Cherry closed her eyes throughout the first half of the night, only to realize that she couldn't sleep. Dallas, however, had no problem with sleeping whatsoever. She could hear Dallas' slight breathing noises, followed by little deep-sleep moans, just behind her ear. She felt weak, she had wanted nothing more at the time than a peaceful rest; but rest would not come. Every time she had inhaled deeply, she felt as if once she had exhaled she would throw up everything within her. As she opened her eyes, she grew restless. And suddenly, she had once again obtained that feeling; the dizziness, and the sensation that she was going to vomit her heart out of her chest.

Cherry quickly got up out of bed and quietly walked to the bathroom. Dallas woke up to the sounds of her crying. He quickly arose out of bed and ran to see what was wrong. He found Cherry alongside the toilet, sitting on the floor. She was wrapping her arms around her stomach, and she was sniffling quietly to herself, attempting to not awake Dallas. She looked up to notice he was watching her the moment she heard him speak.

With a tired, raspy voice he asked, "Cherry, you alright?"

Cherry tried to speak through the aches running through her, "I don't know, my stomach…My stomach, I don't know what's wrong. It hurts so much. I…". She continued to vomit into the toilet. Dallas began to feel worried, this was not any normal reaction that he was used to seeing from someone who had too much to drink. He immediately kneeled down next to her and touched the back of his hand against her forehead. He then rubbed her back slowly, saying "Breathe, Cherry. Breathe."

After Cherry had tried to calm herself down for about two minutes, the pain became worse. She clenched her arms around herself, while nearly toppling over onto her side. Dallas caught her, and allowed her to lean into his arms. Cherry was in a lot of pain, and this frightened Dallas. He hated seeing her so hurt, especially without having a clue what was going on. "Where does it hurt, Cherry? Tell me where it hurts."

She could no longer speak, she only held her stomach tightly. Dallas looked down to see that she was signaling to him that the pain was held in her stomach region. Dallas had finally come to a conclusion in his mind that Cherry was undergoing a small case of alcohol poisoning of some sort. Whatever it was, it was not normal. He had to get her into a hospital.

"Cherry," Dallas tried to stay calm, "I'ma take you to a hospital, okay? Everything's gonna be okay.". He lifted her off of the floor, grabbed a jacket, and wrapped it around her. Then, he picked her up and carried her outside, as he walked back to his car. He set her down in the seat like he had done before, and drove as quickly as he could to the nearest hospital.

Cherry tried to keep herself distracted, thinking of different tunes of different songs that she had liked in her head. She held Dallas' jacket tightly around her, and hoped to God that she wouldn't throw up again. By the time they had reached the hospital, Cherry decided that she had wanted to walk on her own. She thought that maybe the pain would go away easier if she had moved around for a bit. Dallas walked slowly beside her every step of the way, keeping his arm around her waist just in case she grew weaker.

"I'm sorry, visiting hours are closed until morning." a nurse had stated when seeing the two walk in. Dallas immediately raised his voice, "I'm not here to pay a fuckin' visit, can't you see she's sick?".

The nurse backed away slowly, almost as if she were gesturing to call security. Dallas then continued, only in a slightly more polite tone of voice, "Ay look, will you just help us out? She's really sick, lady, you gotta get her a doctor."

Cherry was rushed to a room, however Dallas, due to his behavior, had to wait outside. He became very frustrated, not knowing how Cherry was feeling, or if she was going to be alright. After about an hour, Cherry had walked out of the room with the doctor following closely behind. Dallas could see that they were in the middle of a conversation, and Cherry had looked like she had just been crying. Noticing this, he immediately got up and began walking towards them.

"Were you planning on telling him, or would you rather me explain?" the doctor had asked her.

Cherry shook her head, "Thank you, doctor, but I might as well tell him myself.". Cherry had about a million thoughts running through her head. She was no longer in pain, physically at least. Mentally, however, she was panicked. After Cherry and Dallas had eventually made it back to his car, they sat in silence. Cherry had been fiddling with her hands in her lap, and Dallas could see that she was on the verge of tears.

"What's wrong, baby?" he asked as he reached out his hand and placed it onto her leg. Cherry felt chills crawling up and down her spine when he touched her, it made her feel afraid. She could not help but allow a tear to escape from her eye. She leaned in to hug him as he asked, "Cherry, tell me what's wrong. What'd the doc say?"

"I have to tell you something, Dallas." She pulled away.

With Dallas' hand still attached to her thy, he nodded, "Yeah? And what's that?" Cherry grew hesitant, but she knew it had to be done.

She sighed, and took a deep breath. With tears in her eyes, she began to close her eye lids, and then open them. She wished that she were only dreaming, if only she were dreaming. Goodbye, Dally, she thought to herself as she bit the bullet and began to speak once more:

"Dallas, I-I'm pregnant."

Dallas just stared back at Cherry, as if he hadn't heard a word she just said. He nodded, as if he were in a trance; clearly he had tuned out the words, 'I'm pregnant' and could only see the movement of her lips. But deep down inside, he knew exactly what she had said. He just did not want to believe it.

"Wha-..wait, what?" he asked.

"It was motion sickness," she continued, "the doctor tested me, and I'm pregnant. It wasn't the alcohol."

Dallas looked down. His mind could barely process what had just happened. Instead, he could only fill up the silence with useless words and noises, "I…I uh-".

Finally, he turned to the steering wheel, put the car into ignition, and began to drive back home. With complete silence in the car, Cherry became slightly confused. What was Dallas thinking? Did he hear a word that she had just said? Was he as panicked as she was? Was he going to say anything at all for the rest of the night? Finally, she spoke up. "So…" she said, hoping that it would act as a stimulant for a conversation.

Dallas just continued to drive in silence, looking straight ahead of him. Maybe he just needs time, Cherry thought to herself. Yeah, that's it. Dallas needed time. Maybe he wanted to get home before discussing this. Cherry wiped her tears, and continued to patiently wait until they arrived at his destination. After a few minutes, the silence began to bother Cherry like no other. She wanted to know what was on his mind. She wanted to know if he'd stay. After all, that was what he had just said to her before they fell asleep that very night. He said he'd stay for the night, not for the rest of his damn life, idiot, Cherry thought angrily to herself. She couldn't help but feel like a fool, allowing herself to get into a mess like this. It wasn't like her at all. And besides, Cherry had thought that they had always been careful. She never wanted to take any risks with Dallas, dating him was already risky enough.

Dallas parked his car, got out, and leaned against the car door. Cherry got out, and proceeded to walk around towards him. She took each step slowly and steadily. Cherry couldn't help but notice how preoccupied Dallas was with his thoughts. He didn't even look at her.

Dallas felt like his heart had slowed down to one beat per minute. He wanted to say something, but he had no idea what to say to Cherry. He felt awful, but he also felt confused. What next? How did this happen? All that ran through Dallas' mind was Shit, shit shit shit…

He finally looked up at Cherry, who suddenly had tears streaming down her face, onto her small, soft cheeks. Dallas took one look at her face and lost it. He became frustrated, he felt like he, alone, was at fault for this. He walked towards her with arms open, and grabbed her. He held her in his arms tightly, holding her head towards his chest as he said, "It's okay, it's…it's gonna be okay."

Cherry began to cry. For some odd reason, she felt an overwhelming sense of fear when Dallas said this. She wanted to believe him, she wanted to know that it was going to be alright. But she just couldn't; she could not convince herself that all was going to be well. She could feel Dallas' hand running through her hair, she could feel the warmth of his chest. But she still did not feel as safe as she had wanted to be. She was carrying Dallas' child, what was she supposed to do now?

"Come inside, you'll catch cold out here." he said with urgency. With his arms wrapped around her, he guided her upstairs. On the way up, he lowered his arms, and without barely noticing, Cherry had begun to realize that Dallas was now holding her hand. She felt very strange when realizing this; Dallas and Cherry never held hands when walking. Looking at Dallas, she could see that he possessed a look of worry. Not an obvious sense of worry, but she could tell that his mind was definitely somewhere else. Once they had arrived inside his room, he let go of her hand and closed his door. Cherry continued to slowly walk towards his dresser, staring at the mirror in which she had seen herself in.

Cherry continued to stare at herself in the mirror; she couldn't believe what had just happened. She looked at her body, her face, her stomach. She couldn't believe that she was carrying a child, or at least about to. The image of herself began to cause a stir in her stomach, she wanted to vomit. She turned around to look at Dallas, who was now looking back at her, standing next to his door. He had a blank stare on his face, holding his arms at his side.

"I can't do this, Dally. I can't have a child, I just…I just can't-"

"No, no no no, Cherry…" Dallas interrupted as he walked over to hold her once again.

"I mean we were careful, weren't we?" she asked, concerned.

"Yeah," he whispered, as he tried to recall any time in which they weren't.

Dallas walked over to his dresser, pausing for a few minutes. He then pounded his fist into the wall, suddenly feeling frustrated. Cherry flinched at the sight of this, and sat on his bed. Dallas sat next to her. He wrapped an arm around her, and then broke the silence.

"I'm never gonna leave you, you got that?" he lowered his voice. He wiped a tear off of her face. "I'm gonna make this right, this I promise you." he continued.

Cherry faked a small smile onto her face and looked Dallas in the eyes. She didn't want him to know how afraid she was, afraid of her parents finding out, afraid of what her friends would think; and most of all, afraid of her future.

"I love you," she finally said to him, "But I need you to do me just one favor."

"Anything." he replied.

"Please, just be honest with me right now. Do you want to stay?"

Dallas raised a hand up to her cheek, continuing to look at her. Jesus, what am I doin' here? he asked himself. This was not like Dallas Winston at all. If there was any situation that Dallas would run from, it would be this one. But something was drawing Dallas into this, something out of the ordinary. Something new.

Perhaps it was merely the fact that Dallas had actually, for once, cared for a girl. Normally he would act carelessly annoyed. He probably would have even blamed a girl for becoming pregnant simply because she wasn't thinking. But here Dallas was, for the very first time, standing by someone. He knew that Cherry had a future, being a Soc and all. He knew how much this would change her. He had to do something.

"Yeah," he whispered. He couldn't believe what he was saying, but he knew that deep down inside he was never going to let himself live knowing he had done this to Cherry. He had to stay; he wanted to stay.

"I just…" he continued, as he had an arm wrapped around Cherry, "…You just gotta give me a little bit, alright? I need to think. Just gimme a minute to think."

Cherry nodded as Dallas gave her a quick kiss on the forehead. Stroking her arm up and down, Dallas stared straight ahead of him, thinking about what had lied ahead of him. The strange thing that Dallas had discovered was, he had an awfully difficult time trying to convince himself to stay away. He felt out of touch with himself, his regular old 'Dallas' self. As a matter of fact, he had gone soft. But that was the whole point, Cherry was the only one that Dallas could go soft on. He didn't want to change that. He wanted to tell himself that this wasn't for him, and more importantly, he wanted to tell himself that he was not a father. However, his heart became more of an influence than his head; and his heart wanted Cherry.

"Shit, Cherry. Real mess we got on our hands, real big mess." Dallas looked down at her, as their foreheads touched. Side by side, sitting on the edge of his bed, he continued to rub her shoulder with one hand, and hold her hand in the other. Finally, he added, "I love you no matter what, though. We're gettin' through this, you and me."

Cherry could feel her tears sink into Dallas' shirt. She could barely notice time running by, minutes turning into hours. Every time she began to lose herself, Dallas whispered, "I love you" to her gently, kissing her cheeks. The two laid side by side, and together they remained awakened with moments of doubt, regrets of the past, and hopes for the future.