“Cameron, can you feel him? You know, like before? Is he in pain? Is he lost?” Then I voiced the bane of my worries. “Is he gone?”
He shook his head again, sympathy lining his ice blue eyes. “I just don’t know.”
“That means you can’t sense him, right?”
“It doesn’t mean anything.” He started to close the window, and just before it shut all the way, he said, “Dress warm.”
“Are you sure you haven’t seen my favorite towel?” Brooke asked, standing in another towel that was not her favorite.
I wrapped my arms around my waist and headed back to the bathroom. “I bet Glitch used it. He’s so inconsiderate that way.”
“Mmm-hmm.” She wasn’t buying it.
* * *
When we were finally fit to face the world, I braced myself for the confrontation to come. Breakfast with the grandparents. I took a deep breath and headed down.
“Hey,” I said to my grandmother as I stepped off the stairs. We always played nice in front of company, and since Brooke was right behind me …
Grandma offered a hesitant smile, then looked back at her new phone, a quizzical expression drawing her brows together. “Hey, pix. Did you sleep well?”
“Not really.”
“Hey, Grandma,” Brooke said, stepping off the stairs with a special kind of bounce.
“Good morning, hon,” Grandma said.
Brooke grabbed an apple, bit into it, then continued to talk despite her mouth being completely full. “Neither of us slept well. I doubt we’ll make it through the day without lapsing into a coma.”
Grandma didn’t even spare her a glance that time. “I’m almost certain you’ll make it. If for some reason you lose consciousness, text me. I need the practice.”
Brooke giggled as she scooped peanut butter onto an apple slice, then cast me a sympathetic gaze. “How did you ever survive childhood with such neglect? Such indifference?”
She was doing her darnedest to get Grandma and me to converse. It was not going to work.
The back door opened, allowing the crisp breeze to sweep into the room and up the back of my sweater. I shivered in response, offering my grandfather a sideways glance as he peeled off his jacket and hung it up by the door.
“Hey, pixie stick,” he said, his voice only slightly strained. “Brooklyn.”
“Hey, Pastor Bill,” Brooke said. “Do you like your new phone?”
He strolled over and bent to give me a hesitant peck on the cheek. “Not even a little,” he said, then offered Brooke a peck too.
“Well, I love mine,” Grandma said, her eyes glued to the screen, sparkling with an alarming degree of lust. I never figured Grandma for a techno geek, but she was really getting into that thing.
She pushed a button, and a microsecond later Granddad’s phone beeped. With a heavy sigh, he took it out of the case at his belt and worked a few moments to get the message to come up. Then his face morphed into one of his signature glares. The one that reminded me of a guy at a carnival one time when I tried to convince him I was old enough to go on the Terrifying Twister without my parents’ consent. I was four.
“You couldn’t have just said good morning?” Granddad asked. “I’m standing right here.”
“No.” She waved an impatient hand at him. “You have to text that to me. Pretend we’re on our honeymoon.”
Brooklyn choked on her milk and spent the next two minutes coughing. Then she made this gagging sound that was very much like her reaction to my shampoo.
Taking Brooke’s sudden fit into consideration, Granddad explained. “We had a huge fight on our honeymoon. We didn’t talk for days.”
“But if we’d had these phones,” Grandma said, shaking it at him for effect, “we wouldn’t have needed to talk. These things are great.”
His phone beeped again. “Really, Vera? I’m right here.”
“What? I can’t hear you.” Then she giggled like a mental patient, and I almost smiled. Maybe the phones weren’t such a good idea after all.
The back door opened again when Cameron strolled in, his blond hair a disheveled mess.
“You look like a tumbleweed,” Brooke said, her voice hoarse from her most recent efforts.
Never one to be accused of social graces, he shrugged at her before nodding to my grandparents. “Hey, Pastor, Mrs. James.”
“Hi, Cameron,” Granddad said, but Grandma was still busy with her phone.
He didn’t seem to mind. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and leaned against the wall, waiting for us. But when Brooklyn wasn’t looking, his eyes wandered toward her, a glint of interest in them despite the fact that she was in the middle of stuffing the last remnants of apple into her mouth. Then his phone beeped. He fished it out of his front pocket, frowned, then looked up at Grandma, who now wore a satisfied grin on her face. After clearing his throat in obvious discomfort, he mumbled, “It’s nice to see you too, Mrs. James.”
Grandma nodded. This was getting ridiculous.
“How did you know it was Grandma?” I asked him. “She just got that phone.”
He leaned forward to confide in me. “She’s been texting me all night.”
“Grandma!” I scolded, breaking my vow of silence and giving her my best look of shocked dismay. “You can’t go around texting high school kids in the middle of the night. You’ll get arrested.”