“But what are you gonna do about the ones already down there!” he demanded.
“Davy, no, put all that cat food back. We don’t have a cat.”
“I’m gonna feed it to the alligators!” my little brother explained.
“Did you see them, boy?” Mr. Boyde demanded, peering at Davy.
Davy nodded. “I thought it was a dinosaur, but Remy said it was one of the alligators that lived in the sewers!”
“You’re not dumping cat food down the storm drains,” I warned him.
“But you said I could have anything!” he cried.
I felt a headache coming on. I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Fine,” I said, “you want cat food? Go for it.”
“You watch out for those alligators, young man,” Mr. Boyde said as I helped haul him to his feet. “Even the little ones can bite off your finger.”
I checked the time. Was Meg out right now with Walter? I needed to know. But I had three carts of groceries to pay for.
“I’m hungry!” one of the kids complained, which started the rest of them off.
I tried to relax my shoulders. “You can all go buy food from the cafeteria,” I told them.
Remy wandered into Costco as the cashier was scanning the cat food.
“Is that for the alligators, or are you adopting a feral cat?” he asked me.
“How is this a thing? Why are people talking about alligators all of a sudden?”
“If you’re going to be mayor,” Remy chided, “you need to know what’s going on. I bet Meg knows about the alligators. Or she’s getting very intimate with the snake in Walter’s pants.” He grinned.
“Do you know something?” I growled.
Remy laughed at me. “Relax. Meg is totally going to go for you and the cat food over Walter and his yacht and billions.”
“Walter has a boat?”
Remy showed me an article on his phone. “A big one.”
“Fuck. Maybe I need to buy a boat.”
“I think you’d better focus a little closer to home.”
Davy held out a hot dog to me and a slice of pizza. He was covered from head to toe in mustard.
“He’s just getting ready for thewurstfestival next week,” Remy said with a laugh.
21
Meghan
“Did you dress up like Catwoman to steal a car?” I hissed at Kate.
“We’re not stealing,” she countered. “It’s your car. The bank can’t just lay claim to everything in the house.”
“Technically, they can if you leave it there past the eviction-notice date. They sell it to recoup some of their losses.”
“Boo,” Kate said. Then she struck a pose under the streetlamp. “I still look pretty hot, right?”
