Okay guys, I know. Its not really close to Christmas but this idea came to me when I was laying in bed trying to distract myself from thinking of the amazing creepiness that is Stranger Things. (Amazing show BTW) This is a How to Rock one-shot with multiple couples. In my opinion, HtR ended way too soon but every time I rewatch the episodes, I became obsessed with it all over again. The couples are Zander/Stevie, Nelson/Grace, Kevin/Kacey, and OC/Molly. No hate please, but CONSTRUCTIVE criticism is welcomed. :) Enjoy!
Just so no one gets confused ;) :
Zander and Stevie: Tanner and Kit (4), Oliver (1)
Nelson and Grace: Colton (7), Clover (4), Cody (7 months)
Kevin and Kacy: Quinn (5), Sommer (3), pregnant
Walker and Molly: Finn (5), Brittany (2), pregnant
"Finn," Molly called up stairs for her son. "Did you change into the clothes that I put on your bed?"
The boy poked his head out of his bedroom door. "Do I have to wear the vest, mom?" he pleaded, for the four hundredth time.
Molly placed her hands on her hips and gave Finn her "mom stare", as Walker called it. "We have already been over this and you know what the answer is. Now finish quickly, Grace texted and said that they are almost here," she replied, softening her voice on the last sentence.
After watching Finn's door close, the anxious hostess headed to the kitchen to make sure that she had all the food ready. She was checking the jello, salad, and punch that was setting in the fridge when she felt strong arms wrap around her waist. "Calm down, Honey. I don't think the jello has moved in the last sixty seconds," Walker chuckled from behind her.
She took a breath, calming her over working brain. Turning around to face him, she replied. "Walker. Its the first year that I am hosting the Christmas supper. What if the turkey doesn't taste good or the jello doesn't set. What if this Christmas dinner isn't as good as Kacey's or Stevie's?"
"If it makes you feel any better, Kacey's potatoes last year were a little too salty for my taste," Walker commented, picking a nearby strawberry off a plate and popping it in his mouth.
Molly smiled at her husband for a moment before realizing something. "Babe, where is Brittany?" She asked.
"In the living room beside the tr..." Walker's voice trailed off as he soon realized what she ment. He hurriedly went to livingroom to make sure the toddler was behaving well.
Molly just smiled in amusement. In her opinion, Brittany was in the cutest stage that a child could be in. Hobbling when she walks. So curious about the everything. Talking in that language that is half baby and half English. But Walker wasn't exactly a big fan. Though he did enjoy the cute moments, he thought the ones where she would get herself into trouble overpowered all else.
Molly quickly cut up the last banana and placed the slices on the fruit platter. She put the platter in the fridge and turned around when she heard Finn enter the kitchen. He was wearing black dress pants, a ruby red shirt, a black vest, and a Forrest green tie. "Awww," Molly cooed. "My little Finn looks all grown up."
"So I have been told," Finn replied. He took a seat at the bar across from where Molly was currently washing banana gunk off her hands. "Mom. Were you and Dad best friends like Zander and Stevie?"
Molly looked up from the sink. "In a different way then Zander and Stevie. Why?"
" Cause the other day when we went to the park, Colton said that you can't be in love unless your'e best friends," he informed. Molly turned off the sink and reached for a towel while Finn continued. "I don't think that was true because Nelson and Grace were not best friends and they got married."
"Well, when you truly love someone, they become your best friend," Molly informed. She smiled when she remembered the day that Walker walked into school. They had been anything but best friends. She snapped out of her daydream. "Why are you wondering about love, Finn? You're five. Your biggest concern should be what video game you are gonna play."
A look of disgust appeared on his face. "Eww. I don't care about love. I just don't want Colton to be right," Finn replied. He popped off his seat as the doorbell rang. "Oh! I hope that's Colton!"
Finn was still unable to open the heavy oak door of the house so he waited just inside the door. Molly hurried from the kitchen after her excited son. When she reached the door, she fixed her already perfect hair. Molly pulled the door open to reveal Nelson, Grace, and their children standing in the steadily falling snow.
"Come on in!" Molly exclaimed.
The Baxter's hustled into the house as Walker, carrying Brittany, entered from a second living room. Grace half ran over to Molly. "Molly!" she squealed. She set the car seat with a sleeping Cody beside the couch.
"Hey Grace," Molly greeted, hugging her best friend. She continued as they separated from their hug. "How was the week long camping trip?"
"Cold," Nelson replied from next to his wife. On one of Nelson and Grace's dates, she had convinced him to go camping with her and her family. On this trip, he was taught how to camp properly unlike on their class trip. Since then, they go once a year with Grace's family and once a year with their own.
The aforementioned couple helped their children take off their coats and shoes before Nelson went to help Walker get some firewood from the backyard. The kids ran upstairs, Finn begining the conversation with the love ordeal. Molly and Grace didn't even bother moving to another room before they started talking.
"How is Walker's job going? I still don't understand why he would need one, considering how much money his dad left him when he died," Grace questioned, taking off her own designer coat and boots. She knelt down to check on Cody.
"It is true that we are quite rich but, in his will, Walker's father left him the tech company. We own the company so there is always plenty to do," Molly answered. The women heard a knock on the door. Molly reached for the shiny silver handle and pulled the door open. She smiled at her new guests. "Hey guys. Haven't seen you for a whole twenty hours."
The Robbins's chuckled as Molly motionened for them to enter, which the did rapidly. "Hey Grace," Stevie greeted while taking off Kit's coat. "Kacy and Kevin weren't too far behind us," she said to Molly. Zander and Stevie took off their kids coats and shoes before taking off their own, all the while talking. The kids ran upstairs as the adults went into the second living room. Cody was left sleeping peacfully in his car seat by the couch but Stevie took one year old Oliver with her.
Waller and Nelson were already there placing chopped wood in the fire. Zander walked over to help them as the women sat on the couch. "I heard somewhere that you signed a new talent. Who is she?" Grace asked Stevie.
"Its a this girl named Franastasia Fox," Stevie replied, Oliver messing with the fringe on her shirt. "She has a great voice and is very beautiful. Both Zander and I think that she can do great in the music business. Her only downfall is that she is extremely demanding."
"She is even worse then Brittan Cole was," Zander chimed in. "And you all know how that turned out." The others nodded, remembering said guy. Zander and Stevie had owned a very successful record company for some years now and there hardest talent up to this point had been Brittan. He had been demanding from the get go, but that did not stop the Robbins's from signing him. He got a big head after his first album and soon his demands got extreme. Finally Zander, being the head of the record deal, was forced to release him of his contract.
"If she is so much like Brittan Cole, why did you sign her in the first place?" Nelson questioned as he took a place on the couch next to Grace.
Zander, also sitting beside his wife, was the one to answer. "When she auditioned she acted perfectly normal."
Just then the doorbell ran again. Molly hopped off her chair and hurriedly made her way to the first living room. She opened the door to see the Reeds bundled in coats. "Hey guys. Come on in," she greeted, motioning for them to enter. They did so and proceeded to take off coats and shoes. Kacey, being the women she was, had designer everything.
As Molly watched the couple, she thought of there odd relationship over the years. All through high school, Kevin had a crush on Kacey but when college started, he started dating this other girl. That was about the time when Kacey began to really like him. He didn't know this until their last semester of college. Once he found out, they started dating. But that wasn't the end of their problems. Both fell madly in love and within the next year, Kevin proposed. The catch is that Kacey's father did not like the idea of his daughter marrying a man who was not as wealthy as he.
The wedding was postponed but Kacey, being stubborn as always, would not call it off, no matter what her dad said. Kevin got tired of not being able to marry her and not have her father's respect so he put his college degree into action. He programmed a new kind of antivirus program that worked on any virus and created an app that still makes at least $750,000 a day. Because of this, the Reeds immediately became rich and Kacey was allowed to marry Kevin. He knew that this wasn't the ideal way to gain her father's respect but if it ment he and Kacey could marry, he could live with it.
At Zander and Stevie's wedding, they were the last to get married, Molly, Grace, and Kacey had talked about how all of their relationship were so different. Walker and Molly were the "enemies turned lovers", Kevin and Kacy were both the "girl realizes she likes guy but its too late" and the "forbidden", Nelson and Grace were the "picture perfect unlikely lovers", and Zander and Stevie were the "best friends turned lovers". Molly still couldn't believe that they were the last to get married. Zander and Stevie had been dating since junior year of high school, longer then any of the others.
Molly snapped out of her remenising and escorted the Reeds into the second living room while their children ran up stairs. "Kevin!" Nelson yelled holding his arms open.
"Nelson!" Kevin yelled back and gave Nelson one of their "I haven't seen you in a long time because you went camping" hugs.
Kacey leaned over to Stevie. "Sometimes I wonder if I am second in his life," she said as the two women watched Kevin and Nelson.
Stevie chuckled. While looking at the two she noticed that they had not brought the gifts in. "Zee. Can you please go get the gifts out of the back of the car?" she questioned.
Zander looked at her, reluctant to brave the cold after sitting by the warm fire. Stevie just stared right back. "If you get them now, you won't have to sit next to Sam at my family Christmas dinner," she bribed.
Zander looked at her a little longer before swinging over the couch. "Wish me luck!" he called as he vanished into another room.
"That's the Media room, Zander," Walker called.
"I realize that," Zander replied as he reentered and exited out a door on the other side.
"I should go get our gifts too," Nelson said, exiting the same way as Zander.
"Me too. Why didn't we just bring them in when we came in?" Kevin questioned out loud. He followed Nelson out.
"And I...will not go out in the cold but I will open the door for you guys," Walker announced. He gave Brittany to Molly before exiting the same as the other men.
Stevie watched all the men leave and then turned to the women. Her smile turned into a nervous frown. "Okay, you four are my friends, right?" she questioned.
The question caught the others off guard. Grace was the first to regain herself. "Of course. And friends tell each other anything and everything."
This seemed to comfort Stevie a little. She sighed, then continued. "Glad you said that cause I need to tell you something but you can't tell Zander." The other women nodded, to curious to speak. Stevie looked all them in the eye and blurted her thoughts out. "Zander is always talking about how he is so happy and that our family is perfect and how he never wants anything to change. But that's impossible cause you never know what life is gonna throw at you, push you into, or dunk you in and it just so happens that at this point life decided to change our family because I'm pregnant."
The women's curious expressions turned into excited ones. "Stevie. That's great!" Kacy exclaimed.
"I'm just a little worried about telling him because he so happy with how life is," Stevie continued while nervously biting her hair, a habit she hadn't gotten rid of.
Grace rolled her eyes. "Stevie, this is Zander we're talking about," she comforted, removing Stevie's hair from her mouth. "Ever since you had the twins, he has had baby fever."
"Yeah. When Walker brought Brittany with him to the recirding studio for that meeting, Zander held her for like two and a half hours," Molly added. "He loves children and will love to add another to your family."
Stevie let out a sigh of relief. "Thanks guys. I really needed to hear that," she said with a warm smile.
"Mom!" The cry was heard clearly from the stairs in the second living room. All the mothers's attention was quickly turned to Kit and Clover angrily descending the stairs.
"Clover won't let me play with the pink car!" Kit exclaimed to her mother. She ran over to Stevie and stood stubbornly in front of her.
"I got it first!" Clover countered, stomping over to her mother. "I tried to give her the black car, Momma! But she wouldn't take it!"
"But you had the pink car last time!" Kit whined.
"Kit," Stevie said sternly. "If Clover got the car first then she gets to play with it. She nicely offered you the black car so why don't you play with that one for a little."
"And Clover," Grace added, just as sternly as Stevie. "You have to take turns with the pink one so in a few minutes, switch, okay?"
The girls nodded before running half joyfully up the stairs. "I have a feeling that those two are going to be a handful once they get older," Kacey commented as the women watched the girls.
"They're already a handful," Grace corrected, causing the other women to chuckle. They heard some loud thumping before Nelson entered with presents stacked above his head.
"You know, honey," he began, setting the presents on the floor. "Next year, let's buy a few big presents instead of a lot of small ones."
An hour later...
"I'm not sure," Walker responded, looking over at Zander who had just asked him a question. They had already ate dinner and the children had ran upstairs to play until present time. The women were working on clearing the table while simultaneously having a conversation in the kitchen.
"Isn't it like in February?" Nelson voiced, taking a drink from his wine glass. The men were sitting at the table discussing the up coming school reunion.
"I heard February 15th," Kevin added. "You could always text Andy and ask. He and his wife Anya are in charge of the whole thing."
Zander put his silverware on his empty plate as Grace took it to the kitchen. "I never had Andy's number in high school and I don't have it now," he replied. "Wait. Andy got married?"
Walker nodded. "Yeah. She is the secretary at our Denver office," he explained setting his half empty wine glass on the table. "Sweet woman but she thinks of the weirdest things."
"Oh speaking of weird," Zander began, leaning both elbows on the table. "One of my producers got arrested yesterday for accidentally stealing a Twinkie."
"Seriously?" Nelson asked in disbelief. "If one were to steal something, you would think it would be something usdful."
Meanwhile...
Grace set her pile of dishes down by the sink and turned to the other women. "I think it's a little bland," she said bluntly.
"Really?!" Kacey and Molly exclaimed in unison.
"You think Balke Cruiser's newest wardrobe line is bland?" Kacey asked, shocked.
"Why?!" Molly exclaimed, just as shocked as Kacey. Both women were extreme fashionistas. They always had the latest of everything. Shoes, dresses, purses, and jewelry were just the begining.
Grace shrugged. "It's all been done before. I don't think he created anything original," she reasoned.
"I agree with Grace," Stevie chimed in. "I mean, I don't know much about fashion but his line didn't look like any New Year Style."
Kacey and Molly half agreed with her reasoning. Although Stevie was no fashionista, she had a knack for knowing if something was gonna succeed or fail.
"Kids! Present time!" Molly called as the women made their way to the second living room where the men had already migrated.
As the children came rushing downstairs, bringing their excitement with them, and the snow began falling heavily, the eight friends gathered together in peacfulness and joy. They had been through everything together and were determined to keep sticking together in the years to come.