Page 93 of Tickled Pink

The front door opens. Before we can sit up and greet her, Phoebe bounds through the foyer toward the stairs without stopping.

“Phoebe?” Thad calls out. “What’s up?”

She doesn’t reply, instead releasing a deep groan, her boots clunking up the stairs.

Immediately, Stinky bolts from her spot by the fireplace and follows Phoebe up the stairs. We follow her lead, Thad pulling me off the couch with him. Together, we follow the girls, our focus now locked on taking care of Phoebe.

Phoebe comes first to us. Always.

“Phoebe,” I say, the two of us a floor behind. “What’s wrong?”

Another groan.

Thad looks at me, frowning with worry.

We follow her through the open bedroom door, catching the tail end of her performing a belly-flop onto the rose-petal covered bed. She smothers herself in her pillow with another groan, the sound muffled and weak.

“Phoebe,” I say, more worried now. Thad and I climb onto our sides of the bed, flanking her. “Sweetie, what’s wrong?”

“I’m thirty,” she says into the pillow.

Thad and I exhale; the edges of his perfect mouth ticking up.

“That’s all?” I ask aloud.

“That’s a lot!” she says, bouncing the bed as she turns over onto her back. “It’s ten more than twenty.”

“Ten less than forty, though,” Thad says, softly rubbing her thigh to adjust her inched-up dress back down to her knees.

She whines. “In ten years, I’ll be forty!”

We laugh. Can’t help it. She’s just too cute when she whines.

“Phoebe, it’s okay,” I say.

“How is it okay? I’m practically a spinster.”

“You’re not a spinster,” Thad says. “Spinsters don’t have boyfriends. You have two.”

“Yeah, but no babies.”

Thad and I share a glance. “Uh, Pheebs,” he says. “You don’t want babies.”

“I know,” she says.

“We don’t want babies,” he adds with a nod toward me. “None of us want babies.”

“I know!” She flops once. “I know.”

I sigh, figuring it out. “Your parents called, didn’t they?”

She looks at me, her eyes full of sadness. “Yeah,” she answers.

I rub her arm while Thad takes the other hand. “What’d they say?” I ask.

She pushes air out through her lips. “Same as last year,” she says. “And the year before that.”

“Where are our grandbabies?” Thad says.

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