Peter took notice but pretended not to, stealing glances at her from the couch as she darted past.
“Peter, after we get Uncle Herb, I have to go out for a bit. I need to take a shower now.”
“Who is staying home with us?” Peter wanted to know. If she said nobody or gave a line saying how he was old enough now to be trusted, that meant he was babysitting CJ. Kids got good money to babysit, and that’s where he wanted to lead the conversation. Plus, these handsomely paid babysitters weren’t watching CJ; there should be some extra combat pay for that.
“Uncle Herb will be here,” she said, as if this was the most ordinary thing in the world.
“Really?” Peter loved his Uncle dearly, but he was not what you’d describe as the typical babysitter.
Abby stopped what she was doing and placed her hands on her hips. “Really. Problem?”
“No,” Peter said. Unlike CJ, he knew when not to push his mother. The hand-on-the-hip thing was a dead giveaway. The topic of monetary compensation would have to wait.
“Please wake up your sister now. I’m in a hurry,” Abby said.
Peter’s shoulders sagged. He had just given in to his mother, and this was how he was rewarded?
The Worst Things To Do In The Morning—A List by Peter Grady.
1. Wake Up.
2. Wake Up CJ.
A tornado outbreak from the minute she woke, CJ slept on her back, totally still with her hands folded over her chest. Her resting pose always freaked Peter out, as if his little sister was part vampire or something. And she slept hard. You could shake her, and she’d roll a little like a large log, only to return to the original resting spot. She had resisted a set bedtime since she was two, and now that their father was out of town a lot, Abby didn’t have the energy at night to battle and enforce. So she let CJ run and run until she was totally out of gas, then she’d find her curled in some random spot—the middle of the hallway, under the kitchen table—and Abby would carry her to bed.
Peter hovered over her bed. He sighed.
“Wake up, CJ.”
Baby Vampire didn’t respond. Her interwoven fingers sat motionless on her chest.
He stood on the bottom of her mattress and jumped up and down, chanting “Wake up!” but CJ’s body just moved with the waves.
Frustrated, Peter jumped off the bed and headed to the door. “All right, CJ, we’re picking up Uncle Herb. See you later.”
CJ bounced into the air. “Where’s my lasso?”
Peter had CJ buckled into her car seat, eating a granola bar and drinking a juice box, when their mother crashed out of the front door running to the car, buttoning her blouse and pushing her wet hair over her ears. A look of bewilderment crossed her face as she reached the car.
“You got her dressed too?” she said, pointing to the Wonder Woman outfit on CJ, accumulating bits of granola crumbs by the mouthful.
“She slept in it.”
Abby dropped her purse at Peter’s feet in the passenger’s seat. She shook her head, impressed. “I don’t know, Peter. Sometimes I think you’re more cut out for this gig than me.”
* * *
Uncle Herb lived in a group home, a twenty-minute ride from the Creek. Peter didn’t know the exact definition of a group home; it’s what his mother had always called the place, but from what he could gather a group home was where several people lived, related only by the fact they all were disabled, and the house had staff acting as caretakers.
Back when they were house hunting, Abby’s conditions were a ranch home for its wheelchair accessibility and no farther than a half hour from her brother. She wanted her brother to feel welcome, though Herb hadn’t spent any significant time there as of yet. They had moved in right after Peter’s summer vacation last year, and during Christmas, Nick was adamant about going skiing over the holidays. He was so stressed out over the new business that Abby didn’t fight him on it, but she wished she had. She spent much of Christmas morning feeling guilty, thinking how her brother had to spend it with only the staff who worked in his home. It was the first Christmas they’d ever spent apart.
In turn, Abby’s conditions annoyed Nick, who didn’t like the location limitations or the nixing of his dream to buy and restore an old Victorian, though Abby’s rebuttal that it was too much of a project for them was valid. Nick would never admit it, but DIY was a letter combination that didn’t agree with him. He was hapless with a hammer, and his only experience and knowledge of construction had been gleaned from watching home improvement shows on television.
“How long is Uncle Herb staying with us?” Peter asked as he fiddled with the air conditioner vents, then the radio station presets—anything to distract him from his mother’s aggressive driving. Cars in the process of being towed had more distance from the bumper in front of them than the poor car Abby was tailgating now.
It didn’t help Peter’s nerves that his mother was applying eyeliner as she drove.
The car in front braked and Peter winced.
“Mom, can you pay attention to the road?”
She pointed to Peter with her eyeliner pencil. “Hey, the driver controls the radio,” she said and pressed the button setting for the “all news, all the time” station. “Uncle Herb has two weeks of vacation. Hopefully, he’ll stay the whole time, but I’ll leave that up to him. Sometimes it’s easier for him to be in his own environment.”
“Uncle Herb, yay!” CJ cheered from the backseat.
Listening to the all news station was a form of torture on Peter’s ears. What a broken record, repeating the same things every twenty minutes, especially now with the drought and all. Today will be super hot and super dry outside. Tomorrow the same. The next day, ditto. And the next day, well, you know where I’m going with this, right? the radio host blabbed.
A citrus scent floated under Peter’s nose. He turned to his mother and noticed the pressed slacks and expensive blouse. It wasn’t unusual for his mother to wear sweatpants the entire day.
“Why are you so dressed up?”
She smiled. “Do I look pretty?”
Peter hated when she asked him that. She was his mother.
“Well, if you need to know, nosy pants, I might be going back to work. Just part-time though. Mrs. Stewart is doing quite well in real estate, and she wants me to come in today and talk to her boss. I can work a flexible schedule, and to tell you the truth, I think I might be good at that type of work. We met a lot of those agents when we were looking for our house. They weren’t anything special. I’ll just need to get my real estate license, but I can cobroker some deals for now.”
Peter turned around to see if CJ was listening. She was off in her own world, rigging her lasso into some sort of pulley system, stringing it through the seat and around the seat belt latches. Peter turned back to his mother.
“Why?” he wanted to know.
“Because you need a license to sell homes, silly.”
“No, why do you need to go back to work? Dad makes a boatload of money now. He says it all the time. Why do you have to work too?”
She seemed taken aback by the question, but Peter didn’t see anything wrong with it. He was confused, so he asked. Whatever happened to “there’s no such thing as a stupid question?”
Abby’s eyes darted back