Always Okay | (Adopted By Elizabeth Olsen)

Chapter 38

Word Count: 4968

Lizzie's POV

Today was a pretty good day. Alexis and I started the day bright and early and with no nightmares. I don't think I've ever seen a smile like the one she had when she woke up, to say it was heartwarming would be an understatement. We spent the day walking around New York City avoiding the paparazzi after my meetings this morning. Alexis helped me cook dinner for the twins, Olivier, and Boyd, which was fun. She has some weird cooking quirks but nothing dangerous. She has strangely good knife skills, which I elected not to comment on due to the nature of the day we were having. Each meal began with the same whiney complaints from Alexis that quickly turned into incoherent angry sentences. Then after lots of begging and pleading and tough love, she finally gives in to eat some of it. I do my best to gauge how much she's eating, but it can be hard with some things like breakfast this morning when she crunched up the toast into small pieces that couldn't be reasonably eaten.

Dinner tonight was no exception except this time, it also included several annoyed looks from Boyd. I brushed them off mouthing to him that we'd talk later. After dinner, I opened the rest of my birthday gifts before going home to Brooklyn with Boyd and Alexis.

Olivier and Boyd joked that I was having a week-long celebration for my birthday, but no one else commented as we all knew why this had been such a delayed birthday. I didn't mind, my birthday wasn't a huge deal to me and I really didn't want to make Alexis uncomfortable. She already had this guilty look on her pale face. MK and Ashley had gifted me some tickets to an LA Dodgers game that was coming up in March as well as a weekend getaway for Alexis and me to Utah. They said they choose Utah because it was close to home but far enough for a good adventure. Chris and Scarlett got me this Welcome to the Avengers Family basket that was complete with treats and goodies for both Alexis and me. They had even gotten Alexis, a matching Avengers jacket that we all received in our wrap gifts from Age of Ultron. Alexis painted this cute picture frame that had pictures of us from over the years, well some from when she was little and some from now. It was honestly the cutest thing I'd seen in a while.

The older pictures were from her first day at school, well daycare, and the other was one of us at central park. If you only knew of her from these pictures, you'd think she was a really cuddly, smiley toddler. She was but she was also a very sassy one, who was too terrified of nighttime for all the wrong reasons. The newer ones were from various times over the past month. One was us in the hospital, she had this angry but cute look on her face while I was smiling wide like an embarrassing parent. Another was us during press week at the hotel, this was one of the few early pictures we had together where she was genuinely smiling. I think Mark took this one because it was more candid. I was looking at her with a wide grin and she was watching something else but had a joyous smile nonetheless. The other was us at the beach, so I imagine Scarlett took this one since if I remember correctly Clay was too wrapped up playing in the water. And the last one was very recent like it happened yesterday recent. It was Alexis and I cuddling in bed with my arms wrapped around her and one of hers around me while the other held on tight to that damn bear.

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When we made it home to Brooklyn, I promised Alexis I'd read her a story if she got ready for bed and did her PT exercises. While she got changed and brushed her teeth, Boyd had me unwrap my birthday present which was a small Italian flag and an envelope that included some plane tickets for a week-stay in Italy. For the past three years instead of getting each other random items that we probably won't use, we've gifted each other trips or adventures for either the both of us or us and some friends. I wasn't very surprised by the gift until he told me that it was just him and I thing. I didn't really respond after that and luckily Alexis called me saying she was ready. I told him I'd be back after Alexis goes to sleep, hopefully, that'll give me enough time to think this through. It's not that I don't love our trips or spending time with him, I just don't want to say yes and have him think that I can easily leave Alexis behind or that Alexis is an optional part of my life because she most certainly is not.