"So is it true?" Ricky inwardly cringed. He knew who that voice belonged to and he wasn't in the mood to deal with her, especially considering he could hear irritation in her voice. He shut his locker and turned to face the girl who had spoken to him.

"Is what true, Adrian?" he asked with a bored tone of voice.

"Did you get that Amy girl pregnant?"

"Who wants to know?" he replied, knowing his answer would grate on her nerves. Adrian quickly looked around to make sure no one was within earshot of them.

"Are you the father of her baby or not?" Adrian asked again, her teeth clenched. Ricky nodded but didn't offer anything else to the conversation. "Well!?"

"Well what?"

"Is she gonna keep it?" Ricky's brows furrowed angrily.

"Of course she is!" he said fiercely, causing Adrian to blanch and take a surprised step back.

"Wait, you want her to keep it? Who in their right mind wants to be a parent in high school!?" Ricky rolled his eyes and adjusted the strap of his back pack over his shoulder.

"We're having a baby, Adrian. We're not just gonna shove the kid off on some strangers." Ricky turned to walk away but Adrian grabbed his arm.

"We?" Ricky just looked at her, waiting for Adrian to elaborate on her question. "So what, are you two like together now or something? You don't have to be with a girl just because you knocked her up you know." Adrian's voice became seductive as she took a step closer to Ricky. "We could still fool around, and we're both smart enough to be careful about it," she said with a suggestive smile. Ricky tugged his arm free of her grasp and rolled his eyes again.

"I've already got one kid on the way, Adrian. I'm a little busy tryna deal with that to hook up with you right now." He walked away and Adrian huffed with annoyance as she glared at his back and crossed her arms. How did some little band geek get to him before me? What's she got that I don't? Adrian wondered as she stormed off down the hallway in the opposite direction. At Ben and Henry's lockers Ben was sighing once again as he placed the books he wouldn't need for the first half of the day in his locker.

"What?" Henry asked, not looking away from his own open locker. Ben shut his locker door and leaned his forehead against it.

"How'd he do it?" Henry shut his locker door and turned to face his friend.

"How'd who do what?" he asked as Alice walked over to join them. Ben turned around so he was leaning against the lockers.

"How'd Ricky get to Amy before me." He turned his head to look at Alice. "I thought you said Amy was the kinda girl who'd be desperate enough to sleep with me." Alice arched an eyebrow at Ben, annoyed with him.

"First of all, looks can apparently be deceiving. Second, if she's far enough along that a pregnancy test would come up positive then, doing the math, she met and slept with Ricky before school started so it's not my fault that my assessment of her was incorrect," Alice stated matter-of-factly. Ben sighed, conceding defeat to Alice and the three of them headed towards their morning classes. Amy, Lauren and Madison did their best to ignore the stares and whispers of their fellow students as they made their way to their classes also. It wasn't until lunch that Amy was confronted with the gossip about her. Amy, Madison and Lauren were carrying their lunches outside looking for a table that was mostly in the shade since it was a nice but rather warm day. They had just rounded the corner of a hedge in the courtyard when the voices of some girls on the other side of it drifted their way.

"I can't believe she got knocked up by Ricky," said one girl.

"I know!" replied another. "Everyone knows he sleeps around. You'd think she wouldn't be stupid enough to let him talk her into not using a condom."

"How do you know he talked her into it?" a third girl asked.

"Oh come on!" said the first girl. "It's Ricky Underwood, and have you seen her? She's a quiet little band geek. He totally talked her into it."

"Yeah," the second girl agreed. "How stupid and naïve can you get?" Unfortunately for the three girls in question, Robbie, Simon and Terrance were sitting at a table within earshot of them and, after overhearing this conversation, were quite heated. The three boys stood up and turned to walk over to the girls and saw that Amy, Madison and Lauren were stopped in their tracks starring at the girls. Seeing Amy's embarrassed and tearful expression, Robbie lost it. He marched over to the girls table and slammed his hands in front of the second girl who'd spoken.

"And what makes you such an intelligent saint, Melissa?" he said with a slightly raised voice as he addressed his classmate. Melissa started and looked at Robbie with confused eyes as the heads of several other students turned their way.

"Huh?" she said stupidly, not sure why the guy she had a crush on was suddenly angry with her.

"Why are you so certain Amy's only pregnant because she's stupid and naïve?" Melissa didn't have an answer. "So you mean to tell me that in the sixteen or so years you've been alive you've never once made a poor decision or judgment call? Hmm?"

"Well, I….I mean."

"So you've never done anything that caused you to have to deal with an unintended consequence?" Still Melissa couldn't formulate a response. Simon jumped in with another question.

"You expect us to believe that you've never done anything that caused your parents to ground you or take away a privilege?" Simon turned to Terrance and rolled his eyes. "Yep, definitely a saint this one." Terrance sniggered and smirked at Melissa, his eyes glaring at her. At Simon and Terrance's behavior one of Melissa's friends came to her defense.

"Why are you sticking up for some little slut anyway, Simon?" asked the first girl who'd spoken. She should've chosen her words more carefully because the eyes of all three boys turned ice cold, the kind of cold that led to the creation of the phrase 'if looks could kill.' The girl recoiled but Simon invaded her personal space and verbally pounced on her before Robbie could. Simon likewise slammed his hands down in front of the girl and continued glaring at her.

"Obviously your parents never taught you that name calling is rude, Danielle," Simon said, his voice as ice cold as his glare even though his voice itself was elevated enough that the small crowd of students who had now gathered to see what was going on could hear him. "Just having sex doesn't make a girl a slut. Using sex as a means to an end, like you do, makes a girl a slut. And that's not name calling, that's calling something for what it is. Likewise getting pregnant doesn't make a girl a slut. Now, Amy happened to get pregnant the first time she had sex little Ms. No-it-all and even then it wasn't planned." Danielle flinched, trying to physically get away from the harshness that Simon was directing at her. Like Danielle had tried to do for Melissa, the third girl at the table tried to come to Danielle's rescue.

"So apparently you guys have a problem with the word slut but why are you getting so heated about this girl? Do you all have a crush on her or something?" she asked, not understanding what all the fuss and hostility was about. Terrance answered her question.

"Do you have any siblings, Karen?" he asked calmly. Karen shook her head, her eyes still confused. "Did you have any family friends growing up that were like brothers or sisters to you?" Again Karen shook her head. "Then you couldn't possibly understand this, but Amy's our little sister." The three girls' eyes widened in shock and then filled with confusion as they looked between the three boys. Terrance rolled his eyes and looked up towards their sisters, who were still standing just past the edge of the hedge. He motioned for them to come over and, hesitantly, Amy began moving forward, Lauren and Madison right beside her. The crowd moved back to let the girls pass and when they reached the boys, each put his arm around his sister. Terrance looked at the three gossips and then the small crown around them before him and spoke again, speaking a little louder to make sure everyone could hear him.

"Listen up everybody 'cuz I'm only gonna explain this once. These are our biological little sisters," he paused to motion to Amy and the girls before continuing, "Robbie, Simon and I have lived next door to each other since we were babies and before our little sisters all came along. Being best friends and practically family, you mess with one of our sisters, you deal with all three of their big brothers. Got it?" He looked around the crowd and then down at the three gossips. Seeing a few nods and looks of understanding, Robbie spoke up as well.

"So let's get it straight people. Yes, my little sister's pregnant. Yes, Ricky Underwood's the father. No, she's not a slut, or any other derogatory word you can come up with, and if anyone's got something to say about it you'll have to deal with the three of us. We clear?" He likewise looked around the crowd and then back at the three girls. Seeing that no one had anything else to say, Robbie nodded his head once in approval. "And now you can all go back to your lunches." Robbie, with his arm still around Amy's shoulders, led her over to the table he'd been sitting at, the boys and their sisters following, as the crowd gradually dispersed.

After the boys sticking up for Amy, and basically scarring every other boy at school away from Lauren and Madison, the rest of the day went by much quieter. Being high school, students were still gossiping and whispering about Amy but now there was an element of fear involved. Now students looked around first to make sure none of Amy's big brothers were within earshot and they quickly stopped talking if they were. Oh the boys knew people were still talking about Amy but at least this way she wouldn't have to accidentally overhear any of the talk while she was at school. Ricky wasn't quite so lucky. Now that people knew how overprotective Amy's brothers were, many were surprised that Ricky was still breathing. In fact, a fellow band mate approached him at his locker after fourth period. He looked around nervously before speaking to Ricky.

"Dude, how are you not in a hospital somewhere?" Ricky's eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Huh?" The other guy rolled his eyes.

"You saw how in your face her brothers got with those girls. They should've thrashed you by now!" the guy said in disbelief. Ricky huffed and rolled his eyes.

"Amy and I are tryna figure things out so I guess they're just waiting to see how things play out," Ricky replied, shrugging his shoulders. As Ricky headed down the steps to his next class he only had one thought: how are things going to play out?