Page 28 of Peach Tree Family

When Seth turned away from her, he caught the displeased look on Theo's face. "Something wrong?"

Theo denied it and turned away. The rest of the flea market had stuff that was more to Ace's liking, but it was Seth who spotted their first find.

"A tarp. You've got to get this. It has metal grommets for tying it down," Seth said as he looked it over carefully.

"That is a good one, and we'll get some bungee cords too," Theo told him.

"I'm going to find something good too," Ace said then he frantically looked all around and started pointing at random things.

"You win, Ace," Theo told him but Ace gave him a skeptical look since he didn't buy anything he pointed at.

It was Theo's turn to find something they needed. "I see a coffeemaker. The tag says ten bucks. It's mine."

"You didn't even haggle for it," Seth hissed at him as he paid.

"It looks clean and instant coffee just doesn't do it for me," Theo told him.

Before they continued on, Seth stopped them. "All right, from now on, when we see something we like, we pretend we don't really want it to drive the price down."

"Lie?" Ace said.

"Not lie, just pretend," Theo told him.

Moving on, Seth nudged Theo and said. "That lamp."

"Ugly," was all Theo had to say about it but a little later he saw one he did want.

It wasn't to Seth's liking though. "You don't mean that dented, old floor lamp?"

Theo saw it differently. "It's a vintage, brass, cantilevered, reading lamp. It has character."

"What it's got is decades worth of tarnish," Seth said.

But Theo's decision was made. "I'm getting it."

"Wait up," Seth said, the back of his hand resting against Theo's chest as he stopped him. "I don't want a repeat of what happened with the coffeemaker. Let me haggle for it."

Theo didn't take a breath until Seth dropped his hand. "I have more self restraint when coffee isn't involved," Theo told him but let him haggle for it anyway. Seth's low opinion of it did bring the price down though he stopped short of calling it a piece of junk.

"You did the trick," Ace said when Seth came back with the lamp. "You pretended you didn't like it."

"Pretended. Right," Seth said as he handed the lamp to Theo.

"You and Ace can pick one for the other bedroom," Theo told him.

"Me and you together," Ace said to Seth and they high fived. Ace stared hard at all the lamps they came across, but didn't find any that won him over.

He did see a trunk with lots of kids' stickers all over it as well as crayon marks. "I'm calling that well-loved," Theo said and told Ace he could have it.

"I'm gonna pretend I don't like it," Ace said announcing his plan in his version of keeping his voice down.

"Good job whispering. I don't think they quite caught that across town," Theo said to him.

In the end they got the trunk and picked up a rickety folding table and three lawn chairs that they piled in the truck with the rest and covered with the tarp.

Theo had their next stop planned but didn't mention what it was until they pulled up in front.

"Who's getting a cell phone?" Ace asked, getting his hopes up as he saw that they were parked in front of the cell phone store.

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