Chapter 18

Togetherness

Sarah just stood there not sure if what she was seeing was real or not. She walked closer and saw that Liz had tears in her eyes.

"Liz is that really you?" Sarah whispered as she and Liz hugged.

"Yup it's me." Liz said as the tears started to roll down her cheeks.

"But I watched you die." Sarah cried as she too started to cry.

"I know but they revived me ten minutes later. I had a lot of therapy to go through and then my parents needed me. You understand, don't you?" Liz pleaded. She needed to know that her friend could accept this.

"I do, I'm so happy that you not dead and well..." Sarah said not wanting to let go of the one person she thought she had lost. At the age of 15 she lost her mother, which turned out to be her adoptive mother. She had been so sad for over 6 months. Her mother had homed schooled her and then she had gone back to school when she was 17 to finish high school and get her degree for collage.

"I know I put you though so much and I'm sooo sorry." Liz said again.

Sarah had totally forgotten about Gabe who had been watching the whole thing from behind her

in case she needed him. He silently sent her a message that he was still here.

"Liz I want you to met someone." Sarah said wiping the tears from her eyes and turned to face

Gabe. "This is my brother Gabe."

"Hi nice to finally meet you. Christian told me all about you. He wanted to wait until tomorrow, but I needed to see you guys today." Liz said.

"Wait a minute you met my brother?" Gabe questioned.

"Uh yeah I went to him first to find out what's happened." Liz answered. "So Judson and Mac got married and had a kid."

"Uh yeah, but wait a minute how did Christian know about Mac and Judson getting married when he..." Gabe stopped and turned to go back down to the living room. He walked in and saw Christian sitting on the couch talking to Mac and Judson. "Chris can I talk to you for a minute. Please."

"Gabe what's going on up on deck I heard crying and talking?" Judson asked.

"Why don't you do up and see." Gabe said.

"Oh okay. Mac you coming Tessa will still be asleep for a couple of hours." Judson said standing up. He took Mac's hand and together they walked up the stairs for the surprise of there life.

Back Down Below...

"Christian how did you know about Mac and Judson getting married and having a kid before I did?" Gabe asked as he stood in front of his brother.

"Gabe promise me you won't get mad at me." Chris said. "When Sarah left I kept in touch she told me everything. She said not to tell you because you would get upset."

"WHAT why would I get upset." Gabe yelled. "Does this look like I'm upset!"

"Gabe calm down." Christian said.

"Calm down, your telling me to calm down, when you kept this all of this from me. Why would she not tell me? I thought that she trusted me." Gabe said as he sat down on the chair and put his head in his hands.

"Gabe I'm sure that she does. Maybe Judson told her not to tell you or something." Christian said trying to cheer up his brother.

"Oh yeah and she tells you." Gabe said.

Up on deck Sarah heard the whole conversation and knew that she had messed up big time and that her relation with her brother was in jeopardy.

Judson emerged from the stair well and saw Sarah's back towards him. Mac came up behind him and saw Sarah's back as well that she was talking to someone. As Judson approached her he saw a dark red haired women standing in front of her.

"Sarah, what's going on up here?" Judson asked.

"Judson." The women said as she stepped out from in front of Sarah. Judson's eyes opened wide and he couldn't believe that the person in front of him was real.

"Mac do you see what I'm seeing?" Judson asked.

"Yep, but how?" She said as she went and gave Liz a hug.

"I don't know." Judson said as he too gave her a hug.

"I've missed you guys." Liz said to her two short time team members.

"Uh Liz I think that you need to explain the whole story over again." Sarah said. "Why don't you guys go for a coffee or something? I'll look after Tessa."

"Oh okay, sure you don't want to come?" Liz asked.

"I'm sure." Sarah said as she started towards the stairs. She watched the three people she cared for so much walk down the gangplank and in to the Land Rover. She walked down the stairs and saw Gabe and Christian fighting. They didn't notice her come down so she just stood there and listened and watched.

"Gabe, Sarah trusts you and you need to believe that." Christian said.

"Yeah well she must trust you much more. I can't believe that she told you and not me. I worked with them for over three years." Gabe said he couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"Gabe come on you have to believe me. It wasn't her fault, it was mine." Christian said. He had to make his brother know that. It was his entire fault for blurting it out in the first place, and now he had dragged Sarah in to this whole mess. Gabe and Christian continued to fight and banter back in forth until Sarah could take no more. By now there were tears rolling down her face.

"STOP IT, WILL YOU JUST STOP. IT'S NOT EITHER OF YOUR FAULTS, UNDERSTAND!" She yelled at them, as she fell to the floor crying.

Gabe ran to her side and held her in his arms. Trying to comfort her. Christian came over and he too held her in his arms. He looked over at Gabe and told him that he was sorry. They continued to hold Sarah in their arms and soon all three of them started to cry. They knew that they needed each other and they would always be close.

Two Days Later...

Sarah rolled over in bed and saw that it was almost 10:00am in the morning. She looked over at Liz's bed, which was empty. She closed her eyes and fell back asleep. It only felt like she had been asleep for a few minutes when she felt someone gently shaking her shoulder. She opened her eyes and saw that it was Gabe.

"Hey." Sarah said quietly as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes.

"Hey your self. You going to get up soon?" Gabe asked gently. He knew that he must have hurt his sisters feeling from the last couple of days ago when he had said actually yelled that he didn't trust her which wasn't true.

"Uh yeah, but I know why your here. You want to talk about the other day." Sarah said sitting up and resting her head on his chest.

"Yeah, listen I didn't mean any of that. I love you and I want you to know that." Gabe said gently stroking her hair.

"Gabe I love you too." Sarah said as she looked up at her brother's green eyes, which were identical to hers.

"Thanks I think that I needed to hear that." Gabe said as he looked down at Sarah. "Hey you want something to eat. I can make you some pancakes."

"Sure, but where are the others?" Sarah asked as she sat up and looked at Gabe with a questioning look.

"They went out his morning and probably won't be back until the afternoon. So we have the whole boat to are selves." Gabe explained.

"Did Drew come by?"

"Uh no but I think he's been trying to call you all morning, because your cell has been ringing non-stop all morning." Gabe said with a laugh.

"And you would know this because..." Sarah asked.

"Because you left it in the living room last night when we came back."

"Oh." Sarah said. "Well get out and I'll get dressed. I want blueberry pancakes. Kay?"

"Sure thing, a batch of blueberry pancakes coming right up." Gabe said getting up off the bed and walked out and closed the door behind him. He leaned against the door and knew that he and Sarah had a while to go before there relation would get back to the way it had been before.

Ten minutes later Sarah emerged from her room. A light blue t-shirt and a pair of track pants accompanied her ponytail.

"Those pancakes ready yet?" Sarah said as she came around the corner and saw Gabe placing a

platter of pancakes on the table. With a cup of orange juice on the side.

"Yep, you hungry?" Gabe said as he pulled out a chair for her.

"Well aren't you just the little gentlemen this morning." Sarah joked.

"Well I thought that I owed you this much at least." Gabe said as he took a seat in front of her.

"Gabe, wait you don't owe me anything. I should have told you and Christian, you had as much of a right as he did to know what was going on." Sarah said. "Judson told me not to tell you until they were ready to accept it themselves."

"Sarah I understand but why tell Christian and not me?"

"Because I needed to talk to someone, Judson and Mac were putting a lot of pressure on me and

I needed to talk to someone and Christian was the only one I could think of because I couldn't tell you without breaking Judson's promise not to tell you."

"Okay then, well I know now and that's the main thing. So dig in there's a lot there." Gabe said with a smile at seeing his sister happy for once. It made him smile to see her happy.

Judson and Mac got out of the SUV along with Liz and Tessa. Christian had gone back to the house and Gabe had decided to stay the night to make sure that Sarah would be okay. They had gone out for the day. When they left Sarah was still asleep and Gabe didn't want to leave her alone so he decided to stay behind.

"Well what do we want to do first?" Judson asked the crowd.

"Toys, toys, toys." Tessa chimed.

"Okay then off to the toys." Judson said as they started the short walk to the shopping mall.

They went up to the large toy department and bought Tessa a stuffed elephant with big floppy ears. After Mac and Liz wanted to go cloths shopping so Judson took Tessa and went to the large indoor playground for an hour while the girls went out on there own. As Judson was walking towards the playground he saw Drew walking with another girl. They were happily talking and then they sat down on a bench. Judson took Tessa and walked over to another and sat down out of the eye of Drew.

Then they "KISSED WHAT THE HELL THOSE HE THINK HE'S DOING!" Judson said to himself. "HE'S ENGAGED!" He put Tessa back in the stroller and went of to find Mac and Liz.