A/N: I promise I'll update Feeling Something New soon, but I felt like getting this out of the way. Tell me what you think.
Parentship
By AnotherSideTheOtherStory
Chapter 1: Taking the Assignment to the Next Step
Ethan yawned as the days events finally themselves apparent through the dull ache in his muscles. He took a seat in the car next to Jane and gave her a sympathetic smile, which she returned with one of her own. He couldn't remember having a worse day in his life, and certainly had no recollection of ever having one so boring. Not only was the Morgan family reunion dull and uneventful but the fact that his mom had confiscated his cellphone and Benny had been banned after the 'incident' last year made it all the worse.
"Wasn't it great to see everyone?" asked Ross as he started the engine. Both his children and wife groaned in response. "Ok, it was bad, but did you at least try to have fun?"
"What is it with older people and pinching?" asked Ethan as he rubbed his cheek. "Especially Great Grandma Morgan, she's like a lobster."
"I know," said Jane with a frown. "I thought because she was old it wouldn't be that bad but her fingers are like steel."
"You should've seen her when she was younger," responded Ross with a small smile. "She was so much more worse, she could crack a nut between her thumb and pointer finger."
"Can I get my cellphones back now?"
"Of course," said Samantha as she rustled through her purse. "Thank you for at least trying to enjoy the day."
"Anytime mom," said Ethan happy to have his phone back. He felt his heart skip when he noticed several text messages and voicemails, all of them from Benny. Something must've happened while he was away; he clicked the texts message first and thought about everything that could have gone wrong. Sarah might've been staked, Benny could have been injured, Jessie could've returned, Benny might've been hurt, Rory could've gone to the dark side or Benny could be in the hospital to name a few of his worries and concerns.
Hey E, question about the assignment- what are your parents eyes color? –B (Friday 6:30PM)
Is hair color considered recessive or not? Still waiting to hear about the eye thing! – B (Friday 7:01PM)
E, I need to talk to you right away! It's not an emergency, but you need to see this!(it has to do with our project !) And don't worry about the questions I had earlier! I figured them out! –B (Friday 11:45 PM)
Ethan sighed in relief; no one was hurt. He re-read the texts and did a double take. How had Benny figured out the eye color and hair question? He thought about it for a moment before deciding he didn't want to know the answer. He clicked the voicemail, closed his eyes and listened to the sound of his best friend's voice.
"Hey E it's Benny, I hope your having fun at your family reunion, tell your grandma I say hi and that I'm sorry about the cake last year. Umm… if you could call me as soon you get this message that would be great. K, bye." (Saturday 7:10 AM)
He sighed and did his best to fight off the exhaustion that slowly began to overtake him. When he realized he was fighting a losing battle, he closed his eyes and thought about his best friend waiting for him back at home. Benny…. He smiled as he dreamed about the assignment the two of them had partnered up for.
"The average human body contains tens of thousands of genes," said Mr. G as he paced along the classroom. "These genes are segments of DNA, and contain several basic traits such as hair color, skin color, and more. You may be wondering why I brought this up, and it's really exciting because it has to do with your next project! Now get into groups of two and I'll hand out these packets that explain more."
Ethan watched as all around them students let out groans, sighs, and moans of disapproval before getting up and finding someone to work with. Benny leaned forward on their desk, stuck out his lip in an overdramatic pout and said:
"I hate projects. They're difficult, take forever, and are worth way more points than they should be. I mean seriously who cares how long it takes to boil a chemical that we'll never see in our lives again."
"What are you talking about?" asked Ethan as he was handed a packet. "I'm the one who ends up doing all the work while you sit around eating marshmallows and playing videogames."
"That's because you never actually let me anything, and if you did I'm pretty sure we'd both end up failing."
"Lucky," whispered Rory from behind them. "I want to sit around eating marshmallows and playing videogames, Ethan be my partner."
"I'm good," said Ethan with a smirk. He turned to Benny. "Promise you'll at least attempt to help with some of the work?"
"Promise."
"So yeah, call me when you get this message. Or when you get back home because I seriously need to talk to you about the assignment and I might have uh… you'll see when you get here. You said you'd get back tonight right?" (Saturday 3:05 PM)
"Now I know the last thing you all want to do is work on a project, especially when it's a three day weekend," said Mr. G sympathetically as he leaned against his desk. The class nodded in agreement. "But this assignment is easy, think of it more as a chance to explore who you are than an actual project. We're going to be studying recessive and dominant traits such as hitchhikers thumbs, dimples, freckles, and more."
"So why are there pictures of plants in here?" asked Benny as he flipped through the packet. "And these strange boxes?"
"Are we plant people?" blurted out Rory. "Because I could totally rock the whole human plant thing."
"No we're not plant people, what your looking at is Mendel's experiment with plants and hereditary traits. It's a introduction to the idea of what traits might get passed on and which one's wouldn't. For your project you're going to be reviewing various traits you have, figuring out if they're recessive or dominant, and then working with your partner trying to figure out what a child between the two of you would look like."
"That's not going to help with the rumors about us dating," said Ethan as he turned to face Benny, who for some reason or another had a stupid grin across his face. "W-What?"
"We're going to be parents E!" said Benny as he attempted to try and hug him. "I'm so proud!"
"Congratulations!" said Rory with the same stupid smile. "Can I be the god-father?"
"No we're not, it's just an assignment," said Ethan with a laugh as he attempted to keep his friend at arm's length. "Knock it off you two."
"But any child we had would be the ultimate combination of nerd and geek, not to mention ridiculously good looking," said Benny modestly as he placed his elbows on the table. "Though Erica and I could probably make some pretty hot kids."
Ethan rolled his eyes and went back to work, someone needed to pay attention for the sake of their assignment.
"Wake up," mumbled Jane as she poked him. "We're home."
"When did I fall asleep?" asked Ethan as he sat up and stretched. He noticed Jane was playing an app on his phone, and extended his hand. She gave it to him with a smile.
"You fell asleep listening to your messages, oh and Benny called while you were out."
"What did he want?"
"No idea, I let it go to voicemail."
"Thanks," said Ethan sarcastically as he got out of the car. He placed the phone against his ear and smiled when he heard the familiar voice of his friend.
"So Ethan, yeah please call me when you get back, it's kind of important and has to do with the assignment. Don't worry about waking me or my Grandma up, just stop by when you get a chance." (Saturday 7:09 PM)
That caught his attention. Benny never used his full name, which could only mean he had either messed up on the assignment or done something equally insane. The possibilities when Ethan actually stopped to considered it, were endless. With a sigh of both annoyance and excitement he headed next door towards the Weir residence.
"Where are you going honey?" asked Samantha as she stopped in the doorway. "Aren't you tired?"
"I just need to head over to Benny's and make sure he started our biology project. I'll be back in a few minutes, promise!"
"Tell Evelyn I say hi."
"Yes mom," said Ethan without looking back over his shoulder. He knocked on the door and was greeted by a rather exhausted looking Benny. The older boy gave him a smile and quickly pulled him in.
"Oh good you got my messages," said Benny as he ushered him towards the living room. "Yeah so about our project I might have messed up a little tiny teensy bit."
"What do you mean messed up?"
"I may have tried to use magic as a shortcut to finding out what part of our genetics were recessive and dominant and it didn't quite work out the way I thought it would."
"So what did you do?" Asked Ethan confused when Benny suddenly motioned for him to sit on the sofa. "Did you burn the packet, accidently rip it, or did you lose it?"
"Nothing like that. It's just well…."
Before Ethan could ask what was wrong he heard the sound of crying from the other side of the house. A moment later a small child ran into the room and straight into Benny's arms.
"What's the mater buddy?" asked Benny as he picked him up and held him close. "Did you have a bad dream?"
"I did…," whispered the child as he buried his face into Benny's shoulder. "You lef me."
"Benny who is that?" asked Ethan as he took in the child's curly brown hair and bright green eyes.
"Ethan, this is Matthew...," said Benny with a huge smile. "He's our son."
"Our WHAT!"
