“You wanna explain to the fire department why a black man with no connection to the owners of this house is in their yard?” Duke asked.
“Why is he in the yard?” I asked Duke.
“Search me, I was down the block, not gettin’ shit about Dexter by the way, when I got the call from Roxie,” Duke answered.
“I think he said he heard something and thought the owners were back here. He came around to talk to them and got caught by the dogs. Though I can’t really be sure since he was yelling the story and cursing a lot while he told it so I didn’t follow,” Roxie put in.
“Why don’t we go buy a few steaks and bring them back? Lure the dogs away,” a voice said from behind us and my body got tense when I recognized it.
I turned stiffly to look, hoping that I was hearing things, and not the usual Good Ava and Bad Ava nonsense, not even caring that it would mean I had finally lost what was left of my mind and everyone turned with me.
Mrs. Stark and my Mom were standing behind our tribe. It had been Mrs. Stark with the steak idea.
For the second time that day, I had to ask, what… the… fuck?
“What are you doing here?” I screeched. Yes, I screeched, totally unable to control the shrill in my tone. I’d lost it, I was done. This was too much. I could take no more.
“Who are they?” one of Olivia’s girls (earlier she had been quickly introduced as Rhonda) asked.
“Hello. I’m Josie Stark, Luke’s Mom. And this is Christine Barlow, Ava’s Mom. Pleased to meet you,” Super Mom Stark came forward and started shaking hands and bestowing warm smiles on everyone as if she was at a church mixer.
Everyone shook her hand but they all continued to stare at her.
“You’re Luke’s Mom?” Shirleen asked, staring wide-eyed with wonder at Mrs. Stark.
I wasn’t surprised at her reaction. Luke seemed more the type to explode fully formed out of a pit of blistering lava, not spring from the loins of a woman with a conservative hairstyle, low-heeled, faultlessly-shined, bone-colored pumps and sporting a short-handled, matching-bone-colored purse two steps up from a granny bag.
“Sure am,” Mrs. Stark stated proudly.
“I love this!” Daisy squealed and then giggled her tinkly-bell giggle. Jet, Roxie and Shirleen were grinning at each other huge and I feared they were about to join in on the giggles.
“Um…” I cut in before hilarity could ensue. “Again, can I just ask, what are you doing here?”
Mom and Mrs. Stark were warily looking Tex top-to-toe, obviously not certain what to make of him.
Mom tore her eyes away from Tex first. “Well, Josie and I were talking. We’re both worried about you. So we sent Marilyn and Sofia to the mall and we decided to follow you, make sure you were okay.”
“What?” I asked, even though I heard her answer, I just didn’t want to believe it.
“I know it’s none of my business,” Mrs. Stark, obviously not hearing me or deciding not to answer, turned to Olivia. “But you’re a pretty girl. I like your lipstick. It’s the perfect color for you. You have a lovely grandma. A girl like you, well, she shouldn’t be out with a boy who has bounty hunters after him. I don’t know you but I’m a mother and I’m pretty good at sizing people up and, one look at you, I know you could do better.”
Mom looked at me. “We listened at the side of Mrs. Conrad’s house. You were wrapped up in things, didn’t see us.” Her eyes got soft. “Ava, sweetie, I had no idea. Your troubles.”
Fuck.
Fuckity, fuck, fuck, fuck.
“I’m fine, Mom, honest, I’m over it,” I assured her and turned my attention back to Super Mom Stark. I wasn’t certain Olivia Conrad was the kind of girl who liked anyone getting into her business, especially middle-class, white Super Moms. I thought that might be more pressing at this juncture than Mom finding out I was conned, beaten up and violated by a total jerk. I would deal with Mom later. “Mrs. Stark –” I started.
“That Louis, he was no good,” Rhonda told Olivia, I thought unwisely. “I was always sayin’ you should cut him loose.”
“Mm-hmm,” Olivia’s other two girls, Tamika and Camille, murmured their affirmation in unison.
“Well, I loved him,” Olivia defended herself.
“You loved his big dick,” Camille put it then she looked sheepishly at Super Mom Stark. “Sorry, but it’s true.”
“Sex is not love,” Mrs. Stark said sagely.
“If it’s good nookie then it’s close enough,” Shirleen muttered under her breath.
I stared at them, stunned speechless at the fact that Mrs. Stark seemed to be intent on holding an impromptu woman’s talk show on a stranger’s lawn. The dogs were barking, Smithie was up a tree and Tex looked like the kind of guy no one wanted loitering around the neighborhood. I was pretty certain it was dumb luck that the police hadn’t already descended on our party. I was also pretty certain that dumb luck wasn’t going to hold out.
Before I could intervene, Duke did. “Time for the honesty,” he growled, looking, scarily enough, at me.