I'm sorry it took so long I was finally able to get a little bit of internet access today, unfortunately this will be a somewhat common occurrence throughout the summer. So this is another apology in advance for any delay of updating in the future. In the meantime I hope you enjoy the chapter I have for you. It's hard for me to believe that I'm only for chapters away from fifty and still have so many readers. I am so grateful for that. As always I love to hear your reviews they make my day every time I read one. And of course I one nothing.
We had twelve days between Halloween and the twins birthday, the closer it got the more excited the girls got and the more nervous I got. Both girls had agreed to a small party at the house the following Saturday as long as we assured them they would still get plenty of presents from us on their actual birthday.
When the morning did come I woke up to an empty bed but the smell of bacon all through out the house. I hurried through getting dressed and found that Patrick already had both William and Cass in the kitchen with him while he made breakfast. He was in the process of both frying bacon and using cookie cutters to shape the pancakes which looked to be chocolate chip, and probably something else knowing Patrick.
"You've been busy." I poured my own coffee, "Why aren't the girls up yet?"
"I let them sleep in a little bit later so that I could make the surprise birthday breakfast." He removed the cookie cutter and flipped the pancake, "You can go wake them if you would like to be the first person to tell them happy birthday, I'll be done here in a couple minutes anyway." And so instead of having my nice warm cup of coffee I set it down to go wake up the birthday girls.
"Guess what today is?" Alyssa giggled as I helped her into a dress she had found in Patrick's storage unit."
"Well I think it's Tuesday." I smiled.
"But what else is it?" Emily found a skirt of her own to wear.
"I don't know what else is it?"
"It's our birthday Teresa, don't you remember?" Alyssa frowned, leading the way to the bathroom to brush teeth and hair.
"Your birthday. Well that would explain the giant breakfast Patrick is making downstairs."
"Giant breakfast!" Emily jumped off her stool.
"Teeth first then breakfast." I stopped her. They rushed through the rest of getting ready and ran down the stairs for breakfast. I dropped them off and showed up to work as usual, but something had been gnawing at the back of my mind for the past week. I knew for a fact that Patrick had not looked into finding a writer at all and Bertram would be coming back to yell at him soon, and that was why I eventually called him into my office.
"What can I do for you?" He smiled falling onto the couch in my office.
"You can tell Bertram you've found a writer."
"Teresa, you and I both know I haven't."
"You're going to write it."
"Why would I do that?"
"Because you have the whole case memorized, and you're never going to chose any one else. Then when Bertram does pick someone you'll be difficult and withholding, so you're going to write it."
"When am I going to do that?"
"How about all of the time you spend sleeping on you're couch?"
"Teresa."
"You have it memorized it probably won't even take you that long, and then I'll reread it to make sure you didn't make a joke of it. We both know the only way you'll feel comfortable is if you write it your self. "
"I don't know how to write a book Teresa."
"You're basically writing about your life, all you've done the past eight years is eat and breathe that case. You know it better than anyone. I can proofread it or whatever when you're done, then all we have to find is a publisher."
"Bertram won't be happy about this."
"Well it's better than having not looked into things at all."
"You really think I should write this?"
"I really think you should."
"Okay then."
"Okay." I repeated, I tried not to sound surprised by that, he had just given in a lot easier than I thought he would. "Really? You're not going to make a mess of this."
"If this is what you want I'll do it. You're right about all of that other stuff, no one else will do it right."
"And you'll actually do it, you won't just put it off like you have been so far."
"Now we both know you're not going to let me." He chuckled, "You'll end up asking me about it every night and make it impossible for me not to start it."
"I really think this is the best idea."
"Well you can explain to Bertram why he won't get an entire chapter to himself to brag about the accomplishments of the whole CBI."
"Okay so he won't be happy at first, but lets face it we're saving him trouble because how many writers do you think you'll make quit before you make it past the introduction." I questioned and he just smiled and closed his eyes. "Did you get the cake for the girls?"
"It's in the fridge at home, I picked it up after you left with them for school."
"Thank you."
"My pleasure."
"And dinner, you have plans for dinner?"
"Yes Teresa I have plans for dinner."
"This morning went pretty smooth don't you think?"
"It did."
"Any thoughts about how tonight will go?"
"Nothing that we haven't already worried about. Everything is going to be fine."
"Well I'm going to go pick them up, you staying in here?"
"And be all alone." He feigned concern, "Not today." He followed me out of my office only to collapse on his couch in the bullpen.
The girls came running out of school with paper crowns and leftover cookies, both were all smiles. Then once at the bullpen both girls went sprinting with their crowns and cookies to the team.
"Guess how old I am?" Alyssa stopped in the middle of the bullpen.
"Patrick doesn't get to guess." Emily added.
"Wait why don't I get to guess?" Jane sat up with a frown.
"Because you always get stuff right, so you can't guess." Emily just rolled her eyes. "So they have to guess."
"Are you five?" Rigsby grinned.
"Nope." Alyssa giggled.
"That doesn't make since you were five yesterday." Grace frowned.
"It's our birthday!" Both girls announced jumping onto the couch with Patrick.
"Your birthday… well I guess that would explain it." Rigsby smiled.
"That would explain the invitations to a birthday party on Saturday to." Cho added.
"Uh huh, you're all coming aren't you it's going to be so much fun and all of our friends are coming and you need to come to."
"Oh of course we're coming we wouldn't miss it for the world." Van Pelt smiled.
It took a lot longer than I expected to get the kids out of the office, you'd think they'd want to go home and unwrap presents and eat cake. Instead they wanted to pass out cookies and show off their crowns. When I did get them out of the office it took everything I had to keep them away from the presents at least until Patrick got him.
"Alright you guys if I let you open your presents when Patrick gets home will you go to bed on time after dinner?" I tried, it seemed unlikely since they would also get cake, but I had to try they did have school tomorrow.
"We absolutely positively promise!"
"We're waiting for Patrick to get home." I reminded, stopping the stampede for the small pile by the couch.
"But it's our birthday we should do what we want to do." Alyssa groaned.
"You can do what you want as long as it doesn't include opening presents until Patrick gets home."
"Can we eat more Halloween candy?"
"Do you want to ruin your appetite, rumor is it's going to be an extra yummy dinner."
"What's for dinner?" William frowned looking up from his toys.
"That is a good question, and it sounds like the person with the answer just pulled into the garage." Not a minute later Patrick was swinging to very excited girls in a circle.
"Teresa said we could open presents now, you're home!"
"I see no one is actually happy to see me it's just the prospect of presents that has you excited." He laughed, "but presents before cake Teresa what is this?"
"They have school tomorrow they can't be up all night." I reminded.
"They can call in sick and then you can call in sick."
"Patrick I've heard this plan before, and it's not happening."
"Fine you two were promised present lets open those presents, and then you'll have something to do while I cook dinner." He fell next to me on the couch and William crawled onto his lap.
"Can we open them now Teresa?" Emily was bouncing up and down in anticipation.
"Yes, you can open them now." I couldn't help but laugh lifting Cass off of her blanket and on to my lap. "Packages came from their grandparents this afternoon." I glanced at Patrick.
"Add that to a couple cards from other relatives." He just nodded, "We should have them send some sort of thank you card."
"How do they all know our address?"
"From the letters and the pictures the kids send back and forth to their grandparents. The grandparents tell the other family members and now we have a handful of birthday cards probably consisting of money anywhere from five to fifty dollars."
"Who would send fifty dollars to a six year old?"
"Some one who didn't want to spend extra shipping a toy." He shrugged as the commotion of unwrapping began in front of us. Amongst their presents were Barbie's, some homemade clothes from their grandparents, a couple of movies that they had really wanted to see, and Patrick and I agreed on replacing the bikes their grandparents had sold back in Chicago. Of course this lead to an long argument about how it was to late and to cold to be riding the bikes right away, and how they would probably have to wait in the garage for a little while. When all was said and done there was still a single box sitting in the dead center of what had once been a small mountain.
"Patrick what's that?" I looked up at him.
"Something that needed a new home." He smiled, we had agreed to get everything for them together what was he doing going out and buying things on his own. "That's for both of you." He instructed the girls, "Be careful opening it."
"Oh my gosh, Patrick how much did that cost?" I frowned, it was one of the most beautiful tea set I had ever seen, porcelain with flowers engraved on the side, it was beyond words, the detail in each piece.
"It cost a lot of money a long time ago, but recently it only cost a half hour of my time to unbury it from the back of the storage unit, clean up all the cobwebs, and wrap it up."
"I thought you already got all of Charlottes toys from the unit."
"I wanted to save this for a special occasion." He smiled, "You girls promise to share that with your sister when she gets bigger right, and be very careful those are breakable."
"Come on Teresa come play tea party with us."
"I don't know girls Teresa's more of a coffee person." Patrick teased.
"I would love to play tea party with you." I brought Cass and joined them on the floor that had once been carpet but was now a sea of torn wrapping paper.
"How about William joins you ladies as well, while I go make dinner." Patrick lifted the boy off of his lap and disappeared into the kitchen.
"Teresa why do I feel so sad on my birthday?" Emily wondered while her sister poured the imaginary tea.
"Oh sweetie…" I didn't really know what else to say, "I bet it's because you miss your mommy and daddy a lot and they can't be here to celebrate with you."
"I really miss them." She whispered.
"Me to." Alyssa nodded.
"I know you do, I miss them to, and I know they really wanted to be there at all of your birthdays."
"I'm sorry Teresa." Emily was trying her hardest not to cry.
"You don't have to be sorry for anything sweetie."
"I promise I'm not sad because I didn't like my presents, that's not why I'm crying."
"I know, I know." I set Cass on her blanket and invited the girls onto my lap while William went back to his toy cars. "It's alright to be sad today, it's alright to be sad any day that you miss your parents. Just know that Patrick and I are always going to be here to help you okay." Both girls nodded into my shirt, "I bet dinner is going to be ready really soon and then you know what you get after that…"
"Birthday cake!"
"Uh huh lets get you guys cleaned up and ready for when Patrick calls us to the table."
"Dinner's ready." Patrick called not twenty minutes later. I walked into the kitchen to find each place set with a full plate. A serving of spaghetti, chicken fingers, and of course a slice of homemade pizza, he had really out done himself this time. "
"Patrick!" I couldn't help but exclaim.
"You girls had to make it difficult you couldn't pick one favorite food." He just smiled lifting William into his seat. Soon we had moved onto the birthday cake, which led to an over abundance of energy on all of the kids parts. And we had to wait for the expected crash before putting them to bed.