Page 23 of Knocked Up by my Rival

Thunder clapped loudly.

“The rain says pancakes,” Benjamin said.

“What?” Troy asked, confused.

I laughed. “We’re making pancakes because the thunder and lightning are talking about it.” That wasn’t what I’d meant at all, but here we were, talking about storms as if they ordered pancakes for us.

“Right,” Troy said. “Well, I’m Troy.”

“I’m Benjamin.” Benjamin stepped up and held out his hand like a little grownup.

“Nice to meet you,” Troy said with a smile, shaking Benjamin’s hand. “And you are?”

“Tammy,” she said solemnly. “Are you here to work?”

“And maybe have a pancake if I’m allowed,” Troy said.

“Yeah!” Benjamin said.

“With sprinkles,” Rory added, peeking out from behind my leg. “Auntie Mackie said it’s okay.”

I smiled. “This is Rory. We’re in the kitchen.”

“Well, I have a surprise for you.”

“What is it?” Tammy asked, and the kids crowded around Troy. He pulled out a pack of cookies, and I groaned.

“Oh, we should have that with milk!”

“I thought I asked for no sugar,” I said.

Troy grinned at me. “I got a sugar-free pack. You can have fun without the evil that follows.”

I took the box from him and studied it. It was indeed sugar-free.

“It looks like a rip-off of the real deal to me,” I said. “I’d never advertise this stuff.”

Troy laughed. “Stop thinking about work. Let’s go have those pancakes, huh?”

Thunder roared so loudly it drowned out whatever the kids might have said. Rory clung to my leg so tightly I struggled to stay upright, Tammy covered her eyes, and Benjamin squeezed his eyes shut, terrified.

“Oh, it’s okay,” Troy said. “It’s just static.”

“It’s what?” Tammy asked.

“Have you ever rubbed your hands against a jersey and then when you touch something it shocks you a little bit?”

“Like down the slide?” Benjamin asked. “At the park, it always snaps me.”

“Right, like that,” Troy said. “Do you know what that is?”

They all shook their heads.

“Static electricity is like little sparkles that some things collect when they rub against each other, and when it snaps like that, it’s because the sparkles jump off one thing and go to another. If there are too many little sparkles, some of them have to escape to go somewhere else. The clouds rub together like that, too, and they collect sparkles. Then, when they touch each other, the sparkles jump between the clouds, but it’s much louder than on the playground. When the clouds rub against each other, we hear it and call it thunder, and when the sparkles jump—”

“It’s lightning!” Tammy cried out.

“Right,” Troy said with a laugh. “A storm isn’t scary, it’s beautiful. It’s the clouds working hard to make sparkles, and they share it with each other. Sometimes good things still make scary sounds.”

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