She caught my eye.
“This is what I mean.”
Trevor opened a sliding glass door, taking care the screen was shut, the blast of cool air making the room much more pleasant.
As everyone caffeinated up, I finished chopping onions, wiping my eyes at the end.
“You know, if you freeze the onions first, you won't cry,” Alex said.
“Or hold a piece of bread between your teeth,” Darla added.
“What?”
“Like this,” she showed me, grabbing a slice from a loaf, gently biting one end of it, letting the rest flap down like a sagging shelf. “The onion fumes get trapped in the bread and don't make their way to your eyes.”
“You hold a piece of bread in your mouth like that the entire time you're slicing onions?”
“Mmmm hmmm?”
“Who taught you that?”
“Mama.”
Better not ridicule it, then. I closed my mouth, the joke swallowed fast.
As the rest of us sat down at the table, coffees in hand, Darla disappeared down the hall, then reappeared, arms full of our sheets and pillows from the bed. She pivoted to the laundry closet, stripped everything down, and started a load.
“Why are you doing sheets?” Josie asked with a sly grin.
Trevor and I said nothing.
“These two were so good in bed last night I squirted like my hoo-ha became one of those music-choreographed fountains at the Bellagio in Vegas,” Darla answered.
Alex paled.
“I'm going have a shower now,” I said, standing up, ignoring the other half of my coffee.
“That's what she said,” Darla muttered in a joking tone.
Alex cleared his throat, stood, and looked down at the glass slider. “Uh, we have a visitor.”
“Mama's here already?”
BAWK!
“Only if she's a chicken.”
We all turned to see what Alex was talking about.
And he was right – there was a live chicken in the area between the door and the table.
“You brought Mavis with you?” Darla said in a deadly voice to Trevor, who looked as shocked as the rest of us, until I intervened.
“No – wait. Remember Dmitri warned us the neighbors have yard chickens?”
“Right,” Darla muttered. “Hmph.”
“What's a yard chicken?” Alex asked, staring down at the bird like he was putting a jigsaw puzzle together.
“Free range,” Josie muttered. “In fancypants Massachusetts, it's free range and you charge an extra $3 a dozen for the eggs. Here, you buy chicks for $2 each from a farmer and call them yard chickens and the eggs are free.”
“Shoo!” Darla said to the chicken, who looked up at her, then bent down and pecked at her shoelace.
“You did tell it 'shoe',” Trevor cracked, but that was the wrong thing to say.
“Get.That.Chicken.Out!” she screamed at Trevor, who reached down, picked the thing up, and turned it upside down in his arms as it fought back.
The bird went still.
“What kind of trick is that?” Alex marveled.
“Chickens go limp when you turn them upside down.”
“All cocks do,” I said under my breath.
“Shut up, Joe,” Trevor and Darla said together as Trev got the chicken outside and closed the glass slider.
I grabbed my phone and texted Dmitri:
You have big holes in the screen doors here and the chicken next door just got in the house.
Immediately, three dots appeared.
And then:
Sorry about surprise cock. Eggs free for you if laid in house. Deal with neighbor.
I stared at the text and laughed.
It might be easier to fix the screens.
He replied: On order.
I had a feeling Dmitri had a lot of parts “on order” when it came to keeping his properties in good shape.
Also, the showerhead in the hall bathroom broke, I added.
Plumbers so bad, Dmitri replied. But they cheap. You use other bathroom.
I wasn't going to bother to explain about Alex. We'd settle it all later, when we were leaving.
“Landlord says the chicken eggs in the house are free,” I announced.
Josie looked around. “Eggs? The damn things lay eggs in here?”
Darla looked at the open carton next to the stove. “Dang. Wouldn'tve bought so many at WalMart if I'd known they were free in the yard.”
“House,” I corrected her. “Apparently, the chickens wander and sometimes lay them in the house.”
I left them to go into the sanctuary of our bedroom, where the teeny-tiny Josie-sized shower was located. Alex would have needed a crowbar to fit in here.
The chicken wasn’t the only animal in here, though. I looked down at my crotch and discovered a wildebeast. My junk needed a trim.
Then I remembered I never packed my razor.
Trevor’s dopp kit was on the sink, half-open, a deodorant peeking out. One look and I found it: his electric razor.
Was it a dick move to use it to pretty up my jungle? Sure.
Which meant I grinned the entire time.
Five minutes later, I was presentable and grabbed the last towel, dried off, and went to get dressed. Answered a few emails. Browsed Reddit for a bit.
Yeah, I was procrastinating. Sue me.
When I came out of our bedroom, Josie was in the kitchen, toweling her wet hair.
“You fixed the showerhead?” I asked.
“No. Took a quick bath.”
“Don't use all the hot water,” Trevor complained.
“We are all done. I took my shower before I went to WalMart,” Darla declared.
“Ooooo, fancy. You dressed up,” Josie said with a smile, waggling her eyebrows.
Ding dong!
We looked at the clock. 10:50 a.m.
Trevor was still in his underwear.
“Shit!” he shouted, sprinting for the shower as every single member of Darla's family magically appeared at the door.
Darla wanted a big family gathering?
She was about to get one.
Chicken and all.
Chapter 18
Trevor
The shower was much needed.
So was a good wank job, but it would have to wait.
Darla was on the other side of the house, the tantalizing scent of cooking pork, fennel, garlic, and seasonings wafting across the long ranch, making my gut gurgle. The shower wasn't fancy, but I didn't have to worry about anyone crashing through the ceiling.
Which meant it was just fine.
I hated not knowing when we were leaving. Liam had a point, even if he was an asshole about it. We weren't doing gigs where we lost a few hundred bucks of we cancelled.
Entire months – sometimes a quarter of a year's earnings – would be at risk if we didn't play the whole show.
Plus there was the whole issue of our future hanging in the balance with each gig. Playing Times Square on New Year's Eve had skyrocketed us. What used to be a few hundred each was now five figures each, and if we played it right, soon we'd be at six.
We were edging in on the kind of incomes our parents earned.
Talk about revenge.
Yeah – revenge.
Everyone wants to best their parents, right? Not in a big way. Quietly. Stealth-like.
Maybe some people want to rub their noses in it, but not me, Liam, Sam and Joe. We wanted to earn more than our parents and hold that card close to our vests.