Alex turned in her seat and waved to attract her father's attention as the theatre slowly filled with patrons attending the ballet's matinee of The Nutcracker. Beside her, Emily bounced Maverick on her knee, the one year old squealing with glee with every bounce.

"Look, Mav!" Emily exclaimed to the baby when Damon got closer, "It's Papa!"

Maverick squawked, then jammed his tiny fist in his mouth, slobbering all over himself.

Alex just laughed softly at her grandson and passed Emily a burp cloth from the diaper bag at her feet. "Hi, Dad," she greeted her father when he took the seat next to her. "Dotty is going to be so happy you could make it."

"Are you kidding?" Damon said, "I wouldn't miss it for the world."

The whole family was overjoyed by the news that the ballet company would be promoting Odette to Principal for the spring season. They would be making the formal announcement following the afternoon's performance, which is why the entire family had gathered.

"Where's The Boy?" Damon asked. Even after three years of marriage, Damon still hadn't warmed to Levi and refused to call him by name if he could at all help it.

Alex sighed wearily. "Dad," she gently scolded, "Be nice."

"He's on his way," Emily added. "He worked the night shift last night, so he needed to get some rest, but he should be here any minute."

Levi worked as a paramedic and, seeing as he was the low man on the totem pole, he was getting the crappy shifts. Which meant that Odette needed a lot of help with the baby. When she'd announced her pregnancy to her mothers, Alex and Emily had had a long conversation and ultimately decided they would both retire and move out to St. Louis to help Odette and Levi.

"Oh," Damon said. A beat. "I suppose it's admirable that he's trying..." It was about the nicest thing he'd ever said about Levi...he said it begrudgingly, though.

"Dad," Alex chided, "Emily and I have accepted Levi – he's a wonderful young man and he makes Dotty very happy. Sooner or later, you're going to have to make your peace with the fact that Odette is growing up and she..."

Damon interrupted with a harsh insistence of, "I don't have to accept anything. I ignored my gut instincts when you brought home that James boy because you said he made you happy and look how that ended up..."

Alex huffed – it was a good point, she had to begrudgingly admit, but still... "Okay, well, be that as it may," she said, "The situation with James was very different. He and I were high school sweethearts, we'd never dated anyone else, so we didn't have enough life experience to know we were making a mistake. Odette and Levi are very different people."

Anything further they might have said on the subject was cut off by Levi's arrival and Maverick's immediate squeals of joy upon seeing his father.


"Houston, we have a problem," Emily said to Alex when she opened the door to the family bathroom to let her in.

The ballet was nearing its denouement and it wouldn't be long before they announced Odette's promotion – at which time, Levi and Maverick would be joining her on stage to give her flowers, which is why Alex had spent nearly twenty minutes wrestling him into a smart little shirt and bow tie. The problem that had arisen (probably not surprisingly) is that Maverick's diaper seemed to be having some trouble containing its...contents.

"What's the problem?" Alex asked. Emily had texted her 911 from the bathroom and Alex had run out of the theatre, terrified that something serious was wrong, so she was currently a little annoyed to find both of them in one piece.

Emily gestured rather emphatically at the diaper bag. When Alex continued to stare at her expectantly, she huffed and said, "There's no back up outfit..."

"What!?" Alex exclaimed, seemingly suddenly understanding Emily's consternation. She dropped to her knees and began digging around in the diaper bag. "I could have sworn I packed a second outfit!"

"I don't know what to tell you," Emily said with a shrug. She picked the baby up off the change table and balanced him on her hip. He was currently naked but for his diaper, given the extent to which he'd soiled his outfit.

Having emptied the contents of the diaper bag onto the floor and failing to find the outfit she thought she'd packed, Alex stood, hands on her hips as she chewed her lip in thought. "Looks like we only have one option here..." she said ominously.

Emily blanched a little. "Are you sure? Because you know what..."

Alex nodded solemnly. "I know. But it's the only choice."


"I knew there was something off about that boy," Damon hissed to Alex.

Alex sighed wearily. "Dad..." she muttered, "Can you please just...let it go?"

"Let it go?" he repeated. "He has my grandson in a Blues jersey!"

"Dad, keep your voice down," Alex whispered, feeling her cheeks burn under the imagined stares of other audience members. "This is Odette's special day, so please just zip it?"

Damon seemed like he would have liked to continue ranting about it, but ultimately, he crossed his arms firmly over his chest with a huff and fell silent. Though, not before he got in the last word, "The only Miller woman who had any good taste in men was your mother..."