A/N - When you read this sentence, I will either be 1) in New Jersey having the time of my life at Great Adventure or 2) Bored on the car ride to Buffalo to watch my 21-year-old brother graduate college. Let's pray that I'm still at 1.

NEW INFO: I have photographs/visuals up on my profile for this story. i.e. what Emma looks like, the inside of Fabian's house, etc. The link is under the "Extras" category if you scroll down on my profile to view what I have on "Lost & Found", you should find the link down there, or if you want to see the album now, it's imgur/ a / VJ9qw#0. Without the spaces, and add a .com on imgur, of course.

Usually, in Don't Be Afraid, I make my Author's Notes about a million miles long, but I don't have anything good to say today. Well, on to the story, I suppose?

DISCLAIMER: Since the name change didn't work, my name is now officially Julianna again. The security in Orlando wasn't happy with me when I said that I owned them. I was forced to say that no, I do not own House of Anubis. I learned the other day that Jerome is in Transylvania with the papers - I'm taking a flight there tomorrow. By May 20th, I shall own House of Anubis!

Fabian Rutter: ...is it bad that I don't know what today's date is?
Nina Martin: Considering the fact that you're nineteen and it's fifteen hours into the day, yes.
Fabian Rutter: Oops. Aaron kept me up all night. "You have a concert soon, Fabian!" "Make sure your teeth are brushed, Fabian!" He's driving me insane.
Nina Martin: I would trade Eddie for Aaron any day.
Fabian Rutter: And who would Eddie be?
Nina Martin: *That* is none of your business.
Fabian Rutter: I am presuming he is your friend.
Nina Martin: I am neither confirming nor denying that.
Fabian Rutter: You still never answered my question.
Nina Martin: And that would be?
Fabian Rutter: What's today's date?
Nina Martin: Today is Saturday, October 6th, 2012.
Fabian Rutter: Nina, we have been talking by email for more than 2 months and you still refuse to give me your phone number. Why?
Nina Martin: Oh, no reason.
Fabian Rutter: There has to be a reason. And I'm being serious. My friends find it funny that I only have the mother of my child's email address. They still tease me about it to this day.
Nina Martin: I just don't feel comfortable. I don't want to feel like I rushed this. If you, say, get kidnapped by a fan tomorrow and killed, I would feel bad that I felt like it was soon enough to give you my telephone number. Emma lived without a father for 2 years, and now you're back in our lives. I want to take things slow.
Fabian Rutter: I understand. But I promise that you can trust me, and that I won't be leaving anytime soon. But why are you so insistent upon the fact that a fan is going to kidnap and kill me?
Nina Martin: I heard it happened to Justin Timberlake once.
Fabian Rutter: Well, you shouldn't trust the media. They said I was dating my stylist, Carol, once
Nina Martin: What's so bad about that?
Fabian Rutter: Carol is 33.
Nina Martin: HA! Yeah, I think I know you well enough to know you'd never date someone who's 14 years older than you.
Fabian Rutter: And I know YOU well enough to know that you used the calculator on your computer to figure out the age difference between me and my stylist.
Nina Martin: Yes, you're right on that. I have a question, though.
Fabian Rutter: Ask away.
Nina Martin: Since the one-night stand we had in the summer of 2009, have you dated anybody?
Fabian Rutter: Yeah. 2 people. Jessica and Grace. They didn't last *that* long though.
Nina Martin: When did you date them?
Fabian Rutter: I dated Jessica for a little over a year, from spring 2010 to summer 2011; Grace was something for publicity a few months ago, and I really liked her, but Aaron forced me to break up with her. What about you? Have you dated anybody?
Nina Martin: No. I haven't even kissed anyone since I had the one-night stand with you and got pregnant. No one wanted to be around the "Sophomore Slut".
Fabian Rutter: I'm sorry. You shouldn't have had to gone through with that. Don't you have a couple of friends, though? How come I've never met them?
Nina Martin: And how come I've never met YOUR friends?
Fabian Rutter: Hm. I don't know...I think Jerome, Mick, Amber and possibly Alfie are free today. You want to come over?
Nina Martin: Come over? Your house? Again?
Fabian Rutter: Yeah! You've already been over there once and we've been talking for like five hours so you don't have any excuse. You know where my house is. I don't have anything to do now and neither do you, and besides, I do want you to meet my friends! So come over. Now!

Just like last time, I logged off, leaving the mother of my child confused and without an explananation. I closed the laptop with a snap and jumped down the stairs two at a time. I grabbed my cell phone from the counter and proceeded to call Mick.

He picked up after the third ring. "What's up?" he greeted, his voice muffled, obviously indulging himself in some sort of food.

"Do you have anything to do today?" I asked, silently crossing my fingers for the answer I wanted. Ever since August 7th, I had wanted Nina to meet my friends, but we had never gotten around to it. Even though she felt like we weren't close at all, I felt like we were closer than any other friend of the opposite sex I'd ever had.

"Um..." he drifted, thinking as he chewed the unknown food. I predicted it was a ham sandwich. "No, I don't have anything to do today. I have to watch Liz, but I don't think she'd mind going over your house."

Liz was Mick's thirteen-year-old sister. She was obsessed with One Direction and Ed Sheeran, and would classify herself as "Hipster". Liz and Jerome's younger sister, Poppy, have rivalries from time to time, so I really hoped that Jerome wasn't subjected to watching his sibling like Mick was.

"Yeah, that's fine," I began, trying to work my way around the truth. I didn't know if Mick would want to come if I told him the girl I had sex with three years ago was coming over. "As long as she doesn't mind people she's never seen before. Okay, come over right now."

"Wait, what do you mean by company-" Mick was cut short by me pressing the red button and his voice vanished. I ignored his multiple attempts to call back, and once the blonde eventually gave up, I decided to call Jerome. I could probably tell him who was coming.

"Talk to me," was his greeting, picking up the phone.

"Please tell me you don't have to watch Poppy today," I groaned, plopping down on the couch in the den. My four sisters, my mum, and my dad were all out and about - I decided to stay home, as usual. No one would be home. I still wasn't ready to tell anyone else my secret, and I probably wouldn't be for a long time.

"Nah," Jerome said simply, remaining silent. That was obviously my cue to talk.

"You want to come over today?"

"Why?" he questioned. Jerome questioned everyone's motives, without a valid reason.

"Remember a few months ago, when Alfie drove us to Picton to meet Nina?"

"Nina's the mother of your child, right?" I confirmed his suspicion, and Jerome continued, "Yeah, I remember. Why?"

"Well, I was just talking to her-"

"By email?"

"Yeah," I admitted, and I shushed Jerome when he laughed. "Stop it! Look, I just invited her over my house, and I want her to meet my friends. Which includes you. Besides, you'd get to come over my house and that's a huge plus!"

"And you want me to meet Nina? The girl you had sex with when you were fifteen?"

"Yeah."

"I still can't get over that. You had sex when you were sixteen and I'm TWENTY and I haven't even kissed anyone yet!"

"Yeah, well, boo hoo. I'll see you in a few minutes."

xXx

I called Amber and, unluckily for me, she brought Alfie along.

Alfie was a good kid, but he tended to be annoying three-fourths of the time. Ever since Mick and I told Jerome that we thought his best friend was annoying and didn't want him around, I hadn't seen Alfie's face so much anymore.

When Alfie drove me to Nina's house in Picton on August 7th to reunite with her, him and Amber had been dating at the time. They had an on/off relationship so Amber broke up with him a few weeks later. Their breakup didn't last long, though, because ten days later, they were back on and driving to my house as a couple.

Mick was the first to arrive. The first thing he did was grab a bag of crisps from the cabinet and plopped down on the couch to start eating them. He turned the television onto a football game and began watching the players kick the ball around a court.

Liz, Mick's younger sister, walked in with headphones planted in her ears, listening to a song by the one and only boyband, One Direction. I caught the lyric "You're still the one", before Liz sat down next to her brother and started eating the crisps along with him.

If there was one thing I knew about the Campbell family, it was that they loved to eat. Mick stuffed another crisp in his mouth before facing me and mouthing, Liz doesn't know about Nina.

I shrugged. It wouldn't matter, anyway. Liz would probably listen to her music the whole time, unless she saw something that perked her interest. If she thought that my friends and I were just babysitting, than Liz would be stationary for the next hour or two.

Amber and Alfie arrived next; Jerome, late as always, pulled into the driveway afterwards. Amber and Alfie sat cuddling on the couch, while I waited for Nina to show up by watching the game with Mick and Jerome.

An hour and a half passed and Nina didn't show her face. Granted, I didn't give her much information, much less a choice, so she might have decided not to come.

Jerome, obviously, was thinking the same thing as he asked, "Mate, where's Nina? You would think she'd be here by now."

"Who's Nina?" Liz asked, pulling a bud out of her ear.

I was saved from explaining by Mick, who decided to talk to her about chores, but that wasn't necessary because one minute later, there was a knock on the door.

I jumped off the couch and ran to the foyer to open the door for Nina. She smiled at me, but the smile vanished when she saw the other five people in the common room.

"It's okay," I assured her, "they're not going to bite. Hey...where's Emma?" I asked, scanning the ground for my daughter. I thought that Nina would come to my house with the toddler, so everyone else could meet her; Amber would have a ball playing with Emma.

"My Gran's watching her," Nina explained, stepping into the foyer. "I didn't think I should bring her. I thought you were kidding at first, but when you didn't respond back, I knew you were serious...and if I was meeting your twenty-year-old friends, I didn't think I should bring two-year-old."

I tried to hide my disappointment, even though Nina had a good reason. I placed my hand around her waist and steered her into the common room, trying to avoid any other room in the house. She wasn't shaking or trembling with fear like I expected her to be; instead, she stood straight and confident with her chin up, ready to face any challenge that was thrown at her. She was as confident and happy-go-lucky as she was three years ago when I met her.

I liked talking with Nina. She had interesting things to say, and even though she tore me away from my work, her conversation kept me captivated, making me want to talk more, which is rare for me.

"I go to a performing arts academy," I began. "My parents think I have some sort of gift of song-writing, so they're sending me there to, and I quote, 'master my gift'." I was making air quotes to show what they said to me only two months ago.

"Do you like going there, though? Is that what you want to do?"

I hesitated a moment, before realizing that was stupid because I should know the answer right away. "Yes," I said, beginning my statement confidently. "I love song writing. I love it more than anything, but I don't think I want to dedicate my whole day to it, you know? I kind of want to go to college before I think of a career with music."

"Ah, so you DO want to do something with music!" she giggled, showing me her beautiful smile. Now, she went back to being the person who asked the questions. "Is the song you were writing for school, or for yourself?"

I knew this one. "Myself. I'm writing it for myself. I just don't know what I'm going to do with it yet."

"What's it called?"

"It's called 'Lost and Found'. It's about two people who meet, but their love is lost and when they meet again, they're trying to rekindle the relationship they once had."

"That sounds great!" Nina beamed, and I was happy that she seemed interested in me and my musical career. She continued, "You sound really talented, but you seem so shy. Practice in front of a mirror, because if you overcome your fright, you could really go far, and I want you to achieve your dream."

"AHA! So this is Nina, eh, mate?" Jerome's voice boomed from the common room, as Nina and I set foot in the wooden room.

Nina's smile never faltered or gave any impression that she was uneasy about meeting my friends. Amber moved away from her boyfriend's grasp and faced Nina; her face lit up, and I knew she wanted to ask Nina a million and one questions about everything.

The silence continued, as I never said anything to Jerome's question. Nina finally broke the silence by asking, rather loudly, "Well? Aren't we going to do introductions?"

"Oh, right!" I fumbled, trying to lead Nina into the common room and manage my posture at the same time. I wanted to make a good impression, but I think Nina already knew by then that as was as shy and geeky as I was when i first met her. But she didn't care. She liked that about me, even.

"Okay, Nina," I began, pointing at Mick. "The boy with the blonde hair who's lazing around eating chips is Mick Campbell, one of my very best friends. He's very athletic and outgoing and has a great sense of humor, but tends to mess things up with his girlfriends a lot. The last girlfriend he had, he messed things up with her so badly that he dressed up as a cheerleader and sang a song to her."

There were some chuckles around the room at this, and Mick just shrugged with a sly grin plastered on his face. I continued and pointed to the next person. "The other boy with blonde hair is Jerome Clarke. He's a prankster, so watch out for him, or you'll end up covered in a pile of goo when you wake up the next morning."

I shivered at the memory, but continued the process. "And the girl with blonde hair is Liz Campbell, Mick's younger sister. She was brought here by force. She probably doesn't even know you're here because she's indulged in a fantasy world where she's married to Zayn Malik and he's serenading her with a song."

"Mara likes One Direction," I heard Nina mutter under her breath, sounding the tiniest bit amused. I presumed Mara was one of her friends, but since Nina wouldn't tell me if she had any friends, I was forced to predict that she had no friends and was the person who sat alone in the bathroom eating lunch because no one wanted to sit with her.

I pointed to the couple who was tangled in each other's arms on the couch. "The girl is Amber and the boy is Alfie. Amber is probably the biggest fangirl you'll ever meet; do not befriend her, because she will not stop talking about David Beckham until your ears bleed." Amber laughed at my comment, but I knew that Amber and Nina would be good friends one day.

"Alfie's a prankster along with Jerome, but if this were Harry Potter, Jerome would be in Slytherin and Alfie would be in Hufflepuff. Alfie's more of a carefree guy with a better sense of humor, but Jerome's the ultimate prankster. I would suggest you stay away from them."

"Well, excuse me," Jerome and Alfie said at the same time. Jerome didn't look the slightest bit ashamed that I had planted him in the cunning house of Hogwarts; instead, he looked flattered. The introductions were complete.

Nina and I shared a long look, and based on the introductions I had just given with my horrible sense of humor, she was happy to be here. W ehared a smile, but our moment was broken by Jerome, who announced, "Well? Aren't you going to tell us about the girl sitting next to you?"

Everyone's eyes were trained on me; even Liz's, who seemed to have broken up with Zayn Malik at the moment to pay attention to me. I didn't know if I could trust Liz with this secret; her brother's best friend got a girl pregnant when she was fifteen, and now they're trying to make things work as teenage parents. Only three people out of the seven people in my family knew my secret; should I trust Liz?

Then what I'd been thinking for the past two months came back: I'm a father now. I need to take responsibility.

"Well, everyone, this is Nina Martin. When I was sixteen and Nina was fifteen, I met her in a coffee shop. I took her back to the coffee shop, and nine months later, we ended up with a daughter named Emma."

It wasn't much of a surprise; the only person in the room who didn't know was Liz, and even she didn't seem to be taken aback like I expected her to be. She didn't say much, but she was murmuring something to herself and putting the headphones back in her ear. When no one spoke, I announced, "Well, don't be afraid to ask questions."

"Fine," Amber exclaimed happily, moving over from the other side of the room to where Nina and I were sitting. "How's Emma?"

Amber was all up in her business, so Nina was leaning back and away from Amber; but Amber didn't seem to notice or care, as she stayed in that position and waited for an answer. Finally, Nina scooched over next to me and said, "Emma's fine. My grandmother is taking care of her."

"Does she miss her daddy?" Amber cooed, like she was witnessing a couple making up.

"Um...yeah, I guess," Nina said, shrugging her shoulders while eyeing the brown leather couches. "I don't know. There isn't much a two-year-old can say, right? But we talk about Fabian all the time," she stated, like I wasn't in the room with her. I supposed Nina was used to that feeling; I wasn't around for Nina's pregnancy, much less the first two years of my daughter's life.

It saddened me to think about that. There I was, having the time of my life on stage, singing songs and playing the guitar, while Nina had to look after an infant while dealing with the struggles of bullying and money. Her grandmother was getting old, so Nina probably had to look after Emma most of the time. I wasn't there to help her through everything, because she didn't even know my name. How could I have been so stupid as to not tell her my name?

I had missed Emma's first steps. I missed the first time she fed herself, said her first words, or smiled, laughed, read for the first time. I missed so much, and nothing could ever replace the guilt I felt. No one can change the past. I can't go back and change what I did.

I sighed with sadness, but Amber continued to ask questions. "If you were fifteen when you met Fabian, and now it's been three years, are you eighteen? Do the people at your school make fun of you because you're a teen mum?"

"Um, no, actually, I'm seventeen," Nina deadpanned, trying not to look in my friend's eyes. Mick, Jerome, and Alfie couldn't be distracted by Nina, even though the game was raging on the television. "And, well, I mean...no, they don't. Not really."

I could see right through her lies. A few weeks ago, after I had the interview, I turned off messages on my phone and laptop when I was chatting around chatting with everyone, so I didn't know that Nina desperately wanted to talk to me because she'd been called a slut in school. After I saw her attempts to get in touch with me, I'd apologized and we'd talked it out. I'd told her that there was no chance I thought of her as a mistake. Ever since then, we'd been growing closer and closer.

I guess through the past three years, when I wasn't in touch with Nina, she'd thought that I'd thought of her as a mistake. And that wasn't acceptable. I'd never thought of her as a mistake, even when I wasn't thinking about her - which wasn't often. Sure, I hadn't had sex any time after her, but it's not like I thought of that summer night when I met her. She was a one-time thing, I had thought, but karma came back to kick me in the ass.

And that kick hurt.

Jerome interrupted Amber's question streak with a question of his own, aimed at Nina. "So you're American?" Nina nodded. Jerome aimed his gaze at me. "Mate, you never told us she was American."

I shrugged, trying to slyly move my arm around Nina's shoulders. I figured she'd be comfortable with it; we'd been talking for two months now, and we'd grown closer than anyone talking by IMs could. "What's the big deal? She just used to live 5,000 miles away."

"Dunno," was Jerome's expert explanation. "Just an observation. So, Nina, where in America did you live? How was it?"

She explained about Los Angeles and the huge crowd that lived there. She talked about her school, her old friends, her old house. The questions continued for a while, but they mostly leaned around Emma.

"What does she look like?"

To which she answered, "My hair; light-brownish that cuts a bit after the ears. She has Fabian's eyes, which are blue, but not a sky-blue or an ocean-blue; more of a cement blue. She has an egg-shaped head and a big nose."

"When is her birthday?"

To which she answered, "May 25th, 2010."

There were plenty of other questions, which Nina so gladly answered. It wasn't another two hours until Amber and Nina bid their goodbyes, exchanged email addresses (To which I told Amber, "HA!") and I decided to walk Nina out to her car.

She was laughing as we walked down the path. "Well, that was nice," she decided, pulling her coat over her, as it was now October and was nearing Winter. I nodded and laughed as well, holding her waist as we jumped over the curb and approached her car.

"I'll talk to you later, yeah?" I suggested, opening the car door for her. She smiled at my gesture and moved closer to me; our lips were two inches apart. I was just thinking that they might touch when she bid a quick "Thank you" closed the car door, and drove off. I was left to tell everyone that I still didn't have her phone number.

I owed Jerome ten pounds.

A/N - Now the people on Team Fabian have met Nina! We're on a roll here. Next chapter is "The Surprise", and it will be up on May 17th.