He chuckled. “That gal is a stick of ol’ dynamite just waiting for a young ‘Sparky’ like you to come along. What’d ya do now to piss her off? Tell her the sky is blue?”
“I tried to save Cornelius from her clutches.”
“You’d have better luck lassoing a dust devil. Is Corny broken now?”
“The opposite, actually.” At least I was pretty sure that was the case.
“Yer kiddin’.”
“Not kidding. She made his antennae spin around for a few heartbeats, but now he’s picking up all of the usual channels plus a few new ones.”
“Hi, Mom!” Layne raced past me still wearing his school clothes—jeans and a T-shirt with a medieval knight on the front—only to slide to a stop and hit reverse. “Great gad-Zeus!” His hazel eyes were wide as he stared up at my face.
“I think you mean ‘gadzooks,’ kiddo,” I corrected, ruffling his blond hair. He and Doc were a pair with their Zeus exclamations today.
“What happened, Mom? Did you get into a fight at work?”
That was one way of putting it.
“Because if someone is bullying you,” he continued, “Doc can teach you how to defend yourself without getting in trouble with the principal. I mean, your boss.”
“Oh, really?”
Layne nodded. He knew from experience, I figured. Last fall he’d been getting picked on about me being a ghost-lover, or something like that, by a couple of little shits at school and ended up getting suspended for fighting. Doc must have given him some pointers on the side about dealing with bullies.
“I’ll have to ask Doc for help.”
Prudence was certainly a bully by definition, always picking on me about my boorish lineage and lack of intelligence. Maybe Doc could school me on how to make her stop being such a haughty pain in the keister.
“So, did you?” he pressed.
“Did I what?”
“Get into a fight at work?”
“No, honey. I just ran into someone’s elbow by accident.” I didn’t like lying to my kids, even though sometimes skirting the truth was necessary to keep them from waking up screaming in the night like their mother.
Layne’s brow lined. “Maybe you need some glasses like Addy, so you can see better.”
“Maybe.” I wished it was as simple to fix as putting on a pair of glasses. “Did you finish your homework?”
“Does a slug have four noses?” he shot back.
I wrinkled my nose at Harvey, who snickered. “I don’t think I want to look close enough to find out.”
“The answer is yes, Mom.”
“Great. I’m sure that piece of knowledge will save my life someday. Now go wash up for supper.”
“I need to get something from my room first. Harvey says we can eat in the living room on TV trays tonight because the table is going to be full.” He jumped up and down. “Can we, Mom? Please?”
Eating in front of the television was a treat for my kids, because it was much more fun than sitting at the table with boring adult talk. Although, I had a feeling that tonight’s subjects might be very interesting for a boy who was obsessed with medieval weapons and mythical beasts. A little too interesting for his worrywart mother.
“Harvey knows best.” I glanced toward the kitchen. “Where’s Doc?” I needed to blow off some steam, and he was my favorite vent. The Picklemobile had been in the driveway, so he must be around the house somewhere.
“He’s down in the basement with Addy,” Layne answered and rocketed up the stairs.
The pen for Addy’s chicken was kept down in Aunt Zoe’s basement, along with the equipment for Layne’s science experiments, a workbench, and some crates of old toys and whatnot.
I looked to Harvey. “Is something wrong with Elvis?”
I sure hoped not. There was going to be enough drama-filled wailing going on tonight without my daughter joining me because her pet chicken had a few feathers out of joint.
“There’s a lot wrong with that chicken,” Harvey said. “For starters, she’s a chicken who thinks she’s the tall dog of the pack.”
“I meant besides the obvious.”
He shook his head. “I think Addy is telling yer stallion about her plans to fix up the place and build a third story onto that bird’s pen.”
“Sheesh! You’d think that bird was royalty.”
“Well, she does share a name with the king of rock-n-roll.” He thumbed in the direction of the kitchen. “Reid’s making firehouse chili and cast iron skillet cornbread, and we need to set the table.”
I rubbed my stomach. “Cornbread and honey, yum.”
“I want to hear more about your colorful face.”
“I already told you about it.” I tossed my keys in the bowl on the sideboard.
“You told me the how but not the why.” He started for the kitchen.
“Wait.” I caught his arm, lowering my voice before asking, “How’s Aunt Zoe? Is she getting along with Reid?”
While my aunt had invited her old flame to come cook for her, her horns might still be out and poking Reid in the backside.
He shrugged. “She hasn’t ridden in from the range yet.”
“Good.” I frowned toward the kitchen. “You did hide her shotgun shells like we talked about, right?”
He huffed. “You think I spit upwind?”
“I haven’t put much thought into which way you spit.”
“Well, I don’t, and the first thing I did when I brought your whippersnappers home was find that box of shells and tuck ’em away in your underwear drawer.”
I cocked my head. “My underwear drawer?”
His two gold teeth shined through his whiskers. “Yep.”
What the planets? “Why there?”
“I wanted to see if your skivvies had company.”
“What sort of company?” Was he talking about a live mouse, like the one Addy’s cat, Bogart, had dragged into my room last month and left as a wakeup gift?
“The sort of company that comes with a pocket in the front for a love plunger.”
It took me a blink to realize what he was talking about, and then my cheeks warmed. “Harvey, whether Doc shares an underwear drawer with me is none of your business.”
“It is, too.”
“How do
