I locked the SUV in the garage, ran into the house, into the living room.
'The wedding rehearsal is tonight,' I yelled at Morelli. 'The wedding rehearsal!'
Morelli was working his way through a bag of chips. 'And?'
'And we have to be there. We're in the wedding party. It's my sister. I'm the maid of honor. You're the best man.'
Morelli set the chips aside. 'Tell me those aren't blood splatters on your shoes.'
'I sort of punched Anthony Barroni in the nose.'
'Anthony Barroni was at Rangeman?'
'It's a long story. I haven't time to go into it all. And you don't want to hear it anyway. It's . . . embarrassing.' I had Bob clipped to his leash.
'I'm taking Bob out, and then I'm going to help you get dressed.' I dragged Bob out the back door and walked him around Morelli's yard. 'Do you have to go, Bob?' I said. 'Gotta tinkle? Gotta poop?'
Bob didn't want to tinkle or poop in Morelli's yard. Bob needed variety. Bob wanted to tinkle on Mrs. Rosario's hydrangea bush, two doors down.
'This is it!' I yelled at Bob. 'You don't go here and you're holding it in until I get back from the stupid rehearsal dinner.'
Bob wandered around a little and tinkled. I could tell he didn't have his heart in it, but it was good enough, so I dragged Bob inside, fed him some dog crunchies for dinner, and gave him some fresh water. I ran upstairs and got clothes for Morelli. Slacks, belt, button-down shirt. I ran back downstairs and shoved him into the shirt, and then realized he couldn't get the slacks over the cast. He was wearing gray sweatpants with one leg cut at thigh level.
'Okay,' I said, 'the sweats are good enough.' I took a closer look. Pizza sauce on the long leg. Not good enough. I ran upstairs and rummaged through Morelli's closet. Nothing I could use. I rifled his drawers. Nothing there. I went through the dirty clothes basket, found a pair of khaki shorts, and ran downstairs with the shorts.
'Ta-dah!' I announced. 'Shorts. And they're almost clean.' I had Morelli out of his sweatpants in one fast swoop. I tugged the shorts up and zipped them.
'Jeez,' Morelli said. 'I can zip my own shorts.'
'You weren't fast enough!' I looked at my watch. It was almost six o'clock! Yikes. 'Put your foot on the coffee table, and I'll get shoes on you.'
Morelli put his foot on the coffee table, and I stared up his shorts at Mr. Happy.
'Omigod,' I said. 'You're wearing boxers. I can see up your shorts.'
'Do you like what you see?'
'Yes, but I don't want the world seeing it!'
'Don't worry about it,' Morelli said. 'I'll be careful.'
I pulled a sock on Morelli's casted foot, and I laced a sneaker on the other. I raced upstairs, and I changed into a skirt and short-sleeved sweater.
I threw my jean jacket over the sweater, grabbed my bag, got Morelli up on his crutches, and maneuvered him to the kitchen door.
'I hate to bring this up,' Morelli said. 'But aren't you supposed to take the cello?'
The cello. I squinched my eyes closed, and I rapped my head on the wall. Thunk, thunk, thunk. I took a second to breathe. I can do this, I told myself.
Probably I can play a little something. How hard can it be? You just do the bowing thing back and forth and sounds come out. I might even turn out to be
good at it. Heck, maybe I should take some lessons. Maybe I'm a natural talent and I don't even need lessons. The more I thought about it, the more logical it sounded. Maybe I was always meant to play the cello, and I'd just gotten sidetracked, and this was God's way of turning me in the direction of my true calling.
'Wait here,' I said to Morelli. 'I'll put the cello in the car, and I'll come back to get you.'
I ran into the living room and hefted the cello. I carted it into the kitchen, past Morelli, out the door, and crossed the yard with it. I opened the garage door, rammed the cello into the back of the SUV, dropped my purse onto the driver's seat, and returned to the kitchen for Morelli. I realized he was just wearing a cotton shirt. No sweater on him. No jacket. And it was cold out. I ran upstairs and got a jacket. I helped him into the jacket, stuffed the crutches back under his arms, and helped him navigate through the back door and down the stairs.
We started to cross the yard, and the garage exploded with enough force to rattle the windows in Morelli's house.
The garage was wood with an asbestos-shingle roof. It hadn't been in the best of shape, and Morelli seldom used it. I'd been using it to keep the SUV bomb-free, but I now saw the flaw in the plan. It was an old garage without an automatic door opener. So to make things easier, I'd left the garage open when not in use. Easy to pull in and park. Also easy to sneak in and plant a bomb.
Morelli and I stood there, dumbstruck. His garage had gone up like fireworks and had come down like confetti. Splintered boards, shingles, and assorted car parts fell out of the sky into Morelli's yard. It was Mama Mac all over again. Almost nothing was left of the garage. Morelli's SUV was a fireball.
His yard was littered with smoldering junk.
'Omigod!' I said. 'The cello was in your SUV.' I pumped my fist into the air and did a little dance. 'Yes! Way to go! Woohoo! There is a God and He loves me. It's good-bye cello.'
