Free Aurora 08 - Poppy Done To Death by Charlaine Harris

father’s, but I hoped she would get over it right now.
    “I think at least for this week. He’s out for Thanksgiving break now. I got the impression that things are going pretty badly between Dad and Betty Jo.” No point in spelling out my father’s peccadilloes. As far as my mother was concerned, it was an old story. “Phillip got caught up in the middle of that. He made his way over here, and I hope he can stay for a while. He’s so big now, Mother, you wouldn’t recognize him.”
    “Just like Phil, messing up a second chance to get it right,” my mother said.
    This was such a vulnerable way to put it, and her voice was so unhappy, it was hard for me to believe I was listening to the same stiff-backed woman who had created her own fortune after my dad had left her. The shock of Poppy’s death had cracked Mother wide open.
    “Have Poppy’s parents come in yet?”
    “No, they’ll be here in about an hour, I think. Then poor John will have to go through another emotional scene.”
    “Why?”
    “Well, he feels obligated.”
    “No, Mother. John David is obligated, not his dad. You make John go to bed, tell him John David and Avery can handle the Wynns. In fact, they can all go to Avery and Melinda’s. For that matter, I can put the Wynns up. I have another bedroom, and all I have to do is go make the bed.”
    That would make my life even even more confusing, but I wanted to help my mother any way I could.
    “I’ll give you a call back on that. But you’re right,” she said resolutely. “John needs to rest more than he needs to worry. Avery and Melinda are perfectly capable of handling whatever comes up. And poor John, he keeps thinking that he and John David are so alike because John lost his first wife and now John David’s lost his ... but the situation is totally different. Tell me, where was John David when you tracked him down?”
    “Ah, he was visiting a friend.” I closed my eyes at my own stupidity. That had sounded pretty lame.
    “Visiting a friend, in the afternoon of a workday.” My mother’s eyebrows were probably arched clear up to her hairline. “I’ll be willing to bet the friend is pretty and female and wasn’t wearing work clothes when she opened the door.”
    I winced. “Well...”
    “You don’t need to say anything else,” Mother said. “And Poppy, bless her heart, was just as bad. People these days are just like rabbits. Everything’s sex. No duty, no loyalty. By the way, where’s Robin?”
    I didn’t like her thought association there, and she was not the first person who’d asked me today where Robin was. We weren’t engaged and we weren’t talking about marriage. We weren’t a locked-in official couple.
    “He’s in Houston. He’ll be back day after tomorrow,” I said, sounding just as stiff as my mother.
    “Do you think he and Phillip will get along?”
    “Mother, you have enough to worry about right now. I believe I can handle Phillip and Robin.”
    “You’re right. Well, let me go. I have to convince John he’s not responsible for the whole social process surrounding Poppy’s death, and I have to remind John David that he is .”
    “Good luck, Mother. I’ll be there when I can. Remember, if the Wynns need a place to stay, the door is open. Just let me know thirty minutes ahead of time.”
    “Thanks, baby. I’ll talk to you soon.”
    Because I couldn’t seem to sit still, I went to the third bedroom and made the bed, just in case. If the Wynns drove in from their retirement community in the next hour, it would be at least another hour after that before they’d be ready to retire, and they might well want to go see Poppy’s body. Could they? Or would her body have already been sent to Atlanta for autopsy?
    I just didn’t know.
    I yawned, a big jaw-cracking yawn. I’d run out of steam.
    Phillip shambled into the living room and plopped down on the couch opposite my chair. He was looking much better, and he was smiling.
    “Thanks for the