Author’s Note: Sorry for the month and a half break between chapters! I’ve been super busy lately and haven’t had much time to write or sim. If you’re still here, thanks for reading, and if you’re in the US, have a happy Thanksgiving!
Chapter 131
Once they told their families, Orion and Tara kicked their plans to move and get married into high gear. Tara moved into the house as soon as they closed, but Orion decided to wait until after the wedding to move in permanently. It gave him time to decide what technology he wanted to bring and what renovations to make, and even though he was not officially living there, he spent his nights there anyway. It let him work on what they needed done and be around in case anyone from Sixam decided to try and abduct Tara in her sleep.
After he finished work at the lab for the day, Orion stopped at the mansion to pick up another load of stuff to take to the new house. Patrick, who had the night off, was playing with Jessica in the study while Maria worked on a painting. Jessica enthusiastically beeped the star on her walker when Orion came through. “Uncy Ry-ry!”
“Hey, Jess! You chasing your Dad around in that?”
She giggled, while Patrick straightened and stretched. “She’s getting around pretty well, but the walker helps keep her out of Mommy’s paints. How’s the new house coming along? It’s starting to look bare upstairs without all your stuff.”
“Great. Mom and Dad were over earlier. He helped me wire up a sprinkler system in the garage where I’ve got my work bench, bot unit, and chemistry stuff, and Mom had Plumboptimus set up a nectar rack in our dining room. She even gave us a few bottles to start it off with so we’d have something for any unexpected guests. Then she told me all about how it was better to keep nectar in a basement, but since we don’t have one, the dining room will be okay because it’s climate controlled. But if we ever do put in a basement, a cellar really is much better storage, and so on.”
“She’s not wrong, but I hear you on how she can go on. It’s not like you’ll be hosting nectar tasting parties for Landgraab level snobs or anything.”
“Susan does have some very high quality and expensive vintages, and she probably gave some of them to you, so I can see why she’d want you to be careful. But your friends never struck me as the types who’d say much about that kind of thing,” Maria mused.
“Only the foodies, maybe, but Guillermo’s more likely to tell me what meat or fruit goes with what type rather than play snob. Unless I served it chilled when it was supposed to be room temperature or something like that. Same with April, but it’s not like she’ll be coming over unless it’s a huge party or something. Tara says she’s okay with us being friends, but you know she can be kind of…”
“Jealous?” Maria guessed, while Patrick came out with a slightly different one.
“Paranoid?”
“Neurotic with enough issues to fill an archive?” Buddy chimed in.
“I wouldn’t have said any of those exactly, and Buddy, you’re a llama, but yeah, somewhere in that neighborhood. She’d never say I couldn’t be friends with her because she’s not controlling or petty and she wants to trust me, but I know it bothers her anyway. So I don’t give her reason to worry, even though I know nothing’s going on. I don’t do private any messages with her on social media and I only see her if I run into her by chance or if we’re out with other friends.” Orion shrugged. “But I’m not planning on any parties other than the wedding anytime soon, and Tara won’t even be drinking nectar at that because she’s not touching it until after the baby is born. So what Mom gave us will last, regardless.”
“Heh,” Buddy scoffed. “If I was you, Alien Boy, and I had to live with her, that’d be gone by the first trimester.” He made the twirling finger gesture implying she was loopy, and while only Patrick could see that visual, Orion was annoyed at just the audio.
“If listening to you all this time hasn’t driven me to drink, Tara sure as plum isn’t going to,” he retorted before returning to the original subject. “Anyway, after they set up the nectar rack, Mom had Plumboptimus install a self-cleaning upgrade on our downstairs toilet while she tested our wi-fi speed on her tablet and told Tara in enthusiastic detail how much she liked our TV and its sound system.”
“So,” Maria asked with a knowing gleam in her eyes, “speaking of enthusiastic detail and driving people to drink—which I’m guessing is what Buddy said?—how many visits have you gotten from your dear neighbors?”
Orion chuckled. “Travis figured out I’ve been going there in the Galaxa since the first night after Tara moved in, and he’s been by a lot to see it and the other tech I’ve brought. Yesterday, Cycl0n3 saw the lab van there delivering some bot building stuff and of course that brought all of them over to check that out, even Cybelle, who asked if I’d be building her a robot friend anytime soon. Oh, and Blair brought over a ton of baby things, too. I don’t even know where she gets them or why she thinks I can’t just buy what I need, but I think she just likes giving cute baby gifts.”
“We’ve got a ton of clothes she gave us that Jess was only able to wear a few times before she outgrew them,” Patrick said. “That’s Blair, though. I rip on her for being such a goody-goody, but she is really sweet. You’ve got to love her.”
“Says the guy who lives across town from her and not next door,” Orion quipped back. “But, joking aside, it’s cool having them as neighbors. It’s sort of like trading having one set of parents around for another, but with more personal space because they’re not actually in my house.”
“Luckily, this house is pretty freaking big. But I understand, and kind of envy your freedom to do whatever the plum you want with the place only having to get Tara’s okay for it. Maria and I talked about getting a grand piano for the living room, but Mom’s bookshelf is in the only good place for it, and you know how she’s got this sentimental attachment to it because her parents gave it to her right before they died and it was still a kit in their garage when that happened, and our Uncle Jonathan put it together for her when they moved to Sunset Valley. So I’m not going to push it if she wants to keep it in the living room in that corner because, ‘There’s no other good place for it.’ Or argue with Dad about his old sports car he got back when they won the lottery before you were born. I mean yeah, it’s kind of cool in that retro way, but it needs engine work none of us can or even want to try doing, and he never gets around to getting it fixed, so he hardly drives it anymore. I’ve told him he should just sell it or at least get the work done, but it never happens, so it sits in the garage taking up a slot I’d like for a badass new car. And you know how Mom says both her car and her ‘frail old bones’ need climate control, and Iris, despite loving being outside, also insists her convertible doesn’t love being stored there. Not to mention all the crap they keep in there that’s got nothing to do with vehicles or even yard work or the greenhouse. Speaking of which, taking any of that with you?”
“Not as much as you hope. Sorry. Guess your badass car will have to live outside whenever you get it. Though I hear those aren’t highly rated for child safety anyway,” Orion teased as he gave Jessica a playful push in the walker, making her go “Wheee!” as she sped across the floor.
“You’ve seen how he drives. Neither is his lead foot,” Buddy quipped.
Patrick made a sarcastic face at his invisible friend. “Hey, nobody asked you.”
After their chat, Orion went up to his room to pack more things. He was passing through the upstairs rec room to bring stuff down when Iris caught up with him with Patches in tow. Although school ended hours ago, Iris went out with Cameron and some of her friends afterward, so she had only just gotten home. “Maria said you were up here. Is that another box of space rocks?”
“One of my last stashes of them.”
“Need some more midnight energy boosts, huh?” Patches asked, and Orion nodded.
“I don’t like consuming the cool or valuable ones. I want to keep those to set out. I think they’ll look neat in the landscaping.”
Iris snickered. “And your house looked so normal from the outside. Careful. Make it look too outer space, and Dad’ll get all freaked out that you’ll raise suspicion.”
“Yeah, because me looking like this isn’t weird enough, or the old couple with their robot and geeky teenager dropping by all the time aren’t all a hundred times weirder than some meteorites in the shrubs.”
Iris raised an eyebrow. “You better have meant Blair, Cycl0n3, Travis, and Cybelle with that, mister.”
He smirked. “Oh, you haven’t been by all
that often.”
“Ha ha. Very funny.”
“I wish I could go visit you,” Patches said on a wistful note. “I’m going to miss you.”
“Aw, I’ll miss you, too, Patches.” He smiled in her direction, even though he could not see her. “A lot more than Buddy.”
“You won’t miss him, too? Even a little?”
“Well, maybe a tiny bit.” He held up his fingers a smidgen apart. “He has his good points. Deep, deep down inside.”
“Ha. I see all this hanging around Saint Blair, Cycl0n3, and Travis has done wonders for your sense of humor,” Iris remarked before continuing on a more serious note.
“So, how are things going? Is Tara doing all right?”
He could tell what she was asking both directly and between the lines. “Are things between us okay and is she handling the whole alien baby situation and not freaking out, you mean? Yeah, and for the most part. It’s hard for her. She’s, well, you know how she is. It gets to her. She’s worried about the aliens, them spying on us or plotting to abduct her or the baby after it’s born, even after the wedding because she’s scared they won’t honor it or they’ll change their minds or whatever. I told her they’ve never taken me, and I think that helps, but she worries anyway because that’s just what she does. I try to reassure her as much as I can. But we’re getting along fine, and her family’s been over to see her, too. Her parents a couple of times, and Wilbur came with Penny and Rodrigo the other day.” He left out that there was a little bit of tension, unspoken, between him and Wilbur, but beyond some suspicion that Orion picked up on from him, nothing untoward was said. “He told us he was looking forward to being an uncle and thought it was pretty cool that Rodrigo was getting a cousin on his side.”
“Ha, well that kid’s already got, like, what, a thousand on Penny’s side?”
“More like eight, but still. Nine if you count Arlo and Bella’s baby that’s due around when mine and Tara’s is. I only knew about that because Travis mentioned it while we were talking about how Starla is Rodrigo’s cousin, and Rodrigo is my baby’s cousin, and that doesn’t make it weird if he marries her someday, does it? Because he doesn’t think it should, considering how Patrick and Chris marrying Maria and Tad already crossed a ton of branches a lot closer between the Wainwrights and Wolffs in the family forest.”
Iris was amused. “Patrick, Maria, Chris, and Tad are all weird for many reasons, but that’s among the least of them. And him marrying Starla Bunch someday would be one of the more normal things I’ve seen him say or do, so there’s that.” She paused and gave him a curious look. “Speaking of marriage, how are you feeling about taking the plunge now that it’s getting closer? Getting nervous?”
“Of course not. Why would I?”
“Well, I know you love her and with the baby on the way it makes sense, but you did just get back together after a while apart and…”
“And some bad stuff?”
“That’s a pretty euphemistic way to put it.”
“It wasn’t—well, okay, it did hit me hard, but that’s because I never stopped loving her. Even when I tried. And I think that just proves we’re meant to be, you know? Because if we didn’t feel that strongly, that should’ve been it. But it wasn’t. We couldn’t forget each other, even when we tried to move on. So, yeah, while the unexpected baby rushed things, I’m sure we’d have gotten engaged eventually anyway. It just happened a little sooner. And this time, we don’t have any more secrets, so there’s no reason we’d break up again.”
“I understand why you feel that way, but still. I can’t imagine being your age and ready to get married already. You’re just finishing university, and you’re getting married and having a baby! I know the baby was a surprise, and you have to take care of it, but it’s not like it was generations ago when having kids outside of marriage was all scandalous and they’d be treated like plum over it. I get that being married also helps protect them from Sixam, but I just don’t think I could do it if it were me. I’m happy for you, and I really hope it makes you happy. I mean that,” she emphasized before continuing. “But a lot of people really aren’t ready to settle down at your age, not deep down, even if they think they are. And you’ve even had more experience dating other people than, say, Patrick or Chris or Blair or Mom and Dad. I know everyone in our family seems to get married young, and it’s great it’s worked out for most of them, but… well, I’ll just say, even if I could get surprise pregnant, I don’t think I’d just marry the father like that.” She snapped her fingers. “Even if it was Cameron. You know I love him, but I feel like if you’re going to get married, you should be
really sure that you want it as a done deal, forever. I loved Lane, too. And Lester. But they didn’t work out. I’d have to be really sure because I don’t ever want to go through divorces. Breakups suck enough without lawyers involved.” She paused. “I’m hope you get what I’m trying to say. I don’t want to rain on your parade or make it out like I think you’re doomed before you even go under the arch. I hope you’re still together and as happy as Mom and Dad or Blair and Cycl0n3 at their age. It’s just hard for me to imagine wanting to be tied down like that in just a few years. It’s not that I don’t think you’ll be a good husband and father or anything. I know you will.”
“We just want you to be happy being that,” Patches added.
He appreciated her honesty even though he thought her concerns were unfounded. “I know. Thanks. I’m sure I will.” He hugged her. “I get where you’re coming from, and I promise, I’ve thought about this a lot. I love Tara and I want to spend the rest of my life with her and our baby, and I know she loves me just as much.”
“I’m glad. Now, all that said, what’s this I hear about you having your wedding at the dojo? Was Maria messing with me or are you really planning to get married there?”
Orion couldn’t help but smile. “Isn’t that cool? Tara and I both like their garden, and when she said how wedding pictures would look great there, I said, well why not ask if we could do it there? And they said yes, so that’s the plan! Kind of fitting, huh? Especially since we got together bonding over a mutual interest in martial arts?”
“It’s, well, no one could say it’s not you.”
“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”
Iris smirked. “It means I love you, big brother, but you’ve got, let’s call it, not exactly traditional tastes.”
“Aww. Are you saying my wedding isn’t going to be cool enough for you?”
She gave him a playfully dismissive wave. “It’s all right. We all know I’m the cool one anyway.”
He snickered. “Oh. Okay.”
“Are we really going to debate this, Mr. Blue Leather Skull Jacket and space rocks in the front yard? I mean, I’ll give you that you’re cooler than Saint Blair and Cycl0n3, and you’re definitely ahead of Travis and, considering his bad pun habit, sometimes even Chris. And Patrick may be in a rock band, but we both know what a huge dork he is off stage, so, really, that leaves the number one slot to…”
“The straight-A botany nerd with the invisible friend?”
She responded by blowing him a sarcastic raspberry and picking up a box of his stuff to help him carry it downstairs.
While Orion chatted with his siblings while packing and moving, their nephew that had the dubious honor of being placed in the middle of Iris’ coolness scale gave Tara a prenatal checkup. All her vitals were normal, aside from a slightly elevated heart rate and blood pressure induced by the stress of worrying about whether the half-alien hybrid baby she was carrying was normal.
“So, everything looks good?”
“Yup. Appears so.” Chris finished reviewing the data in her record. “You’re still pretty early on, but everything looks fine. The only thing I’m at all concerned about is that borderline blood pressure reading. It’s probably just anxiety spiking it, but I’d keep an eye on it at home. If it starts reading like that regularly or it gets higher, let me know. It can be an issue in pregnancy if it gets out of control.”
“Okay. Though I’ve never had high blood pressure before.”
“Like I said, it’s probably nothing. Just try not to worry too much and take it easy.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“I know,” he sympathized. “Look at it this way, though. It’s a great excuse to get Orion to spring for spa trips for you. Tip from someone who worked there in high school: the massages are the best value, and the mud baths are super relaxing. Just stay out of the sauna because that hot dry heat isn’t good for pregnant women.”
“And you really think the baby will be normal? And it looks normal on your… your records?” She eyed the computerized medical record anxiously.
“There’s nothing in here that’d set off any red flags about what you’re thinking. I promise,” Chris reassured her. “Besides, the medial privacy laws are very strict, and usually the only ones with legitimate reasons to try and access them are other doctors or insurance underwriters, all of whom require your permission first. I made sure you documented consent to very limited access to cover that.”
“Okay.” She relaxed somewhat. “But do you think the baby will be normal?”
“I can’t say for sure how the baby will look, since heredity can be a bit random on which parent you look more like. It’s too early for a sonogram to show any defining features, but I don’t see anything at this point indicating health problems or abnormalities. There’s no reason to believe your baby won’t be at least as normal as Orion. We’ll keep checking as things progress, though, and in the meantime, just do your best to stay healthy and well-nourished.”
It was as optimistic as he could be while still being realistic, and while it was not exactly what she wanted to hear, it was honest and not
bad news. “All right.”
“Also, I know you and Orion love your martial arts, but be careful doing anything that could strain you or get you a blow to the midsection. You might want to focus more on things like meditation, and as far as exercise in general goes, stick with gentle, low impact stuff. Cardio is good, but keep it light to moderate, and avoid heavy weightlifting. Make sure you get enough sleep and try to keep stress levels low if you can. Oh, and take your vitamins. I’ll send a script to your pharmacy for some prenatal ones and start you off with a sample here.” He handed her a colorful pill. “As a bonus, these will be almost as good for your hair and skin as those regular spa trips.”
“Wow. That’s big enough to choke a horse.”
“It goes down easier than you think. Just take a full glass of water with it.”
“Thanks, Chris. I’m glad there’s a doctor I can tell all this to without feeling like I’ll be treated like I’m crazy or who might, you know, do something horrible and crazy.”
“Hey, it’s no problem. You’re family now, and we look out for each other. I know I joke around a lot, but I grew up knowing the deal about Orion. I know how serious the whole Sixam thing is, and the kind of things my grandparents, especially Grandpa, worry about when it comes to him. So whatever you guys need, I’m here for you.”
“I appreciate it.” Tara put her hand on her belly. “And I’m sure he or she will, too.”
Later that evening, after Orion went back to his new house and Boyd and Susan watched TV with Jessica while Iris and Patches caught up on the day’s gossip up in her room, Patrick and Maria relaxed in the hot tub together. “Feels like ages since we’ve been able to just kick back like this. No rehearsals. No gigs. No family drama. No projects that just won’t let us put them down because we’re too caught up in them, and even Jess is happily watching old Star Trek reruns with Mom and Dad.”
“Yup! They’re determined to geek their granddaughter up early. But Jessica’s having fun, and it’s nice they get to spend the time with her.”
“And it’s been a while since they had a kid in their formative years to show all their favorites to. Wait until they get to add Orion’s.” He smiled. “Jess and his baby will be about the same age apart as Chris and I were, or Orion and Chris, since he’s right between us. I bet they’ll be close like we were growing up. Even though he’s our nephew, he always felt more like an honorary brother or close cousin. Especially because Blair was so much older, it was like she was more of an aunt than my sister when I was a kid.” He chortled. “Definitely when she lectured us, even if I did pull the ‘you’re my sister, not my mom’ card on her whenever I could.”
“Yes, and Tad’s mentioned more than once with a bit of irritation what a great example you set for Caleb when it comes to that.”
“A
tad of irritation, you might say?”
Maria splashed in his direction. “That was terrible. Clearly the bad influence of your honorary nephew-brother.”
“And here I thought I was creative, baby. I’m hurt,” he teased back, although it seemed Maria was only half joking and her mood was souring. “Hey, I was just kidding. Are you okay?”
She sighed. “I guess. It’s nothing you said, not on purpose anyway. It just made me think of something that’s been on my mind.”
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s just… just the reminder that Jess won’t have a brother or sister like you did or even I did, because of the stupid werewolf thing. Because I’m afraid of passing it on.” She frowned. “And what’s even worse is… never mind.”
Patrick was concerned. “No, what? Tell me.”
She bit her lip. “No. I—look, it was terrible. I don’t really want to say it. I hate that I even thought it.”
“Come on. It can’t be that bad.”
“Patrick, you know I love Orion, and I don’t think any less of him for being alien or anything, right?”
“Yeah…”
She sighed again, hesitating, but then just blurt it out. “I can’t stop thinking that if he can have a baby and not worry about it, knowing what he is and what his kid will be like and probably go through, why can’t I? I mean, the werewolf thing, honestly, you can hide it a lot easier than
that. And I really did want more kids someday, before I found out. I used to imagine us having at least two. Maybe a boy and a girl, a cute little matched set. Then I found out I was a werewolf and that ruined that dream. We were lucky that Jessica turned out normal.” She sniffled. “And it sucked, but I thought I was okay with it until Orion got Tara pregnant. Even though it was an accident, he was
so happy about it! And Tara, even someone as, well, you know how Tara is, even
she can handle it! Then suddenly there are all these cheerful preparations for another baby in the family, one with even more complications and challenges than a werewolf one of ours might have, and it hit me hard. It makes me feel like not wanting another child because it might be a werewolf like me is so… so minor and whiny and petty compared to that.” Her face rumpled. “And then I thought, my Watcher, even though Tad tried to be nice and say I wasn’t that bad, I really did turn out like him after all. Like Dad, who never wanted any children because they might be flawed, have something wrong with them. Like I turned out to. I
hate it, Patrick! I didn’t want to be like him. Yeah, I know I have kind of high expectations about a lot of things, but I never really thought, never believed I was that bad!”
Patrick put his arm around her. “Hey, you’re not Thornton. Or Orion, for that matter. You can’t help how you feel sometimes. It sucks, but it’s true. That plum just isn’t always rational.” He gave her a rueful smile. “If it was, there’d be a lot fewer patches on the walls from all the times I lost it over something ticking me off at the time.”
She sniffled again. “You don’t think I’m awful and horrible and selfish?”
“Baby, I love you. If I thought you were terrible, I wouldn’t be with you. Seriously. It’s okay. I understand how you feel about the werewolf thing.”
“But I also know you really wanted another baby someday, too. And so did I! I feel like I’ve ruined that with my hang-up.”
“It was a nice thought, but I’m okay if it never happens. I love you and Jess and if that’s how it is from here on out, just the three of us, then that’s what it is.”
A hint of a smile returned to her face. “Thank you for understanding and not judging me.” She paused. “And bearing with me, because, even though it scares the plum out of me to think if we had another baby that it might have my curse, I don’t know, sometimes I think maybe I should change my mind. That it might be worth the risk because we did both want more children. And if Orion and Tara can handle the alien thing, shouldn’t
I be able to handle the werewolf one? But then I think about what if the baby is one and grows up to hate it as much as I do? What if they hate me for passing it on to them and having them knowing I could’ve? But then I think, maybe that’s just me thinking like Dad again, and I sure don’t want to be like him. So I just… I’m just not sure.”
“If you’re not sure, then we wait to make any big decisions until you are.” He smooched her.
“Okay.” Feeling better, she smiled with a hint of flirtation. “Though that means no getting frisky in here tonight unless you want to leave it up to the fates to make the decision for us.”
Patrick smirked, and he couldn’t help but notice how her swimsuit top had slipped low in the bubbles. “Heh. No problem, baby, but in that case, you might want to pull that up a bit if you don’t want my mind going all sorts of places it probably shouldn’t.”
In the days leading up to the wedding, Boyd and Susan not only helped Orion settle into his and Tara’s new home, but they also worked on their wedding gift to him—a household plumbot. “Good thing we’ve gotten good at making these advanced nanites,” Boyd mused as he went through their inventory. “Now we need twice as many.”
“Well, we’d only planned on making one in such a short time frame. Not two.” Susan and Boyd had already been working on a plumbot for Chris and Tad as a gift to celebrate the finalization of their adoption of Raul. Their grandson’s household was almost as full as theirs with him, Tad, Esmeralda, Hilda, and Raul as well as Morgana and Caleb and, of course, Diddy and the pride of neighborhood visiting pet, stray, and feral cats in their yard that Chris was always meeting, befriending, and inevitably feeding. The laundry, cooking, and dishes alone could take half the day if Tad’s grousing was to be believed. While they all had their chores and pitched in to get everything done, it was clear that a plumbot would be a huge help and well appreciated, especially now that Morgana was having frequent arthritis flare-ups and more trouble getting around in her old age.
“I think we’ve got enough on hand to make the solar chips for both of them, and we’ve already got duplicates of the nanny chip and the cleaning chips. But only one music chip. Think we should put that one in Orion’s bot? Babies do better with lullabies and settle-down music than teenagers.”
“Settle-down music for teenagers is the kind that annoys their parents,” Susan quipped. “Remember how Patrick used to crank his amplifier on his guitar for angry riffs when he was mad at us?”
“At least he was good enough at it that it was usually in tune.”
“To be honest, the one I couldn’t stand was that awful boy band music Blair liked at that age.” Susan made a face. “Our old house on Maywood was so small and even with the doors closed, you could always hear it in her room. Even playing our music on the stereo or computer didn’t always drown it out.”
She looked over the plumbot schematics. “So, what entertainment chip should go in Chris and Tad’s bot, then? The art chip or the humor chip? Morgana and Raul are both artsy types, and if the chip is as advanced as the manual implies, it might be able to craft things they could sell for extra cash. But a humor chip probably has broader appeal.”
“Oh, Chris would love it, no doubt, and it’d be fun to interact with. I’d be curious to see how it works compared to Plumboptimus and Cybelle.”
“Considering most humor is lost on them, that would be interesting. And it’s something that would appeal to the teenagers.”
“Not to mention the family troll Grandpa Cycl0n3 when he visits.”
“So, an old man as mature as a teenager. My point stands.” She entered some data, started a program, and then closed the screen. “We’re all set. The next phase should be done in four hours, and we’re still on track to finish in a couple of weeks.”
“Not before the wedding, but before the baby at least.”
“Yup.”
It was good news, but thinking about the wedding and baby spiked Boyd’s anxiety nonetheless. “Oh, Susan. I know we’ve done everything we can to help them, but I’m just so worried. I know logically this was going to happen someday, that Orion was going to go out on his own and have a family, and even tell the world what he is, but, oh, I guess a part of me hoped I wouldn’t live to see it and worry about it in real time.” He sighed. “You know what I mean, right? Of course I want him to be happy, and I want to meet our grandkid, but now that it’s all happening, I’m just so terrified about what
could happen if something goes wrong. To him, to the baby, to all of them!”
“That’s why we’re doing what we can,” she tried to reassure him.
“The wedding is so rushed and there’s so much going on. What if something slips? I don’t even mean Tara necessarily. I don’t think she’d say anything on purpose, but what if someone in her family starts thinking there’s more to what’s going on than what they say? Justine’s a retired cop and if she’s anything like Blair, she probably can’t help but notice when things are off. What if she gets it in her head to investigate Orion’s ‘condition’ and starts poking around and probing Tara for details and Tara says something that a trained interrogator would pick up on without even realizing it? Or what if it’s not even that, but something like the baby gets a bad fever while Wilbur or Justine and Marty are babysitting and they take it to the hospital and not Chris and some doctor runs a bunch of tests on the odd-looking sick baby and discovers the alien DNA? We didn’t have to worry about this with Orion because all of us were in the know! But—”
“Boyd, I know it’s hard, but please try not to do this to yourself. The baby isn’t even born yet and nothing’s wrong with it. Orion’s fine, Tara’s fine, and the Keatons seem to be fine with the wedding and excited about their new grandchild. I’m sure they do wonder about Orion’s condition and whether the baby will have it, but if it comes up, we can talk to Justine and Marty ourselves about what raising Orion was like, without getting into the details. We can even tell Orion that if it makes you feel better, to send them our way if they have questions they’re not sure how to answer.”
“That might work.”
“Remember, this is their grandchild, too. Even if they found out about all of it, they’re not going to want to see anything happen to them, or their daughter. No matter what they might think of us. Not to mention, Justine’s been a friend of Blair’s for a long time. If there was any indication they’d be a danger to Orion or his unborn baby, she’d have said something. They’re good people.”
Boyd took a steadying breath. “I suppose. Not everyone’s a suspicious old paranoid crackpot like me.”
She patted him on the shoulder and smiled. “I didn’t say that. I’m just reminding you that you’re a little more… prone to imagining a worst-case scenario than usually happens.”
“Which is a nice way of saying I am a paranoid old crackpot,” he pointed out wryly despite his mood, and she hugged him.
“Yes, but I love you.”
