a baby!”
“No, you’re a childish brat!”
Owen rinsed his hands and picked up his phone. His still wet thumbs flew over the letters.
Owen: Help.
Melanie: What’s wrong?
Owen: The girls are fighting.
Melanie: Any hair pulling or blood?
Owen: Not yet.
Melanie: Does big, strong Uncle Owen need help from little Auntie M? ;-)
Owen: Yes.
Melanie: LMAO on my way. Need anything?
Owen: No.
Melanie: Not even ice cream?
Owen hesitated. She knew his weakness for ice cream.
Owen: Okay but hurry.
Melanie: ;-)
The past weeks had settled into a routine. After the Fourth of July weekend, without fail, Melanie came to the house on Saturday night to play games, watch movies, do girly stuff with Abby and Sarah, and just be a part of the family. If it got too late, she crashed in the guest bedroom. This weekend, Beverly had a rare day off from her Sunday morning church service gig, and Connor had asked if he would take the kids for the weekend so they could have a date night somewhere besides home. They left this morning for a bed-and-breakfast place up in Hot Springs and planned on spending the evening soaking in one of the outdoor hot tubs.
Owen got to be the adult in charge, and Melanie had said she would help. He realized he needed it. Refereeing the kids’ squabbles turned out to be more than he thought. He hoped a trip to the emergency room for Mattie wouldn’t be necessary.
He pulled the golden brown boxty cakes from the pan when Sarah yelled through the house. “Auntie M is here!” One glance at her clean bare face and pink satchel told him what the evening’s activities included.
“Facials!” Both girls squealed and forgot their snit at each other.
“Are we doing nails, too?”
“Did you bring the natural clay mask or the oatmeal one?”
“Can I have another loofah? Mine fell apart.”
“How ’bout the hair mask stuff? Can we do that too?”
Melanie laughed. “Yes, all of it. I brought the organic natural stuff just for you, Abby.” She sniffed the air. “Oh, what is that heavenly smell?”
“Mosskey!” Mattie dove over the couch again, this time coming to a perfect sitting position. He bounced on the cushions in his excitement.
“Boxty,” Owen corrected.
“It’s potatoes made into pancakes. Uncle Owen made farty cabbage too.”
“Oh, really? Are you going to try to fart the alphabet tonight?”
Mattie stopped bouncing and looked at Melanie with wide, surprised eyes. “You can do that?”
Her laugh rang out. “Not me, monkey-butt. You. I’ve heard it’s possible, but you have to concentrate and practice a lot. I bet there’s a YouTube how-to video. When you try it later, point that weapon of mass destruction away from me, yeah?”
Owen shook his head and groaned. “You just gave the boy a life goal.”
She shrugged and moved to put two tubs of ice cream in the freezer. “Look at it this way, O-man. He’ll eat what you serve him tonight, and it will give him something to do that doesn’t involve swinging from the ceiling or sliding down the banisters.”
Owen turned off the burner and pulled the sausages from the oven where he’d kept them warm. “Oy, wash up. Food is ready.”
Dinner progressed without incident. All four kids ate plenty, and very little food was leftover. Even the cabbage disappeared. The boys took their turn in kitchen cleanup, while the girls set up for their night of girly pampering upstairs in Connor and Bevvie’s spacious room. Owen heard them argue over what movie to watch.
“Princess Bride?”
“We’ve seen that a hundred times. Pride and Prejudice?”
“That one is old.”
“So is Princess Bride. How ’bout Beauty and the Beast?”
“Animated or live version?”
“Live, of course.”
Owen’s respect for his sister-in-law and her patience grew with every sentence. How did she ever do this as a single parent?
The boys settled for video games. Owen sat and watched them play for a while, but the constant jerking movements of the screen made him dizzy. He climbed the stairs to check on the female population of the house and got a glimpse of three heads wrapped in towels and three faces covered in grayish, lumpy gunk. Abby shrieked when she spotted him looking in and slammed the door in his face.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, if he ever had children of his own, he hoped God would spare him the complexities of raising teenage girls.
He spent the rest of the evening with a book until the boys called it a night and scampered upstairs to bed. “Don’t forget to brush your teeth.”
“We know, Uncle Owen.”
He leaned against the banister and listened to flushing