This is chaos but we'll get through together

Custody battles

A few weeks later

"I dunno. It just feels so weird leaving her alone in her own bed" Anne says as she looks at Elizabeth who was taking a nap.
"Don't worry. She'll be okay and I'll look after her if she wakes up. You are gonna win this battle. It's the last day of it. Me, Anna and Kitty will get on just fine with watching the kids" Cathy says, kissing Anne's forehead and smiling at her.
"Okay. If she does wake tell her I'll be back soon. Love you" Anne says and Cathy smiles, pulling her in for a hug.
"Love you too. Now go get that sole custody like an absolute queen"

2 hours later

"Mama? Where mama go?" Cathy had been reading when she heard Elizabeth sleepily calling out. She puts the book down and walks into the toddlers room, her heart breaking when she sees the girls face streaked with tears.
"Catcat where mama?"
"Mama just had to go out for a little bit. What's wrong?" Cathy says, lifting her out of bed and rubbing her back.
"Scary dream" Elizabeth mumbles "mean Man hurted mama and had a big sword" she says, stumbling over the pronunciation of some of the words.
"It's okay. Mama will be back soon. I promise" Cathy says, knowing exactly what Elizabeth's bad dream was about. She walks around for a while, carrying Elizabeth in her arms until she got to the living room. Elizabeth happily spends the next few hours helping her clean up the mess made by hurricane Kitty and Anna which was mostly food wrappers, cups and some pillows and helps bring the stuff everyone left downstairs up to their rooms for them.
"Want me to tell you a story?" She says softly once they get back downstairs and Elizabeth nods.
"Yes please catcat!" She says and Cathy smiles, bringing her back downstairs and finding a nice story in the book of fairytales Anne had gotten and reading it to her. Just as she finishes, the front door opens.
"Did someone say full custody?!" Anne says happily and Cathy smiles, coming out to greet her with Elizabeth running ahead of her squealing excitedly.

***

Anne smiles when she sees Elizabeth running to her and lifts her up for a hug.
"Did you have a nice nap sweetie?" She asks her as Elizabeth rests her head on her shoulder.
"had a scary dream but catcat made it okay again" Elizabeth says and Anne looks at her and mouths a 'thank you' at Cathy who smiles and walks over, kissing her cheek.
"Well we won. They deemed him an unfit parent" Jane says as Anna and Kitty appear with Mary who had been in her room playing mario kart the whole time and stopped when she heard everyone coming in and Edward who was just waking up. She tells Anne about the chaos Anna and Kitty managed to cause and how good of a help Elizabeth had been in helping her put things normal again.
"Mama? I have milk and cookies please?" Elizabeth asks, looking up with a big smile.
"Well seeing as you were so good for catcat then yes you can" Anne says.
"Look. Just because we decided to have a pillow battle while the kids and Cathy were chilling upstairs doesn't warrant a time out" Anna was jokingly trying to reason with Jane who was pretending to put the dynamic duo in a time out.
"I was completely innocent in all of this that's for sure" Mary chuckles.
"Yeah she was in her room playing her Nintendo the whole time. Reliable witness. And responsible babysitter" Cathy says as they all go into the kitchen and Anne gets cookies and a sippy cup of milk for Elizabeth.
"Thank you mama!" She says happily and Anne smiles, kissing the top of her head.
"You're very welcome sweetie" she says, sitting beside Cathy who whispers an explanation about the bad dream Elizabeth had while she was napping.
"Thanks for looking after her for me. I'm really glad she's taken a shine to you" Anne says, pulling Cathy in for a hug. They sit talking for a while and Anne smiles when Elizabeth manages to wriggle down from her booster seat thing that she had so she could sit at the table and throws her now empty cup into the sink.
"Mama up?" She asks, holding her arms out to Anne.
"Of course! C'mere Lizzie" Anne says, sitting Elizabeth on her lap and hugging her as she starts telling Cathy about the custody battle.
"So they won't let him see the kids. But he's going to try get rights to a supervised visit. I just hope that he doesn't get that" she says as Elizabeth leans against her and absentmindedly plays with her fingers.
"Yeah. Me too" Cathy says and Anne smiles, tapping Elizabeth's nose and making her giggle.
"So anyways. They asked me if I'd like to register a secondary guardian and I have until the end of the week...so I was kinda hoping you'd like to be that secondary guardian"
"I would love that! Thank you!" Cathy says happily and Anne chuckles, leaning over and kissing her.