2005

Charlie woke up the next morning in his bed with a hangover, and sighed. Gingerly he got up, brushed his teeth, and went to the kitchen.

"Good morning Charlie!" Alan said, looking upfrom hisnewspaper at the dining room."How are you?"

"I've got a headache the size of a planet!" the mathematician groaned.

"Here's some orange juice" Alan gave him a glass. "Hungry?"

"No!" Charlie shook his head.

"David says that you were very upset at dinner" Alan began.

"Everyone has been lying to me!" Charlie's answer showed that Alan had hit a nerve.

"David was worried about you" Alan said gently. The two were sitting next to each other. Through the windows, the skies showed a gray cloudiness.

"How old was I when you found out?" Charlie asked suddenly after some more dark brooding.

"Charlie...does that really matter?" Alan turned his focus to the paper.

"It does to me!" the professor insisted.

"Four" Alan said softly, bracing himself. Something told him that he wasn't going to like where this conversation was going.

"So you had time to develop the bond." Charlie mused. "What if you had found out when mom had been pregnant with me? Would you have asked her to have an abortion?They were legal then."

"Charlie...I..." Alan didn't know what to say.

"Or would you have left her? I mean Don was pretty young...or was he the reason you stayed?"

"I stayed because of the three of you!" Alan felt hurt.

Charlie's next question was the last straw for the poor man "Would you have stayed if I hadn't been a prodigy?"

Hurt, angry, and in pain, Alan got up, and left the house. How could Charlie imply such a thing?

"Dad!" Charlie called his father, part of him regretted saying what he did.

Soon, he decided to talk to his mother's wedding picture again.

"David seems like a great guy! Why didn't you introduce him to me? It was my right!" he began and paced. "I missed so much with my grandfather, Marc, and Dawn. It wasn't my fault that you felt guilty! They were my family! I had the right to know them! You were always talking about the importance of family, yet you denied me the right to be with members of it! Did you need to forget that I was the result of a mistake? ..." His 'talk' with Margaret was interupted by a phone call from David.

TBC

Author's note:I'm trying to finish this fic, so my focus will be on 2005. However, bear in mind that Charlie is not gonna forgive Margaret easily.