Two Broken Souls

chapter six

Like most people, my parents met while they were in college together.

My mother lived in California her entire life and decided to go to college in state. She couldn't leave her family and she had no interest in moving far away either. My father, on the other hand, moved all the way from Washington to have a fresh start. The two met on their first day of college and the rest is history.

They married eleven months after their graduation and had Mellie just five months later. Then Ryder two years later. And me the following two year later. We always joked that our parents only got married because mom was pregnant. Though they deny it, I always believed that there was some truth to it.

Mrs. Bodeut was tapping her foot on the linoleum floor like she's preparing to break out in a song and tap dance at any given moment. "Today is one of my favorite days of the year."

I look at the date. It's only March 15th. I wonder what could get Mrs. Bodeut so geeked out. She frowns as her eyes scan the class. We're all slouched at our desks, most of us trying to pretend like we aren't spending every second staring at the clock.

Mrs. Bodeut sighs. "Doesn't anyone want to know why I'm so excited?"

"I do, Mrs. Bodeut," Mackenzie says.

"Anyone else?" she prompts, and the class groans.

"I'm glad to see how enthusiastic the young minds of the future are." Her attempt at sarcasm falls flat. We all continue to look at her with glossy blank stares, our mouths slightly open.

"What's going on, Mrs. Bodeut?" Mackenzie coaxes.

Bodeut walks behind her desk. "Who's ready to have a baby?" she asked as she set down a carton of eggs with a blue mark on half of them to indicate that it was a boy and a pink mark on the other half to show that it was a girl. "Today I assign my world-famous egg baby project."

The class groans again. Projects are the worst.

"You'll each be assigned a partner."

The class groans again. Group projects are even worse.

"Oh, come on," Mrs. Bodeut says, smiling. "My students always love this project."

The class mutters, a mixture of groans and sighs. Mrs. Bodeut's face reddens and she fumbles with the worksheets. "Does someone want to help me pass them out?"

No volunteers.

"Mia?" she asks in a pleading voice.

"Uh, sure." I stand up from my desk.

Once I'm back at my desk, Mrs. Bodeut continues explaining the project. She tells us that she expects us to treat our eggs like a real baby because even though this is a project, this is good practice if we ever want to become parents.

We'll be graded on how thorough we write our weekly reports and we even have the chance to earn extra credit if we make a cute little family portrait book filled with pictures. I find that creepy. Who would want to take pictures with a bunch of eggs?

When Mrs. Bodeut called out the names for partners, it wasn't a shock that most of the couples were paired together. Mrs. Bodeut did that as a way to show them what parenting as teens might be like. What surprised me the most was that Mackenzie and Aaron weren't paired together. Then I realized that the two have been acting differently lately. They weren't interacting with each other in class anymore; even in history. If they broke up or got into a fight they were keeping it private.

Clay and Will were partnered up with each other and had a baby boy which they named Carson. Their scenario is that Will and Clay are both working fathers who have a part time nanny who cares for their son while away at work.