Undying Love

The next day Kelsey was coming over to hang out with the girls and me. I got up at 5:30 and showered before going downstairs and making coffee. I sat down at the table and started some assignments. I was almost finished with my sixth assignment when I heard banging on the upstairs gate. I walked up and went over the gate. I took the girls hands and led them into the bathroom. I stripped them down and put them in the tub. I was getting them dried off when I heard someone yelling.
“Kelsey! Is that you?” I yelled back.
“Yeah.” She said coming into the room.
“Kels!” The girls said pointing to her.
“Hey there girls, come here Ella. Let’s go get you dressed.”
“Thanks, Kelse.” I said following her and Ella.
“No problem. I love these little girls.” We got them dressed in one of the outfits I got them for their birthday. We were standing in the kitchen feeding them and I was cleaning everything up when Kelsey looked at me.
“What’s up?” I said looking down at her. She leaned up and kissed me. I kissed her back gently. She pulled away slowly and sighed.
“I’ve wanted to do that for awhile.” She looked at me being shy.
“Are you sure you want to go down this road?” She nodded slowly. “I’m just warning you if it doesn’t work out between us I don’t know if it would be a good idea for you to work for me.”
“I’m not going to worry about an if; I’m going to worry about right now.”
“Sounds pretty good to me; I’ve been meaning to ask you something. Would you be willing to watch the girls when Kristine has Jordan?”
“Of course, I love spending all the time I can with these girls.” She finished helping me with the dishes. “I want to show you this place that I love going. It’s this park in the middle of this place. It’s about an hour walk from here, but it’s a nice day.”
“Sounds good; let’s get the girls ready.” Fifteen minutes later we were walking out the door. I was pushing the stroller and Kelsey was eating an ice cream cone. As we walked I checked my cell phone.
“You’re worried about her aren’t you?” Kelsey asked looking at me.
“I’m not worried about her. Kristine can handle herself. I’m worried about her going into labor and then I don’t get the phone call and I’m not there when my son is born. I don’t want to miss his birth. It’s going to be a while before I have more children.”
“Oh, that makes sense I guess.” Something in her voice made me look at her.
“Are you alright?” She shook her head. “What’s wrong? What did I say?”
“You don’t want to have kids with me?” She whispered the pain evident in her voice.
“Yes, I do. It’s just I’m going to be eighteen soon and then it becomes illegal for us to be together like that. I also don’t want to get you pregnant in High School. It only causes problems. All the stuff I do on my laptop is school work. The High School Kristine and I went to told me that if I missed another day of school I wouldn’t graduate. When Kristine left me I told myself I wouldn’t sleep with anyone else until I’m married.”
“Oh, can I ask you a personal question?” She said looking down.
“Sure, go ahead.”
“Was Kristine your first?”
“No, after my parents died I went through this stage where I just kind of slept around. I always wore protection and I got checked every few months. It was just a bad time in my life. I regret every one of the women I slept with. After Kristine found out she was pregnant I called all of them and asked them if they had been pregnant. I was a little lucky, none of them were.”
“You called all of them?” She gasped.
“Yeah, I made sure to keep all their numbers. They all went to my High School. The first girl I slept with was my girlfriend. She only slept with me because she felt sorry for me.”
“I’m sorry for everything you went through.”
“Thank you and now since you asked me that question; I ask you the same question. Or rather, have you had your first time?”
“Yes, my relationship last year got a little out of hand and one night it just happened. Two weeks later he dumped me when I told him that my leukemia was back.”
“You said you’d been in remission for almost five years?”
“I have been; my white blood cell count was low so I had to take some pills for a few weeks and when I was normal again they told me my cancer had never really come back. They had caught it before it had, but when I told him that he refused to go back out with me. Told me he didn’t want to pay for all the cancer things if we ever got married.”
“What an asshole. You know Kristine never knew that I had cancer until Ella got sick. She told me that she’d kick my ass if my cancer came back.” We finally made it to the park and we let the girls out of the stroller and they ran for it. Whenever they got too far away we’d call them back and then they’d run off again. We’d been sitting there for a few hours when my phone started ringing. “Hello. Yeah, okay, got it; I’m on my way. Yeah see you in a few. Thanks.” I hung up. Kelsey looked at me. “Kristine went into labor.” I started packing up the girls’ things. “Ella, Amara!”
“Mikal, stop; I’ll get the girls and take them home and stay with them, you call me the second Jordan is born.”
“Thank you; and I will. When I call you if you could bring the girls up so we can get a family photo I’d really appreciate it.”
“No problem, now go. The girls and I will be fine. I promise.” I kissed her cheek and ran towards the house. I got there in half an hour and quickly shoved myself in the car, driving as fast as I could to the hospital.