Page 92 of Puck Drop
“I have to tell you, Logan,” she continues. “And please excuse my candor.”
Knowing that me laughing right now would set her off, I just move my head up and down, my chin almost hitting my chest as I bob it around.
“You have the common sense of a squirrel,” she concludes.
Her statement is so matter of fact and out of nowhere, I have no idea how to react. I stare at her for the longest time before bursting into laughter. She smiles, too, with a proud look on her face, almost like she loves seeing me laughing.
“Aww…” She leans forward and squeezes my cheek with her fingers. “You are adorable when you’re happy. No wonder Betty followed you all the way to God’s country.”
“Elizabeth,” I correct her. “Not Betty. She’s only twenty-five,” I remind her.
Aunt Kathy looks distracted by now, her right arm just about getting lost inside the handbag.
“Ah, finally!” She pulls out a cell phone. “I need to find a better way of carrying this sucker around. I have to invest in a new bag, much smaller this time.”
She brings the screen to life, then taps on a few things before she looks like she is writing an entire novel. When she’d finished, she drops the phone in her lap and flexes her hands a couple of times.
“They make those keyboards way too small,” she explains when she catches me staring. “Typing on it makes my fingers cramp.”
My head bobs in understanding. “Makes sense. Maybe you should use the voice to text feature,” I suggest.
“That is a wonderful idea! You’re a smart boy.” She pats me on the knee again, just like she did earlier. “But I couldn’t do that now since I was typing things about you.”
The woman never fails to amaze me. I don’t know if that’s a good or a bad thing.
“You were typing things about me to other people?” I ask for clarification.
Aunt Kathy harrumphs and crosses her arms over her chest. “Well, I wasn’t going to send a text to myself about you. That’d be weird, wouldn’t you say, Logan?”
“As weird as you sending messages to others, I’m sure.”
Aunt Kathy lowers her glasses down her pointy noise, taking a minute to assess me from head to toe. In the end, she seems to approve of what she sees.
“Thank you for being such a good friend to Sebastian,” she finally says to me. “He told me how you two weren’t very close when you played here in New York, but it was good for him to have a familiar place out there.”
I swallow around the large lump suddenly forming in the back of my throat.
“I was happy he was there, too,” I murmur. My voice comes out weak. Talking about Sebastian is a reminder of the situation he is now in. As weird as it sounds, the funny interaction I just had with his aunt made me forget about him being on life support only feet away.
“I need you to do something for me,” Aunt Kathy continues. “Go down the hallway and take the elevator to the eleventh floor. Then you take a right, and you will reach a conference room. Go and wait for me there.”
Looking around in confusion, I try to figure out what she’s talking about. Nothing has changed with Sebastian, and I know she hates leaving him alone.”
“Why?” I ask in obvious confusion.
Her response is quick. “Because Sebastian would want you to.”
More confused than ever, I stand up and stretch my legs, feeling a bit stiff after sitting in this plastic chair for the last couple of hours straight, not to mention the four days before today.
“Is there anything I can bring you on my way back?” I ask. “Something to eat? Coffee? Tea? Water?”
“I’ll come up with something,” she assures me. “I’ll text you.”
I grin at her, showing all my teeth. “I’ll make sure to check my phone.”
She shakes her head at me in amusement. “How did you even end up this cute? Go away!” She points toward the door. “Eleventh floor. Make a right. Conference room.”
Still confused about what’s going on, or why she needs me to go to this conference room, I play along, only to appease her. After all, she’s going through a lot right now, and I don’t want to further aggravate her by not listening to her.
