A/N: I don't own Ugly Betty. I love reviewers. And I really am having fun writing this.
45.
"Daniel, I don't think I'm going to be able to make it in to work today," Betty told her boyfriend one morning about six months after they started dating.
"What's wrong?" he asked, sitting up in bed and rubbing his eyes. He pressed his cell phone against his ear as his girlfriend coughed on the other end. She hadn't been feeling well the night before, so she'd left work early and then he'd gone out to dinner with his mother.
"My head feels fluffy and I keep coughing and I have a sore throat and a fever."
"Then stay home and rest, but I want to come over after work and see how you're doing."
Another coughing jag began and Daniel waited patiently for it to subside before Betty continued. "No, Daniel, I don't want to get you sick."
"Honey, if you've got it, I'm probably going to get it. We're together more than we are apart. I don't know why we have two separate apartments anymore."
"So that when I'm dying, you don't get what I have. Now, please call your mother and tell her I won't be at work today. And I'll call you when I'm better."
"I'll see you when I get off work today."
"Daniel, I don't want you getting sick."
"We'll argue about this later. I need to call my mom and go to work."
"Are you going to see Betty tonight?" Claire Meade asked her son.
He nodded. "I need to get her Kleenex, cough drops, Nyquil, chicken noodle soup, and maybe some flowers."
"Aren't you the romantic?"
Daniel laughed. "I'm taking care of my girlfriend, Mom. Romance isn't that important when I'm just trying to take care of her."
"Tell her I hope she feels better soon."
After coughing for a moment, he nodded. "I will."
"And don't get sick, Daniel."
He smiled as she pressed the back of her hand against his forehead. "I'm trying to stay healthy."
"Daniel, you two need to quarantine yourselves together at your apartment or hers. Whatever she is, you're coming down with it. You're coughing and you have a fever. Now go get that stuff you were going to get her and then quarantine yourselves from infecting the rest of the world."
"Yes, mother," he replied with a sigh and a smile.
Betty and Daniel both had strep throat. They spent a week alone in her apartment taking antibiotics, watching movies, and eating chicken noodle soup. They didn't talk much or do anything terribly romantic. They were just two sick people living in the same apartment and sleeping wherever they fell asleep, which was usually the couch. When they were both finally well enough to leave the apartment, they had to clean it. "I don't want to see this place again for about a month," Betty told Daniel as they threw away Kleenex tissues that were scattered around and washed dishes and disinfected every available surface.
"You could come live in my apartment."
She smiled. "I'm not quite ready for that. Daniel, we haven't even slept together yet."
"I know," he said. "We've been together for seven months or something like that. You know I've never done anything like this before?"
She looked at him. "Daniel, have you ever been in a relationship that lasted this long before?"
He sheepishly shook his head and smiled at her. "Sofia was probably my longest relationship."
Betty wrapped her arms around her boyfriend's neck and looked up into his clear blue eyes. "I'm so proud of you. You've grown so much and you've become such a mature adult."
"I'm a mature adult?" he asked.
She kissed him. "You, Mr. Daniel Meade, are an adult. I know that must surprise you but I think you've grown so much since we met."
"I'm the kind of guy who can date you. And I wasn't when we met."
She leaned against his chest and he held her close. He had his dream girl in his arms. And he didn't have strep throat anymore. His life was pretty much perfect and he couldn't help smiling. How could a man be as lucky as he was? He had once been a playboy focused only on his own needs and wants but now here he was in a relationship with a woman who was selfless and giving, much like the person he had become. He wasn't as good of a person as Betty but he was changing. He was learning to put other people first and to think about their needs before his own.
46.
Daniel Meade sleepily reached for his girlfriend and found nothing but a pillow. And when he opened his eyes, the bright numbers of his alarm clock told him that it was 3:19 A.M. Therefore, Betty should have been in bed, sleeping peacefully. Daniel climbed out of bed and walked to the bathroom but no one was there. Then he found his glasses and made his way to the living room where he found his girlfriend sitting on the couch and staring at the television. "Is there a reason you're watching infomercials at three in the morning?" he asked
"Yeah, there's a great deal on knives that can cut through marble. I thought we should get some for the kitchen."
Daniel sat down next to Betty. "Umm, honey, you're watching an infomercial for Elvis's greatest hits. I don't see anything about knives."
"Oh, it was the last one; I must have dozed off."
"Which again brings us back to my original question; what are you doing watching infomercials at three in the morning?"
"Do you think I'm fat?"
"No," Daniel replied. "Why do you ask?"
"Look at me."
"You're wearing my bathrobe and I'm about a foot taller than you; of course it won't fit you."
Betty smiled. "No, Daniel, let's be serious. I'm never going to look like Amanda or any of those other Mode girls. I'm never going to be skinny like them."
"So you have curves," he told her. "I think they're sexy. And I prefer that to any anorexic stick that only eats two tic-tacs a day. And you have great child-bearing hips, which I think will be very useful someday."
She leaned back against his chest and he wrapped his arm around her. "Do you really think that I'm sexy?"
"Would I be dating you if I didn't? Let's be honest here; I'm Daniel Meade. If I didn't think you were sexy, would I date you?"
She laughed. "But what about when I'm pregnant and huge? What are you going to do if I'm pregnant and I look like a whale? Will I still be sexy then?"
"You'll still be gorgeous to me. It'll be my baby and you could never look like a whale. And I'm always going to think you're gorgeous."
"But I'm not always going to be twenty-nine and look like this. Someday I might get old and fat."
Daniel kissed his girlfriend's cheek. "Betty, I love you. I'm always going to love you. Fat or thin, tall or short; you're my Betty and I love you. Now, will you please stop watching infomercials and come back to bed with me? I can't sleep without you."
"But I'm comfy here. You're really comfy."
"I spent hours every week at the gym and you're calling me comfy."
"Shut up so I can sleep."
"Turn off Elvis and come back to bed with me."
"But Elvis is cute."
"And he's dead," Daniel said, grabbing the remote and hitting the "power" button. "And now he's left the building. So we're going to bed."
"But I'm comfy here."
"So I hear." And then he looked down at her to see that she'd fallen asleep. He knew he'd lost the battle and he might as well just sleep where he was.
47.
"Mommy, I have a question for you," five-year-old Sarah announced one day walking into the kitchen where her mother was making lunch.
"And what might that be?" Betty asked her daughter.
"Why don't Grandma Claire and Grandpa Ignacio live together? Melanie's grandparents live together. Are they divorced?"
Her mother smiled at her daughter's innocence. "No, your grandparents aren't divorced."
"Then why don't they live together?"
Betty put down the sandwiches in her hands and turned to her daughter. "Sarah, Grandma Claire is Daddy's mother. And she was married to your Grandpa Bradford but he died a few years ago, before you were born."
"Does Daddy miss him?"
"I think so. It was his daddy."
Sarah nodded and then a puzzled expression came over her face. "If Grandma Claire isn't your mommy, then where is your mommy?"
"My mother was your Grandma Rosa who died when I was younger. She died long before I ever met Daddy."
"Did you meet Daddy's daddy?"
"I did," she replied. "He was the one who introduced me to your daddy."
"He must have been a nice man."
Betty smiled, remembering Bradford Meade and thinking that "nice" wasn't the first word she would have used to describe him. "He was a very special person."
"Do you miss your mommy?"
"I do," she said. "She was a wonderful woman."
"Was she like Aunt Hilda?"
"I suppose she was, in her own way."
"Was she like you?"
"Your grandpa thinks so."
"She must have been amazing," Sarah told her mother. "Would she have liked Daddy?"
Betty nodded. "She would have loved him."
"Then I bet I would have loved her."
"I'm sure you would have loved her.
"Would she have loved me?"
Betty kissed her daughter's cheek. "Of course she would. Now, let's go take lunch out to your brothers before they starve to death."
48.
Being the mother of five children was a full-time job, if you asked Betty Suarez. She once wrote an article for her mother-in-law's magazine, Hot Flash, about the difficulties of raising five children while trying to balance that with a career, once they started school. But until all of her children were in school, she stayed at home with them. And after Vivianna started kindergarten, Betty started working as the editor in chief of Mode again. "How do you do it?" Becks asked her one day when he walked into her office.
"Do what?" she asked.
"You're hot as hell, you have five great kids, you're married to Daniel, and you're the EIC of one of the biggest fashion magazines on earth. How do you have time to do all of that?"
"I'm really talented," she replied without looking up at him. "And I have an amazing husband."
"So here's the thing," he said, sitting down. "I've been asked to contribute some photos to a gallery that's doing a show about the role of women in the twenty-first century and I was wondering if I could use you as a model. You're a working mother who manages to make it all work."
"You'll have to show the power behind the throne," Betty told him. "I couldn't do this without Daniel and five wonderful kids."
"Okay, here's what I'm thinking. I want to do some shots of you working but also some shots of you at home doing stuff like cooking and spending time with your husband and kids. I want to show you as kind of the American Dream for a woman."
"Yeah, well, no one else gets to be married to Daniel Meade. And he's half the reason I can do this."
"But you'll do it? You'll be my model?"
She shrugged. "I guess so."
"Awesome, so when I can take pictures of you?"
"When is your show?"
"In about three months, so we've got time but I'd like to do it soon."
"Next week is Vivianna's birthday and Christmas. Would the second weekend of January work for you?"
"Whatever you want," he said. "You're the model."
"Yeah, usually the photographer is in charge of this kind of stuff. I've been around the magazine world for a while and I know these sorts of things."
"Well, you're married to Daniel Meade and he could probably kill me with his bare hands if he wanted. Plus he's my best friend."
Betty smiled. "Well, then you can do the shots of me at work that Wednesday and then the stuff at home, you should be able to do that Saturday."
"I'll see you then."
"So you're the woman who has it all," Daniel remarked to his wife as they explored the gallery several months later.
Betty smiled as she saw the picture of herself talking on the phone while cooking. "I think the idea is that I'm talking to you on the phone while making dinner and helping Nik with his homework."
"It's sexy," her husband told her. "And the pictures are amazing. But I have the real thing and I like that more. I get to keep you forever and ever."
There were pictures of Betty working at her computer, talking on the phone and working with the other editors at Mode. There were pictures of Betty with her children and with Daniel. Daniel's favorite picture was of Betty and Daniel in the kitchen working on dinner. He had reached around Betty to grab something and then pulled his wife close against his chest. She was laughing with her mouth open and her eyes sparkling and he had his nose buried in her hair as he kissed the top of her head. Lucas probably would have described it as "old people love" but Becks had captioned it "Caught in the Moment."
"I love you," Daniel whispered in his wife's ear. "You truly are an amazing woman."
She smiled up at him. "And you're an amazing man. I don't know what I'd do without you."
"You wouldn't have as many beautiful children," he replied.
She leaned against him. "And I wouldn't have the most amazing husband on earth."
He kissed her. "You're cute."
49.
"My oldest daughter is getting married this afternoon," Betty told her husband. "And I don't feel old enough for that to be happening."
He smiled. "I know how you feel. But I'm just stunned that she's old enough to be getting married. She's only twenty-five."
"I was twenty-nine when we got married; that's not much of a difference. And I was twenty-two when we met."
Daniel shook his head. "Where did the time go?"
"We met thirty-three years ago," Betty said. "It feels like it's been the blink of an eye."
He nodded. "I know. I still remember that girl in the Guadalajara poncho walking into the glass wall."
"And I remember the idiot boy who gave me inane tasks trying to get me to quit."
"I was the playboy who wanted to keep my perfect little world."
"And I was a dreamer who wanted to change the world."
Daniel kissed his wife's cheek. "And then everything changed when I fell in love with my assistant. I was so afraid when I realized that I was in love with you."
"Why?"
He shrugged. "I was sure that you weren't interested in me. And I realized that I liked you more than I'd ever liked any girl before. I knew that if I'd fallen for you and I couldn't get out easily. And I was sure that you knew and were secretly laughing at me. I had been so protective of you and so affectionate towards you. I was positive that you and Christina were laughing at me for being dumb enough to fall for you."
She laughed. "I didn't think you were obvious at all."
"Oh come on," he replied with a smile. "Don't you remember when I told you that you were stupid for dating Henry? Or what about when I got Gio fired for being an asshole to you?"
"I thought you were just my over-protective older brother/best friend."
"Did you ever think that I liked you?"
Betty shrugged. "There were definitely moments when I suspected something. I remember the night you took back Mode from Wilhelmina. I wasn't sure if we were just really good friends or if that look in your eyes meant something more."
"I didn't even know that I liked you yet then."
"There was also a day about a month or so before we started dating. I was at my desk and I looked up to see you watching me. I wasn't sure if you were just zoned out or what. But I felt like you were watching me."
"I probably was. I was very protective of you and I was really worried about you."
"What about you? Did you ever suspect that I liked you?"
He nodded. "You spent a lot of time snuggled up against my chest during movie nights shortly before we started dating. You would just lean back against me and make yourself comfortable."
"You always wrapped your arm around me when I did that and I felt so safe and comfortable."
"You used to tell me that I was comfortable."
"And you'd always protest with something about the number of hours you spent at the gym."
He laughed. "I remember when Sarah was a baby and you used to take her out to the living room or to her room to get her to fall asleep in the middle of the night."
"I wanted to give you some peace and quiet so you could sleep."
"I know but there were nights when I couldn't sleep because you weren't there. I needed you there to help me fall asleep."
"And then you'd come find me in the living room and we'd all end up sleeping on the couch."
"Until Sarah woke up and wanted to be fed," he recalled. "That was twenty-five years ago."
"And now she's the one getting married. She'll have children someday."
"It's so weird. I don't feel old."
"Sarah wants to have our daddy-daughter dance to 'Sunrise, Sunset' from Fiddler on the Roof. And that's how I feel about her getting married. I don't remember growing older; when did she grow up?"
"I remember the first time she brought Logan home," Betty said.
"That was five years ago."
She nodded. "And now she's marrying him."
"I told him he had to be good to her. He had to respect her."
"Daniel, he was terrified of you that first visit. I think he was afraid of you for about two years after that."
"He called me sir until he graduated from college, but I understood how he felt. I was terrified of Ignacio when we first started dating. I remember when we moved in together. I really thought he was going to castrate me."
"And I think that's how Logan felt about you."
"He's a good kid. I like him now."
Betty laughed. "You're a good father."
"But I'm not ready for Vivianna to start dating just yet."
"Daniel, dear, she's almost seventeen years old; she's been on dates before."
"But she can't be in any serious relationships yet. I'm not ready for her to grow up."
Betty kissed Daniel's cheek. "Sweetie, she's almost an adult; we have to let her grow up."
"But I liked it when they were little kids and we were their whole world. I was the most important man in the world to them. And now Logan is taking that place in Sarah's life."
"You still have Reese."
He smiled and nodded. "But Lucas is starting to take more responsibility for her."
"When she's upset, who does she run to? Who disciplines her when she misbehaves? Who kisses her boo-boos? Daniel, Lucas might be her father, but you're her daddy. That little munchkin adores you."
Daniel smiled. "She's an angel."
50.
A few hours later, Daniel and Betty were standing in the back of the church where Logan and Sarah were getting married. "Are you ready?" she asked him as she came out of the room where her daughter was getting ready.
He shrugged. "Are you?"
She dabbed her eyes with a Kleenex. "Hell, no, but she is. Daniel, she is so beautiful and so happy about this. How's the groom doing?"
"Logan is nervous," he told her. "He asked me if I was sure that Sarah wasn't going to bail on him."
"They're cute." She studied his face for a moment. "Did you think I was going to bail on you?"
He nodded. "I remember about two minutes before the wedding started. My mom came into the room to see how I was doing. And I asked her if you were really there and if you were really going to marry me. And she laughed."
"I knew you were going to be there waiting for me. You wanted to get married too badly."
"I just wanted you for the rest of my life. And I think that's how Logan feels right now."
"Well, he's marrying Sarah," Betty replied with a smile. "He can't marry me; I'm already married to the most amazing man I know."
"Mom," William said walking over to his mother. "Can you tell Sarah that it's go time?"
She nodded. "Daniel, are you ready?"
He smiled and gave her two thumbs up before William and his mother both started laughing. "It doesn't matter whether or not I'm ready," he said. "This is about Logan and Sarah, not me."
"She's married," Betty said to Daniel as they stood in the receiving line after the wedding.
"Yeah but I like Logan; he's a good guy. He'll take good care of her."
"But for the first time in my life, I feel old."
"I'm nine years older than you. You're not old."
She smiled and leaned against his arm. "I'm glad someone thinks so."
"When was the last time Lucas called you old?"
She shrugged. "It's been a while; I'll admit."
"See," Daniel said. "He's finally growing up."
Betty looked over at her son who was standing nearby holding his one-year-old daughter on his hip while talking to a friend of Sarah's. "He's getting better at the whole parenting thing."
Lucas and Reese were still living with his parents but he'd finally gotten himself a job and started taking classes at a small, local college. He wasn't the best parent in the world but he was getting better at relating to his daughter. He couldn't punish her but her grandparents were both more than capable of saying no to their granddaughter and setting limits for her. And they were trying to teach her father how to do that for himself. Eventually, he wanted to move out of their house and take Reese with him. But that could take a while since he wanted to wait until after graduating from college before doing that.
"You know Mrs. Meade," Daniel said to his wife. "I think we actually did a pretty good job of raising our kids."
A/N: Please review!
