Page 37 of Cocky Player

“Everything okay?”she asked, her hand pressed to my cheek.“You seem flushed.”

I shook off her concern.“Everything’s great, it must be the sun from the market this morning.”

“Ah, what do you call it?Your new church?”

What can I say, wandering the indoor areas, as well as the outdoor streets, relaxed me.

“And I’m faithful to attend weekly.Unlike some people I know.”I winked and skipped past her, her laugh following me.

“Someone has to take the time to cook a meal for all you ungrateful creatures,” she called out, but I was already in the kitchen, pouring a glass of white wine and popping a small tomato into my mouth.

“Dinner looks amazing as always, as do you, Mom.”She was nearing sixty but could pass for forty-something, and she didn’t throw thousands into beauty treatments.I could only hope I aged as well as her.

“Aunny BeeBee!”The screech came right before two small chubby hands smacked the backs of my thighs.“Aunny Beebee here!”

“Well, hey munchkin.”I squatted down and ruffled my nephew’s hair.“And who are you?”I tapped my chin.“I don’t think we’ve met.”

“Me Mikey!Me Mikey!”

“Oh!So you are, that’s right.And you’re this many, right?”I held up four fingers.

He giggled and with his pudgy hands, he folded down one finger.“Thwee!”

Michael tended to speak in shouts or cries, a rough and tumble boy wholovedwomen more than men.He’d climb into the lap of any woman he met and hid behind our legs when new men entered the room.It was the most bizarre and hilarious thing I’d ever seen.The onesie I bought for Tomas made me laugh.

It’d be more perfect for Michael.

“Well, how could I forget.”I picked him up and smooshed my face to his cheeks, back and forth until he squealed with laughter and pushed against my chest.“I missed you, Mikey.And I have a present for you.”

I made sure to grab lollipops for all my nieces and nephews when I came for Sunday dinners.After years of being gone more than I was home, I wasn’t above bribery to get them to fall in love with me and fill my cupboard with mugs stamped with “Best Aunt in the World.”

“Now, where’s your dad and mom?”He shoved a finger in the direction of my parents’ back yard patio and I leaned in, gripped his finger and nibbled on it.“Then show me the way, Mitchie.”

“Mikey!”he shouted, legs already kicking for freedom.

“Oh, that’s right.I’ll remember next time.”I gave him one last kiss and set him on his feet before pulling a lollipop from my purse.“Now don’t eat this while you’re running and ask Mommy first, okay?”

“Yes!”His final shout bounced off the walls as his feet thundered toward the back of the house.

I tossed another tomato into my mouth and grabbed my wine.“Need any help, Mom?”

The marble island countertop was already filled with salads and fruit, breads, and two incredible charcuterie boards.

My mom knew how to cook as well as entertain and she loved doing it most for her family.

“Of course not, go see the family.”

Before she could rope me into polishing silver or slicing more vegetables, I took her advice and moved through their house, stepping over plastic cars and Barbie Dolls littered all over the hallways.They’d be cleaned up within minutes of everyone leaving, but when my mom was in grandma role, she never minded the mess.

A messy house means a well-loved house.

A clean house is a cared for house.

A time for everything and everything in its time.

She said it often through the years, laughing while we teased her allowance of messes and her fastidious need for cleanliness.Eventually, she just began tossing a cracker or chunk of cheese or what whatever was nearby when Dad started in on her.

I always inhaled a breath before walking into the melee that was my family.With four kids in the family, two incredibly still overprotective brothers and a sister who might even be worse, my family wasn’t only full of love and occasionally restrictive in their love for me, they were loud.Boisterous.More than once a nearby neighbor called the cops on our family get-togethers for noise disturbance when we hung out in the back yard, my nieces and nephew splashing through the pool with Eva telling Sam to bugger off.My oldest brother Aiden sitting at the outdoor bar with a beer in his hand, still all over his wife, Becca, like they were newlyweds even though they’d been married for well over a decade.It was their boys, Maxon and Beckett who would get into screaming competitions, seeing who could jump higher and farther off the diving board while making the largest splash, causing their sister Sophie to screech, and Kollin or Mikey to demand they do it again and again.

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