Toby walked up to Happy's work bench while she was welding. He held out a photo of a house.
She stopped and lifted her mask when she noticed he was approaching.
"What's this?" she asked.
"A picture of a house." He responded matter-of-factly.
"I see that, dummy. Why?" she said taking her mask off entirely.
"Because maybe we should start thinking about moving, buying a house or a condo." He said still holding up the picture.
"No." she said taking off her gloves.
"Happy, you've lived in that apartment for almost a decade." He said putting the picture down and leaning against her workbench.
"Exactly. It was fine 10 years ago, and it's still fine now." She said.
"That was your first real apartment. I understand the emotional attachment to it, but we have a growing child who needs more room." He said trying to reason with her.
She rolled her eyes.
"Look, it was big when you lived alone. When I moved in, it was the perfect size for us. Then when we wanted to adopt we lost our office space and storage room, I'm okay with that, but half our junk is still in storage, which is costing us money. The apartment worked when Lucas was smaller, but he's 4 and he's going to keep getting bigger and needing more room for his stuff. We also have a bunny now, which is taking up more room. Think about it, please." He was almost pleading with her.
"The apartment works, it's close to everything we need, and it's cheaper." She was reluctant to give in to him.
"Combined, we make enough money to buy a house with a yard. I have savings that I've accumulated since being clean and I know you have some money saved up too. We have no debt and stable income. If I house hunt and find us a place close to everything we need and reasonably priced, will you come look at it with me and consider it?" he asked.
"Fine." She reluctantly agreed.
Toby threw himself into house and condo hunting.
They had agreed not to tell Lucas until they had seen a house and were ready to make an offer. The buy had mild anxiety, and was known for overthinking things and they didn't want to worry him about moving until they were ready.
2 weeks later
"This place better be good." Said Happy arms crossed as Toby was driving them to see a house.
"It is! I told you, I saw it yesterday with the agent and loved it." He responded.
"You also said that about the condo we saw 2 days ago." She snapped back.
"It's not my fault I didn't see the structural failures of the building. I'm not the engineer." He responded glancing at her as he was stopped at a red light.
She rolled her eyes.
They pulled up to an empty lot about 15 minutes from the garage. It was at the end of a street off the main highway that headed out of the city.
"This isn't a house." She deadpanned.
"I know, I know. Think about it, we could build the home we want. You could design it, you can make sure it's structurally sound, we can make it exactly what we need in terms of size, we can have a yard, build a garage and we could even get an above ground pool." He said with a smile as they walked to the middle of the property.
"You're a white picket fence kind of person, aren't you?" she smiled at him.
"I am now." He smiled back.
She was silent for a moment looking around them.
"How are we supposed to afford to build a house?" she asked.
"Well, I've got enough money saved up to pay for the piece of land. You've probably got enough to cover some or most of the start-up costs and building supplies. We'll be able to save money on building costs, because you and Walter can easily make the designs. I'm also sure you know how to get a deal on building supplies and a crew. We can do the painting and easy stuff ourselves. You could probably wire the place yourself in a night." He smiled at her.
"You've put a lot of thought into this." She said blankly, processing what he was telling her.
His eyes were lit up in excitement. –He always looked so good when he was excited and happy about stuff, the way his eyes lit up made her fall more in love with him.
"I did. We can afford this and still be able to live comfortably. During construction money's going to be a little tight, because we'll still be paying rent at the same time so we have somewhere to live. Once that's done we'll be good again." He said reaching out for her hand.
"We'll be using up all our savings and going into debt with a mortgage." She said quietly.
"We can afford it though. Besides, I want to use my savings on us. I want to use it to see our family grow and be happy. I want Lucas to have a home and a yard. I want him to have the life I never had. I want to give you the life you deserve and that I know you secretly want." He said as he pulled her closer to him.
She smiled at him. "Thank you." She pulled him down and kissed him quickly.
"Is that a yes? Are we doing this?" he asked gazing down at her.
She had a big smile plastered on her face and she nodded.
"We get to be a white picket fence family!" he said and hugged her again and kissed the top of her head. He pulled back and looked at her "Good, because I may or may not have already put in an offer for this property." He smiled.
She elbowed him. "Of course you did." She rolled her eyes.
A little while later
They were in the car and Happy was driving when Toby's phone rang.
"Really? That's great! Thank you so much, I'll be in touch." He said into the phone then hung up.
"Happy, the property's ours! We got it for much less than they were asking, which is great! We can go down to the office and sign the papers today." He said smiling at her.
"Oh god, this is real." She said quietly.
He could tell she was starting to get anxious. - Something about her breathing becoming uneven and tensing up, is what Toby was pointing out.
"Babe, pull over, let's talk about this." He said softly.
She obliged and pull off the highway.
"Hey, talk to me." He said softly putting his hand on her thigh.
"A house, Toby. I haven't lived anywhere stable but my apartment since I got out of the system. A house is expensive. We have to build it. I don't know the first thing about being a suburban mom, gossiping with other moms in the neighborhood. A mortgage we're going to be paying off for the next 20 years." She had more to say, but she had started to panic a little bit. Her breathing was getting heavier.
"Happy, breath." He said as he moved his hand to her shoulder and started to rub the top part of her back. "One step at a time, alright? Don't worry about the suburban mom thing, it's not a suburb. It's just a house on a street, and the neighbors probably won't even talk to us. It's not exactly the rich district. You've committed to a child, and me for the rest of your life, you can commit to a mortgage. Houses are expensive, but we're financially stable. I know moving is scary, but it's the rational next step. If you don't want to build, we can keep looking, just because our offer was accepted doesn't mean we have to buy it. We can do this, together." He smiled
"Okay." She said softly after a minute once she caught her breath.
"We can do this." He repeated. "I'm here. We can do this. Let's give our son the life we never had. Let's give ourselves the life we had only dreamed and hopped for. Let's prove everyone who said we'd never have all of this, wrong. Happy, we can do this, if you want to." He smiled again.
"Okay." She smiled. "Let's sign the papers." She said wiping her face and readjusting her jacket.
"Thank you." She said as she put the car in drive and they started to drive away.
"Thank you." He replied.
Later that evening
They had signed the papers and were back at their apartment with Lucas eating dinner.
"So we've got something to talk to you about." Said Happy.
"It wasn't me. Ralph did it." He replied fast.
"What? No. Wait. What did Ralph do? If something's going to blow up again, you need to tell us before the explosion, even if it's small. We don't need another science experiment gone wrong. Your face was light purple for a week." she asked
"Nope. Nothing. It's fine. What did you have to tell me?" He asked quickly taking a sip of his juice.
They both eyes him suspiciously.
"Anyways…How do you feel about moving? All together into a bigger house." Said Toby.
Lucas' eyes opened wide.
"A house?" he asked. "We all stay together and we move into a bigger house? That sounds awesome!"
"Good. Because we bought some property today, and we're going to build a house. Bigger bedrooms, a backyard maybe even a garage." Said Toby taking a bite of his food.
"That sounds awesome! Can I paint my room? I want green." He said with a smile.
"We're not even close to that step yet, but I don't see why not." Replied Happy.
He continued smiling and then got up and gave them each a hug "This is the best. You guys are the best parents ever." He said as he got back onto his seat to keep eating.
"That's why we're doing this." Said Toby quietly leaning over to Happy.
A few days later
Happy was working on the blueprints for the house when she decided to go show Toby.
They kept bickering about what they wanted.
"3 bedrooms is fine." She said.
"4 would be better. Then we each get an office space." He replied.
"I don't need one! If we do, we take out the second bathroom." She said
"No, 2 is better." He said scribbling on her papers.
"Toby! We don't need a huge house, we're 3 people!" she said scribbling over his scribbles.
"And a bunny!" he said dramatically.
She rolled her eyes.
"We also don't need 3 floors. Trust me." She said scratching stuff out on her papers.
"If we have 4 bedrooms we do." He replied.
She rolled her eyes again and walked away to work on some new idea.
A little while later
She slapped some new blueprint rolls down on his desk and unrolled them.
"Here. Look at these." She said turning the papers so he could read them and she walked to stand next to him.
"Look, main floor, decent sized kitchen with an island, lots of storage. Bathroom. Open concept with the living room and dining room. It also had a decent sized laundry room with a door, because we tend to get messy at work, and we can keep the mess all in one place. Upstairs has 2 big bedrooms, a small one, and a bathroom."
"Looks good, but I was kind of hoping we'd have another floor. We have a lot of junk to store, and you and Luke need a work space." He said.
"I'm not done. Your office is the small bedroom upstairs, we're going to have a big garage. Luke and I can work on stuff out there, and you won't hear 99% of it. But, If we want to go all out," she said as she pulled out a second set of blueprints. "same thing except we can have a basement, which can be an entertainment room. You can keep all your movies down there, your Xbox or whatever it is you play and we can store some stuff down there too, maybe even have a small workshop, which means a smaller garage, and slightly smaller dimensions for the house, but we all get exactly what we want." She smiled.
"Smaller garage and house means saving some money. But it also means more stairs and a bigger lawn to cut." He pointed out.
"Isn't that what kids are for?" Said happy with a small laugh.
Toby smiled "You know what you're talking about, it's up to you. I would like an office space, and an island in the kitchen. That's all I ask. My books need out of their boxes."
She thought about it for a moment.
"I think the second one is best, but I'm going to keep working on this a little more. We don't really need an entertainment room, but it would be nice to have 2 TV rooms. We don't need a big garage, I have all my stuff here." She said rolling up the blueprints.
"This is our forever home." He said with a smile "Do exactly what you want."
She'd never had that. She'd never had a forever home before. She thought she had found her forever home about 8 times in foster care, and her apartment just ended up being where she had lived the longest. It felt like home because it was the first place she ever felt safe, it was the first place she had on her own. Toby had never really had a forever home before either. He had lived in many different houses over the course of his life, none of them ever felt like home, even with his parents. Living with Happy felt like home, but he still wanted a house that he owned, that he knew was his forever.
3 months later
Toby had picked Lucas up from school and brought him to the house that was now under construction.
Happy was on site working with the crew. She couldn't help herself, she was a busy person and she wanted to make sure everything was done properly and up to code.
"Toby! I changed the plans again." She said when she saw him walk out of the car with Lucas following behind.
He wasn't surprised. She had changed the plans so many times he wasn't even sure if they were going to have 3 bedrooms or 7.
"I'm shocked." He said sarcastically, handing her a cup of coffee.
"Look, see, now the bedroom is going to be two feel larger this way, but Lucas' room is going to be a bit smaller, but that gives us more room for the bathroom." She continued talking about dimensions and nodded pretending like he understood and knew what she was talking about. He was watching her enthusiasm more than anything, she was so excited to be working on her own house. She was talking really quickly.
"Babe, how much coffee have you had?" he said taking the cup out of her hand.
"I'm not sure, probably a lot." She said reaching for the cup.
"No, no, no. No more coffee. Its 4 o'clock, you're way too wired for more, if you plan on sleeping tonight." He said holding it out of her reach with a small smile.
"I hate you." She said, squinting a little bit.
"No you don't." he said with a smile still holding the coffee out of her reach.
2 and a half months later
They were trying to get into their house as soon as possible. Happy and Paige had spent the night at the house painting and putting in the baseboards and trimmings.
"So how was the attempt at a honeymoon?" asked Happy as she was standing on a ladder painting.
"It was good. The 24 hours away was nice. It's too bad we had to cut it short because of a case, but we knew that was a possibility, that's why we didn't go very far." She said with a small smile.
"Yeah, that happens with our job." She laughed.
"Really get to appreciate the nights away when you have kids, eh?" said Happy.
"You're telling me." Laughed Paige.
"I love my kids, but getting a night away is really nice. Quality time with my new husband is nice, but it's even better when you don't have to stay quiet and worry about a kid walking in, or waking up." Said Paige with a laugh.
"So true!" said Happy laughing.
"Was Isabelle good while we were out?" Asked Paige.
"She was great, she's a pretty easy kid to please. She likes to bug Luke, she laughs and he gets annoyed. It's pretty funny." Said Happy
"Good. Did you guys ever think of a second one?" asked Paige.
"We thought about it, but we decided against it. We've got our hands full with Lucas, the adoption process is so long and we're happy with the way things are. He's an only child, but I think it's good for him. Besides he's with your kids almost every day." She responded.
"Makes sense." Said Paige.
They continued talking about nothing and everything through the night as they were painting.
They had gotten increasingly closer through the last few years, Happy hadn't had many female friends through her life. She never had many friends in general, but it was nice to have Paige around. She was great for advice on almost any subject.
The next day Toby and Lucas went over to the house to paint his room. He had decided he wanted a light green room and that he wanted to paint it himself with Toby. Toby loved to do the kid stuff with him, playing in the backyard, baking, building forts. Lucas would always say Toby was his best friend, and if Toby was being honest he would say his best friend was Lucas too.
A few days later
They had moved in to their house. They were still unpacking and trying to get everything organized and set up. They had a bunch of furniture delivered that was in boxes that they would have to setup. The delivery guys said they could set it up, but Happy insisted she do it, because she could probably do it better and faster than they could.
It had been a long day so they ate Chinese food while sitting on the floor of the dining room around boxes.
"I love our new house." Said Lucas eating some noodles.
"So do I kiddo." Said Toby.
"So tonight you're sleeping on the mattress on the floor, we'll put your bed together tomorrow." Said Happy.
Lucas nodded.
A while later, Lucas was playing with his bunny in his room. Toby and Happy were unpacking the kitchen stuff and organizing everything.
"I really love the way you designed this house. It's perfect for us, we have a back yard and even an entertainment room, which is going to be so great with the projector we got." Said Toby handing her some plates.
"It is! We've got huge bedrooms, and there's room for everyone to do their own things and not trip over each other. I'm glad you talked me into this." She smiled
"We got our white picket fence. We got our forever home." He smiled and pulled her into a kiss and a hug.
"I finally found my forever home." She smiled.
Toby felt a mixture of so happy he could cry, and so sad he could cry. He was sad because it really hit him that his wife had been so alone for so long, she had never had that stability or certainty. It had taken until she was in her 30's for her childhood dream of finding her forever home to be realized. He was also happy beyond belief that they had found it together. That they had finally gotten their white picket fence dream, they had a family and a home. They were getting the life they never had, and they were giving Lucas the life he deserved. He had also been so alone for so long and he too, had found his forever home.
She pulled back "Are you crying?" she let out a small smile.
"No." he said wiping his face "Maybe."
She smiled again, her arms still around his waist "Why are you crying?"
"We've made it. I mean, really made it. We have a home, our forever home. It's perfect. Our life is perfect. I'm the happiest man alive. Everyone who said I wouldn't accomplish anything more than school was wrong, people who said I'd ruin anything good, were wrong. Happy, I'm just so"
She cut him off when she reached up and wiped his face. "You big teddy bear!" she couldn't hold back her smile.
"You don't understand, I thought for a long time, that I'd ruin anything good. I haven't ruined this, and I won't. I thought I wasn't worth it…I never thought I'd get this. I believed what people had told me. That I wasn't good enough, I ruined people, I was a screw up, I'd never get my shit together." he said looking down at her.
She looked up at him "But you're so good for me and Lucas, and all our friends. You've cleaned up your life. You saved up the money for the property, you did that." she smiled.
He looked down, avoiding her eyes for a moment.
"Hey, what's going on?" she said as she noticed the shift in his expressions.
He avoided her eyes but spoke softly. "When I was in my early 20's it was the lowest of the low for me. I had stood on top of buildings contemplating bad things. I even went so far as to take pills one night. I woke up the next day. I was mad when I woke up, but now, I'm so glad I did. I would have missed this, all of it." He said still teary eyed. He looked almost ashamed, like he couldn't believe that he had actually done those things.
She got a sympathetic look on her face "Toby, I had no idea" she said, reaching for one of his hands and pulling him closer to her.
He held her "It was a really low point. I don't like to talk about that time in my life, but it happened. I just realized how happy I am that it didn't end there, that I did live and I get to live this incredible life, with you and Lucas. Scorpion too."
She pulled back with her arms still around him, smiling up at him. "I would never have gotten my husband and best friend, Lucas would never have gotten a family. The world would have lost the best shrink. Scorpion wouldn't be as strong as it is."
She reached up and put her hand on his cheek wiping away the few last tears. "I'm sorry that you went through that. If I could take away that pain for you, I would. You've come so far since that time. You're so good for me, us. You've proved everyone wrong, you became the perfect husband and father, you've quit gambling, we have a house because you quit gambling and saved money. I'm so thankful you lived, Toby. I can't imagine my life without you."
"I wouldn't be here right now if I knew how to do proper dosages," he said with a small smile.
"It's like the alprazolma..when you slept through our first date." she smiled at him
"Wow, I am never living that one down. We've gotten married and had a child since then." he said
She smiled back at him.
"People told me I'd never accomplish anything other than school, I never thought I would either. I never thought my life could be this good. I spent my life believing I didn't deserve good, but now, I'm happy-we're happy together and we deserve all of the good in the world. Thank you, for believing in me, and us." He smiled at her and kissed her quickly.
"I never thought I deserved good either. We've proved everyone wrong. We're worth it, so is our son. Thank you, for never giving up on us." She held him close.
Just then Lucas came out of his room to find them hugging in the kitchen. He ran up and hugged both of their legs.
Toby picked him up. "This kid," he smiled "Is the reason we're here today."
"He's pretty great." Said Happy with her hand on Lucas' back, smiling at him.
"Who would have thought a screw up genius with a medical degree and a genius mechanical engineer from foster care would have all of this together? Marriage, solid jobs, a house, and a genius son?" said Toby with a smile. "I've never been so happy to be alive. I've said that so many times, but it's true every single time."
"Daddy, were you crying? Why were you sad?" asked Lucas looking at him.
"Yeah buddy, but it was happy tears. So it's okay." he smiled at Lucas and then back at Happy.
"Your dad's a softy. He's got a big heart." said Happy with a smile and a little laugh.
Lucas looked confused. He didn't understand the concept of happy tears. He had a good EQ, but he still struggled with other people's emotions sometimes.
"You'll understand it one day, kiddo." he said with a smile. "It's a good thing. Trust me."
*If anyone has any ideas for more chapters let me know :)
I'm really thankful for all the reviews, they're great :)