Aspen slurps the bottom of her protein shake noisily and leaps off her ball.
“Take a Lot before you go.” MaxiMum holds out the old top hat. (The Lotterys used to put their Lots in a Tibetan singing bowl, but the hat is way more Hogwarts.)
“I’m going to give Slate a sponge bath after just-super-quickly-checking if anyone’s attacked my portal. He’s horribly sweaty.” Aspen takes Slate out of her hoodie pocket and scratches his white belly. He plants one of his nibbly kisses on her chin.
“Bathing him doesn’t count as housework,” says Sumac, “because he’s your rat, and it’s fun.”
“And no screen time till you’re done, Aspen, no matter what state your portal’s in,” says MaxiMum, shaking the hat till Aspen takes a Lot.
“Drop Everything and Read.” Aspen scowls at her card. “CardaMom, trade?”
“You don’t even know what I’ve got,” CardaMom points out as she plucks a Lot out of the hat.
Aspen yanks it out of her hand. “Fill a Toy Basket. Deal!”
“I get to drop everything and read The Orenda!” CardaMom punches the air in satisfaction.
“And don’t fill the basket with just one big cuddly,” PapaDum warns Aspen.
PopCorn is scanning the listings in the city freesheet. “Bambini, who wants to come hear an Australian aboriginal country-and-western singer-songwriter tonight?”
Sic looks over his shoulder and pokes the page. “There’s a postpunk hip-hop crew in the mainspace, I’d go to that while you’re upstairs with the folkies.”
“That works.”
“Cat Girl?” asks Sic.
Catalpa’s only just come downstairs in her long black nightshirt. “Unless I’m out crochet-tagging,” she yawns.
She and a bunch of other fourteen-year-olds are currently obsessed with making colorful patches to cover bike stands and pipes and park benches. Like graffiti but with yarn.
“And for your challenge,” says PopCorn, “you can each review it on the family blog.”
Sumac goes to take just one more piece of bacon….
But Grumps is already eating the last one. His jaw moves like he’s not even enjoying it.
Wood dumps everything compostable in the metal bucket and sets down the rest on a plate for Diamond. CardaMom’s scrubbing the grill pan; she flicks her braid out of the scummy water. MaxiMum puts three pills beside Grumps’s plate.
“That stuff’s not doing a thing for me,” he says.
“Mm,” she says, “the doctor said they take a few weeks to kick in.”
“Giving me bad dreams.”
“I’m sorry about that, Iain. The side effects usually fade with time.”
“Hard on the stomach too.”
“If you take them after a meal, like right now,” says MaxiMum, “that should help.”
Finally, he sticks out his lizard tongue and swallows them. (MaxiMum’s so persistent, it occurs to Sumac, she could probably talk anyone into jumping off a cliff.)
“Kapow!” shrieks Opal from his perch.
Grumps glares over his shoulder at the bird.
“You likes parrots?” Brian asks him.
A sniff. “In their place.”
She looks confused. “Opal gots lots of places.”
“I was thinking of the jungle. How do ye manage?”
“Manage?” repeats MaxiMum.
“Hygienically.” His red-and-purple nose wrinkles. “With it flapping hither and yon and dropping its whatsits.”
“Oh, Opal doesn’t fly,” says PapaDum.
“And don’t worry, PapaDum’s trained him to go on a sheet of paper on that shelf there,” says MaxiMum.
“PapaDum’s Opal’s flock leader, that’s like the alpha dog,” Wood explains.
“See his squinchy wing?” Aspen jumps up to stroke the left one. “He got smuggled in a suitcase and it damaged him. We’re his rescue family.”
“Something wrong with all of them?” asks Grumps.
The Lotterys stare at him.
He nods at Diamond, lying on her cushion near Wood. “That crippled mutt, and the cat who’s scared of his own shadow….”
“Quartz is a she, and she’s just not as sociable as her sister, Topaz,” says Sumac, “but there’s nothing wrong with being an introvert.”
“And if you bothered to actually watch Diamond,” says Wood, “she moves better on three legs than most dogs do on four.”
A leaden silence. Two days, thinks Sumac; the grandfather’s only been here since the evening before last, but he’s like a gray thundercloud hovering over the house.
The old man plonks his plate beside the sink.
“Does Grumps not have to pick a Lot? Is he too old for chores?” Aspen asks.
Sumac glares dragon fire at her sister. He’s not meant to know what they call him.
“What did you say?” he demands.
“Nothing,” says Aspen weakly.
MaxiMum and CardaMom are exchanging a look.
“Grumps, you said, I heard you.”
“It’s kind of like Gramps, you know, grandfather,” says Sumac.
“It is not. A grump is a cranky puss,” says the old man.
He leaves the Mess without another word. And without anyone asking him to take a Lot, Sumac notices. Clearly he’s going to be like the king and the rest of them are the servants.