Page 79 of The Surprise

Gabe grimaces. “Not that kind of hurt.”

“Um, are you sure you’re not hungry?”

He shakes his head slowly.

“Well, like what, then?”

“I think. . .” Gabe doubles over. “I think I need to go poop.”

I groan. “Okay, buddy. Let’s go.” I walk with him to the bathroom and stand next to him, patting his back while he goes. Groaning.

Being a fill-in mom is super gross.

When I look up to check the clock on my phone—I have four minutes to get over there—I notice something strange.

There’s a cow looking at me through the window.

Yeah. That’s noteversupposed to happen.

I swear under my breath.

“Whoa, what does that word mean?” Gabe asks, his moaning temporarily stopping.

“Just focus on what you’re doing, okay?”

“But you just said—”

“I know what I said, but look.” I point, and when Gabe sees the big brown head with white splotches eyeing us through the glass, his eyes widen.

He repeats my word.

Mom isnotgoing to be pleased if she realizes I taught him that. Ugh. “Let’s not say that any more, okay?”

He says it again. Of course he does.

I glance at my phone again. Two minutes until Beth will be waiting on me in the grove. This time, I wish I could say even more creative words, but my little sponge brother would for sure love to hear those. I suppress any more grumbling I want to do and force myself to text Beth.

SOMETHING CAME UP. WE’LL HAVE TO MEET ANOTHER DAY.

Then I spend the next two hours rounding up cows. But that’s nothing to the very next day, when the poo Gabe is currently making starts to bubble up as very smelly sludge out of the toilet. That’s when I find out what septic sprinklers are, and what happens when your septic can’t empty and needs to be pumped.

I’m replacing a septic sprinkler head—thanks YouTube—when my phone starts ringing. I wouldn’t answer, but I know that ringer.I’m Walking on Sunshine.I wipe off my hands and swipe.

“Hello?”

“Is everything okay?” Beth sounds worried. “It’s not like you to cancel last minute. Then you never called me or explained, either.”

I groan. “Aunt Amanda randomly ditched me last night, and my mom’s out of town, and so is my Aunt Helen, and Whitney forgot to lock the gate and about fifty cows got out. One of them trampled the septic sprinkler, and with the snow melting. . . Basically it’s a literal poop storm over here.”

“Storm?”

“Poop soup? What sounds worse?”

She laughs. “All of it sounds pretty bad.”

“Well, anyway, sorry for canceling, but trust me. You are lucky not to be here.”

“About that.” A horn honks from our driveway, and I look up.

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