A Little Rhine Must Fall (10 page)

I closed my eyes briefly and tried to think of something nice to say. My mother had always told us “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” Karen, my older sister, was the only one who took that seriously when we were kids and would refuse to talk to me for days on end.

I thought some more. I had already explained to Carolyn (more than once) that Cassidy just wasn’t ready to be potty trained and that I wasn’t going to make a huge deal over it. When she was ready, she would be ready. Apparently none of those conversations had stuck in Carolyn’s head. I also was
not
going to discuss my pregnancy with her. Mark could do that. As soon as he knew about it.

The good news was that I only had to deal with the anti-pregnancy comments for the next eight months. As soon as the baby was
here
, she would fall in love with him and spoil him just like she did the girls. Take Cassidy for example. Carolyn hadn’t wanted us to have two kids (she’d only had one, ergo, one was the correct option). She conveniently forgot her reservations the moment Cassidy arrived and I was sure she would do the same for this baby … when he arrived … in eight months.

I settled for a non-committal, “Mmhmm?”

“Good,” Carolyn said. “I’m so happy we agree.” Megan called her and she ran off to see what spoiling she could do.

Cassidy struggled to get off the changing table and I had to hold her down with one arm while I pulled her shorts back up. Then she was off like a shot as soon as her feet hit the ground. I was wondering how much longer Carolyn was planning on hanging out as I headed into the hall bathroom to wash my hands. I stopped cold.

Previously, I had decorated the bathroom with light purple walls, dark purple towels, and a purple and red, Indian style shower curtain. All that was gone. I blinked. Nope. Still gone. It was replaced by pink. Bright pink, frilly shower curtain, with sequins and glitter. Pink, fluffy towels, and a gold and pink bathmat. Even the generic Great Value soap dispenser had been replaced with a pink and glittery gold monstrosity. I thought the walls were still purple, but it was hard to tear the eyes away from all the pink.

I stuck my head out of the bathroom. “Umm, Carolyn?”

“Oh, that’s right!” she called. “Megan, go tell your mommy about our little surprise!”

Megan came running to the bathroom door. “Mommy! Mommy! Granny brought bea-
u
-tiful pink pretties for the bathroom! Can we keep them? Please?
Please?
Granny says we can keep them if you say okay! Can we? Please?”

My smile was about to crack my jaw. Just like
everyone
in the world, I just
loved
it when someone came in and decorated my house for me. Without asking me. In front of my children. There was no way to reject the pink monstrosity without being the bad guy to my daughters. Touche, Carolyn, touche.

I caught sight of my face in the bathroom mirror and adjusted it. “I’m going to kill you,” was probably not the best look to show the grandmother of my children. I chose a nice, “How lovely” face and hoped it stayed in place.

The only silver lining would be
Mark’s
face when he came in and saw the remodel. Since Carolyn was
his
mother, he had no problem letting her know exactly how he felt on certain issues. And a pink bathroom would definitely be one of the issues that he would feel strongly about.

I joined Carolyn in the living room. “So … pink,” was all I could really think of. Not the most intelligent comment.

“Yes,” she smiled, thrilled that I loved it. Or else, thrilled that I hated it and had to pretend to love it. I never knew with her. Did she
intentionally
try to be horrid, or was that just her natural charm? “I’d noticed that your old shower curtain was getting a little ratty, and I ran across the new one while I was shopping the other day. I just
had
to get it for the girls. Don’t you just love the glitter?”

No. I hate glitter. Hate might seem like a strong word to some people, especially when used about something as innocuous as glitter. Those people would also have had little actual experience with glitter. The thing about glitter is that it never stays where you put it. It spreads. Rather like the bubonic plague. Soon everyone in the house is breaking out in spots and the fact that those spots are small and shiny doesn’t make it any better.

Besides, my shower curtain was
not
getting ratty. It had never been used as a shower curtain. The girls always took baths. It was there for looks. A look that
I
had picked out. A look that was
not
pink and gold and glitter. Call me crazy, but I thought that I should have the right to decorate my own house the way I wanted it decorated.

Maybe I should show up at Carolyn’s townhome with pink plastic flamingoes. If I could get the girls excited about them and have
them
stick the birds in the yard …

“Can we keep it, Mommy?” Megan begged again. “It’s so beautiful!”

“Booful,” Cassidy echoed.

“We’ll talk to your father about it,” I said with a strained smile. Oh, yes. You had better believe that we would be talking to your father about it. My smile turned evil. If my reaction to the hideous pink was strong, Mark’s would be Chernobyl, and it would explode all over Carolyn. Oh, how sweet is revenge!

“Can Granny stay for dinner?” Megan asked loudly. Crap. How many times did I have to go over the rules of etiquette with her? Never, never,
ever
ask if someone can stay for dinner in front of that person. We obviously needed to review our Emily Post.

“Well, honey, I’m sure Granny has other plans,” I said, clearing meaning “No.”

“No,” Carolyn said, “I really don’t have any other plans.”

My smile faltered. What planet did this woman come from that she couldn’t take a hint? Maybe the aliens were already among us! Maybe my motherin-law had been body-snatched by little green men! Nah. She’d been like this for years and the aliens had only just arrived. If only things could be that easy.

“I really hadn’t thought about dinner yet,” I stammered. It was a lie. I
had
thought about dinner. I had thought about asking Mark to pick up Taco Bell on the way home from work, but I wasn’t going to tell
her
that.

“Stay for dinner,
please
!” Megan begged. I was going to shoot her. I was going to take her out in the backyard and go Old Yeller on her.

“If it’s okay with your Mommy,” Carolyn told her.

I wanted to scream. It was hours until dinner time. I would be a third wheel in my own home. Ignored by my children and my motherin-law. Unable to relax. Why couldn’t she read body language? It was like we were speaking different languages. I didn’t scream, I caved. Standards and ideals are good up to a point. But sometimes a girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do. Later I could beat myself up about how much I was using my ability for little things, but right now I was just going to roll with it.

“Granny has to go home,” I commanded with the Voice. “Carolyn, thank you for watching the girls. Please go home now.”

She left. Hallelujah! She packed up her bags, kissed the girls goodbye, gave me halfhearted hug and left! Megan and Cassidy almost started the bit where they screamed and cried when she was leaving, but one death glare from me and they instantly shut-up and waved goodbye quietly. They knew the facial signs; it was not a day to test Mommy.

The rest of the afternoon went peacefully by. No jaunts around the world. No Klingon attacks. No visits from Satan’s henchman. Just peace and quiet. Megan and Cassidy played nicely together for once and I even managed to throw three loads of laundry through the wash. (Well, two really. One was a load that I had washed the day before and had forgotten to move to the dryer and had to
rewash
since it had soured.)

Mark was a hero and brought Taco Bell, which was always a big hit, and there were only a few dishes to clean up while he tried to herd the girls to the bathtub. For a day that had started with such drama, this one was ending pretty peacefully. I briefly wondered where Bastet had gone, but figured that, since I had done my bit and gone to the moon, she had moved on to bigger and better people to bother.

Megan and Cassidy loved getting a bath, but also knew that it heralded the approach of bedtime, which was not a favorite, so they were stalling for all they were worth.

Megan sat down cross-legged on the floor, propped her head on her little hands and asked Mark, “So, Daddy. Tell us about your childhood.”

He fell for it. “Well, Megan,” he sat down next to her and pulled Cassidy onto his lap. “When I was a little boy, your Granny used to keep me locked up in a cage on her pirate ship and she would only let me out to fight off the Tyrannosaurus Rexes that would attack and try to pull us to the bottom of the sea.”

“Really?” The girls’ eyes were huge.

“Bath time,” I reminded them from the kitchen.

Mark stood up and offered each of them a hand. “Yes, really,” he continued leading them back to the bathroom. I bent my head over the sink and tried to keep a straight face. Any minute now …

“And she would only feed me bananas and gumdrops and— Holy
cow
!”

I sniggered. He’d seen it.

“Uh, Piper?” he called.

“Yes?” I yelled back innocently.

“Were we attacked by a brothel?” he yelled.

“Mark!” I yelled at the same time that Megan asked, “What’s a brodel?”

“Did Liberace pay us a visit?” he yelled.

“One more guess and you’re out!” I laughed.

“Granny gave us pretties!” Cassidy cried, dancing up and down in excitement.

“Oooh,” Mark said knowingly. “And Mommy’s okay with this?”

Megan nodded her head. “Granny said that if it was okay with Mommy that we could keep the pretty pink towels.”

“They are pink,” Mark agreed. He shaded his eyes with one hand. “Very pink.”

“We can talk about it later,” I yelled.

Mark sighed. “Joy.” He stuck his head back out of the bathroom. “Did it
have
to have gold glitter and beads?”

I shrugged. “
I
didn’t ask for the bathroom to be redecorated. In fact,
I
had nothing to do with it.”

“What was wrong with the old shower curtain and towels?”

I shrugged again. “Apparently they weren’t good enough.”

“Didn’t
you
pick those out?” he asked. How cute. Men were so dense, but he was slowly catching on that his mom was the bad guy.

“Yes, I did.” I put just the right note of puzzled hurt into my voice. I hoped he caught the implication that she thought
I
wasn’t good enough, but that might be pushing his powers of observation.

“I’ll talk to her,” he said grimly.

“Thanks,” I said with a genuine smile, and kept the victory dance internal.

Our conversation had taken less than a minute, but it was enough time for Cassidy to strip out of her diaper and go running down the hall naked and squealing. Mark ran after her and I turned back to the dishes.

When the girls were finally bathed, tooth-brushed, storied, and tucked in, and then tucked in again, and then given drinks, and then tucked in a third time, and then threatened, then chased around the house, then spanked, then tucked in a
fourth
time, and then finally asleep, Mark got his phone to call his mom about the bathroom. I was going to surreptitiously eavesdrop but my phone chose that moment to ring.

It was my mom. “Hello, dear!” she greeted me.

“Hey, mom. What’s up?” I strained to hear Mark’s end of the conversation but he went out on the back porch when I started talking. Drat.

“How are my little angels?” my mom cooed.

I had been the one to chase them down the final time and administer the spanking so I couldn’t agree with the “angel” label. “Fallen?” I answered.

“Oh, no!” she scolded. “Not my little girls! Piper, you are just too hard on them.”

“Hard on their bottoms,” I muttered.

“I don’t want to hear it!” she sang out. “I can’t believe that my darlings would
ever
need to get a spanking!”

“Mom!” I protested, “You spanked me all the time!”

“Yes,” she agreed, “and you deserved it.”

“Whatever,” I mouthed.

“What was that?”

“Nothing! What did you call about?”

“I was just calling to remind you that your sister’s birthday is coming up.”

“Yeah, no worries. I already sent her a present.” I tried to keep on top of the family birthdays. Karen was living out in California and didn’t come home much, but we talked on the phone frequently, usually with me filling her in on the latest awful thing Sarah had done, and we managed to stay close.

“Oh, good for you! I just wanted to make sure you called her on her birthday. She was sounding a little lonely last time I talked with her.”

Mom was a great one for reading between non-existent lines. Last time she’d jumped to conclusions had been when Karen told her she had a “surprise” when Mom came out to visit. Mom had a wedding location and date picked out and was going to order invitations when she arrived at Karen’s house and met her new puppy. I still liked to give her a hard time about that.

“Lonely?” I asked. “Are you sure?” I’d talked to her just the other day and she’d sounded fine. I would never admit it, but I was a little jealous of Karen’s carefree life. Single, no kids. To me it seemed like she could do whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted. I wouldn’t trade Mark and the kids for the world, but sometimes I did think about
selling
them. Too bad the gypsies never showed up to buy.

“Anyways, just give her a call on her birthday and have the girls sing for her,” Mom suggested.

“Will do,” I agreed.

We chatted a bit before hanging up and I had another fifteen to twenty minutes to wander around the house and wonder what Mark was talking about. I couldn’t go out on the porch without being obvious that I was trying to listen in.

I tried to lay on the bed and read, but my mind just couldn’t concentrate. Mark came back into the bedroom. He was off the phone. I rolled over on the bed and looked up at him.