Extra Pale

A soft, lilting tune drifted in from the kitchen, accompanied by a rather less tuneful voice. His eyes opened slowly, gradually adjusting to the light flooding in great abundance from the sizeable gap in the curtains.

Normally, the empty space next to him would have worried him, but the singing - if you could call it that - confirmed her presence. What vaguely sounded like Whitney Houston filled his apartment as appetizing smells met his nose, reminding him how hungry he was. He sat up, stretching his muscles lazily, and clambered out of the bed, pulling on some sweat pants and a tee shirt as he padded towards the door.

"...So I'll go, but I know I'll think of you every step of the way..."

Carter grinned at the sight that greeted him in the kitchen. There she was, stirring scrambled eggs around in a pan with little care for what she was doing. Her slight form was clad in his DisneyLand tee shirt and some shorts, her dark hair tumbling messily down to her shoulders. As she stirred, she sang, starting softly but getting louder as the song progressed. The new toaster sat proudly on the counter, boasting two pieces of unburned toast.

"...that is all I'm taking with me, so goodbye, please don't cry..."

He took a step forward, wrapping his arms around her slender waist and joining her for the chorus.

"And I-iiiiiii-iiiiii will always love you!" they sang together, before breaking in to giggles. She turned to face him, leaving Whitney to do all the hard work as the key changed drastically, and smiled at him.

"So you woke up then?"

"How could I not?" he retorted with a smirk, "It sounded like someone was strangling a cat out here."

She poked him hard in the ribs, putting on an expression of mock disgust. "I am a very talented singer, I'll have you know," she informed him, "I just chose to pursue medicine instead of a lucrative career in show business."

He nodded thoughtfully, dipping his head for a kiss. Their lips met for a moment, then pulled apart again. "Would you still love me if you had your millions?"

She considered this, running her fingers idly up and down his arm. "Probably not. Count yourself lucky I'm not famous."

He grinned, then looked over her shoulder. "Well, you didn't burn the toast...but the eggs are looking pretty blackened..."

Her face froze, and she spun round to face the stove. She yanked the pan off the stove, peering at the contents, then dumped them in the trash. "Well, you can't fault me for trying," she shrugged.

"You can blame me for distracting you if you want."

"I was counting on that."

His eyes met hers, and they shared a smile. For a while there, they had both forgotten everything that had happened over the last few months, weeks, days, hours. Those memories could be dealt with later - right then, it was all about them. Alone. Together. And nothing else even came close.

"Did you sleep well?" he asked, sitting at the table and looking across at her.

"You mean when you allowed me to sleep?" she asked, her eyes twinkling.

He chuckled. "I think *you* were the one keeping us both awake, Abby."

She gasped. "Please! It was all you, you and your insatiable appetite."

They shared another glance, this one loaded with passion, with intensity, with meaning. Images from the night before came back to him in flashes - and not one of them was disappointing. In fact, they were anything but. He got to his feet, already missing the feeling of her body against his, and pulled her in to an embrace. She rested her head on his chest, her arms slipping comfortably around his waist, and they fell silent once more. They stood, swaying slightly in their own little dance, wrapped up in each other’s arms.

"I missed you."

*****

His shift had been, thankfully, uneventful. The ER had been busy enough to successfully avoid both Deb and Luka, but not so busy that he couldn't sneak in a few coffee breaks with Abby. As dependent as he was on the liquid, it wasn't the real thing drawing him to Doc Magoo's. In that diner, he could sit with Abby, talk with her...do whatever. And he knew that Deb only went when she had to. And Luka called it `an open invitation for food poisoning`.

So, basically, it was the perfect place to avoid them.

The guilt that had been pushed to the back of his mind during the previous evening and that morning had returned with a vengeance. All he could remember was sleeping with Deb, her telling him she loved him, him kissing her, then blowing her off to get back together with Abby.

Put like that, it was no wonder he felt like shit.

It wasn't that he didn't love Deb - he really did. But...but she was his best friend, and no matter how great she was in bed or how soft her lips felt on his, it should never have gone further than a friendly hug.

Damnit. He didn't understand why women fell in love with him in the first place. For one thing, he wasn't foreign. He didn't have an accent. He didn't go and kill people for the woman he loved. And his past was more colourful than....something really colourful.

But then, he was rich. Or at least, Gamma was. And his parents were. It wasn't as if he was short on the cash front...but still. It always made him uncomfortable - he felt like the moment a woman knew about his wallet capacity, everything was jeopardized.

But that wasn't why Abby loved him. She was different. She knew about his past, and embraced it. She knew about his riches, and ignored it. She knew *him*. That made the world of difference to him.

Not that he thought Deb was after the money, or that she didn't embrace his past. It just didn't feel quite as comfortable with her as it did with Abby. He couldn't be blamed for that. It was all in the chemistry.

And there had been chemistry between them. But the wrong kind. Carter couldn't quite place it - almost like a desperation, a need to feel loved, a want to be noticed.

It all seemed so stupid now, of course.

He paused at the lounge door, staring in through the window in quasi- horror. There stood the two embodiments of awkwardness and what seemed to be green-eyed jealousy - Luka. And Deb. In the same room. Talking.

That could *never* be a good thing.

He observed silently as they talked, trying to lip-read, anything to work out what was passing between them. And it may have been pure, unadulterated paranoia on his part, but he could've sworn he

saw Luka say `Carter` and `die` in the same sentence.

He backed away from the lounge, eyes fixed nervously on the door in case it should swing open and Luka would storm through carrying a shotgun, pipe or similar. He didn't even notice as he bumped in to someone. He didn't notice that his feet were carrying him down the hallway as fast as they could. He didn't notice his hands stretching out and pushing a door open.

But he did notice Abby. Lying on a gurney. With Haleh, pressing an ultrasound handset against Abby’s bare stomach.

For a moment, he thought he had walked straight in to an alternate universe. Haleh smiled softly, continuing as if nothing had happened. Abby’s eyes shot up, meeting his guiltily, and not even the thrashing silence could drown out the distinct sounds of a heartbeat. His eyes widened.

"Abby....?"

She stared back at him, then smiled timidly. Her eyes drifted to the screen of the machine, the black and white image jumping out at the pair as Carter slowly approached her, reaching out to clasp her hand. They watched in amazement as the image moved, listened as the thudding of the heartbeat echoed around the room. Tears filled his eyes, mirroring the ones in her own eyes as he looked down at her.

"We're having a baby."

*****