“So, you are coming with us to spread the ashes tomorrow, right?” Aunt Sue asked.
I nodded. “Right.” It was the least I could do. Especially considering Mrs. Carmichael was now residing in a leftovers receptacle.
“Good. We’ll leave at eight. The gates open at nine.”
“Gates?” I asked, grabbing onto the word. Suddenly I had a bad feeling about this.
Aunt Sue blinked innocently at me. “Yes. They don’t open until nine in the fall.”
“What doesn’t open until nine?’
“Disneyland.”
Mental forehead smack.
“Disneyland? Wait-you’re spreading Mrs. Carmichael’s ashes at Disneyland?”
The aunts nodded in unison.
“It’s what Hattie wanted,” Aunt Sue spoke up. “She was the first Mickey Mouse, you know. Her fondest memories are of the Magic Kingdom.”
“It is the happiest place on earth,” Millie added solemnly.
I shook my head. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s not legal to spread human remains there.”
“No one will ever notice,” Aunt Millie assured me.
I had a hard time believing that.
“I don’t think this is a good idea.” I looked to Cal to back me up.
Thankfully, he nodded in agreement this time. “She’s right. They have security cameras all over that place.”
Aunt Millie waved me off. “No one’s going to bother a couple of old women.”
“Dropping ashes from a Hello Kitty container?!”
“Oh, we got that covered,” Aunt Sue assured me.
I hated to even ask. “Covered?”
She nodded. “We’re going to transfer her into one of those souvenir soda bottles as soon as we get in the park. No one will bother us carrying around a soda pop. Then we’ll just kinda tip the cup over a little and, voila, she’s in her favorite place.”
I felt faint.
“Where exactly are you going to do this?”
“On It’s a Small World,” Aunt Sue replied. “Hattie loved that ride. Hattie was the first Mickey Mouse, you know.”
Yes. I knew.
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” I said for the third time in as many minutes.
But I got two pairs of bony arms crossed over two pairs of saggy boobs and two matching glares. “This is what Hattie wanted,” Aunt Sue told me. “She was taken from this world too soon. The least we can do is honor her last wish. You’d honor my last wish, wouldn’t you?”
I bit my lip. “Yes?” Only it came out more of a question.
“Then it’s settled. We leave at eight.”
I opened mouth to protest…but realized it was futile. With or without me, these two were going to deposit Hattie Carmichael on It’s a Small World tomorrow. Unless I wanted to spend the afternoon bailing them out of jail, I’d better make sure they did it stealth-like.
“Oh, this is going to be so fun!” Aunt Sue said, clapping her hands. “I love Disneyland. You know, Hattie Carmichael was the very first Mickey Mouse.”
Lord help me.
The next morning I awoke to the sight of fuzzy Elvis staring down at me. Again. What I wouldn’t have given to be back in my own room.
I stumbled out of bed, rubbing my eyes, making my way on autopilot through the house toward the scent of coffee. Cal was already at the kitchen table, sipping his cup, reading the paper. Aunt Sue was frying bacon. Or, more accurately, burning bacon.
I wrinkled my nose. “I think it’s done.”
“What?” she asked, over the sizzling sounds.
“I think the bacon’s done!”
“What did you say?”
“It’s burnt!” I yelled.
Aunt Sue looked down at the blacked strips in her pan. “Oh. So it is. Oh well, I guess we’ll just have eggs,” she said, shrugging her shoulders as she reached into the refrigerator.
Just in case, I popped a couple pieces of sourdough into the toaster.
“By the way,” Aunt Sue said, cracking eggs into a bowl, “your cell’s been going off all morning.” She gestured to my purse sitting on the counter.
I popped it open and looked at my phone readout. Four calls. All from Felix. I bit my lip. Apparently he’d read my column.
I was just contemplating putting the phone on mute, when Cal slammed his coffee cup down on the kitchen table behind me.
“What the hell is this?” he asked.
I spun around to find Cal-a very pissed off Cal-holding up today’s
I guess Felix wasn’t the only one doing some early morning reading.
“Um…my column.”
“Obviously. Are you out of your mind?”
Aunt Sue angled around him to read it, then did a subdued little, “Oh, my,” her big, round eyes going my way.
I crossed my arms over my chest in a defensive posture.
“What the hell were you thinking?” Cal asked.
“What? I should just sit back and let this creep systematically destroy everything around me? I can’t go home, I’m being babysat twenty-four seven, my neigh-bor’s dead, and someone’s trying to blow me up! Everywhere I go this guy is threatening me. I’m sick of it!”
“The police-” he started.
But I cut him off. “The police aren’t doing jack. You saw them test the scene yesterday-they came up with nothing. I’m tired of chasing leads to nowhere. I’m calling this guy out in the open.”
“And if he doesn’t turn himself in?”
I sighed. “I’m not stupid. There’s no way he’s turning himself in.”
Cal narrowed his eyes. “Then what exactly do you expect to accomplish with this bluff?” He threw the paper down on the table.
“Don’t you watch any cop shows?”
He didn’t answer, just glared.
“If he doesn’t want to see his name in the paper as a murderer, he’s got to shut me up before I turn in my column for tomorrow.”
Something shifted behind Cal’s eyes. “Shut you up.”
I nodded.
“You mean-”
“I mean he’s going to come after me, and that’s when I’ll catch him red-handed.”
A muscle twitched in Cal’s jaw. “No.”
“What do you mean, ‘no’?”
“No way am I letting you use yourself as bait.”
“This isn’t about you
“Over my dead body.”
“Don’t tempt me,” I countered.
Cal threw his hands up in the air. “This is dangerous, reckless, and about the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Are you calling me stupid?” I thrust my chin up, hands on hips.
