Colors»L.R.H AU

Six

He's so prettyyyy ugh i hurt. i hurt bad.

I tried my best to help Roni, but in reality, it's very difficult to help someone with problems you have no idea how to solve.

I shouldn't be calling a fetus a problem (Roni taught me it was slightly offensive.) but sometimes it just slipped. And when it was one of those good days were Roni wasn't stressing about how she was going to make bills work and society not call her a clumsy slut, we talked about the girliest things possible.

Arguing about names and genders is what the good days mostly consisted of.

"I think I've made my decision: I want a girl," Roni gushes while patting her tummy. I muted Friends and sighed. I spent most of my time spending the night at Roni's recently, since she'd always call me over in the middle of the night because she needed me anyway.

"You said you wanted a girl ten times, then you said you wanted a boy about eleven. Make up your mind, please."

"I just want to be happy and positive about both," Roni pouts, curling her lower lip.

"Yeah, yeah. Tell me why you want a girl this time?" I question.

"I want to put little bows in her hair," Roni giggles, pulling her knees up to her stomach,"and pick out little dresses and lots and lots of pink and call her Princess."

"My mom wanted to name my puppy Princess once." I raise my eyebrows. "It was horrible."

"Naming your dog Princess and calling your daughter Princess as a nickname are two totally different things," Roni huffs, clearly annoyed.

"Well, they're both idiotic sounding," I say. Roni leans over and socks me in the arm.

"I like the name Julia," She says, "And Amy."

"Julia is okay," I shrug, "I like names that are not too common, personally."

"Wow, did we actually halfway agree on something?" Roni gasps sarcastically.

"Any other names besides Princess?" I shake my head.

"Katelyn," She says uneasily,"but I don't know, I have mixed feelings on Katelyn."

"I like the name Katelyn," I smile, "Then you can call her Katie or Lyn, since you like nicknames."

"Yeah, but I don't know. I like Julia the most." Roni shrugs, "What names do you like?"

"For girls I like Misty and Stella. For boys I like Lucas, Troy, and Anthony."

"That's funny," She laughs, "I don't like any of those names one bit."

I just shrug.

"I used to know this boy named Anthony," Roni continues, "He was annoying. Hard-headed, never listened either. Everyone hated him. It was weird, though, he was oddly goodlooking. His personality just drove everyone away."

"My brother's name is Anthony," I decide to say.

I hadn't talked let alone thought about Anthony in years. It was just hard to explain. It gave me headaches thinking about my broken home.

"I didn't know you had a brother." Roni furrow grows, "You never talked about him."

"I know," I sigh, "Now, do you still want a girl, or have you changed your mind already?"

Her laugh filled the room, making me stop thinking about my brother.

***

Two days later, Luke had officially dropped out of the local community college.

The next day after that, he packed his bags to attend the boot camp of his dreams.

He was making a fourteen hour drive out into the camp where he would spend two and a half months training to be the best soldier he could be.

It made me cringe internally, though, thinking about how such a sweet innocent boy like Luke would be turned into a fighter- A killer.

Not quite killer, I tell myself as I watch him pack his last bag into the trunk of his car. Just trained to kill at the right time.

I don't think I could ever think of Luke as a killer. A hero is a better term. A boy with a huge motivation and a big heart.

I smile at my thoughts.

"Bye Luke," Roni embraces Luke.

"Bye," He murmurs, rubbing her back. "Everything will turn out, I promise."

She nods into his shoulder.

He then lets her go, holding onto her shoulders and nodding his head, meeting Roni's gaze for a few seconds.

Luke turns to me, looks me dead in the eye, then pulls me into the most massive hug.

It's one of those hugs that the other person is just so warm, and you can smell their unique scent and feel them breathing against your body. I don't think Luke and I had ever hugged before, but if he hugged like this every time, I'd never let go.

"Bye-bye, Myra," He says, resting his chin on my head.

I chuckle into his chest, "Bye, Luke."

"You're not going to replace me with another guy while I'm gone, right?" He asks.

"No, because only one guy walked me to half my classes for three months and only one guy meets me at the same coffee shop every day at the same time."

Luke laughs, pulling us apart. "Just be careful. Take your chewable gummy vitamins once a day. Don't eat McDonald's every day, you want to keep that sexy body in shape. Water all your houseplants, feed your goldfish, and don't go out anywhere past ten alone."

"I don't have a goldfish," I laugh.

"Then you should get one, they're cool," Luke grins widely, and a soft laugh follows, "I'll see you both in two and a half months."

With one last wave goodbye, he gets in the car and drives away.