“Maisie, you have to calm down. You’re gonna…”
“I don’t have to do shit!” Yes, I heard her in stereo– both in my mind and in my ear. I had to do something quickly. All hell was about to…
“Give me the damn…”
“Maisie, you don’t need the phone.”
“Yes, I do! What are you… Oooooooh…”
“Yeah, oh” I tried hard not to laugh. Then, both mentally and aloud, I calmly instructed while trying to hurry because my shop was still on fire, “Now, untangle yourself from the nice Tigress and tell her you’re sorry.”
Yep, I was going to pay for that last comment, but I had to do it. After all, I was the oldest sister and Dragon Queen. I had to get my kicks where I could.
I heard a muffled, “Sorry about that. I kinda lost my mind. I think it must be all the pregnancy hormones.”
“I’m sure it is, Dr. Walton,” the Tigress sweetly replied, and surprisingly, I could tell that she meant it. Damn, she really was good at her job.
But there were other pressing matters than my sister’s apology and the Tigress’s professional aptitude. My. Shop. Was. On. Fire. (Yes, feel free to sing the Alicia Keyes song, substituting shop for my girl. Why not? For better or worse, this was my circus, and these were my clowns, why not add a little music to the shit show?)
“I’m really sorry. I promise to make it up to you. How about a gift card to Martha’s shop. I heard you say…”
“A gift certificate to ‘Martha’s Shop’…”
Yes, my tone was dripping with sarcasm and more than a little fear.
“…won’t be worth the paper it’s written on if somebody doesn’t call the Fire Brigade!”
As you can imagine, along with being more than a little sarcastic, I was yelling into the phone and into my sister’s pregnancy-hormone-soaked mind.
“Oh, no, Martha!” They chorused. Finally, the attention was back to me.
Oh, no! The attention was back on me. What had I done? I was going to have to…
“Are you okay?” Maisie asked. “Are you hurt? Are the boys okay?”
Whew! Maybe I was going to get out of this situation without being forced to explain what happened. Was Fate finally on my side? Could it be?
“Martha? Are you there?” I could envision Maisie’s jaw tightly clenched, her crystal blue eyes narrowed to tiny slits, and each word being forced through gritted teeth. I could imagine it because I had seen way too many times. “Martha… Answer me or I’m callin’ Arthur. He, tis, and Chewy are okay, right?””
And with those words, she snapped me right out of my stupor and my lips were moving of their own volition.
“Of course, the boys are okay. I got the big boys headed to the door and scooped Chewy up the second I snee… I mean, smelled the smoke."
Smiling, despite the catastrophic turn my life had taken, I looked down into three sets of big brown eyes and knew everything would be okay. Seeing those three furry faces gazing up at me was all it took to melt my heart. We’d been through a lot together, and they’d be the first to tell you that my tendency was to jump headfirst into any and all situations without a plan. They’d also agree that more times than not we made out better than when we started. I had to believe that the flames eating away at the back of my shop was all part of some grand plan, and as long as we had each other we could get through anything.
"Yeah, the boys are just fine. They’re munching on turkey jerky."
"Oh, good," Maisie and the Tigress breathed in unison.
Then my little sister added, "When you first introduced me to Arthur and Chewy, I was a little freaked out," she chuckled. "I mean, talk about Mutt and Jeff– no pun intended. Chewy looks like a cross between a Wookiee and an Ewok from Star Wars, and don’t even get me started about Arthur. He is the spitting imagine of the Wolfman before he learned to walk upright.”
“And what about me?” Otis asked. “Of course, she thought I was the most handsome specimen of male Wolfhound she’d ever seen, right?”
“Right,” I mouthed, nodding wildly while praying that Maisie was going to stop with the trip down Memory Lane and get back to calling the Fire Brigade.
Of course, that didn’t happen. Instead, the Tigress 911 Operator jumped on the Canine Appreciation Cruise, and we were headed for the high seas.
“And you can’t forget about Otis. He is the just such a gentle giant, and I love his long, dark, slate gray fur. I look as forward to seeing all of them every morning.”
