SURPRISE!

I finished this quicker than I thought it would, so this is my, slightly late, Christmas present to you all.

It jumps about a bit, but it works that way to cover all of the characters.

Merry Christmas!

Epilogue…Ten Years On

To say Ethan was nervous would be an understatement because he was about to ask Troy for his permission to ask Jasmine to marry him.

The young couple were still going strong and were now living together in a flat not far away from their family homes. With Ethan now being a manager at the local sports centre and Jasmine about to graduate from university, as a fully qualified nurse, specialising in children's medicine, Ethan felt like the time was right to take the next step in their relationship, he just hoped that Troy agreed.

"Alright Ethan, what brings you here today?" Troy asked, as he came back into the room with coffee for them both.

"I have something I need to ask you and I'm not really sure how to say it, so I'm just going to come out and say it. Troy, I'd really like it if I could have your permission to ask Jasmine to marry me?"

Troy smiled slightly to himself as he took a sip from his coffee, he knew that this question would come at some point and he'd known the answer for a long time as well.

"I've been waiting for this day for a long time now Ethan and my answer was decided a long time ago, you have one hundred percent of my permission to ask Jasmine to marry you; I'd be delighted to welcome you into our family."

"Thank you Troy, thank you so much," Ethan let out a sigh of relief, as the pair shared a hand shake and then went on to share some everyday chit chat until a voice from upstairs interrupted them.

"Daddy?" Troy smiled at the sound of the small voice and put his coffee cup down before heading up the stairs to retrieve the youngest member of the Bolton family, Eliza Jessica Bolton.

With Jasmine living with Ethan and the twins at school and becoming more and more independent each day, Gabriella had the sudden urge to add one more member to their family and a year and a half later Eliza was born.

"Look who's here Eliza, " Ethan heard Troy speaking to his daughter and put his coffee cup down to brace himself for the hug that was sure to come.

"Ethan!" Eliza's eyes lit up as she saw her almost brother-in-law and pounced on him for a hug.

It's been twenty one months since Eliza was born and she was definitely the thing that was needed to make the Bolton family complete. With Gabriella's looks and Troy's personality, Eliza was sure to have the boys fighting over her later in her life.

TGTGTGTG

It had taken five years of training, but she'd finally made it, Jasmine had finally graduated and the day had been attended by all of her family, including Miranda and a now nineteen year old Summer. Gabriella had decided to invite everyone back to theirs and so as everyone started to pile into their cars, Ethan realised that this would be the perfect opportunity to propose, he knew it would be today, he just wasn't sure when, but unknowingly, Gabriella had just given him the perfect moment.

As the children played on their jungle gym and everyone else lounged round on the decking, Ethan decided it was time to make a speech.

"I just want to say how proud I am of all the work you've put into things Jaz and how you persevered, no matter how hard it got. I want to thank you for letting me be part of that journey and I also want to ask you a question." Dropping onto one knee, Ethan pulled the ring out of his trouser pocket and opened the box. "Jasmine, will you marry me?"

"Yes, yes of course I will," Jasmine's voice was quiet as she failed to keep the tears from falling and let Ethan put the ring on her finger before pulling him into an earth shattering kiss, not caring that they were in front of their family.

In the moments that followed, the girls cried as everyone congratulated the newly engaged couple and Ethan admitted that he'd ask Troy's permission first. This in turn, earned Troy a slap on the arm for not telling Gabriella, but despite the stinging sensation in his arm, Troy assured Ethan that he never came close to telling his wife, he was waiting to see the priceless look on her face as the question was asked, and, he decided, it was most definitely worth the wait.

TGTGTGTG

Unlike her friends, nineteen year old Summer had never had a boyfriend, not a proper one anyway, she's held hands with a boy a couple of times when she was twelve, but that wasn't exactly what you'd call a relationship. It wasn't that boys hadn't been interested in her, they had, but Summer had never wanted to rush into things, when they had, and inevitably she had ended up hurt and very weary of boys.

But now that she was nineteen, Summer felt like there was something missing in her life and that something was a boyfriend, but unbeknownst to Summer, that was about to change.

For the past few weeks, Summer had been working in the shop at the local animal centre with a boy she knew from college. They weren't in the same classes, but had met through friends of friends a couple of times, although they had only ever exchanged pleasantries. Working together had meant that they'd gotten to know each other quite well and Summer had begun to realise that the way she felt when she was around Tom, wasn't the same way she felt when she was around her other colleagues.

Summer thought, or at least hoped, that Tom felt the same way and so today she was going to talk to him about it and if things went badly, then she'd have to deal with the consequences, at least she'd know either way.

Three months into being engaged and while at Eliza's second birthday party, Ethan and Jasmine had announced that they'd set a date for their wedding, June twentieth, Jessica's birthday. At the same time, Jasmine had asked Summer to be her chief bridesmaid, but had also told her she could invite a friend, male or female. Summer realised that this would be a good starting point when it came to talking to Tom, she would invite him to Ethan and Jasmine's wedding.

It had been a quiet day at work so far, the weather was nice and so people were out and about enjoying it, but this all played to Summer's advantage, she was going to talk to Tom, it was now or never.

"Tom? Can I talk to you about something?" Tom stopped his aimless tidying up around his till and turned to look at Summer.

"Sure Sum, what's up?"

Taking a deep breath, Summer looked Tom in the eye. "I love working with you Tom and I really like you and I know it's a while off yet, but I was wondering if you'd be my date to my brother's wedding in June?"

"Of course I'll be your date to your brother's wedding, I'd be honoured. But you're right, June is a long way off and I don't think I can't wait that long to spend some time with you, away from this place I mean, so would you maybe like to come to mine tomorrow night? We could order in and watch movies, I don't really have the money to go out, but next time we get paid we'll go out on a proper date."

"It's okay Tom, ordering in and movies is good, maybe we could get to know each other better as well? There's a lot of stuff you should probably know before you definitely decide to be my date to the wedding."

"There's a lot of stuff you should probably know about me as well Summer, but I'm telling you now, I will be your date to the wedding, you're too precious to lose."

TGTGTGTG

Christmas was always a busy affair in the Bolton household and this year was no different.

Maria and Miranda were doing the cooking and so along with Troy and Gabriella, Jasmine, Ethan, Summer and Tom had been given the task of undoing and putting together Michael, Mitchell and Eliza's toys.

Summer and Tom's date night in, had consisted of her telling him about her Dad's death and her hurtful past with boys, while he had told her how he'd been abandoned by his parents as a new born and had therefore always been under the care of social services. It was the reason why he now lived by himself and didn't socialise very much, but also why very few people knew the truth about his life.

The couple had dated for almost a month before Tom had asked Summer to be his girlfriend and they've been going strong ever since.

Tom was here today because Gabriella hadn't wanted him alone at Christmas and she also knew that Summer would be all mopey if he wasn't here.

"How on earth are you not getting fed up with this?" Ethan asked Tom, as they sat surrounded by toys and boxes. "It takes twenty minutes to undo one and then they only play with it for like ten minutes before getting bored of it and wanting you to open the next one."

Tom shrugged. "From the age of twelve to eighteen, I was the eldest child in a residential home of twenty, my entire Christmas day was spent doing this, I've kinda gotten used to it."

"Is this your first Christmas out of care Tom?" Gabriella asked, as she helped Eliza change into yet another princess dress.

"Yeah, that's why I took you up on your other of coming here so quickly, I hadn't thought about what I'd do at home by myself and I still haven't to be honest."

"Well you're always welcome here and we're very happy to have you, right Eliza?"

"Right!" The little girl answered, running over to give Tom a hug, one which he happily returned, right before tickling Eliza and making her giggle echo throughout the house.

TGTGTGTG

It was a week later and the same people were celebrating, as the clock struck midnight and a new year started.

Michael, Mitchell and Eliza were all tucked up in bed, as Troy decided it was time to make a speech. He cleared his throat slightly and waited for everyone to quieten down before he started speaking.

"I think we should all make a group resolution and I think it should be to embrace all of the life changing events that take place this coming year and to enjoy them to the full. So, to life changing events?" He asked, as he raised his glass in a toast and waited for everyone else to do the same.

"Life Changing events!"

TGTGTGTG

It's not very long, but I wanted to make up for the rubbish that I posted as this story's final chapter, hopefully it goes some way to making up for it.

I hope you've all had a fabulous Christmas and with any luck I'll be back writing for you all in the new year.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE REVIEW! THANK YOU!