Elizabeth stared at Conner waiting for him to say something. His face had gone pale, his eyes had widened and his mouth had fallen open, but so far he hadn't said anything. He wasn't even looking at her, just staring out at the ocean.

"Conner? Did you hear me?" Elizabeth said unable to take the silence

"Um, yeah, I'm just finding it hard to believe that's all. I mean...WHAT!"

"I found out after you had already left, I wasn't sure what to do…"

"No, no, no, no" Conner cut her off as he stood up and started flinging his arms in disbelief. "I mean how…no…after five years…I don't…no" Conner stuttered in obvious disbelief. He started pacing back and forth shaking his head. Elizabeth figured the best thing to do was to probably just stay quiet until he asked her a question she could answer.

Suddenly Conner stopped moving and turned to look at Elizabeth, looking her in the eyes and demanding her full attention. "I don't understand" he said.

"What don't you understand Conner? We slept together, we didn't use protection and as a consequence for that action I got pregnant and had a baby."

"That's not what I meant Liz. It's been five years since that night. Why did you wait until now to tell me? You've waited this long, why did you tell me at all? It's not like you kept in touch with anyone from home, you could have gone on living your life without telling me and I would have never found out. What changed your mind?"

"Conner, you need to understand something here," Elizabeth pleaded with Conner standing up to look him in the eye and try her best to get him to understand. "When I found out I was pregnant you had been gone for six weeks and I hadn't heard anything from you since you left. I was already an emotional mess before finding out I was pregnant, and to top it all off the day I found out was the same day I got in that fight with Jessica. So I ran. I didn't know what else to do. But you have to believe me when I tell you that I always planned on telling you. I just didn't know how or when that would be."

Conner looked at Elizabeth, an unreadable expression on his face. "Look Liz," he said, "I need some time with this. This is a lot of information to throw on me all of a sudden. Do you think you can give me just a little time to wrap my head around all this?"

"Of course. I expected you would need some time. I've had five years to get okay with this, it would be wrong of me to expect you to be ok with it in a matter of minutes. Take all the time you need and find me when you're ready to talk." Elizabeth paused hesitating ever so slightly before adding, "There's just one thing Conner. Since Tia was the one who told you I was in town you're obviously still friends with her and I don't know how close Tia and Jess are but can you please not tell anyone? No one else but my parents know that I have a son and I don't want Jessica to find out from anyone but me. So if you could please just try not to tell anyone yet I would really appreciate it." After Conner looked at her and nodded his head Elizabeth turned and walked toward her car.

Elizabeth got into her car and closed the door. Man it had been a long day, first her parents, then her sister, then Tia and then Conner. It was all so exhausting. She needed a nap, maybe she could call her parents and convince them to watch Aiden a little longer while she went back to the hotel to get some rest.

A little while later Elizabeth was back in her hotel room, she had called her parents and told them that things hadn't gone so well and they had agreed to watch Aiden for a little longer and when Elizabeth was ready they would all go to dinner together as a family. Elizabeth lay on her bed looking up at the ceiling taking in everything that had happened that day. Out of the million scenarios that Elizabeth had played in her head over the years of how things would go when she finally came back home she never imagined it quite like that. Now she just needed to figure out her next steps. There was what she was going to do to get Jessica to at least hear her out, and then there was the matter of Conner. He said he needed time, which she understood, but what would happen once he had time? What if he said he didn't want anything to do with her or Aiden? She had five years waiting for this moment and in that time she had made plans and expectations, but now that the moment was here what if none of that happened? Then what would she do?

Elizabeth stood up and headed towards the bathroom, maybe if she took a shower it would help her unwind and relax. She couldn't go back to Aiden so tensed and worried, he would notice and start asking questions she didn't want or know how to answer. Just as she reached the bathroom there was a knock on her door. Elizabeth stopped and turned to look at the door. Why would anybody be knocking on her door? The only people that knew where she was were her parents. The person on the other end of the door knocked again and Elizabeth slowly walked towards the door to answer it. When she opened it she was standing face to face with a very nervous and fidgety Conner. She had never seen Conner like that before, he was always so cool and composed, acting like he didn't have a care in the world. To see him so undone was almost as much of a shock as seeing him at her door at all.

"Conner? What…"

"I need to talk to you," he cut in without letting her finish.

"Ok sure, but how did you know where I was?"

"I called your parents, they told me where I would be able to find you."

"Ok, well why don't you come on in and we can talk"

Conner glanced nervously around and Elizabeth knew what he was looking for,

"He's not here Conner, my parents are watching him right now, it's just me."

Conner stepped around her into the room and as Elizabeth closed the door she glanced over at Conner who had begun to pace the floor.

"I have to say Conner, when I said you could have some time to think and we could talk later I didn't expect that to mean only an hour later"

"I didn't either, but as I sat there thinking, I had a million questions running through my mind, so I thought maybe it would just be better if I found you."

"Well here I am, so ask me anything you want and I'll do my best to answer it"

Conner continued to pace back and forth for a little while until finally he stopped and looked at her.

"No one else knows?" he asked

"No one but my parents."

"It's been five years and you haven't said anything to anybody?"

"Nope"

"Where have you been all this time?"

"New York"

"And what have you been doing in New York?"

"Working mostly. I didn't go to college, being pregnant with no form of a support system I knew I had to figure out some way to support myself. Using what little I had from my savings I got myself a tiny studio apartment and got a job waitressing at a restraint. Waitressing wasn't enough money to live on, especially as an only parent so after I had the baby I signed up with a temp agency as well. After numerous odd jobs I got placed at a small local newspaper that ended up hiring me as a permanent secretary. After a little while there the editor said they would give me a job as a blurb writer starting once a week if I went to school. So I've been attending night classes at a local community college trying to get my journalism degree."

"So what's going on with all that now that you're here?"

Elizabeth looked up at Conner who was standing there staring down at her, "It's on hold at the moment" she said.

"What does that mean exactly?"

"Well it means that I have more important things that I need to do right now so that other stuff is just going to have to wait."

"You know, I get this feeling like you're holding back, not telling me something"

Elizabeth stared up at Conner he always seemed to be able to read her better than she could read him, "Look Conner I said I would do my best to answer your questions, and that's what I've been doing. You said you needed time to think and then you showed up here an hour later with nothing but questions. Now I completely understand, I sort of sprang all this on you out of nowhere, but now it's my turn to ask a question. I need to know what you're thinking. Are you scared and thinking about turning and running the other direction or are you thinking about giving this a shot, getting to know your son?"

Conner looked down at Elizabeth and then sat down on the bed next to her.

"Look" he said, "I'm not going to lie all of this scares me, more than that it terrifies me. The thought of me being a dad, wow, I still find it hard to believe. But then again, the minute you left the beach after telling me I started to think about this kid I never knew I had and how he has gone his whole life without knowing his father. I know a little something about what it's like to grow up without a dad around, and it's not something I want my son to go through. Thinking about how much of his life I've already missed, how many milestones I've missed, it makes me sad. And listening to you describe the sacrifices you've made makes me realize that not only have I not been there for him, but I haven't been there for you either. Now I know it's not going to be easy, and I know that there may be times where I'll feel like bolting, but I also know that I won't because now that I know I have a son the idea of turning my back on him and not doing everything in my power to be a good father to him would kill me. I made a promise to myself a long time ago when my father left me, that I would never leave any of my children without a father."

Elizabeth drew in a shaky breath, was this really happening? Was Conner really saying that he was going to stick around, that he was going to take responsibility and be there for his son?

"Conner are you sure? I know this is asking a lot but I need to make sure you are positive you want to do this. Aiden and I have been living just the two of us for years, it's far from perfect, and I won't pretend that it's ever been particularly easy but it's worked for us, we have a system. All of that would be disrupted if you came into our lives and decided it was too hard for you and ran. I can't have that. It would be too devastating for both of us"

Conner took Elizabeth's hands into his own and looked her straight in the eyes.

"Believe me when I tell you that I am positive" he said, "I may not have thought about it for very long but I didn't need much time to know I am in this. Forever. No matter what."

Elizabeth wiped the tears from her eyes and gave Conner a hug.

"You have no idea how much it means to me to hear you say that." She said with a tiny laugh, "now how would you like to meet your son? We were going to go out to dinner with my parents tonight, you should join us."

Conner smiled and reached out to wipe away a tear that was trickling down her face, "I'd love to" he said.