A/N: Hey all!
I woke up this morning crazy in my Linstead feels and somehow this was born. I hope you enjoy!
Much love,
Kae
"Dad, can you tell us a bedtime story pleeeeeeeeassssseeeeeee?" 7-year old Cami asked, sticking out her bottom lip as her father tucked her into bed.
"Pleeeeeeassssseeeee, Daddy?" parroted 5-year old Nadia.
"Of course, munchkins," Jay replied, moving for the bookshelf. "Which one should I read tonight?"
"No book, Daddy!" Nadia chirped.
"We want you to tell the one with the warrior princess and the soldier," Cami said. "We told Kaycie and Adi all about it and they want to hear it too!"
Kaycie and Adelia, the girls' friends from school, were staying the night with them tonight while their parents went out for some much-needed alone time.
"You do?" Jay asked, turning to the other little girls.
The girls nodded animatedly and seven-year-old Kaycie added, "Please, Mr. Halstead?"
Jay turned back to his daughters. "You didn't tell them how it ends, did you?"
"No!" all four girls answered.
"Please tell us!" Adelia begged.
"Okay, okay," Jay conceded with a smile. "I suppose since you all asked so nicely."
The girls erupted in cheers as he began: "Once upon a time, there was a princess with wavy brown hair and big, brown eyes." He paused, looking at each of his daughters' friends in turn. "Come to think of it, she looked a lot like the two of you!" he exclaimed, tousling their hair and making them giggle.
"But my hair's blonde," pouted Adelia.
"But you have brown eyes!" Nadia countered, "Just like the princess!"
"What about us, Dad?" Camille asked, practically bouncing under the covers.
"Well, let's see…" Jay said pensively, squinting his eyes at first Cami, "You have gray eyes and brown hair-" then he turned to Nadia, "- and you have brown hair and brown eyes!"
"Mommy said that's how I got my name!" the five-year-old bragged.
"You were named after the princess?" Adi asked, awestruck.
"Nuh-uh. You were named after Mom's best friend," Cami corrected in her best matter-of-fact tone, propping herself up on her elbows. "Tell her, Dad!"
"But Mommy said -"
"Do you girls want me to finish the story or would you rather argue?" Jay asked patiently.
Both girls immediately quieted, sending apologetic looks at their father.
"That's what I thought," he said before continuing the tale: "The princess - who looked a lot like all four of you - lived in a small house in a big city."
"Aren't princesses supposed to live in castles?" Kaycie asked.
"This isn't a normal princess," Cami told her. "Listen!"
"She lived there with her brother and a really mean mother," Jay continued, "who made her do all the chores by herself - just like Cinderella - and take care of her little brother."
"She didn't even let the princess and her brother have candy," Cami added. "She kept it all to herself."
"All of it?" Kaycie repeated, aghast.
"All of it," Cami affirmed, and her friend's eyes went wide. It must've been somebody really mean if they didn't share their candy.
"What about her Daddy?" Adi asked.
"She didn't have a daddy," Nadia answered simply.
Adi scrunched up her face in confusion and turned to Jay. "Doesn't everybody have a Daddy, Mr. Halstead?"
He took a deep breath in. This wasn't a conversation he planned to have with someone else's kids. Before he could answer, however, Nadia chimed in: "Me and you have one daddy and one mommy but some kids have no daddies and some have two daddies."
"Lotsa families are dif'rent from ours and that's okay as long as they're happy, right, Dad?" Cami added.
Jay smiled proudly. "That's right, munchkins."
"So did the princess have two mommies?" Adi asked.
"I was just getting to that part of the story," he answered. "When the princess became a teenager, she met a really nice man and woman who took her away from her really mean mother -"
"And they became her mommy and daddy?" Adi interjected.
"And they became her mommy and daddy," he repeated.
"And then what happens?"
"Well, since they lived in a big city, the princess's new daddy wanted to make sure she knew how to keep herself safe from the bad guys. - Did your mommy and daddy teach you how to be safe from the bad guys?"
"Never let go of their hand or try to run away," Adi answered dutifully.
"And if someone tries to steal us, we should poke them in the eyeballs and kick them between the legs!" Kaycie chimed in. "Mom and Dad didn't tell us to kick them between the legs but the boys do it to each other at school all the time and it hurts them really bad."
"Our mom says to hit bad guys really hard in the stomach," Cami told her friend. "That way it hurts them really bad if it's a boy or a girl tryna take you, and if you're lucky you'll knock the wind out of them."
"Knock the wind out of them?"
"Make it harder for them to breathe for a minute or two," Jay explained. "The princess's new daddy taught her to do all those things, and - because she was older - he taught her even more ways to kick the bad guys' butts, and then she became -"
"A warrior princess!" Cami and Nadia finished in unison.
"When she growed up, she kicked all the bad guys' butts!" Nadia exclaimed.
"Her and all of her warrior friends," Camille corrected her sister.
"Yeah, her and her best friend where I got my name and the soldier and all their other friends -"
"You didn't get your name from her."
"But Mommy said -"
"Girls," Jay warned, waiting again for them to quiet before he resumed telling the story: "The warrior princess worked on a team with her best friend and a soldier and their other friends to keep the city safe. Then, one day, there was a really, really, really bad man who kidnapped the prin -"
"Not the princess!" Adelia gasped.
"No, listen!" Camille chastised. "The super bad guy kidnapped the princess's best friend and the soldier, not the princess."
"Did the bad man hurt the princess's friends?"
"Only a little bit," Jay assured her. "The bad man hid them in a place where he thought nobody would ever find them, but he was in for a surprise. He thought he had knocked out both of the people he kidnapped, but the princess's best friend was just pretending to be asleep. When the bad man tried to lock her in a room - Bam! She poked him in the eyeballs and Wham! She punched him in the nose. But you know what?"
"What?" Kaycie and Adelia.
Jay shook his head sadly. "She wasn't quite strong enough to beat him."
"Is she okay?" Adi gasped.
"Did the soldier wake up and beat him up and save the princess's best friend?" Kaycie asked, wide-eyed with concern.
"No, silly," Cami said, "in this story, the princess saves the soldier!" As soon as the words were spoken, she clamped her hands over her mouth - she'd been trying so hard not to spoil the ending.
"That's right, Cami." Jay smiled at his oldest, surprised she'd managed to hold back as long as she had. "The princess found where the bad man was hiding her two friends -"
"- and she kicked his butt right on down to the jail!" Camille finished proudly.
"So, if a princess falls in love with a prince who rescues her…" Kaycie began pensively, "does the soldier fall in love with the princess who rescued him?"
"And they live happily ever after?" Adelia added.
"Oh, I think the soldier was in love with the warrior princess long before she saved him," Erin responded, more to her husband than in answer to either of the girls, as she finally moved further into the room from where she'd been listening in the doorway. "But, yes, sweets, they live happily ever after."
"Did they get married?" Adi asked.
"And have babies?" Kaycie seconded.
Erin nodded, taking a seat beside Jay. "They got married and had two beautiful daughters."
"But no sons because boys have cooties," Cami told her friend, sending the two of them into fits of giggles.
"I wouldn't bet on that," Erin said for only Jay to hear. She moved from behind him, smirking at his bewildered expression as she began tucking each girl in again in turn. "Good night, girls. Sleep well."
"Good night, sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite," Camille and Nadia replied as their parents shut off the light and stepped into the hallway.
Further down the hall, Jay closed their bedroom door behind him and cocked an eyebrow at his wife.
"What?" she asked, feigning ignorance as she changed into her pyjamas.
"You know what," he answered, encroaching upon her space.
"Do I?"
"You know exactly what, Er. What's this you said about not betting on no boys?"
She tried to shrug nonchalantly, but a smile blooming on her face gave her away. "All I'm saying is there's a 50/50 shot."
"Erin, you'd better not be messing with me." He was smiling now too. They'd been trying for their third for so long.
With a wide smile and tears of joy in her eyes, she shook her head.
In one swift but gentle motion, Jay scooped her into his arms, kissing her deeply. "You're pregnant," he breathed when they finally broke for air.
She nodded, her head nestled in the crook of his neck.
Awestruck, he carefully laid them down on their bed, hugging her tightly to him and peppering kisses into her hair. "You're amazing," he whispered. "I love you so, so much."
"Takes two to tango," she teased, "but I love you too, Jay."
He pulled a blanket over them, and held his wife close, overwhelmed with joy. There would be sweet dreams tonight, indeed.