"It's a pregnancy test".

"What? Ew!" David recoiled, suddenly feeling faint.

He knew it. He knew she'd get pregnant. He'd been bracing himself for that frantic phone call, sometime between her fifteenth and twenty fifth birthday. She'd been in so, so many dangerous situations in her life that he'd been able to fix with an envelope full of cash, coloured contacts and a fake ID, but it was the unplanned pregnancy that would completely unravel him.

And there she was, twenty seven years old, and she hadn't come to him. She hadn't come to him at all, she'd just tossed the test into their shared garbage, and gone on like it was just another Monday.

"She's pregnant?" David said quietly.

"Well someone is pregnant!" Johnny almost shouted. "You have to talk to her!"

"She's not MY child!" David shot back. "How did this become MY problem?"

"She's your sister, David! You should be looking out for her!"

It all came down to him. It always came down to him.

"Do you even know if she is pregnant?" Patrick said soothingly.

"No! Which is worse! She didn't tell me!" he was as close to hyperventilating as he was going to get. He wasn't going to give her that satisfaction. "I can't raise a child!"

"Remind me again why you're raising the baby?"

"Because I've been cleaning up her messes for twenty eight years now, Patrick! Of course its going to be my problem! You think my mother is going to raise this baby?"

"She raised you two-"

"Raised is a strong word to describe what she did for us".

Patrick nodded, continuing to rub the cream under David's eyes. "That tracks".

"That's so mean! Why would you think that?" Alexis's mouth twisted, a telltale sign that she was going to cry. "I'm not pregnant!"

"We all thought that honey!"

"That's so mean!" she said again, her voice rising even higher.

"So you're not pregnant?" David said, sitting on the edge of Johnny and Moira's bed. "

"No, David, ew!"

"Oh thank God". Moira tilted her head upwards. "Because a Podunk baby out of wedlock is not something we can afford right now!"

"Oh! My! God!" and she flounced off towards their motel room, slamming the door.

"She's not pregnant", Johnny mumbled to himself, and David rolled his eyes heavenwards, stalking after his sister.

"Goodnight children", Moira called.

"Goodnight!" Alexis growled, already under her blankets.

"You're not pregnant?" David checked again, as he turned off the light.

"No, David, ew". Her voice was quiet, and she rolled over to face him. "I would have told you, anyway", she mumbled.

He bit his lip to hide the tiny smile trying to break across his face, as Alexis pulled her comforter up over her shoulders. His sister, his baby sister, was twenty seven, and had escaped so many things (he didn't like to think too hard about the situations she'd found herself in, because it made his heartrate skyrocket), but he still knew that he was the first person she'd come to.

Babies had the sloppiest mouths, but perhaps he'd make an exception.