Page 28 of Karma Kitty Christmas
“Right?”
“Like, they got—”
“So excited!” They both said in tandem, and Isaac wondered if he was glowing like she was.
“That was a rush, Isaac,” Roxy finished breathlessly. “Not gonna lie. We gotta do that next year. And yougottatake pictures of the blanket you finish. It’ll beamazing. In a million years, I never thought they’d get so amped up over your sticks-and-string thing. I’mboggled.” She turned to Allegra. “And you must be the lucky recipient of the blanket. Congratulations!”
Allegra gave her a shy smile. “Thank you. You must be Roxy—Isaac talks about you a lot. And the kids, uhm, Falcon, Pigeon, and Sparrow?”
Roxy grimaced. “Yeah. My husband—I mean, I get having a passion, but not once has Isaac suggested naming the kids something like Worsted or Acrylic. Sadly, I’m not married to Isaac, so….”
“Falcon, Pigeon, and Sparrow,” Allegra said, nodding like it made total sense.
Isaac and Roxy called the kids by their middle names, which were alittlebetter. Justice, Patricia, and Anne. When Isaac had learned that the third one—also his goddaughter—would be named “Sparrow Anne,” he’d glared at Brian and said, “Just so you know, when she runs away, she’ll be at my house, and we’ll be filling out change-of-name forms. But you do you.”
Todd hadn’t been there, of course, because Isaac had known Brian would laugh at that but Todd would have been mortified.
“Brian wanted to go into the forestry service so badly,” Roxy said wistfully. “I wonder, sometimes, if we’d been on an isolated hill in the middle of The Devil’s Woodland Anus, if he would have let me name the boy Brian Junior.”
“If you have a fourth and he names it Vulture, I’m abducting that child before you sign the paperwork,” Isaac said, meaning it. He felt like it was the least he could do.
“I’d slip the kid out the back to keep him from having that name,” Roxy said, nodding. Then she glanced up at Allegra. “And lucky you, you can name your little up-and-comer something sane.”
Outside, the sound of kids pelting by and chattering had died out, and Roxy looked wistfully out Isaac’s window and sighed.
“You guys,” she said, “It is almost the weekend, and thanks to Isaac, I’ve got a babysitter tomorrow night so I can have a date with my husband. But right now, I’mdyingfor a drink with my friends. You guys game?”
“Not your teacher friends?” Luca asked.
Roxy shrugged. “Isaac and I are sort of a matched set. That a problem?” She tilted her head at Luca, and for a moment Isaac had a flashback to when Todd had told Isaac not to call Roxy at home more than twice a week because it wasn’t socially appropriate. They’d had tocoordinatetheir calls, and they’d gottenreallygood at texting, becauseTodddidn’t want to feel bad about Isaac’s social life.
“Not a problem at all,” Luca said, smiling. “I didn’t want to get in the way. I know when I take my crew out for a drink, we get very… I can’t think of the word….”
“Groupie,” Allegra said.
“That’s not the word.” Luca stared at her.
“Clannish,” she said instead.
Luca grimaced and glanced at Isaac and Roxy. “Okay, that’s sort of the word. But this isn’t like intruding on a group,” he amended. “This is like having a drink with friends.”
“There you go.” Roxy smiled at him and then glanced at Isaac and raised her eyebrows.
Isaac gave her a flat look, although secretly he was very pleased that she seemed to enjoy Luca and Allegra’s banter. “Ofcourse I’m coming,” he said. “I thought we agreed that I’m not dead yet.”
She shrugged. “You were a little dead for a while. We’ve gone out very few times in the last year.”
Isaac shook his head. “She was preggers,” he told them. “Knocked up. Quickening.With child. I may have been dead, but on the days I was ready to go out,somebodywas gestating.”
“Uh-oh,” Allegra said. “We’d better go soon, or gestating will bemyexcuse. I don’t want alcohol, of course, but I could eat you all under the table right now.”
Roxy grinned at Isaac. “It’s like you brought her here just for me.” She helped Allegra out of her chair and linked arms with her. “Come on, sweetie. I’ll tell you bibles full of truth about the one thing that will make the two of them run screaming in horror.”
“Hoohas,” Allegra said soberly, and Luca and Isaac both shuddered while the two women laughed their way out of the building.
DINNER ANDdrinks—all nonalcoholic, because for all her talk, Roxy was still nursing the youngest one, and Luca didn’t want to knock back a beer while his sister couldn’t, and Isaac didn’t want to feel like the only heel getting buzzed—was far more fun than Isaac had anticipated.
Luca and Allegra didn’t merely laugh politely at Roxy’s infectious humor, they contributed to it. Theyenjoyedit, and Isaac listened to the three of them tell stories avidly, remembering that time in his life when this was the best part of whatever event had brought him to a restaurant. It didn’t matter if it had been a concert, a rave, or a passed final—sitting at the table, listening to other people’s stories, had always felt very communal.
