10

Alex and Serena returned to the apartment with several more bags than a fake shopping trip should have garnered.

Olivia's eyebrows furrowed as she perused the purchases from her vantage point in the kitchen. She shook her head and smiled and bit her lip to contain her laughter.

Serena grinned and shared a look with Alex as she passed by the couple's silent conversation to sort through the shopping at the table the next room over.

"What are you doing?" Alex as she watched Olivia open another beer.

"Why do I feel like this is a loaded question?" she smiled innocently at Alex.

"Why aren't you changed?"

"Into what?"

"For the thing tonight," Alex said.

"We have a thing tonight?"

"Dinner with my uncle," Alex continued. She tried strong-arming her with a look.

Olivia raised both eyebrows.

"What day is it Olivia?" Alex asked with a leading tone.

"Saturday." Olivia refrained from resisting Alex's insistence any further. "And… We have dinner with your uncle on Saturday. I'll go change."

Alex followed Olivia into their bedroom. "I'm going to start getting ready. Let Casey and Serena know I've called for a cab," she said.

"We're getting ready for an imaginary dinner so that Casey and Serena can share a cab?" Olivia said, disbelief evident even in her whispered tone. She tried not to roll her eyes.

"No. We're actually going to dinner with my uncle, and now you get to go out there and get them to share a cab."

"Why would they share?"

"Because they're leaving at the same time and are going in the same direction."

Olivia rolled her eyes a little. "You do know there is a fine line between taking advantage of a situation and pushing it."

Alex fixed her with a look that Olivia did not like seeing outside of a courtroom.

"I'm changing, I'm changing," Olivia said. Exchanging her jeans for a pair of form fitting slacks that she knew Alex was fond of on her, hoping to assuage the annoyance at her reluctance.

Olivia returned to the living room to see Casey tidying up the evidence of their game snacks and saw Serena checking something on her phone and gathering her bags to leave.

"Sorry to run out on you," she said, walking over toward Serena. "I completely forgot about a family dinner. But at least there's a cab waiting for you to share." Right after she said it, it hit Olivia, that she meant it. She had referred to the dinner with Alex's uncle as a family event. And it was really starting to feel like it too. For unfathomable reasons, Alex's mother had always liked Olivia, and the rest of the Cabots seemed to fall into the same line.

"Why do we need to share a cab?" Serena said, shaking Olivia out of her reverie.

"Uh," Olivia nearly shook her head to remember what they were talking about. "You both live in the same direction. Is there a problem?"

"I," Serena said, searching for an excuse, but Olivia had her stumped. "No, there's no problem."

"Good, I'll let the doorman know you're coming." Olivia turned away from her and grimaced as she headed toward Casey, knowing that her role in this was now set.

Casey willed the elevator to go faster. She was beginning to think that any nerves she had for controlling embarrassment were destined to fail every time she was around this woman.

In fact, sadly, it was like any other day around the blonde. The more Casey tried to suppress her awkwardness, and especially her bad luck- the worse those things would get.

She took a long, deep, slow breath trying to calm down as they arrived in front of the building and smiled at the more than welcome temperature change. Evening was starting to fall and the city was flooded with clear, wonderfully cooler air. That in and of itself made her feel better.

"It finally cooled off," she said. "It was like walking through soup this morning."

Serena nodded. "Yeah, it's almost a shame to take a cab."

"You're right," Casey agreed. She thought about how nice it would be to stretch out her legs a bit, enjoy the brief bits of nice weather in summer - as well as the relief from the pressure of sharing a cab. "I think I'm going to walk."

"Hmm," Serena said, "That sounds good. Maybe I should too."

Casey couldn't cool the expression of surprise on her face, but she recovered faster than she could have hoped and motioned in the direction that they were facing. When Serena nodded in agreement, Casey reached out and gently took the larger gathering of bags from Serena's hands. "Can I help even the load for you?" she said, a beat too late.

Serena raised her eyebrow at the chivalry and Casey's stomach dropped. In an instant she was 12 years old again, in line for the impossibly huge roller coaster her sisters dragged her on- the one so large that the wind it created whipped her hair about her face as she was staring up at it.

Her eye twitched and she was afraid to look at Serena to see the rest of her expression. When she did, the blond looked a little chagrined at having an escort home. One who had taken over carrying her bags without asking. One that she would have to have an actual conversation with.

They started down the streets filling with people headed out for the evening, called forth by the nice weather.

"So," Serena she said, breaking the silence building up between them. She drew out the syllable a bit sounding like she wasn't exactly sure where to pick up a conversation at since they'd already addressed the weather. "How's your caseload?"

"It's manageable for the moment. And at least I haven't been called in yet tonight."

Serena smirked. "You do know that saying those kinds of things out loud will only cause work to call."

Casey attempted an innocent affect. "I said nothing. You heard nothing."

Serena laughed a bit, and looked around as if searching for something to say. "Do you usually follow beer with tea?"

Casey rolled her eyes, one of these days she would have to kill Olivia. "As much as Olivia likes to make fun of me for it… No." She smiled sheepishly. "Beer is the obligatory baseball/softball drink of choice, of course."

"Of course," Serena agreed.

"But, my hands get cold easily and with how cold Alex keeps their place… anyway, if I drank coffee every time I wanted to, or every time I was cold, I'd be unbearably," she scrunched her nose, "hyper. Hence the tea."

"I know what you mean, if I could drink as much coffee as I wanted…." Serena let out a little laugh, "I already drink too much." She laughed again as the realization hit her, "I think I developed a taste for it when I was ten."

Casey smiled. "Ten?"

"My father likes his coffee with lots of cream and sugar. He'd always let me have the last sip after it had gotten cold."

"That's really sweet," Casey said. Her smile grew bigger, her eyes lit up imagining a ten year old Serena, and the smile lines in her cheeks brought out her dimples in full.

It was the kind of smile that made you smile back in reflex, Serena thought. "Well," she said. "As sweet as getting your child hooked on coffee can be."

"Keep it up and I'm going to have no choice but to stop and get some."

"You're that suggestible?"

"About coffee I am."

Serena laughed that great surprised laugh she was capable of, and Casey felt it deep in her stomach.

"Well then," Serena said. "There's a great place up on the next block. Who am I to get in the way of the enduring allure of caffeine."

Conversation became easier after getting coffee, somehow making it necessary to walk a little bit more slowly, and enjoy the evening. Topics wandered harmlessly from work to personal, and back again. Serena talked about working with Jack. Casey told Serena about her experiences clerking.

"She really made you take an acting class?"

"Yes," Casey said. She hung her head and laughed a little at the memory. "She said I didn't need help with writing or research, but that I needed to learn to control my reactions and facial expressions."

"That is… honest."

"It's one of the things I really like about her."

"So, did it help?"

"Probably more than I want to admit," she shrugged. "I mean, I'm under no impression that I'm great at it now, but I used to be a whole lot worse at shielding my reactions." Casey said, in a very resigned tone. "But she did also let me sit in court every spare moment."

"Well," Serena said, "She was tougher than the judge I clerked for. And she always found something for me to do, whether it was work or making tea or reserving golf times."

"I guess I was lucky. Judge Clark really pushed me to get ahead. She introduced me around at different events, things like that. So, even if I had some really long days, I didn't mind."

She smiled as another natural pause in conversation came up. While they were getting less frequent, they were also becoming less awkward.

"This is nice," Casey said.

Serena looked over at Casey, wondering where she was going with this. But then again, she was starting to learn that she shouldn't jump to conclusions where Casey was concerned. She settled for a raising a questioning eyebrow.

Casey shrugged, "I just realized that it's the weekend and I'm not at work, it's nice out, and I'm not exhausted."

"I know what you mean," Serena said. She looked over and smiled, causing a distracted Casey to stumble slightly.

Serena looked back at the nearly non-existent crack in the sidewalk and smiled again. Her chest shaking with the battle of fighting a giggle.

"Yes, well, the seems in the concrete will get you every time." Casey said, shaking her head slightly.

"The streets of NY are indeed very dangerous," Serena said in fake solemnity.

Casey's response was cut short as she nearly stumbled a second time, startled by her phone as it vibrated in her pocket. She sighed as she looked at the ID read out. "I really should learn to avoid saying things out loud about not working. Excuse me."

She stepped to the side for just a moment, returning as she closed her cell phone, a grim expression on her face.

"You have to go in?"

"Yeah, a warrant," Casey answered, looking up and down the street for signs of a cab.

"We're two blocks from my building. Come on, it'll be easier to catch a cab out front."

They arrived shortly and stood only a bit awkwardly, facing each other. "Well, thanks for the walk," Serena said, taking the bags that Casey was holding.

"My pleasure."

"Good thing we got that coffee."

She was rewarded with a shy smile and a slight blush as Casey said, "The caffeine is definitely going to be needed, so thank you," she said and waved before getting into a cab.