Free Tats Too by Layce Gardner

really think we’re dead ?”
    Flora and Fauna look at each other and lay their palms across their respective hearts, exclaiming, “They don’t know!”
    Flora sits in the empty chair, reaches out and takes Vivian’s hand in hers. “Yes, darlin’, I hate to break it to you like this. But sometimes when you’re taken away unexpectedly, it takes the soul a little while to realize. Our husbands lived here with us for a good ten years after they died in that sinkhole accident.”
    Fauna lays a newspaper in front of me, ordering, “Read.”
    I look at the paper and immediately recognize the photo on the front page. It’s a picture of me and Vivian in the hospital with Georgia in my arms. Delia snapped the photo just a couple of hours after Georgia was born. The big, bold headline reads: EXPLOSION KILLS TWO LOCAL WOMEN.
    So that’s why they think we’re dead. They read about us in the morning paper. I was worried there for a minute.
    I push the paper under Vivian’s nose, saying, “They’re right, Vivian, we’re really dead.”
    I tap my finger on a paragraph, silently asking her read it. I see her eyes skim the words: The mysterious explosion surrounding the deaths of Lee Anne Hammond and Vivian Perelli aka Vivian Baxter is under investigation by the FBI. According to an anonymous source the two women were prime suspects in the disappearance of the renowned Devil’s Diamond. The two women were being watched by the FBI with the intent that they would lead the authorities to the La Cosa Nostra godfather responsible for the diamond’s theft two years ago…The remains of the two women and their child have not yet been found…ongoing investigation…”
    “If we run into that hateful-looking woman again, we’ll tell her you two are passed on,” Fauna says.
    “What woman?” I ask.
    Flora explains, “There was a woman all dressed like a cowboy with a badge and everything. She was down at the bingo hall last night showing your pitchers all ’round. Babbling on and on about diamonds and Eye-talians. Said she was with the…Federal Government.” She whispers the words Federal Government like how most people say the word cancer. “Those two words are a sure-fire way to get people to close their mouths for good.”
    Fauna continues, “She sure thought highly of herself.”
    “She’ll never catch a husband with that poor attitude,” Flora agrees.
    Vivian blinks a couple of times and nods at me.
    “Well,” I sigh, standing and wiping my mouth on a napkin, “I guess we better be getting along then. We need to get to heaven before they lock the doors on us.”
    “Yeah, that’s right,” Vivian says, “heaven, here we come.”
    Fauna stands, too. “Will you still talk to us after you’re there?”
    “Oh, sure,” I answer. “We’ll…uh…we’ll call you.”
    Flora smiles up at me and for a split second she looks seventeen again, “Will you tell our husbands hello for us? We haven’t heard hide nor hair of them for thirty years.”
    Vivian answers, “Of course we will. That’s the first thing we’ll do.”
    Fauna giggles, “Husbands, hell. Tell Elvis to look me up.” She fans herself with her fingers and blushes three shades of red all at once.
    I laugh. “I’ll do better than that. I’ll get him to sing a song just for you.”
    Fauna grabs me in a bone-crushing hug and I just have to say, “Uh, you do know that sausage is pork, right?”
    “Ssshhhh!” both sisters shush me at once. Flora leans in to my ear and whispers, “Don’t tell Wiggly. He doesn’t know.”
    “Oh. Okay.” I can’t help but laugh. I set a couple of our Hollywood premiere tickets on the table. “I know you probably can’t go, but here’s some tickets to a Hollywood movie premiere if you want.”
    “Hollywood?” both sisters say at the same time, giggling.
    “Yeah,” I answer, “we obviously can’t make it because…well, because we’re dead, you know.”
    Vivian and I work our way through the goodbyes and