Notes: For Flufftober - Bedtime Stories

AU - canon divergence, with Barry/Eddie/Iris

One More Story

"Mom," Nora said as Iris tucked her into bed. "I wanna story."

Ruffling her daughter's hair, Iris chuckled. "Alright, which one do you want tonight? Where the Wild Things Are? Stellaluna?" she started to list off some of Nora's favorites.

"Uh-uh. I wanna real story. 'Bout you and daddies." Nora yawned sleepily, though she was clearly fighting it.

Iris smiled. "Oh, one of those stories. Alright then." She thought for a moment. "When your daddies and I had only recently started dating..."

Iris gave Barry a look. "Do we need to confiscate your phone?" she asked, mostly teasing.

"Sorry. Cisco has no concept of time off. And he keeps sending me texts about stuff happening in the area." Barry hesitated and then handed over his phone to Iris. "He keeps getting the codes wrong, though."

"Maybe we should tell him we'll give him a pop quiz on the material," Eddie muttered, looking over Iris' shoulder. Barry'd been correcting Cisco's police code blunders and citing why he didn't need to actually do anything because he was off the clock and on a date and 'oh my god Cisco, that is not an emergency, the actual police can handle it, let me have my date in peace!'

Barry snorted in amusement. "We should, that'd be hilarious. And he might actually get them memorized for real. Right now he just sounds like Arnold Rimmer."

Eddie perked up. "You like Red Dwarf too?"

"Oh no," Iris muttered, but she was smirking now.

"I love that show. And don't you 'oh no' us, Iris West," Barry teased. "You were the one who first started sneaking downstairs to watch the midnight airings on PBS when we were kids."

"Oh, really, what a rebel," Eddie jumped on the teasing.

"Excuse you, I was down there for Blackadder. Red Dwarf just happened to come on afterwards." Actually it might've been the other way around, but Iris knew Barry wouldn't call her on it. And then then phone in Iris' hands buzzed again. This time it was Caitlin.

"Bad man with gun at convenience store."

"Actually, Bar, you might want to take this one," Iris said, giving the phone back.

Barry's eyes widened and then he was suited up in the blink of an eye, asking for directions on the comms while also giving Iris and Eddie a quick kiss on the cheek each before rushing off. Then he was back moments later, looking flushed and his hair a bit messier. More kissable, really.

"Disarmed the gunman and tied him up. Left the gun out of reach and the whole thing is on the convenience store's surveillance system, so that should make things easy on the DA for prosecuting the guy," Barry said, then added, "and hopefully that's the only real emergency for the night."

"It'd better be," Iris decided. "Cause you're gonna be missing any further text messages tonight. Eddie and I are taking you to bed."

Eddie nodded, staring at Barry's lips a little closely. And, well, running did seem to make Barry's mouth just a little redder than normal. A bit chapped too, though. He really ought to start carrying chapstick around more often...

Iris edited the story a bit to make it more amusing for Nora. Laying it on a bit thick about all the wrong codes Cisco had sent and Barry's increasingly frustrated corrections.

And Nora, of course, was left giggling despite probably not really understanding why it was so funny. Uncle Cisco was always right and smart, so Cisco being wrong was silly.

"Ready to say goodnight, darling?" Iris asked, kissing Nora's forehead.

"Uh-uh. One more story."

Iris eyed her daughter suspiciously. This girl liked to try to 'one-more-story' herself into a later bedtime. And her dads were big enough suckers to let her do it. Honestly, though... Iris probably was too.

"Alright. But only one more. You can ask for another afterwards all you like, but this is the last one and you have to sleep afterwards."

"Not sleepy," Nora grumbled petulantly. And then yawned again. Big and wide.

"Alright, then. So I used to be something of a disaster in the kitchen," Iris said, huffing and poking Nora's sides when she interrupted with, "still a d'aster, mommy."

The peals of delighted laughter were not conducive to sleep, but if Iris was reading things right then once Nora settled down to listen then she wouldn't even stay awake all the way to the end.

It was going Barry's first night home after too many spent sleeping at STAR Labs where he'd been recuperating from Zoom breaking his back. They were all a little traumatized from it all, but Barry walking into their apartment - their home - would no doubt help ease the feelings of helplessness that Iris had been carrying around since she saw Zoom dangling Barry in front of her mockingly at CCPN. Feelings Eddie shared, having witnessed first hand Zoom's equally mocking speech to the CCPD, holding Barry up before the cops as though showing the Flash could bleed would destroy the support he received.

There were still shadows in all of their eyes, but tonight... tonight Iris was going to surprise Barry and Eddie with dinner. Not that her boys were aware of her plans.

Which, in hindsight, maybe they should have been.

The oven let out a billow of smoke when she went to retrieve the casserole. Which, admittedly, Iris had forgotten to set the timer but surely it hadn't been in there that long... and of course now the smoke detector was going off.

Iris popped open a window, grabbed a long stick specifically for poking the battery case for the smoke alarm to make it stop having power to beep with, and then quickly removed the casserole dish from the oven before shutting the oven quickly. Then she shut off the heating elements and turned to stare forlornly at the casserole dish on the stove.

It was... blackened on top. But maybe under the crust it was still fine? Iris went to grab a knife from the utensil drawer to check.

It was not still fine.

At which point Eddie and Barry walked in the front door since Eddie had insisted on driving Barry home.

Eddie immediately started coughing. Barry sneezed. They shut the door behind them.

"Babe," Barry said, turning to Eddie in concern before sneezing again. "Are you okay?"

"I'm gonna go stand by the window," Eddie muttered, coughing. "I'm fine. I'm fine."

"I'm sorry!" Iris exclaimed, feeling tears pricking at her eyes. "I forgot to set the timer. And it burned."

"Go get some fans, sweetheart," Barry said, walking over and pressing a kiss to Iris' forehead, wrapping an arm around her shoulders for a moment. "I'll take care of clean up and order us some take out. Okay?"

"Okay." Iris sighed and went to fetch the fans. "Sorry, Eddie," she added as she passed him by.

He snagged her wrist and drew her in to kiss her cheek. "Better luck next time, love."

Somehow, both of them made Iris feel better about her mishap with their little shows of affection.

"And the moral of the story," Iris said to her sleeping daughter, "is always set the timer on the oven." She stood up and shuffled quietly towards the door, pausing before she closed it from the hallway to blow a final good night kiss to Nora.