Christmas Wish 3
Disclaimer – As always, the characters belong to either Bellisario or Universal...I'm just taking them out to play again since neither Bellisario or Universal does anymore.
A/N – Events in this story will, as always, have no effect on my main story arcs, and for timeline purposes, take place a year after the events depicted in CW 2. (Making this somewhat of an AU fic).
Summary – Caitlin's gone two-for-two with Christmas wishes. Can she make it three in a row?
"Walkin' in a Winter Wonderland..." Stringfellow Hawke never thought he'd be fully into the Christmas season, much less the Christmas spirit. But then, I never expected Caitlin and I to fall in love and get married, he admitted as he finished hanging the last of the ornaments on the tree at Santini Air. This past year has been just about perfect, Hawke admitted to himself. His thoughts, however, were of a Christmas two years ago, after Sister Monica had taken Bobby Phelps' group back to the church, and "Santa" was in the hangar with Caitlin.
Flashback
Finally, after about two hours, the group had all given their wishes to Santa Claus, and after Bobby said special good-byes to String, Caitlin, and "Santa," the group left, but before Dom decided to change out of his Santa costume, Caitlin said, "Um, Santa? I've got a Christmas wish myself," even as she noticed String turning away from them.
"Well, little lady, Santa listens to everybody's wishes, so come over here and tell me about it," Dom said as he glanced over at String, noticing that his young friend hadn't moved too far out of earshot.
Cait sat herself down on Santa's lap and said, "Well, I feel kinda foolish doing this...but...I want to hear four special words from String this year. I think it's time, don't you...'Santa?'" She glanced longingly over in Hawke's direction, and Santa knew exactly what "four special words" she meant.
"Well, young lady...have you been a good girl this year?" Dom chuckled to himself as he asked the question, knowing perfectly well Cait had been a good girl all year long.
"Yeah...at least, I think I have," Caitlin replied honestly.
"Well, then...you'll get what you want," Santa replied, giving Caitlin a friendly pat on the shoulder.
End Flashback
Of course, I knew what she wanted, Hawke smiled to himself as he climbed down off the ladder and began looking for his wife. So, I gave it to her...told her exactly what she wanted to hear.
Flashback
"Aw, Dom...I feel like such a fool. I poured my heart out to you...I mean...Santa Claus, and I thought String had heard me...but, I guess not. Either that, or he doesn't feel the way I hoped he did," she sighed as they heard a commotion outside, and Dom noticed his boy coming towards them. "Don't be so sure, Cait," Dom reassured her when he saw the expression in Hawke's eyes.
"Hey, Dom...you need us for anything else today?" String asked, obviously having something else on his mind.
"Huh? Oh...nah, we got nothing else scheduled for today...you kids go and have fun...whatever it is you're thinking of," Dom answered, more than a little apprehensively.
"Thanks, Dom," Hawke said, taking hold of Caitlin's hand and noticing her expression. "Hey, Cait. Take a ride with me?"
"Huh? Oh...sure, String. You got something in mind?" she answered, and tried to keep the sadness out of her voice.
"As a matter of fact, yeah, I do," Hawke replied, and the two of them got into one of Dom's choppers and lifted off. As Dom watched them leave, he noticed that Hawke seemed to be headed in the direction of the cabin. Good luck, String, if you're gonna do what I think..no...what Caitlin and I hope you're gonna do.
About an hour later, String brought the chopper down on the landing dock at the cabin, and as he and Caitlin got out, she asked him, "Hawke, why did you bring me all the way up here? What's going on?"
Hawke gathered his courage, knowing that what he was about to say was, without a doubt, the hardest thing he'd told anyone in a long time. Finally, he took Caitlin's face in his hands, and, gazing deep into her blue-green eyes, he answered, "Caitlin...there's something I've wanted to tell you for a long time, but I never seemed to find the right opportunity, or feel the right way about it. But now," he paused for a moment, then plunged ahead. "I needed to tell you this – Caitlin, I love you..."
End Flashback
Just then, Hawke saw Caitlin walk out of the office, and thought she looked a little down. "Sweetheart, what's the matter?" String hated to see his wife sad, and especially now, with their friend Bobby Phelps and his youth group coming back for their yearly visit with Santa Claus, who would once again be portrayed by Dominic Santini.
"Aw, it's nothing, Hawke," Caitlin tried to assure her husband. "I was...just thinking about another Christmas wish. You know, I've been doing pretty good with those the last couple of years."
Hawke smiled and replied, "Yeah. I remember. Two years ago, you asked for me to tell you that I loved you...then, last year, you wished that I'd propose...so, what could you have left to wish for?" Hawke was genuinely and honestly puzzled. It would seem to me that she already has everything she could want...well, except for...wait a second...she can't be going to wish for that...can she?
As if she sensed what her husband was thinking, Caitlin smiled and said, "Well, Hawke...I didn't tell you the first two wishes, so why would I tell you this one? Besides," she added with a sweet smile, "If I tell you, then the wish won't come true."
I hate when she has a point, Hawke grumbled to himself as he and Caitlin went to look for Dominic. They found him a few minutes later, working with a string of lights he was hanging from one of the helicopters. Hawke called up to his friend, "Hey, Dom! You ready to play Santa again?"
"Yeah, sure, I'm ready, String," Dom replied as he climbed down. "Cait? You got another Christmas wish for Santa?" Dom knew Caitlin had been pleased with the results of her last two Christmas wishes, so she most likely would have a third one, Dom reasoned.
"Yeah, I think I've got one last wish," Caitlin remarked with a grin, which she directed at Hawke.
Three days later, Dom was back in the office putting the finishing touches on his Santa outfit, as Cait and String waited out in the hangar for Sister Monica with Bobby's group. In keeping with tradition, Caitlin had dressed up again this year, and Hawke once again found himself intoxicated, not only by the smell of the perfume she wore, but also with the sheer beauty in the woman next to him. Not just physical beauty, either, Hawke said to himself, although she is gorgeous...but she's so beautiful in other ways, too, Hawke admitted to himself. Just then, Sister Monica's group arrived, and in the lead, as usual, was their friend Bobby Phelps. "Hi, String! Hi, Cait!" he bellowed as he charged towards his friends, to envelop them in a monster hug.
"Hey, buddy! We're glad to see you!" Caitlin told her young friend, as she gave him a friendly peck on the cheek. "How have you been this year?"
"I've been real good," he replied and glanced over at String. "You smile a lot more. I like it," he said. "I was happy to see you and Cait get married, String."
"I was happy, too," Hawke replied, and added, "and I still am very happy," when he caught Caitlin's look.
"Where's Santa Claus?" one of the other kids demanded. Just then, the office door opened, and a hearty "HO HO HO!" rang through the hangar as "Santa" took his place to begin listening to the childrens' wishes. Once again, when Sister Monica had bundled all the kids back on the bus to go back to church, Caitlin found herself on Santa's lap, to confess her final Christmas wish.
"Well, Santa...you know the last two wishes I've made have come true...and, I've been a good girl all year long...well...mostly," she admitted, her cheeks turning a particular shade of red at a memory from a couple of nights ago. Finally, she continued, "and my last wish is...I wish Hawke and I would start a family...I want to have kids."
Santa paused for a minute, not quite sure how he would answer this one. "Well, young lady, I know this will be the hardest wish to grant that I've ever gotten from you, but," he smiled knowingly at her, "I think you'll get this one, too...after all, you've been doing pretty well so far, haven't you?" Santa laughed heartily as Caitlin nodded, then slipped off his lap after giving him a friendly peck on the cheek.
On their way back to the cabin, Hawke thought he'd finally figured out what Caitlin's third Christmas wish was, even though he knew she wouldn't tell him. It's almost too obvious, he thought to himself. After all, what do most married couples want? To have kids.
Sometime in late January...
"Hawke?"
"Yeah, Cait?"
"I...I have something to tell you," she stammered, a little nervous at something she'd learned that morning. "You remember when I bought..." She couldn't bring herself to finish the sentence.
"What? That home pregnancy test kit? Yeah, I remember...that's nothing to be embarrassed about, Cait."
"Well, I took the test this morning...and it's positive. I'm going to have a baby, Hawke."
"You're serious? You're going to have our baby?" Hawke was at once stunned and elated by this news, and he gathered Caitlin into a gentle, but passionate embrace. After a while, he said, "I didn't think it was possible...after everything you told me happened when you were a baby." Caitlin had told him that she had been a premature baby, and was given a cocktail of steroids in order to try to stimulate her growth, but she had been advised as she grew up that these drugs might make it impossible for her to have children. Now, it seemed, they had proven the odds wrong.
"Hawke? I know these home tests aren't completely accurate...so I was thinking..."
"We'll go to the hangar and make a doctor's appointment right now," Hawke said, and led her out to the helicopter.
Two hours later, Hawke sat in the waiting room of Caitlin's OB-GYN, as he waited for some news regarding his wife. Finally, a nurse came out, and took Hawke back to the exam room where Caitlin was. The first thing Hawke noticed was that his wife was in tears. "Are these good tears, or..." He stopped when he saw her expression. "Guess not."
"No, Hawke. The other test...was wrong," Caitlin sighed, as she tried to get her emotions under control. "I'm sorry, Hawke."
"Cait...you've got nothing to be sorry about," Hawke said. He turned to the doctor and asked, "Is it okay to try again?"
"Well, Mr. Hawke, physically, yes, Caitlin's fine for normal sexual activity...emotionally, that might be a different story." She turned to Caitlin and said, "Cait, I know this wasn't the result you were hoping for...but like I told your husband, you can start trying again as soon as you're ready," and the doctor noticed Caitlin's expression brighten when she said that.
Sometime in late May...
Here we go again, Hawke said as he once again sat in the waiting room of the OB-GYN's office. I just hope this isn't going to be another disappointment, like last time. Hawke could still remember the look on Caitlin's face when she told him that they weren't really pregnant. That was the saddest I've ever seen her, he mused to himself, and what really hurt was, there wasn't a damned thing I could do about it. They'd started trying again a couple of weeks after that doctor's appointment, and just a couple of days ago, Caitlin had taken yet another home pregnancy test, and gotten the same result. I just hope this isn't another false positive, Hawke sighed. That would just kill her. Just then, the nurse came out, and led Hawke back to the exam room where Caitlin sat, waiting, with the doctor.
"Cait? You okay?"
"I'm fine, Hawke...we're all just fine." She glanced up at him, hoping that he'd caught the end of her statement.
"We?" You mean..."
"That's right, Mr. Hawke," the doctor confirmed with a smile. "This time, she's really pregnant." Hawke's smile as Caitlin stood up to embrace him could have lit up the entire examination room. "Now, Caitlin...I want you back here in three months for a checkup, and we'll do a sonogram then, to see what we can see. Okay? Again, you two, congratulations." Hawke and Caitlin both thanked the doctor before they left to go home.
Sometime in mid-August...
Hawke and Caitlin were waiting in the exam room as the doctor studied the pictures she'd gotten from the sonogram. Caitlin turned to her husband and whispered, "Now remember, Hawke. All we want to know is if the baby is healthy. Got it?"
"Yes, dear," Hawke mumbled. Just then, the doctor looked up and said, after finally having convinced herself that what she saw really was what she saw, "I have to tell you, this is an interesting sonogram."
"Interesting? How?" Caitlin sounded worried. "All I want to know is, is my baby healthy?"
The doctor smiled, and said, "Relax, Cait. You don't smoke, you don't drink heavily...your career choice could become a problem later on, but I'm not too concerned about that right now. You're doing everything right. Don't worry. Your babies will be just fine."
"Oh, that's a relief. Did you hear that, Hawke? The babies will be just fine. Okay, let's go," Caitlin said, and they began walking out of the exam room, but something the doctor had said made Hawke turn around. I have to make sure I heard what I think I heard, he said to himself.
"Did you say 'babies?'"
Caitlin heard her husband's question and turned back to the doctor. "Yeah. Did she say 'babies?'"
"That's what I said, Caitlin. In about four months, you're going to have twins."
Hawke suddenly felt a little woozy, and had to ask the doctor for a chair to sit down. He sat next to his wife and said, "You're sure?"
"Absolutely, I'm sure," the doctor replied, holding the sonogram image up to the light. "That's why I stared at the sonogram for so long...to make sure that what I saw really was what I thought I saw. There's one little head...and here's the other. We caught this at a good time...sometimes, the scanners don't pick up one or the other at first."
"I can't believe it," Caitlin whispered as she stared at the images of the two lives growing inside her. "Hawke...we're having twins. Dominic will be so surprised!"
Not half as surprised as I am, Hawke admitted to himself. "Any idea when the babies will be born?"
"I can't be positive," the doctor said, "but it looks like you're going to have your very own Christmas miracles," she stated with a calm air of finality.
"Christmas...well...it's a little late, but..."
"Yeah, Hawke...my last Christmas wish will come true." Caitlin smiled the special smile she saved only for her husband. "Thank you so much, Doctor." Just before they left, Caitlin turned back and said, "One other question, Doctor..." She hesitated, but her doctor knew the question that was burning in Caitlin's mind.
"Caitlin, you're carrying twin girls. And, you're quite welcome, Caitlin...and again, congratulations." Hawke and Cait left the doctor's office and headed home, as they had a lot of work to do in the next four months. First, of course, they had to build an addition on to the cabin. That'll be something Saint John, Dom and I can work on, once Cait can't help us anymore, Hawke reasoned. But, if I know her, she'll be involved until the very last minute.
A few days later, back at the hangar, Caitlin asked Dom to talk with her and String in the office for a minute. As he closed the door, Dominic asked, "Okay, you two...what's going on? You're not having problems with the baby, are you?" Dominic looked at Hawke like his own son, and had come to love Caitlin like a daughter, so to think that the two of them were not getting along somehow, after everything they'd been through to get where they were, or even worse, that something was wrong with the baby, was something Dom wasn't sure he could stand.
"Seriously, Cait. Are you both okay?" Dominic queried.
"Dom, we're fine," Caitlin said, as she leaned into String. "We're all...just fine."
"All?" The last time Dom heard somebody say that, it was their friend Nick, as he announced that his wife had just had triplets. Caitlin watched him, and glanced at String as she waited for Dominic to finally put the pieces together. Suddenly, Dom's face brightened. "You mean..."
"Yeah, Dom. Come Christmas time, you'll be the surrogate grandfather...to twin girls."
"Oh, mama mia, I can't believe it!" Dom shouted as he gathered Cait and String into a huge embrace. "But, this is gonna change a lot of things around here. No more flying off to God-knows-where whenever "Mr. Clean" calls us."
"Well, Dom..Hawke and I will worry about that when the time comes...for now, though, there's something we wanted to ask you," Caitlin said, to change the subject. "Would you be okay with us naming one of our daughters...'Sally Anne'?"
Dominic stared, unbelieving, at his two closest friends. "You...you want to name one of your kids after my daughter? String...Cait...I would be honored," Dom answered them, with tears filling his eyes as he embraced Hawke and Caitlin again. "Cait? You know what that means? It means your last Christmas wish is coming true."
"Yeah, Dom," Caitlin answered as she glanced at her husband. "And, the babies might actually be here around Christmas time, at least, that's what the doctor said."
"Well, that's great news. Any ideas what you'll name the other one?"
"Well, Caitlin decided on an old Irish name – Saoirse Hawke."
"Saoirse?" Dominic stuttered, butchering the pronunciation. "Sounds Indian to me, not Irish. How the heck do you pronounce that, anyway?"
"Seer-sha," Caitlin replied, grinning. "I looked it up – it means "freedom," which seems appropriate, considering we're both pilots...and love the freedom we have in the sky," she stated firmly.
"I like it...I don't quite get it, but I like it," Dom said as he toyed with the name in his mind. Oh, String...I'm gonna really feel sorry for you in about 16 years, buddy, Dom said to himself. If those girls are even half as pretty as their mother, you're gonna be up every night worrying about them being out with some guy. Unless, of course, that guy is anything like their dad...or their uncle Saint John, Dominic added, silently.
Christmas Night
"God, why did I think I could do this? I'm not ready to be a mother," Caitlin gasped as the next contraction hit.
"Sorry, Cait...babies disagree. Okay...this time, push!" As she followed the doctor's orders, Caitlin looked over her shoulder at her husband and shouted, "Hawke, I swear...if you ever touch me again, I'll cut it off and make you eat it! Do you hear me?" String shuddered at the thought, but then realized it was only her frustration and the pains talking. A few contractions later, and their first child, Sally Anne Hawke, had been born, followed a few minutes later by her sister, Saoirse Marie Hawke.
"I can't believe we did this, Hawke," Caitlin whispered as she looked at her two daughters.
"Cait, you did all the work," Hawke chuckled. "I don't know how you ladies do it, carrying babies around for nine months."
"Oh, Hawke," Caitlin whispered through joyful tears, "carrying our twins was the most incredible experience of my life...up until a few hours ago," she added with a wry grin. "Those last few hours are not something I want to go through again any time soon."
"Yeah, I kinda got that impression," String replied as he held Saoirse, and looked at Sally in the arms of her mother. "I hope you didn't mean what you said about..."
"If you ever touched me again, I'd cut it off and make you eat it?" Caitlin fixed her husband with her most adorable impish grin and said, "Well, I wouldn't go that far...but any of that kind of activity's gonna have to wait a little while, at least," she admitted. Caitlin knew she couldn't deny her husband for long, and, to be perfectly honest, I wouldn't even if I did want to, she admitted to herself. But, she sighed, I've gotta let myself heal a little bit.
One week later, at Santini Air
"String? Cait? I thought you two were supposed to be...oh...wait a second...are these my two little angels?" Dom looked into the carriers at two tiny babies wrapped in pink blankets. "Aw w...they're so cute! So, who's who?"
"Well, Sally Anne is over here," Caitlin pointed to the baby on Dominic's left, "and this one is Saoirse Marie," Caitlin said, as Sally reached up and grabbed one of Dominic's fingers in her tiny hand.
"They're so cute, you two...I know, I know, I said that before, but it's the truth. I think they both are gonna look like you, Cait," Dom smiled and turned to String, "which means, buddy boy, I'm gonna feel real sorry for you about 16 years from now, when those boys start calling for them," Dom grinned as he watched his two surrogate grandchildren, who seemed to be falling asleep again. I hope you two girls find two guys like your daddy and your uncle Saint John, Dom thought to himself as he stared at the babies. You find two guys like them, and you'll do just fine.
Standing there with his wife beside him, and watching their twin girls, Stringfellow Hawke felt as happy as he had ever been in his entire life. He had finally gotten his happy ever after, and had been able to give the woman he loved her three most special Christmas wishes. Or, would twins count as 'four,' he asked himself. Oh, who cares, he finally decided as he squeezed Caitlin closer to him. "Merry Christmas, Cait. I love you."
"And I love you, too, String. Always, and forever." Silently, Dom, Hawke and Caitlin watched the two sleeping children, each pondering the future.