“Mommy? The phone is ringing,” Short called out. Then he proceeded to dance to the ringtone instead of picking it up. It was his own personal disco service. “Hello?” I answered.
“MOV? Hey, it’s me, Oakley.” I had been
expecting my sister’s call for over a week now.
I tried to be smooth and not bring up Muse right away because I knew it
would upset her.
“So, uh, Oak
… what’s the deal with Muse? Is she
still there?” “Yes. She’s here. She finally talked me into biking cross country with her. After a few glasses of wine, I caved. I was like, What the heck? Sure, why not? It’s not that far, really, California to Chicago.”
“Don’t you
mean Maine? Maine would be cross country.”
“Shhh! She might hear you, you’re on speaker
phone!” I heard a fumbling noise and
then a loud click as she transferred to a receiver. Oakley continued in a muffled whisper, reminiscent
of serial killers in movies. “Muse
thinks Chicago is all the way across America.
She’s lousy with geography, so I’m not gonna tell her. Chicago is plenty far enough to bike!” “So, Oakley, when do you leave?”
“Well, I told her to get some biking gear and we could leave early tomorrow.”
“Wait, what do you mean, you told her to ‘get some biking gear’?”
“I gave her my credit card and sent her to the mall.”
“NO!”
“She said she'd be back in a few hours ...”
I could feel my heart beating out of my skeleton, like a cartoon character. “Oakley, go after her! Leave now!”
“What is your problem, MOV? She knows to only buy biking-related things.”
“NO! You actually gave her your credit card? Why would you do that?!”
“Oh, come on MOV, what could possibly go wrong?”
(coming up next: the exciting conclusion!)
MOV
("Muse/ Oakley Vacation")
("Muse/ Oakley Vacation")
