Normally, she'd have had a maternity leave. That really hadn't happened. She'd tried to take off from the DEO over the last couple of weeks, but she'd found herself going in at least part time. Maybe it was just the comfort of it. Alex brought Amara with her, just mainly being at the DEO and with her mother still in town (plus all of her helpful co-workers), she managed to get some time in the lab here and there. It wasn't like it once had been, but it felt like something that Alex had to do.

"You know, you could take the day-"

"Are you coming too?"

She looked over to see him smirking in response. "Alex-"

"You're just as guilty of being a workaholic," Alex pointed out. She smiled and bounced Amara a bit, she was snug in her carrier currently sleeping, but Alex was concerned that her little one would wake if she ceased her movement. "We just both need to figure out a schedule…"

"We have a schedule," J'onn pointed out. "Unless you're talking about-"

You know what I'm talking about.

J'onn's eyebrows raised and he seemed more amused. You're getting better at this.

"What time are you done with your day?" Alex questioned innocently.

"Depends-"

"Kara and my mom wanted to have a sit down dinner with a homemade meal and everything," Alex told him. It wasn't like this was the first time they were doing it, but it would be the first time that week and she thought it was important for them to get back to feeling more like a family again. He'd been giving them space and had been keeping his distance and yet still spending a good chunk of time with Amara. Their daughter was growing so quickly and she didn't want J'onn to feel like he was missing any of it...and he was family. Even if she and J'onn didn't know where their relationship stood, the one thing they knew is that they were family and that they'd do anything for their daughter. "Come. Six. My place. No excuses."

"What if aliens invade?"

"We'll call it Monday and you can let Adler handle it."

J'onn smirked. "Adler, huh?"

"Or Harewood."

"Or anyone?"

Alex smiled brighter at that. "Well, not anyone…"

"See you at six."

"See you then."

"Am I the only one who noticed that Amara hasn't been changing her appearance the last few days?"

Alex smiled. "It's been about nine days." Even though her daughter had acted almost like a chameleon when she'd first been born, Alex never didn't recognize her own daughter. Nothing that Amara could do to change her appearance would change that for Alex. That also meant that Alex noticed every tiny change and thing that stayed the same when it came to her daughter. She'd noticed, she'd just not said anything in case it was a fluke and Amara wasn't ready to keep an appearance. J'onn had said that it would stop, but then...this was the first Human/Green Martian hybrid that they all knew of. So, it was still unknown territory.

"Well, she's gorgeous, no matter what coloring she sets her mind to," Eliza insisted. Her mother was walking around the apartment with Amara in her arms while dinner cooked. It seemed like whenever her mother had a chance, she had her granddaughter. Alex was glad, though. Amara wouldn't realize how lucky she was to have the family she had until she was grown up. "I thought Kara and J'onn were coming?"

"Kara is running late because-"

"CatCo?"

Alex smiled and gave her mother a nod. "CatCo."

"And J'onn? Is he taking care of some alien incursion?"

There was a knock just then and Alex already knew who it was. She got to her feet, she'd been trying to practice resting when she didn't have Amara. Alex couldn't just go and nap in that moment, she wasn't that tired, but she had been walking around the DEO for a good portion of the day so resting was feeling a lot better. Pulling the door open, she took a step back to allow him in.

"Actually, I was picking up flowers and trying to figure out what might be the best type of wine to bring to dinner," J'onn said as he entered with a paper bag in one arm and a rather large armful of flowers in the other.

Alex immediately went to help him after she'd closed the door. "You didn't have to do that."

"You had talked the other day about maybe having a glass of wine," J'onn told her. "And the flowers are for all of you...if Kara ever arrives."

She moved with him into the kitchen and set down the bottles of wine on the counter before grabbing vases from the cupboard. The only reason she really had any were because of holidays and then finally coming home with Amara after everything. She couldn't believe how many bouquets of flowers she'd ended up with. It had been quite the celebration, but Alex didn't feel like they were completely out of danger though. The cyborg that had been sent after her was gone and it had seemed like as quickly as he'd gone down that the troops that had been deployed into the DEO had been recalled. So far, it had been fairly quiet on that front. Cadmus was still out there though.

Each moment was sacred.

They couldn't live in fear.

That didn't make it any easier.

"Cat's having her finish up some big project that she gave her at lunch today or something," Alex told him as they worked together to get the flowers into water. "Hopefully she's here before the dinner timer goes off."

J'onn put an arm around her and hugged her close before pressing a kiss into her hair. "Do you need anything?" he asked in a whisper.

"I'm okay," Alex replied as she smiled up at him. "I still think there's things we should discuss…"

"I can go in the other room," her mother called.

Alex looked over her shoulder at her mother as she bounced Amara a little. "No, it's okay-"

"It's really no problem."

Her mouth fell open and her mother was gone in the other room before she could argue any further. She turned back to J'onn, not really ready to have this talk with him so soon. She hadn't had any real time to go over things and plot out what she wanted to cover. "I-I just-I think that we-"

"It's okay," he said as he held up a hand. "We don't have to discuss this right now."

"I want you to be able to spend more time with Amara."

"It might be too big of a step right now," J'onn said gently.

She didn't think that he meant for him, she was fairly sure that he meant for her. He wasn't wrong. She was still thinking about trying to have accommodations so that her mother could be close by. "I still feel like you and I should live together...with Amara...raising her and-"

"I don't want to force you into-"

Alex frowned a bit. "You're not. I keep thinking that I would feel safer with you here...that you deserve this time with her...and that maybe we could find a place that's bigger than my apartment. Not a house. I'm not ready for that, but they do have some larger places...three and four bedrooms, then my mom would have her own bedroom to stay in when she's here from Midvale."

"I think it's good for Eliza to be able to spend this time with you and Amara right now. I don't want to be in the way of that."

"But you're Amara's dad...and you deserve to have that time, build that bond," Alex reminded. She was quiet for a moment. "I adored my dad...and you should be able to spend as much time as you want and you can with her."

"You're certain about this?"

"I might have found a few places when I was sitting in the control room, Vasquez helped me because it was all confusing," Alex told him. "I do better with pictures and simple stuff when it comes to apartment hunting...and all of the websites were anything but user friendly."

"Do you want to look them over now?"

"I mean, we can…" she stumbled, this wasn't how she expected the evening to go, but she was okay with it. "Vasquez e-mailed me all the links to the places that fell within the perimeters I gave her."

"Which were?" he asked as they walked over to the couch where Alex had left her laptop.

"Three to four bedrooms. Preferred two bathrooms. Laundry machines in the unit, if possible. Close to Kara and then also taking into consideration how far it'll be to drive to the DEO. I'm pretty sure that Vasquez said something about preschools…"

"All sounds good. Might want a good area for Kara or I to fly in, if possible."

"Good idea," Alex said as she sat down and pulled her laptop onto her lap, bringing out of hibernation and immediately going to her e-mail. This was both exciting and terrifying. She really didn't look forward to moving, but other than the furniture she had in her current apartment, Alex didn't have that much.

They looked through a couple of them and then J'onn seemed interested in one in particular. "This one is a newer community?"

"Yeah," Alex said. "Vasquez tagged this one because she liked that it had a playground and I think she said that the schools in the area are close and really good. She also mentioned that it has a community pool so we would be hosting DEO parties."

J'onn smirked at that. "It's enclosed?"

"There's a wall around it, yes," Alex said as she clicked through pictures of the entire community. All of the interiors and layouts of the apartments themselves looked perfect and modern. There would be nothing for them to do except the whole moving, packing and then unpacking part of it. No fixing up anything.

"Does it say which ones have the openings? Maybe we could find one on the second story that's near one of the walls," J'onn suggested.

It would make the perfect place with the perfect possible entrance and cover for Kara and J'onn's visits. The apartments all had a fairly spacious patio area, which made it all the better, so it just depended on where it was. "I don't think they have the community layout, but maybe we could go and visit...look around in person?" Alex suggested.

The apartment door opened and they both looked over to see Kara entering, she was carrying a bunch of bags. "Hey, sorry I'm late. I might have seen something too cute that I couldn't pass it up for Amara…" Kara gushed.

Her sister really might have been the most excited about there being a baby in the family. It wasn't that everyone else didn't love Amara, they did, but Kara always was on this completely other higher level of happy and excitement. Alex just was happy that Kara was Amara's aunt. "What this time?"

"I almost got a puppy-"

"You didn't-"

Kara looked so sad for a split second. "I didn't," she told her and held up a finger. "But...she's going to need a puppy or something when she's a little bigger and you have more room."

"Alex and I are looking at a bigger place right now," J'onn spoke up.

The squeal that escaped her sister's mouth made Alex cringe. "Okay, okay, we are...but we're not getting a dog right now," Alex said holding up a hand to her sister. "The only kind of dog Amara can have is a stuffed one for the time being."

"Well, I did get one of those," Kara said as she pulled it from one of the bags. "It's machine washable. Completely baby safe. Stitched eyes and the material is the right kind. No choking hazard pieces or anything."

"That's an acceptable dog."

"Good," Kara said as she cuddled it once she'd placed the other bags on the ground.

"We don't get to see the other stuff?"

"Later," Kara told her. "It's clothes and blankets and baby stuff...and because you're getting a bigger place you'll have more space for it."

Currently, the bassinet was in Alex's room near the bed. She'd read about eventually easing Amara into another room, a nursery, by putting her down for naps in a full sized crib. That would definitely come if they got one of the larger apartments. "Okay, but maybe dial it back a little…"

Kara rolled her eyes before sitting with them. She held out her arms and gave the 'gimme' motion with her hands. "I want to see these places...and I hope that this means that we're less walking on ice."

"Yeah, I feel like that's never going to stop," Alex told her sister honestly as Alex pushed back her own hair from her face. "All I do is worry about Amara… Whether it's if she ate enough or if I did something right or if she's happy...and then there's her safety. I don't think I can ever turn that off again."

"Aww...Mama Alex…" Kara beamed and half teased before turning her attentions to the laptop. "I'm going to live vicariously through you...and also, be the best aunt...ever."

It wasn't the extra rooms.

It wasn't the freshly painted walls.

It wasn't the furniture.

It wasn't anything except that they were together. It was the first night they were having a family dinner at her new place...at their new place. Even though Alex's name was on the paperwork, it really felt like it belonged to all of them. Her friends at the DEO had helped them quickly move in and unpack. It was a blessing, it kept the stress off and in a way made it a little surreal.

"Alex, spaghetti's done," her mother called.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to take in that this was it. This was their home. Even though Alex knew deep down that home was when they were together, it wasn't a place but a state of being with her family, this really felt like home...and it had felt like Midvale was home but after her father had 'died'...it had been Kara. Now, it was like this new home was a sanctuary, not just for Alex...but for all of them.

As she finished putting away the washed clothes into the new dresser for Amara, she couldn't get over how nicely everything had come together. When she'd lived in her old apartment, she'd just had the bassinet for Amara there and most of Amara's things had been stacked up on top of Alex's dresser. Now here her daughter had a room all to her own, an entire set of furniture, even the walls were painted to match the theme that she and J'onn had picked out. She fingered the soft fluff material of the white stuffed alpaca with a scarf from the mint colored walls that Benanti had given Amara when she'd been born. Normal people bought stuffed bears or bunnies, but Lara Benanti brought babies alpacas.

"Al-"

"I'm coming," she called over her shoulder before taking in the baby's room one last time and turning to head out. Amara wasn't using the nursery, but it would be soon enough and for now at least her things could be stored in the proper places. It also gave a good quiet area to rock her in.

The sound of voices and laughter was a signal that more people had arrived, which meant J'onn and Kara. Moving out to the living area, she found that Kara had already stolen Amara out of her swing, but J'onn didn't seem to mind. He was moving to the kitchen and already talking to her mother. It hadn't been that long, Alex felt, and it felt like this was how their family had been for a good portion of their lives, even if it had really just been a couple of years now.

"It smells delicious, Eliza, but you know you didn't have to cook," J'onn said.

"I know, but I like to do it," her mother told him.

Alex moved to them, leaving Kara to bounce and talk to Amara in the living room. "Do you need any help?" she asked.

"I think we could still use some glasses and napkins on the table."

"I just folded a bunch of those new cloth napkins, I'll go get them," Alex said as she pointed in the direction of the laundry.

"And I'll get the glasses," J'onn spoke up. "Wine?"

And this home life was something that Alex realized she'd been missing. The family togetherness. The ease of it. Most of all, the peace. It had all taken them some time to work on, but now it was the easiest thing in the world for them.

Returning, she started to set the napkins out at each place setting. "Also, Vasquez was asking today if we're ever going to do a housewarming slash official baby shower or baby homecoming...I think which was followed by an AKA it's about damn time Cadmus stop hunting Danvers." She looked over to see her mother just blinking. Alex shrugged. "Her words, not mine."

"Maybe we can look at what's open for the pool house building," J'onn said. "I'm fairly sure I read that you get use of the small kitchen in there as well as the barbeque."

"S'mores are my request!" Kara called as she started to move towards them, Amara still in her arms.

"Okay, okay...let's just wait to plan this work barbeque until after dinner," Alex told them.

"I hope you made enough spaghetti...I've definitely worked up an appetite."

As they all gathered around the table, taking their seats, Alex couldn't help but beam. J'onn was trying to convince Kara that he could hold Amara while she ate, but her sister seemed determined to hold tight to her niece. Her mother poured the wine after setting the pot of pasta on the table. Alex picked up her glass and held it out. "Here's to the Danvers...we should come with multiple warning labels…"

"Like no one should mess with us."

The End.