"Hey superstar, how'd you talk Coach into ditchin' practice?"

"Oh, I just told him I'm pregnant, and I need a few days to, relax."

(Episode 3x06, "It Ain't Easy Being J.D. McCoy")

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They all thought he was kidding. Tim Riggins, silent and brooding as he may be, was also known as quite the notorious smartass among friends, family and peers (and teachers and coaches and lord knows). Jason and Herc laughed, loud and uproariously, at that mental image before quieting their chuckles and moving on. Jason cleared his throat and grabbed his damn list and it was business as usual. Tim smirked and took a swig of his beer. Billy scowled in the corner, folding his arms and pouting down at the wheelchair-bound former quarterback as he rattled off his list of construction (or deconstruction, as the case was) tasks to be completed for that day. Business as usual. They went about their day buying toilets, lifting ceilings, knocking walls down (or fooling around and bullshitting and drinking beer, more accurately, much to Jason's irritation and dismay), and they all forgot about Tim's pithy mock-explanation.

But he wasn't kidding, of course. Tim had his reputation as a Panther, the star varsity fullback, drinkin', whorin', slut-bangin', rally-girl-screwing, cheerleader-dating womanizer with the twelve abs and the great arms and the twelve abs at stake. Him knocked up was a comical image to get in your head, a thought to laugh about and make you cringe, but it would never happen ever. Except it did, and now Tim was screwed. And not the good kind; the kind usually only his gals needed to worry about. So once he made his little discovery, he decided to go to his main gal for advice.

"Very funny, Tim," Lyla Garrity had rolled her eyes as usual, all bitchy and judgmental, except she made it look adorable as always. "Why are you here? I'm busy."

Tim stood in the doorway of the apartment Lyla shared with her father, Buddy, and shifted his feet uncomfortably. "I kinda hoped you'd be able to help me out with this," he admitted, pressing onward despite thinking maybe he probably should have just laughed it off as a joke after all and hauled ass to hide somewhere for the next eight months.

Thankfully Lyla was spared a bitchy response when her fat fuck of a father stumblebummed his way out of the bathroom, red-faced and sweating in the aftermath. "Big Tim Riggins!" He blustered, lumbering over to the doorway and breaking a fresh sweat with the effort of those five extra steps. "What brings you here, son?"

I'm pregnant. He took a split second to imagine himself saying that to Mr. Garrity. Ah ho, ah hee, ah hoo. "Actually, Mr. Garrity, I was just leavin'. Sorry to bother y'all."

"Oh nonsense," Buddy insisted, smiling. "Me and Lyla here was just about to settle in and watch some footage from last Friday's game!" Like Tim hadn't been there to see it himself. "How 'bout you come in and join us, Tim? You want some steak, pan fried in butter the way God intended?"

Oh Lord. "No thanks, Mr. Garrity. I uh, gotta get back. Help my brother fix the shower." He threw out the first lame-ass excuse that popped in his head. "I'll see you around. You look good, Lyla," he tacked on at the end, just for that extra special little look Lyla gave him.

So that didn't work out, obviously. Tim was disappointed, but not surprised, that Lyla had not believed him, but he resolved that the situation would present itself soon enough, and he wouldn't have to work very hard to convince her then, would he?

Tim had already told Coach, but of course Coach just thought he was being a smartass and told Tim that if he wanted to keep his position as fullback for the Dillon Panthers, he'd better show his ass up to practice the next morning. Not really seeing any alternative other than being kicked off the team (and that would be just devastating), Tim complied.

But apparently his unborn miracle baby saw quite another, even more devastating, alternative to Tim attending a rough-and-tumble football practice this early in its development, so its survival instincts (so strong already, bless its little not-quite-formed heart) kicked into high gear and Tim awoke the next morning real early, sick as hell, puking his guts out in the bathroom with the door locked long enough for Billy to get all mad and holler something about pissing in the sink.

"I'll do it," Billy shouted, already moving dirty dishes to clear himself a spot. "You better let me in there or else you're scrubbin' this whole sink with bleach!" Like they even had bleach. The Riggins brothers probably used cheap tequila to disinfect their household surfaces and wounds.

Needless to say, Tim couldn't make it to practice that morning. Coach was not happy about this development, so he decided to pay his fullback a visit after practice. Y'know, once actual school had started and all his players were in regular class not doing their work. Except for Landry but okay whatever.

Billy answered the door in his underwear and got real embarrassed when he saw Coach Taylor standing there, dark sunglasses on and permanent scowl fixed firmly in place. "Afternoon, Billy," he greeted tersely, hands on hips. "I'd like to speak with Tim, please."

"Sure thing, Coach," Billy began. "Tim's been in the bathroom all morning, but if you wanna come in and sit down, and uh, I'll go get him for you-"

"That'll be just fine," Coach replied, effectively silencing the elder Riggins.

Coach did not sit, however; he stood in the foyer while Billy retreated down the hall. Tim showed up shortly afterwards, hair a mess and face a worse mess. He wore a pair of old grey sweats slung low on his sweet V and nothing else. "Hey Coach," he began, voice rough from screaming out torrents of bile for the past three hours. "Sorry 'bout missin' practice…"

Coach's hostile demeanor softened a bit after catching a nice glimpse of the state into which his fullback had deteriorated. "Damn, son, the hell happened t'you?" He furrowed his brow, giving Tim a flabbergasted look.

Again, Tim told Coach Taylor about his current predicament. Coach figured that since Tim had already explained this to him beforehand, he probably wasn't just doing it to be a smartass anymore. Coach worked his jaw, eyeing Tim fiercely. He was disappointed in him. "Aw'right, son. I'm not here to lecture you on the decisions you've made. I'm only gonna suggest that in this particular case, you man up and face the consequences of your actions." He turned and made his way toward the door, reaching for the handle. He stopped and looked back. "Get some rest. Take care a'yourself." And with that, he was gone.

Football was a no-go at this point. Drinking was too. Tim hated it, but apparently giving up two of the three things (sex being the third thing, for those of you too slow to get the reference, and he was still having plenty of that, yes ma'am) that had lovingly sculpted his entire reputation hadn't decimated his popularity too badly. But that most likely had to do with the fact that now nearly everybody in Dillon had heard what happened and Tim Riggins had now become famous for a whole new reason. People stared. They talked. It was pretty uncomfortable. But Tim made do with his new rep as the knocked-up he-slut of Dillon and carried on with life the way he usually did.

"Damn, Rig, ain't yo' daddy ever teach you to wrap your willy?" Smash hollered out when he passed Tim in the hallway.

Tim, who was about five months along at this point but still mostly able to hide his stomach (not like anybody didn't know, but still), shut his locker and turned to face Smash. He flexed his fingers once, then abruptly swung and socked Smash in the face. Blood exploded from busted capillaries. Smash, nose swelling and blood running, yelled a slur of obscenities and launched himself at Tim, slamming him against the lockers with a loud metallic BANG! Tim shoved Smash off of him and socked him in the face again. By this point several students had flocked to the scene, gathering to watch the fight, hooting and hollering for the victory of their Panther of choice.

"Tim! Stop!" Tyra, who had literally flew in from out of nowhere, grabbed ahold of Tim's arms and steered him away from the rapidly escalating fight scene, while Smash's bros and hos were doing the same to him.

Mrs. Taylor was sitting in her office sorting through some papers on her desk when the door opened. She looked up to see Tim Riggins standing there, greasy hair all hanging down in his face, knuckles raw from a recent fistfight. "Hey, Tim," she began, eyeing him as he shut the door and slumped down into one of the hard plastic seats across from her desk. "What happened to you?"

Tim looked up at Tami through lank strands of hair, green eyes dull with irritation. "Williams," he muttered lowly.

Tami set the papers down and settled back into her own chair, folding her hands and propping a leg up over her knee. She looked at Tim. "This is the third time you've been in my office this week," she began. Tim shifted uncomfortably, and Tami noticed. "Would you like a different chair, Tim?"

"No, I'm good."

"Okay. Well, Tim, I'm sure you know getting into fights isn't the best thing for you to be doing right now."

"Williams started it," Tim countered, slouching down and resting an arm over his stomach. "He's always talkin' crap these days, Mrs. T. I'm just defending my honor."

"Mhmm." Tami nodded. "It's one thing to defend yourself, Tim. It's another to put the safety of your unborn child at risk by gettin' into fistfights every other week."

Tim furrowed his brow. "Well I'm not just gonna stand there and listen to his crap, Mrs. Taylor." Then he gripped the chair's arms and pushed himself up like he was about to walk out the door, but Tami stopped him.

"Sit down, please." Her voice was level, but her eyes said boy, you better sit your ass back down in that chair. Tim sat. She continued, deciding to switch gears. "How are you these days, Tim?"

Tim exhaled through his nose, running a hand through his hair with mounting agitation. "Fine, I guess."

"You feeling better?"

"A bit, yeah."

"That's good." Tami paused. Tim just stared, wishing he could just go already. "Coach told me, you know, that Billy had to keep you home for a couple weeks…till you were feelin' well enough to come back to school."

Tim reached up and rubbed his neck. "Yep," he grunted.

"You've been to the doctor, I assume?" Tami probed further, eyebrows arching sternly.

"The clinic," he mumbled. Once, he added silently. That's where he'd first heard the news: well, Tim, this is certainly a change of pace, the doctor had said. Usually I end up prescribin' you a round of Amoxicillin when you come here, but this time it looks like you're gonna need these prenatal vitamins instead!

'Scuse me, Doc? He'd replied, dumbstruck. Then he realized Mrs. Taylor was still talking to him and he shook himself free of that unpleasant flashback to pay attention to Coach's wife. "Have I what?" He repeated, feeling like a dumbass.

"Have you finished your make-up work yet, Tim?" Tami repeated, already knowing the answer. Tim's blank stare spoke volumes. She sighed, scooting forward in her chair. "Look, I know-"

"What's the point, Mrs. Taylor?" Tim interrupted, green eyes flickering into animation. "It's not like I gotta worry about ineligibility now."

"Well, see, that's the thing, Tim," Tami pressed. "You do have to worry about somethin', and that's your high school education, and your future. The future of your child."

Tim abruptly stood, chair legs scraping against the floor. "Jesus Christ," he swore (that sudden surge of anger must've been monumental; he hadn't dropped the JC bomb in a while) and stalked out the door, slamming it on the way out. Apparently, Mrs. Coach's concern had sparked a little mood-swing action in our hero that afternoon.

Tami watched Tim leave, mouth hanging open at his audacity, but she refrained from calling him back, instead remembering how moody and irritable she had been during her own pregnancies. She softened, finding herself sympathizing with the young football player as she went back to the pile of file folders on her desk. Maybe she could contact his teachers, get an extension on those make-up assignments. Lord knows the kid needed all the help he could get these days.

Billy stared at his younger brother. He'd been doing that a lot lately, especially these past few weeks. "How uh. How're you holdin' up, there, Tim?"

Tim, who was bent over peering into the fridge, looked up at the sound of his brother's voice. "Quit starin' at me, Billy, before I beat your face in."

"Yeah right, Tim. Mrs. Coach told you 'bout fighting in your…condition."

"So?" Tim braced a hand on the fridge door, eyeing his smaller older brother. "Mrs. Coach ain't here. Who's gonna stop me?"

Billy rolled his eyes, turning and heading for the couch. Tim was being a huge pain in the ass, even more so than usual. Billy figured it probably had something to do with the whole being knocked-up thing. Just because you're a friggin' manwhore who doesn't know how to wear a rubber doesn't mean- and that was as far as Tim had let him get on that statement. Billy'd nursed that black eye for days afterward, blood boiling the whole while.

Tim joined him in the living room a few minutes later, sandwich and Gatorade in hand. Billy looked over at him. "How come you're bein' such an ornery asshole, Tim?"

Tim took a bite of his sandwich and chewed meditatively, gaze fixed on the TV screen. "Because, Billy," he mumbled slowly around his mouthful of sandwich, "I kinda hate my life right now. No beer, no parties, no memories. No football," he swallowed. "I got kicked off the team, Billy."

"You didn't get kicked off, just temporarily suspended," Billy corrected, not in the mood for his brother's moping. "Coach'd never kick you off the team."

Tim just looked at him, and Billy knew he was thinking of that time he'd snuck off to Mexico for a week. With Street. And Lyla. Coach had been pissed.

"That was different. This," Billy hesitated, aware of the subject matter he was broaching. "Coach knows. He gets it. You'll get right back on the team after…this."

"Yeah, Billy, I doubt Coach'll be in the mood for forgiveness anytime soon." Tim took another bite of his sandwich, not studying his brother.

Well it was your own damn fault, Billy wanted to blurt out. You got yourself in this mess, dumbass. He took a swig of his beer and swished the bitter alcohol around in his mouth, mulling irritably over the last several months and all the bullshit that'd come with them.

He'd suspected something was off about Tim after he went to the clinic to have that rash looked at. He left the house only mildly discouraged, sure he'd just get his usual round of antibiotics and ridicule and be done with it (until the next jailbait skank hooker whore rally girl came along, that is). Billy'd gone down to The Landing Strip to get drunk and spend some quality time with Mindy, expecting Tim to show up and join him within the next hour or so. But Tim never came.

Billy'd staggered home later that evening to find Tim sitting on the couch with the TV blaring. But he wasn't paying attention to ESPN, he was squinting at the label on a huge bottle of pills. Billy figured it was the crotch rot meds, but Tim'd gotten those plenty of times – he knew the dosage and side effects for those by heart. This must've been something different, because Tim was concentrating awful hard, switching between the label on the bottle and a small sheet of paper in his other hand. Billy waited until Tim fell asleep to snatch up the bottle and take a look for himself. Prenatal vitamins.

Ohhhh hell. Oh holy crap. Jesus H. Christ.

So it'd finally happened. His little brother had sexed it up too much and gotten himself into a real jam this time. Well, it wasn't as bad as AIDS, Billy supposed, but it sure as hell wasn't a no-big-deal like a patch of crabs. This was a Situation, one that Billy was sure fell under the category of big brother looking out for little brother. He and Tim were definitely gonna have a serious talk later.

But that talk never came. Partly because Billy wasn't sure how to broach the subject – hell, maybe he'd read the label wrong, he had been wasted, after all. And Tim was acting the same, no reason to suspect anything out of the ordinary. He drank and fucked and fullbacked and talked Billy into helping him and Six and Herc fix up that old house of Buddy Garrity's. Everything was so normal that Billy was starting to slip back into the old belief that everything was fine, it was all going to be okay, and there was nothing to worry about. Tim was fine.

Except Tim wasn't fine. That one morning a couple weeks later, when he woke up real sick, that's when Billy knew. Knew knew, deep down in the pit of his stomach, made his whole body sink with dread knew. All of his suspicions and uneasiness came crashing down on him, and after Coach left, he finally confronted his little brother about the bottle of pills and the clinic visit.

"Hell, Tim, I thought you were joking!" He'd hollered after Tim reminded him of that day he'd shown up late to the construction site. They'd all thought he was joking. He'd told Coach too. This news was going to spread quickly. Probably already had, half of Dillon had probably already caught wind of Tim Riggins' latest and greatest scandal.

Then he felt bad for yelling, because Tim had looked up with wet eyes and croaked, "What am I gonna do, Billy?" and Billy'd heaved a heavy sigh, anger dissolving, and got all melty inside and bent down and clapped a heavy hand on his younger brother's shoulder and rubbed his back and reassured him that whatever choice he made was fine with him. He'd help him through this and wouldn't kick him out if he decided to have the thing. Tim stayed quiet after that, and then Billy got worried.

Billy was almost positive Tim would have opted to get rid of it. Not that he didn't want kids of his own someday, but he figured his little brother wouldn't have been too keen on giving up his body (namely the ripped abs sculpted by five years of grueling workouts and football practices) and reputation and sex appeal and pretty much his whole life as he knew it for a kid right now. But apparently that was what Tim decided to do, because the weeks crawled by and he started to show and Billy realized he'd kept it. Then he was like, "Oh shit" all over again.

After that, Billy's worry dissipated and gave way to anger. How in the hell did Tim plan on supporting this kid of his, on paying for it, on paying for everything? Billy had proposed to Mindy some months beforehand and was saving up for the wedding. That was his main goal. Now he had that to worry about on top of keeping them afloat, keeping up on the mortgage payments, and putting food on the table. Billy couldn't afford to pay for Tim's dumbass mistakes this time. And that's what this baby was. A fucking mistake.

"Whoa."

Billy looked over at Tim, jarred back to reality by the sound of his voice. "What is it?" His tone was dull; he glanced at the TV, expecting a slo-mo replay of a huge tackle or something.

Tim held the last bite of his sandwich in midair, like he'd paused on the way to shoving his face. "It moved."

Billy's brow furrowed. "What moved?"

"It moved, just now."

Oh! "The – it, moved?"

"Yeah." Tim's eyes widened, and he straightened up. "Billy!"

"What?" Billy sat up fully now, giving Tim his full attention. "You okay?"

"C'mere."

Billy stood and went to hover over his brother, palms sweating and heart pounding. "You need me to call somebody? Is this it? What - "

"It feels weird. Feel it, Billy," Tim said in the same tone he used when they were little and he would dare Billy to eat dirt or steal a cigarette from one of their parents' packs.

Billy stared at his brother, anxiety slowly fading and giving way to a strange mix of this-is-gay and but-I-do-kinda-wanna-feel-it. "Wh-what's it feel like?"

"Just feel it, Billy."

Billy hesitated for a second, and then he quickly put his hand on Tim's stomach before he had a chance to pull it back. "Oh, man," he proclaimed, cringeing a little but grinning at the same time. "That's somethin' else, Tim."

Tyra decided to throw Tim a baby shower. She had always been the party planner, but Tim liked when her parties involved alcohol and kegs and strippers. As soon as he found out what she had been planning for the past week, he came unglued.

"Seriously, Tyra," Tim began, following his slammin'-blonde-tall-drinka-water ex into the living room, where she was wrapping up a phone conversation with God knows who. "What the hell?"

Tyra hung up the phone and turned to face him. "Baby showers mean money, Tim," she explained as if that remedied this whole situation. "God knows you could use all the help you can get."

Tim bristled. He so wasn't in the mood for this shit. "What's that supposed t'mean, Tyra?"

She breezed through his living room, cordless phone in one hand and phonebook in the other, completely focused on the task at hand and not even noticing the loaded edge to his question. "Well, let's face it, Tim, you and I both know you're not exactly fit-to-do in the financial department, and normally that's not a problem for you, but what are you gonna do when the baby gets here?" She rolled her eyes and sat back down at the kitchen table, flipping through the phonebook, already preparing for her next call. "Let's just say you're gonna be buyin' a lot more than beer and gas for your truck a few months from now."

Tim gave birth to his child the same day the Dillon Panthers went to State.

He woke up fine and like an hour later he started feeling like crap. Of course, he dismissed all of his body's signals and went to fling himself across the couch and watch ESPN. He got to the second commercial block before hollering for Billy.

"Billy," he said, eyes wide with mounting panic, and then his whole face screwed up in pain as another cramp seized his insides. "BILLY!"

"What?!" Came the irritated reply as Billy bustled out of the back bedroom, still squinting from sleep and raising a hand to shield his hungover eyes from the sunlight. "Quit screamin', Tim, you're gonna wake up the neighbors!"

Tim threw his cereal bowl at Billy's head. Billy only just managed to Matrix his way out of an unpleasant situation as the bowl hit the wall, shards and milk exploding everywhere. "What the hell, Tim?!" He gestured to the milk and cereal soaking into the already ruined carpet. He was nice and sobered up now, and not in the mood for his little brother's cranky bullsh-

"Oh," he said, his own eyes widening in dawning horror and realization as Tim curled in on himself, groaning through clenched teeth. "It's – it's time? D-day? This it?"

"No, Billy," Tim grated out, cutting his older brother a murderous glare. Thankfully, his sarcasm didn't go unnoticed this time (at least that was one thing he had going for him).

"Oh, all, all right," Billy began, face reddening as he flustered and leapt into action. "Just, stay calm, Tim, everything's gonna be all right, just take it easy, we're on our way, here, lemme just-"

"BILLY!"

"WHAT?"

"Put some pants on."

"Yeah, yeah," Billy waved Tim away, hurrying into the bedroom and grabbing his night-before jeans, old and wrinkled and smelling only a little offensive. "Think you can try not to have the thing in the truck?"

"Billy, I'm gonna kill you-"

"What, Tim! We're almost on E over here, I gotta stop and get-"

"For Chrissake Billy, I'm almost, havin' your-nephew over here!"

Billy whipped the old Silverado into the Amoco station heedless of Tim's laboring cries. "It'll only take a minute, Tim! Jeez, just calm down, will ya?"

"I'M HAVIN' A BABY OVER HERE, BILLY!"

"Really, Tim? Cause I couldn't tell. Maybe you should scream a little louder in my ear, maybe that'll get your damn point across!"

"Are you for real right now?"

Billy said nothing, just pulled up to the pump and got out to pay. Tim exhaled at the end of the contraction and turned wearily to look out the window. "Billy!" He yelled.

"What?!"

"Are you goin' in there?"

"What's it look like, jackass?"

"Why?"

"Cause I didn't get any breakfast yet, Tim! And I ain't eatin' that hospital food, that stuff tastes like cardboard and old crap!"

"Well, if you're goin' in, can you at least get me one'a them doughnuts I like?"

Billy scowled and shook his head, turning and storming toward the convenience store. Tim breathed through another wrenching contraction, screwing his eyes shut and hollering "THE CHOCOLATE KIND, BILLY!" out the window at his brother's retreating back.

If Tim could ask his own body if it was for real right now, he so would.

Face contorted hellishly from agony and exhuastion, he flopped back onto the pillows, panting heavily, shining with sweat, hair plastered limply to his forehead. "Billy," he breathed, and his brother grabbed his hand and squeezed like hell.

"M'right here, Tim!" Billy yelled at a completely unreasonable volume, eyes wild, clutching his brother's hand like there was no tomorrow. "Whaddya need?"

Tim breathed, ignoring the chants and instructions from the medical personnel surrounding him, and weakly tilted his head toward his brother. "Tell…tell Mins you're sorry…f'r puttin' her through this-" and a sudden arching, strangled groan cut him off as his body doubled over with the force of the next contraction.

"YOU ARE NOT FUCKING NAMING HIM WALT, TIM!"

The baby looked just like Jason.

"Huh," Billy murmured, nose red from proud uncle tears. "Looks just like Jay, huh, Tim?"

Tim held his child and smiled, hazy with exhaustion. "Yup," he agreed. "Little Streeter."

This was so much fun. I'm sorry. (No Regrets!)

Friday Night Lights the TV show and all characters/events/etc. = not mine, property of NBC and Peter Berg and such.