She nodded, satisfied that her babies were still communicating.
“How’s Spike?” I was amazed the cat was still alive.
Mom sighed. “She’s good, though still a terrible mouser. The other day she proudly showed me one that she brought in from outside… It was still alive. She let it go and didn’t even bother to chase it as it ran around the kitchen.”
“Oh no.” I chuckled as she told me about Spike’s new adventures and the Bunco group’s newest addition. I pulled into The Brick House’s parking lot. I had been seeing stuff about the renovations for a bit and was excited to go inside. All threefloors’ interior lights were shining through the oversized windows set in a dark red brick exterior.
Mom turned and looked at the building. “Did you know this used to be a potato processing plant?”
I used her momentary distraction into the past to grab her phone and turn on airplane mode. Electronics were not her strong suit and it would take her a while to figure out what was wrong. I slipped the phone back in her purse.
“Nancy mentioned they had to shut down again for several months. Something about water problems.” She tapped her fingers on her leg. “Her son had his reception scheduled here, but they had to cancel at the last minute. She was livid.” Mom turned and faced me. “Informed us we were now boycotting the place.”
“Yep.” I grabbed my gray eyeliner from my purse and added light lines around my eyes and near my mouth. I tried to look at my face from different directions. It wasn’t great.
Mom scowled in my direction. “Em?” She leaned in. “Are you drawing wrinkle lines on your face?”
I jerked mid wrinkle line, causing a dark smudge. “No, um, it’s a new contour shading thing I saw online. Do you like it?” I gave up with the pencil and grabbed the large floppy sun hat from the back seat and began securing my light blond hair underneath it with pins. Mom leaned out of the way of the large brim.
“Honestly, no.” Mom held her hands up to protect her face. “It looks terrible.” She started digging in her purse. “Don’t worry, I should have a wet wipe in here.”
I hopped out of the car before she could attack. “It’s okay. I don’t think we have time. I’m just grabbing a few things, anyway.”
I’m pretty sure that lies don’t count when the accused was performing good deeds. It might not be in the Bible, but somewhere definitely says that.
I rushed toward the building hearing Mom’s door shut behind me.
“Geez, where’s the fire?”
Her quick steps clipped on the sidewalk behind me and I glanced to see her waving a wet wipe as I climbed the concrete stairs.
I pulled up the tickets on my phone and ducked my head, blocking everything with the sun hat. A bored teenager scanned the tickets as she popped her gum and scrolled videos on her phone.
Nice! Maybe they didn’t care about the whole fifty plus thing.
Inside, the building was a breathtaking mixture of old and new. It had large, dark wooden beams and posts, exposed brick walls, old chandeliers, framed newspaper articles, and accents of sleek industrial metal. To the right was a series of rooms, and ahead, a set of stairs and the bathrooms.
“Wow.” Mom stopped and stared.
“My thoughts exactly.” It was gorgeous.
My mother huffed. “Speaking of gorgeous, you need to wipe that gray off your face and take off that god-awful hat. Is that a bunny on top of it?” Her lips frowned.
The hat was a Savers find. I went with whatever had the biggest brim. The animals and plastic fruit on top of it were a bit much, but taking them off would have ruined more than it helped. “It doesn’t matter. I’m not going to see anyone I know. And it’s not a bunny…I’m pretty sure it’s a mouse?” I waved her off, but then to the right I noticed a KISMET SILVERS EVENT sign on an easel next to the double doors that were propped open.
Shoot. I tried to block the sign with my body as we passed. Mom tipped her head to the side and moved behind me to read the sign.
“What is Kismet Silvers?”
It was too soon—she would bolt.
“No idea.” I looked around, desperate for a distraction. Perfect! Bathrooms. “I need to use the bathroom, then we can figure out where the inventory they want to get rid of is.” I nodded to the bathrooms off to theleft.
She followed me to the restroom and began fluffing her hair and applying her lipstick. I stepped into the stall and carefully went over my plan.
Make sure no one looks at me.
Make Mom find a date.
