Chapter 6

I know it seemed weird that Summer didn't stay in the hospital with Brynn...but I had to make her leave so that I could do this first scene in this chapter...

Summer yawns even before she opens her eyes the next morning, she'd had a hard time sleeping her thoughts kept turning morbid as she thought about the possibility that something could go terribly wrong with Brynn and eventually she ended up snooping through her mother's medicine cabinet for sleeping pills around midnight. Opening her eyes Summer nearly jumps out of her skin, "good God, Seth, what the hell are you doing in here?"

An exhausted looking Seth is sitting in the chair by Summer's bed, "I came in here at three, trying to see if I could figure out why you never told me about her."

"By watching me sleep?" Summer asks immediately getting defensive.

"I still don't understand it," Seth states. "Why you didn't tell me about her?"

"I..." Summer sighs, she doesn't have a good excuse, she doesn't even have a flimsy excuse, she has no excuse.

"You left the day I got back, you couldn't stand to wait one more day before disappearing off the face of the planet?" Seth demands.

"I couldn't," Summer shakes her head, the fear she had felt then was no different from the fear she felt now. "I was scared."

"You were scared, of what?" Seth asks, Summer can tell he's still angry. "That I was going to turn my back on you?"

"No."

"That I would deny that she was mine?"

"No."

"That I would leave you?"

"No." Summer shakes her head for the third time.

"Then what were you afraid of?" Seth demands in frustration.

Summer takes a deep breath, "I was afraid you'd do the opposite, that the instant you found out I was pregnant you'd drop on one knee and the next thing I knew I was going to be married and with a baby at 17. The thought of that scared the hell out of me. I didn't want to be married and I didn't even want to be a mother."

"What?"

"I was going to give Brynn up for adoption, I had no intention on ever keeping her. But when she was born I couldn't..." Summer shakes her head.

"So what's your excuse for the last five years?" Seth questions.

Summer shrugs, "we were fine."

"You were fine?" Seth scoffs. "You've made me an absentee father because you were fine. Did you even stop to think that maybe I would have wanted to know my daughter?"

"Of course I did," Summer snaps back, "but I didn't want to confuse her."

"Confuse her? Oh sure a father is a difficult concept to grasp."

"Seth..."

"So what? If we had never run into you I probably would never have known about her?"

"Seth..."

"No," Seth cuts her off again, "would you have ever told me about her if I hadn't shown up in New York."

Summer bites her lip, "no, I never planned on telling you about her."

"Dammit Summer," Seth stands up suddenly and stalks out of the room.

Summer flops back onto her pillows and pulls her covers over her head, and burying her head in her pillow Summer lets out of a frustrated scream. With that done she pushes the covers off of her and heads to the bathroom attached to the bedroom that had been hers when she was living in Pennsylvania. Quickly she showers and pulls on a pair of jeans and a tank, letting her hair remain wet and un-styled.

"You're up early, it's only six-thirty, I figured you'd sleep in a little," Cherie Johnson, Summer's mother, is sitting in the kitchen with a glass of orange juice and the newspaper, "I heard you in the bathroom at midnight."

"Sorry, did I wake you?" Summer asks pouring herself coffee.

"That stuff'll kill you," Cherie comments of the coffee. "And no, I was awake, I had some work I had to get done."

Summer nods, "I'm going to eat and then head over to the hospital, see if they'll let me bring Brynn home tonight."

Cherie nods, "I have to pick Devin up from the airport, he left this meeting early. So, Seth huh?"

Summer rubs the back of her neck and drops into a kitchen chair, "yeah. I'm as surprised as you."

"Jules informed me that he had to try to resist decking the guy," Cherie states.

Summer bites her lip, "he just showed up in New York and in my apartment building."

Cherie cringes, "is there anything I can do to help?"

"Could to make him stop hating me?" Summer asks breathing in the scent of the coffee.

"I can't do that, but I can Jules and Tony from beating him to a bloody pulp."

Summer smiles, "I'd appreciate it."

"Leighanna's coming down."

"She shouldn't do that," Summer insists, "she's got a wedding to plan."

"I told her that," Cherie responds, "but she said she'd take advantage of seeing you and Brynn at the same time. Especially since she won't see you guys until the week before the wedding."

"So," Seth enters the room, "are we going to the hospital or what?"

"Let me make some breakfast first," Cherie stands up, "Brynn's not going to be up yet anyway."

"There's pictures all over your house," Seth's small talk is breaking the beyond uncomfortable silence in the car on the way to the hospital. "There's lots of kids, I had no idea you had brothers and sister."

"The older ones are Derek's kids from his first marriage, Leighanna's a year older than me, Anthony's 20 and Julius, who you met last night is 18. And you'll meet the younger ones later, Kyla and Bryant are 12 and only ever go by Ky and Bry and then there's Denna who's 10."

"Wow," Seth comments.

Yeah," Summer nods and the silence resumes until they are on the children's ward floor.

"Mom!" Brynn exclaims from her bed where she's watching cartoons.

"Hey sweetie," Summer gently hugs Brynn and kisses her. "How do you feel?"

Brynn shrugs, "they're giving me lots and lots of medicine!"

"It'll help you to feel better," Summer promises.

Brynn nods, "that's what the nurse said. Who's that?" Brynn points at Seth who is lurking in the doorway.

Taking a deep breath Summer asks, "Brynn, sweetie, remember how whenever you've asked me about your father, do you remember what I told you?"

"Umm," Brynn thinks for a second , "that you guys weren't together, but that didn't mean that my Daddy doesn't love me."

Summer nods, "that's right. Well, this is your Daddy, Seth Cohen."

Brynn's dark eyes focus on Seth, "are you really my Daddy?"

Seth nods, "yeah, I guess I am."

"Did you come to see me cause I was hurt?" Brynn asks.

Seth nods again, "yeah, I did."

"Oh," Brynn smiles, "my mom says I look like you. Do I look like you?"

"Looks like it."

"Did you see my kitten?" Brynn inquires and when Seth nods she asks, "isn't OJ the cutest cat you ever saw?"

"Well I don't have a lot of experience with cats, but out of the ones I've seen she is the cutest."

"So are you going away again when I get out of the hospital?" Brynn asks her dark eyes unblinking.

At her daughter's words Summer's heart nearly breaks and she has to look away from both Seth and Brynn but Seth seems to take over naturally coming to stand on the other side of Brynn's bed he responds, "nope. I just moved into your apartment building, so you'll get to see me a lot. Me and your Uncle Ryan, Aunt Marissa and cousin Timothy."

"Where'd you used to live?" Brynn asks.

"In California."

"By the beach?"

Seth nods, "right by the beach."

"I've been to the beach, Uncle Jules took me on a sailboat once, it was fun!"

"You like sailboats?"

As the conversation begins Summer manages to slip out of the hospital room unnoticed and in search of Brynn's doctor whom she had spoken to before going home the night before. "Dr. Steele," Summer calls catching up to the middle-aged Asian woman.

"Ms. Roberts," Dr. Steele offers a warm smile, "I'm guessing you want to know when you can take your daughter home?"

Summer nods, "you said last night you just wanted for observations, that hasn't changed has it?"

"No," Dr. Steele shakes her head, "you can take her home as soon as you get the paper work filled out."

Summer nods in relief, "good."

In the coming chapter Ryan and Marissa find out about Brynn and Summer and Seth try to put their differences aside for the sake of their daughter, which is going to prove to be harder than they thought.