With the boys back home and barely understanding what was about to happen to their family once again, Carly could barely justify spending another night in Jason's arms. Once Michael and Morgan had been tucked securely into their beds, the two had drifted back downstairs to the living room. As was their usual routine, Jason flipped on the television to find an old movie on the classics channel and Carly headed for the kitchen to retrieve two beers and a bag of potato chips. By the time she came back into the living room, Jason was sprawled on the sofa. It had been a long day for both of them, one full of so many changes so quickly.

"Here, a little brain food," Carly offered as she tucked herself into the little corner of the couch not occupied by Jason's long legs. He smiled gratefully as she flipped off the cap and handed the bottle to him. "I love this movie. I haven't seen it in years, but when I was younger, Virginia used to let me stay up late to watch it. Growing up in Florida, I couldn't imagine what it would be like to live anywhere as beautiful as Rome. Now, I've been to Europe more times than I can count. I hope that I never take any of this for granted."

Sitting up to give her more room, Jason flipped off the Audrey Hepburn movie and turned to look at Carly. She smiled shyly under his watchful gaze. He loved that he could make her blush after all this time. Carly was rarely modest, but in his presence, she could become almost self-deprecating. However, even in that state, she never lost that confidence that made her who she was. Sometimes it was only a front for the fear, but he knew that she could always find a way to believe in herself as long as she knew he was on her side. The same applied for his emotional honesty. He could always tell the truth about how he felt with her because he knew that she would somehow understand. Reaching out, he tugged playfully on the end of her blonde strands. "I wish I would have known you when you were a little girl."

Closing her eyes, Carly remembered herself at seven years old. She had grown up in the trailer park, but on rare occasions, her adoptive mother had managed to scrape enough money together for a trip to the beach. The first time she could remember seeing the ocean was on that vacation when she had run in the surf until her legs literally gave out. She had laughed all day, chasing the tide in and out from the sandy shore. Until she met Jason and had Michael, she couldn't ever imagine being that happy again. "I don't think that you would have talked to me when we were little kids," she pointed out. "I wasn't exactly the type that you prep school boys hung out with. Your family wouldn't have let you get within a hundred feet of me even if our paths did happen to cross."

His hand roamed up her hair and down her cheek to cradle her face. "I would have found a way to find you, even then," he promised her. "If I could have ever imagined that someone like you existed out there, I would have found my way to you. You are too much a part of me for us not to have met."

For a man of little words, Jason certainly chose the right ones. "I love you, Jase," she confided. "I know that I say it a lot, and when I don't, I know you know how I feel. On some level, you've always known how I felt. It's just sometimes I look at you and I just have to say it. It's like I'm afraid that if I go one more second without telling you, something could happen to change the fact that you love me. I still can't believe it sometimes that you chose me. It might have taken awhile for you to realize that you chose me, but you did. You picked me out of all the women in your life the night you said you would be Michael's father. That night in the rain changed my life."

"It changed both our lives," he agreed. "Car, I never thought that you would take me on such an incredible journey, but you have shown me places and things I would have completely missed out on if we had never met. I would have accepted that Robin's view on life was the only one that existed. I wouldn't have met Courtney or Sam or Elizabeth. And as much as I hate that each of those relationships symbolize time that we were apart, I'm glad that I had them."

She understood that now was a time that he just needed to talk, to find a way to make sense of a past that so clearly defined them. "What did you learn from Robin?"

"I know that Robin was judgmental later on, but in the beginning, she really did accept me for who I was. When I woke up in that hospital room, I felt so terribly alone. I didn't know anyone, but everyone seemed to know me," he remembered. "Robin knew Jason Quartermaine, but she understood that wasn't who I was anymore. She found a way to give me the space that I needed in a time when my entire family wanted to suffocate me. I woke up to an entire life that I didn't remember."

"If it wasn't for Robin, part of me knows that you would have never found your way to Sonny," Carly acknowledged. "For that and that only, I am grateful for what Robin did for you. Maybe it's hard not to regret that choice sometimes, but if you hadn't rebelled against your old persona, you wouldn't have been in Jake's that night. I think I should point that out the next time the sainted doctor wants to lecture me. I might have finally found a way to pin it all on her."

Jason chuckled to himself, knowing full well how Robin would take Carly's new plan of attack. She was relentless in her dislike for his former flame, not that he could really blame her. Robin had put Michael's life at risk and destroyed Jason's family. "After Robin, there was you, and there wouldn't be anyone else for a very long time. I had that little thing with Elizabeth, but it was really just a tiny flicker of what was to come. I cared about her, but life was too much in the way. I guess that's what it kind of felt like when Courtney came into our lives. Between A.J. and Sonny, there were too many brothers in the way in the beginning."

"Until me," Carly giggled. "She's the only woman besides me that I ever thought was good enough for you. Maybe it's because she was Sonny's sister or maybe it was because she became the best girl friend I ever had, but I trusted her with your heart."

"Courtney taught me that it was okay to love again. We both know that I was scared to let anyone in after what happened between you and me, but I couldn't help but fall in love with her," he confessed. "I wanted to make it work. For a long time, I could really see forever with her. She just wasn't fit for this life and losing the baby was the final nail in the coffin. I still hate that she ever had to go through so much pain. Who knows how life would have turned out if she hadn't jumped in that icy water to get away from Alcazar? I know that we can't go back and change it. It happened for a reason. I just have thought about it quite a bit, especially after she died. She might still be here if things were different."

"Jase, if things were different, you might have never met her," she pointed out. "If things were different, you could have married Robin. If things were different, I could have never slept with Sonny that night, which eventually led to Morgan. If things were different, you wouldn't have hooked up with Sam or had your heart trampled on. All of these things had to happen for us to get here. These events led up to the night that you spent with Elizabeth and the son that you conceived. I hate so much that has happened, but I love that you have a son. I love Jake."

"You amaze me," he complimented, leaning forward to kiss her briefly. She pulled away slowly as he reclined back against the couch. "Speaking of Sam, our entire relationship leaves me with so many mixed feelings. I went through so much with her, the good and the bad. With her, I guess the biggest thing that I learned was that you can't make choices for someone else. I thought I was protecting her at the time, but it ended up being our downfall. When I knew that I was going to have to tell you about Jake, I was afraid that I'd made the same mistake."

Carly moved closer to him to press her body to his. His shoulder against her shoulder and his thigh against her thigh, they just needed to sit next to each other and feel one another's presence. "You and I are stronger than that," she retorted. "We're unbreakable."

"I didn't really learn anything from my little excursion to Elizabeth's life," he declared. "Well, I guess that's not entirely true. I learned that loving someone means accepting them for who they are. It doesn't mean lying to make life into a version of something that you think it should be. To be in my life, you have to do it on my terms. I know that it's not fair, but that's the way that it is. She couldn't do that, and I can't change that. The only thing I can do is be a good father to my son."

"You are the best father I have ever seen," she said. "Even if I don't have another nice thing to say about that woman, she does have good taste in fathers. Few would say that Zander would have been a good choice, but I knew the real him. He was a good man, strong and kind when he loved someone. I was lucky enough to be one of those people that he cared about. If she would have given him the chance, I know that he would have been a good father. When he couldn't be, she wisely chose my dear cousin. I will choose to ignore that brief stint where Ric thought he was going to parent Cameron, and focus on Lucky. Despite his little walk on the wild side with the pills and Maxie Jones, Lucky just might be the sanest of the Spencers. He's got a mostly even temper and a good head on his shoulders. He has been a good dad to Cam."

Though the cop and the mobster had had their differences, and would likely continue to as the situation unraveled, Jason had to admit that Lucky had been a good father to Cameron and even Jake when he had gotten sober. Everything he had done had been for the boys. "And what about me? Did she choose right with me?"

"You're the best choice anyone could ever make, Jase. I was the first one to pick you, remember?"

"How could I forget?" he murmured as he drew her into his arms again. He couldn't go very long these days without wanting to hold her. It was always like that in the beginning stages of a relationship, but they were so far removed from the beginning that this felt like an entirely different story. The Jason and Carly that were ten years ago wouldn't recognize the version of themselves now, but he preferred who they had become to who they had been. "I guess that's why I picked you. You picked me first."

"Let's just say that we picked each other. I don't want to get blamed for anything later on," she teased brightly. Jason smiled before yawning involuntarily. "You're tired. We should get some sleep. You are picking up Jake in the morning, and we have a big day ahead of us."

"And the boys are here so I should sleep down here in the spare bedroom," he realized. "It's fine, Carly, I understand. I may not like it, but I understand." He was about to say something else when the familiar tone of his cell phone chirped from across the room. It always seemed to ring at the most inopportune times. "Spinelli, what do you need?"

Carly smiled as she listened to Jason talk somewhat patiently to the adorable computer hacker. Their conversation went on for a few minutes, mostly one sided as Jason rolled his eyes at whatever Spinelli was saying. Having likely been on the opposite end of one of those conversations before, she decided to rescue the young man. She took the phone from Jason and pressed it to her ear. "Spinelli, I hate to think of you in that penthouse all by yourself when your entire family is here together. Why don't you pack an overnight bag and come stay at the cottage tonight? Jason and I will arrange a day this week to make sure that everything else comes over. You don't even have to stay in a pink bedroom anymore."

"Oh, Valkyrie!" Spinelli cried on the other end of the line. "Not that I don't appreciate Stone Cold's very generous offering of the Regrettably Pink Room, but I have missed living in a real house. The Casa de Valkyrie would be a much welcomed addition to the Jackal's life."

"It was Jason's idea," she told him. "Just get your things together and have one of the guards drive you over. The boys are asleep, but Jason and I will wait up until you get here. I have a bedroom all picked out for you downstairs. We'll see you when you get here."

Handing the phone over to Jason, she waited for him to protest over her unannounced invitation. Instead, she was surprised when he lifted her off her feet and kissed her deeply. "Thank you."

"He matters to you, so he matters to me. He's our family," she said simply when he set her back to her feet. "If he doesn't like it, we can redecorate it to his tastes. I'm already going to be busy with redoing one of the other spare rooms for Jake. I was thinking that I might redo my bedroom, too. We need to have a fresh start with things that are only yours and mine. I want it to be a little bit of you, a little bit of me."

"Kind of like our family?"

"Exactly like our family."