Bubba's Tale - Encounter with Steve

The next time the swing flew into view it was empty and I heard my mother say that the stun gun was only for their protection and that Steve wasn't to get to close to the mutant. I was waiting for something that would explain these words when the gate to my yard swung open on some very rusty and very unused hinges and into my world entered my mother and a little boy, both wearing what appeared to be environment suits and my mother carrying what appeared to be a sawed-off shotgun. I quickly deduced this to be the aforementioned stun gun and started to shake from fear, the mutant must of somehow gotten past the safety fence and into my yard. My fear turned to puzzlement when I heard my mother say to Steve that mutants often shake when approached by strangers and that he had nothing to worry about. As I was the only thing in sight that was shaking, it suddenly dawned on me just what was going on.

You might be able to imagine my surprise at this nasty bit of enlightenment but the ongoing mind-expansion was not to end with this revelation, for the next thing I heard my mother say to Steve was that this was the mutant and that it was her boo boo, all the while she was pointing a finger directly at me. Steve was my older brother, it turned out, and he had a speech impairment that was acceptable to the folks that made up society. In fact, it was even considered cute by many, since he could not say the sound of a long "u", so he consequently called me "Ba-Ba" and could never count past one. After this fateful meeting, Steve was allowed to visit me, deeming it his duty to drop in on his pet mutant at least once a day, always taking painstaking care to don his environment suit and making sure that his fingers were never even remotely near my mouth. I grew to enjoy his afternoon chats, for he often would have a story of how his day had gone and even I found his speech impediment kind of cute.

And so Steve grew to the age of attending school when the daily visits came to an end and my folks grew perplexed since they were informed by the authorities that I would have to be allowed to attend school as it was my law-given right. I heard them argue outside the closed gate about enduring shame and ridicule and hadn't God already dealt them this thing called a bad hand. But the day came when the gate swung open on its rusty hinges and I was directed to quickly step into a yellow bus that had flashing red lights on it. I was on the way to school, a place that I was legally required to go 180 days a year for a purpose I had yet to determine. The yellow bus was not the school itself since the driver said that he would be glad when he got to the school so that he could unload something that belonged to a superfund effort. I was puzzling out what a superfund effort was when the door of the bus opened and all my fellow passengers exited, running for their lives and desirous of barf bags if I correctly made out the words they screamed into the air. I didn't need a barf bag as far as I could tell and felt quite safe so I exited the bus with what I hope appeared to be dignity.