thinking about him. Constantly. Imagining what he was doing, was he thinking about me? Making up little scenarios in my head about how we'd run into each other accidentally at the club. He would be playing golf and I would walk by and he would be so distracted that he'd completely miss the ball. Silly." It was endearing how she looked like she was still daydreaming about those moments.
"It's sweet." Sookie smiled.
"I was in love." Emily drank her Manhattan.
"It is wonderful to be in love." Michel sighs.
"But the thing I remember most was that for the entire week before my wedding, I'd wait until my mother went to sleep, and I'd sneak out of bed and I'd put on my wedding dress and my tiara and my gloves, and I would stare at myself in the mirror and think how very safe I felt. How very right and wise and honored." She looked at the group that was smiling at her. "This is a very good drink. I highly recommend it."
"Okay, I have got to make a call." Sookie took her phone out of her purse.
"Are you calling Jackson?" Miss Patty asked.
"No. Well yes, but it's only because I need to pick up something I left at his house, that if it's still there, I should. . .hi honey, it's me." She got up from the table.
"And who are you writing to?" Emily looked over at Rory, who had her pager out.
"I just want to see if Dean's around." Rory shrugs.
"And thinking about you?" Emily gave her a knowing smile. Rory blush as she finishes her page.
"Oh no, not you too." Miss Patty looks over at Lorelai digging in her purse.
"No, it's just..it's…I'll be quick." She walks away from the table.
"I'm going to shake my thing." Michel got up to dance.
"What about you? Don't want to see if Tristan is thinking of you?" Emily asked. Rory and Miss Patty looked alarmed.
"He broke up with me. He was tired of being in a commitment. Sorry, I didn't tell you but it was never the right time. The last couple Friday nights have been so good, I didn't want to bring them down." She explains knowing that her Grandmother would be hurt being the last to know.
"That's good to hear. You'll find someone better." Emily had been hearing the trouble he was getting into. She was glad that her granddaughter no longer had ties to him.
"Thanks." She felt silly not mentioning it sooner when she took it so well.
"Hey." Lorelai came back to the table.
"Hey." Sookie came back soon after.
"Did Michal leave?" She wonders.
"Nope. He said he had to shake his thing." Miss Patty nods to the man dancing by himself. Soon a few drag queens join him, making him uncomfortable.
"I'm going to dance too." Anna got up to join them. She giggled as Liza Minnelli twirled her around.
Lorelai is sitting at the table balancing her checkbook. Rory is at the counter, pouring herself a glass of orange juice. "I can't believe that school is already starting." Anna was sitting across from her mom, getting her planner ready for the new school year.
"Ugh. I used to hate school starting. I once flipped the pages back in a calendar my mom kept in the kitchen and tried to convince her it was June and not September." Lorelai remembers thinking she would be able to fool her every year.
"Didn't work?" Rory put the orange juice carton back in the fridge.
"Hmm, oddly enough." She shrugs.
"I got an interesting call today." Rory sits at the table.
"Oh yeah, who?" She asked.
"Dad." She told her. Anna looked up, knowing what she was about to bring up.
"Cool. How is he? I..I..I talked to him last night." She mutters.
"He mentioned that." Anna nods.
"Yeah, I was about to mention it myself." She lied.
"That's quite a coincidence," Rory said, even though she didn't buy it.
"Did I not mention it last night?" She asked.
"No, I would have remembered that." Anna laughs.
"I could've sworn I did." She shrugs.
"Why'd you call him?" Rory asked.
"Oh, just to check-in." She looked down at her checkbook.
"At your bachelorette party?" Anna pushed her eyebrows together.
"Seemed as good a time as any." She kept her eyes down.
"To catch up on calls?" Rory pushed on.
"Yeah, pretty much." She looks up at them to smile.
"Seems like a weird time to call someone that you didn't even invite to the wedding." Anna points out.
"Did he call just to fink on me?" She put the pen down.
"No. He wanted to see what's up with you. He thought it was weird too." Rory defends her father.
"Heaven forbid I ever use the phone again." She threw her hands in the air.
"Was it when you told us you were calling Max?" Rory asked.
"Somewhere around there." She closed the checkbook.
"Why would you let us assume you were calling Max?" Anna asked.
"Honey, someday when you're a little older you will be introduced to something that is extremely seductive but fickle. A fair-weather friend who seems benign but packs a wallop like a donkey kick and that is the Long Island iced tea. The Long Island iced tea makes you do things that you normally wouldn't do, like lifting your skirt in public or calling someone you normally wouldn't call at really weird times." She explains the effects of strong alcohol.
"I'm not looking forward to meeting the Long Island iced tea." Rory smiled.
"I'd definitely walk the other way." Lorelai wished she did last night.
"Dad said, he wants to see you happy," Anna told her.
"I know." She nods.
"And we really want you to be happy." She points to herself and Rory.
"I know, sweetie." She nods again.
"You are happy about all this, aren't you?" She leaned in to ask.
"Don't I seem happy?" She counters.
"That's not an answer." Anna sighs.
"I'm happy." She smiled.
"Okay, I'll be in my room." She got up to take her planner up to her room. She forgot her school calendar up there anyway. Rory went to her room to read.
"You need to pack." Rory came into Anna's room.
"What?" She looked up from her magazine.
"Mom, calling off the wedding. She wants to go on a road trip to avoid having to face everything." She explains.
"That's what the phone call to dad was about. She knew she wasn't ready." She got up to grab her duffle bag.
"Yeah, we're going at five in the morning. I got to finish packing. Bring a swimsuit, just in case." She walks out of the room.
They were in the jeep driving through an empty Stars Hollow. "Wow, totally deserted." Rory thought there would be some people getting their shops ready for the day.
"We're the last ones left." Lorelai turned onto the main street.
"So, are we almost there?" Rory smiled.
"We're almost there and nowhere near it. All that matters is we're going." Lorelai looks ahead.
"We're practically gone already." Anna smiled in the backseat.
"Look out world." They stop at the red light and stare at it, waiting for it to change.
"Damn Taylor," Anna cursed the new traffic light.
