A/N: I've been trying to get back into the Jolex writing spirit for a while, but it's been hard considering that Grey's Anatomy has been the furthest thing from inspiring these past couple years. Watching this show has become emotionally draining and I'm not sure if I'm going to continue. That being said, I decided to revisit a universe I love. "To Build a Home" was not only one of my favorite stories to write, but it seems to have been one of everyone else's favorites too. I don't think I ever received a response like that from any other fic. While you could probably understand this story without reading "To Build a Home", I think it would be best to read that first.

The concept of this fic is a series of one-shots about Jolex and their growing family that take place in the same universe as "TBaH". These one-shots will vary in length and subject matter, and will not always go chronologically. We may jump back and forth between years quite a bit, depending on my muse. I also don't know how often it will be updated, because it just depends on when I feel inspired (I'm also in the middle of writing a novel, which takes up most of my free time, so you know there's that).

This chapter takes place after Alex and Jo get back together, but before Liam is born. The chapter title comes from the song "Little Wonders", which is where this story's title came from as well. Enjoy!

don't you know the hardest part is over

After they got back together, Alex thought everything would be easy again.

Yeah, he was wrong about that.

It's not like things are worse (not that that's saying much), but there is so much to prepare. Alex is grateful that they finally don't have to worry about Jo's ex anymore, but then – as his only living relative – she has to deal with the bastard's funeral. He suggests that they just dump his ashes down the garbage disposal, but Jo insists that she's going to be the bigger person and not stoop to his level. Watching his girlfriend arrange for the burial of her abusive first husband is almost too much for him to bear, but Jo perseveres through it because she's the strongest person he knows. She buys him a simple plot at a cemetery back in his hometown and orders a run of the mill funeral that neither of them attend. Instead, they stay at the loft and toast to moving on from the past - Alex with a beer, Jo with ginger ale. After that, they start looking for a house and buying things for the baby, because Jo is in her third trimester and they are totally not prepared. Also, having a kid is expensive. Alex wants to kick himself for not saving up more money.

"You missed a spot."

Alex looks over his shoulder to meet Jo's eyes as he paints the nursery wall. Jo is lying diagonally on the rocking chair that is still covered in plastic tarp, her bare feet hanging over the armrest, one arm draped over her belly. She's wearing one of his old Iowa State T-shirts, because his clothes and scrubs are the only things she feels comfortable in these days. Everything else is too tight and she detests maternity clothes, because in her words they're too flowery, too frilly and/or look like they belong to an old lady. "You could help me, you know."

Jo pops a potato chip into her mouth. "I'm pregnant, I get to sit this one out."

"Well then stop micromanaging,"

"But you're a terrible painter and I don't want our kid sleeping in a room that looks like crap." She points to a spot on the wall. "Now, like I said, it's not even there. You should add another layer."

Alex rolls his eyes, but does as he's told. "You're a pain in the ass, you know that right?"

"Yeah, but I'm your pain in the ass."

After touching up that spot on the wall, Alex steps down from the ladder and drops his paint roller into the tray. "That's enough for today."

Jo looks at him, chewing. "But you're not done."

"Well, maybe I would be if I had some help."

"You could've called Avery. Or Hunt." Alex sits down on the floor and plucks the bag of chips from Jo's hand so he can help himself. She gives him a dirty look. "Oh Hell no. You did not just steal my pregnancy snack."

"Easy there, princess. I guess our kid isn't the only one I'm going to have to teach about sharing."

Jo sits up immediately, lunging for the bag, but when she swings her legs over, her foot accidentally lands in the paint tray. Her mouth forms a small 'o' and though Alex tries to restrain himself, he immediately bursts out laughing.

Jo gives his shoulder a shove. "Quit it!"

"Well, if you want to help me with the room, you can go rub your foot on the wall over there." This just earns him another playful whack from Jo, only in her efforts to reach him she falls off the chair, and now half her leg is covered in blue paint. This only makes Alex laugh harder.

Jo lifts herself onto her knees and brushes off her hands. "That's it."

Alex opens his mouth to offer up an apology just as Jo lifts up the paint roller. "You wouldn't dare." He says.

A mischievous glint appears in her brown eyes. "Oh yeah? Try me."

He drops the potato chip bag and rises to his feet, Jo half a second behind him and attempting to grab him by the back of his shirt. He reaches for the door handle but he can't get a good grip on it thanks to the paint on his hands and Jo is able to catch up with him, grabbing onto him and smearing the paint roller across his back.

He spins back around to find her staring at him triumphantly, a few stray tendrils of hair having fallen out of her ponytail, her lips forming a proud smirk. "You're gonna pay for this, Wilson." He promises, picking up the can and sticking his hand in it, flicking paint at her.

She giggles, backing up and holding up the roller in front of her like a shield. "Okay, I'm sorry! I'm calling for a ceasefire!"

"Too late!" She backs away but ends up in the corner, blindly waving the paint roller at him as he wipes his paint-soaked hands across her face, belly, chest, and practically everywhere else. Before long they've both dissolved into a flurry of laughter, both of them completely covered in blue and kissing each other.

Half an hour later, the room has been completely forgotten. They are both on the floor, Jo's head on Alex's lap, more paint on them than on the walls by this point. They definitely have to go back to the store and buy more tomorrow.

Jo perks up. "Oh, he's kicking." She grabs Alex's hand and places it on the spot so he can feel. "That's pretty crazy, right? I don't think I'll ever get used to that…"

Alex kisses her on the forehead. "I love you."

She smiles up at him. "Love you too."

It hasn't been an easy road, but he loves his life. And it was definitely worth the wait. He would go through it all again, just to end up here.

Something is up. Jo can feel it.

The hospital is oddly quiet today. Usually Alex will come to check up on her in between surgeries, but it's been radio silence on his end since this morning. She would've assumed he was just busy, but she hasn't seen Stephanie or Leah all day and Robbins hasn't invited her to scrub in like she usually does. Even DeLuca won't answer her pages. Everyone is ignoring her, which means that something is going on. But what?

Jo absentmindedly drums her fingers against the counter of the nurses' station. She doesn't have any surgeries for a few more hours, there's no one to talk to, and even her charts are all done. She pokes her belly, wondering if the baby will start moving, but he's napping at the moment. She checks her watch twice in a one minute interval. Yup, Jo is very, very bored.

"What are you doing?"

Jo immediately perks up when she sees Alex. "Hey, where have you been? I haven't heard from you since this morning."

"I had a…an appendectomy. I couldn't get away."

She raises an eyebrow at him. "I didn't see that on the board."

"It was an emergency." Alex says, before taking her arm. "Come on, I have a surprise for you."

"Ooh, is it a hip replacement?"

"No."

"ACL reconstruction?"

"No."

"Well is it a pediatric surgery then?"

"It's not surgery related," Alex explains, leading her down towards the peds ward. "It's for the baby."

"Did you finally put the crib together?"

"Umm…no."

"Did you read the baby name book yet?"

"Not yet, but I will."

"Can you at least tell me if I'm getting warmer?"

"You were closer with the crib."

Jo mulls this over for a moment, but comes up empty. "Okay, I've got nothing. Come on Alex, what is it? You know I hate surprises."

"You'll like this one," Alex assures her. They've stopped outside one of the staff lounges now, and Alex reaches for the doorknob. "At least, I think you will."

"Alex, what -?" She cuts herself off when Alex opens the door.

"Surprise!"

Jo stares open-mouthed as she takes in the sight before her. Everyone is there – Leah and Stephanie, Robbins, DeLuca, Bailey and Ben, Hunt and Shepherd, Jackson and April with baby Harriet, Webber, Pierce, even Grey. A 'It's A Boy!' banner is strung up and the table is covered in neatly-wrapped presents and homemade treats. It's enough to bring Jo to tears (though it doesn't take a lot to make her cry these days). "Oh my God, you guys!" She gasps, covering her mouth with her hand. "This is too much!"

Steph and Leah both come over to hug her while Kepner claps her hands together. "Okay everyone, who's ready for a game? Let's see who knows the mommy and daddy to be the best…"

Jo looks over Murphy's shoulder to Alex, who is standing back and smiling. She mouths 'thank you' at him. She's so touched that she can't even be annoyed about April's dumb shower games.

Jo never used to have friends. She never had a family. No one cared about her or loved her. But now? She has all of that and more. It's more than she ever dared to hope for.

It's half past four on a Tuesday morning when Alex suddenly awakens with a jolt.

"Jo?" He mumbles into the darkness, only to receive no answer. He looks over and the spot in bed next to him is empty. The mattress is cold to the touch, indicating that Jo hasn't been sleeping there for a while. He has a feeling he knows where she might be.

Alex sleepily trudges down the hallway towards the baby's room. Jo has been having insomnia lately and sometimes she'll go to the nursery when she can't sleep, to move things around or fold baby clothes. Nesting, or whatever. It's not unusual. "Jo?"

His girlfriend is sitting on the floor, legs tucked under her. There are a bunch of the baby onesies they received at the shower sprawled on the floor but she's not doing anything with them, just staring, as if she had gotten distracted after she took them all out. Her eyes are trained on a green onesie with the words 'My mommy and daddy save lives – what do YOUR mommy and daddy do?' written on the front, staring blankly.

When she recognizes the sound of her name she glances up and Alex flips the light switch, plunging the nursery into light. Jo turns her head, but not quickly enough – he can see the traces of tears in her light brown eyes. "Sorry, did I wake you?" She says, fumbling with the pile of onesies as she gets back onto her feet. "I couldn't sleep again and I didn't want to disturb you with all of my tossing and turning…"

She turns to put the onesies back in the dresser but Alex places a hand lightly on her forearm, halting her mid-motion. "Jo," He whispers her name like someone might utter a prayer. "Come on. I know when something's up with you. Whatever it is, you can tell me."

She pauses, her lips pursed, her eyes roving the room as she takes a moment to look at everything in it. "It's beginning to feel real, you know?" She says. "I mean, really real. At first, I was so distracted by…by what was happening with the divorce…" Alex winces at the reference to her late ex-husband. "And then after that was over, I was so happy because we were back together, having a baby, happy…" She shakes her head. "But now, we're not having a baby in six months, or four, or two. We're having a baby in four weeks. Hell, I could go into labor tomorrow!"

"Is that what you're scared of?" Alex asks. "Labor?"

"No," She mutters, the tears springing to her eyes again. "I'm scared of…of being a mom. And of being a mom to a son. What if he's a bad person? What if I…" She whispers her fear so low he has to strain to hear, a tear spilling over her eyelid. "What if I can't love him?"

At this, the pieces all fall together in Alex's brain. He would be lying if he said he hadn't experienced similar thoughts. Neither of them have good examples to look to in the parenting department, and Jo's positive experiences with the opposite sex are slim – with ex-boyfriends and husbands that laid their hands on her and foster fathers that treated her like dirt, Alex knows he was probably the only man she ever had a positive relationship with. Until him, every man she'd ever known intimately had abused her.

"I know," Jo says, turning away from him now. "I'm a horrible person. And I shouldn't be thinking like this, not after how we almost lost him…" Alex's temper momentarily flares up when he thinks about how Jo's ex-husband had tried to take custody of their unborn son. The thought of their son being raised by that bastard still makes his blood boil, even though he knows that Jo's ex is buried safely in the ground and it will never happen. "That's why I haven't told you. I'm horrible, I feel horrible. I'm sorry, I understand if you hate me, or if you think I'm a bad mom…"

Alex places a hand on each of her shoulders to steady her and she meets his gaze again. "Jo, you are not a bad mom. You are the greatest mom I've ever met, and our son isn't even here yet."

Her lower lip trembles. "You really think so?"

"I know so," He affirms. "From the moment that you found out you were pregnant, you've fought for this baby. You've gone to war for him. You stood up to your ex for him. You did everything you could to protect him. You think you'd do those things if you didn't love him?"

Slowly, Jo shakes her head. "No, I guess not…"

But, there is one more concern and – as if he can read her mind – Alex continues. "Now, as for the other thing you said…" He pauses and sucks in a nervous breath, before confessing what he's been too embarrassed to tell her. "I've worried about it too, you know? Sometimes I look at you and I just think to myself 'How am I going to be a dad?' I don't know the first thing about it."

Jo opens her mouth to cut him off – to remind him that he is one of the best pediatric surgeons in the country, that she's never seen someone as at ease with children as him, that if he can care so deeply for other people's children he'll have no problem loving one of his own – but Alex isn't done yet.

"My dad was a really shitty dad, Jo. No – not a shitty dad, the shitty dad. You know, I don't even remember him ever telling me he loved me?" He has a faraway look in his eyes, and Jo's heart breaks for him. "My point is, I have those fears too. I don't have a good father that I can model myself after. And I wasn't always the nicest person before I met you, I was…" Alex laughs lightly. "I was an ass. I wondered how someone who's made mistakes like I have could teach my son to be a good man. What right did I have to be someone's dad? But then I thought to myself…we already love our kid. If we're already better than our parents in that respect, who says we can't learn from their other mistakes? All we can do is try our best and let him know every day that we love him. But that's a start, right?"

Jo bows her head, eyes welling with tears, and Alex brushes a loose coil of hair behind her ear. "He's not going to grow up like us, Jo. He's not going to be angry at the world like we were." When he sees that she's crying again, he hesitates. "Did I say something wrong?"

Slowly, Jo lifts her head to meet his eyes and smiles through her tears. "No – you said exactly the right thing."

In that moment she thinks that maybe, with this man by her side, she can do anything.