A/N: Wow! I'm at 90 reviews! I think, that if this chapter gets me to a hundred, I will throw a party and respond to every reviewer from chapter ten in chapter eleven. And give everyone a free car!

Also, I changed Madison's birth date to the eighteen. We'll say Marissa got off her crutches on the fifteenth. Sometime this week, I'll go back and fix it in the last chapter.

Unfortunately, whilst I am celebrating the success of The Difference, I am depressed about my new story, One By One. I got 5 reviews on my first chapter , and… none on my second. :'(. Not trying to sound whiny here, but I'm telling anyone who reads One By One right now that I will never make Chapter 3 until I get at least 2 reviews (wow, that's sad).

On a lighter note, this story is coming to an end. BUT (dadadaDA!) I am probably making a sequel. You may ask, why a sequel to a story that's under 20 chapters? Because, it would be very stupid of me to have say, chapter 15 be when everyone is a senior in high school, and then all of a sudden next chapter they're all out of college. That's all the hints I'm giving about my sequel! Review, and let me know if you like my idea of a sequel, or think it's utterly ludicrous and you would never ever read it, even if someone held a knife to your throat.

Disclaimer: What do I own? A hairbrush, ten bucks, some make-up, random junk that I shove in a dresser drawer, some clothes, and my dad's old 1960 something edition of Sorry! (the board game). Did you see The OC in there? Didn't think so.

Ryan, Sandy, and Kirsten sat around the kitchen table, waiting for Marissa, who had gone to put Madison down to bed.

"Alright, I'm here," she said, sliding into a seat next to Ryan.

It was February twentieth, two days after Madison's birth. Although she had been a little over a week premature, she was perfectly fine, so they had let her and her mother go home the next day.

It was by a stroke of luck that today was President's Day- no school. Marissa wouldn't have gone, anyways, but it was nice to know that she wasn't missing anything.

Which was why they were here, at the kitchen table. To decide what Marissa was going to do about school.

"There's two months left," Sandy said abruptly.

"What?" Marissa was confused.

"There's two months left of school. Two months left until you graduate high school. Marissa, you have been working for that since you were five. It would be a shame to never get your high school diploma with less than seventy days left."

"I-" Marissa began, but Kirsten cut her off.

"Sandy, we know that, but it's impossible. Marissa can't take a newborn baby to school with her."

"So leave her here."

"Sandy! After raising Seth, you should know that a baby needs to be with its mother for at least a month after birth. What would we be able to when Madison gets hungry?"

Sandy's face turned red. "Oh. Yeah. You're right Kirsten. But there are ways of her getting her diploma and having the baby with her.

"And how is she supposed to do that?"

"Well, for one, she could miss the last two months and go back in the summer," Sandy suggested. "Marissa, what classes are you taking?"

She thought. "Um, World History, Biology, Geometry, and English Lit."

"See? It's easy enough to make up four classes in one summer. She has eight weeks, and each course is a four week course."

"But then I could only do two classes."

"But, each course is a half-day. So you could take, say, Geometry and World History in the first session, Geometry from 8:30 to 12:15, and World History from 12:30 to 4:15, and do the same thing second session, except switch those classes with the other two."

"Well, what I was think-" Marissa began.

"Wait a minute," Kirsten interrupted. "She can't do that."

"Why not?" Sandy asked.

"Because, the summer classes are going to teach everything from the whole year. Marissa knows most of it. She just needs to make up these two lost months."

Sandy sighed. "Damn, you're right."

"Um," Marissa said, trying to get their attention. "I have an idea."

"Marissa, forget it, there's nothing left to tr," Sandy said.

"Actually, there is."

"Okay, Marissa, if you say so."

"No, there is! This girl in my Lit class did it a few months ago when she had a baby. The school offered her this kind of tutor, I guess, who taught her the stuff she had to know at her house, and I guess that it worked really well, and she finished all her course work a few weeks ago, and is going to get her diploma at the graduation ceremony."

Ryan nodded. "I heard about that."

Sandy looked doubtful. "Are you sure?"

"Positive. You can call the school and ask. They'll provide a tutor for anyone who can't make it to classes." Marissa replied.

"But doesn't it cost money?" Kirsten asked.

Marissa's face fell. "Oh. I didn't remember that. But I think it does."

"Marissa, money is not an issue in the least. We'll do whatever it takes to get you to graduate. I'm going to go call the school right now, and ask them." Sandy said, getting up and walking over to the phone.

"Isn't the school closed today?" Marissa asked Ryan.

"Guess the office is still open, Sandy's talking to someone."

Marissa was about to go grab something to eat, when she heard the now-familiar sound of her daughter crying.

"Ryan, come with me."

"Where?" he asked, his mouth full of a waffle.

"Maddy's crying."

"Okay," he said, swallowing the Eggo.

They walked over to Marissa's room, which was half-empty, as Marissa and Maddy were soon going to be moving into the pool house with Ryan.

Maddy continued crying as her parents walked over to her crib. Marissa picked her up.

"Hello, darling. Mommy wishes that you could talk so Mommy doesn't have to spend forever figuring out what you want," she crooned.

Ryan laughed. "You need her to talk for this one?"

Marissa looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"Take a whiff," he said.

She cautiously sniffed the air. "Phew, how did I miss that?"

He shrugged.

"Okay, Maddy, time to… let Daddy change your diaper!" she said, handing the baby to Ryan.

"What? No! Why don't you?"

"Because, Ryan, we have to take equal responsibility, and I sure am gonna get a lot of it while you're at school and I'm here with the tutor and Maddy, so start taking a share of it now. It won't kill you, you know."

"You never know."

After putting on the clean diaper inside out, then backwards, then accidentally ripping he tabs off, Marissa took pity on her boyfriend and fixed the new diaper herself.

As soon as Maddy was back in her crib, she immediately fell asleep.

"She's so cute," Marissa whispered.

He smiled. "She looks just like you."

Marissa kissed him. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

A/N: Aww, how sappy. I'm thinking that Chapter Fifteen will sort of be an epilogue, explaining what happens between now and the sequel. So, yes, this is the last real chapter, I guess. It would be so nice to be able to go out of this story, my first story, with a hundred reviews.

But, if a lot of people say they think that a sequel would be a shitty idea, maybe I'll just continue with this and tweak the plot of the sequel so it could apply to this part.

So, you all know your mission. Review! Go! Go! Go! LOL.