I hope everyone enjoys this next installment. I'm trying to update as well as I can and keep the flow. Thank you for all your reviews and favourites. It means alot that someone enjoys this!
Disclaimer - Not Mine.
The SCU settled into a routine that wasn't so different from before except there was one less car in the parking lot since Jane and Lisbon came to work together, usually arguing with smiling eyes about something or other as they got off the elevator.
She still got mad at him for crazy stunts, still tossed random office supplies at his head. Jane for his part was still getting punched in the nose on occasion.
Her townhouse began to change too. There were tea bags on the counter in the kitchen, suits started to multiply in her closet and there were two toothbrushes living by the sink. The dining table had finally found use as Patrick refused to eat in front of the television unless it was popcorn. Soft cosy blankets materialized over every piece of furniture in the living room.
Patrick and Teresa started their own ritual. They would help each other put their respective chains around their neck. Hers holding a cross, his a ring. He had wanted to remember Angela and Charlotte but not dishonour Teresa either. He still remembered when she put the chain around his neck for the first time.
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Teresa had watched him struggle with the ring and the implications to what they had. He'd fiddle with it constantly and look as if he was somewhere far away, then he would glance at her and guilt would settle on his features. The conflict apparent if not spoken about. She found an estate jeweller and saw the chain, knowing it was perfect. Strong and intricate, much like the man she was going to give it to.
"Patrick, can I see your ring, please?"
He looked at her solemnly from the couch at the townhouse and he couldn't deny her anything. She had been so patient.
Quietly he handed it over, unsure where she was going with it as she went to the bedroom. He stared after her and just waited for her to return, wondering what she was doing but he trusted her.
When Teresa came back in to the living room, she asked Patrick to turn which he did slowly, and then he noticed the chain and the ring lowering before his eyes and around his neck as she fastened it.
"I don't want you to forget them and I wouldn't ask you to."
Patrick couldn't speak over the lump in his throat as he turned to look at the little dark haired angel who had fallen into his broken world. He just pulled her into his lap and held her as his emotions carried him and the silent tears fell, wetting her neck where his face was buried. Teresa just stroked his hair and quietly loved him for her, Angela and Charlotte. There was room.
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The pattern of their life became a drumbeat. It had a rhythm of comfort and normalcy in a world where they never expected to find it. Neither figured they would be domestic but that is exactly what they were. Dinners, laundry, falling asleep on the couch in front of the TV, arguments over who had used the last of the hot water. Patrick had moved in and neither had really noticed. It was like everything else in their life, it just had happened.
And some of the things that had just happened were bigger than the others.
Morning routines of coffee for her and tea for him became tea for both. The coffee machine must be needing a clean because the smell of what came out of it turned her stomach. So Patrick had humoured her and descaled it and cleaned it. She still couldn't stand what came out of it but she didn't mind as she was growing fond of tea.
She couldn't get enough of blueberries either. Not that Patrick minded so much. He just had to remember to buy twice as many blueberry muffins as Teresa would eventually eat her weight in them nearly. He didn't tell her that he noticed, and he didn't tell her that he noticed her button down shirts pulled a bit more across her chest either. Not that he minded as he rather enjoyed the rounding out of Teresa and the reason he suspected for all the changes was a gift he never thought he'd have.
It was when she seemed to have the world's smallest bladder with the constant need for a toilet break that she decided to see her doctor. A woman's curse was the dreaded UTI so she made an appointment to get the antibiotic that she thought she would need.
Patrick just grinned over his tea cup from her office sofa as she made the appointment with the GP. He'd see if he could go with her to the appointment the following day. Didn't want to miss this little revelation for the world.
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"Why did you demand to drive me, Patrick?" Teresa huffed in the waiting room while thumbing through a 6 month old Cosmo.
"We drove my car this morning and you couldn't take a CBI vehicle for personal use. And you hate driving the Citroen," he logically argued.
"Be logical then. See if I care."
Patrick just smirked at her with his eyes twinkling. Why he thought the doctor was a grand adventure, was beyond her comprehension.
"Ms. Lisbon? The doctor will see you now."
Patrick rose with Teresa and she just looked at him and said, "I can manage on my own you know."
"I am here to support you dear," he stated as if that would totally explain his presence to a very routine doctor's appointment. Teresa just shook her head, figuring it wasn't worth a fight.
"Ah miss Lisbon. How are you today?" The kindly 60ish doctor asked as a greeting.
"I think I have a UTI so just needing some antibiotics today, Doctor."
"No problem Teresa, we'll just need a urine sample to test and it won't be long to get the culture done. When we know what it is, we can prescribe what's necessary."
Teresa grabbed the specimen cup and did what she had to do handing it to the lab tech that was waiting outside the bathroom stall.
Patrick just winked and squeezed her hand when she came back in the examination room while waiting on the results.
Apparently Jane only hated doctors when they were bothering him but seemed to enjoy her visit immensely. She would never figure him out.
When the doctor entered the exam room after a while again and holding lab results, Teresa was waiting on the macrobid prescription that she had needed before. That isn't what she got.
"So Miss Lisbon, I take it that Mr. Jane is your partner?"
"Yes, for about 3 months or so now?" She said with a questioning lilt to her voice.
"Well then I suppose congratulations are in order for you both. You're pregnant."
"Excuse me?"
"I said you're pregnant Miss Lisbon. I can't tell how far along but I would say not too far as you are petite and not showing yet. We'll have to schedule an ultrasound to be more precise and line up an OBGYN for you."
Teresa blanched. Pregnant. She didn't expect that but she should have, they hadn't exactly done anything to prevent it. She looked at Patrick and just watched him grin, eyes sparkling. He looked happy and smug. She enjoyed the fact that he was happy but she really wanted to slap the smug off of him. He obviously had his suspicions as he wasn't taken aback at all. She'd have to kill him later.
The rest of the appointment was a bit of a blur. Patrick took the prescription for pre natal vitamins from the doctor, and took the list of OBGYN's to look through and ushered her out after he paid for the visit. She still hadn't said anything and he started to worry that he was the only one that was happy about the turn of events.
He led her to a bench in front of the medical clinic and sat down next to her.
"Teresa?"
"Yeah?"
"Please say something."
She turned to look at him and noticed the worry that was etching itself onto his face as his fingers nervously rubbed the knuckles on her hands while he held them, waiting expectantly for her to talk.
"I don't know what to say. I'm a bit numb right now and it hasn't settled in yet. The idea if you know what I mean. This is a bit overwhelming."
"Do you want it?" Patrick asked and unconsciously held his breath. Starting to worry about what she would want.
Teresa looked at him and smiled.
"You sweet crazy man, how could you think I didn't?"
"You were just so quiet. And there are things out there that haven't been resolved yet, I just thought..."
"Stop right there Patrick. You are amazing. For all you have been through, you still have a capacity for life and joy that I wonder at every day. Don't you dare think that a boogeyman is going to scare me away or deprive us of our family. I love you."
Patrick was stunned. They had never said the words out loud, implied yes but it was so different to hearing them from her cupid's bow mouth. He crushed her to his chest and kissed the top of her head.
"I love you too. Together we can do this."
"Together."
With that they stood and walked back to the Citroen with something so precious that they had created and the world became more vivid for them both. They just had something so wonderful that they couldn't help but fight for it.
They were becoming a family.