Sorry for the long wait but I've been a little busy. I hope you enjoy the chapter.

O-o-o-o-o

Mommy's phone rang. It showed a picture of Rick. Claire looked around for mommy. She was nowhere to be seen. Claire remembered that she'd said something about taking a shower.

Mommy said Claire wasn't allowed to pick up her phone unless she asked beforehand. But mommy was taking a shower so she couldn't ask and maybe Alexis wanted to have a play date so she had to pick up, right?

Claire listened and could still hear the shower running in the bathroom. The phone rung again and Claire picked it up.

„Claire Beckett" she said, she'd picked that up from mommy. Mommy always said her name when picking up the phone.

„Oh hello Claire" Rick said.

„Hi Rick" Claire answered cheerfully. „Are you calling to schedule a play date for Alexis and me?"

„Not exactly" Rick told her. „Is your mommy there?"

„She's taking a shower" Claire said. „Why did you call then?" What other reason was there to call?

Rick chuckled and Claire wondered why. Sometimes adults were strange. They laughed at the most normal questions or sentences.

„Well, see Claire, Alexis and I bought a recipe book made especially for kids and Alexis wondered if you were free tonight or sometime this week to come over and have dinner together. She wants to cook for you and your mommy"

„Is she allowed to cook all on her own?" Claire asked in wonderment, jealous. She would have to talk to mommy about it. If Alexis was allowed to cook on her own so should she be, right?

Rick laughed. „Of course not. That's way to dangerous. We're cooking together but with the new recipe book Alexis can do a lot on her own because there are a lot of pictures."

„Oh okay" Claire said, just a little bit disappointed that cooking wasn't something four-year-olds could do theirselves.

„So maybe you can ask your mommy when she's finished showering if you've got time to have dinner at our place sometime this week. Or next week. Whatever works" Rick said.

„I'm gonna do that" Claire told him. „Bye Rick"

„Bye" Claire held the phone away from her ear and ended the call. She knew how that was done. It was pretty easy. She always wondered why grandpa thought it was complicated. She'd seen him use his new phone once and he hadn't known how to pick up a call. Mommy had had to show him first. Claire didn't know if grandpa could do it now. She hadn't seen him in a long time. But right now she didn't care.

She was excited about going to Alexis' place for dinner. She hoped she'd get to help make dinner too. Or maybe mommy could buy her the same book. She loved going to Alexis' place, she liked it too when her and Rick came to their apartment but not as much. She liked meeting at the playground too. The most important thing was meeting Alexis somewhere. And she hadn't seen her all day. She'd been at preschool and mommy had been at work and then mommy had picked her up which was awesome. Because it was always best when mommy came to pick her up. It was okay too when uncle Javi or uncle Kevin or aunt Lanie picked her up. They were fun. But the days when mommy picked her up where the best. Because she loved mommy the most. And most days mommy would take her to the playground where they'd meet Rick and Alexis. Which was just amazing.

Thinking about that reminded her that she had to go and ask mommy about going to their place right now. She opened the door from the living room to the hallway. Then she listened. She couldn't hear the shower running anymore. Maybe mommy was finished?

„Mommy?" Claire called.

„I'm in the bedroom, sweetie" Mommy called back. Claire took the phone from the coffee table again to take it with her. She looked at the screen and saw green rectangles with a lot of little letters in it so she knew mommy had text massages but she couldn't read them. She could read some easy words but not whole text messages.

She opened the door to the bedroom. Mommy was just wearing a towel. Claire sighed. If mommy wasn't even dressed it would be a loooooong time till they could go out. Mommy always took ages.

„Can you hurry, mommy?" Claire asked. „Rick said Alexis is cooking for us and we should come over as fast as we can." That's what he'd said, right?

Mommy's brows scrunched together funnily. „When did he say that?"

„Just now on the phone" Claire said and then wanted to take the words back immediately. She wasn't allowed to pick up the phone on her own. Mommy looked a little angry.

„You picked up my phone?" Mommy asked. „Claire, what have I told you about that?" Mommy's voice was stern. Claire didn't like her using that tone of voice.

„Not to do it" Claire said, looking at the floor. But then she looked up again. „But I saw Rick's picture. And I figured he was calling because of Alexis anyway. And Alexis is my friend so the call really was for me" Claire reasoned.

Mommy's eyes rolled but her lips quirked up a little too before her gaze went strict again. But Claire already knew she wasn't in that much trouble.

„Still. When I tell you to not do something then you have to listen, Claire" Mommy said, a little disappointed.

„I know, mommy. I won't do it again. Promise" Claire said. „But can we go have dinner with Alexis?"

For a moment mommy looked like she was going to say no. But then Claire could see her change her mind about it. Good. Because if mommy would have said no she would have been very disappointed. And she got very sad when she was disappointed. Claire didn't like being sad.

„I'll have to call Rick back. I'm pretty sure he didn't say that we should come over as fast as we can tonight" Mommy said. Hm, Claire thought about it. Maybe that really wasn't what Rick had said. But that's what Claire wanted anyway.

„But hurry, mommy. I'm very hungry" Claire said.

„There's a box with fruits and vegetables in the fridge. You can have some of them" Mommy said. Claire shook her head. Oh no, that wouldn't do at all.

„I'm not hungry for fruits and vegetables. I'm not hungry for anything we have at home. I'm not hungry for take-out either. I'm hungry for dinner at Alexis' place" Claire told her.

„Of course you are" Mommy muttered but Claire didn't understand what mommy meant by it. „Even if we go tonight – and I still have to call Rick first – I'll still need some time to get ready, Claire. I just came out of the shower. I have to apply lotion and make-up and get dressed before going out. So you can go to your room and play for a while."

„You don't have to apply lotion and make-up, mommy" Claire said. „You already smell good and are pretty."

Mommy gave her a smile, bent down and kissed her cheek. „Thanks baby."

„So are you just getting dressed real quick so we can go?" Claire asked eagerly.

„No" mommy said. „But if you stop arguing about it and go play I'll be ready much sooner."

„Fine" Claire huffed. „But we can go to Alexis' place when you are finished?"

„I'm calling Rick back and if he really meant tonight, then yes we can go" mommy said.

„Great" Claire exclaimed and then went to her room. Maybe she'd find a toy she wanted to take to Alexis' place.

O-o-o-o-o

„Hello" Claire greeted Rick and Alexis when they opened the door. She was about to just run of with Alexis when her mother nudged her, shooting her an expecting look.

„Oh right" Claire said, remembering what they'd talked about on their way over. „Thanks for the invite for dinner. We brought juice and wine" Claire held up the bottle of grape juice she was holding and pointed at the bottle of red wine in her mother's hands. „Mommy said you have to bring something when you're invited for dinner at someone else's place."

„Well, thanks Claire. Come on in" Rick held the door wide open to let them in.

„I made my very first lasagna" Alexis told Claire proudly. „It's in the oven baking. Daddy says it will be ready soon. Come on, I'll show you."

„No opening the oven without me, Alexis" Rick called. „Only look through the glass."

„I know" Alexis called back.

„Hey" Kate said to Rick after the girls had taken off towards the kitchen. „Thanks for the invite." It was ridiculous how happy she'd been about the invite. After she'd called him back she'd really looked forward to spending the evening with him, Alexis and Claire. It wasn't like they didn't spend time with them. The opposite in fact. Almost every free minute Kate found herself spending with Rick and the two girls. They'd both been shocked about Claire and Alexis wanting to share them at first but had shrugged it of as their daughters just being overexcited about their new friendship. But in the end they'd done that anyway. They spend so much time together. And Claire went to Rick with her books when she wanted them to be read to her. And sometimes Alexis went to Kate when she and Claire were playing at the play ground and another kid was being mean to them.

But still, tonight felt different. They'd never had dinner at his place. Or hers. Until tonight Kate had felt like they were simply meeting so their daughters could have play dates. But going to have dinner at his place felt … different. She didn't know how it felt different. It just did. But in a good way. So she wouldn't question it. Just like she didn't question their late night phone calls or texts where they didn't talk about anything important. They just talked about the simplest things.

„We love to have you over. Alexis was so excited about cooking and about cooking for Claire especially" Rick said with a smile, guiding her towards the kitchen. He didn't want to leave them there alone for too long. Now that the kitchen wasn't a place only he was allowed to use he wasn't sure if Alexis understood when she was allowed to touch and use things and when she wasn't.

„So Alexis really cooked that lasagna by herself?" Kate asked. „Claire told me about a special recipe book I have to buy now too?" She hadn't really understood what her daughter had been talking about other than that she wanted the same book Alexis seemed to have.

„Oh yeah" Rick said excitedly. „It's awesome. I saw it and just had to buy it. The book comes with differently sized and colored cups. And the recipe book is almost entirely with pictures. So kids know they need to take the big red cup for the tomato sauce and the medium sized cup for the cheese and so on. It's pretty cool and that way I can teach Alexis to cook at an early age. I won't have to cook anything anymore when she's a teenager"

„So that's the goal?" Kate asked laughing. „Creating your own personal chef so you never have to cook again?"

„Yep" he said and laughed too. Then he shook his head. „No, not really. I enjoy cooking and now it's something we can do together. I want her to grow up loving it."

O-o-o-o-o

Kate and Rick sat on his couch, the girls having fallen asleep about half an hour ago, leaving their parents to finish the Disney movie without them. But when they'd started talking he'd turned the sound off. Neither of them cared about the movie going on on the screen.

„Meredith called this morning" Rick said, a little gloomy and sighed.

Kate shot him a sympathetic look. She really liked that they were able to talk about these kind of things. They were both still hurt by their recent break ups. No matter how distracted they were most of the time with each other and their kids.

„What did she want?" Kate asked. He probably wanted to talk about it. Otherwise he wouldn't have told her that she had called.

„Nothing really" he shrugged. „She asked to talk to Alexis who was at preschool of course. So she just told me about the movie she's shooting right now and about life in LA in general. She sounded happy." He didn't sound happy at all though. His shoulders hung a little, Kate noticed. His eyes were clouded too, the corners of his lips downturned.

„You miss her, don't you?" Kate concluded.

Rick nodded. „Sometimes, yeah" he sighed. „I just…" another sigh. „I don't know." He shook his head at himself. He wasn't that bad with words normally. „Sometimes I wake up at night and wonder where she is for a moment. And when I remember I just miss her. Then I remember why she's gone and I don't want to miss her anymore but I just do."

Kate could relate.

„I know what you mean. Josh and I haven't been really happy in our relationship for a long time. Both of us. But the bed just feels colder without him. I'm happy he's gone. But he's been a part of my life for so long that sometimes I feel like something is missing" she said. Rick nodded. He knew exactly what she meant. And Kate reached for his hand to squeeze it. She loved that he understood how she felt. She hadn't talked to Lanie about that but she knew her best friend wouldn't understand the way Rick did. It was just something you had to experience yourself to really understand the feeling of being very glad that the relationship was over but missing your former significant other anyway.

„I don't even think it's really Meredith I'm missing" Rick continued, holding on to her hand. „It's family life. Or not even that. Because our family life was never like I imagined it to be."

„How do you imagine it to be?" Kate probed, wanting to lead his thoughts in a happier direction.

He shrugged. „I don't know. Just little things. Like having breakfast together, at least on weekends. Watching movies together, having snow fights, building the biggest sandcastle at the beach. Things like that. Meredith though was never interested in those kind of things. And she never had breakfast. She skipped it every day. She slept in anyway. When she got up Alexis and I had had breakfast already. Hours ago, most days"

„Feel free to not answer" Kate told him. „But why did you marry her? You must have known that beforehand, right? That she isn't into the family life style like you are"

„It seemed like the right thing to do" Rick explained. „We've been together for a while and just had fun when one day she started throwing up in the morning. I didn't think anything about it at first but she was fine the rest of the day but the next morning she was sick again. And we both figured it out and went to buy a pregnancy test together. Meredith was so scared. And then there were two lines on the stick and she started crying about not wanting a baby yet. But I fell in love with the baby the moment I started thinking about it. I comforted Meredith and told her that it would be great. I was so in love with the idea of having a family I think I just forget that I never before had pictured Meredith as the mother of my future children. And that she wasn't really made to be a mother. And of course marriage seemed to be logical. A whole family. That's what I dreamed of. So I bought a ring and proposed."

Kate nodded. That actually made a little sense.

„Josh never did" she said, sharing her story with him in return. He made it so easy. And it had never been easy for Kate to share anything about her past with anyone. „Of course I think of myself as emancipated enough to be the one proposing when I really think I found my one and done. But well, I never really thought Josh is it."

„So Claire wasn't …" Rick started but stopped the question. It wasn't really a question you wanted to be asked about your kid that you loved more than anything else.

„Planned?" Kate finished for him. She shook her head. „No. Josh and I… I don't think we ever loved each other. But we cared for each other and we were both okay with coming second after the other's work. Or fifth after work work work and work. We were comfortable with each other and neither of us were interested in having a relationship with someone who'd expect us to spend more time with them. It was very convenient. When I wanted to see him, I did. When I didn't that was just as well. We've been in a relationship for about two years when I got pregnant. I hadn't even had the time to figure it out myself. I got a minor injury on a case and in the following treatment my friend Lanie took my blood levels and noticed it. I told Josh." Kate stopped for a minute and took a deep breath.

„It's making me nauseous to even think about it now" she swallowed hard but continued. „But at first we talked about if we even wanted to have the baby or if I should get an abortion. I've got to hand it to Josh he was very supportive at the time. He didn't try to influence me at all. We talked about how having a child would affect both of our lives. But in the end we both decided to keep the baby. And I'm so glad we did. Josh accompanied me to every appointment with the doctor, talked about medical things with her every time. The baby's health was very important to him. He wasn't overprotective though and I appreciated it. During the pregnancy we both didn't really connect with the baby like other parents do when hearing the heartbeat or looking at the ultrasound pictures. But the moment I held Claire in my arms for the first time that changed. At least for me. I stayed at home for a few months but being at home all day was driving me crazy and hadn't been the plan in the first place anyway. So we figured a schedule out of who was watching Claire when and most times we sticked to it. Our relationship though never changed. It was convenient and we cared for each other and now both loved our daughter. But never really each other."

Wow, Kate thought when she was finished. She didn't think she'd ever told someone so much. Despite her mother's grave. Rick didn't say anything. He didn't judge either.

„Thanks for listening. I never realized how much I needed to tell that to someone" Kate said, squeezing his hand which she was still holding.

„You're welcome" Rick told her, squeezing back. Her eyes were a little glassy and he could see was trying hard not to cry. „You wanna talk about something else now?"

Kate chuckled surprised. How did he know exactly when it was time to change the topic? „Please" she agreed.

„Okay then" Rick said seriously. „Did you know that the people who are currently alive represent about 7 percent of the total number of people who have ever lived?"

Kate's brow scrunched in confusion. Then she started to laugh. „How did you came up with this?" She shook her head. He was ridiculous.

He shrugged. „Read it on the internet when I wasn't writing today."

„So that's what you do when you're doing research?" Kate asked, still laughing softly. How could he make her laugh in a matter of seconds when she'd felt like crying a minute ago? Kate shook her head. She didn't really care how he did it. She just enjoyed that he was able to take her mind of the heavy topics so easily. He told her more ridiculous facts that nobody really needed to know while they continued sipping their wine.

Neither of them noticed how fast the time seemed to pass by. They were talking and laughing and drinking wine. Kate couldn't remember ever having felt so comfortable in another persons presence. At least not since high school when she'd been able to talk to her girlfriends for hours. Or just launch around with her mom and watch silly tv shows. That was probably the last time she'd felt so comfortable just doing nothing important with another person. She hadn't even thought that it was possible for her to reach this kind of innocent emotional intimacy with someone as an adult. Not since her mother had died and she'd grown apart from her high school friends.

She wouldn't put a name on her relationship with Rick but if she had to she would say he was becoming her best friend. She confided in him, told him things about herself she'd never told anyone before and let him make her laugh. Of course there were still a lot of things she wasn't comfortable talking to him about. But she'd only known him for a few weeks. So the level of their friendship was amazing.

„Do you want another glass of wine?" Rick asked her when she finished what had been in her glass.

„I'd love too" Kate replied. She felt so relaxed. His couch was so comfortable. She never wanted to get up again. Especially not when he kept telling funny stories and her daughter kept sleeping peacefully beside her.

Rick took the bottle from the coffee table but noticed that it was almost empty. „Oh" he laughed. „We already finished this one. Do you want to stop then or should I get another one?"

Kate bit her lip, her cheeks felt warm, she was comfortable and relaxed. Maybe she should stop. She hadn't had more than one glass of wine in a long time but right now she felt good and she didn't want this night to end yet. So she agreed to him getting another bottle.

She really was enjoying spending time with him. They'd had play dates at the play ground and his place all over the last two weeks. Almost every spare minute Kate had they spent with Rick and Alexis. And it wasn't only Claire's idea. Sure, she was never against it but sometimes Kate had made plans with Rick before either of their daughters could even ask.

And after their play dates ended and they'd both tucked their daughters in bed in their respective homes they'd often call or text to just talk with each other.

When Rick came back with another bottle of red wine he filled both their glassed up and sat down beside her again.

After they'd talked for what felt like only minutes Kate looked at her watch and looked again. It was past midnight. That couldn't be, right? They couldn't have just talked for over four hours, right?

„It's pretty late. We should get going" Kate stated and stood up. But when she did the room seemed to move with her. Her vision was blurred too. She was so surprised that she fell back on the couch.

„Are you okay?" Rick asked, concerned. His hand had fallen to her back to steady her.

Kate chuckled embarrassedly . „Yeah sorry, just a little tipsy, I think."

„Really?" Rick asked between apology and amusement. „Sorry. I didn't mean to get you drunk, Kate"

„Not drunk, slightly tipsy. At most. I was just surprised" Kate told him and made another attempt at getting up. This time she was prepared for the slight movement of her surroundings and didn't fall back on the couch. Rick's hand on her back would have prevented her from doing so anyway. He'd stood with her.

After a moment the room was steady again. She turned to Rick and gave him a luminous smile.

„Thanks for dinner and being such a good friend" she said. Rick studied her intensely. Her eyes were wider than they usually were and for some reason she was keeping eye contact longer than normally. She probably wasn't even noticing.

He made a decision.

„Yeah" he said slowly. „And I'm gonna continue being a good friend by not letting you go like this."

„What do you mean?" Kate asked. Nothing was moving anymore, especially not when she looked into his blue eyes. They were very steady. And extremely blue. And very… pretty. He had pretty eyes. She was about to say that but held back in the last moment. That's when she understood what he meant though. She would never blurt out things like that if she were sober. She didn't even know why that came to her mind anyway.

„You are a little drunk, Kate." His smile was apologetic. He really hadn't meant to get her drunk. He would have thought she could hold her liquor better than that. She was tall after all. „If you really want to go home then I'll call for my car service and will accompany you to your doorstep. We'd have to take Alexis too though. I can't leave her here alone. But if you want to take it I'm offering you my guest room. That would be way easier."

Kate would protest if she were here alone. She'd just call for a cab to take her home. But Claire was here too and no matter how not drunk she thought she was she wouldn't take the risk and carry her daughter all the way down to the street, into a cab and all the way up to their apartment when there was even the slightest chance that she was drunk and would stumble and drop Claire. Not that she really felt that drunk. Only slightly tipsy. But better safe than sorry. And of course she wouldn't make Rick and Alexis make a trip to her apartment and back in the middle of the night. Not when he offered guest rooms.

„Okay, thanks" Kate said.

„Great" Rick smiled. „So I'll just carry the girls up and put them in Alexis room. She's got a bed big enough for both of them. Or Claire could have the guest room and you get the second guest room my mother usually uses when she stays over."

„No, that's okay. Just put them in Alexis' bed together. I'm sure they'll love that when they wake up in the morning" Kate said.