"They're not here yet." Cristina muttered, picking at the hem of her shirt. "They were supposed to be here five minutes ago and they're not here yet."
"They're late, so what? It's five more minutes that you have to relax." Burke mumbled, glancing out the window onto their newly purchased property.
She let out a long sigh, and turned to look at him. "If we bought this house and spent countless hours on the phone with my mother to decorate it and they don't show up, I'm going to be very unhappy."
"They'll show up, Cristina."
"Not if they automatically picked Betty Crocker." She muttered.
Burke shook his head at her and glanced back out the window, "We needed a bigger space anyway."
"Not just for the two of us. There's no point in a bigger space if it's just the two of us." She protested, "We don't need four bedrooms."
"Five." He corrected her with a grin. "And we can use five bedrooms."
"What the hell do we need five bedrooms for?"
Slowly, Burke walked over to her hand grasped her hips tightly, pulling her close, "I can think of a lot of things we can do with five bedrooms."
She smirked, pushing him away, "We did that just fine with one bedroom."
"And a couch."
"And a kitchen counter."
"And a shower." He added with a grin.
"Okay, so five bedrooms isn't such a bad idea." She shrugged, "Whatever."
Burke bent to brush her lips over hers, but she pushed him away before he could.
"They're here."
Her eyes focused on a miserly old woman coming to the door. She was wearing polyester pants and a matching jacket and Cristina struggled to determine exactly which decade she'd just traveled from. She pulled open the door with a forced smile on her face, "Hi, Mrs…"
"Wintour. You must be Dr. Yang?"
Cristina nodded slightly, "And this is Dr. Burke."
"Nice to meet you." She stood outside the door, staring expectantly at Cristina.
Cristina turned to Burke with a look on her face and he rushed to her side, "Please, Mrs. Wintour, come in."
The woman stepped inside the house and immediately her eyes began to scan it, "Thank you, Dr. Burke." She scribbled down some notes on a yellow notepad, "I have three other appointments this afternoon, so we'll have to make this quick. So if you'll show me around."
Cristina stepped back and watched nervously as Burke took the lead. The woman sneered at some things and cleared her throat at others and Cristina shifted nervously behind them. The house wasn't bad, so what the hell was the faces for.
"It's a large space." She finally noted aloud, "But I've noticed that you haven't childproofed anything."
"We only just moved in a week ago." Burke nodded evenly, "We've purchased the equipment to do so."
"You've only just moved in a week ago? So this house is a recent purchase?" The woman paused, glancing at the two of them.
"Yes. We lived in an apartment in the city prior to living here." Cristina confirmed, wrapping an arm around Burke, "We wanted to move to the suburbs. There are better schools here, and we have plenty of space for him to run around."
"Straight into your fireplace, I suppose." Mrs. Wintour made a face.
"Excuse me?" Burke nearly choked on the words.
"Fireplaces are hazardous for children. Did you even research what kind of living space that you should have when you have children?"
"A lot of people that have children have fireplaces." Cristina protested.
"Their children also end up with third degree burns." She scribbled down some notes onto her paper and proceeded, "Let's continue."
Burke glanced down at Cristina as the woman continued forward with raised eyebrows and Cristina made a sour face, then pulled her forward. "Let me show you Xavier's room." He smiled pushing open a door just at the top of the long staircase.
"It's awfully close to the staircase don't you think? There's a great potential for falls."
Cristina rolled her eyes, "We've purchased latching gates so that won't be an issue."
"You've never had experience with crafty toddlers, have you Dr. Yang?" The woman scoffed, walking into the room.
Cristina bit back a comment about never having children, let alone having toddlers. She narrowed her eyes as the woman ran her eyes over the decorated nursery. Her mother had insisted upon Noah's Ark, and she was sure that the woman would have something to say about that as well. Perhaps she'd make a remark about elephants giving the children nightmares.
Mrs. Wintour remained silent as she scribbled down some notes and continued out of the room. "The rest of these rooms, what are they?"
"Spare bedrooms, and the office." Burke smiled, "I can show them to you if you like."
"I am here to do a home study, Dr. Burke. I will leave no corner of this house unturned. Where is the master suite?"
"Right here." Cristina feigned a smile as she pushed open a door at the far end of the hall.
"It's a bit far from the nursery, don't you think?"
"We have a bassinet." Cristina shot back at her, feeling her temper get the best of her.
The woman's outdated heels echoed through the hall as she made her way into the master suite and glanced around for a moment. "Another fireplace." She mumbled as she made some notes and exited the room.
The uncomfortable inspection of their new home continued on for what seemed like forever and finally they were ushering her to the door. "When will we hear about the study?" Cristina asked, anxiety in her tone.
"When did they say that you'd receive a decision from the division?" The woman snapped, "Twenty-one days from the hearing. That's when you'll receive your decision. I'll make my recommendations to the board regarding your homestudy."
"And what will those recommendations be, Mrs. Wintour?" Burke finally spoke up. "Is there anything that I can change now?"
"I recommend buying a child friendly home the next time you intend to adopt. Good day."
The two watch as she got into her car and disappeared down the driveway. Cristina turned to Burke, "We're so screwed."
"No we're not. This house is fine. There is nothing wrong with our house." He tried to assure her, pulling her into his arms.
"No, the house isn't 'child friendly'. We have fireplaces and our bedroom is too far from the nursery, and stainless steel appliances harbor bacteria and we have stairs." She muttered, "We should've moved into a trailer and decorated with legos. Maybe that would be child friendly."
Burke laughed, "We're not out of it yet. We still have eight days before we hear anything."
"Eight days before we hear that we bought this house for no reason at all, you mean."
"Five bedrooms." He uttered low in her ear, "We can do plenty with five bedrooms." He brushed his lips over the skin under her ear.
"Not now. I'm going to go make crap child friendly." She mumbled, pulling away from him.
Burke watched as Cristina disappeared into the kitchen and he clenched his jaw. He wanted so badly to give her a positive sign that they would make it through this. He felt that the deeper they got into the process of adopting Xavier, the more distant she grew. He followed her into the kitchen and grasped her wrist tightly, "Come on."
"Burke, not now. I have to make it baby proof or whatever. What if they do a surprise thing and come back to see if I put the ugly little plastic things in the outlets?" She sighed, trying to pull away.
"We're going to see Xavier." He pulled harder on her wrist, pulling her towards the door.
"Why?"
He brushed an errant curl from her face before leaning in to kiss her softly, "Because you need a reminder as to why we're putting ourselves through this."
She smiled lightly, nodding but not really feeling it. "Okay. Let's go see Xavier."
"In eight days, he'll be ours." Burke uttered low, wrapping her in his embrace.
"I know." She lied, her gaze connecting with his. "In eight days, you'll be a daddy or whatever."
"And in eight days you'll be a mom." He pressed.
"That doesn't matter. What matters is that we go see, Xavier. Remember? You're supposed to remind me why we're doing this." She shrugged herself out of his arms.
He pulled her back to him, "Why don't we go test bedroom number three first?" He reached down to grab her legs and wrap them around his waist. He carried her up the stairs with a grin on his face as she let out a genuine laugh.
"You can't do this when there's a gate there." She reminded him in a mocking voice.
He pushed open the door to the 'third bedroom' and lowered her to the bed, hovering over her gently. "We'll just have our crafty toddler open it."