FicWad

Chapter Three

I'll give you one guess Mr. Granger. She's one-year-old and pretty soon may very well be crying her little heart out because she can't stand loud noises! Hilary's words echo in my mind and I feel my heart stop.

I look at the small child on her hip with tears in her eyes. Oh, God. She can't possibly mean what I think she means...There's no way that...But she does look a little like me.

"W-what are you saying?" I manage to ask after a few seconds.

Hilary pushes a strand of hair behind her ear and gives me a weak, wry smile. "I'm saying that you...Tyson, are Tyler's dad."

I just stare at her, at a loss for words. "What?"

She sighs. "You heard me. You are Tyler's father. Don't worry. It's not like I'm going to ask you for child support or anything. You don't even have to have anything to do with her if you don't want to..."

I listen to her as she rambles on and on and I can tell that she's nervous. I look at Max, Ray, Kai, and Mr. Dickenson. They all look just as surprised as I feel.

I guess they can feel me staring at them because they all look away from Hilary and Tyler and look at me. None of us know what to say. I mean, what can we say?

Max, Ray, Kai and I came here to battle against a supposedly very powerful all female beyblading team. Not meet up with Hilary and find out that I have a kid.

Max looks back at Hilary and finally speaks. "Why didn't you say anything?"

I can see the beginning of tears in Hilary's eyes. "What was I supposed to say?"

"How about the truth," Ray said slowly as he found his voice. "You could have told us instead of just walking away."

Hearing my friends speak gives me the courage to speak as well. "Didn't you think I had a right to know? You should have told me, Hilary. I would have helped."

She pulls Tyler closer against her and rests her head on top of her daughter...our daughter. "I tried to tell you," she whispered, "but I didn't know how. So, I decided to get an abortion, but as soon as the nurse called my name and turned tail and ran because I couldn't just kill my baby. When I told my parents, my dad kicked me out of the house. I decided to tell you then and if you didn't like it, I would leave. But when I tried to tell you, I began to think. You are the Beyblade World Champion, people look up to you. If you had an illegitimate child it could ruin everything for you. So, I decided to just...disappear."

While telling the story, the tears in her eyes began to roll down her cheeks. I never could stand it when she cried and it took everything I had not to walk up to her and try to comfort her. I guess I just have to keep reminding myself that we're not dating anymore and she's the one who walked away. She's the one that decided to leave.

I watch Tyler shift in her mother's arms and reach up her tiny little arms to wipe her mother's tears and give her a hug.

Apparently, she doesn't need me to comfort her anyway.

The girl with brown hair and red bangs turned to Hilary and smiled softly and whispered something in her ear. After a few seconds, Hilary gave Tyler one final squeeze before sitting her on the bench and a certain determination filling her eyes.

"My team and I came to Japan so that we could have a beybattle against the best beybladers in the world...the Bladebreakers, not so that I could tell you why left. So, let's go through with the battle and if you have any questions they will be answered afterwards. Okay?"

Max, Ray, and I looked at Kai. He's the captain. It's up to him.

He nods. "Fine."

"Good," she replied.

I look her in her eyes and she seems to immediately understand the message in my eyes: I'm going to be the one to battle her.

"So, how about some introductions before we go through with this," Ray suggested as he lifted a brow.

"Um...right," Hilary said as she looked at her teammates. "Introduce yourselves."
"What?" the girl with red hair asked, surprised. "Shouldn't you introduce us?"

Hilary rolled her eyes. "Why should I when you three can speak for yourselves?"

"Because, it's the polite thing to do."

"Yes, well at the moment I don't really feel like being polite. Introduce yourselves."

The girl frowned and pushed a strand of red hair behind her ear. "Fine," she turned to face me and the others. "Hi, I'm Martha Mao, but everyone just calls me Marti."

A girl with blonde hair and blue eyes speaks next. "I'm Josephine Anderson, but call me Jo."

The girl with brown hair and red bangs, the one that had been talking to Hilary earlier grinned at us and spoke. "Hiya! I'm Tika Matthews. I don't have a nickname but the others. I've been waiting to meet you ever since Hilary told us about you guys. She said you were all really great. But I am a little disappointed that I won't be able to meet Kenny and Dizzi. I was really looking forward to meeting a talking computer. You---"

"That's enough, Tika," Hilary cut her off. "We need to get to the battle. You can give them your life history once we're done."

I couldn't help but smile. Tika sure has a lot of energy. I wonder how Hilary met her and the others. I guess I'll figure that out later.

"So," Jo said with a slow grin, "I'm up. Who am I going up against?"