And So It Begins.... Part I

And So It Begins…

Part I

“God, I don’t think that I could eat another bite,” Cole said with a satisfied sigh and a grin that turned into a wince as he curled up into the fetal position that had Jason narrowing his eyes on his son.

“You’re pathetic,” Chloe mumbled, shaking her head in disgust as she closed the notebook that she’d been reading and-

“Ow!”

-tossed it at Cole without bothering to look up as she grabbed the next notebook on the stack of neatly organized notebooks by her side. Jason glanced from the girl that Cole had started to drag, literally most of the time, over here, back to his son who kept sighing dreamily every few minutes, to the little girl who alternated between glaring at his son and watching the Pirates of the Caribbean, and back to Chloe as she closed the notebook and-

“Ow! Oh, my god, woman! Would you stop doing that?” Cole demanded as he rolled over onto his other side so that he could glare at the girl that was nothing like the girls that he normally brought home, which Jason truly appreciated since they annoyed the hell out of him.

“No,” Chloe mumbled absently as she paused to push her glasses back up her nose.

“I hate you,” Cole muttered with one last glare before he forced himself to roll over to face Jason.

Once he was settled, Cole closed his eyes, slowly exhaled, muttered, “God, I’m so full I think I’m gonna die,” before opening his eyes and…getting that same smug look on his face that he’d had since Jason walked into the living room a few minutes ago. Locking his eyes on Jason, Cole said, “It was everything that I’d ever dreamed it would be and so much more,” confirming Jason’s suspicions.

He’d found a buffet.

Which made Jason wonder, where did his son find a buffet that hadn’t banned them yet…

Jason glanced from his son, who was once again murmuring, “Worth it,” to the teenage girl that got an A in his AP World History class last year.

“He wouldn’t stop complaining until I told him where it was,” Chloe said, answering his unspoken question.

“He made us say that he was our brother so they’d let him in,” Katie said as she climbed off the loveseat, crossed the living room, stepped on top of Cole, and-

“Ow!”

-jumped on the couch next to her big sister and settled in with a satisfied sigh.

“Where?” Jason asked, focusing his attention back on his son.

Shaking his head, Cole reached back, grabbed a throw pillow off the couch, shoved it beneath his head and closed his eyes with another satisfied sigh and a mumbled, “I’m not sharing.”

“Not you…” Jason said, focusing his attention back on Chloe.

“He made me promise not to tell,” Chloe said, not bothering to look up from the notebook that she was reading.

“I see,” Jason murmured as he shifted his attention to Katie and-

“I can be bought,” the little girl that kept him well-supplied with Wilderness cookies said, making him smile.

That is, until Cole said, “Nintendo Switch,” making the little girl’s eyes light up as her mouth snapped shut and she pointedly looked away from Jason, clearly unwilling to do or say anything to risk a chance to use Cole’s Nintendo Switch.

With a nod, Jason glanced back at his son to find him settling in for a nap. “This is really what you want to do?” Jason drawled.

“Absolutely,” Cole murmured with a nod as Jason stood there, sighing heavily, because he was really going to miss him.

*-*-*-*

“Thank god,” Haley whispered as she glanced back to find Hunter fast asleep in his car seat, hugging the blankie that Mikey had given him with a little smile on his face.

“You are so much like your big brother,” Haley said, unable to help but smile as she watched Hunter for another minute before she opened her car door and-

“Save me, Mommy!” came the hysterical scream that had her quickly climbing out of her car, stumbling over her feet, and-

“Mommy!”

-finding herself looking up to find her husband holding their oldest son over the garage roof by his legs.

Pushing her glasses back up her nose, Haley looked from her son, who was still screaming hysterically as though this was the first time that a Bradford had done this to him, to her husband who was sending her an incredibly sexy smile and a wink and-

“Why?” she asked no one in particular as she gestured to her husband and son before letting her hand drop because she honestly didn’t know where to start.