I would first like to thank my Beta Reader Leonardo dicaprio and prenncooder

Four

Pacing around the room I felt my mothers eyes on me. It was my last day of vacation and with Dad was at work it was the best time to tell her. "Um...Bug you know you can tell me anything right."

That did it I just let the words fall out of mouth. "I had sex with Alex while you were gone."

Her face is frozen. "You had sex."

I sit on the couch. "Yes. And it was great."

"That's...Wow." This was a curve ball that she need some time to recover.

"We were safe every time." I shouldn't said that I might get this man that I love killed. And, she could hide the body with Dad.

"Did you do it on this couch?"

"No."

"In my bed?"

"God no," I say my tone disgusted. "I was made on that bed it would be to weird even by our standers."

"The shower?"

"Yes, but I scrub it clean."

"Okay." She gets up going to the liqueur cabinet.

I watch her take a bottle of Aunt Elizabeth's fruity varnish "Mom?"

She comes back and my only thought is she gonna kill me. I had tried a sip of the stuff once when I was eight tried some thinking it was juice. Mom found in the hammock looking at the sky. "I think I need a drink."

"Why?"

"Cause my little girl isn't a little girl your a woman." She hugs me.

"I though you would be angry." I say confused.

"Gracie, its just this the part of your life I'm not prepared for." I knew what she meant. Mom had never had any sisters and lost both her parents at a young age. "Being a parent means to learn on the job, there is no class or drill."

"So," I look around at the house were I had grown-up become a woman. "Do we tell Dad."

"No." She pours more alcohol into the glass. "Drink." I down the fruity drink that will still get me drunk, I have tolerance but this stuff is strong. "You'll tell him is you want but if I could make a few suggestions."

"What?"

"Make sure Alex is with you and that you give some kind of alcohol to your father."

I wasn't going to tell him and Alex was afraid for his life at this point. "Okay good talk."

"And Gracie?" She takes my arm as I flea the room. "You make an appointment with Elizabeth."

"Yes, Ma'am."

)()(

"Does your father know about this?" Elizabeth asked me while holding my future in her hands.

"No, and would really love it if you didn't tell him." I was hear at mid-night the latest time possible. "Mom knows why I'm here."

"Well." She places the bottle in my hand. "As long one of them knows and I wouldn't tell your father. I there are still place I haven't been to and I would like to see Paris again."

"Paris? That doesn't exist yet." It was one of those place that we the younger generation didn't connect with. I of course knew about it history was one of the key points of education here. Our teachers would say In order to make a better future we had to learn from the past.

She laughed it off "I know but its just something we older people say. Now take one of these every day with food and if you forget you'll have to take two as soon as possible."

"Yes, Aunt Elizabeth." I say taking out one the bright blue pills throwing it in my mouth I shallow it dry."

"So much like your parents." She said as I show my additdued about pills.

"Is that a bad thing?"

Her lips pull into a smile. "I don't yet."

"Thank I have to get back." Putting the small bottle in on of my many pockets. "I'm on a break after all." My vacation was over and I was back on KP duty at the fence it would end when walked the premiter with Dad. Then I had to train with Reynolds from three hours, which, wasn't to bad sometimes I could even pin him. Only after could I go home for a shower be done for the day. Of course done with work meant free time my plan was to work on some new land mines.

)()(

The call from Alex came almost as soon as I walk into the door. Yes, we have seen each other quick lunches in the square or talking on comms. "Hey Babe." I say laying down on my bed.

"You sound tired maybe I shouldn't ask."

"Alex they invented coffee and hot water for a reason."

He laughed "Good because I want to ask to dinner along with your parents tonight at Boylan's."

"Tonight?" I think about all our schedules. Dad would get off at seven, Mom training a new group of scientist in the field would be back some times around four. They would both be tiered and hungry "What time?

"I was thinking eight."

"That's prefect."

I forgo my shower instead I just take off my body armor, remove my weapons, change into my ratty bomb making cloths. My studio was a shed that we had all built after my eighth birthday when I blow a hole in the kitchen. Malcolm had given a chemistry set for my birthday thinking would like to make smoke bombs. He was right I loved the bombs that could but they were to tame for my. Using some food coloring and alcohol I made real bombs. That got bigger and bigger till one day I blow up the kitchen.

Then after was no longer ground around Christmas that year we built my lab. I enter the room its smells like smoke and grease. I had been trying to make a land mine that would only go off if a certain type of dinosaur stepped on it like a Carno or slashers . It was difficult because the wights differed so much that I would had to write a new program. But now that I had it was ready to be tested. I put on the test shelf then turn to the fire work station was trying to make them into a side business but it was hard to mix them. There were so many duds that had been exploded in beginning it looked like the fourth of July every week. Looking at my note's I'm missing something, I guess that another trip to the eye is needed I had only a fraction of the information needed.

By five that night I've been engrossed in my workshop and grease. Now was the time to shower. Mom was inside cutting-up vegetables "No need to do that." I say filling a glass full of water. "Alex is taking us all out to dinner."

She stops the knife "Really?"

"I don't why he just is."

)()(

He was going to kill Alex, I thought as we sit a Boylan's in a table in the center of the room. Alex picked this very public place because what ever he wanted to tell Dad it was going to big and he freaked a public place offered more support. More people to hold him down or more witness's if he committed murder. Oh that was such a awkward word for our sunny home it made think of the dark world my parents left. I heard story as a child from older kids who had come from there. Now they were to me just scary story's told around back yard camp fires. A story were just walking out your door would lower your life expectancy.

"So," Dad said in his best commander voice. "What's going on with you too."

"We'll sir when I asked five years ago to court your daughter I knew that I loved her even when she did know who I was." He said taking my trembling hand I knew what he was going to ask. My blue eyes search my father I look at his hip his gun is gone but a knife is still counseled in his boot. Mom is armed with gun at all times I wonder if she would shot him I mine she once before I was born back when the colony was young.

"And now?" Dad asked his free hand is holding onto a spoon. That wasn't to bad how much damage could he do with a spoon.

"Now I know that I was stupid to think I could just love her," He pause's to look at me. "I know that now that I can't live without you. So," Alex stands then gets on one knee "Gracie Ayani Taylor will you marry me?"

Then without any thought about murder or the dark story's I say "Yes."