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Severide pants as he runs, Griffin beside him.
Normally, he’d go running with Casey, but it’s Saturday and Ben didn’t want to run, and so instead he gets to bond with Griffin, instead, which is just as great. He loves running with either of the boys or Casey.
“So, bud, how’s school? Got any crushes you wanna tell me about?” he asks, as they turn the first corner away from the house.
“Not a chance,” he says, shaking his head and trying not to pant to much as they run. “You’d just tease me.”
“That’s fun part about being a dad, you can’t take that away from me,” Severide counters, teasingly. He and Casey typically just let the boys come to them, though they enjoy speculating about their interests and love teasing the boys about some of their possibilities. Especially now that Griffin’s in high school.
“You said I didn’t have to share if I didn’t want,” Griffin retorts, groaning slightly because Severide’s pace might be just a bit too fast.
He slows slightly as they make another turn.
“We mean that, but I – I could give great advice –”
“It took you five years to tell dad you liked him, and you didn’t even do it – he just kissed you and you just went with it,” Griffin counters, tease in his voice.
“Alright, smartass,” Severide says, with an eyeroll. “It might interest you to know that I used to be quite the ladies’ man.”
“It doesn’t,” Griffin retorts with a cheeky grin, before he has a burst to run ahead, clearly wanting to beat him.
Unfortunately for Griffin, Severide’s much faster from years of running. “Nice try, bud,” he pants as he catches up to him less than one house-length later.
He huffs but says nothing focusing on the run and avoiding the people walking the other way by running around them.
“I’m just saying that I could help –” he starts when Griffin doesn’t reply.
Griffin rolls his eyes, still breathing heavy. “Five years, dad. Five years.”
“There were – it was – I’m not usually that bad, and to be fair, it’s not my fault your dad didn’t realize I was flirting with him.”
The look of exasperation on Griffin’s face is enough for Severide to know that he’s never going to convince his kid that he’s not that bad at flirting or with relationships when he thinks about how obvious things should’ve been with him and Casey. Especially since he had been flirting with Casey the entire time and he just… ignored it.
It was not his fault. That was all on Casey, and he’s sticking to that theory.
“Is it his fault or were you just really bad at it?” Griffin teases as they slow to head to the back of the house where Casey and Ben are hanging out.
“I’m not bad at it, tell him, Case!” Severide says, as he sees Casey and Ben with photos and a book open that they’re clearly working on.
“Before I answer that, I want to know what it is,” Casey states, giving him a questioning look. “Because there are certain things that a kid –”
“Not that,” Severide interjects when Griffin makes a gagging face with a muttered, “Gross.”
“Then?”
“Flirting.”
Casey tilts his head in clear confusion.
“Dad was trying to claim he could help me if I had a crush and give me advice, but it took him five years to tell you and –”
“Oh,” Casey says, getting it. “To be fair to your dad, the first couple of years we were just friends with no romantic feelings.”
Severide snorts. “I don’t think that was true… we just didn’t realize the feelings were different.”
Casey looks like he wants to argue the point, but then, huffs. “You know what, kiddo, I think you’re right – we’re probably not the best to go for dating advice.”
“I disagree,” Severide states. “I give great romantic advice.”
“Going to you for advice on romance is like going to Mouch for fitness advice,” Casey teases.
Both boys burst out laughing.
“I think you’re wrong,” Severide huffs. “But clearly, I’m outvoted here.”
He eyes the photos and book as Ben uses glue on the back of a photo and sticks it on page that reads Dads and Babies. The photo is amongst the pictures of Andy, Casey and himself holding Ben as a baby. The other page has pictures of them holding Griffin as a baby. “What’s this?”
Casey hums. “Ben found the box of photos that their Aunt Melissa dropped off the other day and we decided to make a scrapbook.”
Ben smiles as he looks up at him. “Look how tiny we were!”
“You’re still tiny, bud,” Severide teases causing Casey and Griffin to laugh.
“I’m not tiny, anymore! I’m big enough to ride the big rides at Six Flags now,” Ben counters as he sifts through some photos that they’ve taken since the boys came into their custody including one from last summer, which is taken in front of the American Eagle ride.
“No, no, you’re so right – you’re not tiny anymore,” Severide assures him.
“You’re just always going to be tiny compared to the rest of us,” Griffin teases.
“You don’t know that,” Ben huffs. “I could grow up taller than you.”
“Yeah, right,” Griffin says, sarcastically.
Casey laughs as the boys begin to argue about their heights and he shares an amused look with Severide, who leans over and kisses him.
“Maybe we can all work on it together.”
Casey smiles, nose crinkling. “Only after you take a shower.”
Severide rolls his eyes. “Fine. Fine. I’ll be back.”
“Good.”
***
It’s actually kind of fun going through old photos.
Not just the pictures they’ve taken since they’ve had custody of the boys, but pictures from before – before the boys were born, before Andy was married, since the academy. Even some of Andy and Severide in high school.
But it’s the pictures of them and Andy that makes him the most nostalgic. He’s been gone a long time now, but he’s still a presence in their lives as the boys grow older, looking more and more like him.
When he thinks about Griffin’s teasing that he isn’t as great as he thinks he is at flirting, he could almost imagine Andy teasing the exact same thing. In fact, he used to tease that every time he got shot down when the three of them would go out while he was dating Heather.
Andy and Casey loved to tease him that he wasn’t as smooth as he’d liked to think (which, of course, he disagrees with).
“Hey, look at this,” Casey says, nudging him and handing him a photo.
It’s a photo of the three of them, first day at the academy. Andy had seen Casey all alone, and looking nervous, which makes sense. He’d been a lot shyer back then. Less confident, maybe a little afraid of someone bringing up his mother. It didn’t help that he was all alone in the world.
Andy had nudged Severide and told him that he looked like a lost puppy and Severide had grinned and said and you can’t resist adopting a stray.
That was all it took before Andy was pulling him towards Casey and ironically, his future.
He looks up at Casey, who’s grinning at him. “Never thought we’d end up here, eh?”
“Definitely not, but I couldn’t imagine being happier anywhere else.”
He kisses his cheek, and Casey moves to kiss his lips. Quick, but sweet with their boys sitting across from them working on the book. “Me either.”
“Good.”
***
By the time the book is finished, they’ve told at least a dozen silly stories about Andy, their friendship, and the boys when they were little.
Like the first time they babysat and somehow ended up making a complete mess with their little paints that Casey thought would be fun to paint their parents a picture while they were gone. Or the time Severide had gotten them a little too hyped up on sugar on purpose just to drive Heather a little crazy, but they didn’t make it home that night (decided to spend the night elsewhere) and Severide had to deal with it instead.
They told stories about their first day at the academy, at 51, them celebrating becoming lieutenants. They talked about the wedding and the silly things that they teased Andy with and the prank he replied with (pretending to runaway to Vegas) which caused Casey to tease him about Brittany.
It’s after the boys have gone to bed and Casey’s coming down the stairs after checking on them, that he finds him flipping through the book.
The book of memories of their lives together. From friends to fiancés, from friends to parents.
He still misses Andy, sometimes, but he knows even with his teasing sometimes about locking them in a closet when they’d fight (Casey had really grown in confidence enough to stand up to Severide and hold his own) to get them to figure their shit out that he wouldn’t be here with Casey if he was still here.
… and the life they’ve built over the years has been one of the happiest times of his life. He can’t remember ever being this happy with anyone else.
Though, sometimes, he wonders what would’ve happened if Andy had done that.
“You okay?” Casey questions as he sits beside him on the couch, an arm around Severide’s shoulders. “You seem a little… lost in thought.”
Severide smiles and nods. “Yeah, I just – all the stories today makes me wonder about things.”
“Like would we be here if things… were different? If Andy were still here, would we have gotten together?” Casey questions. “If he’d ever follow through with his joke about locking us in a closet?”
Severide laughs. “Yeah, exactly. If that would’ve made a difference.”
Casey hums. “I’d like to think that it could’ve made a difference. There’s a lot of what ifs involved… we wouldn’t have been fighting for nearly a year. Vargas would’ve gone to your team, so we might’ve still had Mills…”
“Andy would’ve pranked Mills so hard for … what was it you told him – don’t be a crow – being a crow,” Severide offers. “Though, I don’t know that Mills would’ve joined Squad, then, part of the reason…”
“I probably wouldn’t have tried anything with Dawson,” Casey states. “He would’ve told me that it was dumb to rebound like that after losing Hallie. That I was rushing into things stupidly and I needed time to heal over something like that.”
Severide laughs. “Is that why you agreed with Griffin that he shouldn’t take dating advice from us?”
“Yes, absolutely,” Casey states. “Between some of chaos you got up to after Renee and the stupidity with Pridgen’s Ex-Wife and Dawson, neither of us can really give the best dating advice.”
“But now we’re dating each other,” Severide counters.
“Yeah, by accident,” Casey teases.
“Accident?” Severide scoffs. “How – what – are you serious?”
Casey laughs and shakes his head. “We fell in love completely by accident. We were so focused on the boys and our family, and we just… fell into being together. Something felt right about us being together, and it made it easy to fall in love – just by sharing a life and a bed and kids. But it wasn’t intentional. It’s not like we actively pursued each other –”
“Excuse you, I was definitely pursuing you,” Severide interjects. “Didn’t we talk about this months ago? I absolutely was flirting with you, trying to get you interested and for the record, it worked.”
“It did not –”
“Yes, it did,” Severide counters, closing the book and focusing on him. “My flirting with you absolutely contributed to your interest, you just didn’t do anything out of stupid fear that I didn’t like you that way.”
“I think that proves my point,” Casey teases, running his hands through Severide’s hair as he shifts into his lap. “I didn’t realize what you were doing –”
“Because you were an oblivious idiot,” Severide says, eyeing Casey’s new positioning, curiously. “You –”
Casey kisses him, still soft, still sweet, still short. He pulls back, just enough that their noses are still brushing.
“Just because it was accident, doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing, Sev.” He kisses his nose, and lets his hands glide down his face to his chest. “In fact, I think it’s a great thing, it makes our story that much more fun. Falling in love and not realizing it while raising our boys makes for a hell of a love story. And I can’t wait for all of the inevitable teasing at our wedding.”
Severide laughs, staring into his eyes. “Yeah, I guess it will. People are going to love teasing the hell out of us at the reception.”
“Oh, absolutely,” Casey agrees. “But it’ll make it much more fun – won’t it?”
“Absolutely,” Severide agrees. “And I can’t wait to marry you.”
“Me either.”
“Good.”