Props to my new beta, jayitaintso ! Looking forward to more input!
As Olivia descends the stairs—slowly, taking each step with caution and control—she calls out to Peter.
"Yeah?" he replies from the kitchen, sounding like he has a mouthful of whatever he's preparing for dinner.
"I think it's time!" she calls back, finally stepping off the last stair.
He appears out of nowhere, indeed mid-bite, with wide eyes. "Really?" he asks. "Right now?"
She nods calmly, and he disappears into the kitchen once again.
He's back to her side in moments, and she puts down the suitcase they packed a month before and had remained in the corner of their bedroom until about five minutes ago.
"Where's Etta?" he asks.
Olivia places a hand against the denim straining against the immense swell of her abdomen, and takes a deep breath. "In her room, playing."
"Should I call Astrid?"
"I already did. She's on her way, with Jonathan."
Peter nods anxiously. "Okay, uh…let's get you to the car."
Olivia's already headed in the direction of the garage, slowly but surely, rolling the suitcase behind her, while Peter's still at the foot of the stairs looking rather unsure of what to do with himself.
"Peter, it's going to be fine. Take a deep breath, or take a minute to collect your thoughts. There's no hurry."
He looks up at her, as if seeing her for the first time since she came downstairs. "Are you really going to wear the overalls?"
"Yes, so hush," she says with a smirk, opening the door and walking into the garage.
Olivia had only been three months pregnant when she found the overalls.
Her and Peter had been shopping for maternity clothes, and passed a small little consignment shop. What Olivia found inside would accompany her through the rest of her pregnancy, and the next one.
Astrid arrived not long after Olivia called. Olivia greeted them from the open garage, where she was loading her suitcase into the backseat.
"Hello!" Astrid calls as she climbs out of her car.
"Hey!" Olivia calls back. She moves out into the driveway, approaching the small blue vehicle. Astrid opens up the door to the backseat where Jonathan, her two-year-old son, waves wildly to Olivia.
Astrid lifted the boy swiftly from his seat and onto her hip, pulling a diaper bag onto her shoulder and elbowing the car door closed. "How are you doing?"
She smiles, nods. "Good," she says, lifting a hand to block the harsh sun from her eyes. "Better than Peter."
Astrid chuckles softly. "Freaking out? Yeah, Will did that, too."
Olivia shakes her head, "I don't know what's up with him. He didn't do this at all with Etta. He was calmer than I was, back then. I think it may have something to do with Walter."
Astrid nods.
"Liva!" Jonathan calls, reaching for her.
"Hey, Jon-Jon!" she coos at the small boy, leaning in to kiss his head. "What's up, little monster?"
"Eda!" he says, and Astrid smiles.
"He was so excited when he heard we were coming to see you guys."
"Well, let's get you inside then," she says, hands on her hips. Astrid follows her into the house through the garage, and sets Jon down on the hardwood floor of the living room.
Peter comes walking in, looking much calmer than before but still slightly unsettled. "Hey, Astrid. Thanks for coming on such short notice."
"No problem, Peter. Jonathan needed someone to play with, anyway."
He sinks into a crouch in front of the boy and smiles. "Hey, little man." He puts his arms around him and lifts him high into the air before laying him over his shoulder. Jonathan giggles wildly the whole time, and Olivia smiles. "Ready to go see Etta?" he asks.
"Yeah, yeah!"
"Then let's go!" Peter exclaims, spinning them both in a circle and travelling up the stairs, the small boy giggling all the time.
Astrid smiles after them. "He'll be fine, Liv. He's Peter."
"I know," Olivia sighs, and takes a step in the direction of the kitchen.
Olivia hadn't worn the overalls after Etta was born because they were too big. But one day, when Etta was almost five, she came downstairs and found Peter and Etta playing in the living room. Well, Peter was telling Etta how to build a tower taller than her and she would knock it down so they could do it again.
Olivia walked in and took a seat on the couch, wrapped up in a sweater. It was an unusually chilly early-September day. She tucked her feet underneath her and watched the two of them.
Peter looked up at her after a few moments, and she smiled.
"What?" he asked.
"Nothing," she said. "Just watching two people I love being ridiculous."
"Really, ridiculous?" he asked. He turned to Etta. "Are we being ridiculous?"
"I don't know," she said to her father with wide eyes, then giggled and nodded.
"Of course," he sighs.
Etta fled to the couch and climbed into her mother's lap. Olivia kissed her daughter's head and wrapped her arms around the girl's tiny body. "Have you told him yet?" she whispered into her daughter's ear, quiet enough that Peter wouldn't hear.
Etta smiled, looked at her mother and shook her head.
Peter turned and looked at his wife and daughter.
"What?" Olivia asked.
"Nothing," he said with a smirk, "Just watching two people I love being secretive."
Olivia smiled and whispered something else in Etta's ear.
"Seriously, you two, what are you hiding?" Peter asked.
"Nothing," Etta lied, giggling softly.
"Really? So if I came over there and tickled you, nothing would happen?"
Etta squeaked and curled into her mother's chest.
Peter stood and walked over to them on the couch, sat down on the floor before Olivia and started to lift his daughter from her lap.
Etta squealed and held a hand tight to her mother's sweater, which fell open.
Peter tickled Etta for several moments before he looked back to his wife.
With the sweater open, it showed the layer of denim beneath that spread across her chest. With it closed, it looked like she was wearing normal jeans, but now Peter could see what she was really wearing—the overalls.
His head tilted in thought before he looked to his wife with the wide eyes that looked so much like their daughter's.
"Overalls?" he asked
From his lap, Etta yelled, "Surprise!"
In the kitchen, Olivia was eating Peter's Mac and Cheese straight from the pot, and chatting with Astrid. Every few minutes she would stop, put a hand to her stomach, take a deep breath.
After the first three, Astrid asks, "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Olivia says. "Contractions. They're not terrible, this time around."
Peter comes in from the stairs with Etta and Jonathan following behind him like baby ducks following their mother.
"Ready to go?" he asks, breathing heavy as if he had been running. Knowing the two children, he might have been.
Olivia takes one last bite and nods, placing her fork in the sink and the pot back on the stove. "Give Etta the rest of that if she gets hungry. That was supposed to be dinner," she says to Astrid.
Peter takes her hand and twines his fingers through hers, bringing it gently to his lips.
"Mom, where are you going?" Etta asks.
"We are going to the hospital so I can have your baby brother," Olivia says, leaning down slightly.
"When are you coming back?" she asks.
"I don't know, sweetheart," Olivia says, running a hand over her daughter's long blonde hair—one of the few things she inherited from Olivia. "As soon as your brother's ready, we'll bring him home. Shouldn't be gone more than a day."
"Okay," she agrees easily. "But I get to hold him first when you come back."
Olivia smiles. "Maybe," she says softly.
Etta wraps her arms around her mother as best she can—her hands didn't meet, but rested on her waist. "I love you. Hurry up, brother."
Olivia, Peter, and Astrid all laugh.
"Well, we better get going before we have to deliver in our kitchen. Liv, you good?" Peter asks.
"Yeah, let's go."
Astrid crouches to the floor, where Etta and Jonathan flock into her open arms. "Wave," she whispers to the children, and they do.
Olivia and Peter wave back from the door to the garage before it closes behind them.
"Ow," Olivia said in the lab one day. Her hand went to her swollen stomach, and she leaned back against the edge of a table.
"What?" Peter asked from a few feet away.
"Nothing, just some pain in my side."
Walter also looked up from the body they were dissecting on his slab. "Contractions?"
"No, Walter. She's not due for another week and a half."
"Due dates are not precise, my dear. You could have your baby at almost any moment past 38 weeks."
"It's not contractions, Walter," Olivia insisted adamantly.
"I wouldn't push it, Walter," Peter whispered.
"If need be, I could deliver her here. I have all the equipment…"
"We're not having the baby in the lab, Walter," Peter said.
"You had ultrasounds here! Why not just stay here and save the trip?"
"No," Peter and Olivia said in unison.
Peter pulls the SUV out of the garage, down the driveway next to Astrid's car, and onto the road.
Olivia places a hand on his arm. "Are you okay now?" she asks quietly.
He turns to her and smiles. "Yeah. Sorry about freaking out on you for a minute. It's just…"
"Walter," Olivia says. It's all she has to say.
Peter swallows. "Yes."
"It's okay to miss him, Peter. It's actually expected."
"It's not that I miss him," he says, "I do, but that's not it. I just remembered him asking to deliver Etta in the lab and the memory kind of caught me off guard."
Olivia smiles softly. "I remembered that, too. Right about the time my water broke."
Peter didn't say anything for a long time.
"He'll never get to meet his grandson."
Olivia sighs. "You know, I don't remember a whole lot from this timeline, but one thing that always stuck around was my memory of Walter. I remember getting him from St. Claire's, and I remember that he almost never left the lab, and I remember how he talked about you as a boy when he was high and how much he wanted a real family. For a long time, he didn't have any. After, it was just me and Astrid. Until you."
Peter wouldn't look at her.
"He loved you, Peter. More than anything. And wherever he is right now, he knows that you miss him. That we all miss him. And he knows about his grandson."
Peter had tried to understand Olivia's explanation of what had happened to Walter, of what had happened in another version of the future, but he still didn't understand how she knew, how Astrid knew and he didn't. But he believed them.
"Let's go have a baby," he says.
In 2167, Walter and Michael walk into a house. It is only a skeleton of what had been there once, but Walter still recognizes it.
He wanders the rooms, holding tight to Michael's hand. In the living room, a man stands, waiting.
He looks up to find Walter and the boy.
"Hello," he says softly. He looks to be in his late teens or early twenties, and he wears a leather jacket that Walter hadn't expected.
"Hello," Walter says. "Who are you?"
"My name's Peter."
"That was my son's name," Walter says.
"I know. He was also my great-great-great grandfather. I think," he says, looking mildly confused.
Looking closer, Walter could see a resemblance. He had Peter's facial structure, but the man was fair-haired, and quite skinny.
"What are you doing here?"
Peter smirked. "Well, you're kind of a family legend. The rumor is that in 2015, you disappeared into the future to do something really important. And the day you're supposed to end up is here, so I came to see if it was true."
"Oh," Walter says softly.
"Welcome to the future, Walter Bishop. I'm not a Bishop, but I have a couple cousins who are."
Walter was looking rather bemused, listening to this boy's story. Michael listened intently.
"Both my father and grandfather were named Walter. And my great-great-grandfather, your son's son. Well, your grandson."
"Peter named his boy after me?"
"Seems so, Gramps. But I can't really recite the whole family tree for you, there were a lot of people since 2015. That's why there's this."
The boy sunk into a crouch, taking out what looked to be a pocketknife and opening it. He pried loose a floorboard, and another next to it.
Walter stepped closer to see what was inside. It was a safe, about the size of a mini-fridge, hidden in the floor. Written on it in Peter's—his Peter's—handwriting was his name.
"So, the combo's apparently something important, something from the future-slash-past you came from. 2036."
Walter smiled. "So Olivia remembered. I hoped she would."
Walter lets go of Michael's hand and crawls to his knees on the hardwood floor. He takes the dial and enters the code that, in his mind, he used only weeks ago.
"Five," he whispers. "Twenty, ten."
The safe clicks loudly, unlocking.
He pulls the door open and the first thing he sees is a pair of old denim overalls.
"Oh, Olivia," he sighs.
Tucked in the pocket of the denim was a letter, slightly yellowed with time.
He opened it.
Walter,
We hope that you and Michael have arrived safely. Locked in this safe, you will find detailed accounts of the lives of your grandchildren, and their children, and their children, and so on. We hope that the legend of Walter Bishop brings one of these descendants to you. We are long gone, but we hope that these memories will keep you company, as they did us. We love you and miss you.
Olivia, Peter, Etta and Walt
A tear streamed down Walter's face, and he felt a hand on his shoulder.
He looked back to find Michael smiling.
A/N: So, I have like a whole Bishop and Co. Family Tree written out, but I don't know how I would even begin to put it on here. I suppose if you really wanted to know, PM me or review and I'll try to send it out. BTW, Astrid's line is totally in there. I really wanted her to have a happy ending, too.
