AN: This is just a little idea I've had rattling around in my twisted little brain for a while after re-watching "New and Improved Lorelai". I kept thinking what if Emily had decided to retaliate against Lorelai for waking her up in the middle of the night. This is going to be just a one-shot for now as I'm desperately trying to keep going on "We're OK" I may continue this at a later date or I may leave it as is, depending on how long it takes me to get my other story completed.

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Luke and Lorelai lay contentedly in bed sound asleep; Luke spooned up behind her as was their usual sleeping habit. They'd spent another evening celebrating their engagement after Luke had presented her with the ring he'd bought her, underneath the chuppah he'd built for her. It had started out a little rocky when Luke realized she'd been crying over Rory's defection to her grandparents' house. He just let her cry until she'd gotten it all out, then decided to wait to give her the ring since she was so upset, but she'd insisted on knowing what he'd meant when he said "moment's here." He'd been elated the look of sheer joy on her face when he gave her the ring he'd so carefully picked out for her and how the sad tears had become happy tears when he slid it on her finger. She'd then kissed him sweetly, taken him by the hand and led him upstairs to her bedroom where they made love passionately, but tenderly, both relishing every moment of their renewed celebration. When they'd exhausted all their energy and were lying spent in each other's arms, they'd again talked about how incredible it was that they were getting married, before drifting off into peaceful sleep together. The moment was not to last, though as they were both startled awake by the sound of the bedroom door crashing against the wall behind it.

"What the hell is going on?" Luke shouted as he unwrapped himself from Lorelai and sat up in bed.

"That's what I'd like to know," Lorelai said as she also sat up, reached for the lamp on the nightstand and flipped the switch. She turned toward the doorway to see her parents standing in it.

"Oh my god," Emily said when she realized her daughter was not in bed alone.

"Aw jeez," Luke said as he tried to make sure that his private parts were covered as he was naked because of their earlier lovemaking.

"Hello to you too, Luke," Emily said with disdain as she noticed his state of undress and the clothing scattered across the bedroom floor.

"Mom, what the hell are you doing here in the middle of the night?" Lorelai asked impatiently.

"Sorry to interrupt," Emily said her voice dripping with innuendo.

"You're interrupting nothing but sleep," Luke said getting irritated.

"Now, if you'd been here an hour ago, you'd have really been interrupting something," Lorelai said with an impish grin directed at Luke.

"Jeez, Lorelai, Was that necessary?" He blushed furiously and turned back toward Emily, when it suddenly hit him that by committing to marry Lorelai, he was also committing to spending his life with the Gilmores as his in-laws. "Seriously, we were just sleeping when you walked in. That's it."

"Sleeping?"She questioned with an arched eyebrow still not believing it.

"Yes, sleeping. I have to be up in…" he glanced at the clock, "…three hours to open my business, so, yeah, we were sleeping."

"Do you always sleep like that with my daughter?" she asked indicating his nudity.

"How is that your business?"

"Mom," Lorelai interjected before this tiff between her mother and her fiancé could escalate. "You still haven't answered me. What are you doing here?"

"Well, you seemed extremely concerned about getting your laundry basket back," she said scathingly as she gestured toward her husband who was holding said basket. Richard had remained silent throughout this whole exchange. He didn't even want to be there, but Emily had insisted and he knew she was not a woman to cross when she was angry, so he'd gone along with it. He'd also gone along with it partly because he was hoping that his daughter might have calmed down a little since she'd left Hartford.

"Touché, Mom."

Luke looked at Lorelai and said, "Do I even wanna' know what that means or should I just shut the hell up?"

"I'll explain it all to you later, Doll," Lorelai replied.

"How the hell did you get in here, anyway?" Luke asked, glancing back at Emily." I know I locked the front door when we came in."

"The key in the turtle," Emily replied succinctly.

"There's a key in the turtle?" He looked at Lorelai. "How come I never knew there was a key in the turtle?"

"Because you don't need the key in the turtle, you have your own key."

"Luke has a key to your house?" Richard questioned finally breaking his long-standing silence.

"Yes, Dad, he does. He has for a while. It makes it a lot easier on the nights he closes the diner when he comes over here looking for a little late-night booty call."

"Lorelai, stop," Luke said blushing again. "I'm begging you."

"What? You know, that's what they're thinking about seeing us in bed together naked. They must think you're some kind of perv who's only after sex, even though you and I both know that's not true," she said fingering her engagement ring while she clutched the sheet tightly to her bare breasts. This action was not lost on Emily.

"Well, it seems congratulations are in order," Emily said with a look of contempt on her face directed at Luke.

"Well, that wasn't exactly congratulations, but sure. Close enough," Lorelai said sarcastically.

"When did this happen?" Richard asked. "I don't recall you wearing that ring when you were at our house earlier."

"I wasn't. Luke just gave it to me after I got home."

Emily looked at Luke, revolted and said, "Well, I hope to God you didn't propose to her in bed. That is completely tacky!"

"No, I actually-"Luke began.

"Mom, stop," Lorelai said cutting him off. "Luke has way more class than that, not that you'd know since you've never taken the time to really get to know him. You just make snap judgments based on who you think he is." The truth was she didn't want her to know that she'd been the one to propose to him. It would just give her overly-critical mother one more reason to take a swipe at the man she loved. "Now, you brought the laundry basket back, which I appreciate. So, if that's all you came for, it'd be nice if we could get back to sleep. The alarm clock will be going off at quarter to five so Luke can get to work.

"No, that's not all we came for," Richard said. "We were hoping we could talk to you about this situation with Rory."

"What's left to talk about? I went to you for help like a crazy person. I don't know what the hell I was thinking. I must have been out of my mind to think you'd actually do something to help me without turning it around in some way that benefits you. You did what you want as usual, not giving a damn about the fact that I'm her mother and I want more for her. She worked so hard to get into Yale and it breaks my heart that you're letting her just throw it all away over that jackass frat boy and his stuck-up family who've done nothing but get her into trouble and cause her heartache. Now, when you came in here, I was quite happily sleeping in the arms of my fiancé and I'd very much like to get back to that." She flipped back over onto her side with her back to them.

"No," Emily said firmly. "We are not leaving until we talk about this calmly and rationally like adults. That is if you're capable of having an adult conversation."

Luke turned toward Lorelai and placed his hand on her arm, trying to get her to turn back around. "Come on, Lorelai. Let's get this over with. She sounds like she means it and I'd really like to be able to get dressed for work in the morning without showing off the goods to your mother," he said with a grin.

Lorelai turned reluctantly to face him and said, "You never know, if she'd seen what I've seen, she might enjoy the show." She smiled back at him and kissed him lightly on the lips before sitting back up taking great care to make sure she was still covered by the sheet. She looked at her mother, whose face had that patented Emily Gilmore look of disgust on it at the mention of Luke's unmentionables. "Do you mind giving us a minute? I'd really rather not have this kind of conversation in my birthday suit."

"Lorelai's right, Emily," Richard said. Perhaps we should go downstairs and give them a few minutes to get dressed."

"All right," Emily agreed. She took the laundry basket from her husband and set it down. "Here's your basket back. We'll be in the kitchen when you're ready." She and Richard left the room, leaving Luke and Lorelai alone. They stepped into the kitchen and waited less than two minutes before Luke walked into the room behind them dressed in a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt. He reached for the coffee pot and began filling it with water. Emily looked at him. "Those aren't the clothes you were wearing earlier," she said remembering the discarded jeans and flannel shirt she'd seen on the floor.

"Nope, I had these in a drawer," he said gruffly as he started the coffee maker.

"Are you living here with Lorelai now?"

"Not yet," he said turning to look Emily square in the face, letting her know in no uncertain terms that he was planning on staying in her daughter's life no matter what she thought about it.

"So, you and Lorelai plan on moving in together?" Richard asked his future son-in-law.

"Eventually, yes," Luke replied. "We are getting married and isn't that the way it works? Don't husbands and wives generally live together?"

"You should know, since you're the one who's been married before," Emily replied curtly.

"So, I've been divorced. So what? So has Christopher and that didn't seem to bother you a few months ago when you were trying to shove him on Lorelai." Even though she'd come to him after the fact encouraging him to get back together with Lorelai, he still hadn't forgiven her for her interference that had caused the break-up in the first place. When Emily didn't reply, he continued. "To answer your question, we do plan on moving in together at some point. It's not really going to change things that much. We've spent very few nights apart since we got back together. I've got stuff here and she's got two drawers and half the closet at my place, so moving in together is just inevitable. We haven't made it official yet, but it will happen."

"I see," Emily said quietly. "So, have you set a wedding date yet?"

"No," he said as Lorelai walked into the room wearing the shirt she'd taken off of him earlier. "What took you so long?" he asked her.

"I was picking up our clothes off the floor since we were kind of in a hurry to get rid of them earlier," she said mischievously, causing Luke to blush for the third time since his future in-laws had awakened them.

"Lorelai, honestly," Emily said in an exasperated tone. "Why do you have to be so crude?"

"Mom, I'm not going to apologize for sleeping with the man I love. I don't know why you're acting so shocked by this. You've known since I was fifteen that I'm not a virgin anymore. Besides which, Luke and I have been together for a while now. You didn't really think our time together was restricted to hand-holding and good-night kisses did you?"

"Of course not, but I think it's wildly inappropriate to be flaunting your sex life."

"Why? Luke is a very sexy man and he makes me happy. Very happy," Lorelai added while her mother rolled her eyes.

"That's enough!" Luke snapped. "Can you lay off the innuendo? I know you're doing it just to get a rise your of your mother, but I'm not at all comfortable with where this conversation is heading. Our private life should stay just that, private!"

"Why are you being such a granny about it? You weren't so shy about things when we were making love earlier. In fact I remember some words coming out of your mouth that were downright obscene."

"That was different. We were alone then and that was just between us," he said blushing again uncomfortable with the fact that Lorelai had just told her parents that he liked to talk dirty to their daughter.

"Oh please, Luke, they walked in on us being naked together. They have to know that we had sex at some point tonight.

"Knowing about it and talking about it are two different things."

"I have to say I agree with Luke on this one," Emily said. "This is not a conversation you should be having in front of your parents."

"I concur," Richard agreed.

Lorelai turned to the coffee maker and poured herself a cup. "Fine," she said. "I'll stop. Would you guys like some?" She asked her parents, indicating the coffee pot. They both nodded and she poured them each a cup as well.

"I just hope to God you're taking precautions," Emily said with a sneer, shuddering at the thought of any future grandchildren being fathered by the unkempt man in front of her. She hoped that this would just be another one of her daughter's many fleeting romances. She was waiting anxiously for the day when Lorelai would come to her senses and see that there were better men out there for her.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean? We're in love and we're getting married. Why would it be so horrible if we wanted to have kids together?" Her mind flashed back to the night of the magazine party two weeks before and their extreme lack of precautions. She was hoping that what she'd told Rory was true and that it was a false alarm, but she hadn't had a period since then and she hadn't taken a test yet to confirm or deny it. Not that she didn't want kids with Luke now that she'd found out that was what he wanted too, but she still thought it was too soon for them and she still hadn't told him yet that it might be a possibility that the family he wanted had already been created."You're the one who's been telling me for years that I should get married, settle down and have a real family. Now that I finally found a man who makes me happy and I can see myself having all of that with, you're all freaked out because he doesn't come up to your standards. Well, guess what, Mom? For the first time in my life, I don't care what you think. Luke is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with."

"Since when have you ever cared what I thought about the choices you make with your life? You've always done just what you want whether I approve or not. I don't see this being any different."

"I've always cared what you think. Why do you think your biting words hurt me so much? I hate it that you won't just let me be myself and be happy for me that I've found someone who loves me and makes me happy, even if you don't approve of him. That's what a parent is supposed to do, be supportive of their kids' life choices even if they don't agree with them."

"I can see you really believe that," Emily said sarcastically. "You've been so supportive of Rory's decision to take time off from Yale and move in with us."

"If I thought for one second that this was really what was going to make her happy, I'd be happily supporting her, but I think she's making a mistake. She's not doing this because she really wants to leave school. She's running scared because of that damned Mitchum Huntzberger and the horrible things he and his family said to her. She's doing the exact same thing Christopher has been doing for years. Every time things got too complicated for him, he bailed the hell on out, just like Rory's doing now. I never thought I'd ever see that side of Christopher in her and it scares me to death! I can't stand watching her just throwing her dreams away or the fact that you're facilitating it when you promised to help me talk her out of it! You know that she belongs in school and not living like an heiress in your pool house!"

"That's what this is really all about, isn't it? You're angry that she chose to embrace the life that you rejected! We gave you the best of everything and you just threw it back in our faces as if it meant nothing to you!"

"That stuff didn't mean anything to me! Not when all I wanted from you was your love and attention! Why do you think I did all the outrageous things I did when I was a kid? I was trying to get you to pay attention to me and see me for who I am, not this image of who you wanted me to be! I wanted so badly for you to just love me and accept me the way I am, but I was such a disappointment to you that you couldn't see past that and just love me unconditionally like a mother should!"

"You think I don't love you?" Emily was stunned. She'd never imagined this coming from her daughter.

"Well, it's true, isn't it? You can't love me because I'm such a disappointment to you. But now you've got Rory to be your pretend daughter and mold the way you want and she's a lot more malleable than I am, so she won't put up nearly as much of a fight as I did, especially since she's in a very vulnerable place right now."

"Lorelai," Richard said. "That's not what we're trying to do here. If you'd seen Rory's face, you'd understand why we did what we did. She came to me in tears looking completely crushed. I've never seen her like that before. It broke my heart and I had to do something to help her. I offered her the pool house before your mother knew anything about it."

"But do you honestly think that letting her run away from her problems instead of facing them is really going to help her?" Luke asked him. "She may be legally an adult, but she's still really just a confused kid who needs someone to guide her in the right direction instead of someone who's going to coddle her and let her just wallow in self-pity."

"What would you know about it? It's not like you have any children," Emily said haughtily.

"I spent two years as a guardian to my nephew trying to get him turned around and actually trying to make something of himself."

"And that turned out so well," Emily said sarcastically. "He didn't even graduate from high school."

"Maybe Jess didn't turn out so great, but that's not entirely my fault. My nut-job sister sent him to me when he was seventeen and already set in his ways. But he's doing a little better now. He's at least holding down a steady job and paying his own way and that's something considering the poor example his mother set for him, constantly losing her job, and getting evicted and flitting from one relationship to another, not once considering how that would affect her son. Maybe he didn't graduate under my influence, but I at least did manage to teach him a decent work ethic from all the time he spent working in my restaurant. Now, Rory on the other hand has the potential to do really great things with her life, but that's not gonna happen if the people around her let her just give up on her dreams and throw away everything's she's worked for."

"She's just taking a break. She's not leaving school indefinitely."

"That is such a crock! If she leaves school now, she won't go back! I know from personal experience. I left college to take care of my dad when he was dying and I always told myself that I'd go back and finish, but after he died, there was so much other stuff to do that I never did. I've always wondered where I'd be now if I'd finished my education and I don't want Rory to do the same. I don't want her to look back on her life twenty years from now and regret the choices she'd making now, especially when she's doing it for all the wrong reasons."

"I didn't know you had such an interest in Rory's future," Emily said pondering Luke's words.

"Well, I do. I've watched her grow up and how hard she's worked to get where she is. I love that kid as if she were my own and you don't know how many times since all this happened that I've wanted to drive to your house and drag her back here kicking and screaming and make her listen to reason!"

Lorelai placed a soothing had on his shoulder and said, "Luke, honey, calm down."

"No! I won't calm down! This is completely stupid! You and Rory not talking to each other is insane! The two of you have always been closer than any mother and daughter in the history of the world and this is wrong! I've tried to stay out of it because you asked me to, but I can't keep my mouth shut anymore! You need to talk some sense into your daughter and not let your anger at your parents interfere with that!" He turned to Emily and Richard and added, "And you two need to stay the hell out of it! The fact that you backstabbed your own daughter is unthinkable to me! She went to you for help, though only God knows why and you turned it around on her! That's not the kind of thing parents are supposed to do! If I ever had a kid that would be the last thing I'd ever think of doing!"

"Does that mean that the two of you are planning on having children?"Emily asked, eyebrows raised. "Or is that the reason for the sudden engagement? I noticed Lorelai getting a little defensive when I mentioned taking precautions."

"What the hell does that mean?" Lorelai asked hotly. "You think Luke would only want to marry me if he knocked me up? And for the record, our engagement is not sudden! Our relationship has been building toward this since we got back together! And just so you know, there's a very good chance that I could be pregnant right now!"

"What?" Luke asked in surprise. He was thrown. While they'd talked about having kids just a few nights ago, it hadn't occurred to him that they could already be having a kid together. "Are you pregnant? How did this happen?"

"Well, if I have to tell you how, clearly we're doing something wrong," Lorelai quipped.

"I know how," he said blushing again. "But I thought we were being pretty careful."

"We have been except for the night of the magazine party when we were both a little tipsy and things got a little out of control."

"Right," he said, blushing again as he recalled their encounter in the limo and again in his bed. "I remember."

"I didn't say anything before because we hadn't talked about the idea of having kids and now that we have, it's just that things have been so crazy, I wanted to wait until I knew for sure before I said anything. It's probably not true. It's just that it's kind of gotten me thinking. The last time I had unprotected sex it resulted in Rory, so it's been on my mind."

"So is that why you…" he didn't finish the question, not wanting her parents to know that he hadn't been the one to pop the question. It was bad enough that the whole town was making him feel like a loser over it.

"No, Luke! No," she insisted.

"Why she what?" Emily inquired.

"Nothing, Mom. It's just a private thing between me and Luke.

"So, what are you going to do if you are pregnant?"

"Just what we're doing. We're already engaged and planning a life together, a life that includes a family. If it turns out that our family is already started then maybe we'll just set a wedding date sooner. I don't really know, but that's up to us to decide, not you. You've already made your opinion about our relationship known and you're not going to be happy with me as long as I'm with Luke so I don't see where any of this is really your business."

"Not my business? How can you say that? If you're pregnant, the child would be my grandchild."

"And you've already stolen one child from me and I'll be damned if I'm going to let you steal another one. If I am pregnant now, I'm going to make damn sure you never get your hands on this child."

"Lorelai!"

"I mean it, Mom. If I can't trust the two of you to keep your word when it comes to Rory, how can I trust you with a baby?"

Richard, who'd been silent for a while, finally spoke up again. "Would it help if we had another talk with Rory and tried to convince her to at least talk to you again so that maybe we could all sit down together and hash this out?"

"That was my plan! All of us sitting down together and tag-teaming her to get her to change her mind, but you changed the plan!"

"We were only trying to do what's best for Rory."

"Do you really think this is what's best for her or is it just what's best for you?"

"Lorelai, that's not fair. You didn't see how upset Rory was when she came to see me. I just wanted to help her, but I have to admit that Luke may have a point. Letting her run away from her problems is probably not the best solution. So, maybe we should think about your original plan, Lorelai. All of us sitting down together and discussing this like adults so we can figure out what the best course of action for Rory is and I think Luke should be included in that."

"Richard, you can't be serious," Emily said.

"I am serious, Emily. Luke obviously knows from first-hand experience how hard is it to regain what you've lost when you take a break from college. Maybe he's the best person to be able to convince Rory to go back to Yale."

"Thank you, Richard," Luke said. When Lorelai started to protest, Luke stopped her, saying, "Lorelai, I know you're upset with your parents right now, but we all want the same thing and that's to see Rory happy and healthy. Maybe this is the best way to achieve that."

"Good," Richard said. "SO, it's all settled then. Why don't the two of you come to dinner Friday night and we can all talk about it then."

"Fine with me," Luke said though he didn't relish the idea of spending another evening at the Gilmore mansion, but he did want to help Rory. "Lorelai?"

"Sure, fine, whatever," she said noncommittally.

"All right, then," Richard said. "We'll see you Friday. Emily, let's go. We should let them get back to bed and get some sleep and get back to bed ourselves."

"Right," Emily said as she turned to follow her husband out the front door pondering what had just happened and wondering what was going to happen next in her daughter's life. She was stunned that Lorelai was engaged and that she had admitted that she and Luke wanted children and that they might already be having a child together. She hoped that Lorelai's scathing words about keeping any future grandchildren from her were only words spoken in anger and not something she would actually follow through on. She didn't want to miss out on knowing her grandchildren from the start like she had with Rory, even if it meant that she had to deal with Luke as a potential son-in-law. She smiled a little when she thought about the fact that Lorelai had at least agreed to come to dinner. That was progress toward mending the rift between them.

When the Gilmores left, Luke turned to his fiancée and asked, "So when I said 'what about the kids' how come you didn't say anything about the possibility that there might already be a kid?"

"I was stunned, Luke! I never thought of you as a kid guy. You're always going on about jam hands and how babies are loud and messy and I kind of panicked. I didn't think you'd want a baby. I don't know. I guess I thought maybe you'd bolt."

"You know all the ranting about kids isn't relevant to our kids, right?" he said trying to reassure her. "What bugs me isn't really the kids themselves as it is the parents who don't look after their kids, just letting them run around and do whatever, whenever. I know from watching you with Rory all these years that you would never be that kind of mother and I never thought of myself being a kid guy either, but since you and I got back together, I've been thinking about it more and more. The more that I thought about it, the more I realized that if I was ever gonna be a father, you're the only one I would want to be the mother of my children."

"So you really want to have a kid with me?"

"Yeah, I really do," he said as he slid his arms around her waist pulling her close and looking into her eyes. "I wasn't planning on it this soon, but if it's happened, then we'll just deal with it. I'm in this for the long haul. No bolting. Whatever happens, we'll get through it together. You're gonna have to kill me to get rid of me. I love you and I'm not going anywhere."

"Good," she said as she leaned her head on his chest comforted by his warm embrace and hopeful for the future now that she and her parents had at least agreed to try to start again.