"Just one more set of notes to go over and I get to put this case away forever! And we get to go to Malibu!" Vee sing-songed into the phone. Harry's  chuckle was in key with her happiness.

"It's a long time coming, I know." She could imagine his fond smile. "You've been working hard for months."

"Months and months." She stretched long and groaned a little.

"You tired?" He asked. "You were up before Maribel and out the house."

"I am, but also really restless. I was so excited about putting this one to bed, I wasn't able to sleep much myself." She started to get her auto dictating stuff together. She usually typed things, but she was feeling the 12 hours she'd been up and knew the words would blur. She'd do it like this and have her assistant proof and file. She was ready to go home. That meant she needed to get off the phone. "What are the babies doing?" She asked instead.

"Oh, well, they are thrashing about in their cribs." She heard him move the monitor. "Looks like Bel is up and staring at Teo, willing him awake."

"Seems late for them to sleep." Since they dropped to one nap it was just after lunch until 2:30.

"We had that date with Jameson's nanny from playgroup, remember? They are on a slightly later schedule, so I fed them and then had them walk the short distance home."

"How did you do that?" Her mind boggled trying to picture it, she was sure her eyes goggled too.

He laughed. "I alternated. One by hand, the other on my hip, and when one started whining while the other started to drop off, I switched them." God, he was strong.

"Nice." Vee really should go.

"Yeah it worked a treat. You done typing the brief? when will you be home?" She heard him click off the monitor. "Teo is more than stirring now."

"Um," she'd be about done had she either got off the phone to dictate or typed it while they spoke. She opened a doc and started typing. She may be tired, but this was faster. "Give me a half an hour."

"Need to let me go?" She kinda did. He was walking, his breath was a little faster.

"No, put me on speaker and let me talk to the babies. We can wake them together." She heard a cry.

"Oh no need to wake them. But mamas voice may quiet them." She put her own phone on speaker and talked with Teo while she heard Harry with Maribel in the background.

She'd be jealous she wasn't there except she would be for the next two weeks. Harry had a friend in LA, a wealthy one (she'd have to ask about that), who had offered his beach house. She'd been bandying about vacation ideas when Harry's face brightened in that way he had. His ideas were usually brilliant, and he told great stories, though usually his tales of their day revealed more about himself than any direct question she had asked him. When she asked about him, he'd shrug and go over his CV. Born in the north of England, divorced parents, amazing mum, lovely sister, moved to the states to do his doctorate, couldn't keep up with the expense, was in sabbatical to earn some money to finish.

Those were all pleasant facts, except the divorce, his face scrunched like bitter lemon on that tidbit, but they weren't really about him. The thing she knew, were from observation, or his long asides.

He liked his coffee black but his tea strong and sweet, and only from a pot, not a bag. His favorite meal was breakfast and he ate it at all times of the day and night. Once she'd found him making pancakes at 2:30 am. "Couldn't sleep, and it's always a good time for pancakes," he'd grinned. "Try it." So she'd sat at the breakfast bar and been a good student of anytime breakfast. He also liked to grab cold pancakes as a snack, as did her babies now. "I use the whole grain mix and put in eggs, so they get protein." He'd looked for approval.

He looked for her approval a lot. She wasn't sure if he was trying to keep her involved, was being polite, or really was unsure. Harry's ideas and ways were nearly always A+.

He had asked for approval on the Malibu idea. And he'd told the story in that meandering way of his. Vee, how she'd come to think of herself since he adopted the nickname, usually left with more information about him, and less about whatever the actual topic.

The day they'd been talking about vacation ideas was a perfect example. Harry had been sitting across from her with that sweet little cock to his head he got when she was talking at length. It might be the first time in her life she felt like somebody listened to her and really liked it. Her mama did too, now, but when she was little her mama had been so tired. She worked too hard, too much, and too many jobs. Mama was tired when she got home, and she never had the money or paid time off for a vacation. Because of that, all that scarification, Vee did.

"I should be done with this case at month ends I think I'd really like to go somewhere, relax, play with the babies, sleep in."

Harry laughed. "Vacation with the twins means you won't be getting to sleep in much."

"Not if you come with us." She raised her eyebrows at him. He deserved a vacation too. He'd been working a lot right along with her. She'd paid him extra, but wanted to do more, and there was the other benefit. "Then we can switch off days, I'll keep them most nights, but maybe you can keep them a few mornings?" She hoped he liked the idea, or maybe he would like to just have the time off to see friends, or maybe even go home. "If you want too." She tried to take the pressure off, scale back the hope
in her eyes.

"I think that vacation sounds amazing!" His dimples were so huge, she liked that they showed sometimes even when he wasn't smiling. He was now. "What kind of vacation were you thinking, mountains, beach, big city? Driving or flying?"

He was about to keep going when she cut him off. He might start talking about his favorite vacation when he was 12, or something, and entertaining as that time in Portugal may have been, it wasn't germane to the moment.

"I would actually just love to get out of the city, but still have city amenities. Beaches, and laying around, with nice food and hiking, but not an all inclusive. Ya know. And sunsets. I'd really love some devastating sunsets." She missed heat too. "Somewhere warm. And flying. But not too far. And no layovers. Not with Beli and Teo."

Harry had straightened up in his chair and smiled with flashing eyebrows. He'd put a finger up while he stood before disappearing into a room. He came back 15 min later with the same light on his face stirred together with a bit of triumph.

"I have the perfect vacation for us!" He grabbed the barstool he'd vacated with one dinner plated sized hand and sat across from her. Then leaned in with his chin on his fist. "Have you ever been to LA?"

Victoria wasn't able to school her face.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But there are some really amazing things to do and see there, if you avoid the star walk and such." She'd not been to the star wall. She'd been there for a conference and hadn't seen much but the walls of it, and the immediate area in downtown LA. She hadn't been impressed.

"How'd you know so much about LA?" It was on the other side of the world after all, from the place that imprinted on his voice.

"Oh, I have family, although I guess more close family friends there," he stopped to puzzle over the tree and its branches. "Yeah, just my dad's old college mate, not actually blood relations, though I called him uncle my whole life. Anyway, I wasn't sure where I wanted to go for my post grad. I talked to myself about the requisite places in England. But Oxford and Cambridge seem so stuffy."

"And Harvard isn't stuffy?" She'd gone to Brown.

He had a goofy snicker sometimes. It might be her favorite flavor of his laugh. "Not nearly as cool as Brown. Who went there?" He rapped his chin. "Oh JFK Jr! That's right. Who else?"

There was a list but she just narrowed her eyes.

"Anyway. The opposite of stuffy seemed like California. So I decided that Stanford might be nice. So I called my 'uncle' in LA to see if I could stay with him and commute to school or something."

Vee giggled.

"Ya, I had no idea how big California was. I guess I figured it was like San Francisco, Stanford. LA. Three hours tops, make a tour, see the sights, catch the vibe," he mimicked a surfboard and she lost it.

She was full out laughing by now. His hand illustrations and the little literal hop, skip, and a jump he performed before that. He should go to Disneyland too with that level of animation. "Did your uncle teach you different?"

"Well, no, like kinda. He mostly just was excited to have me. But we went to his house on the beach in Malibu first and then drove to Stanford. Which was beautiful. Up the coast."

"Isn't that like 12 hours?"

"Like 10, I dunno, forever, but we stopped in Monterey. That was nice. And beachfront. By the time we got to Palo Alto, which means high stick by the way, that's a weird name for a town, I was disappointed. The weather was way better in Malibu. Also I had imagined Stanford was waterfront."

"It's not far. The whole state can't be on the ocean."

"Think my expectations were ruinous. I had no idea how big the place was. But, it wasn't what I had in my mind." He shrugged.

"And Boston was." That was the puzzle. It was cold here, and definitely not postcard beaches.

"Well, it's waterfront."

"Do you do much swimming?" She asked.

"I had it in my mind to go abroad by then, and  Boston seemed to have shit weather like home." 

"Shittier." Vee flashed her palms like that was a given. There was more to this story, something she wasn't getting.

"Oh, Texas has better?" Harry derailed her and got up to move behind her in the kitchen. He was grabbing food now. Oooh, nap snack time. She loved when he did this. It was like an informal nosh, so different from the stuffy steak lunches at work when she had to go to client things.

How the hell did he pull together a bruschetta bar so quickly? "Made it last night." He answered her face. "Had a craving, made loads." She'd been around the office late again Friday evening, but only two more weeks until the case officially ended. Her part anyway. But she answered his cheek while she loaded up a toast point.

"Claro, San Antonio at least. Houston's a bit shit, Dallas gets cold, and hellishly hot—"

"Isn't San Antonio really hot?" He interrupted.

"Yeah, but it's a little drier, and there are hills and Austin is close, and it's just better. Certainly than Boston." She sighed. Sometimes she missed how big the sky was and that the clouds looked like cartoons.

"You'll have to show me." She'd like to. The house that built her. That was like the only country song she liked.

She smiled and nodded looking. "Yeah, sometime, you can come to when we go we abuelita. But, much as I love my mother, that's not a vacation exactly."

"Right." He nodded along. "So I just called James, my pseudo uncle, and they are going home for a month. He said we could use his beach house...." Harry's eyebrows  were as high as they could go, floating on hope.

"I only have two weeks."

"Yeah, that's enough, you'll be missing the east-coast-no-bullshit by then. Everybody is fake happy and nice in California." He sounded like he was standing behind a lectern.

"Like you." She felt the need to remind him. He was the happiest person she knew.  But she knew a lot of lawyers.

"Oh, mine's not fake." He shook his head.

That was true. He really was just ridiculously nice.

"But it has its perks. Last time I was there, I found this smoothie shop, amazing wheatgrass shots, and they have a vegan restaurant." he responded to her face, again. He read her like a favorite book. "When in Malibu, Vee." His smile required an answer and a question.

"What the fuck is wheatgrass?"

"You just cursed!" He covered the speaker of the monitor.

She smirked, "That's so we can hear them, not them us, tonto."

"Did you just curse again, but in Spanish?!" He made his offended face. "You def need some California vibes and lots of wheatgrass to detox that liver. All that anger!" He was s shaking his head.

"What my what? None of what you just said makes any sense." She was giggling.

"I dunno, I'm making it up, based on what I can remember about how the guy got me to drink juiced grass. He said anger lives in the liver or the pancreas or some such. But it was good! The grass, kinda. And I felt good and my skin glowed after a few days of it."

His skin always glowed.

He misunderstood her incredulity. "You'll see! We can try some—"

"I'm not drinking grass, like I never ate mud pies." Victoria insisted, shaking her head at him, but carefully keeping her elbow against him. His had come to rest against her a moment ago. He was warm. It was hard for her to find the right temperature. She didn't have that trouble when they were adjacent.

"It's a thing. A Malibu thing, guaranteed to chill you out." That phrase sounded weird and wonderful in his accent. "All we need is flights, a car, everybody drives there, and bathing suits!" He picked up his phone. "Where do they have bathing suits right now? It's outta season."

The snow was black and melting. They may get one more blanket, or not. It was technically spring, just not in Boston.

"Target, it's almost Spring break." She reminded.

The corners of his lips turned down and she cocked her head to the side. She needed to look at his timeline. He seemed to really want to go back to school. She'd miss him dearly, but maybe they could work something out. Maybe she could hire somebody else for when he was in class and studying?

His brow cleared and brightened with an idea. "Wanna go pick stuff out while they finish their nap? Then we can meet you at the green. I'll bundle them up."

She checked her weather app. "Layers, the actual sun may come out!" She was already putting on her purse.

Vee had essentially been packing since that day, little by little. Well, shopping was probably a better word for it. She bought her first mum suit, and tried not to think much about it. Her old suits still fit, or fit again, just not like they used to, and her stomach had new pink welts, like veins of cotton candy, down the sides. She supposed there was nothing to be done about it, two humans had lived in there for a time. That had to leave a mark, right?

She still packed her old high cut black one piece. It looked good and she felt great in it. Victoria caught herself wondering what Harry would think of it before she switched her focus to the babies' suitcase. Like that mattered.

This mattered. Traveling with small children required stuff.

She'd been shopping for Teo and Bel as well. Who knew that resort wear for near toddlers were so adorable? There were a few pieces she knew would be super frustrating, long dress style things, cover ups she supposed.  She just wasn't sure what a baby needed to cover up. But it was so damn cute she'd bought it. There was a little voice in her head that said the inhibited movement may be worth the squalling near a pool. And what a pool it was.

More like an oasis from Harr's pictures. The lush greenery around the deck was like ivy, made it private from the beach the stairs led to. There was a gate, so the kiddos couldn't fall down the path or into the foliage, and the lounge chairs looked so plush, they made her want to nap immediately. "The fabric is moisture wicking, so you don't really need a towel." Harry had told her. She felt like it was made so you could swim naked, all the privacy screens and no need for linens. Not that anybody would be doing that. Small children and platonic nanny relationships and all.

Hmm.

But the moonlight glinting off crystal blue water and the night lighting of the pool were ethereal. Still took the swimmer to a new place it looked like, but instead the island oasis of the day, it was more a fairy hill, where magic things happened.

Magic.

She missed magic. She wasn't sure she'd ever really had it. The ex, well they'd had some good days, hanging out on quads and dancing late into the night. But, they'd gone straight to law school, then to a firm. There hadn't been much frolicking. Even their honeymoon had been serious, a tour of St. Petersburg and Poland. It was his dream trip, but some of the things they saw killed the libido. There were certainly no fairy lights or naked swimming.

Had she ever skinny dipped? That seemed like something that should have happened, and she was too old now to add it to her bucket list.

Was she too old?

Maybe it was time to start dating. She felt lonely. And was thinking about Harry in weird ways. She supposed it was just that they were going to a beautiful place that could be romantic. They made good friends, partners really, but he was younger, and they maybe flirted a tiny bit sometimes, but there was nothing romantic. He was just the nearest male. She needed some attention maybe. She hadn't in ages.

Victoria imagined kissing someone, a faceless someone, on one of the loungers, after a delicious midnight dip, of the thin variety. Wet lips and cool skin, hot breath. The feel on long fingers on both sides of her cheeks holding her still to deepen the kiss. The slide and wiggle of a rough tongue along her top mouth. Vee could feel the plump bottom lip  she imagined, and the broad back under her hands as she was rolled under most of the 60's, if the dates on his shoulders were a timeline.  The v of the back to a slim waist against her palms as they slid over skin beaded with cool water, and strong thighs with bits of text and fauna etched against the crux of her. She stood and defiantly closed the zipper.

That got oddly specific .

She needed to go on a date. But, obviously, after they got back from Malibu. Or not, maybe a tinder date to take the edge off. Could she make up an excuse to leave the kids with Harry one day and meet with someone at the four seasons? Could she swipe right? She didn't think so. She'd just book a massage instead. The reviews there were amazing.

The knock startled her attention away from her suitcase. The door was open, the knock was courtesy.

"Hey, Harry!" She brightened her voice and smoothed her hair. For a moment, she thought about avoiding eye contact, but that would be a tell. She never did that. Especially not in court--a good suit and strong eye contact were good armor. If she didn't look at him, He'd know something was up, she just had to pretend she wasn't just thinking of him on top of her or a liaison with a random to distract her from it. "You packed?"

"Yeah, did it during nap time today. Thought I'd see if you wanted help with the twins' bags?"

"No, gracias." Ohhh she was distracted. "I did them mostly yesterday, just got together the things that came today."

"And you are done?"

She fidgeted with the zipper her hand was still on, looked at it like it was broken or stuck. It was fine, but then she didn't have to be staring into his eyes anymore. Eye contact was good, until it was eye fucking. And that line felt very close. She didn't want to get caught there, and her mind was still under the moon. "Yes!"

"It's easy to pack when everything is new huh?" His voice was lined with laughter. He'd crossed his arms and leaned against her door jam. His hair was disheveled, curly, longer than when he started, and his sweater was snug against biceps. Her eyes jerked up to his smirking face. That was slightly better. His teasing voice; she loved when she caught him talking to the littles in it. The dimples pressed into his voice and his cheeks.

"I put a few older things in there." She was looking in his eyes again. The smile was there too, and in her answering grin.

"Swimsuits, a dress or two you don't intend to wear?" He guessed expertly.

"How do you know that?" Her chuckle was irrepressible.

"Sister, mum." He shrugged. "But, since you're done, nightcap?"

It was only 9 pm, but their flight was ungodly early, so the kiddos would hopefully sleep until the airport, and they could get a full day in on top of travel. "No, a melatonin is probably a better idea. Thanks though." Wine or anything like it, was a bad idea. Red wine made her languorous and chatty. Nope. And horny, which she was already battling, for the first time in a good while.

"Ok, see you before the sun."

"Yes, what a way to start the day!" She felt lame. That was lame, right? But he giggled.

"Oh yeah, I usually like it from the other side more."

"I used to, when you get to be my age, you'll see."

He rolled his eyes, but they had had this discussion before. "Sleep well, Victoria."

He didn't really call her that. She liked the way the syllables rolled off his tongue.

She needed that melatonin. No thinking about his tongue. Anymore thinking about his tongue. She'd need the moon medicine and to meditate, or something, to sleep.

In the end, meditating turned into masturbating, and she slept like a baby, for longer than she had in two months thanks to the case. She was thankful, the flight was hell. They were delayed, their early flight for baby sleep plan backfired, and they didn't make it to the beach house until sundown. And the kids were already sleeping as it was almost their bed time by their internal clocks. They were definitely going to be up before the sun. She'd take the first day. But, a quiet night was in order, an early one too.

She wished she could pretend she had jet lag, or she was tired at all. Instead, she was shaking from all the coffee she had consumed. Harry, too. They both drank iced coffee the way you were supposed to drink water on a good day. Which this one hadn't been.

They'd put the babies in the appointed room, where their hosts had put a lovely crib for them. It was only a minute to get the pack and play up. They'd have to alternate nights between the sleeping accommodations, seemed fair, though the babies would never know.

She watched them for a second. Two years ago, in the throes of a dying marriage, she'd have never imagined this life, this new life. Victoria knew she was so lucky. Beautiful kids, beautiful career, beautiful life, beautiful vacation starting.

Part of that was Harry, he was a godsend. They had  dealt with the rough travel day together, baby switches and breaks included.

Apart from the shakes from all the iced coffee he kept producing, she could not fault him. He'd make somebody a great partner one day.

"Victoria?" She heard and followed the voice. The house was a good size, but not so large she couldn't hear him, and most of the place had a fantastic view.

It was way better than the pictures. The sun was going down and the sunset streaked like cotton candy through the sky. There was a widening purple slash, and from the stairs down to the desk she could see the sun sinking into the ocean. It looked like it went on forever. It stole her breath.

Her sense was taken as well, because the view on the deck was better, Harry was stood between two of the plush deck chairs she had dreamed of,  had fantasies about. He had two glasses of champagne, and was backlit by the sunset.

The worst of it, was that he was shirtless.

"Dios mio!" she exclaimed.

"Right," he opened his arms and turned around. His back was broader than she imagined. "Could this view be more gorgeous?

No, no it couldn't.