a romance-y christmas.

the part where the dinner party commenced (ben is amazing)

"Hey, Tuck." Joey whispered, waving his best friend over.

"Yeah? Why are you whispering?" Tuck frowned.

"Do you think your mom is my mom now, too?" Joey bit his lip. "I mean, they're married, right? I overheard them talking. They said daddy was your mom's husband."

"Really? Does that mean your dad is my dad too?"

Joey shrugged. "Maybe."

"Do you think they'll fall in love?" Tuck fiddled with the hem of his shirt. He always did that when he was thinking. His dad always told him to stop doing it, but seeing his mom do it too makes him do it a lot. "Married people love each other, right?"

"Yeah." Joey suddenly looked up at him. "What if we get them to fall in love?"

Tuck nodded almost immediately. "That's a good idea! We can ask Aunt Callie to put mistletoe at the party!"

"Who's Aunt Callie?"

"Don't worry, you'll see. She's my mom's best friend. I mean, our mom's best friend. She's married to Aunt Arizona."

"Aunt Arizona?" Joey scrunched his face up. "That's a weird name."

Tuck nodded. "Yeah, I thought so too. But she's great."

"Okay. If you say so." He hesitated, before speaking up again. "So, what's the plan?"

"Well, I think your dad likes our mom. My mom doesn't show it, but I think she likes him too."

"So, we get them to admit they like each other!" Joey shouted a little louder than he intended. "Oops, sorry."

×+×+×+×

Miranda spent all day ignoring Ben. He was insufferable. He kept opening up the topic of their marriage, and she hated it.

She focused on her son, and on Joey. She was starting to accept that maybe the kid can catch some slack since he didn't even remembered his own mother. She didn't know Ben's thoughts on her getting close to his son, but if she asked him, it'll open up the thing she wanted to avoid the most.

Right now, they just finished moulding the gingerbread men, and she was helping Tuck and Joey decorate them.

"Dr. Bailey, can you please pass the blue icing?" Joey asked her, grinning. His face was covered with a little flour and some icing. She chuckled.

"Joey, you can call me Miranda." She glanced at Ben, who was helping Tuck with his own gingerbread man. She cleared her throat and took the icing. "You need some help there, little guy?"

The young Warren nodded. "Yes."

"Please." Ben said, looking pointedly at his son.

"Please," he repeated.

Miranda smiled. No matter how the man kept irritating her, he was a good father. That's the one thing she admired about him.

She went around Joey, and peeked at his work. "Oh, that looks like your dad!"

"Yeah! He puts people to sleep so they can fix them. He wears this blue shirt!" he exclaimed and beamed up at her.

"I know, honey." Miranda smiled back. She could feel Ben's gaze on her. "Let's see if we can make your daddy look handsome, shall we?"

"Handsome?" Ben spoke up, and she rolled her eyes. "Is that what you think of me?"

His smug smile was irritating her again, damn, why does he keep showing off his perfect white teeth like that? It unnerves her. "The baked version of you will be, but I don't know about the real one."