"I'm older now," Charlotte said matter-of-factly one day, looking up from her homework to fix Ian with an imperious look. She had recently turned eight and insisted she was all grown up.

Ian glanced up from the science homework he was attempting to help her with (though, truthfully, he was stymied...he'd never been the best student, afterall). "You're a very big girl," he agreed with a fond smile at his adopted daughter, reaching over to tweak her nose.

Charlotte continued to stare at him, head cocked, impatience in her eyes. When he failed to elaborate, she added, "You said when I was older, you'd tell me where babies come from..."

A little desperately, he called down the hall to the bathroom where Emily seemed to live these days with round the clock morning sickness. "Uh... Em? Situation..."

"Handle it!" she barked back, followed by a heavy retching sound.

"Alright," he sighed, looking like a man headed to the gallows. With a glance back at Declan and Gemma who were both preoccupied watching cartoons and weren't about to overhear anything they shouldn't, he nodded. "Ask away..."

"You had sex..." Charlotte said accusingly. It wasn't a question.

He winced, nodded. "That's how babies are made." It had taken nearly two years of trying for them to get pregnant this time, in spite of how suddenly Gemma had happened. He wasn't about to explain that to her, though.

"But how?" she pressed.

He pursed his lips, silently wishing for a way out, but knowing Charlotte was too persistent to let the matter go. "You know how chickens lay eggs? And sometimes the eggs hatch into baby chicks?"

She nodded.

"Inside a girl, there are lots of really tiny eggs. And during sex..." (he said the word like it was poison), "A boy makes sperm that joins the egg and forms a little baby that grows for nine months until it's ready to come out."

"I'm a chicken?" Charlotte asked skeptically.

"No...but you have eggs inside you for when you're ready to have babies." Then, under his breath, he added, "Hopefully not until you're thirty."

"When will I be ready?" she asked, either not hearing him or ignoring him.

"You can when you're about fifteen – your body will tell you when you're ready. But you should wait until you're all grown up," he said in his sternest 'dad voice'. "You should wait until you're married. When you're thirty."

"Mom didn't..." she pointed out, all sass. "She was sixteen."

Emily emerged from the bathroom then, still looking rather green. She flopped down on the couch, exhausted. "Just because I did, doesn't mean you should," she said firmly. "Having a baby is hard work and just because your body tells you it's ready, doesn't mean you are ready."

"Then why did you?" she asked.

"Because I thought I was ready to have sex, but I wasn't – I was doing it for the wrong reasons. And I didn't use protection."

"What's that?" Charlotte asked, "Like a sword?"

"No," Emily said, rolling her eyes.

At the same moment, Ian said, "Yes!"

"It's called a condom," Emily said, shooting Ian a glare. "A boy puts it on his penis so his sperm can't get to the egg and you should always always use one until you're ready for a baby."

Charlotte wrinkled her nose. "Did you forget?" she asked seriously, patting Emily's still flat stomach.

"We wanted to have a baby," Emily insisted.

"Well, I didn't," Charlotte insisted back, rolling her eyes.

"Yesterday you said you did," Ian pointed out.

"I changed my mind. Now I don't."

"Well, it's too late now," he said with a shrug.

"How long 'til the baby hatches?" she asked.

"Hatches?" Emily repeated, brow raised.

"You're a chicken," Charlotte informed her merrily.

"I'm not a chicken," she groaned, shaking her head, "And neither are you. Your baby brother or sister will come in six months."

"How does it get out?"

"When it's time, I'll push the baby out of my vagina," she said, "It's hard work and it hurts because the baby will be big and the vagina has to stretch to make room for it."

Charlotte thought about that for a moment. "Maybe you should just keep it inside, okay?"

"It doesn't work like that." Emily tenderly stroked her daughter's cheek. "I know you don't want a brother or sister right now, but remember how much you loved Gemma when she was born? I promise you'll love the new baby just as much."

"Maybe you should stop having sex," Charlotte declared after a moment pondering that.

Ian rubbed his temples wearily. He missed the days when she was sweet and innocent and didn't ask difficult questions.

"That's none of your business, Nosey Rosie," Emily scolded. "When you're all grown up, you can make that decision for yourself. But not when you're sixteen."

Charlotte shrugged and went back to her homework. "Do you love me?" she asked after several moments of silence passed.

"Of course!" Emily insisted. "Why would you ever think we don't?"

"You didn't want me..."

"Oh, sweetie," she whispered, pulling her daughter into her chest. "You were a surprise, but I loved you from the very first moment and so did your Dad, okay? And even though we planned Gemma and this baby, doesn't mean we love you any less."

"Promise?" she asked, voice soft and meek and so unlike her.

"Of course, mo storín," Ian promised. "We love you forever and ever and three days after that."

"Even when the new baby comes?"

"Even if there were a hundred babies. Even if you turned into a gorilla. Even if you have a baby when you're sixteen...but you won't because you're so much smarter than me," Emily insisted.

Charlotte puffed up her little chest in pride. "I'm the smartest kid in my whole class," she insisted, "'Cause I know 'bout sex and no one else did when I telled them!"

Ian groaned. "You get to handle that when the school calls..."