Page 6 of Champagne & Handcuffs
“Do you think it will all work out?”
Mommy didn’t answer Grandma for a few seconds. “I don’t know. I love your son so much, but—”
“You don’t need to tell me details. I love you like my own daughter, Aubrey. If it doesn’t work out between the two of you, you’ll still have me. I know firsthand what it’s like to lose a man to the force. Every day I’d worry he wouldn’t come home, and then it happened. It’s ten times more dangerous now than it was back then.”
I turned my head, watching a man walk his dog in the grass. I wanted a dog.
“When canwe go to Disney World?” I asked Grandma as we drove to her trailer. Mommy had left. She was crying again, but this time it was because she was leaving me. I wondered how she would be without me for the summer.
Grandma looked at me and raised her eyebrows. “You want to go to Disney World?”
I smiled. “Yeah, I’ve never been, and Mommy told me you’d take me.”
She chuckled. “I’ll have to find someone to go with us. I can’t ride those crazy things.”
“What things?”
“The roller coasters. I’d throw my back out.”
I furrowed my eyebrows. “Okay. Well, who can go with us?”
“My friend Dovie has a teenaged son. We can ask them if they want to go.”
“Okay.” I didn’t care who went with us as long as I got to go. “So when can we go?”
“I’ll check with them and let you know. Maybe next week. Better to go during the week instead of the weekend with all those people. And in this heat,” she shook her head slightly, “I don’t want to melt.”
“Grandma!” I laughed. “You won’t melt.”
“You don’t know about this Florida heat, Sethie. Us old people can’t stay out long, or we’ll get a heat stroke.”
I stared at her for a moment. “Um, okay. Well, then can we go when the place opens?”
“We’ll need to stay a few nights in a hotel. It’s almost a four-hour drive.”
I got excited. “Another hotel? I like hotels.”
Grandma laughed. “Good. We’ll have fun.”
I wished my dad was here and going with us. He’d love all the rides, I was sure of it. “Can I call my dad?”
“Of course, sweetie. When we get to my house, we can call him.”
“How much longer?”
“Not long.”
I sighed and crossed my arms over my chest and looked out the window. I didn’t want to whine, or we might not go to Disney World. I had to pretend that riding in a car for a long time didn’t bother me.
Grandma finally turned onto a street, and I saw a bunch of trailers. “If the little girl next door is outside playing, I’ll introduce you to her.”
I wrinkled my nose. “Little girl?”
“She’s a sweetheart. Her mother works nights, so I usually take care of her until her mother gets home.”
“How little?” I didn’t want to play with alittlegirl.
“She’s six.”
