Muscle Strikes
Puck strutted around church in his overalls that morning, and a bright fuzzy patch of hair trailing in the wake of his march on the top of his bed-head. When he saw Linnea and Francis enter the room, delight lit his chubby face.
“Lila!” he cried. “Fan!”
For the rest of the service, he intermittently reorganized Collette’s colored pen case and called for his Aunt Linnea two rows in front of him during the songs, rolling his chubby arms around each other in circles, showing off his new skill to her.
Toward the end of the sermon, when OLeif had to remove him for talking too loudly, he called over OLeif’s shoulder to Francis and Linnea:
“Bye bye!”
Back at the house, a variety of things were in the works.
Mom had prepared a meal of rotisserie chickens, creamed potatoes, bowls of bell peppers, peaches, and mandarin oranges, and Texas toast. There was also pumpkin ice cream and peppermint ice cream for dinner, plus a dish of chocolate brownies.
There were bikes for the rest of the afternoon, dance class, and naps.
Carrie was having mixed feelings about random events of the weekend, and was in a punchy mood.
“How strong are your muscles now, Joe?” she asked, lounging on the couch.
“Oh, I don’t know. I did 700 push-ups this week.”
“I want to punch your muscle.”
It was the usual thing that happened to Carrie when she was waiting around for something exciting to happen. The old
Tae Kwon Do instincts resurfaced.
“The Mexican at work asked me out yesterday,” Rose said, “after he demonstrated his skill by throwing a lemon at a trash can. And he missed.”
“What about you, Francis?” Carrie asked, walking into the other room to renew the invitation to pain.
Francis grinned, leaning over on the kitchen counter.
“Can I punch your muscle?”
“Sure,” Francis said, shaking his head and laughing.
“Hmmm. Squishy,” said Carrie, testing the striking zone with her pincer fingers.
Punch!!
“Yow!” Carrie cried, holding her hand in agony.
Francis giggled – most of the kids’ entertainment arose from either Carrie or Rose during the week.
And another week had come to an end.