Maria Quinn

Maria Quinn was paying at the counter for her breakfast when she remembered something.

"Hey, Luke." She called out to the man behind the cash register. All he did was grunt in reply. As he always did. "I just wanted to thank you for sending Cassie and Rory that care package," she thanked.

Luke looked up from the register with a confused look. "The what?"

Jess, who was behind Luke with a book in his hands, perked his head up. A book that she was sure she'd seen in Cassie's room before. "Luke, I think they hit the water line again." He tells his uncle, pointing toward a fat corner of the diner.

"Geez. Tom you're dead!" Luke yells out as he heads in the direction Jess pointed. "You hear me? Dead!"

"You here to pay?" Jess asked as he pressed a few buttons on the register.

Maria ignored his question. "Luke didn't know anything about the food, did he?"

Jess didn't show whether she was right or not. "I'm out of quarters, I'm gonna have to give you nickels."

"Why?"

He sighed before looking at her with a glare. "Why what?"

"Why'd you send my daughter food?" She asked.

"No, idea what you're talking about," he lied.

"Stop lying."

Jess sighed. "Look, I'm trying very hard to be nice."

That took her back. "You're trying hard to be nice? You didn't seem to have any problem the other night." She remarked.

"Cause Cassie was there."

"So what? Cassie is the nice police?" She commented.

He took some change out of the cash register. "She told me to be nice and now I'm doing that." He handed her change to her with a fake smile. "Have a nice day, come again soon."

"Listen, I don't know what your deal is with my daughter but you better not get her in any trouble." Maria told him sternly.

Jess nods at her with a mock salute. "Yes ma'am."

~~~

"He really said that?" Lorelai exclaimed in her kitchen.

Maria ran a hand over her face. "That's exactly what he said," she confirmed as she told Lorelai what had happened with Jess that morning.

"Hey," she pipes up. "You know what you should do?"

"What?"

Lorelai looked over at her with a glint in her blue eyes. "You should call him Jessie."

"How is that gonna solve my problem."

She shrugged. "Cassie told me we could call him that. Or even Tess."

"Do you think he likes her? I mean I'm pretty sure he does but I don't know." Maria sips on her third cup of coffee for the day.

"Oh yeah, he's whipped." Lorelai agrees.

She groans and puts her head in her hands. "I just don't want him to hurt her. You know guys like that."

"He's like James Dean except alive."

"The last time I got engaged with a guy like that I wound up pregnant!" Maria voiced her concern.

Lorelai nodded in solidarity. "Don't I know it."

"They're both young and Cassie doesn't know much. One time she got scared to order pizza online cause it was a new place." By this point she was just ranting to herself. Poor Lorelai had to sit through it all. "She's smart and she knows her right from wrong, I should trust that she knows what she's doing."

"Hey," Lorelai says softly as she puts a hand on her shoulder. "It's fine to worry. We're mothers, it's what we do best. Well, besides drinking before ten in the morning." She laughs as Maria let's out a small smile.

"You're right," Maria said with a sigh. "God, you're so lucky Rory has Dean. You don't have to worry much."

Lorelai nodded her head. "Yeah well, if you ever feel like pushing good old Jessie in a lake feel free to do so." She smiles at her friend comfortingly. "Luke pushed him in so I'm sure he'll understand."

Maria looked at her with wide eyes. "Luke pushed him in?" She couldn't believe Luke would do that. But with a personality like that she couldn't blame Luke for wanting to drown the guy.

"This is the same Luke who bought the building next door and put a hole in the wall," Lorelai commented.

"Did you know he's been coming through her window?" Maria suddenly says.

Lorelai scrunched up her face. "Luke's been coming through her window?"

"Ew, no!" She groaned in disgust. "Jess. Jess had been coming through her window! I don't think that they know that I know," she added thoughtfully.

"That's sounds like that episode from 'friends'," her friend commented.

Maria thought for a moment which scene she was referring to. "The one where Phoebe's pregnant?"

"No, it's before that," Lorelai chided. "The one where Rachel and Phoebe find out Monica and Chandler are together," she corrects.

"But isn't that after Phoebe gets pregnant?"

She ignores her comment. "It doesn't matter! Now, we can pull a Phoebe and Rachel and mess with them!"

"But if we pull a Phoebe and Rachel, that makes them Monica and Chandler! I don't want them to become like Monica and Chandler!" Maria rushes out in one breath.

"It won't be any use if they're already like Monica and Chandler!"

Maria's mouth fell open. "You think they're already like Monica and Chandler?" She exclaimed as she stood up from her chair and began pacing around the room.

Lorelai quickly goes to take back her words. "I'm not saying they are like Monica and Chandler, I'm saying they could be." She says from her seat.

"That's not helping!" She retorted. "Oh god, you really think she would keep this from me?" She rubs her hands together as she walks around the room.

"Monica and Chandler kept it from Rachel and Phoebe."

"Stop saying Monica and Chandler!" She yells in frustration.

Lorelai stands up and approached Maria. "Why don't you just ask her?" She suggested with her hand around Maria's shoulder. "What harm would that do?"

"She could think I'm not following the cool mum handbook."

"Screw the cool mum handbook," Lorelai scoffs. "It's time we follow the mum-who's-worried-her-daughters-gonna-end-up-pregnant handbook."

"You think she's gonna get pregnant!"

Lorelai sighs as she looks down to the floor. "It's like you're the one who's pregnant with your constant mood swings," she mutters. "They're not gonna get pregnant, Monica and Chandler didn't get pregnant." She instantly regretted saying anything about pregnancy.

"Monica and Chandler couldn't get pregnant!" Maria tells her friend. "And how did we wind up back to them?"

Maria's face was squished between Lorelai's firm hands. "Look at me." She says.

"I don't really have a choice," Maria chokes out from in between Lorelai's grasp.

"Forget whatever I just said," she starts. "You're gonna go home and talk to your daughter. Okay?"

"Okay."

~~~

Maria burst into her daughters room. She saw Cassie sitting at her seat with her homework out in front of her. Good to know she had her priorities straight. Cassie looked up at her with a frown.

"Can I help you?"

She walked towards her daughter slowly with a shaky smile. "I'm gonna ask you a question and I need you to be completely honest with me."

Cassie nods her head. "If you're gonna ask me if I do drugs, the answer is a firm no."

"That's not what I wanted to ask you, but that's reassuring." She started nervously. "Are you and Jess like Monica and Chandler?"

"I'm just gonna play along here," her daughter says. "By that you mean..." she trails off, waiting for her to explain.

Maria took a deep breath before getting to what has been eating her away since this morning. "I mean are you two dating?"

"Oh," Cassie says quietly as she looks down at her desk. "No mum, we're not."

Maria felt as if a ton of bricks had been lifted off her chest. "That's good to know. But do you want to be?" She inquired again. "I know we've talked about this but that was all jokes. So now all jokes aside, do you like this boy?"

Her daughter sent her one of her rare and soft smiles. Maria recognised that smile. It was the same smile she had on when Maria brought her to Disneyland for the first time. She didn't even need to answer her and Maria already knew what she was going to say.

"I think I do. I really think so." She tells her mum truthfully, the smile never leaving her face.

"Okay," Maria nods as she walks to stand behind her daughter. She wraps her arms around Cassie's shoulder and gives her a soft kiss on the head. "Be careful. Emotions are a dangerous thing."