Father's Day

Collette and Puck spent their Sunday morning in the nursery together. Puck talked loudly to the other babies, handing out toys to them, and sliding down the plastic slide for the full hour and a half. This was after he made up his mind to reconcile loaning out the tricycle to another baby who wanted to partake in the fun of riding a three-wheeler.
After church, OLeif picked up some Little Caesars to spread around the table, where the usual comedy routine had begun, and the current discussion was: country songs and their lyrics.
Joe crowed off a few made-up tunes about trucks and dogs and dying and other things, until they wrapped up the pizza boxes and both OLeif and Joe joined the cats, the dog, and Puck in Lala-Land. But not before Collette, Joe, and Rose called up Dad and sang him the Snicketts’ version of Happy Happy Father’s Day.
While Rose caught flying white puffball bugs, Joe snuggled down with the chubby Pumpkin, who suddenly bolted in the middle of her nap, drawing a long, red scratch across Joe’s face.
“Battle scars!” Rose said.
“You can tell everyone you were in a knife fight,” Collette told him.
“No — a sword fight. Those are what’s in,” said Rose with a grin.
“More like a gun fight,” said Joe.
“What century do you live in?” Collette asked Rose.
“The awesome century!”
Rose lifted her laptop up to the level of her eyeballs.
“Wouldn’t it be weird if our eyelashes were this long?” she asked, waving her laptop up and down in front of her eyes.
Collette and Joe just looked at each other in the usual disbelief.
“So, Rose…” Collette began, switching subjects. “This math exam is very serious, coming up. If you don’t pass it, you’re stuck in school for another six months. Or two years at the community college. Your choice.”
“No way! I’m not going back to that goldfish boy.”
“Goldfish boy?” Joe asked.
“Yeah. The guy who asked me out when I was holding a toad. He had orange hair, big eyes, and a small mouth. So he
looked like a goldfish.”
“Give me that cat!” Rose screeched later, holding out a permanent marker. “I’m gonna draw angry eyebrows on it!”
And she did.
Meanwhile, Francis was due to return from his Scouting adventure in Florida by five o’clock in the evening, or so.