Chapter 6

Oh, my God did Stephanie say that I was going to be a father? And I wasn’t even a man anymore. Was she serious or was this some kind of joke to her? My mind was spinning for a long time. I was only vaguely aware of Stephanie leaving.

I felt a hand on my shoulder and Keith saying, “Heather are you alright? Are you having another blackout?”

I shook myself back into reality, “I don’t think so. I think I was just in shock. That could have been me who wasn’t sure who’s baby I was carrying.”

“It’s a good thing you were on birth control then,” Keith said.

I shuddered, “I don’t think that would have stopped Steven. He wanted to get me pregnant...” things started to get a little fuzzy. “I’m not sure but I think he wanted to get me pregnant more than once. Then he was going to kick me out on the street.”

A couple of days later I was preparing to show Keith the efforts of all my practicing with the lightsaber.

I was excited until I saw the look on his face. He took a deep breath then said, “I know how to tell you this but ... Okay, I’ll just say it. I’m going to need to send you to regular school during the day. I’m sorry but I don’t feel comfortable leaving you here alone all day. And why are you laughing?”

“Because when I saw your face I was expecting something worse. Like I was going to have to go to a different home. I built up so much tension in those few seconds. You have no idea. If that’s all you wanted to tell me then I can live with that. I’d like to get some human interaction outside of the house besides you and Officer Stone,” I said.

The doorbell rang and Keith got up and said, “And speaking of April. I invited her to watch. I hope you don’t mind.”

I kind of did mind. Ever since they started dating she’s been over a lot. Okay, maybe twice, and technically they hadn’t actually started dating yet. That was going to happen in several days. This was supposed to be something between the two of us that he could show off the video later.

I smiled and said, “Sure. But only if you step into the video around the two-minute mark. Exactly the two-minute mark.”

“Two-minute mark? I’ll have to get my timer ready. But I can do that if you ... You’re laughing again. Where you kidding?” he said.

“Kind of. I’ll signal for your time to enter the video. Speaking of time you had better let your guest in. It’s not good to keep a police officer waiting. Or so I hear,” I told him.

April walked in and hugged Keith and said, “So this is going to be exciting. I’ve seen people do stuff like this on youtube before. I never thought I’d get to see it in person. I’ve been a huge Star Wars fan my whole life. Oh, Heather thanks for letting me watch.”

I looked at her shirt, “I can see you’re a fan. So is Darth Maul your favorite character?”

“I love so many of the characters. It’s hard to pick. Whenever he’s on the screen I just love the way he moves and everything. But I have to say that my favorite character is Han Solo for the humans and Rey for the Jedi. I don’t care what the haters of the sequel series say about her. She was fun,” April said.

I could tell that she was excited about this. I couldn’t help but feel my mood lighten towards her. Maybe she would be good for my brother.

I led them to the backyard and had my brother take the camera. I set some music playing. It was Darth Maul’s theme. I started off with a few spins of the lightsaber and picked up as the song did. Partway through I pointed to April and signaled for her to come into frame and stand in one spot. I had originally set up my routine to include Keith to be the one I danced around but I thought this might be more fun for her. I jumped and spun around and did a lot of tricks. I ended my routine by swinging my lightsaber towards the camera and having it stop with the end pointing at it.

As we walked inside I said, “I’ve got to say you were a good sport out there. You didn’t even flinch once. I’m impressed.”

“Yeah, you were great,” Keith told her.

“I almost did flinch a few times. Especially that first time you swung that lightsaber at me and kicked your foot close to my face. That was so exciting. You were the great one out there. I wish I could do stuff like that. Keith you’ve got to send me a copy of that video. I just know my sister would love to see it,” April said.