I sigh happily and pat her shoulder. “I’ve taught you so well, Spawn.”
“You have, Spawner, but you are also wrong. Coffee is gross, tea is gross, and this is heaven. All beverages are better with fruit. And that’s what I hope Nina says in her blog post.”
“Ah, to be young and innocent,” I declare, taking another life-sustaining sip of my beverage as we wander past the yoga studio where I’ve tried, I swear I’ve tried, to Savasana with LaTanya. “But if you continue to insist on this fruit-tea-is-better blasphemy, I’ll leave it to you to fend off all the questions about our new neighbor.”
She gasps. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me.”
She points at me like I’m a death-eater. “You’re not that evil.”
“I might be.” We slow at the corner of Mallard Lane then turn onto our street.
“I refuse to believe it, even of you.”
I tap my plastic cup to hers. “Fine. You’re right. I still like you too much to do that. But remember, that can change at a moment’s notice—you’ve been warned.”
“Hmm. I think you’re bluffing. You won’t stop liking me, because I am literally the best.”
Confidence. It’s one of the many things I love about this kid, as well as how she makes my budding business look good online. “If you keep sassing me about tea, I make no promises,” I tell her. “Feel free to call me the worst mother in the world.”
“You’re the worst.”
We stroll past a yard so lush and green that it looks like a jewel. Betty Juniper is watering the poppies in her garden as she shamelessly peers at the yellow home next to mine. As our steps grow louder, she whips her gaze our way. Excitement shimmers in her eyes, and she calls out in a stage whisper, “Psst! January! I need to talk to you.”
Ooh, Betty always has good stuff to share.
“Hi, Betty. How are your flowers?”
“My flowers? Oh, they’re fine.” She waves her free hand, the garden hose in the other apparently forgotten as it soaks her peonies and poppies and spatters the white picket fence.
“Ahem, Betty.” I peer at the ground, which is becoming more of a lake. “You might want to reposition the hose.”
“Yes, I think your poppies are donning their life jackets.” Wednesday points to the vibrant orange flowers. Betty just blinks at her, so she tries again. “Because they’re about to be submerged.”
Yeah, this girl has no problem speaking her mind.
Betty’s slate-blue eyes bug out as she finally notices the flood, which has broken the banks of the flower bed and is quickly turning into a bog. She fumbles to twist the nozzle so the deluge is more of a trickle. Then she drops the hose, and this woman who is so committed to a green thumb tromps across the lawn, giving absolutely no fucks what her navy-blue wellies do to the wet grass.
She must have something vital on her mind, to put it mildly.
She forges past the fence and marches up to me on the sidewalk. “Listen. About eight minutes and ten seconds ago, I saw a red sedan that looked suspiciously like a rental car drive by.”
Oh, that’s how we’re doing this? We’re Miss Marple-ing the single man’s every move?
“The car slowed outside the yellow house next to yours, but I couldn’t discern whether it pulled into the driveway. But let me tell you, I got a look at the man behind the wheel, and oh me, oh my, he was a kalamata olive.”
“Earmuffs,” I tell Wednesday.
Cue my daughter’s second eye roll of the day. “It’s nothing I don’t hear all the time, Mom.”
“Even so, you don’t need to know about the olive scale.”
With a third roll of her green irises, my daughter hands me her cup and covers her ears.
Betty’s expression is staunchly serious as she dives into a topic worth drowning her perfect grass for. “We are talking full kalamata here. You know what I mean?” She deals me several girl, we’re in this together nods.
I fasten on a smile, strapping in for the Naughty Betty ride. “You mean you wanted to sink your teeth into him?” I’ve heard her scale many times, especially over the last month, since every time I’ve seen her, she asks if I’ve met the man yet.
“Oh, yes,” she says, adopting a deep Barry White bedroom baritone. “Sink them right into his tush.”
Hold on a hot second. “How did you see his tush if he was driving?”
She laughs, shaking her head, all very Silly child, Trix are for kids. “You don’t have to see something to believe in it,” she says. “And I believe in your new neighbor’s yummy butt.” Putting up her hand, she forestalls a reply I wasn’t going to make. “But this isn’t about me. This is for my youngest daughter, Missy. She’s single again, and well, you know how it goes here. Something in the water causes a disproportionate number of women to spring from our wombs.”
