Chapter 230
Billie had gone upstairs to wash her face and hands, then come down to ask Auntie Kat to get the zipper on the back of her fancy dress so she could change and go play. Billie walked right by Uncle Scooter’s office, swishing her skirts and still feeling pretty and royal and pleased when she heard her name.
She wasn’t s’posed to listen, she knew that. But her uncles had been talking about her a lot recently. She knew that, because they stopped talking whenever she came into the room. Mommy and Aunt Dani had done that a few times, too.
“I want to shake the hell out of my sister,” Uncle Scooter said quietly. “Why the hell did she end up making a baby with Simon Johannson? I mean, really.”
“How the hell should I know?”
She missed the rest of what Uncle Andy said as the fry-basket buzzer went off in the kitchen. Billie leaned against the door, pressed her ear to the wood.
“…we don’t deserve to keep her anyway,” Uncle Andy said.
Billie flinched away from the door. She thought Uncle Andy cared about her. Maybe not like Mommy did. Did they not want her to live with them?
“…Billie is Simon’s daughter. Is it right of us—”
She took several steps back. She had a father? Mommy had always said she didn’t need one, but Billie didn’t realize that she actually had one. And no one had told her? She wanted to push open the office door and yell at her uncles. How could they not tell her?
It didn’t matter.
They didn’t want her anyway. She wiped her eyes on the back of her arm and sniffled.
Well, if they didn’t want her, she didn’t have to stay!
But she wasn’t going with any father, either.
Mr. Simon had been nice enough, she supposed, but she didn’t know him. She didn’t want to know him.
She didn’t need a father
Billie screwed her face up. She wasn’t going to cry. She took a deep gulp of air, then hung in the doorway of the kitchen. As soon as Auntie Kat pushed out with a tray, she dodged into the kitchen. Around Uncle Jason, who was cooking. And out the back door.
She didn’t know where to go.
Right now, she just needed to hide.
She hitched up her dress and ran across the street. She forgot to look both ways and a car honked at her. The driver waved at her impatiently and she scurried across the rest of the street. Scrambled into the bushes. Looked back.
No one seemed to have noticed that she’d left. She straightened her tiara and marched off down the road.
* * * *
Why? Why did seniors want to eat dinner at four in the afternoon? It made no sense. Maybe he’d figure it out when he was sixty-five or so, Andy conceded. There had once been a time in his life when naps were undesirable, after all, and he couldn’t imagine turning one down now. Andy rang up the last of the early “rush”—not that any rushing was involved with that bunch—and then waved to Kat to let her know the floor was hers.
He ducked back into the kitchen. “Billie’s dinner ready yet?” he asked Jason. She usually ate early, in the dip between the senior rush and the normal dinner crowds that started around five-thirty or six.
Jason glanced up at him, surprised. “She hasn’t told me what she wants today,” he said.
Andy snorted. “All that ice cream filled her up I guess. Wouldn’t be surprised if she conked out on the couch watching cartoons. I’ll go see what she wants.” He jogged out the back door and up the stairs to the house.
“Hey, buttercup, Uncle Jason wants to know—” Huh. Billie wasn’t on the couch. Muffin lifted her regal head to blink at him slowly, and Trick, curled on the floor where Muffin had banished him, whined at him. But no Billie. In her room, maybe, though usually she didn’t play in there.
Andy scratched Trick’s ears. “I know, buddy,” he said, “but if you’re going to let a bit of fluff the size of your paw boss you around, it’s your own fault.” Muffin had exiled Trick from the couch her third day in the house. It was kind of funny, actually.
Andy knocked on Billie’s door. “Billie? Time for dinner.” No answer. She must have been reallyexhausted to actually get into bed while the sun was still up. Andy cracked the door to check on her.
She wasn’t in the bed. Frowning, Andy pushed the door open further. She wasn’t in the room. Okay, that…was a little worrisome. He checked the closet, in case she was playing a trick. No.