A/N: hello! I'm taking a small step away from season 2/3 DL world to venture back to The Messer family universe! Although he rest assured we will be going back to season 2/3 DL very soon as I am so not finished there yet.
In the meantime... A cutesy little story but also the beginnings of a multi-chap fic I'm working on! Hope you enjoy!
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Rifling through her daughter's backpack, she shook her head. Grumbling at the state of the affairs, she turned the bag upside down and dumped the contents onto the living room floor. She watched in horror as all sorts of crap came flying out.
Lindsay Messer, what have you done? Her voice internally screamed.
She cast the purple bag to the side and began to attempt to organise her daughter's life.
She first collected all the trash and made a hefty pile. Crayon wrappers, empty juice boxes, screwed up pictures. She attempted to smooth out a picture of a flower and puppy her daughter had drawn. It was addressed to 'daddy' and Lindsay made a mental note to give it to Danny later. She was sure he'd love the forty second picture of Lydia sending subliminal messages that she'd like a dog. Lord knew she was fed up of receiving said drawings, notes and letters so she was extremely happy for Danny to be the new recipient.
For all the crayon wrappers in her bag, there were a thousand more crayons: most of them broken or little stubs. As she put them into the trash pile; she made a note to buy her poor kid some more crayons the next time she was at the store.
She then turned her attention to her daughter's binder. That was a minefield in itself. She'd tried to instil even the smallest level of responsibility into her baby, her youngest, but she'd quickly realised that Lydia Messer had wholeheartedly accepted the role as Baby of the Messer family a long time ago. Anything and everything Lindsay did to try and get her daughter to be more organised and sensible was futile. It didn't help that Danny, Lucy and Ben treated her like a little princess.
And if she was totally honest, she guessed she was guilty of that too.
She just couldn't help it. She was her baby. Her final baby. Lindsay knew in her heart that even if she and Danny wanted more children, they wouldn't be able to now. They were hardly spring chickens anymore. Lydia was definitely their last baby. And she was the perfect missing puzzle piece to their family. Among many things, you couldn't help but adore her. She was a goofball and she was a whirlwind of energy, leaving a path of destruction wherever she went. But she was also an incredibly sweet, funny and loving little girl. Lindsay had never met a kid with a bigger heart than Lydia. Her little quirks and mannerisms gave her such a strong personaiity that Lindsay treasured. She cast her attention back to her daughter's binder and attempted to get a lid on the situation.
She dumped out all of the papers and began rifling through them one by one. She knew her teacher tried to get Lydia to be organised. Her poor teacher had tried everything. Eventually, they both realised they weren't going to win and they'd both apologised to one another at a parent teacher conference. Lindsay had apologised to the poor girl about everything always being late and her teacher, Mrs Davis, had in turn apologised for everything being crumpled and shoved in her bag.
Just like the letter Lindsay held in her hands, dated a week ago.
Dear Parents,
Further to our correspondence regarding this semester's focus for learning; we'd like to invite the children to come to school dressed in a superhero costume of their choice. This can be a traditional superhero or a "real life superhero" as we have been discussing in class.
On our superhero day we will be taking part in a range of activities to further enhance the children's understanding of people who help us in our lives.
We look forward to seeing your child dressed in their outfit on the 29th!
Kind regards,
The first grade team.
Lindsay looked at the date. It was the twenty eighth. Superhero day was tomorrow.
And she had no costume.
"Lydia Messer!" Lindsay bellowed.
She heard crashing and then a little voice from down the hallway. "Yeah?"
"Come here!" Lindsay couldnt even hide the anger in her voice.
"Lydia's in trouble!" A voice from somewhere in the house sounded.
"Ben!" Lindsay bellowed back. "I don't need you to be a smartass right now, thank you! You're supposed to be gettin' ready to go to the ballpark with Daddy! Focus on yourself, thanks."
"Sorry!"
Lindsay glanced up as she watched her six year old round the corner with her thumb tucked tightly in her mouth. "What's this?" She growled, holding the screwed up letter in her hand.
"Paper." Lydia shrugged. "Am I in trouble? I sowwy if I am, Mommy."
Lindsay took a moment to regain some composure. "Come here and sit next to me." She instructed her daughter.
With the slowest pace known to mankind; Lydia Messer slowly made her way next to Lindsay. Eventually she sat down with her thumb still in her mouth. Lindsay pulled it out and gestured to the space in front of her. "Lydia. What's all of this?"
"My stuff". She shrugged.
"Yeah!" Lindsay implored. "No kidding! Look at it! It's a big mess. You've got all kind of letters from your teachers screwed up. This was all the way at the bottom and it's important honey. It's about a dress up day tomorrow. Why didn't you tell me?"
"I thought you knew." She shrugged.
"How would I know if you don't give me the letter?"
"But I put it in my bag." She shrugged. "I tried, Mommy."
Sighing, Lindsay pulled Lydia onto her lap. She brushed the soft hair out of her daughter's face and pressed a kiss to her temple. "I know, honey; but how can Mommy and Daddy work out what's important and what isn't when everything looks like this?" She asked, gesturing to the screwed up paper that made up the contents of her bag. "You nearly went to school tomorrow in your uniform and not as a superhero. You would have been really sad to miss out."
Lydia nodded.
"And we've got a little problem: you don't have any costumes like that and you can't go in your princess dresses." Lindsay said. "So what can we do?"
Lydia put her thumb in her mouth and looked down. Lindsay could see little tears forming in her daughter's eyes, "I sorry," she mumbled.
Lindsay sighed heavily before trying to think of a plan. "Okay on your letter Mrs Davis said that you've been learning about real life superheroes. What does she mean?"
"People who help other people." Lydia explained. "Like uh… you!" She said excitedly, "and Daddy!"
"Ahh," Lindsay nodded. "I understand. Police officers? Doctors?"
"Yeah!" Lydia nodded. "I go as Daddy?"
Lindsay cocked her head to the side. "You know what… I have an idea." She whispered. She lifted Lydia off her lap and stood up. She took her daughter's hand and led her up the stairs. "Come with me honey. I have the perfect thing for you to wear."
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Ben watched as their truck driven by his dad, drove down the street towards the house. He bent down and grabbed his bag and made his way to the end of the driveway. He heard the doors unlock and he quickly opened the passenger door.
"Hey Pop!"
"Hey kiddo," Danny smiled at his son. "You ready to go?"
"Yep." Ben nodded as he climbed into the front seat.
"Seatbelt." Danny instructed. "Did you tell Mommy I was here?"
"I called out to her as I left."
"So no then." Danny laughed. "How is she? She ok?"
"Yeah, fine. She was goin' to town on Lydia over her backpack earlier. She was pretty angry."
"Mommy? Angry?" Danny turned to look at him. "You sure?"
"Well she called me a smartass."
"Ahh." Danny smirked. "And were you?"
"What?"
"Were you being a smartass?"
Ben shrugged.
"I'll take that as a yeah." Danny laughed as he indicated and turned towards the ballpark. "What did that have to do with Lydia?"
"I dunno, I think Lydia's has a dress up day tomorrow that mommy didn't know about."
Danny shook his head and chuckled. "Little scatterbrain… anyway enough about your sister. What we workin' on today?"
"Batting." Ben said. "There's a couple's things I wanna fine tune."
"Sounds good." Danny nodded as they pulled into the parking lot. As Danny pulled the car into the space and killed the engine he looked towards his son. "Hey…" he said getting his attention:
"Yeah?" Ben said, looking up briefly from his bag.
"Listen, it means a lot to me that we do this." Danny said softly. "It means a lot to me that we have baseball. The time we spend together is special to me. I want you to know that."
"I know." Ben smiled. "I like that we have this too."
Danny reached over to his son and ruffled his hair. "Come on kiddo."
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Lindsay took a step back from her daughter as she proudly took in her handy work. For a last minute costume, this wasn't bad. It wasn't bad at all.
First she'd examined the options in Lydia's closet. She knew what she had been looking for and prayed it still fit. She dug out a pair of black jeans and got her daughter to throw them on. She then focused her attention on that dressing up tub in the bottom of her closet. She could picture exactly the thing she was looking for and just hoped it was still there. She was losing hope as she was nearing the bottom but just as she was giving up hope; she spotted it. The little black button down shirt they'd bought for a costume Lucy had wanted to wear for Halloween years and years ago. She tucked the shirt into Lydia's jeans and smiled. Perfect.
She had then pulled down the attic ladders and had made Lydia wait at the bottom: she'd disappeared upstairs and had headed for the box she and Lucy had been looking in a week previous. Messer family heirlooms was adorned on the front. She dug in the box and eventually found her desired item. She grabbed the name tag. She shoved everything back into the box and made her way back down the stairs. She'd led Lydia to her's and Danny's master bedroom and added the finishing touches.
On one of Danny's shelves, sat his hat. She'd popped it on Lydia's head and pursed her lips together as she decided it was too big to get away with it. After a couple of minutes of searching, she'd found hers and popped it on her little girl's head. It still wasn't perfect but it was workable.
She had then pinned the name tag to her daughter's shirt. It read SERGEANT MESSER. Lydia's eyes had tried to read it upside down and she'd squealed when she worked out it said her last name.
"That's me!" She'd cried with excitement.
"Actually, that badge was Daddy's. When Lucy was a little girl Daddy changed his job for a little while and he was a sergeant. He was the boss."
"He is the boss… That's what we tell him, right Mommy?" Lydia had attempted a wink.
"That's right… but what else do we know?" Lindsay had quizzed her daughter.
"We know Mommy is the real boss."
"That's my girl." Lindsay smirked. "Okay; So we have Daddy's name badge. We have mommy's police hat… now we need a-" She'd trailed off as she remembered what she had. She'd stood on her tiptoes and reached up onto the top shelf. In a shoebox at the very back, covered in dust held her intended target. She had pulled it down and blew the dust away. She opened the box and unravelled the small object from the tissue paper it was wrapped in. She affixed it to Lydia's belt loop and stood back.
"I think you look perfect." Lindsay smiled proudly at her efforts.
Lydia glanced down and examined what was affixed to her belt. "Mommy; what's this?" She asked.
"It's a badge." Lindsay explained. "All police officers have a badge. They have a special number on it so that everyone knows who they are. This was my special badge and special number when I worked in Montana."
Lydia pulled it off her belt and held it up to her face so she could see it. "It's different to your New York one." She observed.
"It is." Lindsay nodded. "Because Mommy didn't always work here. When I moved here I got a new badge."
"So is this old?"
Lindsay nodded. As a parting gift, her supervisor back in Montana had given her the badge she'd worn so proudly for her short time at the lab there. She'd forgotten about it… until now.
Lydia held it up to her mother and Lindsay affixed it back to her outfit: she then led Lydia to the mirror when she could take in her appearance. "What do you think?"
Lydia twirled in the mirror and smiled brightly. She went up close and narrowed her eyes as she examined her appearance. She then turned to Lindsay and gave her another bright smile. "I look like you and Daddy!" She said excitedly.
"Think you'll pass as a superhero?" Lindsay asked.
"I am a superhero." Lydia corrected.
Lindsay laughed. "You are?"
"I am." Lydia nodded. "I knows it because I look like you and Daddy and you are superheroes so that means I a superhero too now!"
"You're right honey," Lindsay said with tear filled eyes. "you're a perfect little superhero." .
If there was higher praise, Lindsay didn't know what it was. Her daughter, her baby, thought she was a superhero
Lydia turned her attention back to her reflection which was perfect as it gave Lindsay a moment to swipe at the tears that had slipped down her cheeks.
Being a hero to her three babies was most definitely the badge Lindsay was the proudest to wear.
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"Pop, can you pass the potatoes please?"
"Sure kiddo." Danny said as he passed his son the bowl of mashed potatoes.
"So, how was everyone's day?" Lindsay asked,
"Good." Ben said as he spooned potatoes onto his plate. "Dad and I had fun at the batting cages and I got an A on my math homework."
"That's awesome buddy, you never mentioned that," Danny smiled. "Good job. Proud of ya."
"Thanks." Ben smiled. "I was pretty proud of myself."
"An A in math is something to be proud of." Lindsay smiled proudly. "We all know how I feel about it."
"What? You don't like math, Mom?" Ben teased as he poured gravy into his potatoes. "No way. Did anyone else know this?"
"This is brand new information!" Lucy deadpanned, scooping some green beans into her mouth.
"I mean, do we need to call someone about this?" Ben attempted to sound serious but the glint in his eyes gave him away. "Surely the president would need to know this, right?"
"You got an A in Math, not drama Benjamin… I don't know whether I love your sarcasm." Lindsay narrowed her eyes playfully before sticking her tongue out at him.
"I learn from the best." He shrugged as he dug into his second helping of potatoes. "i love you really, Mommy."
Lindsay rolled her eyes before reaching across the table and squeezing his hand. "You're a goofball."
"Luce?" Danny asked. "How was your day?"
"Mine was alright:" she shrugged. "Busy."
Danny nodded. "I hear ya there."
"My day was good!" Lydia said happily. "I got to colour a picture of a bunny and a vet. Then I wrote a whole sentence about a bunny. My teacher said my handwriting got good."
"Good job, baby." Danny smiled.
"When do we get to go on an adventure again?" Lydia asked. "Mommy did you get uncle Mac to give you some time to take us on an adventure? You promised you would…"
"Actually I'm glad you said that kiddo." Danny began, glancing at Lindsay who nodded at him. "We talked about that when Mommy and I went out on Saturday." He paused. "We didn't want to tell you guys before it was all confirmed but… Mommy got us some time off."
"What?" Lucy exclaimed.
"Really?" Ben asked.
"Yay!" Added Lydia enthusiastically.
Lindsay nodded. "Daddy and I have two weeks off over spring break."
"Seriously?" Lucy implored. "Are you joking?"
"We're deadly serious." Danny added. "And there's more."
"More?" Ben and Lucy looked at each other."What do you mean more?" Ben asked.
"Well." Danny began and looked to Lindsay.
"See, we were thinking." She started. "We didn't want to just spend our time here." She paused. "So for our adventure… Daddy and I booked some tickets today. To Montana."
Lucy, Ben and Lydia's jaws all dropped.
"We're going to go and visit Grandpa. All of us. For a whole week." Lindsay explained. "Then we'll have a week at home too. We thought it would be the best of both worlds then."
"Seriously?" Lydia asked.
"Serious." Lindsay nodded.
"This is awesome!" Ben cried. "Messer family vacation!"
Danny and Lindaay both smiled at each other,
"Yeah buddy, Messer family vacation." Danny nodded.
"Are you guys excited?" Lindsay asked.
"Excited?" Lucy implored, "Mom, yes!"
"Does Grandpa know?" Ben asked.
"He does." Danny nodded.
"How many sleeps?" Lydia chirped in.
"Lots yet." Danny explained. "It'll go down quick though."
Lydia nodded. "Can I be 'scused? I wanna go and pack."
"No, nobody is packing any suitcases yet." Danny laughed. "You're not excused. Eat."
"Ugh." Lydia sighed.
Danny laughed, turning his attention to Lindsay. "Told ya we should have waited to tell them."
"You started this." Lindsay rolled her eyes. "Anyway, enough about our Montana adventure... Lydia you've got ballet in an hour and Lucy, you've got gymnastics. More eating, less talking."
"Mommy's spoken." Danny smirked. "Come on troops, eat."
"Don't start." She scowled af her husband. "You're as bad as the kids. Worse some days."
"Ahh, but would you have me any other way?"
Reaching for her glass of water, Lindsay smiled as she glanced at her children as they ate their respective dinners in silence. She then turned back to Danny and reached across the table. She took his hand and squeezed it softly. "You know what, no, I honestly wouldn't change a single thing."
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Thats all for now! Hope you enjoyed it. Any thoughts would be wholeheartedly appreciated!! Thanks for reading!