This fic I originally posted in another fandom but I think, really, this was always just a Pacey and Joey story in my head. So here is their version.

It will be 10 Chapters - Updated weekly

Setting: Canon up until around season 3. AU from there. Joey never got on the boat.

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"I've got a surprise for you," Dawson beams, tapping my nose with the tip of his finger.

There is a spring in his step as he heads for the kitchen and resumes peeling potatoes.

"Yay, you know how much I love surprises," I deadpan, rolling my eyes. Surprises were at the bottom of my favorites list, Dawson's surprises were notorious. Notoriously bad.

I save the document on my laptop, clip it shut, and rise from the couch.

My bare feet pad across the hot floorboards.

"Okay, spill," I glare at him.

"Nope," Dawson grins, focusing on the potatoes

I lean against the pantry door. Waiting. Feet tapping.

"You can groan all you want Josephine Leery. I'm not going to tell you."

I shrug, open the fridge and pull out a bottle of Pino Gris. The bottle is lovely and icy, dripping condensation over my fingers. I run my wet fingers over my neck, pour a large glass and take a delicious sip.

The cool air had been on the fritz for days, getting warmer and warmer until with a grumble and some taps, it finally died, right in the middle of summer. The 'guy' was under the pump; he couldn't get here for at least a week. It felt like a sauna. I reach for the windows to see if they would wind out any further, trying desperately to get some air-flow through our apartment.

"It's not that bad, we've got ice, we've got friends, we'll sit on the balcony. Once the sun goes down, it will cool off," Dawson was exceedingly chipper for a Friday, which of course, made me all the more cautious about his concept of a surprise.

I collect the plates and head for the balcony, setting the places.

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I sit with my feet on the chair beside me, wine in hand laughing with Jen.

Jack and Doug's kids Ella and Lexie are playing under the table with the box of toys I'd brought in from the spare room.

"I swear to God, Joey, I'm going to kill his mother," Jen whispers kill so the kids didn't hear.

"If she comes into my house again and secretly cleans while babysitting I don't know what I'm going to do. I found my plastics drawer the other day completely rearranged. She'd taken out each one RE-CLEANED it and then put it back, in perfectly fucked up little piles," covering her mouth when she realizes she forgot to whisper the 'fuck'.

I snort.

"Thankfully Gail only comes up for the holidays. Of course, I love Gail, I do. But she can be a lot sometimes. Granted, I don't think she's ever re-arranged my draws… yet anyway."

Jen waves her hand at me, "you won the mother in law jackpot and you know it."

For what Gail lacked in draw-cleaning harassment she made up for in incessant questions about the arrival of grandchildren. Her desire to become a grandparent was fierce and it laced every single contact we had with her. Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthday dinners and obligatory weekly phone calls.

"Have you got any good news to share?" she'd ask, every time , with an anticipatory glint in her eye.

Without realizing it, her question poked fingers into the open wound, twisting.

If we had any news, we would certainly share it. So I spend much of my time at the moment doing my best to avoid Gail at all costs. I needed a bit of breathing room.

Dawson, Jack, and Doug chat in the kitchen while Dawson stirs pots, chops vegetables into minuscule cubes, and Jamie Oliver's dinner with his usual flair. Dawson was many things, but he was always the host with the most. He loved any opportunity to have friends around, show off his developing cooking skills and the chance to relax and drink with friends. He loved to play happy family. Smile. Show off. He was the perfect husband. Wasn't he?

I certainly was far from the perfect wife.

When he was home, he cooked mostly extravagant meals. Lobster, homemade egg pasta with truffle oil, duck in a myriad of ways. I don't know where the latest food obsession has come from, but like everything, when Dawson focuses on something it becomes an all-consuming passion.

When he was away in LA or working late nights in his office, I barely could be bothered to cook the toast before eating it. I was known at times to stand in the kitchen and eat dry ramen over the sink to catch the crumbs, with wine.

Always with wine.

"Has he been home more lately?" Jen questions, tilting her head, watching me.

"No, not really, with the movie due for release soon, he's in the office until at least ten most nights. Sometimes he doesn't come home at all and sleeps there. Not that I mind, more room in the bed," I shrug.

Jen gives me a sideways glance.

"Really, it's all good," I reassure her. Pouring us another wine. "Don't look at me like that!"

"Uh-huh," she nods

Dawson had been busy readying the release of his second feature film. The first had opened to mixed reviews. It was thrown together on an extremely low budget, which he naturally blamed for its poor reception. But this time he had secured a big producer, with even bigger funds, so Dawson was convinced that this would be his 'big hit.' He thrived on it, the creative process, the building of this film from an idea to the screen. He threw everything he had into being a film director. He was, and would always be, a film director first, a husband second.

"Okay, so who is the mystery guest?" Jen queries, eyebrows raised.

"No clue, he won't tell me. He's running around like its Santa Claus," the kids pop their heads out from under the table looking excitedly at me.

"Sorry kiddos, don't think Santa will be coming here for dinner tonight," I grin. "But, who knows what Uncle Dawson has in store?"

The kids duck back under the table.

Jen looks at me. Into me.

"Any news?" she is tentative.

I breathe out slowly.

"Got my period yesterday," I mutter quietly, peering through the glass panels to watch Dawson in the kitchen.

Sadness fills Jen's eyes; she reaches her hand out onto mine and squeezes it. I know she wants to hug me but doesn't want to make a scene.

I blink quickly. Clearing the sudden welling in my eyes.

"I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I'm okay. I'm just… done, I just … " I can't finish the sentence and look out across the city. The spectacular balmy night, sun dipping, tapping the tops of the buildings of Boston.

It had been our 4th IVF round. Unsuccessful.

Three years of this. Yearning, aching, desperate to have a child. All for nothing.

Disappointment envelopes me. Warms me like a blanket. I'm used to it now.

I'd never really been that bothered about kids, especially in my 20s. It just seemed like a future that I couldn't envision for myself. Then suddenly, 31 hit. And it hit me like a freight train: the need, the deep need to have a child.

Dawson lept at the idea. Of course! A little family, he could see it instantly. Suddenly screenplay notes started popping up on the coffee table about happy families, babies. But after a year of trying, suddenly it wasn't so fun anymore. It was appointments, and injections, and mood swings and pressure. Constant worry. Financial worry. Sex wasn't fun anymore. It was loaded. It became tainted with the pressure, the expectation.

We hadn't had sex in months.

Combining being a burgeoning director with the strains of trying for a family took its toll quickly. Half of his time was spent in LA, the other half in Boston. He wanted me there, to be by his side to be at premiers and functions, he wanted to get his face out there, to be known. But that was the LA scene, we'd tried living there, but it just wasn't for me. So we came back to Boston, and I delved back into my writing.

He had his life there.

I had my life here.

We were attempting to coexist somewhere in the middle.

Some weeks we would barely cross each other's paths, except when he'd fly back for the IVF rounds, then disappear again in a cloud of jet smoke.

But like tonight, Dawson was putting on a show, a guise that we were the stable, fated couple who ate delicious food each night and laughed with our friends. Not the lonely truth.

We were barely a couple, and we couldn't seem to make a family. It was eating away at us.

Constantly gnawing.

"I suspect that's why he thought this impromptu dinner party was a good idea."

Jen nods, "Distraction technique."

"Yeah, just not sure if he's trying to distract himself or me? Both?" I shrug.

"Can we go out to lunch tomorrow? Talk alone?" Jen asks.

I nod. Yes, that would be a much better place to talk. Not that I had anything much left in me to talk about it anymore. I was tired of it all, so tired.

"Joey," Dawson yells from the kitchen, "Where is the dressing for the salad?"

"In the fridge," I yell back.

"No, it's not!"

"Yes, it is!"

Jen smirks, knowing. She's married, she gets it.

"Let me look," interjects Jack, always the peacekeeper. Sensing that I was not moving from my chair to come and search for said dressing, which I was certain was going to be in the fridge.

"Here it is," he passes it to Dawson as I watch through the glass. Dawson smiles at him but wouldn't turn to look at me.

Ahh, married life, such a wondrous land.

There is a knock at the door. Jen and I look at each other, eyebrows raised.

"I'll get it" Dawson sing-songs and heads to the door. Everyone exchanges questioning glances.

I had to admit, I was curious.

Dawson opens the door, and it takes a moment before I could see. He's hugging someone, and they're slapping each other on the back. He's tall, broad, dark brown hair, cut short. And then I see it.

Clearly.

Pacey Witter.

Jen looks at me, eyes like saucers, "Fuck," she stutters, nearly spitting out her wine.

I can't help but stare, like I've just seen a ghost.