In a Real Emergency
“Irish. Come here.”
Carrie-Bri patted her lap with one hand and held up a chocolate Easter egg in the other.
Irish wrinkled her nose. “No.”
“Come here, Irish,” Carrie commanded again, grinning.
Eighteen year-old Irish reluctantly took a seat on big sister’s lap.
“I trained her,” Carrie explained to Thumper, who was standing in the Big House living room, laughing. “Ever since she was a little girl, I trained her to sit in my lap. And now she still does it, even though she doesn’t want to.”
Irish grimaced, but couldn’t help laughing at the absurdity of the situation.
Carrie then directed her attentions to the little Colombian sitting next to me on the loveseat. “Oh, Yali! Come here!”
Yali pied-piper-ed it to the couch for his chocolate egg and was soon sitting next to Irish in Carrie’s lap.
“He’s in training,” Carrie grinned.
Yali certainly wasn’t complaining.
Thunder rumbled in the southwest. Beautiful sound. Nothing else like it. Fighter jets. Earth-shaking fireworks. Thunderstorms. The best.
A couple of hours later, I found myself up at school post-carpool in Hans’ classroom, listening to Puck and Heidi discuss their emergency preparedness kits, listing off the contents to each other.
“I also have a picture of my family,” Heidi concluded.
“What?” Puck frowned. “You don’t need that in an emergency.”
“Yes, I would. What if someone stole me and then I needed a picture of my family to remember them?”
Puck thought about that for a second, but couldn’t make sense of it. “No. You still wouldn’t need that in a real emergency.”
“Well, it’s an emergency of the heart!” Heidi protested.
Even Puck couldn’t argue that one. He sat down in a chair by the chalkboard to contemplate.
That evening back home, I put the boys in the shower while we waited for Oxbear to come home with Chick-Fil-A, a middle of the week treat I allowed on account of it being “no homework night”. We look for ways to celebrate sometimes.
“PLEASE could you let Yali have a shower instead of a bath, Mom?” Puck had begged me on the drive home. “PLEASE?! I’ll help him!”
Yali was immediately not a fan.
“YALI!” Puck tried to console him. “YALI! YALI! WHAT ARE YOU DOING, SON?! GET BACK IN THE SHOWER!”