“He’s sitting in the back seat,” Riley said, glancing at Gabe in the rearview mirror. He looked like someone had just ripped the head off his favorite teddy bear and then drop kicked it off the roof of a building.
“I do not concern myself with the feelings of others.”
“No shit,” Riley snapped.
“You will not take that tone with me, young lady.”
“I’ll take that tone if you’ve earned that tone. Maybe you’re happy being a servant to your gifts, which I doubt seeing how miserable you areall the time. But that’s not how I want to live, and it’s not how Gabe has to live either. I appreciate your knowledge, what little you’ve decided to share with me. But you don’t get to tell us how to live our lives.”
Riley was still fuming when she turned onto her parents’ street and almost missed the catastrophe.
“What disaster is this?” Elanora demanded as Riley slammed on her brakes in the middle of the street.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Riley groaned.
Her parents’ fence was horizontal, crushing an entire row of boxwoods on the Strump side of the property line.
Daisy the spite cow was grazing happily on the buffet of orange Zinnias in the middle of the front yard. Chelsea Strump, dressed in pink tennis shorts and a white polo, was standing in front of the cow, screaming bloody murder. Her helmet-like hair didn’t budge as she shouted and waved her arms like a deranged marionette.
“You stupid walking hamburger! I’m going to shoot you between the eyes and turn you into a roast!” the woman howled.
Suddenly, Riley felt the swoop in her gut and found herself staring at Chelsea through cotton candy clouds. “Oh, hell,” she murmured.
Her vision narrowed on Chelsea until there was a sudden burst of air and glitter rained down.
“You havegotto be kidding me!” Chelsea Strump, cow-hating neighbor, was apparently Glitter Guy’s next target.
Riley fought off her seatbelt and jumped out of the Jeep.
“I do not have time for this ridiculousness. I want my steak,” Elanora announced, climbing out the other side and stomping toward Riley’s parents’ house.
“Chelsea!” Riley yelled, running into the yard.
Chelsea responded by turning the hose on her.
“Get off my lawn and take your stupid livestock with you. Unless you want me to butcher it in the front yard!”
“Chelsea, this is very important. Have you been glitter bombed yet?” Riley asked, looping an arm around the cow’s thick neck and trying to hip check it out of the flower bed.
“Your illegal family farm is destroying my yard!” Chelsea howled, waving the hose wildly and managing to soak herself in the process. “I have tried to be tolerant. I’ve tried being polite.”
“Really? When?”
Daisy meandered out of the flower bed.
“But you people are the worst! I hate every last one of you, and I hope you all get some kind of incurable disease and die tomorrow!”
If the woman was comfortable saying it to her face, Riley could only imagine what she’d said to people online.
“Stay where you are!” Chelsea screamed, firing the hose over Riley’s shoulder.
Gabe took the deluge of water to the face heroically. “May I be of assistance, Riley?” he sputtered.
“I will call the police right now if you don’t get off my grass!”
“Good! Yes. Do that,” Riley said, deciding she’d rather take her chances explaining things to the local police than having Chelsea get herself murdered. Even if she was an asshole.
Daisy wandered over to the plantings around Chelsea’s front porch and helped herself.
