Todd Manning stood in the doorway of the hospital room listening to his oldest sister talk softly to his long lost twin.

She was trying her best to calm him, but he was getting more and more agitated by the second. It was starting to make him feel agitated. He pressed his feet firmly against the floor, stretching his spine and looking around the room for things to ground him.

"Victor please." Vicki begged him in soft whispers, her hand rubbing along his arm. "You need to stay still."

"You tell me I've been missing for eight months and I'm supposed to stay calm?" He shot back.

Todd ground his jaw, feeling the shock of being told he'd been gone eight years. He remembered yelling, his body jolting. He rubbed subconsciously at his wrists.

"I know you have questions and we'll answer them, but you have to calm yourself." Vicki told him again.

Todd focused on Vicki's voice, it steadied him. He raised his hand to his face and smelled the cuff of his shirt. It smelled like his wife. He wondered if Blair knew why he liked to hold her hair off her neck when she sprayed perfume. Knowing her, she did. Touch. Sound. Scent. He reviewed Dr. Evan's techniques softly in his head, before pressing his thumb to his mouth and tasting the saltiness of his skin. Taste. Sight. He let his eyes flip around the room before focused on his brother's face, running his eyes over the plains. He knew that look. Despite their facial differences, he knew that look. His twin took a sharp breath and let it out.

"Tea's on her way." Vicki said slowly. "We may be able to reach her by phone. Would you like me to-?"

"No." Victor gulped, his eyes shifting left and right. Todd could tell he was trying to hold on, trying not to fall completely to pieces. "I need-." He swallowed again, his body jerking up and down as if he could keep the words inside. Todd immediately knew what his brother was trying not to say. "Can you get Blair?"

Vicki's mouth fell open for a second before she head tilted to the left.

"Please?" Victor's voice broke just a little. Vicki took a deep breath, trying to decide what exactly to do, but Todd'd had enough.

"I'll get her." Todd's voice was strong and clear from the doorway, both his brother and sister looked towards him in surprise. "She's out there with the kids." He nodded. "I'll go get her."

He turned and made his way back to the waiting room. His wife was leaning against the doorway to the room they'd herded them all into. He reached for her, pulling her back without alerting the rest of the family. She turned into him and he brought his mouth to hers and kissed her soundly.

"You alright?" She breathed, her hands ghosting gently against his face.

"No." He snorted, pressing his forehead against hers. "Not even a little bit." She hummed against him, her fingers traveling over his cheek to his ear and down to the lobe. "He's asking for you."

"Me?" She whispered, pulling back just a little to see his face. Todd tilted his head to the left and gave her a look.

"He's desperate and lost and afraid." Todd raised an eyebrow. "He needs you."

She pressed her mouth into a line, her fingers still stroking at his face. Todd kissed her wrist.

"He needs you." Her husband repeated. She ran her fingers over his lips before nodding sadly at him. He followed her back to his brother's room.

"Mr. Lord, we need you to calm down." The nurse was all but ordering, looking up at the monitor on the wall with concern before her eyes dropped to Vicki. "The doctor doesn't want to sedate him but-."

"No!" Victor snapped, looking from his sister to the nurse. "No more drugs. No more-. Oh God Blair thank God." He huffed. "Tell them no more-." His rapid breathing drown out the end of the sentence and his eyes struggled to focus on her as Vicki stepped back.

Todd watched his wife's hands come down on his brother's arm, clamping tightly. The other man's bawled fist unfolded, and Todd felt something in his chest loosen just a little.

"It's okay." She told him firmly. "He'll calm down." She told the nurse, never removing her eyes from the man in the bed. "It's okay. You're going to be okay."

"You can say it." He forced out.

"Say what?" She feigned annoyance.

"I told you so." He gulped. "About the extra security."

"If I said that every time I had the right to, it's all I'd ever say to you." She sighed, her thumb rubbing absently at his arm before she drew her left hand up to her face. Victor blinked, his eyes zeroing in on her wedding set, with Bitsey's ring in the center.

"You marry him?" He asked dryly. Blair just gave him a soft smile. "What am I saying? Of course you did. Right away?" She had the decency to blush and he smirked at her before rubbing his face. "Figures."

Blair turned her head and smiled at her husband. He winked at her.

"The kids?" He'd already asked Vicki, but Todd understood that too. Blair wouldn't lie, she wouldn't hold back.

"They're fine. They're all in the waiting room." She soothed. Todd watched his brother's heart rate slow along with his own. "Hope's personality is blooming. Sam's working a full year above his grade level and Jack's at least a ½ foot taller."

Victor grinned before rubbing his face again.

"And I'm sure I'm going to catch hell for this later, but I think it's better if I tell you then let you see it for yourself-." She looked at Todd again who nodded. "Tea's pregnant."

Victor's hand froze, he looked at Blair with one eye. She nodded at him.

"She's due in five weeks."

"She's…"

"A son." Todd said from the doorway. "Apparently only I produce girls."

"A son." Victor looked almost awestruck for a moment and Todd felt the jealousy course through him. It surprised him. He watched for a second as his twin looked around. "Where's the-." He pressed the invisible button and Blair looked puzzled. Todd smiled and retrieved the bed controls for him. "Thanks."

Victor sat up slowly, wincing with each movement. Blair fussed with the pillows for a second before he batted her hands away.

"Sit. Both of you just-." He pointed to the chairs and they obliged. "Sit. I need you to tell me everything. Start at the beginning."

….

Todd and Blair sat in a heap in the back of the limo, tangled up together, exhausted.

They had facilitated the visitation of each Manning child, carefully observing both visitor and visitee for any signs of distress before Vicki collected them all and took them home.

Tina had arrived and properly fussed over Victor in a way that made him squirm and made Blair realize how Todd's affection for her had grown over the past few months. It surprised her to realize he was no longer bothered by her, which was a big improvement.

They stayed until Tea arrived, barreling in like a sobbing canon ball, collapsing onto her husband's chest in a fit of tears.

Blair almost laughed as she saw Victor give Todd a knowing, weary, eyeroll over the mass of brown hair that fanned across his neck before his own eyes drifted shut and his hand closed around his wife's shoulders. Todd had smirked back before taking Blair's hand and kissing it.

"We're going to go home." He had announced. "You two have a lot to discuss."

"What if they want to move out?" Blair said suddenly, sitting up against the limo seat. "What if they want to take Sam and Dani and move out?"

"Shhh.." Todd kissed her hand. "Let's not imagine the worst."

"What if they don't want to move out?" She looked at him with wide eyes. "Can we even all live together?"

"Shh.."

"I've slept with him." She blurted like it was a confession.

"I'm aware." Todd bawked.

"Could you live with someone I've-?"

"I've slept with Tea." He countered. "You eat breakfast with the proof of that every morning."

"Oh God! Todd, how weird would it be? All of us living in the same house? People would talk."

"Well we can't have that." He snorted, before looking at her with raised eyebrows. She couldn't help but laugh and he joined her. "It'll be okay."

He readjusted himself around her, pressing his face into her hair.

"You were great today." She whispered after a comfortable calm had fallen over the car.

"I was, wasn't' I?" His eyebrows arched. "That's so unlike me."

"I know it was hard for you." She sighed. "I could tell."

"It was.." He stopped for a moment, collecting his thoughts, she leaned back and watched him. "...hard to watch him panic. He was desperate and I-." He shook his head. "I could feel it."

"You wanted to help him." She smiled and he shrugged. .

"I wanted it to stop, and I knew how to stop it." He looked at her. "I saw myself in him. Maybe for the first time."

"That's funny." She breathed. "For the first time I saw him as something separate from you."

"Why?" Todd whispered, moving a piece of her hair away from her face.

"He was just so clearly not you." She shook her head. "Yes, he needed me, and yes I knew how to sooth him, but it wasn't the same." He smiled at that and she sighed, leaning into his chest.

"I know what you're doing." He decided. "Don't do that."

"How can I not?" She huffed.

"Because for the first time I can actually see how you may have been convinced into believing he was me." Todd laughed. "Don't beat yourself up for not knowing almost a decade ago."

"He kept going on about losing eight months." She chuckled bitterly.

"Right?" Todd exclaimed. "The fucking irony. I'm a goddamn saint." Blair snorted.

"He's always been such a damn victim." Her eyes rolled and she felt Todd shift to face her. "What?"

"I love you." He told her honestly.

"You better." She replied, kissing him quickly before dropping back against his chest and snuggling against him.