Unrequited

Again - Christmas 1999

John was in the living room, helping the kids decorate the Christmas tree. It was Christmas Eve, so a Christmas CD was playing - Harry Connick Jr, to be exact - and they sang along to the songs as they worked. His eyes fell on the three kids near him, and he couldn't help but smile. He was so glad to have them in his life. Just a few weeks earlier, the adoption of Arianna's kids had been completed, so they were finally, legally, Taylors, even if that had been in his heart for years. Jack Taylor sat on the sofa nearby, reading the newspaper and nodding off, only to be woken up when one of the kids' singing became a little too exuberant.

"John, honey. Can you come here a moment, please?" he heard and turned to see Arianna beckoning to him from the kitchen.

He handed the ornament in his hands to Sophia and then carefully stepped from the living room, heading for the kitchen. As soon as he entered, he saw Luc asleep in his baby carrier perched on top of the kitchen table. Arianna had probably put him there when she had come in fifteen minutes earlier like she so often did.

"Something wrong, babe?" he asked.

She looked in a daze, and something about her didn't feel quite right. Had something happened on her final Christmas shopping trip?

"Well, not exactly wrong, but..." she replied, letting her voice trail off.

She turned away from him momentarily and picked something up from the counter. When she turned back to him, he saw she had a pregnancy test in her hands.

"It's positive," she said, and John's eyes fluttered in shock.

"What?" he said, the words she had just spoken not entirely sinking into his brain yet.

"I'm pregnant. Again," she told him and then watched a huge smile spread across his face. He pulled her into a tight hug, followed by a full kiss on her lips.

"It's okay? You're not mad?" she asked, and he laughed, cupping her face in his hands as he looked into her eyes.

"If I could, I would keep you pregnant until you couldn't have any more babies," he told her and gently kissed her again.

"Thanks for that," she answered sarcastically and pulled away from him, going to her laptop, which had a website already open on the screen. "According to this, my due date will be around September third. Again," she told him as he came up behind her to see for himself.

"We couldn't do that again if we tried," he said to her, shocked, but he was completely happy about their news. "You know what this means, though, right?" he teased.

"What?" she bit as she walked over to the refrigerator.

"You'll have to get - dare I say it - a minivan," he teased, but she immediately began to protest.

"Oh, no way. Absolutely not. I will not drive one of those things. Minivan is not in my vocabulary," she complained.

He simply laughed at her disgust at that particular type of vehicle. What was honestly so bad about them? Other than it was such a Mom car.

"Four kids will not fit in the BMW, Arianna. Five if you count Atlanta," he told her, and she scoffed at him. "We've already been having this issue since Luc was born. It's time to fix it."

"No minivan," she scolded, leveling her finger at him and making him laugh again.

"Then what shall we do? Strap the baby to the hood?" he retorted as she pulled food out of the freezer.

"Other types of vehicles seat more than five, John," she said tartly and slammed the freezer door shut.

He watched as she went to a cabinet to get out pots and pans. She put one of the ones she needed on the stove and then turned to look at him.

"Or we can just take two cars," she said, returning to rummaging in the pan cabinet. John threw his hands in the air, starting to get frustrated with the conversation.

"Tell me how you think that is feasible. Especially with the parking and traffic in LA," he snapped.

"I don't know, John, but I will not drive a minivan!" she yelled and slammed the frying pan on the stove to punctuate her point.

"This is ridiculous," he said, leaving the kitchen and ending the conversation for the time being.

He knew they would work out that little problem eventually, even if he had to do some convincing to get her into a dreaded minivan. He shook his head as he walked, confused about why it was such a big deal to her. He returned to the kids and the tree, giving Arianna space as she worked in the kitchen.

"Everything okay, son?" Jack asked from behind his paper, and John chuckled.

"Yea. I just need to realize that she's always right," John conceded, and it was Jack's turn to laugh lightly.

"Yes, you do," he told his son without hesitation, and they both chuckled at the spoken truth.