Summary: When the stress became of being teenaged parents and college students too much for Lucas and Brooke, Karen offered to take care of their daughter during the week and they'll have her back on weekends till after graduation. Now graduation is over with and they want their daughter back, how will Karen react?
Disclaimer: I own nothing at all. I wished I owned something from OTH besides memorabilia.
To Get To You
.Chapter Two.
"She's asleep after she put up a fight." Brooke walked over to Lucas who was carefully examining the paper given by his mother.
He wanted to come up with some loophole, some idea better than because she's our biological daughter. He searched and searched and searched some more in the paper work but it was plain and clear. Karen thinks they can't raise her and give her the stability she needs as a young child.
When they left Karen's they stopped at a children's store to grab a few essentials for Annie. They mostly had everything their daughter needs but just to make sure they bought more than enough while also trying to figure out what she wanted for Christmas. With it around the corner, an a small stock pile of toys and clothes growing this Christmas will be one to remember.
"At least she went down." Lucas mumbled, his eyes not falling from the paper.
"We need help with this Luke. We can't afford a lawyer right now. We just started working and have barely no savings." While putting a cranky Annie down for her nap, Brooke was calculating numbers just trying to figure out how much it will cost them. "We shouldn't have to find a lawyer to fight for our own daughter."
"I know that, Brooke. I hate this. I feel like it's my fault." Lucas looked up finally and pulled Brooke onto his lap. He needed her closeness right now. It was a comfort tool. "I didn't push this thought and tell you that we could raise her without my mom's help than we wouldn't have been here."
"And if I didn't have a meltdown Luke, we wouldn't have been here." Brooke paused. "It's a two way road. We can't blame ourselves for it. Right now we just have to make it right."
"I like the way you think, Pretty Girl." He pulled her head down for a soft kiss.
"Haley text me earlier," Brooke was trying to distract him from the giant elephant in the room. "They're getting a Christmas tree tonight and asked if we wanted to tag along. We need to get into the Christmas spirit, now that it will be our first Christmas with just us in the morning compared to last Christmas..."
To say Karen loved Christmas would be the biggest understatement of the world. Her love for Christmas was insane. Santa's decked out all around the house. Christmas lights covering every possible place outside. While the tree stood centered in front of the living room window, displayed for all to see.
"Want to go see Santa today, Princess?" Brooke laid out an outfit for her growing daughter. At three-years-old, Annie was tall and skinny and could fit in with a sea of five-year-olds.
"Santa coming!"
To get the child excited for the Christmas spirit, and to help with the melt downs, Brooke started to tell Annie that Santa comes for good little girls and brings them toys every Christmas as long as they behave. This worked for a little till Lucas bought that stupid Elf on the Shelf toys. Asking a three-year-old to name a doll, she picked Tater, after her favorite food tater-tots. So now Tater keeps an eye out for Santa and this seems to enforce good behavior,
"In one more week, but we can visit him. How does that sound?" Brooke tried to enhance the excitement. "We can show everyone your pretty picture with Santa afterwards."
"Picture mommy!" Annie giggled. She loved having her picture taken and was far from camera shy.
"Yes, picture." Brooke let out a laugh. She changed Annie into her brand new princess undies and a pair of white tights to match her red dress that had a picture of Santa on it and black glittery sparkling shoes covered her feet. Lucas rolled his eyes when Brooke showed him the dress she bought but he allowed it anyway. "There you go Princess." She placed a clip to keep her curly locks out of her eyes. "All ready to go."
"Daddy come on! We see Santa!" Annie screamed running out of the bedroom.
When school was on break for Christmas, Lucas and Brooke would join Lucas's mother for a week at her house, sleeping on a blow up mattress on their daughter's bedroom floor. It was fine for now, and Annie loved waking them up by jumping on it every morning.
"Well have you been a good girl this year?"
"Daddy, I an angel!" Annie stated in an aggravated tone that her father wouldn't think she was an angel. "Duh."
"Oh that's right, you are my angel." He lifted her up into his arms and kissed her cheek. He loved her chubby cheeks but as she aged, they became thinner and thinner.
"Where are you three off to today?" Karen usually gave the three some space when they were together just to bond and make memories. This week was different though; she took the week off from the café to spend time with her son, his girlfriend and their daughter.
"We seeing Santa, Grammy so he knows I an angel!" Anna excitedly spoke from Lucas's arms. "Tater said I princess angel!"
"Oh," Karen's faced turned sad for a moment. She was praying that this month wouldn't be so busy so she could take Annie to see Santa by herself. She found a dress that she had to buy for her granddaughter and thought it would be perfect to wear for this type of thing.
"You can join us if you like, Karen." Brooke offered trying to put a smile back on the older woman's face. "After we're getting her Christmas picture's done. It's time to update the old ones and see how much she grew since than." The moment Annie was born, Brooke turned into a pictureholic. She took multitude of pictures from every event possible along with going to get the normal bunch of pictures each year.
"I don't want to disturb your family time, it's fine." Karen smiled softly. "But I found a dress that I had to get for Anastasia. Let me go get it."
Brooke looked at Lucas who just shrugged as he helped Annie into her coat. He had no clue what his mother did in her free time nor did he really care.
"Isn't it beautiful?" Karen gushed. The dress was pretty, Brooke would give her that much, but she didn't see Annie in that type of dress. "I thought she could wear it on Christmas when we all go over to Deb's." The dress was a gold sateen dress with a tulle skirt and a black bow going across the waist. "I got her new black shoes to wear with it. I didn't know if you had any for her."
"Thanks Karen, but I bought an outfit for her to wear on Christmas already. I'll make sure she wears this one in the pictures today though." Brooke offered a compromise with a smile.
"Wear it whenever you want her too, Brooke. It's no problem. I just bought it cause I knew she'd look perfect in it. You know how I get during Christmas season. Everything has to be perfect in tip-top shape."
"Come with us Karen, we don't mind."
"Come see Santa!" Annie giggle covering her hand with her mouth.
"Santa? Huh?" Karen smiled. "Okay, I'll come."
"We haven't seen them yet, so let's do it. I know Annie would like to see Jamie and baby Lydia." Lucas agreed pulling Brooke tighter into his arms. "I love you, Pretty Girl, you know that right?"
"I love you too Broody." She leaned down and gave him a smooch on the lips. "I'd love to continue this, but our daughter is sleeping in our bed and we need to find a lawyer so this will have to wait till tonight as an early Christmas present."
Sighing, letting out a deep breathe. "I don't know how we can afford a lawyer, it's not possible." He lifted her off his lap and started pacing. "We need to get a loan or something, or ask someone."
"Ask who? Cause I have no one to ask."
"Royale and Mae?" Lucas said the first names that came to mind. "Deb? Nathan or Haley? Hell even Dan I would ask."
"Royale and Mae are probably not too happy with you and Nate for following in Dan's footsteps with knocking up a girl by the time you're eighteen. Deb is probably agreeing with your mom on this all. She's your mom's business partner, Luke." She pointed out the obvious. "Nathan and Haley just had baby number two. I think they need their money. Don't ask Dan. He'd hold it over our heads forever."
"Then Brooke I've run out of ideas. The only one I have is your parents."
Brooke's parents were a sticky topic to discuss between the two. Brooke's dad, who was not too happy with her actions and becoming a teenage parent, still sent messages here and there to check in with her but never more than that. Brooke's mom just ignored Brooke and disowned her.
"I don't know, Luke." Brooke hesitated. She didn't know what her dad would do if she asked her dad for some help.
"It's our last hope, Brooke. We will never get a loan from a bank. We just started working. We can't afford to do this without help. Just send him an email and see what he says, please?"
"Fine." Brooke gave in because she knew it might be the last shot in getting a lawyer. "I'll email him, but if he says no, lets just talk to a lawyer and figure it all out." Brooke stood up and walked over to her computer.
She pushed herself for a little shove to do this. She was so nervous to send it and she didn't know why.
Date: December 19th, 2014
To: R. Edward Davis
From: Brooke Davis
Subject: Need Help, Please
Daddy,
I know you may not be able to help us in this because of what happened in the past, but Daddy I need your help. Lucas, my boyfriend, mom is trying to take Annie from us and we cannot afford a lawyer or anything to help fight it. I can't loose her, Daddy, I just can't. Can you please help us? Even if's just a little. We'll pay you back when we get a chance.
Love you,
Cookie
"There, but if he doesn't respond then we give up, okay?" Brooke pushed her self up and off the desk chair. "I tried, it's something right?"
"Now let's rest a little. It's a Sunday. Most lawyers aren't open today. Tomorrow we will deal with it. For now, let's relax till it's time for Christmas spirit."
"Remember when we got to Santa last year?"
"I don't think I could ever forget that, Brooke."
"Ready to see Santa, Princess?" Lucas was getting excited just for his daughter. Annie's face shined bright like the sun with excitement. "I know you've been very good this year."
"Santa has a beard like Grammy's friend." Annie spoke up giggling.
Brooke and Lucas both turned their attention to Karen who shrugged it off and stated it's just the neighbor.
"Next," The lady dressed in an elf costume who showed a look of boredom and not excitement like an elf should be.
"Go sit on Santa, baby." Lucas put Annie down on the ground and watched her skip off towards the bearded jolly old man.
"I don't think this is a smart idea." Karen held her nose up high in disgust. "Who knows who that man is. He can be a child molester and you're allowing Anastasia to be around him." It was a whisper, so she couldn't ruin the children around her day. What those parents did to their kids was not her fault.
"It's fine, Karen." Brooke stood at the side of Santa. Annie was starting to get nervous and Brooke could read her little girl's face. She wanted nothing to do with Santa. It was going to end badly in a mere second. "Just smile for the camera baby and we'll go."
"Cheese!" Annie faked a smile and ran off to her mother's side. "I smiled mommy!"
"I know you did baby. Did you tell Santa what you wanted for Christmas?"
"Grammy says that Santa knows cause she tells him."
"Oh." Brooke frowned slightly at the thought. She wanted her daughter to have the full Christmas/Santa experience and Karen ruined part of it. "You can still tell him baby. Next year tell him everything you want for Christmas."
"Okay." She grabbed a hold of Brooke's hand.
They quickly looked at the picture, Brooke purchasing one as a memory and moved on to their Christmas picture. Brooke wanted a professional family picture done today. She made Lucas wear a black polo and jeans and she wore a white and black dress to coordinate. It was going to be their first official picture.
Karen had other ideas though. She wanted pictures of her granddaughter and herself. She didn't care about anything else.
Brooke got so upset they ended up leaving without a family picture because of Karen's behavior.
"We should have realized something was going on then." Brooke mumbled.
Lucas used his finger to kiss her softly on the lips. "Brooke listen to me. This will all get better. I promise you. I'm not going to let her take Annie away from us."
"I believe you."
-XO-OTH-XO-
Nathan and Haley decided to meet at Brooke and Lucas's house and Annie was patiently waiting for them.
"Annie if you open the door one more time!" Brooke warned. Ever since they told Annie that Nathan, Haley, Jamie and baby Lydia were coming over she could not stop opening the door, hoping to see them on the other side.
"What then?" Annie paused shrugging her shoulders confused at what her mother just said.
"Stay away from the door." Lucas warned her this time. "You know better. Aunt Haley and Uncle Nathan will knock when they get here."
Then there was a knock at the door and Annie was off running towards the front door.
"You not Aunt Haley or Uncle Nathan..." Annie slammed shut the door just as fast as she opened it.
So there's chapter two! I'm off this week! WAHHHHOOOO! So I'm going to try to write a chapter a day or every other day till Thursday when I become busy with the holiday weekend.
Thank you all for reviewing! It means a lot! Especially thanks too: Angelove23, Sandygirl, Guest 1 & 2 &3, Brooke, StephieMarie23, Dianehermans, Akinka, and Marceltheshellwithshoeson for reviewing!