Author's Note: Thank you again for your great reviews, I have a couple of chapters ready so I thought I'd post another now.

Chapter 6

Carter felt as though he had had no sleep at all when he walked into work the next morning. Vaguely he remembered that in fact he had managed to sleep for a grand total of one hour and forty five minutes and on awaking he was still clutching the now tatty letters from Abby which he had read over and over . If he had been apprehensive about meeting her yesterday when he had been oblivious to the content of the letters, he admitted that now he was almost terrified at the thought of it. He wouldn't blame him if she hated him.

After donning some scrubs he headed out to the desk and collided with a body coming in the opposite direction. Instinctively he put his arms out to steady the other person and himself and found that he was looking into a pair of very familiar deep brown eyes.

"Abby" he whispered

"You look like hell" she commented, surprised as everyone said that yesterday he was looking great.

"I had a bad night" he replied in way of an explanation, thinking that she was looking at him, in a concerned way.

Giving a half smile she said in an awkward manner "Welcome back Carter" to which Carter returned the half smile.

"It didn't take you too long" said Malik teasing the pair of them as he strode by.

Carter suddenly realised that he was still gripping Abby's elbows and let go rather suddenly, causing her to lose her balance slightly.

"I have to go" she said finally breaking the stare.

"Yeah sure" he answered watching her walk away and wondering why he felt so empty.

o0o

"Where's Luka?" asked Ray sometime later as he approached the desk

"With the thrombosis guy" said Jerry

"I thought that was Abby's patient" said Ray

"He is, she had to go see Michael, bit of a problem upstairs" added Jerry

Carter who was also at the desk tuned into the conversation but possibly as he was tired jumped suddenly to the wrong conclusion immediately and said "Why she seeing her boyfriend when we're swamped down here" then inwardly thought "Oh hell I didn't mean to say that out loud"

"Michael's not her boyfriend, haven't you caught up on all the gossip yet?" said Sam

"I've only been back a couple of days" Carter replied

"Michael" said Sam slowly explaining "Is Abby's son"

"Son?" he croaked out and inside was thinking "Of course that makes more sense, why am I so dumb"

"Yeah he's what about eight months and real cute" added Ray

"Really" Carter replied and then to clarify everything asked "So she hasn't got a boyfriend?"

"No not that I'm aware of" Jerry told him

"She's never really said anything about Michael's father except that she told him and he didn't seem to want to know" Sam informed him

"She said that?" Carter replied aware that his voice was unnaturally high and coughed as if to clear it.

"You okay Carter?" asked Jerry

"Yeah I didn't sleep well" he offered as an explanation, hoping that they wouldn't think his behaviour odd.

"Look I'll fill you in on the basics" said Jerry feeling sorry for Carter who looked rather shocked to say the least. "Abby and Michael are doing good. It's been a bit rough with everything that's happened, especially as the father didn't seem to want to know, but there are lots of single mothers' right?"

"She tell you who the father was?" Carter asked

"No but I think Susan might know" supplied Sam

Carter grunted he was not at all surprised by that piece of information in the least. He had a niggling suspicion that he had done something to upset her and this would account for it. "And is there anything else of importance that I've missed?" he asked casually

Jerry and Ray looked at each other and shook their heads.

"Not really" Ray offered "I did date a girl called Stephanie and then another called Jayne, but that's about it"

"Oh" Carter mouthed being more composed by this time.

"Frank thought he was having another coronary but it turned out to be indigestion" offered Sam thinking that changing the subject off the topic of Abby seemed a good move from Ray. There were some things that were better to be saved for another time.

"Uh huh, anything else" said Carter with a little shake of his head.

Jerry and Ray looked at each other again and said in unison "No"

"Right well I've got work to do" said Carter leaving the others at the desk.

"Something's going on with him" commented Jerry

"Mmmm" replied Ray

"He doesn't seem quite himself today" agreed Sam

"And we didn't tell him about the other thing with Abby and Michael" Jerry commented

Ray shrugged and replied "I'm sure someone will tell him eventually" just as the paramedics rolled in with yet another patient for them to treat.

0o0

Carter took a swig out of the beer bottle before setting it down on the counter in his kitchen, which was lit by low lights under his cupboards there. He twirled the spaghetti round on his fork as he thought of all he had returned to.

He had thought coming home would be simple and it had been. It was just that returning to County had opened a whole can of worms he hadn't foreseen. He knew it was going to be somewhat awkward with Abby, but what had transpired in the past two days was totally unexpected.

Life he mused was often full of 'if only's' and on this occasion it was if only he had opened those letters when he had received them, but he hadn't and there was no going back now. No saying what he'd of done or wouldn't have done had he done things differently.

Sighing he pushed the plate away and ran a hand over his face before leaning his elbow on the counter and using his hand to prop his chin up. The reality was, he was a father. Thinking like that made it sound so definite, so real. He had longed, yearned for this moment for so long. But part of him felt as though he had missed the initial moment. The moment his son came into the world. In fact the first eight months of Michaels' life, and the truth was he had no one to blame but himself and he felt as guilty as hell.

Guilty, for not reading the letters or answering them. Guilty for not just giving Abby a random call, as he knew she would have told him then. Guilty for not being there for Abby while she was pregnant and then for the day Michael was born. Guilty for not being there for Michael for the past eight months. And yes if he was honest with himself guilty for not being there to support Abby in some way either.

Meeting Abby today had gone better than anticipated, but it had been short due to the busy work environment and maybe less than he had hoped it would be. Initially on the first meeting she had been surprise to bump into him that way but had been polite and he wondered what kind of strain that had put on her today. When they were in trauma together they fell back into their professional routine together well and he was sure it was just the two of them who were acutely aware of the tension between them.

He couldn't wait for tomorrow, until he saw her again. So he picked up his keys and headed out the door to pay a visit to Abigail Lockhart.