Slightly delayed by Thanksgiving here in Canada, but here we go.

For those of you who are noticing that this story is strongest on the Seth/Summer side, good eye! This originally was a Seth/Summer story, but it just didn't seem to hold up so everyone else got thrown in the mix with their own storyline.

Also, for those worried about Matthew, I only promise that this isn't an angst story; so no guns, kidnapping, rape, murder or violence (unless someone really gets Ryan mad on the last one).

Once again, thanks for all the reviews and comments.

On to the chapter.

Chapter 5: The plot thickens

"What do you mean he isn't there?"

Summer rolled her eyes at the sound of Che's voice.

Seth. She'd been calling Seth, not Che, and though her boyfriend had promised her that he wouldn't get involved in any of Che's wilderness plans, she wasn't encouraged by the fact that her college friend, rather than Seth, was answering her boyfriend's phone.

"Well, where is he, Che?" She nodded at someone passing by, quickly refocusing her attention on the conversation. "A mission? This mission better not have come from you. I know we've talked about the differences between beginning of college Summer and real Summer, but I don't think you quite understand the degree of my rage blackouts."

A folder of papers was plopped onto her lap, and Summer jumped at the uncomfortable weight. She looked up to find Matthew staring down at her, his arms crossed and a scowl on his face.

"Are you going to be joining us for this meeting, or what?"

"Yeah, just a second." Summer rolled her eyes as she turned her attention back to her phone conversation. "Che, I really have to go now, but if I don't hear from Seth in the next few hours, you better believe that you and I are going to have some serious words. I'll find you, Che, and it won't be pretty." She huffed when he offered her nothing more than a sweet good-bye and turned her attention to Matthew. "I thought the meeting wasn't for another hour."

"I moved it up. I could have told you if you hadn't been busy talking to your boyfriend all morning."

Summer shook her head as she got up from her seat. "I was talking to a friend for about fifteen minutes. I haven't been able to reach Seth since yesterday… again."

"Aw," Matthew cooed. "Trouble in paradise? Maybe you should have jumped at my offer yesterday. Now Sean's the one having all the fun while you're pining after him like one of those stupid girls who don't understand what happens when a couple is separated by a number of time zones."

"I appreciate the concern, really, but Seth and I are fine. We're wonderful even. And in less than a month, we'll be in the same time zone, permanently. So you won't have to worry about us anymore."

Matthew laughed. "You don't really believe that, do you, Summer? You aren't that naïve, are you? Let me give you one last chance. You can get together with me, stay on board with GEORGE, and have a great time saving the world, or you can go home to Cedric and realise after a week that you two aren't meant for each other anymore, and then you'll wish you could be back with me who will have moved on to someone who appreciates me and all the things I have to offer her both physically and economically. What's it going to be?"

"I'm going to go to a meeting. I'm going to try not to vomit at the thought of us together, and then I'm going to call Seth and tell him how much I miss him." She offered him a quick smile, and then pushed passed him and into the room where they were meeting.

She felt his eyes watching her as she left him behind. Summer nodded when she found herself walking behind Melinda, one of the few people remaining from when Summer had first joined GEORGE.

"What was that about?" Melinda asked her.

"What?"

"That fight that everyone on this floor could hear if they cared to do so. Are you having a problem with Matthew?"

"I'm not having a problem with him, but apparently he's suddenly having a problem with me and Seth and my leaving." Summer shook her head. "I love you guys, but I honestly can't wait until I'm done here. These last few months are turning out to be nothing but hell."

Melinda shrugged. "He gets fixated. He's never been dangerous, but he is a brat. I wouldn't worry about it if I were you, though."

"Yeah?" Summer asked. "Why not?"

"Two reasons. One: you're out of here in less than a month. Two: I have a feeling he's not going to last much longer."

"What? He's been here longer than I have. Why would you think Matthew was on his way out?"

Melinda looked around them quickly and leaned in to Summer. She lowered her voice. "He's got a meeting with the directors of GEORGE tomorrow. Rumour has it he's been up to something he shouldn't have been doing. We think he's getting the boot."

"What's he been—"

"Ladies," Chad, a senior executive of the group called as he moved toward them, placing a hand on either of their backs, "shall we move this into the room and get this meeting started."

"Sure," Melinda agreed with a wide smile. She sent a nod in Summer's direction and mouthed that they would talk later.

Summer looked back one last time and jumped when she saw Matthew staring at her. She quickly moved into the room and took a seat between two occupied chairs.

Seth's feet tapped out a rhythm that seemed familiar to him, but was too fast to actually be from any of the music he'd been listening to on the way to Summer. She was going to kill him, he'd realised.

She would have been fine with his visit before—probably even happy that he was taking the time to visit her—but then he'd lost his phone. There was no way for her to reach him, and she'd probably been trying to call him since they're last conversation to make sure he was far away from Che and all of Che's weird plans.

Yep, she was going to kill him.

Not to mention the fact that he was just plain nervous. He was primarily there to make sure Summer was fine, but there was no denying that the ring box he carried with him was burning a hole in his pocket. He wasn't sure he'd be able to make it through whatever time he was going to be there without asking her to marry him, and asking her to marry him definitely made him nervous.

"Are you okay, man?"

Seth looked up to find a boy a few years younger than him watching him with wary eyes.

"Yeah. I'm just waiting for someone."

The boy looked around the hallway. "Who?"

"Summer. Summer Roberts?"

"Oh, Summer. Are you going to replace her when she leaves?" The boy looked around the hallway once more, shrugged his shoulders, and let himself fall next to Seth on the floor.

"Nah, I'm here to offer her some moral support so she can eventually leave. I'm her boyfriend."

"No, you're not."

Seth let a small smile tug at his lips. "Excuse me?"

"Well… I mean…" His brow scrunched for a moment as he thought about it. Suddenly his eyes widened and he smiled. "Oh, you guys have, like, an open relationship and stuff?"

"No."

"Really, because yesterday, I'm pretty sure Jess and I interrupted her making out with some other dude."

"I'm pretty sure you didn't," Seth answered with a quick nod.

"I'm really actually quite sure I did."

Seth rolled his eyes at the guy. "You didn't. I'm dating Summer, and if anyone was trying to touch her, I wouldn't be surprised to find out that they were walking with a limp today."

"Sure…" the guy said slowly as he watched Seth. He got up, shrugging his shoulders. "All I know—"

"I'm dating Summer," Seth repeated as he watched the boy walk away.

Seth shook his head as he sat for a moment longer, watching the door he'd been told separated him from the girl who would hopefully soon be his fiancé. He reached into his pocket to take out the cell phone he'd quickly purchased when he couldn't find his. He dialled without looking down at the numbers and started talking before the person on the other end of the line could actually answer.

"Hey, so some guy just told me that he saw Summer making out with someone yesterday."

"Seth, I don't have time to— Wait, what? Don't panic. Summer loves you and she would never—"

"The thing is I'm not panicking, Ryan. I didn't panic at all when he told me. I knew it wasn't true."

"You're not panicking?"

Seth shrugged despite the fact that he knew Ryan couldn't see him, and tugged at the edge of his pants. "Summer would never cheat on me. She loves me, and in a few hours, we're going to be engaged. I have no reason to panic."

"That's… that's oddly normal of you, Seth. Did they give you drugs on your flight down?"

"No. But I could definitely use them right now. I have a feeling Summer's meeting is going to last just about forever. What are you up to?"

Ryan took a few unsteady breaths as he tried to process the conversation. "You want to talk about me?"

"I have to wait for Summer to get out of this meeting, and you sounded like something big was going on. What's up?"

"Well, Kaitlin showed up at the airport yesterday and apparently she's here to visit me."

"Mini-Coop?" Seth asked as he nodded to the people walking by him despite the confused looks he was getting.

"Don't call her that, but yeah."

"Is she on study break?"

"She's married."

Seth laughed. "Hey, those Coopers, really work at making life interesting for you, don't they? Who'd she marry?"

"Some ass," Ryan sighed. "She was trying to make her mother angry or something, and I don't know… she got married and she's pregnant."

"Whoa. That's weird, though. I thought Kaitlin was getting along with Julie these days. In fact I thought Kaitlin was rocking the whole studious girl thing."

"Apparently not. I guess you never know with Kaitlin."

"You never know with women, Ryan. All right, I'm going to scope out these GEORGE guys, see if Summer gave any of them a black eye for hitting on her, or see if any of them know of somewhere romantic where I can propose to Summer."

"But what should I do about Kaitlin?"

"I don't know. What did you do about Taylor?"

"What?" Ryan asked, his voice squeaking in a high note. "I haven't even mentioned… I mean I haven't thought of Taylor—"

"Yeah, no, that's convincing. But I meant what did you do when Taylor was getting divorced? How did you get her out of that one?"

"Taylor was married," Ryan mumbled to himself. "We could just ask Taylor for advice."

"What did I just say?"

"So…" Ryan cleared his throat a few times. "Do you know how I could find Taylor?"

"Not really." Seth shrugged again. "Check her blog, she's usually really open about everything on there from what I hear, and I do mean everything. If you guys ever hook up again, make sure you have editor's rights on that. I'll ask Summer if I ever get to see her."

"All right. Well, good luck with the whole proposal thing, man."

"Thanks. Good luck with the women."

"Thanks. I think I'm going to need it more than you will."

Seth nodded to no one in particular as he hung up. He looked around watching the people milling about the hotel hall. Suddenly, he noticed a guy with a cast on his hand.

"Hey, hey you, did some short girl break your hand?"

"Anything?"

"Nothing but the confirmation that something is definitely going on," Sandy told his wife as they both leaned around the corner to watch Julie as she tried to make herself some lunch. "Definitely something going on."

"But what?" Kirsten asked.

"I'm not sure. I tried calling Frank, but he was barely any help. He sounded surprised that Julie was here, mumbled something about a plan, said he had something right there with him, and then stuttered about how he couldn't wait to get his hands on Kaitlin."

"Kaitlin?"

Sandy shrugged. "Whatever Frank was looking for, or whatever he found, he definitely was not happy with Kaitlin."

"I hope it wasn't clown porn again."

"What?" Sandy asked with a loud laugh.

"Be happy you weren't involved in that one. So, Frank turned out not to be the greatest source… but, hey, he answered his phone."

Sandy shrugged. "So?"

"So? So Julie told us that he was away fishing where she would never be able to reach him. He obviously didn't go that far if you were able to reach him."

"So he lied?"

"I'm not so sure he's the one who lied…" Kirsten said as she narrowed her eyes.

"Julie? What tricks—" Sandy stopped and frowned when his cell phone rang. "Oh, I have to take this. I might have to go out too. Can you hold down the fort with Julie a while longer. She's got exams in a few days, right? She can't stay that long."

"Yeah, well, as soon as she's gone you and I are having a serious talk about all these mysterious phone calls you've been getting, so be happy she's still around."

Sandy leaned down and pressed his lips against Kirsten's. "That may be asking for just a little too much."

Kirsten shook her head as she watched him walk into his office and close the door behind him. She quickly turned her attention back to Julie to distract herself from her distracted husband.

"All right, Julie," Kirsten said as she entered the kitchen. "It's time you and I talked."

"Great," Julie smiled widely. "What about?"

"About the fact that Frank isn't on a fishing trip and that you would be happy with a bottle of wine and Bob Seger if you had the chance to an empty house for a week. So, spill. What's really going on?"

"I just…"

"Julie," Kirsten warned.

"Fine, here." Julie reached over for her purse which she'd kept close to her side since she'd arrived at the Cohen household. Kirsten watched as Julie dug her hand in, shaking her head. "I'll just show you, I… Where is it?"

Julie's resolve melted into panic as she kept searching her purse. She flipped the handbag over and let the contents fall onto the counter, spreading them around as she searched for something. She stopped suddenly, and fire suddenly grew in her eyes.

"Wait until I get my hands on Kaitlin," Julie huffed as she hurried out of the kitchen.

"Not a good day to be Kaitlin," Kirsten muttered to herself as she turned to open the refrigerator.

"I hate my life."

"Well, no one forced you to get pregnant and married. Now, would you just please dial."

"Ryan," Kaitlin whined, "you know she's just going to give me a speech, and you've already given me a speech, so why do we have to involve Taylor? I mean, sure, she's nothing but fun when she goes all crazy and acts as a great distraction from the rest of the boring Newpsies, but—"

"Call Taylor, Kaitlin. Tell her what the problem is, and tell her that you need advice."

"Can't you just call her?"

Ryan shrank away from the telephone, an unhappy frown on his face that Kaitlin couldn't remember ever having seen him wear. "No. I have to go… workout. I'm jogging, or punching bag, or… Call Taylor."

He was gone before Kaitlin could ask anything more of him, nothing but his wallet and keys with him, leaving her to wonder how exactly he would work out in jeans and a T-shirt. She shrugged at Colin who had been listening to their conversation from his seat in front of Ryan's computer. Kaitlin dialled Taylor's cell phone number and dropped back against the mattress.

"Taylor? Hey, it's Kaitlin."

"Kaitlin?" Taylor asked in confusion. "Hi. How are you?"

"Um… I'm not sure."

"What happened?"

"I'm married and pregnant."

Taylor froze. She shooed away the waitress that approached her with the offer of more coffee and turned to face the window of the diner rather than the other patrons. "What?"

"Pregnant and married. How are you?"

"Kaitlin? What… what are you doing?"

"I'm not sure, which is why I called you. I just… I know you've been married before and I was reading your blog so I know that you were—"

"Yeah," Taylor quickly interrupted. "Um, wow. Okay, what can I do? How can I help?"

"Can you come here?" Kaitlin asked in a small voice. "I don't know what I'm doing and I know you studied law, and… Can you just come help, please?"

Taylor sighed as she took a look at her surroundings. She'd been wandering aimlessly since she'd left her mother, too aware that she didn't want to leave the country, and too sad to admit that she had nowhere else to go.

"Where are you?" Taylor asked, trying to contain her joy at being needed.

"Berkeley. I'm staying with a friend while I get this figured out."

"Where? I can come find you."

"I'll meet you at the airport," Kaitlin slowly answered. "It's kind of hard to explain how to get here, especially when it's only the second time I've ever visited."

"Fine," Taylor sighed with a shake of her head. Kaitlin pregnant, married and lost... "I'll call you when I have my flight information."

"Thanks, Taylor."

"Hang in there," she offered. "I'll see you soon."

"Yeah."

Kaitlin smiled to herself as she hung up the phone. She rested her hands under her head as she stared up at the ceiling.

"So, are you really pregnant?" Colin suddenly asked her.

"You want to know what game we're really playing?"

Colin looked around sceptically before finally letting his gaze fall on Kaitlin and offering her a shrug. "Sure. Why not?"

Three hours later Taylor was on a plane to Berkeley, happy to have someone other than herself to think about, but unhappy at the prospect of the memories Kaitlin's situation would bring.

Across the country, Ryan came home to Colin and Kaitlin asleep, each in a separate bed. He wasn't surprised. He could remember Kirsten complaining on some nights that sleeping with Sandy was just too crowded when she was pregnant with Sophie.

He sat on his computer desk chair staring out into space and nursing his battered fists.

"Taylor," he whispered to himself. It would certainly serve as a distraction from his upcoming finals.