Sorry, this one got really long, but I liked the structure. :)
At recess on the elementary school playground, Justin shyly held up a dandelion for Kara. "I picked this for you."
The other six-year-old blushed and took it from him. "Thank you, Justin."
"Hey! Watch what I can do!" Justin exclaimed, running over to the monkey bars. "My dad calls me Monkey. I can be a monkey, wanna see?"
"I don't know…" Kara looked warily up at the monkey bars. "It doesn't look safe."
Justin climbed to the top rung of the monkey bars and swung his legs up on either side of his hands, turning so that his head was hanging down and his legs were wrapped around the bar.
"Justin, get down from there!" Kara cried worriedly.
"Look, I can do it with no hands!" Justin let his hands hang down beside his head.
"Justin!" Kara covered her hands with her eyes. "Stop it!"
"No, you have to watch this! I saw the gymnasts on TV do it! I'm going to swing around and land on my feet!"
Kara peeked at him through her fingers. "You're not a gymnast! It's too high!"
Justin swung back and forth in his upside down position, building momentum. He attempted to rotate his body to land on his feet, but didn't achieve the position he planned. Kara screamed in terror when he landed on his head, and his body fell to the ground, limp.
"Justin!" Kara screeched. She rushed over to him and knelt down beside him. "Justin! Can you hear me?"
Alicia, one of Kara's triplet sisters, looked over at Justin from the swings with fear in her eyes. "Is he okay?"
"Go get Mrs. Thomas!" Kara ordered. She squeezed Justin's hand between her fingers. "Justin, can you hear me?"
"Head… Hurts." Justin whimpered.
"Do you know where you are?" Kara asked anxiously, obviously trained by her father.
"Central Park?" Justin asked.
Kara shook her head slowly. "No, we're at school, Justin. Do you know what today is?"
"Sunday?"
Kara choked back tears. "No… It's Tuesday. Do you know who I am?"
"Kara."
"Okay." Kara breathed a sigh of relief. "Hang in there! You're going to be okay, Justin. I promise."
"Dr. Sloan." Mark's secretary, Ann, poked her head into his office. "You have a phone call."
"I'm kind of busy, Ann." Mark muttered, scribbling some notes on a piece of paper.
Ann cleared her throat and fidgeted. "I think you want to take this."
"I somehow doubt that."
"Dr. Montgomery-Sloan is with a patient, and I'm telling you, one of you needs to take this call. It's… It's about your son."
Mark's head snapped up and he dropped his pen. "What about my son?"
By the time Addison and Mark reached the hospital, Justin was unconscious, and being tended to by Derek.
"Derek!" Mark exclaimed in relief when he saw his best friend with his son.
"I came down as soon as I heard." Derek said, lifting one of Justin's eyelids and shining a light into his eye. "Kara called Hallie and she called me and told me to be on the lookout for him."
"What do you think is wrong with him?" Addison asked tearfully, stroking her son's hand.
Derek checked the other eyes. "Unequal pupils… I'd say he has a pretty bad concussion."
"Oh my God…" Addison whispered.
"Hallie said that Kara said he was on the monkey bars." Derek explained. "He tried to go upside down, but he fell off and hit his head."
"Why would he do that?" Addison murmured.
Suddenly, Justin's body began jerking around the bed. His arms and legs flailed about wildly while his parents watched in horror.
"He's seizing!" Derek swore under his breath and hit the button for a nurse. He frantically dug through a drawer until he found the syringe he was looking for. "Addie, Mark. I'm sorry. You have to go."
Addison stood there, frozen in terror as her little boy thrashed around. She watched Derek plunge the needle into his delicate skin until Mark put his arm around her shoulder and guided her out of the exam room, out of the emergency room doors, hoping the fresh air would help her.
"I'm his mother! I should be in there with him!" Addison insisted.
"There's nothing we can do, Addie." Mark said gently. "We're not neurologists. Derek is."
"He's working on my baby!" Addison shrieked.
"He's my baby too, Addison. He's going to be okay." Mark said, putting his hand on her arm.
Addison yanked her arm out of his grasp angrily. "You don't know that!"
Mark ran a hand through his hair tiredly. "You're right. I don't. But I trust Derek. He trusts me to do my job with his children. He's trusted you to do your job with his wife. Now, we have to trust him to do his job with our son. Can you do that?"
"I don't have a choice." Addison whispered.
Mark pointed to her distended abdomen. "You have to stay calm so that your body can take care of our baby girl. You can't take care of Justin right now, but you can take care of her."
Addison paced back and forth, tears freely flowing down her face. "I can't even take care of myself right now."
"Addie..." Mark pleaded. "Please sit down and try to relax."
"Relax." Addison laughed bitterly. "You want me to relax. Sure, my son was flailing around uncontrollably in there, but I'll just relax! How are you so relaxed? Don't you care about him at all? My son is hurting! What if his brain is bleeding?! He could die! Do you even care?!"
Mark looked pained by her words. He raised his voice to her, a little more than he meant to. "Of course I care, Addison! Damn it! In case you've forgotten, he's my son too, and I'm every bit as fucking scared as you are! I'm just trying to be calm because obviously, standing out here screaming and crying at each other hasn't done anything to help Justin!"
"I don't know else what to do!" Addison screeched, her voice breaking with sobs.
"Calm down, damn it! Please, for me, for Justin, and most of all, for the baby! I'm begging you! You could lose her if you don't calm down. Then how would you feel?" Mark felt as though he was being cruel, but he had to get through to her.
Addison finally heeded Mark's words and took a seat on a nearby bench. "What if we lose him?"
"I don't know, baby." Mark replied honestly, gripping her hand between both of his. "We just have to trust Derek, and we have to pray."
"You pray?" Addison asked, slightly surprised.
"I do… Sometimes. Do you?"
"Sometimes."
"Then we need to do it now." Mark pressed his head against Addison's and whispered a soft prayer. When he finished, he wiped the tears from her eyes and his, then kissed her cheeks. "He'll be okay. He has to be."
They sat on the bench, holding each other for several minutes before the sound of a throat clearing behind them forced them to turn around and see Derek standing there.
"How is he?" Mark asked softly, pulling Addison closer.
"He's unconscious right now. He's responding to stimuli, so it's not a coma, but still, he's unconscious… So the next few hours are critical. If he wakes up soon and everything's okay, then there shouldn't be permanent damage."
"If he doesn't?" Addison asked timidly.
Derek looked down. "We'll cross that bridge if we come to it."
"Did you find anything else wrong with him?" Addison asked fearfully.
Derek nodded. "He broke his neck. We'll immobilize it so he can heal. I don't think there's any spinal cord damage, thank God, but we'll check with some scans.."
"Can we see him?" Mark asked anxiously.
"Of course." Derek offered Addison his hand and helped her to her feet, and gave Mark a reassuring pat on the back. "Then, I want to get the scans… But he's a tough kid, you know. Like his parents."
"He's waking up!" Mark announced, noticing the flutter of Justin's eyelids. Addison jumped out of her chair, where a half an hour had seemed like an eternity, and dashed to his bedside.
"Justin, honey?" Addison asked timidly.
"What happened?" Justin asked dazedly.
"You got hurt on the monkey bars, sweetie." Addison said, squeezing his hand in hers tightly. "Kara said you were hanging upside down. What were you doing?"
"I don't remember…" Justin confessed. "I don't know what happened."
Mark cleared his throat. "Buddy, I know I call you monkey, but remember… You're a person, not a real monkey, so you have to be careful. Promise you won't do that again?"
"Promise, Daddy. Did Kara's daddy help me?" Justin asked with a yawn.
"He did." Addison told him.
"So did Kara." Justin told them.
"She did?" Mark asked, slightly surprised.
"Kara told Alicia to tell the teacher that I got hurt, then she stayed with me and held my hand." Justin explained. "That's all I remember."
"That was really nice of Kara." Addison said with a smile. "You should thank her."
"You might have cooties now, Monkey. From letting a girl hold your hand." Mark teased with a wink.
"Kara doesn't have cooties! She's not a girl. She's… Kara."
"Ohhh, I see." Mark nodded knowingly.
"Can I tell you a secret?" Justin asked Mark hopefully.
"Sure, Monkey."
"You can't tell anyone. Not even Mommy. This is guy stuff." Justin explained.
"Of course." Mark said, amused, and allowed Justin to pull his head close. Justin put his mouth to Mark's ear, blocking the sound with one hand, and using his small finger to plug Mark's other ear (after all, he didn't want his secret to leak out).
"I love Kara." Justin whispered to his father.
It was loud enough for Addison to hear, since Justin had not yet mastered the art of whispering quietly. She smiled to herself, but decided to let Justin think that he and his father shared a secret.
For Addison, Mark, Hallie, and Derek, it had never been a question of whether Justin Sloan would fall in love with a Shepherd girl, considering how frequently they spent time together – it was just a question of which one.
One day, many years later, Addison opened the door to Justin's room to leave his laundry for him to put away after soccer practice.
The first thing she saw was her seventeen-year-old son's naked body. The second thing she saw was Kara's.
"Oh my God!" Addison shrieked, dropping the basket full of laundry. She covered her eyes with one hand.
"Oh my God!" Kara gasped, scrambled around and pulled the covers over top of her head.
"Oh my God!" Justin groaned, quickly pulling a blanket over top of him. "I didn't know you were home, Mom!"
"Ditto! What happened to soccer?!" Addison screamed.
"It was canceled for the rain!"
"Oh my God… I'm just… Leaving." Addison quickly backed out of the room and slammed the door behind her.
"Oh my God, I can never look your mom in the eye again!" Kara exclaimed, slowly peeking her way out from under the covers. "Do you think she'll tell my parents?"
"Are you kidding?" Justin snorted, pulling on his boxer shorts. "The way our parents are with each other? They'll know within the next 5 minutes."
"I'm calling them myself then." Kara decided, reaching for her cell phone.
"Wait, what?!" Justin exclaimed. "You can't do that!"
"Either way, I'm dead!" Kara argued. "At least this way, it might not be as painful."
"It's going to be painful for me! Your dad will come after my balls with a scalpel!"
Kara ignored him and began dialing numbers into her cell phone. Justin groaned and dropped his head into his hands. "I'm going to be a eunuch."
"Mom, what's going on?" Addison's 11-year-old daughter asked curiously. She had quickly left her room to find her mother when she heard screaming. "Where's Justin?"
"He's, um…" Addison blocked the door to Justin's room with her body. "Studying."
"What's he studying?" Amelie asked curiously.
"He's studying, um…" Addison swallowed. "Anatomy."
"Oh!" Amelie's face brightened. "I want to see what he's studying! I love it when he shows me what he does in high school!"
"Absolutely not! You will never ever study anatomy!" Addison shrieked. "Not for ten years, anyway!"
Amelie's eyes widened at her mother's outburst. "Are you okay, Mom? I heard you scream a minute ago…"
"Addison?" Mark's voice came from the top of the steps. "Is everything okay?"
"I'm fine." Addison mumbled. "I just had a long day. And I just saw something I didn't want to see."
Mark quickly walk down the hallway to his wife and daughter, then looked at Amelie. "Hey pumpkin, would you mind letting me talk to your mom?"
"Uh huh, sure. I'm going to get a snack." Amelie announced, taking off down the steps.
"Don't spoil your dinner!" Mark called after her, then turned back to his wife. "What happened, Addie?"
"I just caught your son having sex with Kara!" Addison hissed at Mark, once Amelie was out of earshot.
Mark blinked a few times before bursting into loud laughter.
"You think that's funny?" Addison asked, stunned by his reaction. "He had sex with her in our house!"
"Lighten up, Addie! Like you never had sex in your parents' house?"
"I was smart enough never to get caught!" Addison claimed.
"Are they being careful?" Mark asked.
"Do you think I stopped to look around for condoms or packs of birth control?" Addison asked, planting her hands on her hips. "I got the hell out of there as fast as I could!"
"Justin's smart. So is Kara. I'm sure they're being careful." Mark assured her.
"I'm smart. So are you." Addison pointed out. "We've still screwed up and forgotten the protection a couple of times. In case you've forgotten, go take a look at your son."
"That's true…" Mark murmured, scratching his jaw.
"Do we… Do we tell Derek and Hallie?" Addison asked.
She'd barely gotten the question out before Mark's cell phone started ringing. With a sigh, he pulled it out of his back pocket and frowned at the display. He held it up for Addison to see: "Derek."
"Something tells me that they know." Mark sighed.
"Your son seduced my sweet, innocent little girl!" Derek shouted. He and Hallie had rushed directly over to the Sloan's house after Kara called, only stopping to tell Addison and Mark that they were on their way.
Addison cleared her throat. "Well, let me tell you. The position I caught them in didn't make your 'little girl' look so innocent."
"People!" Hallie held her hands up. "Let's stop blaming each other here! We're all good parents. We can't control what our kids do."
"Why not?" Derek scowled.
"Because they're nearly grown up!" Hallie pointed out. "Where are they?"
"They're hiding in Justin's room." Addison said with a sigh.
"Probably doing it." Mark quipped.
"Not. Helping." Derek said through gritted teeth.
"One of us needs to lecture them." Addison decided.
"Should we draw straws?" Hallie suggested.
"How about this…." Derek said thoughtfully. "How old were we all when we lost our virginities? I was 17."
"16." Mark responded.
"16." Hallie answered. "Worst 3 minutes of my life."
"19. Worst 30 seconds of my life." Addison muttered.
"Aw, 30 seconds? Really?" Hallie gave her a sympathetic look.
"So Addie is the only one who can talk to them without being hypocritical, since the rest of us were the same age or younger! She wins… Or loses, really." Derek said.
"Right! I agree!" Mark chimed in, relieved. "She's an OB/GYN anyway! It's her job to lecture teenagers about sex."
"Wait a minute! Haven't I suffered enough today?! I'm the one who walked in on it!" Addison argued.
"She's right. We all need to talk to them. They belong to all of us." Hallie sighed.
"No time like the present… I'll go get them." Mark walked up the stairs. His friends could hear his pounding on the door and his muffled shouts to Kara and Justin. "Hey! If you're naked, get dressed! I'm coming in!"
"How long has this been going on?" Derek demanded.
Kara and Justin looked at each other guiltily, and he spoke. "Um… About 3 months."
"Have you used protection?" Hallie asked.
"Of course!" Kara assured them.
"Every time?" Addison asked.
"Yes!" Justin said, bobbing his head up and down to emphasize his point.
"Where did you get them?!" Derek growled.
"Uh… The pharmacy! Where do you think? We're old enough to buy condoms." Kara said with a roll of her eyes.
"If you need ever need any, just let me know." Mark said. "No questions asked."
"You're encouraging this?!" Derek asked incredulously.
"I'm not encouraging anything!" Mark defended himself. "They're going to boink no matter what we do!"
"Only because your son is a horndog!"
"It's not all him, daddy!" Kara crossed her arms. "I like sex too!"
"Oh my God." Derek covered his ears. "I didn't hear that."
"See?! I just want them to be safe about it!" Mark explained.
"Do you know what kind of dangers you're getting yourself into?!" Derek turned back to the teens and ranted. "You could get herpes, syphilis, gonorrhea, chlamydia…"
"Yes…" Addison agreed. "Yes, you could. In fact, I have some pictures that I would like to show you…"
"Oh, please, Mom! Not the pictures!" Justin pleaded, but Addison wouldn't hear it. She handed each of them copies of pictures featuring each STD that Derek had mentioned. Kara and Justin grimaced at the sights.
"See? Look at the pus, and the blisters, and the—" Addison was interrupted.
"We're not going to get STDs! We've only been with each other." Kara informed them, turning the picture covered pieces of paper upside down and setting them on the floor.
"Then you could get the worst STD of all, PREGNANCY!" Derek shouted at them.
"I think it's time that we tell Justin how he was conceived." Addison suggested.
"What?!" Mark looked warily at Justin. "I don't think he really needs to hear that, Addie."
"No, he needs to understand what can happen in the heat of the moment." Addison explained. "Justin, you were conceived on top of a ferris wheel at Cedar Point. Your father and I didn't have a condom. 9 months later, here you were."
"That's what you did when you got stuck on the ride?!" Hallie said, her jaw dropping in shock. "No wonder you came off of it so sweaty…"
"What?" Justin stared at them at shocked. "I was an accident?!"
"Accident is a strong word…" Mark said, trying to think of a way to recast it. "I'd call you a surprise. A nice surprise."
"Oh my God!" Justin moaned, covering his face with his hands. "Not only do my parents have sex, but they did it in public!"
"So you see?" Derek said, wagging his finger at Justin and Kara. "That's why you always use protection."
Addison pulled her prescription pad from her purse and began scribbling on it. She squeezed her eyes shut, signed her name to the prescription, and then thrust it to Kara. "Here! Just take it!"
Kara stared at the sideways "8" that Addison had written under the "number of refills" section of the prescription slip. "Um, Aunt Addie? I don't think that the pharmacy will accept 'infinity' for the number of refills."
"Right." Addison sighed, took the prescription back, and crumpled it in her fist. She re-wrote the prescription for three refills and handed it to her goddaughter. "Come to my office in a month for a blood pressure check, then I will refer you to a different gynecologist, because really, it creeps me out."
"I think we're done here." Mark said, noticing the terrified look in the teenagers' eyes. "Come on… Drink anyone?"
"Yeah…" Derek nodded. "Got any Scotch? Forget the glass. I'll just take the bottle…"
"Well, that went well." Kara said sarcastically once their parents had left the Sloans' living room.
"Yeah. Good thing they didn't freak out or anything." Justin rolled his eyes.
Fifteen years after Justin first said he loved Kara, and four years after Addison discovered them in bed together, Mark found himself putting on a tuxedo for the ceremony that would turn Kara Lynn Shepherd into Kara Lynn Shepherd-Sloan.
He was tying his tie when Amelie stomped into the room, looking pissed. "Dad! This dress makes my hips look huge!"
Much to Amelie's dismay (and Mark's delight), the fifteen year old was built like a stick figure, and was rarely noticed by boys. Addison, a late bloomer herself, warned her husband that in a few years, Amelie would be fighting them off with the stick. He was considering commissioning one made of steel.
"What hips?" Mark asked, stifling a laugh.
"I don't want to wear this horrible salmon-colored dress!" Amelie complained. "Kara said it would be pink. This is so not pink, it is salmon!"
"Your mother wears salmon-colored scrubs all of the time at work, and they look great on her." said Mark (who would have had no idea that was what color they were if he hadn't heard Addison say it over and over). "You'll be fine."
"Are you kidding? Those clash with her hair too! You're just too whipped to say anything negative about her!" Amelie scowled.
"Do you have PMS? Is that it?" Mark asked tiredly.
"PMS!" Amelie shrieked. "Why do you always blame it on PMS?! Why can't I just be mad at YOU?"
"Amelie Rose Sloan…" Mark heard his wife's voice behind him, and gratefully turned to see her putting earrings in her ears. "Get in your room, now, and get ready to go. Now, or no Dolce shopping trip next weekend."
"My name is NOT Amelie! It's AMIE!" Amelie yelled.
"That's funny. I don't remember signing my name to 'Amie' on your birth certificate." Mark quipped.
"I hate my name! Just because that was your host mom's name in France, why do I have to suffer?" Amelie demanded of Addison.
"What can we say? We just wanted to torture you as much as possible." Addison said with a roll of her eyes.
"I want to be called Amie!"
"You can be called Princess Frostine of Candyland for all I care as long as you get your ass back in your room and get dressed!" Addison said firmly, with her hands pressed on her hips.
Amelie glared at her and stalked back into her room, slamming the door behind her.
"Hormones…" Mark muttered and pinched his nasal bridge between his thumb and forefinger. "God, I miss when she called me daddy and danced on my feet… Is she ever going to stop hating us?"
"Eventually." Addison shrugged. "Hey, feel lucky. She likes you better than me."
"God, then I can't imagine how you must feel…"
"It's part of the mother-daughter relationship." Addison reminded him, then went back into their room to get her shoes.
"Amie being a bitch, as usual?" Justin asked, sticking his head out of his room.
"Don't call your sister a bi—" Mark replied automatically, then stopped himself. "Damn it, you're about to be married in an hour, and I'm still talking to you like a kid."
Justin smiled like his mother and Mark suddenly realized that he saw his son as a man, and not a little boy. He thought of all of the Little League games he'd watch him play in, the fishing trips he'd taken him on, and how happy Mark had been only a few weeks before when he'd watched Justin get his business degree. Now, Justin was off to Harvard to get his law degree, and Kara had a teaching job lined up.
Rapid snapping right in front of his face shook him out of his reminiscence. "Yo. Dad. You in there? If you are, I could use some help with this tie."
"Yeah." Mark cleared his throat. "Sure."
"How do I look?"
"Grown up." Mark said, somewhat sadly. "You're just all grown up."
"I'll still come home sometimes, you know… I'm just moving to Massachusetts… Not Mars."
"I know… You'll take good care of her, right? And yourself?"
Justin wrapped his arms around his father. "Of course. I love you, Dad."
"I love you too, Monkey."
"Are you sure they're going to be okay? You don't think they're too young?" Mark whispered to Addison, a weary expression on his face as he watched the bridesmaids come down the aisle.
"They'll be fine. No, honey, I don't think they're too young. They grew up loving each other, Mark." Addison studied Mark's sad facial expression, and reached down to squeeze his hand. "Honey, what's wrong? I'm supposed to be the one whining and bawling that no one will ever take as good of care of my baby as me!"
"He's my Monkey." Mark mumbled.
Addison's face softened. "He'll always be your Monkey… He's just… Taller now."
"Too tall." Mark muttered, watching Justin fidget nervously at the altar. "Taller than I am."
"Oh, baby…" Addison laughed softly and hugged her husband. "If you're this way with Justin, I can't imagine how you'll be with Amelie."
"I won't be anything with Amelie, because she is never getting married." Mark said firmly.
They shut up and stood as the first chords of "Here Comes the Bride" rang out. Kara was smiling confidently, and Derek was looking quite emotional, though he'd already walked two of his five daughters down the aisle. Though he knew he was supposed to be admiring the bride, Mark snuck a look back at his son. He'd never seen Justin look so happy; he couldn't take his eyes off of his bride. It didn't seem like so many years before that Mark had been looking Addison that way; certainly not 29 years.
"Maybe you're right." Mark whispered in his wife's ear, slipping an arm around her waist to give her a squeeze. "I think they will be okay."
Two chapters left, kiddies.