A/N: For all of you who were sad to see the impending conclusion of The Difference, I have good news! This chapter is not the epilogue! It is part of the story! I may have another one after this before the epilogue. I realized I totally forgot to put a major scene in here that completely affects the sequel, so here it is. I hope you all like it! (Hint: For those of you that liked the way I wrote Jimmy and Julie, this should put a mile on your face).

Also, I just wanted to acknowledge that, as I was writing this chapter, I got an email, reporting Lil Miss Vixen's review, and I noticed that I was on her favorite, and alert, list for both my account and this story. The other people that have accomplished this feat (which almost made me die of happiness) are froggiezaz and iluvryan (who, also, has me on alert and favorite for One By One. That seriously takes the cake). You guys are the coolest ever.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything you recognize. This includes Marissa, Ryan, Seth, Sandy, Summer, Kirsten, Julie and Jimmy, nor do I own Newport Beach, California, Marissa's mini-Cooper, or Target. I do own the plot, Marissa's middle name (which coincidentally, is the same as mine) and cute lil baby Madison. Hey, maybe I can get Maddy to work for me… she'll steal her mother's car and house keys… and that beautiful convertible and that colossal mansion will be mine! Mine!

And by the way, Target (or Target, pronounced Tar-zhay, whichever you like) is cool. I like it. So don'tbe insulted when Julie Cooper-Nichol disses it.

Marissa had discovered that one of the most difficult things in the world was driving with a howling baby in the backseat. She had been pulled over twice in the last week for driving with one hand on the wheel and not looking at the road as she desperately tried to sooth her sobbing daughter who, apparently, was not a fan of car rides.

So, when Madison was about a month old and Marissa realized that they were almost out of diapers and she was the only one home, her initial reaction was to get in the car and just leave Madison alone.

And almost as soon as that crossed her mind, her newfound maternal instincts kicked in and beat the crap out of that idea.

So here she was, once again, her left hand at the wheel, her right reaching into the backseat, trying to calm Maddy down and not crash into anything at the same time.

Finally, she successfully pulled into the Target parking lot without being arrested. She grabbed Madison and hurried into the store. She was five steps into the baby section when she realized she had left her purse in the car. She scurried back to her beloved new Mini-Cooper, and realized that her even more beloved, if possible, Louis Vutton purse was not in the passenger seat, where she had left it.

She set Maddy back in her car seat as she crawled around the seats, trying anxiously to find her adored bag.

With much relief, she discovered it, fully intact, under the drivers seat, and gratefully set out back to the store.

This time, it only took her two feet inside the front doors for her to realize that she had left Maddy in the car this time.

When she was finally carrying both her daughter and her purse, she set out for the childcare aisle, which she found with remarkable ease.

"Alright," she muttered to herself, "Huggies gave her a rash… Luvs… to much money… Pampers'll work." She grabbed some Pampers and turned around to head to the checkout, but she accidentally smashed into someone, causing them to drop what seemed to be ten million pounds of makeup.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Marissa apologized. "Let me get those for you." She bent down and gathered up all the cosmetics.

"Here," she said, depositing them in the arms of… her mom?

"Oh," she said flatly. "It's you."

"Yes, it's me. Who did you think it was, Santa Claus?"

"I didn't expect to see you in the baby aisle at Target." Was this really her mother? The same Julie Cooper-Nichol, who hadn't had to buy diapers in at least a decade, and at Target? Her mom always said that Target and Wal-Mart were for low budget losers that couldn't afford high-quality merchandise.

"It's a shortcut to the lingerie section. And may I ask why you are here? I suppose you're baby-sitting again. Are you really that hard-up for money, dear?"

Marissa scoffed. "As if I had time to baby-sit."

"Then what is that-" she pointed to Madison -"that you are carrying, may I ask?"

"Actually, it's really none of your business." Marissa brushed past her mother.

Julie followed her. "Maybe so, but I'm curious."

"What a surprise. Are you still sticking your surgically enhanced nose where it doesn't belong?"

"Are you still avoiding any subject related to your messed-up life?"

Marissa whirled around, getting a sense of déjà vu as she did. "Fine. I'll tell you. Then will you go away, preferably to somewhere where I'll never see you again?"

"I'll leave, yes."

"Alright, then. Mother, this is Madison. Madison, meet your grandmother."

Marissa spun back around, pushing other staring shoppers out of the way, as Julie's jaw dropped about a foot. After about thirty seconds of bewilderment, she rushed off in the direction of where she had last seen her daughter,

She caught up with her in the 10 Items OR Less checkout aisle.

"Excuse, pardon me, I'm with her, move please, I'm with her," she explained, butting ahead of everyone to stand next to Marissa.

"Oh, God, you're back again? Couldn't you please leave me alone for once?" Marissa sighed, setting down the diapers on the conveyer belt.

"Marissa Hayley Cooper! You have got to be kidding me!" Julie hissed. "A child? You have a child?"

"No, I walk around with a living, one month old image of me on my back, buying diapers just for kicks."

"And I thought you were a slut back in June!"

This had crossed the line.

"Excuse me, sir," she said to the cashier, who was ringing up the diapers. "This woman has been stalking me for the last hour. Could you please get Security to get rid of her please?"

He nodded, and picked up his phone. "S47, we need you here in Aisle Two."

Julie, looking slightly frightened, vacated her spot in line, and headed for the front doors. "What a disappointment to the Cooper family," she muttered, just loud enough for Marissa to hear, as she walked through the automatic doors.

At once, an alarm went off throughout the store, and a huge, burly security guard tackled Julie to the ground. "You think that you can just walk out of here with half the make-up in the store?" he growled.

Julie immediately realized that she was still carrying the makeup that Marissa had picked up for her in the baby aisle. "Shit."

"You're coming with me," the guard said, pulling her arm in the direction of his office.

Marissa couldn't help but snicker at her mom's predicament. She had been hoping something like that would happen to her for a very long time.

Marissa was ecstatic on the drive home, seeing as how her daughter had fallen fast asleep. She put her down in hr newly relocated crib (they had moved into the pool house) and picked up her phone.

Her encounter with her mother today had reminded her: Neither of her parents knew about Madison. As much as she detested Julie, she loved her father, and admitted to herself that he deserved to know that he had a month-old granddaughter.

She dialed the phone, and listened to it ring about ten times before her Jimmy's voicemail picked up: Hi, it Jimmy. I'm not here right now, but if you leave a message, I'll be sure to get back to you as soon as I can.

Truth be told, she was secretly glad that her dad wasn't there. She could only imagine the conversation. Hi Dad, what's up? Guess what? I've got a kid! She was not anxious for that to be the first three sentences he'd heard come out of her mouth in ten months.

The beep! of the answering machine brought her back to reality. She decided to leave am message.

"Hi, Dad, it's Marissa. Um, I just wanted to-"

She was cut off by a click as Jimmy picked up.

"Hey! How are you?" her dad asked.

Damn. Now she'd have to tell him/

"Um," she began, wording her sentence carefully. "Good. Now."

"Now?"

"I was in a car crash last December."

"Are you okay now, honey? Is everything alright?" Jimmy asked concernedly.

"I'm fine now… but I was really hurt on Christmas. I almost died." She hadn't meant to put so much self-pity in there.

"Thank God you're safe."

"Daddy… there's something else. It wasn't just me they were worried about."

"Was someone else in the car with you?"

"Kind of."

"What do you mean?"

Marissa took a deep breath. He couldn't kill her from Hawaii. "I was pregnant."

Silence filled her ear. She could still hear her father breathing, though, so she knew he hadn't hung up. She was preparing herself for yelling, screaming, and a lecture on responsibility, when Jimmy began talking again.

"Was the baby hurt?"

Maybe he wasn't going to throw a fit. "No, Dad, she's fine."

"She's fine? As in, present tense?"

"Mmm-hmm."

"So, I have a granddaughter?"

"Yeah."

"How old is she?"

"Just turned a month."

"Oh, Marissa, this is great! Why didn't you tell me? I would have flown in. I'm going to have to now, I have to see- what's her name?"

"Madison."

"Madison. Madison… Atwood, I take it?"

"Yeah."

"Are you and Ryan married?"

"No."

"Engaged?"

"No."

"Are you still dating him?"

"Yeah." She hadn't even thought about marriage. "But I love him, Daddy, and that's what counts."

"I know."

A/N: Ahh! I had to spoil it with a fluffy daddy/daughter moment. Have no fear, though, parts of the sequel will be quite angsty. Next chapter will most likely be the epilogue.

I am probably going to continue One By One, but right now I'm not really in the mood to write it. The Difference and whatever I call the sequel will always be my No. 1 priority. But for those (few) of you that read One By One, Chapter Three will be up. Eventually.