Mariano Twins

Celebrations

Jo's POV 

Dean was happy to hear I had made my decision. Clara was glad that I would still be close. I got back to see Luke had left Jess to run the diner.

"Hey. Where's Luke?" I asked as I walked in.

"He left not long after I got here," Jess replies, pouring coffee.

"He's been gone the whole time?" I ask.

"Yeah," he replies.

"That's weird," I state.

"Tell me about it. He was acting all spazzy," he says.

"Do you have any more information?" I ask, leaning on the counter.

"When I showed up he said he had an errand and has yet to return," Jess says.

"What the hell is he doing?" I mumble.

I start clearing tables. After a couple minutes of just working we are both startled by Luke swinging the door open and rushing in. He takes a second to look at us both.

"Oh, hi. You're back," he says, before he goes to the counter and starts clearing dishes.

"That's it?" I ask.

"What?" Luke asks.

"You're acting weird. That's what," Jess tells him.

"It's nothing. Don't worry about it. Get back to work," he replies.

Jess and I share a look before doing just that. The evening continued to be slow, so we expected Luke to close early. Jess and I start our normal system of clean up when Luke stops us.

"What's going on? The diner has been dead for half an hour, and the town itself looks dead," Jess says.

"Yeah, I'd be all for working until closing if we had customers," I state.

"We are closing, but you're not going anywhere," he states.

We both look at him very confused. Before we can continue to question him there is a knock at the door.

Jess and I turn to see people. Luke moves to the door before we get a chance to. In walks the Gilmore girls and the Forester kids.

All are carrying things. Dean has a bag that looks like party stuff and a handful of balloons. Rory and Clara are carrying gift bags, and Lorelai is carrying what looks like a cake box.

"What's going on?" Jess and I both ask.

Luke turns the sign and locks the door before going around to close all the blinds.

"This is a celebration," Rory states.

"For getting into college," Lorelai adds.

Lorelai unloads the party stuff, a lot of which looks homemade. We push a couple tables together.

The order was me, Clara, Rory on one side, Luke and Lorelai on the other. Jess was on the end, to Rory's left, and Dean is on the other end to my right.

Lorelai gives Rory and I New Years crowns that have been covered with construction paper, and say Yale Girl.

Jess and Dean are given hats, also left over from New Year, that now says Headed to SCSU, and she drew little blue things that are supposed to be owls.

Lorelai and Clara were wearing party hats. There are four gold balloons that spell out Yale, and four silver balloons that say SCSU.

Luke made us all food, we ate cake, which Luke got from Weston's. It had white frosting and was trimmed in red, for Stars Hollow High, and had Congratulations written in Clilton blue.

We somehow got Luke in a party hat as well. Clara ended up migrating from her chair to my lap.

"Okay, time for presents," Lorelai says,

There are presents for all four of us. The whole evening was so much fun filled with talking, laughing, eating, and the best part was it was with the people most important to me.

Jess and Rory switched seats, so he was in the middle, and Rory and I both had our feet resting in his lap.

Clara conked out, and was now curled up in Dean's lap. It made me happy to see that most of our conversation was being carried out by Dean and Jess.

They might not admit it, but they have grown closer over that last few weeks. Rory and I were almost confident enough to call them friends.

We start cleaning up, and I step out to say goodbye to Dean. He had moved Clara onto his back, she was still out.

"This was fun. You definitely deserved it," he says.

"Don't forget, this was for you too. You and Jess worked your asses off," I remind him.

"Thanks. I better get this one home," he says.

He bends down to kiss me. I make him bend down a bit more, so I can give Clara a kiss on the forehead.

Her starts to walk away, and my talking stops him.

"You two seemed to be having a lot of fun in there," I state.

"Who?" he asks.

"You and Jess. It makes me happy to see you two hanging out," I reply.

"Oh, yeah. I guess he's really not all that bad once you get to know him," he says smiling.

"Oh, really. It's almost as if you two had listened from the beginning you would have known that," I say, smirking.

He grins and walks back over to me.

"Okay. You were right. Rory was right. He's actually pretty cool. Are you happy now?" he asks.

"Oh, very happy," I reply before giving him another kiss.

With that he heads off. I head back in. Rory and Jess come out to have a similar moment as Dean and I before the Gilmore's head home.

We finish cleaning, and before going to bed Jess and I both give Luke a hug, thanking him.

"I'm so proud of you two," he says.

\\ AN // -- All grammar, punctuation, and spelling corrections are helpful, encouraged, and greatly appreciated. 

Thank you 

-- Izzy