Remy looked back at me. “Here’s the Costco card.” He handed me the plastic membership card. I stared at it in horror.
“I’m not taking them in there!”
“I need a nap,” Remy said and pulled his cap down over his eyes and started snoring. I knew he wasn’t faking it because he had learned to sleep anywhere, at any time, in the military.
I muttered a curse.
“Costco! Costco! Costco!” the kids all chanted as they sprinted off the bus.
“You need to walk in an orderly fashion,” I barked. “Two abreast.”
They formed into some semblance of a line, but as soon as we walked into the big box store, they scattered, grabbing carts and racing to pull giant bags of chips, nacho cheese, and nuts off the shelves.
I couldn’t even rely on the teenagers to help me with the younger kids. After they had stolen another of my cars again and promptly wrecked it, I had made them find jobs to work off the damages, and they were off at their various restaurants. I was solely in charge of the younger children.
“Do not buy anything that is not on the pre-approved list,” I yelled at them.
“But my stuff isn’t on the list!” Davy said, bottom lip trembling.
“You can still pick out what you want,” I assured him. He beamed and ran off.
“Mr. Svensson,” an elderly town resident greeted me. “Good showing at the debate tonight!”
“Thank you,” I told the man, giving him a winning smile. “I appreciate all the support.”
He nodded. “I’m still trying to make up my mind on who to vote for,” he said, putting the brakes on his walker that morphed into a seat and then plopping down on it. “I want to know what your plans are about all the alligators in the sewers.”
I blinked. “Excuse me, Mr.…”
“Boyde,” he said. “My grandpa used to work for the municipal water plant. Said there were alligators down there. I’ve brought this up numerous times to Mayor Barry and Meg. Now, you have my vote if you promise to do something about those dang alligators.”
“Sir, we are too far north for them to survive.”
“That’s not true!” Mr. Boyde insisted. “I had a lady friend over the other day, and she went to use the facilities and said there was an alligator in there. She screamed and flushed the toilet before I could catch it. Now I want to know what you’re gonna do about it!”
I wracked my brain. One kid came over hauling a large bag of fried pork skins.
“That’s not on the list,” I told him. “Put those back where you found it.”
“But it’s for an art project!” my little brother whined.
“We will not have an industrial-sized bag of pork skins in the house.”
He sighed loudly and stomped off.
“Sir.” I turned back to the elderly man. “I’ll ban the owning of alligators.”
“What? You can’t do that. This is a free country! A man should be allowed to have an alligator if he wants to!” Mr. Boyde thundered.
“No, Nate,” I told another brother who was walking past, rolling a large drum of marshmallow cream in front of him.
“It’s for a recipe.”
“No it’s not; put that back.”
“I just don’t want them dumping the alligators in the sewer,” Mr. Boyde continued.
“Fine.” I blew out a breath. “I’ll make the dumping illegal.”
