Fic: When All is Said and Done - Chapter 30
April
Nick sat on the bed, an amused smile on his face as he watched Elijah run around his room, trying to find the perfect clothes and pajamas to bring with him for his 'special birthday sleepover' at Grissom's that night.
He and Greg had been at a loss on what to do with Elijah, as they were planning on going to the reception hall they had found to start decorating for the joint parties they were having on Saturday. Their normal babysitters all had plans for the night, except Sammy who was meeting them at the hall.
Grissom had overheard them talking while at work only three nights prior and offered to take him, stating that he was sure his bug collection and books would keep the toddler entertained until it came time to join his parents at the hall. Both Nick and Greg felt as if they were imposing on their boss, but agreed that Elijah would certainly enjoy the time spent with the entomologist.
Nick cleared his throat and when that didn't work he reached out, grabbing the toddler as he ran past again, "Woah, little man."
Elijah stared over his shoulder at Nick, his brown eyes wide. His posture, despite Nick's grasp on his hips, was posed as if he were still running. Legs were bent with one foot extended forward and his arms were outstretched, fingers aimed at the drawers of his dresser, "poppy?"
Nick pulled him close, "I don't think you need to take four different outfits. Maybe just your pj's and your suit for the party. I'm sure Grissom will let you run around in your pajama's in the morning."
Elijah nodded, "okay poppy." He then looked around his room, "needs udder stuff dough. like stitch and harry. unca gil said he read 'fore bed."
"Cool. I'll get your suit from the laundry room and you can pack up the rest of your stuff in the suitcase. Do not forget your earplugs." Nick said, pressing a kiss to the crown of Elijah's head before standing up, "Daddy and I will check to make sure you have them before you leave."
Nick smirked at the quiet 'rats' that Elijah muttered before leaving the room. He went to the laundry room and grabbed the clean suit off its hook. He took the back stairs down to the kitchen, where Greg was supposed to be preparing the birthday dinner Elijah had requested. As he stepped into the kitchen, though, he nearly turned around and walked back out because of what was going on on the other side of the island.
Greg was humming to himself what sounded a lot like a can-can. He held by its outstretched wings a plucked, headless chicken and was using his fingers to make it kick its stubby little legs in time with his song.
As his husband neared the end of the song, Nick started clapping before saying in a sarcastic tone of voice, "Is the chicken dinner or is it tonights entertainment?"
Greg, who was well on his way to starting a second verse, paused, one of the chicken's legs still up in a 'kick.' He turned slowly to look at Nick, a blush darkening his cheeks, "It depends on what the ham has chosen for its act." He deadpanned, the serious voice not giving away his embarrassment.
Nick stared at Greg for a moment, trying to figure out where the ham had come from, before giving a quick shake of his head, "Yeah. Anyway, once you're done with dinner theater, we should get Eli's presents out."
"Yeah okay." Greg gave the chicken a quick rinse in a seasoning wash and set it in the roaster. A quick glance at the cookbook for the temperature and time was done before setting the electronic clock of the cooker. Once that was accomplished, he followed Nick out into the garage, where they had stashed Elijah's birthday gifts.
There was a total of eight gifts for their son to open after dinner. They had found a sleeping bag that he could use that night while at Grissom's, a butterfly matching game, and a wicked children's microscope that would allow Elijah to see twelve bugs close up, hear facts about them and it could quiz him as well. They also got him a pick up sticks game, some I Spy books, and a 'my little helper' kitchen stool so he could help them in the kitchen, which could also be turned in to a variety of different things such as a playhouse, lemonade stand, or a puppet theater. The last and biggest gift was a miniature art supply cart that was filled to the brim with the various mediums the toddler liked to use.
They placed them on and around the kitchen table and Nick started setting their places at the island while Greg took care of the rest of dinner, which consisted of a cheesy potato dish and a side salad.
The chicken had just come out of the roaster when Elijah tromped into the kitchen, dragging his suitcase behind him on its little wheels, "i be hungry!" he stated, just before his eyes landed on the table, "oooh, dose for me?"
Greg raised an eyebrow and walked over to swing the toddler up into his arms, "Do you see any other birthday boy around here?"
Elijah shook his head before frowning, "why? birfday is in two," here, he very carefully unfolded two fingers and held them in front of Greg's face, "days! you be early."
"Hey Nick? Does it sound like someone is complaining to you?" Greg asked, looking over at the Texan with wide eyes.
Nick paused, the knife and fork he was using to cut the chicken poised to make their next incision, "Certainly sounds that way G. Maybe we should take the gifts back."
Before Greg had a chance to respond, Elijah started shaking his head wildly, "no, no, no, no. im not complainin! promus im not!"
Greg smirked and blew a raspberry on Elijah's neck before depositing the giggling boy on his booster seat. Nick dished out the food and took his seat at the island while Greg cut up the chicken for Elijah. He looked down at his own food and very carefully held back a grin as he said, "You know, G, I feel kinda funny eating this bird after that performance earlier."
"Then you'll feel real bad when you see what the ham's doing later." Greg threw back, not even bothering to look up at Nick. Nick flicked his fork to acknowledge the return before digging into his food.
~~
Greg looked up at Nick and burrowed closer to the warm body he was tucked against, "Looks like everyone's having fun."
Nick looked around the hall and couldn't do anything but nod in agreement. Their guests totaled up in the forties and everyone seemed to be getting along. Even the kids had set up camp in the corner of the room and were playing various games that the older children were coming up with.
The cake's, one a tiered wedding cake and the other a sheet cake for Elijah, had been wheeled in an hour earlier and everyone had joined in for a rousing rendition of 'They Say It's Your Birthday' while Elijah blew out his four large candles. The Beatles song had been Greg, Sammy, and Lauren's idea, the three banding together and starting it before anyone had a chance to start the normal 'Happy Birthday' song.
They had then gone on to opening presents. Elijah had gone first, digging through his decent pile of gifts with squeals in the decibel range of a dog whistle. Once through them all, he promptly proclaimed Grissom's gift to be the best. The older man had gotten the toddler a 'lady bug cove' which went along with the promise of helping him with the miniature environment.
Nick and Greg went next. They had informed people on their invites that they weren't expecting gifts, but they had gotten some despite that. Thankfully, it wasn't in the way of household or 'bedroom' items, but rather gift certificates to various stores and restaurants. Those they didn't mind accepting. There were even a few cards that claimed donations had been made in their names to a few charities, something that appealed to them both.
Rayne walked up to them with Jan on her heals, both of them giggling over something. The two men exchanged slightly worried looks before turning their attention to the two women, "What's up mom?" Greg asked.
"Oh sweetie, Rayne and I were just talking about those summer barbecues your aunt and uncle used to put on, remember?" Jan asked, her brown eyes filled with mirth.
Greg suddenly knew where this was going, "Oh, mom no. I'm not even sure I remember how."
Rayne waved the hand not holding her drink, "Come on Greg. I'm sure it's like riding a bike."
Greg looked at the next table over where Lauren was chatting away happily with Sammy and Catherine, "Maybe she doesn't want to. She might not remember either."
"One way to find out." Rayne walked over to the table her daughter was sitting at and bent to whisper in her ear. Lauren sat up straight and stared at her mother before turning to look at Greg, who shrugged.
When the blond shrugged in return, Greg sighed and stood up, "Okay, lets do this." He kicked off his shoes, glad for the argyle socks he was wearing, which wouldn't provide friction on the bare dance floor. He took Lauren's arm and led her over to the DJ booth.
Nick looked at the two mothers, feeling far out of the loop, "What's going on?"
Jan started giggling again and patted her son-in-law on the arm, "You'll see Nick. Might want to get a good spot on the edge of the floor though."
Taking her advice, Nick walked to the edge of the wooden, makeshift dance floor. He was joined by Christopher, Lauren's husband, who was looking just as lost as he was. As the song playing cut out, Greg and Lauren shooed those dancing to the edge and took up position facing each other.
An up-tempo song started and if Nick was placing it right, it was a song that would have been popular as early as the nineteen thirties. He felt his jaw drop as Greg pulled Lauren into his arms with a twirl as the two started dancing to the song. It was a dance he had only heard mention of but had never seen performed. They were doing the Lindy Hop.
Greg flipped Lauren over his shoulders before turning around to pull her back into his arms. They slid, kicked and did minor gymnastics moves all in time to the beat of the song. There were a few instances were they just swung their hips to the heavy beat, usually when they were going back to their starting position after a particularly advanced move.
They spent over half the song alone on the dance floor, but were soon joined by a few other couples who knew the dance as well, although they did much tamer moves to the flips and tosses done by Greg and Lauren. The two soon separated, Lauren pulling Christopher onto the floor and Greg joining Nick on the sidelines.
The lab rat tossed back a cup of punch before leaning against Nick, "I forgot how tiring that is. It doesn't help that Lauren's four inches taller now then she was the last time we did that."
Nick was still gaping at his lover, "I can't believe you know how to do that G. That was amazing."
Greg chuckled, "Yeah, we were pretty good, weren't we."
"Wow, Greg. That was really impressive." Jillian said as she stepped up to their side. She slid her arms around him in a tight hug before smiling, "Are you all set to come down next week?"
Nick winced as Greg narrowed his eyes at him, "Ah, mama, I haven't told Greg yet."
Jillian's hands settled on her hips as she narrowed her eyes at her son, "Nick...don't you two talk?"
"Hey now, you only talked to me last night about it and I never did give you a definite answer." Nick replied. He curled his hand around Greg's bicep and started to pull him away, "I'll talk to him right now about it if it'll make you happy."
Greg looked over his shoulder at Jillian as Nick pulled him across the room. The eldest female Stokes was actually looking a bit worried about something, "Nick? Is everything okay?"
Nick let go of his arm and dropped down onto one of the chairs that sat along the far wall. He motioned for Greg to sit as well and blinked in surprise as the lab-rat sat on his lap. He shook his head slightly and wrapped his arms around Greg's waist, "Yeah, everything is fine. Mama wants us to go down to Texas for Easter. Maddy is back from Africa and mama wants us all there to see her before she takes off again."
Greg titled his head to the side in thought, "Well, Easter is the twentieth. We'd really only need to take two nights off of work. It could work."
~~
Greg looked over the stand of egg color dyes, "Think we could still dye eggs with Eli? I was kind of looking forward to it this year."
Nick came up behind him and grabbed a couple of boxes, "Don't see why not. Mama will let us use the kitchen."
Greg gave his husband a large grin before motioning to the list clutched in Nick's free hand, "What else is left?"
"The ham, a few dairy things, hash browns and more candy."
Jillian's grocery list was fairly short, mainly forgotten items and things to be bought fresh, so they were really only at the store for about half an hour. Greg hadn't been thrilled about coming into town, but no one else could get away from their activities long enough to make the trip. He knew Thad was lurking around somewhere, but he couldn't see how Nick's ex could know that they were in Texas. He knew he was worrying over nothing, but telling himself that didn't help.
When they got back to the ranch, Nick cornered his mom, asking her if it would be okay for them to use the kitchen to dye eggs. Jillian agreed, mostly because she wanted more boiled eggs for the inside portion of the egg hunt the kids would be going on the next morning.
"I'll have everyone else put together the plastic eggs for outside and the Easter baskets." Jillian said, mentally going over everything that needed to be done.
Nick laughed, "That'll be fun. Ten baskets. Are they all going to be alike or are you putting name tags on them?"
"I have no idea. I'll probably do tags since a lot of the toys are age geared." Jillian smiled and patted Nick's arm, "Go, have fun. There are already some eggs boiled up and on the counter if you want to start with those."
"Thanks mama." Nick went to his room and poked his head through the door, "We're all set so whenever you're ready."
Greg looked up from the book he was reading out loud to Elijah and smiled, "Cool." He looked down at the auburn curls resting against his chest, "What do you say, sproglet? Want to color some Easter eggs?"
Elijah looked up at Greg before glancing at Nick, "color easter eggs?"
"Yup." Nick nodded and came all the way into the room. He sat down on the bed next to Greg's hip, "See, we color Easter eggs the night before Easter and then the Easter bunny visits and hides all the eggs for the kids to find. Some of them even have toys or treats inside. He also brings a basket for the kids."
Elijah nodded slowly, "miss jessie told us 'bout jesus and the res-resaction. no bunny dough."
"Resurrection." Greg corrected absently as he looked up at Nick with furrowed eyebrows. This wasn't a topic he had been hoping to talk about while Elijah was still so young. He also wasn't particularly thrilled that Miss Jessie was talking about such themes to her day care charges. Not everyone was religious. Looking at Nick, he could see the Texan thinking the same thing.
"Ah, well, how about we tell you about the Easter bunny?" Nick suggested.
Elijah nodded again, this time much more quickly, "yeah!"
Nick gulped and glanced at Greg who shook his head, resigned. The younger man then turned his attention to his son, "The Easter bunny is a sign of renewal in the spring."
"renew-all?" Elijah asked, rolling the new word around on his tongue.
"It means start over." When Elijah nodded that he understood to the best of his ability, Greg continued, "The Easter bunny comes the night before Easter and hides the eggs that the children colored. The eggs represent the renewal as well and were colored to show that."
"the bunny?"
"Well, its because a bunnies nest looks so much like a birds nest that people once thought bunnies laid eggs. The Easter bunny thought this funny and took the colored eggs and hid them. Soon it became a yearly tradition."
It was simple and not quite truthful, but it was the best description Greg could come up with at the spur of the moment. Really, how else do you explain about fertility and other countries beliefs to a four-year-old without killing the magic of the holiday? Nick's sigh of relief was loud in his ear as Elijah laughed excitedly and scrambled off the bed, loudly proclaiming he was ready to color Easter eggs for the bunny.
Greg allowed Nick to pull him to his feet and hand in hand they followed the toddler down to the kitchen. Nick dropped Greg's hand and started digging around the kitchen, pulling out cups and spoons while Greg read over the instructions for the egg dyes and started to prepare them.
Elijah clasped his hands on the counter and pulled himself onto his tiptoes so he could see what his dad was doing. Nick saw the curious look in the brown eyes and promptly lifted Elijah so he had a better view of the preparations. Both men could tell he was dying to ask why Greg was dropping little colored pellets into water, but was holding himself back. He probably wasn't quite sure how to ask.
"When these little balls disappear, it'll help turn the water and vinegar into the color for the eggs." Greg said, reading the curious look with practiced ease.
"coool." Elijah breathed out, "can i do one?"
Greg nodded and handed the red pellet over, "What color is that sproglet?"
Elijah's little glare was worth a thousand words. He knew what his dad was doing, "red." He replied before dropping the little ball into the cup Greg indicated.
Greg frowned at Nick when the Texan hid an amused snort in his shoulder, "All right, no lessons." He said with a sigh, "Scoot over to the table sproglet."
"k, down poppy." Elijah said, squirming in Nick's grip.
Nick set Elijah on his feet and once the toddler was at the table and out of the way, he helped Greg carry the cups to the table. Both men went back into kitchen for the basket of boiled eggs and the cardboard egg cartons, to use as a place for the eggs to dry. They then sat down on either side of Elijah and arranged everything into a more convenient placement.
Nick looked at Greg who motioned for him to go ahead. He nodded and grabbed an egg, handing it to Elijah, "All right little man, here's what we do. We're going to very carefully set the eggs in a cup of color. Best way to do that is to use the spoon and slide the egg down, like this." Making sure the four-year-old was watching closely, Nick followed up his words. He used the spoon and very carefully slid his own egg into the yellow dye that was in front of him.
"All right, Eli, your turn. What color do you want?" Greg asked.
Elijah gazed at the myriad of colors with wide eyes, "ooh, purple."
Nick, who was closer to the purple mug, slid it in front of Elijah. He helped steady the small hand that was lowering the spoon into the liquid and smiled when the bright brown eyes turned to look up at him as the egg settled smoothly at the bottom, "what we do next?"
"Well, we have to wait for the shell to change colors. It's gunna take a minute or two for it to happen. To check to see how dark the shell is, we just push the egg up out of the water with the spoon. The longer you leave it in, the darker its going to be so you can have a few of one color that don't look alike." Nick said, demonstrating with his yellow egg.
"coool." Elijah then realized that his dad was doing something totally different then what him and his poppy were doing, "daddy? why you drawin on egg?"
Greg winked and dropped the white crayon onto the table, "You'll see sproglet."
Elijah's eyebrows crinkled in confusion. Even he knew that white on white didn't do anything. He then shrugged when his dad dropped the egg into the blue dye. A minute later, after staring at his egg in the purple dye non-stop, he felt that his own egg was done. With Nick's help, he pushed the egg out and giggled, "its poka dotted, poppy."
Nick nodded, "That's cause of the bumps along the shell. You want it like this or darker?"
"like dis. its purty."
"Okay. I'll set it in the container to dry and you can put another egg in one of the dyes."
Elijah carefully picked an egg from the basket and looked down at it before looking up at Greg, "why you draw on yours?" He still couldn't figure it out.
Greg decided to take pity on his son. He lifted his egg out of the blue dye and picked it up off of the spoon carefully. He turned the egg around and Elijah gasped. There, standing out strikingly against the medium hued blue, was Elijah's name in white.
~~
The one thing Jillian insisted on for hunting real eggs in the house was a count of the completed eggs. She was adamant that she didn't want to miss even a one and end up smelling rotting egg sometime in the future. Every time one of the kids found an egg to add to the basket in the kitchen, a check mark was placed on the sheet that Nick had written the final count on. Jillian and Bill had also written up a list that told of each place they had hidden an egg. They weren't going to take any chances.
There were ten children, including Elijah, hunting for the eggs and so the two men had decided to do five for each making for a total of fifty eggs. There was, of course, no guarantee on how many eggs each child would find but they wanted to at least start off fair. Each child had an egg with their name written on it, however, and if one found the egg for someone else they left it for that child to find. The adults were suitably impressed with the thinking.
Elijah, Trixie, and Maddox didn't know the ranch as well as the other children but one wouldn't know it from the way they tore through the home. Maddox found his five eggs just behind Liam's oldest boy, Jeremy, and the two of them took to helping the two youngest. Elijah and Trixie, consequently, finished next thanks to looking in the places suggested by their helpers. When the other kids couldn't think of anymore hiding places on their own, all ten banded together to find the last three that were missing.
Baskets were hidden indoors as well and the procedure for finding those was much the same as it was for the labeled eggs. They were also hidden a bit more securely than the eggs. Jillian used bedrooms, bathrooms and closets for those. When a basket was found, it was unwillingly passed to a respective parent before the child resumed the egg hunt.
Once the inside hunt was completed, Jillian had brunch ready. Most of the kids were complaining of hunger, with a few of the adults echoing the sentiments. Afterwards, they took up the hunt outside, this time the younger Stokes adults (and Greg) joining in to help. The plastic eggs held goodies that appealed to everyone. Chocolates, from mini eggs to coins, small toys and money were all enclosed in the plastic. The children held off on opening their eggs until their buckets were full, but the adults popped theirs right away. Any money and toys they found were closed up and slid into the closest child's bucket but any chocolate was kept and horded happily.
Greg was packing up his and Nick's clothes when Nick's cell went off. Glancing at the clock on the wall, he looked at Nick with a raised eyebrow, "Who would be calling at seven at night on Easter?"
Nick flipped his phone open and glanced at the caller ID, "Sara." He then shrugged as Greg's eyebrows shot up. He hit the answer button and held the phone to his ear, "You better not be calling about a problem, cause there ain't crap I can do about it down here."
/Nick, it's seven. I'm not even ready for work yet. I called to see how Eli's Easter was./
"It was good. How about I let him tell you about it?" Nick smirked. Elijah still had his rapid baby talk at times, which tended to pick up speed when he was excited about something.
/That sounds cool. Could you put him on?/
"Sure, let me go get him." He covered the mouth piece and said, "Sara wants to talk to Eli." in response to Greg's noticeably growing confusion.
"Ah, he should still be out in the playroom."
Both men walked into the large room and called the toddler over. Nick held the phone out to Elijah, "It's Aunt Sara."
Elijah snatched the phone out of Nick's hands and held it to his ear. Without thought he launched into talking, "guess what! I gots to dec-rate eggies and we lookted for dem dis mornin and i gots a basket wit' toys and candy and der were eggies outside too! Dos had lots of stuffs in dem, like choc-o-late and coins and and daddy and poppy lookted too but daddy didn't share his choc-o-late..."
Greg leaned against Nick as an arm slipped over his shoulder, "I'm feeling kinda bad for Sara right now."
Nick shrugged, his amusement noticeable in his answer, "She asked for it, really. She's been subjected to the prattle before so it's not as if she didn't know better."
Greg craned his head around so he was looking at Nick, "Wanna bet Catherine will be the next to call?"
"No go, man. I'm sorta surprised she didn't call earlier though."
"She had an Easter to get through too."
After Catherine's call an hour later, which was accompanied by Nick's mutterings that he was glad he didn't take Greg up on his bet, Elijah was tucked away into bed and the two men decided to relax out on the patio, as it was still beautiful outside temperature wise. Nick detoured for the coffee Jillian had set on the island for them before joining Greg on the far end of the patio, the section that was off of the family room, past the kitchen. That end of the patio had a fireplace and it was far enough from his parents room that the light wouldn't bother them if they went to bed before he and Greg went inside.
"You know, today was surprisingly fun despite it being hectic." Greg said after he took a sip of his coffee.
Nick looked down at the lab-rat, who was leaning against him, "What do you mean?"
"Well, I've never really had an Easter. Not really anyway. We had a big dinner and my dad took us to church, but with it being just me neither of them thought much into the whole egg and basket deal."
"Could've fooled me. You were an expert when it came to the whole dye thing for the eggs."
Greg laughed, "I read the instructions Nick. Why do you think I had you tell Elijah what to do? I was learning too."
Nick rubbed Greg's head, ignoring the squawk of indignation over him messing up Greg's spikes, "You're sneaky, you know that?" He reached forward and set his coffee on the table before doing the same with Greg's. He then stood up and pulled Greg to his feet, "Come on."
Greg gave him a half smile as he stood, "You're not dragging me horseback riding are you? Cause I gotta tell you, I am so not dressed for it." He motioned down to his khakis and stripped dress shirt.
"Nope."
"We're not doing anything that requires nakedness either. We're at your parents house, Nick."
Nick grinned and pulled Greg into a scorching kiss, that had the lab-rats toes curling in his shoes. He was getting into the kiss and was just rethinking his position on the whole nakedness thing when he was suddenly wrenched from Nick's arms.
"Well well, fancy meeting you two here."
Greg stiffened at the voice, recognizing it easily as Thad's. It figured.
TBC...
Oh, and the mention of Jesus and the resurrection is probably about as far as I'm taking religious mentions, well other than Greg's dad and church. Not everyone believes the same thing about that sort of thing and I don't want to have to worry about offending anybody.