A/N: I am so sorry for the delay, you guys! While my professors aren't piling on the homework, I've still got a fair amount of it and I've been super busy. Not only do I drive up to college every day, but I also have chores and commitments to my friends. I'm also trying out for our dance team, so I've got a couple clinics to go to and then the actual tryouts. Plus, I've been working on a TV show for a while now and I recently been motivated to write more of it, not to mention my book. Not to mention the fact that my sleep schedule is totally screwed up thanks to my wacky class times. I hate to say it, but this story kind of fell to a back burner for a little bit, but the storyline of this chapter has been simmering in the back of my mind for a few weeks now. Hopefully you'll like it and will forgive me for the delay!

Disclaimer: Nope. Don't own anything except for Andrew, Chelsea, Eavan, and Tristan. Plus the occasional random wedding guest. And the girl with the purple hair. I own her, too.

Twelve Months

A Sonny With a Chance story

By: EmbracingRain

Month Ten

One More Time

September 1st

10:39 a.m.

Chad's Voicemail

You have…one unheard message.

First unheard message.

"Hey, Chad. It's me. Sonny, I mean. I'm Sonny. But…you probably knew that. Um…anyways. Call me back or something, okay? I need you to be my fake date one more time and- Oh, hey, Zora."

(Muffled talking.)

"No, I haven't seen your lizard. Just make sure Nico and Grady don't find out you lost him. A lizard's just basically a snake with legs."

(Muffled talking.)

"I know there's major differences between a snake and a lizard, Zora. I'm not stupid. Do you mind if I have some privacy? I'm kinda on the phone here…"

(Muffled talking.)

"No, it's not Chad!"

(Muffled talking.)

"You don't know what you're talking about, Zora."

(The sound of a door shutting. A loud sigh.)

"Sorry. Um. Yeah. Just call me back, okay, Chad? Please?"

September 1st

10:44 a.m.

So Random! Set

Sonny and Tawni's Dressing Room

Sonny sighed in contentment and snuggled into the bright orange couch cushions, tugging her old, well-loved quilt up to her chin. She was just drifting off to sleep, lingering in that peaceful half-consciousness that was the limbo before dreams took over, when the door to her dressing room banged open. Sonny groaned and squeezed her eyes shut tighter.

"Just because I left a message on your phone saying that I needed your help with another fake date doesn't mean you should just barge into my dressing room, Chad," she declared testily.

"It sounded urgent!" Chad countered and Sonny heard him shut the door. "I figured I should- Oh, dear God. What is this…thing?"

Sonny cracked an eye open and sat up on the couch, running a hand through her hair. Chad was prodding at the fluffy, frilly, puffy, yellow dress draped over the back of the couch with a disgusted look on his face.

"That would be the reason I called you," she replied, her eyes somehow finding their way to the soap star's mouth. Luckily, he didn't notice and Sonny was free to reminisce for a few brief seconds about the last time he'd kissed her.

"Don't tell me I have to wear that thing," Chad said, taking a step away from the couch and eyeing the bright yellow dress warily.

Sonny rolled her eyes and shoved her quilt aside before standing up. "Don't be stupid, Chad. I'll be the one wearing the dress."

"That's a dress?" the blonde actor said incredulously. "Damn, Munroe, who wants to publicly humiliate you so bad that they'd make you wear that?"

"It's my bridesmaid's dress," Sonny said tersely. "My brother and Chelsea are getting married this weekend." She picked the dress up off the back of the couch and hung it up on a hook in her changing stall.

"I thought they weren't getting married until Chelsea had the baby," Chad replied, looking confused.

"She had the baby in the middle of last month," Sonny said, raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms over her chest. "Don't tell me that you don't remember."

"Fine," Chad said, shrugging and plopping onto the orange couch in his best attempt at a devil may care way. "I won't tell you that I don't remember."

"How can you not remember?" Sonny demanded, raising one questioning eyebrow at her sometimes fake boyfriend. "You barged in here when I was on the phone with my brother and heard every single detail about my nephew as a result. And then there was what happened after… You know, just as a side note, you really need to learn how to knock."

"I don't remember that specific moment," Chad said, cocking one of his own eyebrows in a challenging manner. "Actually," he continued, a smug smile crossing his handsome face (a smile that unnerved Sonny and made her the slightest bit angry because she could almost feel what he said next deep in her bones before he said it), "I remember the conversation, I just don't remember what happened after. Care to refresh my memory?" He crossed his right ankle over his left knee and propped his elbows on the back of the couch.

Sonny scowled at him, wrenched open her door, and moved to step out. She was barely two steps from the door when Chad suddenly pulled her back into the room and shut the door, an apologetic look replacing his pompous smile.

"Sorry," he said quietly. "That was…uncalled for."

The brunette shrugged his hand off her arm. "You think?" she bit out. "Just because there was a little bit of kissing doesn't mean you need to shove it in my face, alright?"

A little bit of kissing? It was more than that, hon, some ridiculous voice in the back of her mind jeered. You were all over that boy like sheets on a bed or paint on a wall.

"Besides," Sonny continued loudly, trying to drown out the voice in her head, her cheeks a dark shade of pink, "if I'm remembering correctly, you were the one who started it."

"Well, isn't that mature," Chad said snidely, still standing ridiculously close to her. So close, in fact, that his nose was millimeters from her own and she was pressed up against the door. "Pinning the blame on someone else. Way to regress to kindergarten, Munroe."

"Well, at least they're able to define my maturity level," Sonny said hotly, stepping closer despite herself. She tried to ignore the way the tips of their noses were touching was making her spine tingle and the palms of her hands sweat slightly. "You're so immature that they-"

The Wisconsinite found herself cut off when the blonde drama king abruptly kissed her, effectively cutting off her words. She tried to fight it, she really did, but her eyelids fluttered closed and her hands found their way to his chest. Chad Dylan Cooper was like the god of kissing. He made her legs turn to jelly and her heart swoop in her chest before it started to hammer unevenly against her ribcage.

"Shut up, Munroe," Chad murmured against her mouth in between kisses.

"You shut up," Sonny retorted quietly, seizing him by the lapels of his Mackezie Falls blazer and subsequently melding their bodies together in a way that she'd been longing for since their last stolen (albeit accidental) moment here in her dressing room.

It wasn't until she felt one of his hands (the one that wasn't ruining her perfectly styled hair) slip from its position on her hip to a newer one on her bottom that Sonny realized Chad had actually managed to progress from kissing her to Frenching her. And from there, it took her a few more minutes (minutes where his mouth left hers and he began kissing his way down her jawbone) to remember that she was pissed at him.

"I'm mad at you," Sonny said breathlessly, hating herself for the way she sank so helplessly into his slight frame and how her head lolled against the door.

"I know."

"I'm pissed."

"I realize that. But you know what, Sonny?" He kissed her on the corner of her mouth. "You're ruining the moment. Can't you just…" Another kiss, this one on her tingling lips. "Just forget it for a few minutes and…" Kiss. "And kiss me?"

"No-o, I want to be mad," she whined, kissing him deeply despite herself.

"…mad later," Chad replied dismissively before claiming her mouth again.

Sonny allowed herself a few more indulgent minutes of kissing her frenemy-slash-sometimes fake boyfriend-slash-the guy she was possibly falling for before she reluctantly pulled away, a movement Chad apparently took as an invitation to go to work on her neck.

How had they gotten here? How had they gotten from barely friends to something akin to friends with benefits? Ever since she'd kissed him in the woods behind Lucy's house, she'd been aching for his presence, his hugs, his kisses… Even their arguments made her like him…want him…

Arguments.

She was mad.

At him.

She was mad at him!

"Chad," the brunette said warningly, "Tawni could walk in here at any given moment."

His only response was a nip to the delicate skin of her neck that made her moan.

"The only reason I called you was to ask if you'd be my fake date to my brother's wedding, not so you could give me a hickey."

Chad's lips left her throat and he raised his head to look at her, ocean blue eyes meeting velvety brown. He arched one eyebrow, his thumb brushing smoothly against her hip. When had he managed to get his hand under her shirt? It wasn't like he was unabashedly groping her, but still… It was like she accidentally let him French her one time and he suddenly thought it was okay to-

Sonny gave herself a mental shake. Now was not the time to lose her train of thought!

"You expect me to go to a wedding with you when you're dressed as Little Bo Peep?" Chad asked, clearly amused.

"Fine," Sonny said, waving her hand through the air dismissively. "If you don't want to do it, I guess I could always ask Skyler or whatever his name is." She saw something like hurt flash in Chad's eyes and instantly regretted her words. Biting her swollen, still-tingling bottom lip ashamedly, Sonny hoped he could read the apology in her eyes; she really didn't want to apologize for clearly insinuating that she wanted to make him jealous. It was an awkward road their weird relationship shouldn't have to go down.

"I didn't say I wouldn't go," Chad said, pulling away from her. Sonny was disappointed when the warmth of his hand left her hip and her shirt fell back into place.

"That's not the impression that I got," she replied, crossing her arms over her chest. God, she hated herself for deliberately pushing him away when she was vulnerable.

"I'm going, Munroe," he said definitively, loudly.

Sonny almost smiled, but the way her heart started to gallop once more like he was kissing her again put a stop to the motion. It made her nervous, all this heart racing. She was falling for him too hard.

"I'm glad," Sonny said quietly instead.

Chad half-smiled at her. "You don't sound happy."

"I said that I'm glad, Chad. Glad and happy? Yeah, two completely different things."

"Fine," he said, shrugging and beginning to play with a lock of her hair. "You don't sound glad," this part was said teasingly, something that made Sonny crack the barest of smiles.

"'I'm sure I wouldn't sound too happy either if you had me pushed up against the door."

Chad rolled his eyes and Sonny laughed softly, slipping away from him reluctantly.

"Hey, Tawni," she said to the blonde girl, subtly attempting to fix her hair, an action that didn't go unnoticed by Tawni at all.

"Oh, gross," Tawni exclaimed, making a face as she sat down at her vanity and began tugging a brush through her hair. "I interrupted something, didn't I? Can't you guys learn to control yourselves?"

"There's nothing to control," Sonny said, fighting back a vicious blush that was threatening to invade her cheeks. "When does the next sketch start?"

"A few minutes. Do you want to walk down to the stage together?" Tawni asked, turning around in her chair and putting down her brush. "Or would you rather get in a few extra minutes with your boyfriend?"

Sonny scowled at her castmate. "Chad's not my boyfriend, Tawni, you know that."

Tawni rolled her eyes and pulled a nail file seemingly from nowhere. "Fake boyfriend, whatever. Jeez, you guys are so touchy when it comes to your stupid relationship."

Chad chortled slightly, stepping around Sonny and making his way over to Tawni's side of the dressing room where he placed one hand on the doorknob. "We're not in a relationship, Blondie. I think we're allowed to be upset when people accuse us of being something we're not." He formed his fingers into guns and pointed them at Sonny, making a clicking noise in the back of his throat. "Catch ya later, Munroe." With that, he was gone.

Sonny turned back to Tawni, a glare on her face. "Can't you leave well enough alone?"

"Well enough?" Tawni snorted. "I'm just trying to help! You and Chad are so obsessed with denying that you're in any kind of relationship that you've both started to ignore one basic but very important fact: you like each other!"

Sonny scoffed and snagged her script up from the table as she brushed past Tawni on her way out the door, saying, "Now you're just making things up," as she went.

"No, I'm really not," the blonde insisted as the pair walked briskly down the hallway toward the stage. "Look, I'm not you or Chad; I've got an outside view on the whole situation. I see things that you two can't. Trust me, okay?"

Sonny shook her head and walked a little faster, pulling ahead of Tawni. "I'm not listening to this, Tawni."

September 10th

4:45 p.m.

Wisconsin

Hotel Ballroom

Chad fixed his hair in the back of his spoon before raising his eyes to the set of French doors that had just opened up. The DJ was announcing Andrew and his girlfriend (now wife, Chad corrected himself), but the blonde only had eyes for the small grouping of girls preceding the happy couple. The first was a haughty-looking blonde of about eighteen or nineteen years old. There was a devious smile on her overly made up face, but there was an air surrounding her that suggested she was disgusted by everyone and everything around her. She was wearing a blue dress that did absolutely nothing for her, but she wore it like she thought she was Marilyn Monroe. Sonny and a thin girl with shockingly purple hair were walking behind her, Sonny cradling a small blanketed bundle in her bare arms. Chad assumed that Sonny was carrying her nephew from the way both girls were cooing over the blanket.

The yellow mess of a dress Chad had seen in Sonny's dressing room back in California actually didn't look all that bad on her. He supposed it was the kind of dress that looked like a total disaster on the hanger but actually made sense when put on a body.

Sonny must have sensed his eyes lingering over her, because she suddenly looked up and met his gaze with a large smile and a wink. Chad chuckled softly and smiled back. He never would've thought that he'd wind up as Sonny's date to her older brother's wedding.

There was a bit of a commotion when the eldest Munroe and his new wife entered the room, but Chad suddenly found that a delicate flowery smell was wafting under his nose, and he looked around to see that Sonny had taken her place next to him, softly brushing a finger over her nephew's round face.

"Who'sa goo' boyyy?" she cooed with a dopey smile on her face. "Who'sa goo' Trissy?"

Chad snorted and Sonny looked around at him with a smirk on her lips.

"What?" she asked.

"What did you just call that kid?" Chad replied.

Sonny blushed and shifted the baby in her arms. "It's baby talk, Chad. Everyone does it. His name is Tristan."

Chad looked over at the rosy-cheeked baby who peered back at him with calm, clear, blue eyes and then reached up with one pudgy hand to bop the blonde actor on his nose.

"Hey!" Chad exclaimed, pulling his head away.

Sonny giggled. "Yeah, he doesn't like it very much when people do that."

"Then the least you could've done was warn me," Chad said, feigning hurt and placing a hand over his nose delicately. "He could've really hurt me!"

"He's a baby, Cooper."

"Well, well, well," a distinctly feminine voice said, interrupting the actors' banter. "Looks like little Sonny managed to scrounge up some sort of Hollywood scum to bring to her big bwudder's wedding."

Sonny rolled her eyes and looked up at the girl who had so rudely interrupted them. "Chad," she addressed the blonde on her right, "this is Chelsea's sister Eavan. Eavan, this is Chad."

Chad looked up at the bleach blonde in the ugly blue dress who was towering over them. She wore too much make up, he noticed. "Hi," he said quietly. He had a feeling that he wasn't going to like this girl much. She had the typical Hollywood skank air around her; the type of air that Chad had been less attracted to ever since Sonny had joked her way into his life with a fat suit and some fro-yo.

"Oh. My. Gawd. You brought Chad Dylan Cooper?" Eavan shot at Sonny who raised one finely-shaped yet unenthused eyebrow.

"Surprised?" Sonny responded at rapid-fire speed.

"There's no way Chad Dylan Cooper is your boyfriend."

"I didn't say he-"

"I am," Chad declared loudly before he even knew what he was saying. He almost slapped his hand over his mouth but he refrained. Instead he told himself that the only reason he'd said that he was Sonny's boyfriend was because of the way Sonny was blushing and because of the impression Eavan was giving off. Sonny whipped her head around to look at him, and he could have sworn he heard it crack.

"Chad."

Chad shrugged, casually slinging an arm around his favorite Wisconsinite's thin shoulders. "C'mon, Sonny," he said in his best 'Persuasive Mackenzie' voice. "Are you really going to tell your sister-in-law that we're not dating when we are? Jeez, Munroe. I thought I meant something to you." He punctuated his sentence with a wink, but from the way Sonny's mouth turned down into a frown and the way her face turned even redder, he guessed she wasn't so much amused as she was angry.

Eavan snorted, bringing the pair's attention back to her; Chad had a feeling she did it on purpose. She definitely seemed like the kind of girl who constantly felt as though she was attention-deprived.

"I don't believe you."

Chad's eyebrows shot up his forehead. "You don't believe us? I'm Chad Dylan Cooper. That should be enough."

"Prove it then," Eavan said snidely, crossing her arms over her chest and distracting from some of the ugliness of the dress. "Kiss."

"What are you? Five?" Chad demanded at the same time Sonny said, "I'm holding a baby."

Both teen stars looked at each other and then erupted into raucous laughter. The blue swathed girl in front of them gaped in confusion.

"What's so funny?!"

"We're not big on…public displays of affection," Sonny gasped through her giggles. "We're more of a…private couple."

"Bullshit."

Sonny scowled. "Um…hello, airhead. Baby."

Tristan started to cry and both Sonny and Chad looked down at him, worry creasing their foreheads. His big blue eyes were squinted shut and his wails pierced the room as his tiny fists waved through the air. A pungent odor filled the air, making Chad's eyes water slightly.

"Oh, great," Chad heard Sonny mutter. "I don't know where my mom is."

Chad tore his eyes from the squalling infant and looked up at Sonny. "What do you need?" He almost started laughing again. Sonny plus a baby made him care. It was almost too clichéd to be true.

"My mom elected to be on diaper duty today-"

Chad heard Eavan quietly intone, "Oh, gross." She quickly vanished from his peripheral vision.

"-and I have no idea where she is. I don't have anything to-"

"Sonny?"

The brunette comedienne's brown eyes filled with relief, and Chad followed her gaze to see that Connie Munroe had quickly filled Eavan's vacated position on the opposite side of the table. Her mother of the groom look had less of an impact by the presence of a bulky, sky blue diaper bag that was slung over her shoulder. She held out her arms expectantly and Sonny obediently stood up and passed her nephew over to his grandmother cautiously.

"I was just about to send Chad to look for you," Sonny said.

Connie looked around her daughter and clumsily waved to Chad who returned the gesture with a smile.

"Hi, Mrs. Munroe."

"Hi, Chad." She turned back to Sonny. "Where did Eavan go? I saw her over here just a second before Tristan started crying…"

"I said the word 'diaper,'" Sonny told her with a roll of her eyes. "She bolted. You know Eavan."

Connie sighed and nodded. "You're right. Make sure you talk to some of the family, sweetie."

"I will."

"Bye, Chad."

"Bye."

As her mother walked away, Sonny turned back to Chad with a questioning look on her face. Chad raised a solitary eyebrow in response.

"So…do I really look like Little Bo Peep?"

Chad cracked a smiled. "Only as long as I get to be the sheep you lost."

Sonny giggled and leaned against the linen-covered table. "You know you don't have to pretend, Chad."

Who said he was pretending?

"What do you mean?"

"It's just…" She began to make an accordion out of the fabric of her bright yellow dress, her fingers deftly pleating the material. "You don't have to be so…over the top. You don't actually have to act like my boyfriend."

"That Eavan's the entire reason I'm here, isn't she?" Chad questioned her softly.

Sonny nodded, focusing even harder on her fingers' actions. "Eavan and I don't like each other. She really looks down on me and she doesn't believe that I can…well, let's just say she doesn't think I'm pretty enough for guys."

"She's stupid," Chad said bluntly. "And probably jealous. Ignore her, okay? You've got all of your friends to prove her wrong."

"Friends aren't guys," Sonny said, her eyes flickering back up to his.

"You've got guys, Munroe."

A tall, black haired man swaggered past, a glass of scotch clutched in each of his hands.

"You don't need to lie to make me feel better, Chad."

"I'm not lying. I'm telling the truth, okay? I know of a few guys who think you're hot and one specific one who really, really likes you. In fact, he'd probably still like you even if he saw you in that dress."

Sonny laughed slightly and wrinkled her nose. "You really know how to charm a girl, Cooper. Look, I have to go talk to my grandma for a little bit. Think you'll be okay by yourself?"

Chad shrugged noncommittally and made himself a bit more comfortable in his chair. "I'm sure I'll be fine."

As Sonny walked away, Chad kept his eyes on her, a frown pushing his eyebrows together. How many hints did he have to drop until she realized that the guy who liked her was him?

September 12th

3:01 p.m.

Sonny Munroe's Apartment

Sonny smiled privately as she accepted the small package from the deliveryman and then shut her apartment door. Her mom was still in Wisconsin helping out with Tristan for a while, so there was nobody pestering her about what was in the tiny box; it was kind of nice.

She slowly tore the brown packaging paper off of the cardboard (it was covered in Chad's perfect, all-caps printing; the ink was bright blue like his eyes) and then opened the box to reveal a smaller one of black velvet. Upon opening the velvet box, she found a small note which she opened before even glancing at the new charm.

Bo Peep-

Don't worry. It's not Tiffany's this time, I swear. I even saved the receipt if you want proof.

- Your Lost Sheep

Chuckling, Sonny set the note aside and picked the velvet box back up. Nestled in the off-white satin interior was a delicately carved rose (silver, of course). Each and every detail of the silver flower was crafted so realistically that Sonny briefly had a hard time believing it was just a charm. Chad really did spoil her. As she examined the little piece, her smile and the look in her eyes turned wistful. Was it too much to hope that maybe he wasn't just acting?

Oh, gosh. You guys have no idea how jealous I was of Sonny in the very first couple sentences of this chapter! Right now, I want nothing more than to crawl into bed and sleep forever! I'm so tired. Between papers, classes, dance team clinics, and trying to figure out a good sleep schedule (not to mention the nightmare that my eating habits have turned into now that I'm snacking every time I study. Hello, freshman fifteen!) I am completely and totally bushed. You'd think dancing for two hours a night for three days this week wouldn't be that bad, but you should see the routine we have to try out with. It's a nightmare. I can hardly keep my eyes open so…be thankful I got this up, haha. I know it's not the best, but hopefully you can forgive me.

For those of you who are sad about the ending of this story, don't worry! I am too. We've still got three more chapters to go, though, and then I'll be updating Twelve Months of Outtakes and I'm working on a surprise for you guys! I'm not going to say what it is just now, but I'll let you know soon.

I had a lot of fun writing Eavan's character. I based her off of my brother's girlfriend's sister. She's a snot and I really don't like her. If I'd gone to school with her, I probably would've hated her guts.

I named the baby Tristan because that's what I really want my brother and his girlfriend to name my nephew; that or Brad. Unfortunately, my brother's girlfriend has one name picked out and she's got my brother wrapped around her finger. I like the name she picked out, but not for my nephew.

By the way, I was listening to Colbie Caillat's "Falling For You" while I was writing this chapter. It's a good song, so if you haven't heard it you should go on YouTube and look it ASAP. Also, "Smile" by Uncle Kracker and…

You know what? I'll just make you a playlist of what I was listening to while writing this chapter.

1. "Falling For You" by Colbie Caillat
2. "Smile" by Uncle Kracker
3. "Use Somebody" by Kings of Leon
4. "Gotta Be Somebody" by Nickelback
5. "Over And Over" by Three Days Grace
6. "Stuck On You" by Hellogoodbye
7. "She Is Love" by Parachute
8. "Burning Love" by Elvis Presley
9. "Rag Doll" by Aerosmith
10. "All The Small Things" by blink-182

A MEGA THANKS GOES OUT TO MAY LILY FOR NAGGING AT ME TO HURRY UP AND UPDATE. THIS CHAPTER IS FOR YOU, MAY!

By the way, guess what day it officially is? MY BIRTHDAY! Yay! I'm so excited. You can guess how old I am if you want, but you know what would be fantastic? If you guys somehow hit close to two-hundred reviews! That would be an awesome birthday present.