Page 10 of Strangely Normal

We stopped at a room and she threw open the door. “My dad thinks captivated is a much happier word than addiction.”

“He has a point.” We stepped inside the room, and I had to mentally remind myself to close my mouth. A large four poster bed, complete with silky canopy and more pillows than I would know what to do with, sat in the center of a room that rivaled the school cafeteria in size. “Getting lost in the house— hell, I’m going to get lost in that bed.”

“That’s cute. I like that.” Finley looked up at me. “You sure are beautiful. I’ve always wanted to be tall and statuesque like my mom. She was a model. But I was six weeks premature, and I just never grew much.”

“Do you see her a lot?” Talking about her mom sent a twinge of homesickness through me.

“Nah, she’s living in Venice or something like that. My dad got full custody of each of us, so we grew up with him. It helps to have a lot of money for good lawyers. But I think the three of us would have chosen to stay with him regardless. Jude’s the oldest. He’s twenty-two. His mother was an actress, but she died in a car accident. And Cole sees his mother occasionally. She used to be Dad’s accountant.” She sighed. “Oh my gosh, just tell me to shut up when I drone on too much.”

“There’s been no droning at all. I find it fascinating.”

“So what are your parents like?” She reached for my hand. Her fingers were covered with rings, and her slim wrists were weighed down by bangles. “Do you live with your mom or dad?”

“Both actually.”

“Wow, you don’t hear that very often.”

“I know. That’s kind of sad. I live with my parents and my two little sisters. My parents had me when they were teenagers, so they’re pretty young. My dad is absolutely obsessed with your dad.”

She tucked her hair behind her ear and displayed a long row of tiny gold hoops running down one ear. “Let me guess, mid-thirties, played in a band, still wears long hair.”

“Yes. Holy crap, do you know him?”

“No. That is just the usual profile of Dad’s man groupies.”

I pressed my hand to my chest. “Thank God. I just had a nightmarish vision of my dad standing outside of your house with his Black Thunder t-shirt holding a big piece of cardboard painted with the words ‘I love you, man’.”

She laughed. “Hey, you’d be amazed what people do to get into see my dad. One lady even parachuted onto the grounds. She was completely naked, but her body was painted with the Black Thunder black wing logo.”

“What did your dad do?”

“That’s the sad thing about it. She’d gone to all that trouble but hadn’t bothered to find out if my dad was even home. He was in Europe on tour. Jude felt sorry for her though. He handed her a signed picture before the cops put her in the car.”

A wet nose on the back of my hand startled me, and I looked down expecting to see a dog. A black and white pig with a gold hoop in one ear wiggled his snout at me.

“That’s Some Pig,” Finley said.

“He sure is.”

“No, I mean that’s his name, Some Pig. He was rescued from a horrid farmer who didn’t feed him enough. That’s why he is so small. His real name was Sheldon, like the T.V. character, because he’s highly intelligent and obsessive-compulsive, like me.” She leaned closer. “But worse,” she whispered as if her pig could understand.

“Can I pet him?”

“He’d be pissed if you didn’t.”

I reached down and stroked the top of his head. “I’ve never touched a real pig. I remember seeing some on a field trip to the farm, but they didn’t let us touch them. The whole time the guy was standing in the pen, telling us all kinds of information about pigs. But I wasn’t paying attention. I just kept thinking—when are we going to pet them? But we never got to touch any of the animals. It was the lamest field trip ever.” I leaned down and ran my fingers down his back. His hair was thick and rough. “How did he end up being called Some Pig?”

“One day, I made the grave mistake of letting Sheldon, the pig, not the television character, watchCharlotte’s Webwith me. After that his mood changed. He stayed in his straw bed, and he wouldn’t eat, not even nachos. Those are his favorite. So a pet psychic came and had a session with him. She told us to change his name to Some Pig and it worked.”

“There’s such thing as a pet psychic?”

“Yeah, they’re in high demand in this neighborhood. Lots of neurotic pets.” She headed out of the room. “Are you hungry?”

“A little bit.”

“Great. Let’s go down to the kitchen. You can meet Jude. He’s an ass most of the time, but I love him.”

“And does he also suffer from dirty sock syndrome?”

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