Chapter 7

Author's note: Hi all! Back again with another chapter! Just wanna comment on a message someone sent me about this fic… I'm really sorry for the long wait for Amy finding out about the baby. I will say she won't find out for another few chapters. This long wait is mostly due to the fact that a lot of these chapters will take place in one day, so really it's only been five days, I think, since the baby's come into play. Not bad. But Ephram will tell Amy, I promise J Again thanks for the reviews! I'll be updating it more often now. Thanks so much for kicking my butt into gear and making sure I update!

Amy sighed as she hung up the cordless phone and fell onto the couch. She had been trying to get a hold of Ephram all day, but each time she called, she wasn't able to get through; on his cell phone nor the home phone. Granted, they had hung out the night before…

"You know, guys find that annoying," Bright said as he entered the living room, spinning a bright orange basketball on his index finger. He had quickly picked up on that trick, back when he and Colin were in middle school and would do nothing but play basketball. "Calling every hour."

Amy rolled her eyes as her brother.

"Then again, this is you and Ephram; the couple who can't stand to be away from one another for more than a day, so maybe I'm wrong." Taking seat in the chair across from her, he grinned. Amy grabbed the nearest pillow in the couch and threw it at him in hopes of knocking the grin off his face.

"Shut up, Bright," Amy said. "Shouldn't you be at your house? Jeez, you pay rent for a place your hardly ever at…" Sometimes Amy found it cool that Bright and Ephram were close friends, but other times, it was a big pain having your brother and boyfriend best guy friends together.

Ignoring Amy's question, Bright said, "He's probably out doing guy things. You know, he can't be your boyfriend twenty-four seven. Besides…" He took another swig from his water bottle."…weren't you guys hanging out last night till late?"

It was true, they had been. So what? "If this is your version of trying to make me feel better, your failing horribly," she informed her, her arms crossed over her chest.

"I'm just saying…" He sat there for a few more minutes. "Okay, break time's up." He stood up from the chair with the basketball. "Good luck with the annoying girlfriend thing." He headed towards the door. "Oh, but if you do get a hold of Ephram, tell him to come over. I want someone to play ball with and I haven't seen him in a few days." With that, Bright disappeared back outside, leaving Amy alone in the living room.

She glanced over at the phone. Bright was right, as much as she hated to admit it; she was being a typical, annoying girlfriend, spending the day trying to get in touch with her boyfriend. But for some reason, she had a bad feeling that wouldn't go away and she wanted to call him and make sure everything was alright. Not being able to get a hold of him wasn't helping her shake the feeling away, either. Maybe she should just do something to get her mind off of him.

Yeah, that was it. She'd simply try back later.

He could feel the sun on his back, and the wind softly blowing around him as he played in the field. The soft melodies drifted through the trees, filling his ears with the sound of his own music. Ephram smiled, the feeling of freedom more powerful than ever as he sat playing the piano; as if nothing could touch him. He looked to the side of him to see Amy smiling proudly at him. He looked back down at the black and white keys, mesmerized by the sounds around him.

Suddenly the piano began to take another form, a smaller one. Before he knew it, he was holding something small, wrapped in a blanket. He carefully began to unwrap whatever was inside. He gasped when a small baby looked back up at him. The trees then disappeared and everything got quiet around him. Just then, the baby opened his little mouth and began to cry.

"I can't believe you did this," Amy said appearing beside him, her tone filled with anger and hurt, as did her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Amy. I -1 didn't know!" he said as he got up and faced her, the baby still in his arms.

" I can't be with you now, Ephram. Goodbye." With that, Amy turned around and walked away from him.

"No. Amy, wait!" He started after her. Just then, Amy disappeared right in front of him. "Amy!" he called out desperately, looking around for her. Then the baby began crying. Ephram looked down at the baby.

"I-I don't know what to do!" he said, to both himself and the baby. He looked around and realized he was all alone.

Suddenly, Ephram sat up from the bed, and looked down, half expecting to be holding the baby. But he wasn't. He sighed in relief, realizing it had just been a dream. No, a nightmare.

He got out of the bed, feeling the need to walk around. His room was the same as it was before he had fallen asleep; the stereo was still even on as loud as he had had it before.

He looked out the window, wondering how long he had slept. He looked over at his clock, which displayed 5:23PM. Wow, he had been asleep for a while. He walked over to his stereo and turned the sound down enough so he could hear the sounds around him. Where was his dad? He walked over to his bedroom door and opened it, then disappeared downstairs to see where everyone was.

Ephram slowly climbed down the stairs as he rubbed his eyes. While as the nap did him some good, he now probably wouldn't be able to get to sleep tonight. Great, he thought. Once he reached the bottom steps, he could hear Delia giggling and Andy mumbling something he couldn't hear. Curious, Ephram followed the sound to the living room where Andy and Delia sat on the couch, their attention solely focused on the small baby on Andy's lap. He stood there in the doorway and watched as Andy made funny faces at the baby, who would respond by kicking his feet up. He couldn't help but wonder if this would be a common sight in another few months.

"Ephram. I didn't hear you come downstairs," Andy said, having noticed Ephram standing there, watching them. "Come sit down with us. We were just trying different things to make the baby laugh." Ephram entered the living room, but instead of sitting beside them on the couch, he decided to sit in the chair beside the couch.

"I didn't know they could laugh this young," he admitted.

"Sure. There are lots of things they can do this early," Andy said. Of coarse he'd know, he was a doctor. Ephram on the other hand, who's only experience was with Delia, had no idea anything about babies. "They can sit up if you prop them up, and they can grasp objects; they can even roll over at this age."

"Isn't he cute, Ephram?" Delia said, smiling, looking at Ephram before quickly returning her attention to the baby.

"Uh…yeah." Truthfully, since he had found the baby on the porch that morning, he hadn't looked at him for more than a few seconds. He was afraid he's find a resemblance in the baby's little features; he wasn't sure he could handle that.

There was an uncomfortable silence in the room all of a sudden. A silence that went unnoticed by Delia, who's attention was on the baby. But Ephram felt it, and as he looked over at his father, he knew Andy could feel it too.

Once more his attention shifted to the baby.

"Would you like to hold him?" Andy asked, noticing Ephram's attention had gone to the baby as well. Ephram quickly looked up at his father.

"I-"

"C'mon, Ephram. It's fun!" Delia said. He looked back over at the baby. A part of him wanted to get close to him, to touch him, to hold him, to take care of him as he should since it was he who could have fathered this child, not Andy; the other part was scared to death to so much as touch the baby.

He opened his mouth to try and answer when suddenly the phone rang. "I'll get that," he said, quickly getting up from the chair to answer the phone.

"Hello?"

"Thank god! I'm so glad I finally got a hold of you!" Amy said, relief filling her voice. Ephram suddenly felt guilty for turning off his cell phone in the car; he still had no idea what to say to Amy, and after the dream he had had earlier, he was almost afraid to tell her. He could just picture it now: 'Hey Amy. I may or may not have a six month old son with Madison; right now were waiting for the DNA test to come in. Wanna go to the movies?'

"Ephram?" she asked, bringing his attention back from wandering to his troubled thoughts.

"Yeah, I'm here," he assured her. "Sorry. I was in and out all day and my cell phone died, so I left it in my room to charge," he lied. He hated lying to Amy. Not only did he hate it, but the rare times that he did, she always ended up finding out, getting him into trouble.

"That's cool, it wasn't important, although Bright did mention wanting to kick your butt in basketball earlier…."

Ephram laughed for the first time that day. "Yeah, in his dreams." The two fell silent on the phone and in that silence, he could hear the baby making gurgling noises from the other room.

"Ephram, is everything okay?" Amy asked finally. "Your acting… off. Like something's wrong." Of coarse she could tell something was wrong with him. What the heck was he doing, keeping this from Amy? He tried to play out the different scenarios in his head, of what it'd be like telling her about the baby. She would be crushed, that much he knew. But would she leave him? Could their relationship survive this? He honestly couldn't say.

"I just have a lot going on right now," he said, not wanting to tell her quite yet. If she was going to leave him, he wanted to prolong it a bit longer. Besides, he still wasn't sure how he felt about it, what's the sense dragging Amy into this mess right off?

"I gotta go. I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Um… okay? Call me later, I guess…" Feeling a pang of guilt, Ephram hung up wishing he had the courage to tell Amy.