Deanna awoke the following morning with her headache replaced by an extreme case of hyperactivity. Before Will had even awakened, she had cleaned the kitchen and bathroom and was working on the living room.
"Well, I'm certainly glad to see you're feeling better," Will laughed when he saw her.
Deanna looked up at him and the memory of the events of the previous day hit her like a ton of bricks. She just stared at him, not smiling, not saying anything.
Will knew right away that something serious was up, but not wanting to get into it at the beginning of a heavy work day, he simply kissed Deanna good-bye, giving her an extra gentle hug before leaving to start his day.
Deanna ate her lunch in her office that day and, to her relief, Will didn't come by to check on her. You can't run away forever, she told herself. You're going to have to tell him eventually, and the longer you wait, the harder it's going to be.
Fortunately, Deanna was able to get involved enough in the concerns of her clients that she was able to temporarily forget her own. However, as each client left at ten to the hour and she looked up at the clock, her stomach clenched in dread of what she knew was now one hour closer.
At the end of the work day, Deanna took special care to ensure that her office was neat and perfectly well organized before she left. Every time she began to lock the door and return to her quarters, it seemed that there was one more thing that she needed to do.
Deanna was chopping vegetables in the kitchen when she heard Will enter that evening.
"Hi, sweetheart." He came to the kitchen and kissed her lips before going to sit in the living room to await what he knew was coming.
Deanna finished in the kitchen and joined him. He looked at her expectantly.
"I don't quite know how to say this, Will," she began. "But my newest client, Matthew Berq...he's your son, Will."
"No," Will whispered, a look of utter shock on his face.
Deanna nodded miserably. "His mother is Wendy Roper. It happened that time on Betazed, when my mother...tried to keep me away from you, and...and..." Deanna was choking up and couldn't finish the sentence.
"That's not possible." Will just kept shaking his head in disbelief. "She would have told me. Wendy would have told me if something like that had happened."
"Well, it seems that she didn't," Deanna said quietly.
"How did you find out?" Will asked.
"He told me that his mother told him that his father was a Starfleet officer who had accompanied her to a wedding. I checked his birthdate, Will. He was born not quite nine months after you left Betazed."
Will gave a low whisper. "Wow, that's incredible," he whispered. "Why didn't she tell me? I had the right to know."
"Well, how do you think I feel?" snapped Deanna.
"I know. I'm so sorry, Dee. Don't you realize I would have told you if I had only known?"
He went to her and put his arms around her in a comforting gesture, and she let him hold her.
"She should have told me." Deanna felt Will's anger. "I should have been there for him while he was growing up. I deserved the opportunity to have a relationship with him."
"It's not too late for that, you know," Deanna said softly. "He is on the same starship as you now."