He is going to be a father at 17. With a stranger. He wouldn't say they were friends. He wanted to be friends. He wanted there to be more. Just not a kid. Fatherhood wasn't suppose to be until he was in his thirties. How was he suppose to tell his dad, his friends? His own life was a mess, now he had a kid on top of that? This really was his worst nightmare come true. If his dad taught him anything it was to stand up and be a man about things. He couldn't and wouldn't be like his own father.

"Hey, man. What's with the long face?" George asked, taking a seat next to him. Wade sighed, running a hand through his hair. He needed someone to talk to, he like Zoe, wasn't ready for the town to find out. Not until he was able to wrap his own head around this. Fatherhood. That one single little word floated around his head, taunting him. If he was older and ready for a responsibility like this, he would have been psyched, instead of scared and freaked out.

"Remember that girl, I hooked up with at the beach a few months back?"

"How could I forget? You talked about her non-stop the whole way home. We wanted to leave you there," he chuckled, earning a glare from Wade. "What does she have to do with anything?"

"She happens to be, Dr. Harley Wilkes' long lost daughter," Wade told him. This was all so messed up.

"Oh shit," George mumbled. "Make a move."

"It's complicated." He wished it was that easy. He wanted her for himself, that couldn't happen now. He'd always be tied to her for the next 18 years. He had to be on good terms with her, to make it easy on everyone involved. He couldn't start something with her, he couldn't commit to.

"How so?"

"It just is," he sighed getting up. He wasn't in the mood to be around people. He didn't want to find an easy girl. All he wanted to do was go home and forget his problem even existed.

Seeing his dad left for the night he grabbed a beer from the fridge and went to his room. He sat on his bed starting at the unopened bottle. Drinking it would make him forget. Make him like his own father. He couldn't escape the mess he was in. Leaving the bottle on the floor, he found sleep wasn't hard to come by.

"You alright?" Wade gave her a nod. "Boy, I know something is wrong. You haven't touched any of the fish on your plate, and you don't mope ever. Now I'll ask you again, you alright?"

"I have a lot on my mind, Mrs. Breeland." Before she could ask anything else he was gone.

"Zoe, can we talk?" Wade asked. He placed his hand on her lower back, steering her way from the crowd. "I can't fail, I can't be a failure to my child. I want to be a part of his or her life." She couldn't keep the smile off her face. It was what she was waiting to hear.

"Good, I go in tomorrow afternoon. Wally already let you out of your afternoon shift. This isn't going to be easy, but together we can do this."

"I hope so. I still need to tell my Dad. He's gonna flip." The sober him will. The drunk him would praise him and forget come morning. "Does, uh, Harley know who the father is?" Zoe shook her head. "We'll tell Harley together and I'll deal with my Dad tomorrow morning." He hated to but it needed to be done, before news got out and someone else tells him.

"Come over around 6. You sure you don't want me to be with when you tell your Dad?" Zoe asked, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

"It's best this way. How did you get me out of work?" He asked gesturing they head back to the town events. He wasn't mad about it.

"Told Wally I had a doctors appointment in Mobile and you were my ride. He didn't ask questions." Wade nodded.

"Zoe, about me not remembering who you were, it has nothing to do with you or how incredible that night was," he stopped wanting to explain things to her. It was harder to put his thoughts into words. "That was on me. I didn't want to remember that night for the fact I didn't think I'd ever see you again. I didn't want to mope around. You were never mine, but you did take part of me that night."

"Wade, we need you for the peg leg race," Lemon demanded, pulling him off, leaving Zoe standing there, not able to voice her thoughts on what he had unloaded on her. Part of him was relieved about that, but he hated that Lemon had pulled him away. They needed to be on the same page.

"I'm too old for the peg leg race," he whined, wanting out of the race.

"Suck it up, Kinsella," Lemon hissed.

After he was able to sneak away, he headed to Zoe's, seeing she had already disappeared. As he walked, the more he felt sick to his stomach. Harley was a nice guy. He wanted to believe that Harley would keep his cool about this. He was going to step up and be a father. He wasn't suggesting they ship their child off to strangers. Adoption, it was ideal, but he didn't think he could go on, knowing he had a kid out there. His excuse? He was young and stupid, but that wasn't a real reason to give his child up. He was scared but he had every right to be scared.

"What's going on?" Wade asked, seeing Zoe sitting on the porch.

"Thinking," she replied.

"About?" He asked, sitting next to her.

"The baby," she replied. "I know abortion or even adoption would be easier," she started to say.

"NO!" He seethed. "We did this, we can't take the easy way out."

"I know," she stated, placing her hand on his arm to calm him down. "I don't agree with abortion. I want to watch my kid grow up before my eyes. We did this and now we get the pleasure of being parents at a young age." He nodded, relieved that she was on the same page. "You took a part of me as well that night. I understand to an extant where you're coming from. But Wade, we need to be parents first and then figure our feelings out. It's easy to think something is there because we share a child. That doesn't make it true." He didn't think of that. Was that true? He had feelings for Zoe before she was pregnant. Did he have lingering feelings for her now because they were getting ready to embark on parenthood together?

"Zoe, dinner is ready. Wade, I didn't know you were stopping by. You can join us if you want."

"Sure." The word was out of his mouth before he could stop it.

Wade sat at the table, finding everything to be awkward. They ate in silence, the only noise coming from the forks dragging across the plates.

"Is there something going on with you two? Something you need to tell me?" Harley asked, glancing at the teens.

"I've met Wade before. In Charlotte, actually. He's, uh." She was finding it hard to say what needed to be said.

"What Zoe is getting at, is that I'm the father," Wade said, taking over for Zoe. He was ready to bolt if need be.

"I see," Harley said getting up.

"I plan on stepping up and taking care of my kid," Wade explained. Harley said nothing walking off. "He ok?" Wade asked, worried he might come back and give him an earful or a beating. He had never seen Harley like this.

"I don't know," Zoe sighed. I'm going to leave him be though. You can go if you want," Zoe told him, getting up to clean the mess from dinner up. Wade got up and helped her.

He wanted to discuss things about the baby, get to know Zoe, because she was going to be a permanent fixture in the foreseeable future. But as he helped clean up, the silence was nice. He was looking forward to seeing what was going to happen at the doctor's office tomorrow. It was going to confirm everything Zoe had told him. Despite everything he could feel a smile come out. He is going to be a father. That was a blessing. He was young and he wasn't married to Zoe, the thought of being responsible for another person freaked him out. It wasn't ideal and he couldn't change it. He is going to be a father.