Page 64 of The Twelve Months of Christmas
Molly smiled. “You’re a good friend.”
“Just like you. We’re the Three Musketeers.”
“All for one and one for all,” said Molly.
“Unless it’s Frango mints. Then it’s all for me and none for you guys,” Sunny joked.
“Some Christmas spirit,” Molly joked back.
“Okay, maybe one for you. Now, what do we want to do on the twenty-fifth? And where do we want to do it?”
“We can use my house. And how about looking for four-leaf clovers?” Sunny suggested.
“Good luck with that, especially if it rains.”
“Then we’ll cut ’em out of green plastic garbage bags. And if it’s too cold we can hide them inside the house. The person who finds the most gets a pot of gold coins.”
“I like it,” Molly approved. “And we could watch an Irish movie.”
“NotDarby O’Gill and the Little People,” Sunny said. “My grandma showed me that when I was a kid and the banshee scared the snot out of me.”
“Okay, not that. You pick.”
“I will. And we can have green beer for the grown-ups and green Kool-Aid for the kids. And some of the shamrock cookies we’re making for the leprechauns.”
“I’ve got a salad you make with green Jell-O, crushed pineapple and cottage cheese and whipped topping,” Molly offered.
“And corned beef and cabbage for the main course?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, that does it,” Sunny said. “We are ready to party.”
It turned out Tansy wasn’t ready for them to party when Sunny called a couple days beforehand to make arrangements to pick up the kids for the weekend.
“I promised my grandma we’d go see her for the weekend,” Tansy said. “She’s all the way down at Ocean Shores so we can’t exactly be running back and forth.”
“You can’t be running at all,” Sunny informed her. “It’s Travis’s weekend to have the kids.”
“But it’s Grandma Nolan’s birthday.”
“We’ll bring them back Saturday night. Go see Grandma on Sunday.”
“Sorry, we can’t do that,” Tansy said, not sounding even the tiniest bit sorry.
“You know, you don’t get to keep pulling this stuff,” Sunny snapped. “Travis has rights.”
“He also wants to do what’s right. He wouldn’t want the kids not to see their great-grandma on her birthday.”
“Sunday is a great day for a ride to the beach,” Sunny said, determined to win this battle.
“It’s too hard on the kids with school the next day. You guys can have them next weekend.”
“This weekend is our Christmas-in-March celebration.”
“Big deal,” sneered Tansy. “Bella thinks these parties are silly, anyway. Look, I gotta go.” And with that, she was gone, leaving Sunny glaring at her phone and swearing.
She was still steaming when Travis came home from work. “She’s done it to us again.”
