girl,â I said. âTell my mother that. Say, âJalena, sheâs a big girl.ââ
âSheâs your mother,â he said. âYouâre always going to be a child to her. Donât you know once babies are born, itâs your job to keep them safe? Forever. No matter how old they get.â
âBah,â I said.
âI know, realistically, when they leave home youâre supposed to cut the umbilical cord, but honestly, a parent never stops being a parent,â he said.
âHow would you know?â I said. Colin was childless.
âBecause my mother told me so,â Colin said. âAnd so has yours. Besides, you donât have to be a parent to understand that you just canât turn some things off.â
There were times I underestimated him. He would never know about those times, but they did happen all the same.
Ten
The next morning I went downstairs at five oâclock to repeat the process of the morning beforeâonly when I descended the steps I entered the land of Oz. Mrs. OâShea had just placed a huge stack of pancakes in front of Rudy and poured him a deep and wide cup of black coffee. My kitchen sparkled and smelled of lemons and ammonia. There was not a crumb on the floor, not a speck on the counter, and the food looked scrubbed, too.
Even Fritz, my wiener dog, looked as though heâd been shampooed. Sitting under the table looking up at me with one of those purely canine expressions, he didnât seem to be too happy about it.
âGood morning, Torie,â she said. âHope you donât mind that I tidied up a bit, but I just couldnât cook with the kitchen the way it was. I realize your housecleaning day wasnât until tomorrow. Probably.â
My housecleaning day was on whatever day I had the smallest amount of other things to do.
âWould you like some pancakes? I know theyâre Rudyâs favorite.â
âNo, thank you,â I said.
âCoffee?â
âNo, thanks again.â I would have day-old Krispy Kremes and warm Dr Pepper before I would eat those treacherous pancakes. Sheâd probably poisoned mine, anyway.
âI told the sheriff not to bother coming over this morning to watch the kids. Iâve got it under control,â she said.
The truth was, the kids would want to spend the time with her, and that was fine, but it irritated me just a bit that sheâd taken it upon herself to make that decision. It was a minor thing and from anybody else wouldnât have bothered me in the least. Take a deep breath, Torie. Itâs fine. Sheâs done nothing wrong. Iâm just overreacting because sheâs ticked me off over everything else under the sun .
I canât express how proud I was that Iâd just talked myself out of making a big deal out of nothing. If I could just do that for the next monthâseveral times a dayâIâd survive this, and what doesnât kill you makes you stronger. Iâd be in line to be the next Powerpuff Girl. I would be able to tame lions. I ⦠I ⦠I could bring about world peace and stop worldwide starvation.
âOh, and really, Torie, that mayor of yours is just the most charming fella. He and I see eye to eye on a lot of issues. Especially over those chickens in your backyard. Itâs just a breeding ground for disease. You know, that Hong Kong flu started with chickens,â she said. âThe children could get the Hong Kong flu from just standing in your backyard.â
The people in the world would keep on killing each other, and whoever didnât die in war would starve, and the lions would eat me, because there was no way in hell I could talk myself down from this one. So instead of putting up an argument, I grabbed the keys for Rudyâs truck and headed out the door.
âTorie!â I heard Rudy call after me. âWhere are you going?â
âTo the freaking Strawberry Festival!â I