Alex felt like he should be onCandid Camera. This was the kind of prank Garrett would pull. But Garrett didn’t know Julia or Calvin.
“Move your butt, missy,” Alex said to thin air, and Cal giggled again.
“You said butt.”
“Do you want to read the comics or not?” Alex said.
“Yes.” He sobered quickly. “Sam, move.”
When Alex figured Sam had time to get out of the way, he plopped onto the couch. Cal jumped onto his lap, which caught him off guard. “What the—”
“You have a brother named Sam?” Cal interrupted, grabbing one of the books and opening it.
“Yes. I have four brothers. He’s the oldest.”
“I want four brothers.”
“You’ll have to ask your folks about that.”
“What’s ‘folks’ mean?” Cal started turning pages.
“Your mom and dad,” Alex said, flipping back to the front of the book.
“Oh. My dad died. I’ll ask my mom.”
“Shit, kid. I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Shit’s a bad word. You’re not ’posed to say it.”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot. Uh, my dad died too. When I was twelve.”
“I’m five.” Calvin picked at a hangnail on his left hand and seemed to be thinking. After a pause, he said, “Sam wants to know if dads always die.”
Oh, geez. This was above his pay grade for sure. “No. Not always. You ready to read?”
“I can read a little but not real good. You read, and I’ll look at the pictures.”
They spent the next twenty minutes laughing at all the trouble Calvin and his imaginary stuffed tiger Hobbes got into. A pounding at the door and Julia yelling Cal’s name interrupted them.
“Uh-oh,” Cal said.
“What d’ya mean ‘uh-oh’?” Alex said, getting up to answer the door. He opened it to find Julia, her hair wrapped in a towel, wearing a robe and a frantic look.
“Have you seen Calvin?” she asked in a panic.
Alex opened the door wider and nodded to the couch where Calvin was trying to bury his head in the cushions, his little butt wiggling in the air. “He told me you knew he was here.”
“Calvin James Knight!” she screeched.
“I’ll assume that’s not true,” Alex mumbled as Julia stormed past him to reach Calvin.
“You are in big trouble, mister.”
“I left a note,” Cal said defensively.
“You mean this?” she asked, holding up a yellow Post-it. Alex approached her from behind and saw the words “Gon to Alxs” scribbled in five-year-old handwriting.
Cal nodded sheepishly.
