“I know,” Gaga said as she opened a drawer and grabbed a spoon. “I keep a secret stash for when I come to visit. Been doing it for years. Sorry, Belamie, but your love of vegetables is a little intense.”
“How did I not know this?” Corey said.
“Are you sure it’s not expired?” Mr. Hudson asked.
Gaga pulled off the lid and stabbed the spoon into the ice cream. She scooped out a big hunk, stuck it in her mouth, and let it sit there for a moment. “Tastes fresh to me.” She grabbed a handful of spoons and plopped everything down at the dining table. “Dig in, everyone. And start talking. Your days of mystery are over.”
It took hours to explain everything. And another pint of Chunky Monkey. (Corey could not get over this revelation.) By the time they reached the bottom of the third carton they’d told Gaga and Haha everything, albeit in a very haphazard fashion, all of them telling their own piece of the story and talking over each other. Mrs. Hudson told her true history and how she and Matthew met by means of his magical map.
“I’m surprised I didn’t guess it before,” Gaga said. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, Belamie, you’re very intelligent, and I always liked you, but it’s not really a shock to me that you’re not from this century.”
Mrs. Hudson seemed a little offended by this. “What do you mean? I’ve always been able to blend into society.”
“Ha!” Gaga laughed. “Blend, my foot. You slice apples with hunting blades, and you used to think Ben and Jerry were my very helpful neighbors instead of an ice cream brand!”
They all laughed as Mrs. Hudson’s face flushed. “Well, what was I supposed to think? You told me every time there’s a crisis in your life you go straight to Ben and Jerry and they always help you out no matter what. How was I supposed to know you were talking about ice cream?”
“Because everyone knows that?” Corey said.
“Exactly!” Gaga said, pointing at Corey. “I mean, there are odd people who live under rocks, but this was something else entirely.”
Matt, too, had memories of his mother’s odd ineptitudes, blank spaces of knowledge of common, everyday things. He hadn’t thought much of it at the time, just chalked it up to the fact that she was an immigrant and English was not her first language, but after he learned the truth it made much more sense why she’d never learned how to ride a bike, or when she thought a jump rope was some kind of weapon, or why she could never quite understand how the internet worked.
Uncle Chuck and Haha both told their strange tales of how they’d been abducted by Captain Vincent. Apparently, when Haha had gone for a hike, Captain Vincent had mistaken him for Matthew Hudson, then realizing he’d gotten the wrong person, went back and took Charles Hudson, thinking he was Matthew, then discarded them both in the Hudson Bay in the year 1611.
“I managed to escape,” Uncle Chuck said, “thanks to Dad and Jia”—he nodded at Jia, who flushed and looked down—“but I got dropped off in the wrong decade, and well, that was that.”
“Oh, Charles,” said Gaga, placing her hand on top of his. “My baby boy. You’ve been here all these years, and I didn’t even know it. But how could I? I admit, I always thought there was something familiar about you, but how could I possibly have known? Oh, Charles!” She broke down and wrapped her arms around her long-lost son.
Chuck stiffened. He looked helplessly at his brother. Mr. Hudson nodded his head, smiling, and Chuck tentatively put his arms around his mother and patted her awkwardly on the back. “It’s okay, Mom. I’m here now.”
Matt caught Corey grimacing. Ruby gave him a sharp look, but Matt couldn’t blame him. The whole scene was a bit weird. A mother comforting her son who was now about the same age as her.
After a long embrace in which Uncle Chuck looked more trapped than anything, Gaga finally released him and pulled away. She dabbed at her eyes with the edge of her sleeve.
“And, Henry . . . ,” Gaga said, but then she seemed to lose her words.
“Gloria, I’m so sorry,” Haha said. “I can’t imagine all you’ve been through, what you must have thought happened.”
“Well, at least I know you didn’t run off with some floozy, like Patty Chesterton always said.”
Haha sputtered a laugh. “Is that what that busybody told you? And you believed her?”
“Not really,” Gaga said. “I told the boys you disappeared while hiking in Patagonia.”
“Ha!” Haha said, slapping his knee.
“What’s so funny about that?” Corey asked.
“Because she actually told me to hike to Patagonia!”
Gaga looked away, but Matt could see her neck was reddening.
“Why did you tell him to hike to Patagonia?” Corey asked.
“I don’t know,” Gaga said. “I think I saw Patagonia on your father’s atlas and it just came out.”
“But why did you tell him to hike there?”
“We were having a fight,” Haha said.
“It was not a fight!” Gaga said. “It was a disagreement.”
“Sure, a very loud disagreement.”
“What did you fight about?” Corey asked.
“Corey, mind your own business,” Ruby chided.
“I don’t remember,” Gaga said, still turning away. “It was too long ago.”
“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Haha said. “Oh wait, it was yesterday. We were fighting about toothpaste.”
Corey made a face. “Toothpaste? Who fights about toothpaste?”
“We fight about it all the time!” Ruby said. “You’re always leaving the cap off and the toothpaste gets squirted all over the drawer.”
“And you always squeeze from the top instead of the bottom,” Matt said. It drove him nuts.
“And you put the toilet paper on the wrong way!” Ruby shot back.
“I do not. You do!”
“Seriously, it doesn’t matter which way it goes,” Corey said. “You’re such weirdos.”
At this Haha started laughing and then Gaga joined in. It seemed this was very similar to the argument they’d had
