A/N: I'm back! I'm sorry that I haven't updated in almost two months, but real life has been getting in the way of writing. However, here is the long-awaited (and hopefully much enjoyed) chapter four.

As always, if you recognize it, I don't own it.

Summer wasn't all fun and games for me as a college professor. I had to teach a three-credit summer course during July and August. It met twice a week for three hours. I was teaching "Jane Austen and Her Heirs: Female Writers in the Pre-Feminist Era." It was an upper-level course, something not normally taught in the summer, but students had been requesting it pretty frequently. It was also my first time teaching it, but mercifully, Mark Williamson, Michigan's Austen expert, was letting me teach from his notes and letting me call/email him whenever I needed.

I knew that I ran the risk of running into Paul if I went to campus, but I didn't really have much choice in the matter. I worked on campus. And it's a big campus so there was no guarantee that I would see him. But there was also the eternal promise that if you're trying to avoid someone, you will inevitably encounter them at the exact moment when you did NOT want to see them.

And that would be exactly what happened to me the morning of my planned dinner with my dad. I stopped to grab a cup of tea on my way to my class-only to run into Paul in line. I was determined to ignore him, but that failed when he turned around and looked at me. "Oh," he said flatly. "It's you."

I shrugged. "It's me, the same boring old Emma Woodhouse."

"You're pregnant," he continued in the same flat almost disinterested tone.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," I replied.

"I thought I told you to get rid of it."

"You did, but I don't have to do everything you tell me to do."

Paul rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but you should listen to me when I tell you that I don't want to have kids."

"And you're not going to have kids. You're just a random anonymous sperm donor. I'll be raising the baby myself. You won't be involved at all."

"Will George be involved?"

I snorted. "Paul, George is my best friend. He's my roommate. Of course he's going to be involved in my baby's life."

"Is he going to act all baby-daddy for your baby?"

"To be honest, that's none of your business. You're not involved in this situation anymore and what I do is none of your business."

"You're willing to let someone else raise my baby."

"You don't want the kid so I don't see how your opinion makes a difference in this situation."

Paul shrugged. "I just don't like the idea of you and George together."

"You walked out of my life, Paul. You don't get to make that decision anymore."

He sighed. "I see your point, but if you and George raise this child together you'll probably name it something literary and bonkers like Alice-in-Wonderland or Ishmael."

"Well, Alice is a darn sight better than Ophelia," I replied. "Maybe we'll pick that instead of Ophelia…although I was rather coming to like the sound of Ophelia Georgia Woodhouse."

Paul's jaw dropped, which allowed me a moment to turn and see Mark Williamson walking into the shop. Seeing Mark wasn't much of a shock since he and his wife owned the Knit 'n' Lit, a small café/bookshop/yarn store near campus. It was a quirky, sweet place and one of my favorite escapes in Ann Arbor. But that morning, Mark's warm smile was the most welcome sight on earth. But surprisingly, Mark had something even that was more welcome to me. "Whole-wheat bagel with cream cheese and a cinnamon-vanilla latte," he said, holding out a cup and a bag to me. "It's on the house, kiddo."

I smiled. "Thanks, Mark; you're a peach. I'll pay you back sometime soon."

"No worries," he replied. "I can handle the hit of a free breakfast for Emma Woodhouse every now and then."

"I'll still pay you back when I have a chance. And tell your lovely wife I said hello. I'll have to call her and arrange a meeting of the Austen heroines sometime soon."

He laughed. Mark's wife, Lizzie Bennett-Williamson, and I had bonded over our Jane Austen-inspired names at a faculty meet-and-greet when I first arrived at Michigan before Mark and Lizzie were married. Ever since they, we've tried to have a sort of support group for each other. George likes to tag along since he also has a name ripped straight from the pages of Austen. However, unlike Lizzie's name and mine, his name was unintentionally Austentatious; George was named after his grandfather, George Clancy, rather than a character in a novel.

I worked all day. It was exhausting to teach a three-hour class. It always has been, but it's harder when one is pregnant. By the time I got home, all I wanted to do was crash into George's recliner and go to sleep. Unfortunately, when I got home, George was in his recliner, asleep. He had a dried drool trailing down his chin and a copy of Titus Andronicus on his lap. He was, in short, adorable.

So I resisted the temptation to wake him up and went to my own room. I threw myself on my bed with my laptop, intending to check my email. Instead, I fell asleep.

The next thing I knew, I could hear George's voice in my ear. "Wake up, sweetheart. We need to leave for dinner with your dad in fifteen minutes."

I pulled my arms out from under my pillow and stretched. And then I punched George in the face. I covered my face and gasped, "Oh gosh, I didn't mean to hit you. Are you all right? Did I hurt you? Are you okay? I'm sooo sorry."

George laughed. "I'm fine, Emma. It's nothing time and love won't fix."

I ran a hand over his jawline and smiled. "I'll always love you. Now lay down with me. I'm cozy here."

He laughed and lay down next to me. "You look adorable, Emma-Clare, but we need to leave soon."

I stuck out my bottom lip. "I don't want to tell my dad I'm pregnant. I want to stay here and eat brownies."

"Mark called and said you saw Paul this morning," George said.

I sighed. "Mark called you?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

My best friend shrugged. "He told me a few days ago that he'd been seeing Paul around the Knit 'n' Lit a lot lately, and he and Betsy were concerned. So I asked them to keep me posted if you ever ran into him there."

"Why?"

"Because Mark thinks of you like you were his little sister," George replied with a smile.

I sighed. "Good gravy, Mark already has four sisters. Why does he need me too?"

"He doesn't need you, Em, but he wants you to be his sister because he cares about you."

"Like you," I said.

"Sort of," George replied. "Now get up and get dressed. We need to leave in about, oh, say, eight minutes."

"You're late," my dad announced as soon as we were on his front porch. He had been watching for us from the front porch. He lived, and still lives, in an enormous colonial-style house that he and my mom built when my younger sister was born. After their divorce, he had kept the house so that my two sisters and I would always have a place to call home.

"Sorry, Mr. D, but we hit traffic," George said flatly. "You know how rush hour can be."

"You should have factored into your plans when you were leaving."

"Yes, we should have, but Emma was exhausted and desperately needed a nap."

"Oh, Emma, my dear Emma, you work too hard," my dad said, turning to hug me. "How are you? Oh, you look like you've gained weight. Haven't you been watching what you eat? You don't want to get fat, Emma."

I sighed and looked at George. "I suppose we ought to just tell you, Chuck. We were going to wait until we got to the restaurant, but I suppose that now is as good of a time as any."

"What are you going to tell me? You wanted to have dinner with me to tell me that Emma's gaining weight?"

"No, Daddy," I sighed. "We wanted to tell you that I'm pregnant."

"But that's impossible!"

"How is it impossible?" I replied. "George and I are adults who live together. Adults can have babies. I'm having a baby. I'm due in November."

"But you're my baby."

I sighed. "Daddy, Cassie is your baby. And she's twenty-six. I'm almost twenty-nine years old. And I'm pregnant. I'm going to have a baby."

"And we're very excited about it," George added, taking my hand.

"Very excited," I repeated.

My dad shook his head. "I don't like this. This is something that your mother would do, having a baby when you're not married. A baby is a big deal, Emma. Are you really sure you want to do this?"

I sighed. "Yes, Dad, we're very sure that we want to have this baby together. And we're not going to get married just because I'm pregnant. And we think that we can take care of a baby and do a good job of it."

"If you're certain," my dad sighed. "But I'm still against it."

If you care, he spent the entire two hours we were at dinner talking about the price of raising a baby and the dangers children face and the dilemmas of educating children in today's world. And when we dropped him off back at his house, he still wasn't convinced that George and I were mature enough to raise a baby. And he was very concerned that I was going to get fat.

My mother, on the other hand, was thrilled. "A grandchild to spoil," she replied with a grin. "I can't wait to buy the baby all sorts of wonderful things. Are you having a boy or a girl?"

"A girl," George told her.

"Marvelous," she beamed. "I'll have so much fun spoiling her. And hopefully for you George, she won't be like Emma was as a child."

"You always said I was a good baby," I protested.

"Oh you were. You were a marvelous baby. You were sweet and you loved to sleep. You were so much better than Cassie and Bella. Cassie didn't sleep through the night until she was about a year old. And Bella was a sickly baby. And of course your father spoiled both of them. But you, you were a sweet and happy baby. All you wanted was a clean diaper and a full stomach."

"Then what was wrong with me?" I asked.

My mother took a sip of wine. "Oh, as a baby, there was nothing wrong with you. It was when you got older that we had issues. You were stubborn, and you had quite the temper if you didn't get your way. We used to joke that you had all the personality of a bulldozer."

"But she was cute," George said. "You were a cute little kid."

"Great, I was a cute bulldozer."

"So you haven't really changed all that much," George teased.

I sighed. "You're going to earn a ton of early morning feedings if you don't watch it, buster."

My roommate and best friend put his arm around my shoulders. "You know you love me."

I smiled. "I can't help myself. It must be pregnancy hormones."

"You two are going to be wonderful together, " my mom said with a smile. "You're going to have an amazing life. And you had better name that baby after his mother and not me because I hate my name."

We laughed at that because we had to, but as we laughed, I felt the baby kick. And I wondered if, perhaps, we were supposed to name the baby Madeline like my mom suggested.

A/N: Please review! I hope you enjoyed it.