December

"Alex, can you get me a clean brush!" Casey was working on the living room.

Alex had closed on the house at the end of the previous month. They wanted to move in before it started to snow and in New York, you never knew when the snow was coming. It might be there in December. It might not show up until the middle of January.

"Coming Babe!" Alex had been taking a cookie break. Who knew painting a room was such hard work? Casey had wanted to do something herself since Alex had put up the money, so she was painting. Olivia would have joined them, but she couldn't be near the fumes.

She grabbed a cookie for Casey and put it in the redhead's mouth.

"You're the best!" Casey said as she gobbled the cookie. Then she took the clean brush and began working on the trim.

Twenty minutes later, she was done with the first coat. "One room down … only 13 rooms to go."

Alex went wide-eyed. No way was she doing all of this work by herself. It would take forever. The blonde tiptoed away to make some phone calls.

"Hey … Elliot. If I bought some pizza and wings and got a case a beer, would you be wiling to come over and help us paint the house?"

Elliot heard crying in the background. He needed to get out of this house. "You got it, just promise you won't tell Kathy where I am."

"You got a deal!"

The father of five proceeded to sneak out of the house. He was about to make his get away when Lizzie caught him.

"Where are you off to?"

"Um … to the store?"

"Mom went yesterday."

"Well …"

Lizzie stuck out her hand.

Elliot offered her $5.

"That's not enough to buy my silence."

He groaned and then gave her $20.

"If anyone asks, you got called in to deal with a standoff."

When Elliot pulled into the driveway, there were three cars already there.

"We'll need a whole lot of people to paint this house." Elliot had seen pictures, but it was even bigger in person.

He went to the door and it was already open.

When he stepped inside, he saw Fin suiting up. His son was beside him. "Welcome to the party."

The beer was on ice, and the food was on its way.

"How many people are here?"

"With you six."

"Thank you all for coming," Alex said to the crew once they had been amassed. "As you can see, this is a big house and it needs a lot of paint. If we break up into pairs and each pair does two rooms, we'll be halfway done by mid afternoon."

The rest of the house could wait until the following weekend.

Munch paired off with Casey, Fin with his son, and Elliot with Alex. This split up the three tallest people, making it easier to paint each room.

"So what inspired you to want to paint this massive house?" Elliot asked as they started in the kitchen. They managed

Alex groaned. She did not want to paint this fucking house. "I think it's Casey's way of punishing me. I um … kind of made an offer before I took Casey and Liv to see it."

"Ooh!" Elliot coohed. "I got some work done on the car and I forgot to tell Kathy how much it was; she made me sleep on the couch for a week." Apparently, it caused Kathy to bounce a check. They still gossiped about it at the hairdresser.

Alex shrugged. "I'd rather sleep on my couch than paint this kitchen. At least my couch is comfortable."

While Alex and Casey were working on the house, Olivia was alone in the apartment. She was officially off bed rest, and was getting cooped up in the apartment.

I should have gone to the house. Olivia could have hung out in a room that wasn't being painted, but Alex and Casey both wanted her to stay away until the house had aired out.

With the guys all at the house too, there wasn't much for the brunette to do. She was watching reruns of Scrubs when she saw the saddest commercial.

"You can save a life today! All you have to do is call."

Maybe it was her stircraziness. Maybe it was her pregnancy hormones. Something made Olivia pick up the phone and call.

"Hello. I'd like to pursue an adoption."

She made an appointment to come down to the shelter and an hour later, she walked into the local Humane Society.

"Hello. My name is Meredith. How can I help you today?"

"My name is Olivia. I came here to see about an adoption."

"Olivia, follow me."

They had a section for dogs and a section for cats. "You said you were looking for a dog?"

"Yes."

"Are you looking for a puppy or an older dog?"

The puppies were so sleepy and cute, but Olivia knew it was harder for the older dogs to find a home. "An older dog."

Meredith looked like she had just won the lottery. "We have many dogs to choose from." She started rattling off the breeds that had a good reputation for being family dogs.

I want a big dog.

The beagle was cute and so was the bulldog, but Olivia couldn't see them with a yippy little dog.

[CLANG!]

Olivia heard a dog pawing at the cage. He was an Irish settler named Koji. When the brunette saw his beautiful reddish brown hair (not to mention his desperation to leave his cage) she just knew, "him. I want Koji!"

"He's got a bit of a history." The poor dog had been abandoned three different times. He had some separation issues.

Olivia read his file, but nothing in it deterred her. She knew he was the dog. All she had to do was fill out an application

"Do you have a house or an apartment?"

"We just bought a house last month. It's got a fenced in yard and everything."

Meredith filled out the application. "It looks like everything's in order. We just want to make sure that you'll be fully prepared to bring him home."

She'd have to verify her income to prove she could afford the dog as well as demonstrate that she was allowed to have dogs at her home, e.g. the bill of sale for the house.

"When would I be able to take him home?"

"If you can get all the paperwork in, you'd be able to take him home today."

Olivia's eyes lit up. "I'll be right back."

Munch had painted a fair number of rooms in his day. When you've gone through four ex-wives, you learn a thing or two about maintaining a house.

"This is a lovely color," he commented as he put a coat of dark green on the wall. He and Casey were painting the master bedroom.

"It took us forever to decide on colors." They all had different colors in mind for different rooms, and Alex wanted the house to be cohesive, so she didn't want to go from dark green to bright orange, but there were so many room, so they needed lots of colors. She thought the sales clerk from Lowes was going to have a heart attack trying to deal with them.

Munch laughed. "Having one wife and trying to do all of this is crazy enough, but doing this with two girlfriends … oh heavens no."

"And Olivia's pregnant. I swear her thought process makes no sense right now." She's sleepy one minute, wide awake the next, and if there's no ice cream in the freezer … oh it's on, she's ready to start a fight.

"I'm gonna tell her you said that."

"Oh no you won't," Casey threatened him with a roller.

No one was more relived than Fin when they were done for the day. "As cheap as I am … I have never painted my house. Nope, hired a paint crew and kissed my money goodbye."

"Nothing wrong with putting a little elbow grease into the place."

"I'll keep my elbow grease in my elbows Stabler. I don't want them to get arthritis."

The pizza and the wings were killed quickly. They only made it through half the case of beer.

"I'll put this in the fridge for next weekend," when they would be finishing the rest of the house.

"If we could get more people, this would go faster," Munch commented.

"Not a bad idea." Alex turned to Elliot. "Do you think Richard would come over for $50?"

Elliot scoffed. "He'd come over for $20." The kid will do pretty much any chore for $20."

Alex paid Ken for his help and then the boys were off.

Once Alex and Casey finished tidying up, they headed back to the apartment.

"Should we get Liv some food on the way?" Casey questioned.

Alex nodded. "Call her."

Olivia snapped Koji's new collar onto him. "Oh it's so cute." She got him a black collar with silver dog bones on it. She rubbed his head. "How about we go for a walk?"

When she got the leash, Koji started jumping up and down.

"You like your walk, don't you?" She attached the leash and they went to the park.

Koji stayed close to Olivia as they walked, keeping himself between her and passers by.

This all changed, however, when he saw a female cocker spaniel. He wanted to get closer to her.

"Aw, did you find a Lady?" Olivia teased.

Koji looked up at her and whined.

A middle-aged woman was walking the cocker spaniel. She did not look like she was up for a chat. "Come on Lady … let's go."

Olivia couldn't help but laugh. She actually named the dog Lady.

There was an ice cream place on the way home that also sold ice cream for dogs. Olivia got him the peanut butter cup and he was in puppy heaven. He screeched before shoving his face into the bowl.

She was about to throw her bowl away when she got a phone call.

"Hey Casey! What's going on?"

"Hey Liv. We're done painting for the day. Do you want us to bring you back something to eat?"

Olivia was good. "We just got ice cream."

"Who's we?"

Shit! They don't know. "I made a new friend today."

"Oh how nice."

Casey assumed Olivia had made a human friend.

When she and Alex got home, the redhead opened the door and called out, "Liv … we're here."

"WOOF!"

"Did I just hear a bark?" Alex questioned.

"That must be the tv," Casey told her.

Olivia had hidden Koji in the bathrub.

"Hey guys," she came out of the bathroom.

Before Alex could ask her how her day was, she heard "woof!"

"What is that sound?"

"Um, well you see."

Olivia tried to stop her, but Alex beelined towards the bathroom. She opened the door and Koji came running out.

He was so excited, he knocked Alex right on her butt. The dog started licking her face.

"Oh my!"

"Bad Koji!"

Casey couldn't believe her eyes. "YOU BOUGHT A DOG!"