Disclaimer: Honestly, there's a lawyer out there who'd actually bother? Fine. It's theirs!

Summary: Friday night is Family Dinner Night at the Gilmore mansion. How does one maid cope? T for language, and implied adult situations. 2016 Enscotched Ficathon contribution.

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AN: A random little "drunk fic".

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(AN: Boldface is the narrator speaking. The rest is the narrator's train of thought.)

Yes, Mrs. Gilmore. No, Mrs. Gilmore. Three bags full and upside your over-coiffed head, Mrs. Gilmore, has anyone told you that your head looks like a puffy auburn bicycle helmet, Mrs. Gilmore?

Bob and curtsy, nod and dip, twitch my apron, what is this, The Sound of Music? Oh, to sing "so long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, good-bye"! Right in her over-pampered…

Oh thank God, the doorbell! One more meal and this day is over! I can't believe the agency didn't warn me about this witch!

Damn it, she beat me there! How? She's wearing three-inch heels! I'm in sensible shoes! She has to have a secret passageway. There's no possible way she could get past me and to the foyer. Does she have a broom and a wand and a cauldron somewhere?

Wow. Now I'm a coat rack. Nice of the daughter to ask my name, but how can I answer with an armful of wool piled to my eyes?

Oh no, not again. What does it take to get this woman to call me Ellen? Not Helen, not Elaine, not Ellie. Ellen. El. En. Two letters of the alphabet if she must. LN.

I'm not mumbling, I'm trying to breathe, you old…

Think about tuition, think about tuition, think about tuition…

My sister's right. I should just go into bartending like she did. Good tips, lousy hours, but if you can't stand the company, you can call the cops.

I can't believe I'm standing here like a bad rerun of Masterpiece Theater. I'm wearing black, with a white apron and a silly little cap on my head that might have someone else's lice, waiting for orders from Frau Hitler over there. I'll never get the smell of that polish out of my mind. Never. And who goes into the carvings of a lion-paw claw-foot whatever that hideous thing is, and uses a toothpick to see if the maid really did get the dust? White glove, okay, I can almost grasp that, but a toothpick?

Someone drop a house on her.

Someone drop a house on me.

Oooh. Drinks cart is unattended…

Yes! Madame Fussy-Pants there wants me to do something! I can get the cramp out of my calves and maybe she'll get it out of her…

Ice. Fetch ice. Woof. Good dog. Bring the ice.

Why did I think taking two years to earn all the tuition ahead of time was worth it?

Right, no student loans. No owing my education to someone who'll use it like a whip on my back. God, listen to her in there. Lorelai, you're ugly. Lorelai, you're stupid. Lorelai, you're the cause of global warming. She's getting it worse than I do. No way I'll ask for help when it means having to smile when someone's shoveling sh…

Sherry, right, yes, bring the sherry. Nod, bob, curtsy, scurry. Think about tuition, think about tuition, think about…

Alcohol.

Oh, this smells goooood.

She said bring the sherry. She didn't say stay sober in her presence.

Suddenly, the old guy's expertise with martinis makes sense. And so does that daughter's need for two stiff ones on an empty stomach. Why did the agency not warn me about this? Anything special, I asked. Any reason they go through maids so often, I asked. Why does everyone quit on Friday nights, I asked. Oh, no reason, they said. No reason. It's all rumor and hearsay.

More like absolute truth.

Absolute. That's a vodka, isn't it?

Good sherry. Sweet. Nice. Kinda like something I should know the name of but don't because I only got six bites of lettuce and half a pear since breakfast. Fetch this, polish that, sweep there, buff here, and is she telling her kid to be embarrassed for managing an inn? Owning a little house instead of a big one? I don't even own a couch. If my sister didn't let me stay with her, I'd be back in Groton, earning grocery money on my back thanks to the Navy boys. Or in New Haven, pretending I'm flattered some rich frat boy wants a one-off so he'll toss me a twenty.

Tidy the drinks cart? Yes, ma'am. I can do that. I will clean this cart until it gleams, Mrs. Gilmore. It will sparkle. Like those diamonds you wear. A year's salary to someone back in Groton, and it's on your wrist, and you tell your daughter she needs to tell you about her life? What can you know about life, Emily-call-me-ma'am-or-die Gilmore? You ever sacrifice pride for food on the table? Risk disease to keep the rent paid on a place so cold in winter that the roaches move out?

Life? Ha! Her world is top drawer and gourmet, Robin Leach narrating, lifestyles of the rich and shameless. I hope this thing isn't silver plate, because I'll rub right to base metal if I hear one more condescending word out of your whining mouth, you old b…

Whoops, it's seven o'clock and one second past. Yes, ma'am, I need to pay attention to the time, ma'am, you're absolutely correct, Mrs. Gilmore, and by the way, while you were running your daughter into the ground? While your husband and granddaughter chit-chat about books as if this is another one of those nibble-and-gossip parties you throw on Friday afternoons for the Daughters of the American Regurgitation? I drank the sherry! Oh, and finished off half a martini, the granddaughter's ginger ale, and your husband's way-more-gin-than-tonic. You go on in to your three-course meal. I'll stay right here where it's nice and warm and comfy!

Until you yell at me, that is. Tuition, tuition, tuition. Someday, over the rainbow, I'll live high… Or at least get my degree and get out of Connecticut and never look back. The state that stinks one-third of cold ocean, one-third of cold money, and one-third of hot pavement.

Here's the salads, with carrots carved into roses. I wonder if the cook kept the leftover carrot bits for me to take home. He said he would, but men say a lot of things. I'll believe it when the carrots are in my stomach, not a minute sooner. And he better not ask me to pay wink-wink-nudge for the favor. He was going to compost them, for God's sake.

Clear the drinks. Love to, Mrs. Gimme-more, but your daughter there has a death grip on her martini glass.

I wish she'd ease up. My ears are going to bleed. God, please don't let that be me when I'm that age. Either of them. The daughter sounds younger than me. Than her kid. Okay, fair's fair, Empress Emily has me ready to hide under a bed, but can't these people get over it? She got knocked up, she took off, she must've done okay if the kid can get into a fancy prep school, even if she does need help with tuition. Who wouldn't?

Oh right. Her Right Holy Highness.

And that's some wine and, wow, undiluted gin. Oh, that was a mistake. This family is going to die pickled, potted, planted. That's rocket fuel. Whee!

Hey, I'm drunk!

And here's dessert and dessert and dessert and…

And the queen's fruit. One-quarter of a peach, three cubes of melon, and a spoonful of yogurt with a drizzle of honey on top.

They're at it some more. Nibble, snipe, nibble, snap, nibble-insult-swallow-no-chewing. Thank God I'm supposed to be in the kitchen.

I can't believe it! The cook threw out the carrots. That son of a… Fine. No carrots? Then I eat the cake. I hate raspberry sauce, and I really don't like this squishy middle, but cake is cake, and hey, Marie Ain't-Enough there won't let me have bread, so I'll eat cake!

Uh-oh, my master summons! To heel with me! To her high heel grinding in my neck! Time to clear the something-whatevers!

Y'know, tuition isn't worth this. I'll never get a degree with what I earned at the pizza place, but at least that's screaming kids and stupid teenagers and tired-out tourists. This is insane. The Great Moral Arbiter Emily can't get over Lorelai having Pollyanna Pouty-Face, but she adores the little darling, and has no problem with the father, and I don't see that guy anywhere around here. I'd know. She made me dust inside the closets.

This is why I want a degree in bookkeeping. Numbers line up. People suck.

Whoops. I said that out loud.

Well, at least they stopped fighting, right?

The name is Ellen. El as in Elevator, En as in Nino, El Nino is Ellen is me!

Ah, why not…

So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, good-bye!

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AN: I've never been drunk. I avoid the stuff. Tee-total and so forth. That said, the addiction thing runs in my family, and I've heard and seen a lot. Believe me, someone bursting into song when they quit a job? Not even remotely the worst.

"Dipper" is a term that may be unique to my gene pool. A few of my older relatives use it for "a person dipping into the stash of alcohol". Or they could simply be too drunk to say "tippler" properly.

Apologies for lack of diacritical marks where required.