Thanks, as always to my reviewers! I love you all and couldn't review without you! Also, if anyone is interested, I have posted up an Italian Job fic in the miscellaneous section. I'll warn you, there's an arguement in this chapter. I mean a real big clash - sibling rivalry at it's worst. Abigail really lets rip. Just goes to show that I shouldn't write when I'm angry, oh well, enough with the babbeling, on with the chapter:
Sam
xx

"What does it say?" Ben asked her. Opening her eyes, she looked down. She gasped, and covered her mouth with her free hand. "Abigail?"

"Oh my god."

"Abi?"

"Oh my god, Ben." She turned to face him and threw her arms around his neck, looking deeply into his eyes and smiling. He smiled back, if only because he had finally seen a smile through the last few days which had reached her eyes.

"Are you going to tell me already?" He asked grinning, "I don't think it's fair that you know and I don't!"

She kissed him deeply, and he found his answer. "Ben," She whispered afterwards. "We're gonna have a baby. It's positive, Ben, it's positive!"

They embraced tightly, and the test strip was discarded on the floor, and everything that had happened the past week had been forgotten. Nothing else mattered at that moment except that they had finally got what they wanted.

"We're gonna have a baby." Ben repeated. "I'm gonna be a dad."

The excitement in his eyes resembled a kid at christmas, surrounded by presents. Unable to stop grinning, he placed his hands back on Abigail's stomach, trying to feel the new life inside. He looked back up at Abigail's who's eyes were shining, yet these were not tears of pain as before, but ones of joy. The only tears I ever want to see her shed, Ben thought. Abigail placed her hand over his own, unable to believe that for the past month or so, there had been a child there and she hadn't known.

"We did it, Abi." Ben said with a laugh. "We did it."

Seated in the garden upon a bench, Abigail leaned against Ben, her head cradled between his neck and shoulder, and trailed her toes betweent the blades of well-cared-for grass. She felt guilty now. She couldn't stop thinking about the baby, even though it was pushing her parents death out of her mind, for which she felt torn. She was supposed to be focusing on the funeral, on keeping her brother's together, on keeping herself together, but it didn't seem like it was happening at the moment. She sighed heavily, and rubbed her hand over her stomach. God, I've known that I'm pregnant for just over an hour and I'm already feeling maternal. Truth been told, she had been feeling maternal ever since she had seen Ryan and taken him into the garden, but she wasn't prepared to admit that. After all, she wasn't his mother, she was his sister.

"You tired?" Ben asked her softly, his lips tracing her ear as he whispered. She shook her head.

"I feel...torn." She admitted. "I know I should be thinking of Mom and Dad all the time, and I have been, but not all I want to think about is us and the baby. Is that selfish of me?"

"Of course not," Ben assured her. "You need something to keep you going through all of this, Abi, and right now that's two things: your family, and our family." She shifted her head on his shoulder, so she could look up him as he spoke. "Your parents wanted this for you as much as you did, Abi, remember that."

She remembered the conversations she had had with her parents when they had come to see her in the hospital after she had lost the baby.

"I can't even begin to imagine how you feel, Petal." Petal had always been one of Abigail's nicknames from her father, ever since she was little and loved to sit amongst the flowers in their garden. Whenever she was angry or upset, she could always be found in the garden near her favourite flowers, the rosebush that blossomed every year since she helped her father plant it. James Chase was the only one who could get away with calling her Petal, she would allow that special nickname from no one else except her father.

She lay in the hospital bed. Ben was beside her on the bed, one leg pulled up upon the mattress while the other hang from the edge. His arms were wrapped around her, and she refused to let go of him, not wanting him to leave her. Her face was puffy from crying, and her eyes were distant and empty of all emotion except pain. "I didn't think it was possible to feel this bad." She whispered, tears in her voice that still flowed silently with the knowledge that the life that had been inside her was gone forever. Ben stroked her hair softly, he looked as bad as she felt, but was still trying everything he could to comfort her.

James came around to the side of the bed opposite where Ben sat, and placed his hand on Abigail's shoulder while sitting down before her. Ben released her hold on him and for the first time that day, she sat up and moved to embrace her father. Her tears soaked the shoulder of his grey jacket, but he didn't mind. Amanda Chase rested her hand on Ben's knee, giving him a look that asked if he was all right, but he shook his head.

"I just wanted to be a Mom." Abigail whimpered against her father's shoulder. "I don't understand, what did I do wrong?"

Amanda reached and rubbed Abigail's back as she sat with her father. "It's going to be all right, sweetheart." Amanda assured her.

"How do you know that?" Abigail asked, looking at her mother with her tear-stained face.

"Because you're strong, and you have Ben," She looked at Ben, "And you both have each other, and that's what matters." Abigail pulled away from her father's shoulder, turning to face Ben, who kissed her gently, reminding her unnecessarily that he was there. She sank back against the pillows, exhausted, hiding herself in Ben's shirt, and gripping his hand tightly with her tear covered hands. "When you were younger, Abigail, your kindergarten teacher asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up." Abigail kept her head on Ben's chest, but opened her eyes, looking out the window even though the blinds were shut. "No one could make up their mind, except for you."

"Do you remember what you said?" James asked her.

Abigail shook her head a little. "No."

"You said you wanted to be a Mommy." Amanda told her. "You said you were going to be the best mother in the world, and you didn't want to do anything else, until you got your job at the Archives."

"But even then we could see you still wanted to be a mother." James added. "And since the day you came home with your doll, telling us, we didn't want anything else for you."

"I guess so," Abigail agreed after remembering. "I just can't help feeling guilty though," She argued. "Here I am, dealing with death, and all I can think about is life."

Ben kissed her. "Don't worry, everything's going to turn out OK. Ryan's going to have his family still, you're going to have your brothers with you, and you're going to be a Mom, just like you always wanted."

No matter what the situation, Ben always knew what to say to make her feel better. Sometimes, he didn't have to say anything, and just being there was enough to make everything bearable. "And I've got you." She added to his list.

"You've always got me."

"Abi!" Came the shouting voice of Ryan as he came into the garden and jumped onto her lap. She shifted carefully before he managed to land, so she caused no risk of him landing on the baby he didn't know was there, but he landed on her legs instead.

"Hi sweetie," She greeted with a smile.

"Abi! You're smiling!" Ryan said, smiling himself. He had overheard Michael and Abigail talking amongst themselves yesterday about how she hadn't smiled in ages. "Michael said that Ben would make you smile, he told me, he did."

"Did he?" Abigail asked, relieved that Ryan had stopped his unspoken vow of silence around her. He spoke a little to Michael, and he didn't speak at all to Elsa and Danny, but he spoke to her, and occassionally Ben as much as her. "Yes, Ben did make me smile."

"How?" Ryan asked.

"Yes, Abigail." Michael said curiously, coming up behind them and kissing Abigail on the cheek. "How did dear old Ben make you smile."

"Not how you think." She chided at his rude mind.

"Abigail. Ben." A deep voice greeted. Marcus came and stood beside Michael, but he did not embrace or kiss Abigail's cheek as Michael would always do, and Ben could see the instant tension between the two, which was not suprising considering the coversation they had had over the phone the previous night. She had been using the kitchen phone, but Michael and Ben had heard it from the living room. Luckily, Ryan was asleep in bed and hadn't heard anything, but afterwards Marcus had given in and got on the first available plan to California. From what Michael had told Ben during the phonecall, Marcus hated giving in to Abigail, and would never do it when she was younger, whether she yelled at him, which was a rarity, or not. Ben had secretly thought that thier parents death would have brought them together, not torn them apart even more.

"Marcus," Ben nodded in greeting, more cheerfully than Marcus, maybe just in spite of him. Abigail did not turn, nor did she greet him, and instead carried on talking to Ryan as if her oldest brother had never arrived.

"Did you have fun at the airport, sweetie?" She asked him, her smile fading considerably now that Marcus was there.

Ryan nodded awkwardly, sensing the tension between his brother and sister. "Michael, where is my book? I want to show Abi." He asked his brother. Michael thought hard for a moment, trying to remember what he had done with it.

"I think it's still in the car. If you hurry, Uncle Danny might not have locked it yet." Ryan nodded and slipped from Abigail's lap, running back through the house calling after his uncle.

Michael sat on the bench beside Abigail, but Marcus chose to sit on the wall opposite them instead. Ben was now counting down the moments before another outburst occured. Marcus looked considerably angry. "Elsa brought Ryan a book on Egyptians," Michael explained. "He wants to work in a museum like his sister." No one answered. Ben was too busy staring between his wife and her brother, wondering who's fuse was going to ignite first.

"Michael tells me that you're going to take Ryan in." Marcus stated coolly.

"Yes," Abigail confirmed lightly. "Me and Ben are going to look after him."

"His home is here, Abigail. His home is in California."

"Uh oh." Michael muttered, Ben looked sideways at his brother-in-law, and got the confirming look that the argument was going to begin again.

"Which was the home he shared with Mom and Dad, but they're not here anymore, are they!" Abigail pointed out heatedly. "Maybe if you'd gotten here sooner you'd have been able to sort this out with us. But no, as usual, it's up to me and Michael to look out for Ryan."

"You say that like I don't care what's happened." Marcus said quietly.

"Do you?" Abigail's question shocked the three of them. Seeing them all look at her she whispered bitterly, "Everyone's thinking it, I'm just saying it."

"Of course I care! They were our parents!"

One thing that had annoyed Abigail considerably on the phone with Marcus the night before was how he was already reffering to their parents in the past tense. "They still are our parents!" She said loudly. "And they always will be! A parent once - a parent for life!" It was a line that she had repeated many times on the phone last night, and one that Michael remembered that their mother used to say a lot in regard to her children. Only today, it meant so much more to Abigail, but only Ben knew this.

"Stop saying that Abigail!" Marcus yelled at her. "You're not Mom!"

"If it means something to me, I'll say it!" She said back, not yelling like Marcus was.

"Guys, maybe we should keep this down a little-" Michael began, but Marcus looked at him with the same anger he was projecting at Abigail and Michael's voice rose as well. "Oh for God's sake, Marcus! Stop yelling at her!" Michael said loudly, not shouting, but enough to make their brother realise that he wasn't going to let him push Abigail around. "This is about what's best for Ryan."

"What's best for Ryan? He's best off here! With his family!"

"His family? You mean the brother that's travelling, the brother that he barely knows, or the sister who's his best hope?" Michael asked rhetorically. "He will be with his family!"

"What about the rest of his family?" Marcus asked.

"Don't you dare suggest that I'm going to keep him away from any of you." Abigail said with such bitterness that it rose the hairs on the back of Ben's neck. "If he says the word, I'll bring him straight away to see any of you, no questions asked." Abigail promised, looking away from Marcus. "If it's what he want's, then that's what it'll be."

They all fell silent, and none of them looked at each other except Abigail and Ben.

"And you think you can raise a child?" Marcus asked teasingly.

Abigail looked away from Ben with fire in her eyes as she returned her fury to Marcus. In that moment, Ben finally understood the line that Riley said every time Abigail got mad, which was rare: Heav'n has no rage, like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury, like a woman scorned. He had never seen her so angry, so hurt, than when Marcus taunted her that moment. "What did you just say?" She asked him in disbelief.

"You heard me. You're still the child you were twenty years ago! You don't have any experience of motherhood."

"No experience?" She asked. Tears prickled her eyes, but she refused to cry. She wouldn't let Marcus get to her like this. "Marcus-"

"Don't play the sympathy one with me, Abigail. We all know that you want a baby, but wanting a child doesn't make you a mother. You couldn't be a mother even if some miracle made it happen. Because that's what it's going to take for anyone in their right mind to let you look after a kid, a miracle!" Right now, both men wanted to pounce on Marcus and beat him senseless.

Unable to listen to anything else, Abigail stood up and walked away. She didn't trust herself being within a mile of Marcus without trying to hurt him for what he just said. Ben was only a few steps behind her as they disappeared into the house once again. Michael looked after them, before staring at Marcus in disbelief.

"You stupid asshole!" Michael cried out. "How can you say something like that to her?"

"What?"

"Marcus, maybe if it had occured to you to keep in touch with your family, you would have known what has happened to her." Michael explained desperately, ashamed to be Marcus's brother right now. He stood up, going to follow Abigail. "Maybe if you had spoken to any of us in the past year, you would have known about Abigail's miscarriage."

Leaving a stunned Marcus to think about his thoughts, Michael followed Abigail and Ben. With only a day left before the funeral, it didn't seem like the family ties were going to be as tight as they needed to be.