“Worker bees need snacks,” he argues.
I try not to laugh. “You both need snacks. That’s why we had apples and cheese and exactly two honey sticks each.”
I get matching looks of heartbreak.
“Could we have three honey sticks each?” Eliza asks sweetly.
“Four,” Caleb counters.
I hold up two fingers. “How many fingers is this?”
Eliza squints. “Two.”
“Right. Two honey sticks each. That was the deal. Your dad will never trust me again if I send you home made entirely of sugar.”
They groan in unified six-year-old despair.
“Can we go outside?” Eliza asks.
I hesitate.
Through the front window, the light looks wrong again. Too orange, too hazy. The smoke is hanging lower now. If you listen closely, you can even hear the fire from out here: a distant, low roar, like someone turned the valley’s volume knob to “danger.”
“Not today,” I say gently. “The air’s not good for your lungs right now.”
Caleb makes a face. “But inside is boring.”
“I’m not boring,” I protest.
Eliza dramatically flops backward on the couch. “Miss Abilene, we already colored. We already did bee facts. We already played queen bee and worker bee. We already had snacks.”
“And you already tried to turn my toy cat into a dragon,” I add.
“To be fair,” Caleb says very seriously, “she was angry, like a dragon.”
“That’s just her face,” I say. “She always looks like that.”
They dissolve into giggles.
My own anxiety flutters somewhere under my ribs like a trapped moth, but the twins are gravity—get close enough and they pull you out of your own head.
“Okay,” I say, clapping my hands once. “New game.”
Two little heads snap toward me.
“What game?” Eliza asks.
“The floor is lava?” Caleb guesses hopefully.
“Absolutely not. That sounds dangerous.”
He grins. “It’s awesome.”
“No structural damage games,” I say. “Try again.”
Eliza scoots closer. “So what game then?”
“Beekeeper training,” I announce.
