A/N: Bear with me for the ages of the nephews here, I already know it doesn't quite line up with Ben's first word earlier in the story, but this scene popped into my head and I went with it. Hope you can overlook the discrepancy and enjoy! :)

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Alexis was both terrifyingly and pleasantly surprised at how quickly time passed when you weren't quite sure whether you were hating or loving your life. She was happy with her decision to move back in with her father, but at the same time, she was an adult now and really needed to have her own space. Especially with her dad and Kate very steadily maintaining the honeymoon phase of their new marriage. So, Alexis made a new decision. She was going to find a roommate the old-fashioned way and, seeing as she'd been accepted, she would stay at Columbia for medical school following undergraduate graduation in a week. It was all very sound and grown-up reasoning, but somehow that didn't make her want to start her new life any sooner. She was dragging her feet.

Something which Paige, Taylor, and some other friends from Columbia were very excited to help her forget about.

It was Saturday night, the start of senior week at Columbia, for all of the undergraduates, exams were now a thing of the past and they had an entire week to spend drinking together, sending each other off in style.

Staying with Paige this week meant that Alexis was thrilled she could stay somewhere other than the loft with her headphones in to avoid hearing certain things from her father and new step-mother. At least, she was thrilled up until the point that she was maybe just a bit drunk and her place to sleep tonight had gotten mooched out by some guy that Paige was currently sucking face with. Alexis scowled at the ground, she'd left after Paige had told her that she'd be taking this guy home and they would most definitely be having sex. Alexis was no prude, but she'd rather be anywhere else. Paige was notoriously loud during sex.

Alexis frowned again at the direction her feet were taking her, leading her away from the club, down to a very familiar block. She stopped in front of a very familiar entryway and sighed. Her subconscious had led her here and she wasn't sure whether to feel betrayed by herself or grateful. She pressed the buzzer just inside the main door.

"Ryan," came the answering buzz a minute later.

"Hey, it's Alexis," she sighed into the speaker, leaning her head against the wall. "Can I come up for a minute?"

He didn't respond, but a second later, there was another buzz and the door clicked open.

Alexis stumbled slightly as she made her way up the three flights of stairs to his apartment, wondering what she would find. She and Ryan had made a sort of unspoken pact after their New Year's kiss, they both needed some space. They would only send an occasional text if Ryan heard about her exams or she heard about something difficult in one of Ryan's cases, she made sure to say hi whenever he was over for a poker night or if she went down to the precinct, but for the most part, they'd kept their boundaries intact. She knew he'd been going on dates again, though Esposito had made fun of him for not being able to get to a third date a couple weeks ago. As she knocked on his door, she desperately hoped that she wasn't interrupting anything with a woman.

The door was opened by a chubby little boy with wiry black hair, hazel eyes, pale skin, and no clothes on. Absolutely zero clothing on.

"Max! PJs! Now!" Ryan came around the corner with another dark-haired boy resting on his hip, though this boy was in SpongeBob feetie pajamas, thumb in mouth, eyes closed, head nestled on Ryan's shoulder. The naked boy just gave a fierce grin and darted towards the living room.

"Wow, geez, how many years has it been since we've seen each other?" Alexis joked, leaning against the door she'd closed behind her for support. Despite the drool on his shirt, ketchup in his hair, and his bare feet, she couldn't help the fleeting thought that seeing his domesticity was sexy as hell.

"Mm, funny," he replied, glancing around to the living room where he could see a pair of hazel eyes gleaming at him from the other side of the couch. He sighed and gestured with his head to the boy in his arms. "My nephew, Ben, and the deviant over there is Max. I let Karen talk me into babysitting so she and Tommy could have a date night."

"He's cute," Alexis smiled at the little one, gently poking at his pajamaed foot.

Ryan hummed in agreement, twisting his neck to kiss little Ben's head before turning back to Alexis. "Are you ok?"

"Yeah, just friends being jerks," she sighed. "Impossible to flag down a cab right now and definitely not the time of night to take the subway home alone and dressed like this."

"Are you drunk?" Ryan asked, taking in the full view of her, make up heavier than usual, short skirt, long dark tights, heels at least 6 inches tall, blouse open ever so slightly more than decent.

"Um… Not that much," she rolled her eyes at his suspicious squinting. "But also definitely not sober enough to try to get home without calling a cab."

"Sit down, drink some water," Ryan chuckled warmly, shaking his head and filling a glass of water from the sink. "Let me get the kids into bed and we can catch up."

Alexis smiled at him in thanks, squeezing the little foot that she'd still been poking and sat down on her old stool at his counter. Ryan walked back to his guest bedroom, carefully avoiding looking at the naked boy still hiding in the living room. He disappeared into the bedroom for a few minutes before coming back out, minus the child on his hip and instead wielding a pair of Pokemon pajamas. The naked nephew dodged around the couch, but Ryan leapt over it and play-tackled the boy to the ground. Alexis grinned as she watched the scene and heard screeching giggles escape the little boy for a few minutes before Ryan stood up, dangling the freshly dressed youngster up by his ankles. The boy's face was bright red, but the grin on his face was true enough to how he felt about his uncle.

"Say goodnight to Miss Alexis, Max," Ryan said, righting the boy a little so he was instead slung over Ryan's shoulders.

Max just waved at Alexis as he was touted back to the guest bedroom where his brother was already asleep. Alexis waggled her fingers back at him. Ryan stayed in the bedroom with them for several minutes before slowly creeping back out and closing the door on them.

"Sorry about that," he said, taking the stool next to her. "I let them stay up way past their bedtime."

"It's all good. That's what good uncles do," she said waving it off before thinking about her words. "At least, I would think that's what they do. I don't have any uncles. That I know of."

Ryan chuckled and nudged the glass of water further in front of her. "So, what happened with your friends?"

"I was supposed to stay with Paige tonight, but then she decided to hook up at the club. My other friends either hooked up or had already gone home. And I already told Dad that I would be staying at Paige's tonight, so I didn't want to turn up drunk to find him and Kate naked on the couch or something equally embarrassing," Alexis drank some water and looked over at Ryan again. "You know you have ketchup in your hair?"

"Do I?" He asked, hands reaching up to his head, searching for a second before finding it. He blushed and grabbed a paper towel to wet it in the sink and go back to his hair. She giggled at him.

"I guess the hating clothes thing runs in the family?" Alexis joked, remembering where she'd been last semester around this time.

"Ha, I think Max just does it for the attention, he's very into tickle wars at the moment," Ryan smiled back at her. "My parents told me I did it because I hated the constriction. My mother especially likes to tell people how I became competent at ripping off buttons at a very young age."

Alexis laughed as Ryan finished the ketchup clean-up and then started rinsing the dishes in his sink before loading them into the dishwasher.

"So, do you want to call a cab to take you home? Or do you want to stay on the couch?" He asked, starting the dishwasher.

Alexis huffed a sigh and laid her head down on the counter. "I should go home; I didn't mean to interrupt your night."

"Don't worry about it, I'd much rather you come here than stumble around alone where anything could happen. You should sober up a little before you go though," Ryan said, refilling her water glass. "It would make me feel better about letting you out."

"Mm," Alexis mumbled, rather than picking up the glass, she let her arms shift to cushion her head and closed her eyes. Her anger at her friends had propelled her earlier; now that she was safe, the alcohol was muddling her brain. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she just needed to go home, regardless of what she would find. Another part of her brain spoke out loud though. "You do have a wonderful couch."

"I know," Ryan chuckled at her. "Picked it out myself."

She grinned blearily into her arms, still not quite willing to get up.

"Just stay here tonight, Alexis. It's already past midnight."

"Ok," she murmured, thinking of his couch and not willing to argue with herself any longer. At that, Ryan helped her off the stool, guiding her over to the couch. As he wandered off to his bedroom, she struggled to take off her heels and pulled the hair elastic and bobby pins out of her hair in the hopes of getting the dull ache in her head to stop. Ryan came back seconds later with a pair of shorts, t shirt, pillow, and a thick blanket to place in her hands.

"Think you'll need anything else?" he asked. She looked at the stack that he was holding out to her and shook her head. "Good night then, Alexis."

"Mm, thanks," Alexis replied, though he was already halfway back to his bedroom. She changed out of her tight clothes as quickly as she could and then snuggled into the couch. The pillow he'd given her smelled faintly like him. Soap, that stupid hair gel he used, and his own special brand of musk. She sighed into the pillow and tugged the blanket around her. She'd missed this.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The next morning, Alexis awoke to tiny fingers poking at her face and shoulder. The dull throbbing of her head reminded her of the amount that she'd drank last night, but the dark brown eyes in the pudgy little face staring at her were giving her no other clues. Especially when the little boy opened his mouth to ask her something.

"An bhfuil tú i do chodladh? Uncail? An bhfuil sí marbh?" The little boy's tongue lilted over words that were unfamiliar to her.

"No, she is not dead, Bennie," Ryan came over to the couch and crouched in front of Alexis, gently pulling his little nephew back slightly into his arms. "Ben, I'd like you to meet my friend, Alexis. Seo é mo chara."

Alexis wiggled her arm out of her blanket to hold her hand out to the little boy.

"Nice to meet you, Ben."

"Hi," he whispered, eyes widening at the fact that she was moving now, and immediately looking for cover back in Ryan's chest.

"Go on, Ben, it's ok," Ryan nudged him, taking his nephew's tiny hand to reach out in return to Alexis's. "Is é mo chara do chara. Geallaim go bhfuil sí deas."

Slowly the little boy's hand touched hers and Alexis held onto it as gently as she could. The handshake lasted less than three seconds before Ben pulled away again and wrapped himself around Ryan's neck, mumbling softly something that sounded like 'cara.'

"Ok, good enough for now," Ryan said, wrapping his arm under Ben to support him, he smiled at Alexis. "How are you feeling?"

"A little like I woke up in a parallel universe," Alexis replied, shifting under her blanket to sit up a little straighter on the couch. "You're, like, actually bilingual? And so are your nephews?"

"So many things you don't know about me, Little Castle," he responded, teasingly. "Do you want aspirin or pancakes?"

"Ugh, both," she groaned. "Or neither. I should go."

"You would miss pancakes?!" Came a shout from directly behind her head. She winced at the sound, but turned to see the naked boy, no longer naked, from last night, Max, propping himself against the back of the couch. "Uncle Kev makes the best pancakes. He lets us put M&Ms in them. As many as we want!"

"Well," Alexis chuckled at the older boy. "How could I resist that?"

"I'll bring some aspirin over," Ryan said, setting Ben back on the ground and getting up to lead Max back to the kitchen.

"Do you mind if I go wash my face? I feel like I slept in plaster," Alexis asked, after swallowing the pills when he came back. Ryan just sniggered and shook his head.

"There's some facewash in the cabinet and towels under the sink. If you want, you can just take a shower, give the aspirin a little time to work," Ryan gave her a suggestive half smirk. "Pancakes are going to take a little while and Max gets excitable when he cooks."

"Seems like he gets excitable a lot," Alexis replied as she heard what sounded like a bowl falling to the floor in the kitchen and two boys start arguing, one softer in Irish and the other louder in English.

"It's what little boys do," Ryan shrugged it off and went to go clean up the kitchen.

As soon as Alexis got to the bathroom and saw the horror that was her face and hair, she decided to take Ryan up on his offer of a shower before breakfast. It was no wonder Ben was terrified of her, she looked like a train wreck.

The last time she'd been in this bathroom, there were still miniscule touches of Jenny around, an empty half of the medicine cabinet, a single box of tampons, clearly feminine volumizing shampoo and conditioner left on the shelf in the shower. These things were gone now, Ryan's razors, shaving cream, and hair gel took up more space, as if he wasn't saving the empty space for her anymore. As she showered, she felt the aspirin doing its duty, the dull throb of her head relieved and she felt much less stiff. Unfortunately, it also had the added effect of the gut-wrenching guilt at interrupting Ryan's time with his nephews with her stupid drunken antics. After breakfast, she was going straight back to the loft. That was it, no more wasting Ryan's time.