So yay! My birthday is two days away! Isn't that exciting! I love my birthday! So today, my friends and I were playing Ultimate Frisbee and it got a little out of control, and I had the Frisbee and my friend Dan was cheating and trying to tackle me for it, and his mouth was open and came down on the top of my head, and now I have the world's worst headache because technically he bit me, and I was terrified that I was going to have to go get stitches cause it was bleeding, and my boyfriend decided it would be funny to mess with me and tell me that I would need stitches and they would need to shave off my hair, and I started crying, and Dan kept apologizing, and bought me ice cream to make it up to me. And I don't know why I told you that, except that it just happened like a couple hours ago and my head still hurts. Anyway, review please! Consider it a birthday present.

Disclaimer: Alas, I don't own any of the characters.

"Rebecca?" Sandy repeated. What was Rebecca doing writing to Kirsten? What could she possibly have to say to her? This was the last thing that she needed right now. The doctor had said to try to remain stress free. Getting letters from Rebecca was not what he constituted as being stress free. "What does it say?"

"Kirsten," Kirsten read. "I'm so sorry for what I did and the pain that it caused. I should have never come back there. I should have never called Sandy again, and I should have never let him stay in the motel room that night with me. I wish that there was something that I could do that would make it better for you, for him. I know that he would take it back if he could. I know that he loves you more than he had ever loved me. I'm sorry for what I've done to your family. I never meant to hurt anyone, and it kills me that I've hurt you and your sons, and Sandy. I've hurt you all and you didn't do anything to deserve it…I don't deserve your forgiveness; I just want you to know that I never intended to break up your marriage or your family. I'm just…sorry." Kirsten pushed the piece of paper away after she was done reading it like touching it was physically hurting her.

Sandy picked it up and quickly read over it once again.

"I'm sorry," Sandy said. He felt that was all he ever said lately. Kirsten looked up at him, and shook her head.

"I feel like even when she's gone, she's not gone," Kirsten rose from the table, crossed her arms over her chest and stared out at the ocean. "Sometimes I feel like I'm making the biggest mistake of my life, letting you come back, and sometimes I think I can't survive without you." She turned back around to face him. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do or say, or….I don't know…Tell me what to do Sandy." Kirsten was fighting the urge to cry. She was tired of crying. She was tired of it all. She just wanted to crawl under her covers and only come out when everything was okay again. When her husband hadn't cheated on her, and when the woman that he cheated with wasn't sending her letters apologizing to her. That was what she wanted.

Unfortunately, she was very much aware that she was not going to get what she wanted.

What was Rebecca thinking? That Kirsten would get the letter and just go, oh, okay, she's sorry. She didn't mean to hurt anyone. That makes it all the better. She never meant to hurt anyone, she never meant to break up their marriage. Kirsten wanted to track Rebecca down and scream, "Bull shit! You knew exactly what you were doing! You knew exactly what would happen if you called him. You knew what would happen if you slept with him." She wanted to beat Rebecca until she hurt as much as Kirsten did.

"I don't know either baby," Sandy said sinking down into one of the patio chairs. Kirsten looked past him into the house. She could see both boys on the couch playing a game, and Hailey was on the phone in the kitchen.

"Can you…" Kirsten shook her head. "Can you get rid of the letter? I don't care where you put it, or if you burn it or…I just don't want to see it. I don't want to be reminded of its existence anymore." Sandy nodded and crumbled up the letter.

"You should go lay down," he suggested. It was Kirsten's turn to nod as she took one more look at the crumbled letter in Sandy's hand, before turning and heading towards their bedroom. As soon as she was inside and the door had shut behind her, Sandy let his head drop into his hands. He was starting to think that they would never be okay. That this baby was only delaying the inevitable. He was starting to think that she would never really forgive him. They would never really get back to where they had been before the whole Rebecca mess.

Sandy took the letter back into the house with him and tore it up into tiny pieces and dumped the pieces into the garbage.

"What was that?" Hailey asked as she hung up the phone.

"Oh…it was nothing," Sandy said. "An offer for a credit card bill."

"Oh, okay. So, I got my plane ticket."

"When do you leave?"

"Thursday," Hailey said. Thursday was only a few days away and Hailey had big plans for the two days. She would spend as much time with her sister as she possibly could. They would go to lunch the next day, and maybe a movie, Kirsten could pick. "I guess I should tell Kirsten. Is she upstairs?" Sandy nodded. Hailey disappeared from the kitchen just as Seth walked in to grab a bottle of water for himself and Ryan. He ignored his father as he reached into the refrigerator.

"Seth?" Sandy called out as Seth walked past again. Seth turned around.

"Yeah?" Sandy wanted to ask him what he could do to make it up to him. He wanted to ask him if Seth hated him. If Seth could ever forgive him. But what good would it do? What Seth needed was time. Same with Ryan. It was the same thing that Kirsten needed. The baby unfortunately didn't quite give either of them the time that they needed to cope.

Ryan. Sandy suddenly realized that he had been so busy trying to get Seth and Kirsten to forgive him that he almost forgot about Ryan. Seth was never quiet and so the lack of communication was a huge clue as to how he felt about his father at that moment, but Ryan was always quiet.

Ryan never trusted men. Men always hurt him or his mother. Had Sandy just become another man that couldn't be trusted? He always knew that Ryan looked up to him, in fact, he had always taken a little bit of pride in the fact that he was Ryan's hero. He had been Seth's hero at one point too.

Now what was he? He had ruined that image for both Ryan and Seth. He made a mental note to make it a point to talk to Ryan soon. Seth was still standing waiting impatiently for Sandy to say whatever it was that he had to say.

"Nevermind," Sandy said. "Go enjoy your game." He turned away from Seth and placed both hands on the counter and let out a sigh.

"Dad?" He had thought that Seth would go as soon as his back was turned. That's how it went with them lately.

"Yeah?" Sandy turned back around.

"For what it's worth…I don't hate you. I just can't understand how you could do it to her. To us."

Sandy knocked on the pool house door later that night and waited for Ryan to answer.

"Sandy?" He was slightly surprised to see him standing there. "Is Kirsten okay?" Always the worrier, Sandy thought to himself.

"She's fine," Sandy assured him. "She's already sleeping."

"Oh." Sandy could see the wheels turning in Ryan's head. Wondering why he was out there.

"I thought… I thought you and I could talk?" Sandy asked.

"Oh, sure," Ryan sat down on the bed and Sandy took a seat in one of the chairs. Now that he was out here, Sandy wasn't exactly sure on how to start this conversation.

"I just…I wanted to know that…it's okay if you are angry at me." Ryan scoffed.

"Well, thanks for the approval," he said snidely.

"I'm sorry, Ryan," Sandy said.

"I know. I keep hearing you say that. And I know that you are sorry, or you think you are sorry. I know that you wish you could take it back and I know that you wanted to hurt Kirsten, you just weren't thinking about her, you weren't thinking at all." Sandy had never heard so many words come out of Ryan's mouth at once, and he sat back and let him talk. "It's just that you did. You hurt her. You hurt Seth. You hurt all of us. I…"

"What?" Sandy pressed. Ryan shook his head.

"It doesn't matter."

"Of course it does."

"No it doesn't." Seeing that Ryan wasn't going to continue, Sandy asked him the question that he had been dying to ask since all of it happened.

"Will you ever forgive me?"

"I don't know," Ryan said.

"What can I do to make it up to you?" Ryan shrugged.

"Make it up to Kirsten," he suggested. "Seth and I…we'll follow." Sandy nodded.

"I'm trying kid," he told Ryan.

"Try harder," Ryan instructed. Sandy just nodded again and stood up.

"I guess I should let you get back to your homework," he gestured to the books that were sitting behind Ryan. Ryan just nodded and once Sandy was out of the pool house, he sighed and threw himself on the bed.

There went studying for the night.

Hailey left a few days later, the same day as Kirsten's first doctor's appointment. Sandy drove her to the doctor's office and they sat in the waiting room, and for the first time it felt real to both of them.

They were going to have a baby.

Kirsten reached over as they were waiting and slipped her tiny hand into Sandy's. He looked at her surprised, but she wasn't looking at him, she was staring straight ahead and a small smile was on her face.

"I've been thinking," she said. "About names."

"Already?" Sandy asked with smile.

"Well, this kid is going to be stuck with this name for the rest of his or her life," Kirsten said. "I think that it should be a good one."

"I agree. So what were you thinking?"

"If it's a girl, I would like to name her after my mother," Kirsten was asking his permission, but he knew how much it meant to her. And he wanted to do whatever it took to make her happy.

"Of course," Sandy said.

"Really? You wouldn't mind that?"

"Not at all," he assured her. "What about if we have another boy?" Kirsten didn't get a chance to answer as the receptionist called out Kirsten's name. Still holding onto Sandy's hand, Kirsten led the way into the room.

"I don't want to do this alone," Kirsten told him again as the nurse left them alone.

"I know," Sandy said. "You aren't going to. I'm going to be here. Every step of the way." Kirsten nodded and Sandy leaned down and placed a kiss on her forehead. "I love you so much."

And for the first time since he had told her that he slept with Rebecca, she looked up at him with a tiny smile, and said it back.

"I love you too."

Sandy decided after Kirsten's appointment that he wasn't going to go into the office at all that day. Instead, he took her to her favorite restaurant where she ordered a giant hamburger and went to town.

"I love eating for two," she told him grinning. Sandy laughed and let her steal his fries.

"I remember with Seth, you really had a thing for pistachios," he reminded her.

"Hmm, pistachios would be great right now," Kirsten replied. "Do you think that we could stop at the grocery store and load up on some pistachios? Oh! Tapioca. I would kill for some tapioca pudding. But we'd have to hide it." Kirsten frowned slightly. "Or else Seth will eat it all." Sandy laughed.

"We can stop and get whatever you want," he assured her. "We'll just walk up and down every aisle and get whatever catches your eye." Kirsten grinned at him.

"I knew there was a reason that I loved you," she told him. She stole another fry and Sandy felt happier than he had in days. She loved him. She had said it twice that day.

For the first time he entertained the thought of her forgiving him.

It was possible.

He took her hand and gave it a squeeze, and she just smiled at him.

It was definitely possible.

Okay, so that one, a little happier yes? Review please! My head still really hurts. I'm off to bed. Make me feel better, and you know, let me remind you once more, my birthday is in two days. The same night as the OC finale. So that's incentive for you to review!