Hello again all! So here's another update for you. I'm writing them ahead of time, so I should be able to update once a day, maybe twice if you're lucky! ;) I only have three chapters left to write which is pretty fulfilling. I'm really glad you guys are liking it so far and I hope you continue to! Okay yeah. This chapter title once again comes from "The Gambler" by Fun. What can I say? It's perfection.

it was cold but it got warm when you barely crossed my eye

"You are not a fan of the squash," Toby laughs at the grimaces Grace is making. "I will keep that in mind for next time."

"She looks so conflicted," Emily grins. "She loves the turkey and the sweet potatoes, but the squash she could do without."

"Just a few more bites, monkey," Toby promises, scraping the spoon along the bottom of the plastic container. "Then you can have your fruit."

"Ooh, vanilla custard pudding with bananas?" Emily entices. "I'm so jealous, Grace!"

It's an unbearably hot afternoon in mid-August, with temperatures pushing one hundred and the smog and humidity certainly not helping matters. Emily's come to visit; she and Paige are in the city for the weekend, mostly to meet with prospective birth parents, and while the latter meets up with some old swim teammates from college, Emily meets Toby for lunch at a café near his apartment. Spencer's tied up too, regretfully, running a back-to-school seminar for incoming psych students at Columbia, so it's just the two of them, hanging out like old times. Well, just the two of them and Grace, of course. The seven-month-old squeals and babbles hungrily from the high chair beside her father, because he just isn't feeding her quickly enough for her liking.

"I can't get over how much she looks like you," Emily comments. "Especially when she smiles."

"You think so?" Toby wonders amusedly. "I look at her and all I see is Spencer."

"No way! Look at those big beautiful eyes. They're piercingly blue," Emily says. "That's all you. One hundred percent."

"I guess," He agrees. "The doctor kept saying babies' eyes usually change color, especially if they're blue, but hers never did."

"I guess we know who will be winning 'Best Eyes' in high school," Emily states and then laughs a bit when Grace whines, clearly frustrated that her father is struggling to get her pudding open. "And 'Most Demanding Personality'!"

Toby smirks, finally successful, and dips the spoon into her mouth. "Yeah, she takes after her mother for sure."

"Isn't it crazy how old we got so fast?" Emily remarks after a beat of silence. "I mean we're married. We have children. Sometimes, I wish I could go back in time and tell fifteen-year-old me that everything is eventually going to be okay. It would have made high school a lot easier."

Toby has momentary flashbacks of his mother's death, of juvie, of Jenna and nods his agreement. "Have you and Paige settled on parents yet?"

"More like have parents settled on us," Emily corrects. "We met with a girl, a teenager, who we really liked and who we thought really liked us but… It turns out her parents are against gay marriage and they won't let her go through with it."

"They're against gay marriage but they're not against teen pregnancy?" Toby sneers. "That's rich. You'd think people like that would wake up and realize they're in the minority, here. They're not going to win this fight."

Emily smiles. "Yeah. There are some really close-minded people out there. What does it matter if a man and a woman, or two men, or two women raise a baby? If the baby's loved and cared for, that's all that matters, right?"

"Hey, you don't have to convince me," Toby teases. "I'm on your side, Em."

"I know," She grins. "And you always have been."

"I could say the same about you," Toby tells her, wiping Grace's face with the napkin once she's finished. He plucks her out of the high chair and positions her in the crook of his arm, tilting the bottle he's brought into her mouth as she sucks sleepily. "She should only be a few minutes and then we can get out of here."

"Oh please, take your time," Emily says. "It's a million degrees outside and I'm not looking forward to leaving the air conditioning."

But leave the air conditioning they eventually must and when they do, the sweltering heat greets them like an old friend. Toby and Emily part ways, the latter going off to meet Paige and the former heading home to put Grace down for a nap. When he arrives home, however, his apartment is somehow hotter than it is outside. He places the sweaty, sleeping baby in her crib and calls the landlord, concerned that the thermostat says the apartment is 102 degrees. The landlord, a grumpy old woman, tells him it's expelling heat instead of AC and she's not sure how to fix it. When Toby attempts a fix, he finds it's broken beyond repair. They're going to have to get someone who specializes in this down here stat.

Until then, he turns on every fan in the apartment and lounges by the crib, watching Grace's little chest rise and fall rhythmically, slightly concerned she might overheat. It's deathly hot; his shirt is sticking to his back, his hair is plastered to his forehead and he feels so uncomfortable, he's not sure how Grace is so peacefully sleeping. When she does awaken, she's cranky and irritable as though she never really slept. Go figure. Toby blames the heat; he pulls off her clothing and sits her before her toys in only a diaper. It might look strange, but she's far more comfortable without the confining and suffocating outfit she'd been clothed in. Toby knows he should probably get started on dinner, but he really doesn't feel like cooking. The last thing he needs is for the apartment to get any hotter. Instead, he settles on the couch and watches as Grace engages in the colorful toys before her. As a last resort, he peels off his shirt. And then his pants.

And this, of course, is the sight Spencer comes home to moments later.

"I'm gone for six hours," She balks, too surprised to even move from the doorway. "And you two turn this place into a strip club?"

Toby chuckles. "It's hot, Spence."

"Yeah, I'll say. It's hotter than hell in here," Spencer announces, slipping out of her heels and shedding her blazer. "What's going on?"

"Furnace is shot and is blowing hot air instead of cool," Toby explains. "I did my best to try and fix it, but that's really not my area of expertise."

"Well that's awful," She comments and grins at the sight of her daughter, kneeling beside her and scooping her into her arms. "Hi baby girl! How was your day? Did you have fun with daddy?"

Grace squeals in delight and immediately engrosses herself with the infamous Scrabble necklace around her mother's neck. Spencer kisses her cheek and asks Toby, "How was lunch with Emily?"

"Good," Toby nods. "It's been awhile so it was nice to catch up."

"I wish I could've joined you," Spencer laments. "Was Paige there?"

"No, she was meeting some former teammates."

"Oh," Spencer says and when the baby squirms, she places her back on the floor. "Well, we should probably figure out something for dinner."

"It's too hot to eat," Toby complains, grabbing her hand and tugging her down on the couch beside him. "It's too hot to do anything."

Spencer chastises, "You whine almost as much as Grace does, you know that?"

Toby shoots her a look but before he can reply with a disapproving retort, something else catches his eye. Spencer follows his line of vision and watches as Grace, fed up with her inability to acquire a toy that is just slightly out of reach, pushes herself to all fours. She rocks a bit, a little unsteady, as if attempting to propel herself forward. Shakily, she moves one hand forward and drags the opposite knee behind it. Slowly, she does the same with her other hand and knee and then giggles a bit when she realizes that this is actually getting her places. Grace continues this sort of movement until she's right in front of the toy she wants. Happily, she sits back and plays and her parents watch in awe.

"Did she just…?" Toby questions.

"Oh my god, she's crawling!" Spencer exclaims. "She's never done that before!"

They gather their daughter in their arms, kissing her, telling her how proud they are and exclaiming their love.

Grace, however, is not amused. They've pulled her from the toy she worked so hard to obtain and she promptly throws a fit over her disruption.