The artist blushed brightly at being called a "beautiful wife" for the first time in her life. It was strange... it didn't feel any different, and yet it did. A silly title and a few signatures on a piece of paper left her feeling giddy and settled.

"Wanna hit up the west coast before we head back? SanFran has a crazy bridge to see and some of the best food in the country." She fiddled with their hands until her fingers were comfortable. "We could head down through Los Angeles, up through Cali and Oregon. Some of the best scenic routes on that drive. Maybe hit up my home state and we can stop by Seattle!"

She bounced a little, looking over at him and experiencing a moment of reflection. The first time she had spoken to this man had been in a car. He'd hotwired it in order for them to go off and try to save her roommate. She remembered how awkwardly he had tried to comfort her at first, and how sincere he had been after.

"... I really love you, you know. You're the most amazing person I think I have ever met."

If he hazarded a glance her way, he'd see the warm expression in her eyes. A soft smile on her face as she squeezed his hand.

"We can go anywhere, do anything, and I'll have a blast."

"Sounds like a plan." Saph said as she detailed her clearly already thought-out route up to her home city of Seattle. That was fine, he'd booked a cabin up there for them already, anyway.

He got to driving quickly, slowly glancing over as he felt eyes on him. Adoring eyes. He never thought he'd have someone look at him that way. He almost forgot to watch the road for a moment.

He smiled a bit as she spoke up. "I love you too... I dunno what you see in me, but I gotta say I'm glad you do. What ever I'm doing right I'm gonna hafta keep it up to make sure you stay around." He smiled and keyed in the coordinates for, well, roughly north, and followed the directions, which appeared to be jumping between four thousand different freeways until you found the one that went toward Washington.

On the way they would have to hit up her list of attractions, and interesting places. After all, they had to get a head start on all of the memories they would make together.

"I hear there is this legendary burger chain around here called Out and In! Wanna check it out?"

"He asks the pregnant woman if she wants to eat. ha!" Of course, she did. Incubating a human was hard.

They drove around hitting up attractions and places to eat like a ball in a pinball machine. When they hit the coast they stopped by Risney Land, because you can't just drive past the place of magic and dreams. She wasn't able to safely get on any of the rides, but that didn't stop her from wearing a dog-eared hat and snapping pictures with the friendly red shorts wearing dog mascot.

They stayed in a pirate themed room, which gave her flashbacks to pirate monkeys, but Saph helped distract her from the heebyjeebies well enough with a skimpy pirate costume and an eyepatch. She had to say, he didn't look half bad with long dreadlocked hair.

They headed out the next day with gifts galore. Shelby had convinced him to buy a hat for Elke, mostly because imagining the brooding teen sulking in it made her laugh.

The drive up to the Golden Gate Bridge was long but relaxing with just the two of them. She drove half the time, five miles under the speed limit and in the right lane and switched whenever Saph aggravated her by picking at her driving.

Parking and walking out onto the bridge was a breeze. It was a nice day too. Beautiful view in pretty much every direction. She snapped a few pictures of them there, shared a long kiss, and then led the charge to waddle back toward the car. She needed to pee!

The drive from there up the coast was also beautiful. She was more familiar with the area the closer they got to Washington, so she pointed out various places to stop.

When they hit the very tip of Oregon, she wanted to stop in a little fishing town. The population was hovering somewhere around 700, and pretty much everyone they encountered seemed to be in their 60's at the very least. It was pretty though surrounded on all sides tall dense tree growth. The town was settled in the nook between two mountains. It had two gas stations and one main grocery store.

She loved this particular town because of the atmosphere. Mist rolled through the higher trees and clung to the beaches. Even when it was sunny it was cool and breezy.

She dragged him to a secluded beach, clad in suits and with a large towel and sunhat on her head. The sand was literally packed with sand dollars that crunched underfoot. Gulls and crows skulked close to the water on the hunt and farther down the beach on an old abandoned dock a pack of seals were napping the in sun. She wanted to find a place close to the water, but far enough away to avoid the birds.

A lot happened in those first couple of days. Like a couple on a mission they hit up Risney, made pirate whoopy, hung out on beaches and cool bridges, and much more! It was pretty great, aside from Shelby not knowing how speed limits work. He actually likes driving in California a lot. Everyone wanted to go fast, which worked really well for people who like to go fast. For Shelby, not so much. People rocketed around her like she was a cone in an obstacle course.

The trip through Cali was looooong. There was a lot to see, though. Once again it reminded him just how small his old home was. There were vast deserts, huge mountains, rolling hills, and great plains in this country he called home, and all he'd ever spent his time in was a relatively tiny box. A crowded box, but a tiny one. Here he was, though, broadening his horizons. He looked over to Shelby, who was concentrating on driving again, and smiled.

"That's gotta be 300 cars that have passed us, now. I think that's a record. You think they take records for something like that?" He grinned a bit, and looked out the window at the view of the ocean. Getting up higher north the freeway swayed more toward the scenic oceans sights, and the scenery slowly switched from browns to greens.

They stopped a lot, Shelby had to rest stop more often on account of baby. When they finally made it to their couple day stop, Saph marveled at the small cabin set up in the middle of the tiny town a mutated stones throw away from the beach. It was the furthest away someone could possibly be from NYC. It was nice. They could relax, make some grub, walk down to the beach, and not have to worry about someone almost hitting them in a crosswalk, or someone trying to mug them... It was just quiet.

After the first day he looked over to her and stated plainly. "You know, I think I could live in a place like this for a week before I went completely insane." Yeah, it was a bit too quiet for him to live in. "We gonna look for a place of our own when we get back?" He lay upon the beach towel they'd bought, staring at the clear summer skies. "How much money did you end up with, anyhow? You know, after all those paintins?"

She chuckled at him, stretched out beside her husband with her arms propping her up. "I'd give myself a few months before lacks of human contact started to get to me." She was the antisocial one of their marriage, after all. "We should come here every year. Make it our anniversary spot."

He mentioned houses and she whipped her phone up out of nowhere and had about a dozen real estate tabs open on her browser. She grinned guiltily as she draped herself partly over his chest so she could show him some of the houses she had been looking at. If he had a sharp eye, he would notice that most of them were fairly expensive.

"Already been lookin' love."

She tapped away a bit more while he asked her about her finances. In an offhanded kind of way, she pursed her lips, scrolled through her phone to her bank app, and opened.

"I had to pay off my student loans and a few other things, but I've still got a good about. About two hundred and fifty thousand give or take a bit after bills." She returned to scrolling through houses and names of real estate agents without a second thought about the money. She had always been decent at saving instead of splurging.

He supposed he wasn't surprised when Shelby revealed that she was already looking at houses. She was more of a planner than he had ever been. He liked that about her, it was something he sorta needed in his life.

They'd brought some bottles of water with them on account of the sunny weather, and he opted to take a drink as she pulled out her phone to show him her bank app.

When he saw and heard the totals she had in her bank, the water left his mouth quickly via surprise spit. He coughed and choked as he rolled away, fighting off the shock and sudden pain of water in his nose. After a moment he looked up, his eyes wide.

"You... We... We? We have two hundred and fifty THOUSAND dollars? No wait, I saved ten after the ring, so... Two sixty... I have... I mean, I ain't even ever SEEN a bank account with that much money on it..." He stared at her for a moment... Where did she?

Oh... All those paintings... Roach had bought them a house... If it wasn't strangely depressing and terrifying to think about it, it was actually hilarious. After all the effort the big evil bug went through to ruin her, he'd nearly singlehandedly paid off her student loans and given them half a house worth of money after...

"So... Uh... When we looking? When we get back?" He looked at the real estate agents with a blank look on his face... They had 250,000 dollars... He'd never had more than 10 in his life... Hell, before the mansion 200 bucks was living life large. The money had him staring at her like some sort of alien.

Shelby really probably should have patted his back and offered him a napkin, or maybe worried about the water in his nose or... or something.

"PPFFTAHAHAAHAHAH!"

Instead, she was laughing at him. On her back, legs kicking with her arms around her middle. Chortling and snorting at all his pain and suffering. She even cried a little.

After that subsided and she rolled over on her side to deal with aftermath cramps, she couldn't help but grin at him. "I think he faster we get a place the better. Gotta set up the baby's room and settle in before I pop it out and our lives get turned upside down."

They still didn't know what they were having. The first ultrasound hadn't been clear enough, so they were waiting until it was a little bigger to try again.

"I'd like a bigger place... one we can grow into instead of having to move out in a few years. Like... four or five bedrooms. An attic. a basement. Attached garage. All the shmancy stuff." She propped her head up on her hand, fully hoarding the beach towel now.

Her smile was full of adoration when she looked at him again. "What are you looking for in a place? What's your dream home, babe?"

He gave her an indignant look as she laughed at him. He leaned over her as she recovered, staring down at her as she talked about the house she wanted. He couldn't help but concede a wistful smile at her fictional dream home. He sat back when she turned it on him, and he looked up to think about it.

"I dunno... I never thought i'd get this far, honestly. Never thought about a white picket. Nah, I'm good with what you want, as long as you're there, and happy with it..." He paused for a second, and looked over to her. "But I want a me room, you know? Place for the collection... Maybe a basement. My very own Owlbear cave(this, of course, a reference to the popular vigilante super hero comic. "Owlbear Man")." He grinned a bit. So he did want some things.

"But we can get a fixer upper, too... I mean, we got an insane downpayment, so that helps, but I don't mind getting the best potential with that money, and making it better together, you know?" It was a romantic thought, but he was willing to put in the work to make it a reality. Also, he had plenty of time inbetween working for the NYPD and X-Men missions.

"I mean, we gotta also make room for all twenty of the kids, too,"

"Oooh, fixer-upper! I likey." She could get her hand's dirty painting and really making the house their own. "I will concede you an Owlbear Man cave, so long as you agree not to start wearing capes or digging under the foundation." She paused, "No Gull boy sidekicks, either."

She shot him a dirty look at the twenty kids comment. "I thought we agreed no more than fifteen!" She shot back. "My uterus isn't a congo line for babies!" Her glare developed into laugher only a moment later, and she laid back to enjoy the rest of the day with him.

--

"That was the worst decision I have ever made," Shelby stated loudly and miserably to the whole two of them in the car, while she sat in the driver's seat. "I am never letting you convince me to do that on a beach ever again." She shot her husband a dirty look from the sides of her eyes, a full-on pout in pace on her lips. She was slightly sunburned and itchy, and her hair was stringy from ocean water.

They were pulling off the freeway into Seattle, which was just as congested as she remembered it. She was back in her element. "First stop is the hotel, a shower, food, and then we can go out and about." Someone honked at her a millisecond after the light turned green. She stuck her hands out the window to double flip them off before moving.

Two hours later she was fresh-faced and belly full.

"Well, what should we do first oh beloved husband of mine?"

Saph pretend sulked as she proposed her rules on the OwlbearMan cave, pausing when she stressed the no Gullboy rule. "Eh... What about Gull Girl?" Yes, part of him really did have his mind set on fighting crime with his adopted daughter as a team. He honestly wasn't sure what Shelby thought of it.

He chuckled as she protested his high baby count number. "Fine, we'll settle for... Three... Three sound good?"

---

"We are definitely gunna do that again some time." He spoke at the same time she rejected the idea, and then looked off, ignoring the state of her hair and skin innocently. "Ah, yeah, s'what I was thinkin." He laughed out loud when she flipped off the impatient driver. They arrived at their hotel not too long after, and got all cleaned up. It was strange, not having to get up to fight crime in the morning... Or sit in front of a security camera. Honestly, if the present company wasn't around he'd have gone bonkers by now. He sort of had during his last "Vacation", hadn't he?

Well, everything was better now. He looked to her as she asked him what he wanted to do next. Much better.

"I'll give you one guess and- SURPRISE ATTACK" He rushed forward and grabbed her up, hopping toward the bed for a feisty fade to black.