After several weather delays Olivia and Fitz were finally getting off the plane in Green Airport. Both silently thanking God they were close to her apartment. Fitz looked down at her next to him. He had both their bags, but she was weighed down with her backpack full of books. On the flight they had taken the gauze off of their tattoos and displayed them proudly.
"You want to grab the bags and I'll go get us a rental?" Fitz asked hoping to get out of the airport and into bed before either one got too grumpy. It was two thirty in the morning, they had been at the airport since four the day before. Olivia had pulled out her cell phone to text Claudia that they had landed, as she gave him an aggravated look.
"Or I could get the bags and you could get a rental?" Exhaustedly he asked her, trying not to set her off. His Livvie was many things, and grumpy this late at night was just par for the course. He usually thought it was cute when she got all sleepy and grumpy, but tonight he was too tired.
"It's almost three o'clock, the car rental places aren't even open anymore." She was right, which was why he had wanted to order the rental in advanced, but she told him they didn't need to. Of course he wasn't about to point that out.
"You're right, I'll call a car service." He began to pull out his phone, but she stopped him.
"That's crazy, let me just call Abby." He knew full well that there was no point in arguing with her. They both had plenty of money, more than they could ever need, but Olivia was not one to be wasteful. The airport was only fifteen minutes away, and Abby would jump at the chance to drive Olivia's car.
They walked together over to the baggage carousel and Fitz watched patiently for her bag Olivia listened to Abby's phone ring. Eventually she heard Abby's voice in the voicemail message and hung up. She was about to tell Fitz they needed a new plan when her phone rang. Answering immediately, assuming it was Abby she was shocked to hear Claudia's loud voice through the phone.
"What?" Olivia answered.
"Hey Dummies! Just because I know you there's a car waiting outside the terminal to take you guys home. You're welcome." She had heard them discussing a ride home in the car on the way to the airport and knew that with all the delays they would never get one.
"Brat!" Olivia sassed her, but she was thankful. She knew she had a tendency to get grumpy after a long day and didn't want to argue with Fitz after everything they had been through.
"Call me in the morning. And enjoy the rest of your naked week with your flyboy." With that Claudia hung up, knowing that Olivia was grateful, despite her insistence to the contrary.
Fitz walked back over to her with the bag, that she had to buy to put her stuff they had bought, he caught her smiling looking at her wrist. He knew in that moment that no matter how grouchy or stubborn she would always have him. He sat himself down next to her and placed his head on her shoulder sleepily.
"Abby on her way? And I hope you told her that the second I walk in that door I'm stripping down to my boxers and going to sleep, with you, in our bed." She nuzzled her face into his curls, loving hearing him say 'our bed'.
"Nope." He sat up and gave her an exhausted look, "CeeCee got us a car." Fitz's face flushed with relief,
"Have I mentioned how much I love your sister?!" He pulled her up and started leading them towards the exit. Still holding on tightly to his hand she looked at him softly,
"So our bed hmm?" He looked down at her when she asked the question. They hadn't really spoken about moving in together, Fitz didn't want to freak her out and he knew she loved her apartment and space, but he couldn't remember the last time he hadn't spent the night at her place. It certainly felt like it was 'theirs' and not just hers anymore. He searched her eyes for any nerves or hesitation, but found none, He brushed his lips across her before pulling her closer into his side and making their way to the lone town car sitting outside the terminal.
They sat together silently willing the car to hurry and get them home, the adrenaline that had been their constant companion the last few days had been long gone. Olivia couldn't sleep on planes and Fitz stayed awake the whole flight, holding her hand during turbulence and distracting her with talk of the mile high club. Both of them were nearing the twenty-four hour mark and after the way the day started it felt like they had been awake longer.
Making their way into the building they moved like zombies, both silent and slow, but relieved to be home. Just like he ha promised Fitz left the bags right inside the door and pulled Olivia with him into the bedroom. They both stripped down, working like a well-oiled machine, Fitz peeling his clothes off until he was in his Calvin Klein's. He gently tossed her the shirt he had been wearing and she put it on over her bra and panties. They both slid in on opposite sides and met in the middle. Fitz lay on his back and pulled her flush on top of him. Within a few minutes both were sound asleep.
The next morning, or afternoon rather, Olivia looked and saw that it was almost one o'clock. She had woken up still right on top of Fitz, clearly both of them too exhausted to move even in their sleep. She rolls off of him gently trying to make sure not to wake him.
She couldn't remember the last time she had slept this late, and she had never known Fitz to sleep. It occurred to her that the last few days had taken more out of him than he let on. She checks her phone and sees several missed calls from Claudia, Harrison, and three from Abby. Not wanting to wake Fitz she slid into a pair of gym shorts that were sitting on top of her dresser. She leaves his shirt on, not really ready to part with it yet. She first calls Claudia back knowing that she's probably worried.
Claudia answered after only two rings, yelling about being irresponsible. Olivia laughed and calmed her down. After making a few references to Fitz keeping her awake all night Claudia forgave her and moved on. Olivia tried to ask her about what was going on with their father, but she wouldn't give her any information. Frustrated Olivia said goodbye and promised to talk to her later. Next she called Harrison, but got his voicemail, after leaving a brief message she made her way to her kitchen. Claudia hadn't had time to stock the fridge before she left so Olivia opened the door to find nothing but string cheese and diet coke.
She groaned realizing she would have to go to the store. Olivia hated grocery shopping. To her it was tedious and putting groceries away was worse. Still frustrated that no one would let her help it what was going on, it occurred to her she had no control of her life. Until this situation was fixed she needed to do something. Heading back to her bedroom, she changed into something warmer silently, hoping Fitz would sleep for a few more hours. Grabbing a pen she began her list, than left a quick note for Fitz, so he wouldn't worry if she didn't get home before he woke up.
It was simple, all it said was "heading to the store back soon, Love O." She went back into the room and left it on the pillow next to his head. He stirred, but didn't wake up so she stuck her feet in her sneakers and headed out the door on a mission. She was gone for nearly an hour when Fitz woke up and found her note instead of her beside him. He was slightly disappointed but remembered that he hadn't had a proper shower in a few days and decided to take advantage of the time.
He took his time, taking a shower, shaving, trying to get all the grime and everything off from the trip. By the time he was done Olivia still wasn't back. He figured he would start some of the laundry and try and get things put away so that they could spend the rest of break relaxing. While he was stripping the bed sheets he turned on the radio and gathered the rest of the dirty clothes from their bags. After putting in the first load he looked around and tried to think of anything else that he could do, but was at a loss. As usual her apartment was spotless, there was a single glass in the sink that he quickly soaped up and put away, but found nothing else out of place.
Looking over at her book shelf he noticed that she had added the books he had gotten her in Kansas, he smiles as he thinks about how whenever she buys a book she brings it home and adds it to her collection. He also notices she is running out of room on her bookshelf and running out of room in her apartment for more bookshelves. Thoughts of them moving in together briefly run through his head, but he pushes them away for now knowing what her answer would be.
Realizing that he managed to keep himself busy for over an hour, but she still hadn't returned concerned him a bit, but since he wasn't sure when she had left or how busy the store was he figured he would start looking into getting a new car now that his lease was up. After he gave up that he alternated between grading papers and checking the laundry. Another hour passed and he began to worry, Olivia hated grocery shopping there was no way she would spend two hours in a grocery store. He was about to pull out his cell phone, and call her when he heard the intercom buzz and her voice enter the room.
"Fitz? Can you come help me out down here?" He hoped up to answer her and throw on a sweater.
"Be right there!" He answered back and made his way out the door. He assumed she had a few bags of groceries that she needed help with, but when he went outside he saw that not only her trunk was full, but her backseat was filled with bags and boxes.
"Jeez Liv do we even have room for this much food?"
"S' not all food." She barely responded, she was on a mission unloading everything and wearing herself down with bags. Recognizing he wasn't going to get much out of her, he too loaded himself down with the rest of the bags and followed her into the building. She left everything on the counter and he followed suit. Without hesitation or comment she began to unload the bags and put the food in the refrigerator. He figured he would try to engage her in conversation again.
"So whole food? Thought you hated the crunchy granola crowd?"
"You like whole foods." She had her head in the fridge moving around a giant bag of carrots. He bought most of his food from Whole Foods, when he wasn't at Olivia's he tended to eat healthy, but Olivia mocked him and complained about and their faux concern for the environment. He always countered with her 12 mile per gallon car, which led to a fierce look, and her warning him not to insult her baby.
"You know you didn't buy any wine or popcorn right?" He looked around at all of the food she had bought was food that had to be cooked. It was unlike her.
"We are eating healthy."
"Details Livvy, I need details. What's going on?"
"We aren't eating crap anymore." She informed him like he had just asked the weather, but she still wasn't really giving him much to work with.
"I figured, I mean I didn't think you bought twenty pounds of carrots because they were on sale. I mean why now? I've known you almost a year and I've never seen a single vegetable in your refrigerator." He was right, she liked fruit on occasion as a snack, but usually the contents of her refrigerator were limited to wine and take out containers.
"I also joined a gym and bought a juicer." Still loading up the fridge at a wild pace. It wasn't usually this hard to get information out of her. Something was wrong.
"Olivia, stop, breathe, talk to me. Are you…." He didn't really want to ask her, he was fumbling over the words, "uhm pregnant?"
"God NO! Why would you even ask that?"
"Why else would you be all health conscious? Last week I ate tofu and you mocked me for two hours."
"I just… I need… I cant… Ugh! Okay, so Michael and Claudia wont tell me anything that's going on. I'm at a stand still right now. I cant do anything to move forward because I have no idea what the future is going to look like anymore. I need to be in control of something, and this morning I woke up and I realized that my health is pretty much the only thing I can be totally in control of, and in typical me fashion I went a little overboard with it." She looked around the kitchen at the nearly dozen bags taking residence in the kitchen. There were bags on the table from Macy's where she had bought cooking supplies and from Lululemon where she had bought work out clothes. He was giving her a worried look, but he understood. She was a woman that had always made her own choices and fixed her own problems and now all of a sudden it was out of her hands. She needed something to hold on to. "You don't have to do it with me. I just figured since you go to the gym anyways you wouldn't mind. I signed us up for boxing, but I bet I could take Abby." She was a bit embarrassed now, she hadn't really asked him about the gym or anything. She just assumed he would be a long for the ride.
"Of course I'll go with you, although I'm not boxing with you! You're too competitive and you fight dirty. I'll watch you kick someone else's ass though. And as far as the food goes, I can't promise I won't cheat, because I really like pizza and steak, but I told you we are in this together. I didn't just mean the hard stuff, I'm here for all your whims and desires, neurotic or otherwise."
"Oh we are still having pizza and Chinese, oh and those gyros. Crap this isn't going to last very long is it?" He laughed softly and gave her a kiss to wipe the defeated look off of her face.
"Not to add fat to the fire but Brown has a really nice rec center you know. Its got a pool and everything." He told her in a joking tone, but the relief that was on her face after he kissed her was gone and was replaced by sadness.
"We can't go there together Fitz. That's why I joined the gym. That's why I didn't wake you to go to the store with me. Because outside of this little bubble, I'm your student and you're my teacher."
"Livvy…" Immediately he felt awful he should have thought about it. The time away they had to worry about so many things, but someone thinking their relationship was inappropriate wasn't one of them. It was nice.
"I know, it was easy to get caught up when we were away. To be able to be in Kansas and say that this is home, that we are here together and have a home. That here we are normal, but that's not exactly the truth."
"I hate this Livvy." He sounded so defeated, hearing her say those things to him, it was progress. They had made so much progress together, but outside of her apartment it meant nothing.
"It's almost over. Six weeks. We just have six more weeks until we can go to the rec center or the dining hall or wherever and don't have to worry. For now all we have to do is keep counting down the days together and hope no one notices the tattoo's."
"Guess I got a little over excited, maybe we should have waited," her face faltered a bit, "I'm glad we didn't but now all I want to do is show it and you off. I hate that I can't no matter how much longer it is. Its too long."
"It'll be fine, you wear dress shirts when you teach and have office hours and its getting colder so I'll be wearing long sleeves. Besides we can show them off to Abby and David. David will make that snobby disapproving look I love so much and Abby will tell me I'm crazy be secretly think its romantic." He may not have thought of all the consequences of the tattoos beyond the permanence, but Olivia had. She knew that being an African American and female in the law arena would come with enough problems, she didn't need to compound them by adding another hurdle.
He snuck another kiss, this time lingering, making sure she felt him. He tucked the hair, that had gotten lose from her bun behind her ear and helped her put everything away. Together they took out the juicer and tried to figure out how to work it. They tested it out with some of the carrots she had bought. They both took a sip together,
"That's pretty good." Fitz was shocked he liked it, but Olivia's face was telling a different story.
"Tastes like dirt!" Olivia spilled the rest of her cup into his and began cleaning the machine out. It had six separate pieces that needed to be cleaned and put back together. After a couple minutes of fumbling with it she decided this wouldn't be a regular thing. He helped her disconnect the pieces and she glared at him as he did it with ease. Eating healthy, working out, it all came natural to him from his time in the Navy, but for Olivia a solid meal consisted of pasta, fried meatballs, and lots of garlic bread to dip in the sauce. Working out she could manage, she loved swimming to clear her head, and was always a fast runner, she was especially excited to try out kickboxing. It was a new start, a new way to occupy her mind without stressing about things that were out of her control. It would be her own person brand of therapy.
"So I have like two more papers to grade than I'm all yours for the rest of the break. Any big plans or ideas?" He was making himself comfortable back on his spot in front of the coffee table where he had left everything earlier.
"Well first I'm going to make OUR bed," she put emphasis on the word our, "than I am going to give my boyfriend the naked week he was promised." He lost all focus on the papers he was writing and followed her with his eyes as she made her way into their bedroom with her favorite dark purple sheets. Any hope of grading papers was gone, he only had two papers left, one was Abby's, he had helped her review it himself and knew it was fine. He scribbled an A on it and moved it to the other pile than ran after his Livvy.