A/N: Sadly, this is the final chapter of this story. I want to again thank deathlyhallows123 for the prompt this story was based on. And I also want to thank all my readers, and especially my reviewers. You guys are fantastic and hearing your thoughts never fails to make my day. Enjoy the end of Bringing Up Baby!

Million Dollar Baby

"All right, class." Miss Tutweiller clapped her hands together, smiling brightly. "Today is the day you've all been waiting for: the end of the baby project and the recommencement of your social lives!" Instead of greeting this announcement with enthusiasm, a good portion of the students' faces held sad looks. The rest were asleep. "What's wrong?" Miss Tutweiller asked. "Aren't you all looking forward to going home and getting some sleep?"

"I... guess so." Bailey hedged, keeping her eyes focused on the baby in front of her.

"It's not that we don't want to end the project, Miss Tutweiller, but we've kind of gotten attached to our babies, you know, and once you take them back we're going to miss them, and things aren't going to be the same, and-... and, I don't want to end the project!" Addison buried her mouth in her hands, cutting herself off. Woody reached over and rubbed her back comfortingly.

Miss Tutweiller frowned. "Now, now. They're only dolls, girls."

"Maybe to you!" London pouted argumentatively, sticking her index finger in her fishbowl and swirling it around playfully.

Miss Tutweiller rolled her eyes in exasperation. Grabbing the cardboard box the dolls had come in, she sat down at her desk. "Now, when I call your names, I would like you and your partner to hand in your dolls. I'll do a quick evaluation of their condition, and then give you your final grades after I've read your papers. Okay? First up: Woody and Addison."

Reluctantly, Woody and Addison stood, approaching her desk. Addison gave Linka one last squeeze before handing her to Woody, who gently kissed the baby's forehead. "Goodbye Linka."

He handed the baby to Miss Tutweiller, who quickly checked the doll over for damages. Upon turning her upside-down to inspect her back, the doll's head fell off into the cardboard box.

"I'm gonna miss how she does that!" Addison sobbed, leaning against Woody for comfort.

He pulled her into his arms. "Me too... Me too."

Miss Tutweiller marked the baby's condition as "unchanged," her eyes quickly skimming their two-page paper.

"So what do you think the main lesson of this project is?" Addison asked, looking over the screen of her laptop at Woody, who was burping a fussy Linka over his shoulder.

"I dunno..." Woody said, still concentrating on the crying baby. "I guess that you have to be patient with your kids. You have to learn about them, find out from them what they need and what they like... right?" The baby burped but continued to wail, and Woody began to sing to her quietly.

"Right." Addison smiled. Biting her lip thoughtfully, she began to type. "'The most important aspect of childrearing is establishing a bond with your child..."

Miss Tutweiller smiled at the upset pair. "Woody, Addison... This paper looks very well-thought out. Good job. Next up, Zack and Maya."

Maya gave Julian a quick hug, then handed him to Zack, who did the same. Exchanging a nervous glance, they handed the baby over for inspection. They both breathed a sigh of relief as Miss Tutweiller looked him over and nodded approvingly. "Very good, guys." As she placed him in the cardboard box, he began to make terrible mechanical screeching sounds. "Hold it."

Already returning to their seats, Zack and Maya froze in their tracks, turning slowly.

"What happened to this baby?"

Maya cringed. "Uh... you can read about it in the paper?"

"How are we going to tell Miss Tutweiller that we let an infant fall off a cruise ship and into the ocean?" Maya asked nervously, continuing to shake droplets of seawater out of the baby's torso into a towel.

"Well, we're not going to say it like that..." Zack sat on his bed, hands poised over the keyboard of his laptop. "We'll put a positive spin on it. Now... how do we put a positive spin on the fact that we let an infant fall off a cruise ship and into the ocean?"

Maya thought long and hard. "Well... Mr. Moseby rescued him, and we helped rescue Moseby... It's not like we stood by and watched helplessly."

Zack tapped his lower lip. "Not bad, but not enough." he said. "No, wait... I've got it." He stretched out his fingers and began to type.

"Parents are the primary caretakers of the child, but their responsibilities extend beyond keeping the child fed and clothed. Parents need to create a network of support for their child, surrounding them with an environment of love and safety. During the course of our project, our son ended up in a dire situation, and his godfather risked life and limb to help him. Julian's friends and family were constantly there for him to keep him safe and happy in any situation, and that's the kind of stability a child needs."

Maya looked over his shoulder, jaw dropping in admiration. "Oh my gosh, Zack, that's... really good. It's not even a lie."

Grinning, he made a show of cracking his fingers. "I know."

Miss Tutweiller skimmed their paper and cleared her throat. "Ahem. And by our son ended up in a dire situation, do you mean, our son ended up in the ocean?"

Zack winced. "Yeah..."

Miss Tutweiller shook her head, marking down the baby's condition as "waterlogged." "You know, kids, I was expecting things like this. Accidents happen. It's how you deal with them that matters." She smiled at the moaning doll. "The fact that you even managed to recover him from the ocean is actually pretty impressive. At any rate, this looks like a very good paper."

Zack smirked at Maya and raised his eyebrows. She rolled her eyes and looked away, blushing.

"Cody, Bailey, you're up." Miss Tutweiller continued. "You two must be happy the project is over."

Bailey hugged Joseph for the last time, stroking his plastic hair, while Cody said goodbye to Caleb. "I don't know, Miss Tutweiller." Cody answered. "It was a good project."

"Yeah," Bailey agreed quietly. "We really learned some important things." She handed Joseph over, an apologetic look on her face. "I'm sorry I snapped at you about being in our business the other day, Miss Tutweiller. You were right. And you're more than just a teacher to us. You're a good mentor and a good friend."

Miss Tutweiller smiled, placing a hand over her chest. "Bailey... Thank you." Clearing her throat emotionally, she took the doll. "Ahem. Any problems with these two?" she said, looking them over and seeing no damage.

"No." Bailey replied, grinning sideways at Cody. "Caleb's batteries were loose, but we fixed him."

"Wonderful." Miss Tutweiller deposited their simulators in the box with the other students', marking their condition as "good." "Knowing you two, I'm sure I'll find your paper excellent, as always." Briefly, she glanced over their report.

Cody paused in the doorway, watching silently as Bailey cradled a whimpering Joseph, caressing his plastic hands and humming an unrecognizable tune under her breath. It wasn't hard to imagine that Joey was a real baby, that Bailey was his real mother... that she and Cody were really married. The rush of tenderness in his heart as he imagined the scenario surprised even him- he wasn't supposed to be feeling this way. They were only in high school. They weren't even together.

She looked up to see him standing there and sent him a smile that weakened his knees. "Hey." she said, checking her watch. "You're right on time."

Cody entered her room, shutting the door behind him. "I'm a man of many faults, but tardiness actually isn't one of them." he said with a self-deprecating grin. Gently, he set Caleb in the blanket-lined shoebox that served as a crib and held up the warmed bottle he'd brought. "I know Joey usually eats around this time."

"Perfect. Thank you." Bailey agreed, handing him Joseph. Cody fed the bottle into the baby's mouth and he began to drink. Bailey patted the bedspread beside her. "Why don't you sit?"

Obediently, Cody sat. Bailey grabbed her laptop from the desk and opened up the paper they'd started working on the night before. "I think that the most important thing we learned was... the importance of teamwork."

"Yeah. We got a lot more accomplished as a family than we did apart." Cody agreed.

"And we learned that if we trust each other... we might surprise ourselves." Bailey finished softly, sharing a glance with him. She paused, hands poised over the keyboard, not typing.

Cody frowned at the distant look on her face. "Something on your mind, Bails?"

Bailey shrugged. "I'm just going to miss the kids, that's all. And..."

"And what?"

She blushed. "I... I guess I'm going to miss... hanging out with you. Like this."

He raised his eyebrows. "We can still hang out after the project, Bails." he reminded her. "We will still hang out."

"I... I know..." Bailey stuttered quickly. "It's just, we won't be..."

"Married?" Cody finished with a half-smile.

"Yeah." Looking away quickly, she resumed typing.

Cody sucked in a deep breath. "I'm gonna miss this too." he confessed. "It... feels right, doesn't it? You know... us?"

"Being together?" Bailey swallowed hard. "I... I don't know. Maybe we're just... used to each other. You know, since we... dated for so long."

Cody looked away from her. "I don't think I'll ever be used to you, Bails."

Judging from the way her mouth had dried up, Bailey admitted to herself that she wasn't exactly unaffected by him either. She cleared her throat self-consciously, changing the subject. "So I still owe you for winning that bet. What do you want?" She blushed as she realized what a horribly open-ended offer she'd just made.

But he didn't give her a hard time. "Don't worry about it. It wasn't an official bet." he said kindly, waving her off.

"Yes, it was." Bailey argued, her pride getting the better of her. "Let no one say Bailey Pickett welches on a bet."

"'Welches on a bet'?" Cody repeated. "I didn't realize I was married to Marlon Brando..."

Bailey giggled. "Well you are." A thought struck her. "Turn around."

Giving her a weird look, Cody slowly shifted until his back was to her. "Okay-" He jumped about a foot when she rested her hands on his shoulders. "Hey!"

Bailey pressed her thumbs along the edges of his spine. "Relax."

After a moment he realized what she was doing, but his stiff posture didn't slacken. "Bails, you don't have to-"

Bailey gently applied more pressure to the area around his neck. "Is that okay?" she interrupted, referring to the change in pressure.

"Yeaah." he breathed, closing his eyes, unable to help himself.

Bailey didn't know what had possessed her to do it, to reciprocate the massage she had won from him in their last bet... didn't know why it felt so right to put her hands on him, or why her breathing had suddenly become so stilted.

Somehow she could tell he wasn't faring much better; she could feel him shaking, the slight tremble of his muscles under her fingers. She ran her hands up his shoulder blades and began kneading his shoulders. He moved the hand that wasn't holding Joseph up to his own shoulder, resting his hand on top of hers. The position was strangely intimate. Bailey couldn't lie to herself anymore. She loved Cody. She wanted him. "Do you want me to stop?" she whispered, bringing her lips close to his ear.

"No." he answered in a low, rough voice that sent chills through her. But he picked up her hand and pulled on it gently, twisting around. Once they were facing each other, he let go of her fingers, instead using his free hand to cup her cheek. He paused. She smiled in assent.

Guiding her face with his hand, he leaned in and touched his lips to hers fleetingly. Their lips brushed again, once, twice. Shifting closer to her, he moved in to press their lips together more fully... And Caleb began to scream.

They jerked apart, grinning ruefully, and Bailey got up to retrieve Caleb from his crib. "Oh, Caleb." she sighed. "I guess parenting doesn't leave a whole lot of time for romance..."

"Yeah, let's put that in the paper." Cody joked. He put an arm around her and Caleb as she sat back down beside him. "The project will be over tomorrow. We'll have all the time in the world for romance."

The words sent a shiver through her. "So we're back together?" she asked cautiously.

Cody pressed his lips together. "It's all I've wanted since we broke up."

"Me too." This time Bailey leaned in and closed the gap between them, bursting, ecstatic with happiness, the paper all but forgotten.

Miss Tutweiller frowned, looking over the last few paragraphs. "This looks... good..." Cody and Bailey returned to their seats. "London?"

London looked up. "What?"

"Your project." Miss Tutweiller reminded her.

Slowly, London slid the fishbowl off the surface of her desk, hiding it from view. "What project?"

Miss Tutweiller rolled her eyes. "The fish!"

Pouting, London stood, bringing the fishbowl to the front of the room, setting it roughly on the teacher's desk. Immediately a repentant expression crossed her face, and she crouched down to be eye level with the bowl. "I'm sorry, baby. Mommy shouldn't have slammed you."

Miss Tutweiller took the paper from London's hands, almost dreading what she would find on it. Looking it over, her eyebrows rose slowly. "London... this is very good. I mean, I see that your main motivation to take care of the fish was that it was shiny... and the whole second page is just photo booth stickers of you and the fish together... But what you've written here... I can see that you have learned a few things about responsibility."

London sat at her rarely-used desk, frowning at the goldfish. "What did I learn from you?" she asked it. "Well, I learned tons of things!" Opening her pink, besparkled laptop, she opened a word document and started to make a list.

"1) Babies need water.

2) Babies need fish flakes.

3) Babies don't like smoothies or filet mignon.

4) Don't put babies in Zack's blender."

She paused, looking at the fish, frowning in concentration.

"5) Babies like to be in a nice big tank where they can swim, but it is okay to put them in a little bowl too, as long as they are somewhere safe.

6) Babies can't take care of themselves. They need to be watched all the time. They need parents to protect them from other people, and from blenders, and from being out of water too long.

7) Parents need to put baby's needs above their own."

She looked up at the fish, who was swimming peacefully around his little bowl. "Did I forget anything, baby?" she asked it. "Oh, wait, I know."

"8) Babies need love."

"Well...we can talk about your complete disregard of MLA format some other time. I think you hit on some good points here, London... " Miss Tutweiller said encouragingly. "Babies do need their parents to protect them, and parents always need to consider how their actions will affect their children." She smiled at London, who was listlessly trailing her finger in the fishbowl, waving at the fish. "And they certainly need love. London, would you like to keep the fish?"

London's eyes widened. "Really?"

"Really." Miss Tutweiller nodded.

London scooped up the fishbowl happily. "Thank you, Miss Tutweiller!" She smiled at her new pet. "You are going to be the richest goldfish ever!" Holding the bowl under her arm, she pranced out the door.

"London!" Miss Tutweiller called after her. "Class isn't over yet! London!" She shook her head in exasperation. "Why do I bother?"

Later that day, the three couples met up at the Easy Squeezy, as was their normal Friday routine.

Sitting beside Cody, Bailey noticed that there was a new blender on the bar. "Looks like you could have had your victory smoothie after all, Cody-Kitten." she said with a teasing smile.

Cody leaned in and kissed her on the lips. "Well I don't want it now, Bailey-Bunny." he returned, matching her tone.

Zack, Maya, and Addison stared at them, open mouthed. Woody looked at his friends, eyebrows raised. "What? You didn't see that coming?"

"Wha-? Since when-?" Maya stuttered. "I thought you two hated each other."

"Close..." Bailey corrected happily as the juice guy set a smoothie with two straws in front of her and Cody. "We love each other."

"Yeah, we do." Cody said, looking into Bailey's eyes.

"Now I remember why it was kind of a relief when they broke up." Zack moaned, cringing at their sweet-talk. Maya frowned and elbowed him.

"Yeah, but think of how much less crying he'll do." Woody pointed out optimistically.

"Ooh. That's true." Zack realized, changing his position on the matter. "Congratulations, you two. I'm happy for ya."

"Oh!" Addison shouted suddenly. "Look, there's Miss Tutweiller!" The teacher had just appeared on the deck in her bathing suit and sunglasses, a half-finished romance novel tucked under her arm. "Don't you want to know how we did on our projects? Miss Tutweiller!"

The rest of the group took up the call. "Miss Tutweiller! Over here!"

Miss Tutweiller dropped her head back in annoyance, sensing that this was one of those days when she'd get no peace unless she gave her students what they wanted. After determining that they wouldn't be ignored, she sighed, making her way over to the smoothie bar. "Hello kids."

"Can you tell us what we got on our projects?" Addison asked excitedly, and the others quickly agreed.

Miss Tutweiller made a face. "Well, I don't know... I don't have everyone's graded yet..."

"But you have ours graded, right?" Bailey pressed. "We were the first people to hand them in!"

"Oh, all right." Miss Tutweiller conceded, taking off her sunglasses and going into 'teacher mode'. "Addison and Woody, you got an A."

"Yesss!" Woody hissed, pumping his fist.

Addison threw her arms around him. "We did it!" she squealed. After a second, she realized their position and awkwardly backed away, but Woody slipped an arm around her waist, pulling her back with a shy smile.

"Cody and Bailey, you got an A-minus." Miss Tutweiller said, explaining. "You did a fine job with the project, but I had to take some points off of your paper. It was great up until the last paragraph, but your conclusion was very vague and rushed, and, frankly, all over the place."

Cody and Bailey shared a glance, flushing, as they realized that they'd both been too excited over their reunion to properly finish the paper... spending most of last night kissing instead of proofreading. "I can live with an A-minus." Cody volunteered.

"If you can, I can." Bailey agreed, taking his hand and squeezing it.

"Zack, Maya, you two probably had the best paper so far." Miss Tutweiller began. "And the way you worked together to care for Julian despite the fact that you both worked so many hours part-time was very impressive. I didn't expect to see such responsibility from you, Zack."

"Well, that's my brother." Cody spoke up. "Whatever it takes to impress a girl."

Zack rolled his eyes at Cody. "Look who's talking." He looked at Maya, who was biting her lip nervously, blushing, but he spoke to Tutweiller. "So what's the verdict?" he asked hopefully.

"B-plus." Miss Tutweiller said apologetically. "Sorry, you two, but I couldn't ignore the damage to the doll, so I had to dock you a grade level."

Zack sucked in a long breath, trying to play off his disappointment. He'd been so sure he was about to win the bet... and a kiss from Maya. "Oh well, I guess that's fair. B-plus, though, that's pretty good for me."

"It's the best grade you've ever gotten on one of my projects." Miss Tutweiller agreed. "And it was some fine work. You and Maya should be proud. Congratulations to all six of you, actually. You really stepped up to the plate, and your hard work paid off." She slipped her sunglasses back on. "Now, if there's nothing else, I'm about to stop being your teacher and start enjoying my weekend."

"Thanks, Miss Tutweiller." Cody said.

"Yeah, see you on Monday!" Woody added, causing Miss Tutweiller to sigh hopelessly, remove her sunglasses and go back inside.

Zack turned to Maya. "Sorry about the B." he apologized. "You win. I guess you were right about me." He smiled weakly. "It won't be easy to let you go, though-"

Before he could finish the thought, Maya surged forward, taking his head in her hands and kissing him deeply, right there in front of everyone. Surprised, Zack froze for a second before kissing her back, sliding his arms around her. When she finally pulled away, he was staring at her in awe. "What was that for? We got a B. I lost!"

"I know..." Maya said. "But I was wrong about you. You're not just a goof-off or a slacker. You were a great father, and a great partner, and... I really like you."

"I really like you too." Zack answered back with a grin. "Oh... wait. Does saying that count as hitting on you?"

Maya looped her arms around his neck. "I don't think I want you to stop hitting on me... as long as I'm the only girl you hit on."

"The only one." Zack promised. "But the bet-"

"Forget the stupid bet!" Maya ordered. "And kiss me."

And, to the sounds of cat-calls and wolf-whistles from their friends, Zack obliged.

A/N: Thanks for reading! Now show me some love! What did you think?