Chapter 11  The Conversation

It was Nick's turn to be stunned. He stood, looking at both Steve and Mark, unable to comprehend what he had just heard. He was about to open his mouth when the door behind them opened and Elizabeth Carter was wheeled out on her way to the OR. Nick Snr. followed, came to a halt next to his son and looked at him. He saw Nick's expression and totally misunderstood the reason for it. Reaching out, he laid a hand on Nick's arm and said, "She is going to be okay, Nick."

Seeing that Nick was unable to answer, Mark stepped in and said, "I think we'd be better off in my office."

In silence and with a myriad of thoughts rushing around their collective minds, the four men made their way to Mark's spacious office. When they were all seated, Nick Snr. looked at his son and asked, "What's going on, Nick?"

"I met Steve, Pop," Nick answered.

"But you said that you had missed your lunch date," he answered.

"That's right, Pop," Nick replied, "but I met him here at the hospital."

"Here?" Nick's father was confused, "How?"

"He met me, Mr. Carter," Steve quietly replied.

Nick Snr, swivelled in his seat to look at Steve and realised that he was the police officer from the store.

"You are my son's father?"

Steve smiled a little at the incongruity of the last remark and answered, "I guess I am."

Silence fell over the group until Mark spoke, "Nick, your Mom is going to be in the OR for at least a couple of hours. Why don't you and Steve have your lunch now? I'll keep your dad company."

Steve and Nick rose to their feet and as they reached the door, Mark continued, "Steve, don't take Nick to the canteen, go somewhere else."

Grinning at his father, Steve said, "I wasn't going to.  I thought we'd go to Bob's"

"Hmm," chuckled Mark, "a fair compromise, I suppose."

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Twenty minutes later, Steve and Nick were seated opposite each other, a plate of ribs and fries in front of them both.

"You seem to be well known here," Nick commented, breaking the silence between them.

"I co-own this place," Steve replied.

"Who with?"

"Jesse Travis and my dad. We bought it after we all got caught in the bombing of the hospital a couple of years back."

"I remember that!" Nick exclaimed, a rib dripping with special sauce half way to his mouth, "Hey, wasn't it Dr. Sloan who figured out who it was that was responsible?"

"He did," Steve answered, "your grandfather is a very clever and persistent man."

"My…………,"Nick began, "I suppose he is, isn't he?"

Again there was silence for a while.

"Can I ask you something?" Steve questioned eventually.

"Sure," Nick replied.

"How long have you known that you were adopted?"

"I have always known…..er….,Steve," Nick stumbled a little over the name, "it's been a part of my life for as long as I could remember, Mom and Pop made sure of that. When I was fifteen they gave me the letter that my birth-mother, Amy, wrote to me and ever since then I have wanted to meet the both of you. I've met you, now I just need to meet Amy."

A look of sadness came over Steve's face, he really wasn't sure how to tell Nick about Amy. Although he had sent a copy of her letter with his Consent form to the agency they had not passed it on to Nick, believing that the information would best coming from Steve.  Nick saw the look on Steve's face and said, "What's the matter, Steve?"

Steve passed the envelope he had taken out of his pocket across the table. Taking the pink papet out of its envelope, Nick slowly read the letter. By the time he reached the end, tears were brimming over in his eyes and he looked up at Steve saying, "I'm never going to see Amy?"

"I'm sorry, Nick," Steve answered, "I only found out about Amy's death a short while ago."

"Tell me about her," Nick urged.

"It's a long time since I knew her," Steve responded, "but I can tell you what I remember."

The food in front of them gradually disappeared as Steve spoke of Amy. They even managed to laugh as Steve described Amy's love of the colour pink.

"So you only found out about me a short while ago?" Nick asked a little later as they sat drinking coffee.

"Yes," Steve answered, "I really had no idea that Amy was pregnant. Her parents, when they found out, sent her to live with her aunt and I never saw her again. I only found out that I had a son when I received her letter."

"And you started looking right away?"

"Of course," Steve responded with a smile, "I had a head start with the address of the adoption agency on the back of the photo of Amy holding you."

"Do you have the photo with you?" Nick asked.

"Yes," replied Steve, reaching into his wallet and passing the photo across the table to Nick.

He looked down at the photo and said, in a surprised tone, "That looks just like Andy when he was born."

"Andy?" Steve asked, not quite grasping the significance of Nick's comment.

"My son," he replied, handing the photo back to Steve and reaching into his own wallet for a photo of Jenny and Andy.

Steve looked down at the second photo he held in his hand and for a long while said nothing. Nick looked across at his face, a little concerned as he saw the colour fade from his cheeks.

"Steve?" he asked.

Steve shook his head a little and looked up at Nick saying, "This is your son?"

"Yeah," Nick replied, "your grandson, I guess."

An expletive, softly uttered, escaped Steve's lips although the smile hovering around his mouth as he spoke, took any sting out of the words.

"Would you like to meet him?" Nick asked softly.

"Very much," Steve answered quickly, then a thought struck him, "How are your parents with all this? Will they mind?"

"They have known since they gave me Amy's letter when I was fifteen that I wanted to find my birth-parents. I know, from what she wrote, that Amy loved me. I have never resented either of you, if anything, I was grateful for Amy's courage in giving me up and allowing my parents to adopt me. We have had a lot of conversations over the years and they know that, to me, they are my parents. They brought me up, brushed my hair off of my face when I was leaning over the john throwing up, cheered with me and cried with me," he looked across the table, "I don't need another parent, Steve."

"I know that, Nick," Steve replied, "and I wouldn't want to try. I'd like to get to know you though and be a part of your life."

"I'd like that too," Nick answered.

Steve looked at his watch, "Your mom should be coming out of surgery soon. Do you want to get back to the hospital?"

"Yes, thanks," Nick said, standing up along with Steve.

As they moved towards the entrance, the door opened and Jesse entered the restaurant. He had fleetingly seen Amanda as he left the hospital and knew about the missed lunch.Therefore, Jesse was not expecting to see Steve with anyone and, consequently, he took no notice of Nick thinking that he was another customer. He smiled politely at Nick before looking past him to his friend and said, "Hey, Steve I'm sorry to hear that you missed out on your lunch. What are you going to do now?"

"Nothing, Jess," Steve said, his pleasure at finally meeting Nick, translating into an inability to resist teasing his friend and, giving Nick a surreptitious nudge in the hope that he would catch on.

Nick did and kept quiet.

"Nothing!" Jesse was incredulous, he knew how much Steve had been looking forward to meeting Nick.

"Well, it obviously wasn't meant to be, Jess," Steve replied, a suitably mournful expression on his face.

As Steve knew he would, Jesse rose beautifully to the bait.

"Steve," he exclaimed, "you can't just leave it! You need to ring the agency to explain, I am sure your son will understand."

"He does," Nick spoke, a distinct chuckle in his voice.

"Hmmm?" Jesse murmured, actually seeing Nick for the first time.

Nick held out his hand, "I'm Nick Carter, Steve's son."

Almost in a daze, Jesse took Nick's hand and shook it. Then realisation hit him and he turned on Steve, "You sneaky, rotten devil!"

Nick looked between the two men, impressed at the obvious friendship between them and the affection they had no trouble in showing.

"I'm sorry, Jess, I just couldn't resist." Steve smiled and continued, "Nick is Elizabeth Carter's son. I arrived at the hospital and overheard him on the phone to the restaurant, put two and two together."

A huge smile spread across Jesse's face, lighting up his features and making him seem years younger and he said, "That is great, Steve!"

"We can't stop now, Jess," Steve continued, "we are going back to the hospital to see if Nick's mom is out of OR."

"I can tell you that," Jesse answered, "she came out of theatre just before I left. The op went fine, she will be up and about in no time."

"Thanks, Jess," Steve said, as he and Nick exited Bob's.

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Arriving back at Community General, Steve and Nick quickly made their way to Mark's office. Steve opened the door and stopped dead in his tracks causing Nick to canon into his back.

"I don't believe it!" Nick heard Steve exclaim.

"What's happening?" Nick wanted to know. He peered over Steve's shoulder and looked into the room, a chuckle escaped him, "Not you too?"

The scene which greeted their eyes and had caused their outbursts, was the sight of Mark and Nick side by side, tapping their way back and forth across the light grey carpet. At the sound of Steve and Nick's voices, the two men stopped dancing and looked across at their son's.

"Hi, Steve," Mark began, "we were…………er."

"We can see what you were doing, Dad," Steve replied, "I just thought that you would have been with Mrs. Carter by now. We saw Jesse and he said that she was out of theatre."

"So she is," Mark agreed, "but it will still be a while before she is settled in the ICU so I have arranged for them to ring us when."

"And the dancing?" Nick broke in, unable to keep a large grin from spreading across his face.

"Well," his father began, "we discovered that we have a mutual love of tap dancing and Mark said that he'd teach me a new step whilst we waited."

Just as Steve was about to speak again the phone on Mark's desk rang. Scrabbling amongst the large pile of paperwork which covered it, Mark picked up the receiver and spoke, "Mark Sloan here. Okay, thanks. We'll be up in a few minutes."

The four men left the office and made their way to the ICU. Mark and Steve waited outside, allowing Nick and his father to enter alone. Steve turned to Mark and asked,

"Okay, Dad, so what was with the dancing lesson?"

Mark returned Steve's look and replied, "We were both feeling a little tense and Nick happened to notice that picture on my wall. You know, the one from last year's benefit, where I'm dancing. I told him about the new step I taught myself and, before we knew where we were, we were up on our feet tapping away. I'm sure it could have looked a little inappropriate but it kept our minds off the two of you and stopped Nick from worrying about his wife."

Before Steve was able to speak again, the door behind them opened again and Nick came out alone, leaving his father sitting by Elizabeth's bedside.

"Is everything alright, Nick?" Steve asked.

"It's fine," he replied, "it's just that time is getting on and I ought to get home and let Jenny know what is going on."

"Jenny?" Mark queried.

"My wife," Nick answered, "she will be beside herself and I really don't want her worrying too much at the moment."

"Why?" Mark asked, the doctor in him coming out.

Nick hesitated a little, he hadn't even had the time to tell his Mom and Dad about Jenny's pregnancy yet. Then, in a split second, he decided to tell Steve and Mark. After all, he reasoned, his parents had heard about Andy first, it would be nice for his new found family to hear about this baby. He spoke, "We have just found out that Jenny is pregnant again and she is feeling pretty rough."

"Pregnant?" Steve said, whilst Mark picked up on the second word.

"Again?"

"Yes, we already have a son, Andy." Nick replied.

Mark looked at Steve and said, "That means you're a grandfather."

"I know," Steve smiled, "Great, huh?"

"I really must go," Nick interjected, looking at his watch, "but when things settle down we will all get together."

"Here," Steve said, as Nick turned to go, handing him a card with his numbers on it, "call me."

As Nick disappeared into the elevator, Steve turned to Mark and said, "What a rollercoaster of a day, Great-grandpa."

"Tell me about it," Mark replied, putting his arm around his son's shoulder and leading him towards the nearest doctor's lounge for a coffee.

Authors Note: I am in the process of writing the final chapters to this story and they will be posted as soon as possible. I would also like to add a word to Alf, who has kindly reviewed this story.  Thank you. Your words have touched me more than I can say and I feel privileged that you have read my story. Under normal circumstances I wouldn't reply to a review this way but I have no other way to let you know.