DISCLAIMER: I do not own Big Time Rush or any of its characters

Christopher Mitchell was still staring down the hall that the boys had raced down to find Logan. Their friend. His son. He looked back to Jennifer, noting how tightly her hands were clasped on the tabletop. "They really are that close, then?" he asked. "Just like Joanna and you and Brooke and Sylvia."

Jennifer allowed a small smile. "They're brothers," was her simple answer to that. "They need each other to survive, I think. I'd hate to think what they'd do if something happened to one of them." She sighed and, leaning back in her chair, folded her arms across her chest. "Chris, what's going on? What are you doing here?"

Staring down at his own hands, Chris could only shake his head. "I suppose you don't know a lot about what happened, do you?"

"Well, Joanna definitely didn't want to discuss it, even years later," Jennifer informed him. "After you left, she didn't even tell the rest of us. She would always be 'too busy' to talk. We didn't even know you'd left for a few months."

"She's a proud woman…" Chris sighed sadly. When Jennifer didn't seem to have any more to say, Chris gestured to the hall with a nod of his head. "Do you think he'll come back out at all?"

"Logan takes time," Jennifer told him. "He's a sweet, sensitive boy. He can't handle something like this all at once—something this huge. He's probably in shock. I swear I have never seen Logan as angry and fired up as he was when he was yelling at you." She fiddled with a thread on her shirt. "He's probably been holding all of that in for all these years—maybe without even knowing how resentful he was toward you."

Chris waited for a minute, and then spoke again. "I'd better be going, then," he murmured. "I probably should have…called or something first, to let him get used to the idea. Do you think…do you think I could have just a quick word with him before I leave? Just a quick one," he added quickly, sensing Jennifer's bristling.

There was a moment of complete silence. Chewing on the inside of her cheek, Jennifer got up and walked down the hall, gesturing for Chris to follow.

~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~

All four heads shot up when the knock came on the door. "Logan, sweetie," came Mama Knight's voice. "Your dad—Chris. Chris wants a word with you before he leaves."

"Are you crazy?" James blurted out before Logan could say anything. "He has nothing to say to that rat bastard!"

"James!" Kendall hissed, not sure what he could really say about Chris himself, but knowing that his mother wouldn't take kindly to swearing.

"It's okay." All three boys swiveled their heads to stare at Logan in shock. He still hadn't said a word to the guys about what exactly had happened—they'd been sitting there only a few minutes. His voice, still quiet, was much steadier than it had been when he had let them in. He seemed to have gotten a hold on himself and the redness was almost gone from his eyes.

"You sure?" Carlos asked, concerned. When Logan nodded, Carlos glanced apprehensively at the other two.

Kendall shrugged. If he was willing to talk to the man again, it wasn't their place to stop him. He gave Logan an encouraging pat on the back as the poor kid took a deep breath before standing, walking to the door, and unlocking it.

Mama Knight was standing there, leaning against the doorframe. When she saw Logan, she couldn't hold back a sympathetic smile. Chris hovered in the background, a few steps further down the hall, again seeming to want to come closer but at the same time feeling that he shouldn't.

"What do you need?" Logan asked of him, keeping his voice bland and emotionless. The three boys in the bedroom all surreptitiously moved closer and closer to the doorway to be able to hear the conversation clearly.

"I'm gonna head on back to my hotel—I'm staying at the Holiday Inn a few streets away," he informed Logan, who gave no response at all. "Look, Logan," Christopher said with a sigh. "I want to talk to you. You deserve some answers. Meet me tomorrow at the bistro down the street—I'll buy you lunch and you can ask me questions, or we can just talk, or…hell, you can yell at me again for all I care. Just give me a chance to explain some things."

"He'll buy him lunch," James murmured in Kendall's ear. "Sure. That makes up for seventeen years of absolutely nothing." Kendall gestured for James to shut up.

It was silent as everyone waited for Logan to refuse. But that didn't happen. Logan hesitated and then nodded. "Alright."

"What-?" James started to shout, but Carlos and Kendall both immediately jumped on him, placing hands over his mouth.

Chris glanced over at the three boys in the bedroom, but other than a slight flinch ignored James's outburst. "Great," he said to Logan with a small smile. "I'll see you there around noon?"

Logan shook his head. "We're recording until one. I'll meet you then."

With a nod, Chris agreed. He paused, seeming like he might say something else, but then just nodded again. "Bye Logan. Jennifer," he gave her a nod and she gave a curt one in return. He then cleared his throat glancing back at the boys. "Kendall, James, Carlos." The boys offered him no farewells, Logan included. With that, Chris walked out of the apartment, Mama Knight showing him to the door.

As soon as the front door closed, Carlos and Kendall released James. "What are you doing, Logan?!" he exploded. "Why would you give that asshole the privilege to insert himself into your life like that?"

"I don't understand either, Logan," Kendall agreed, albeit he was much more gentle. "I thought you hated the man. You were so upset over even seeing him just five minutes ago. And now you want to have lunch with him?"

"You could have said no," James said stubbornly. "Why did you say yes?"

"Because I deserve some answers," Logan snapped at them. "He's offering me explanation. I won't listen to him try to excuse his behavior—if he tries that, I'll walk out. But if he's going to give me an honest answer to this question that's haunted me my whole life—why?—then I'm going to get it."

Mama Knight appeared down the hall again. "Logan, you don't have to go to lunch with him," she said as well. "You don't have to ever see him again if you don't want to."

"I do want to," Logan insisted. "I deserve my answers. I want them." He looked over at Mama Knight, realizing something. "Mama Knight, you knew him."

"Yes…" Mama Knight seemed confused as to where this was going.

"How'd you know him?" Logan asked. "He left when I was six months old, but I didn't move to Minnesota until third grade."

"Logan, sweetie, your mom and I have been friends since college," Mama Knight told him, sounding surprised that this was news to him. "Joanna, me, Sylvia, and Brooke, that's where we met—maybe as close as you boys."

"Really?" Logan asked. He shook his head. "My mother never mentioned you to me."

"Well," Mama Knight began with a sigh. "We went to college in Minnesota. Brooke, Sylvia, and I, we were from there, but your mom was from Texas. We all ended up becoming fast friends somehow—we lived on the same floor, two rooms side-by-side, me and Joanna, Sylvia and Brooke." Mama Knight smiled fondly at the memory. Then she frowned. "That's where Joanna met Chris."

With a sigh, Mama Knight gestured for the boys to follow her to the living room, which of course they did. Mama Knight disappeared into her room for a minute and came back out with a faded Polaroid. She held it out and the boys crowded around it. There were their mothers, all in their early twenties, posing for a picture on some sort of quadruple date. Mama Knight was with Mr. Knight, but Mrs. Diamond and Mrs. Garcia were with different boys—probably guys they were dating at the time. And there was indeed a young Chris Mitchell with his arm around Joanna's shoulders.

"He was such a nice guy," Mama Knight continued. "We all liked him. They got married right out of college. All three of us were at the wedding." Mama Knight smiled. "It was very beautiful. They were so young, but so, so in love." She sighed and pulled the picture back to study it herself. "After the wedding they decided they'd move to Texas to be closer to Joanna's family. Chris's parents already had died and he had no siblings or anything, so it was more logical at the time. It was hard," she recalled. "To say goodbye to her." The boys all shifted uneasily, each imagining what it would be like if one of them suddenly moved several states away. They couldn't imagine it.

"Anyway, we all got married in the next few years too," Mama Knight explained further. And it was such a surprise when each one of us were getting pregnant. Only a few months between all four of you boys." She smiled at them fondly. "We always did like doing things together. Joanna was always calling and letting us know how she was doing too. And when you were born Logan, oh she was so proud. She sent so many pictures. We kept saying we had to get all these boys together. They'd be best friends just like their mamas."

Then Mama Knight looked sad and troubled. "And then, Joanna dropped off the face of the planet." Mama Knight shook her head. "No, that's not entirely true. She just…she stopped seeming interested in talking to us. She wouldn't return phone calls for weeks, and then she'd come up with an excuse not to talk. She stopped sending pictures. We got worried. Eventually we dragged it out of her that your dad had left, Logan—she'd just woken up one morning to a note saying he was sorry. And he never came back."

Logan's blood ran hot at the mention of that. So there'd been a note, huh? He'd apologized, huh? Logan stowed away this information to throw in Chris's face at lunch tomorrow.

Mama Knight wasn't done yet. "We wanted to be with her so much," she whispered, sounding like there were tears in her voice. "We all wanted to go to her, or her come to us. But she'd just lost her dad a year ago, and she wasn't going to leave her mom, she insisted."

"Grandma died right before the end of second grade," Logan recalled. "And then in third grade…"

Mama Knight smiled. "And then in third grade you came to Minnesota and we were all so excited. We didn't have a chance to get together because you arrived only two days before school started, but we had big plans to get you boys all together—the other three were all best friends already." James, Kendall, and Carlos all smiled. They couldn't remember a time when they three hadn't been best friends. "And I was so surprised when who shows up with you, Kendall, after the first day? None other than Logan Mitchell." She smiled at him. "You boys were just drawn together I guess."

Mama Knight shook her head, realizing she had gone on a bit of a tangent. "But no matter how hard we tried, Joanna never explained anything about Chris leaving," she told Logan, getting back on track. "She just said that he had left, it was in the past, and she had been a single mother almost your whole life. She was…well, she said she was over it long ago and didn't need our help. So we let it be…but all three of us have always hoped she'd suddenly shed some light on what had happened to that young couple in love we had seen on their wedding day."

Logan just sat there a minute, perched on the back of the sectional. He seemed to be processing this information in that super-quick, super-smart brain of his. "I see," was all he came out with. He got up from his seat and ran a hand through his dark hair and then exhaled deeply. "I think I'm going to go and see Camille," he told them. "Maybe just…walk around a little. I just…I gotta think this through on my own first. No offense guys," he offered to his friends.

"Do whatever you want, Logan," Carlos said immediately, for once sounding mature and reasonable.

"We'll be here," James told him, having calmed down considerably during the story.

Logan gave them all a weak smile before he headed out.

~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~BTR~~~~~~

He didn't go and see Camille. He'd never planned on it. He just didn't think Mama Knight would want him to do what he was planning on doing. He went to a remote part of the top floor of the building, where none of their friends lived, so he could have this conversation in semi-privacy.

Pressing the speed dial and then holding his phone up to his ear, he felt his heart racing as the phone rang once. Twice.

"Hello?"

"Hey Mom," Logan greeted grimly. "You'll never guess who showed up today…"