Chapter 12 #2
“Stop!” She playfully slapped his arm. “They have some hidden gems!”
But do they? I almost asked.
Peggy laughed. “Of course not, sillies,” she said. “They’re from .”
Now that I knew the nightshirts wouldn’t be moldy or visibly stained with sweat, my interest returned. The room’s volume soon escalated, and it didn’t help that Teddy and Bryce stole two of the nightshirts and started running around with them on their heads.
Finn and Maisie looked unimpressed while Connor was failing miserably at swallowing his laughter. Warmth flooded my chest as I had a flash of what he looked like at ten years old.
A buzz cut and freckles, I remembered.
Nick whistled, the sharp sound a shock to my eardrum. Even Swede’s head snapped up from resting on my knee. “Everyone settle down!” he called. “Let Nana explain the rules!”
“Yes, I’d love a refresher course.” Beth eyed her brother. “Some of us need to understand that you can’t sabotage another team’s balloons…”
Jay chuckled. “Bethany, I will not apologize for being a competitive child.”
The room heeded Nick’s words, and Peggy explained that the game would involve one player from each team wearing an enormous nightshirt over their clothes. Each team also would be given a bag of balloons and an air pump.
“Using your team’s pump and good old-fashioned lung power, you have ten minutes to blow up as many balloons as you can and stuff them into your team’s nightshirt,” Topper instructed. “The team with the most balloons in their nightshirt takes the cake.”
“You all have five minutes to strategize!” Peggy concluded, and just like that, she took a stopwatch out of her pocket and pressed start. Every team laughed and made a mad dash to different corners of the room.
“I want to wear the nightshirt!” Teddy exclaimed, waving it over his head.
Erica and Allison exchanged a look before my stepmother jumped into mom mode. “Teddy, we need your superfast arms to help stuff the balloons into the nightshirt.” She turned to me. “Olivia, how about you wear the shirt while Allison and I blow up the balloons?”
“Dibs on the pump,” Allison said. “My lungs don’t compare to yours, Erica.”
Erica smiled. She’d lifeguarded in high school and still swam regularly. “What do you think, Teddy?” I asked, trying to channel my inner Connor. He was so natural with kids. “You want to stuff me like a turkey?”
Grinning, he surrendered the nightshirt, and I pulled it on over my clothes.
Meanwhile, Sage wore her team’s nightshirt with Connor and Bryce doing breathing exercises to ready their lungs.
Of course, I thought at the sound of Connor offering pointers on how to most effectively expand lung capacities.
He’d mentioned his mom taught yoga on the weekends.
Our five-minute strategy session felt more like thirty seconds, but somehow, everyone seemed pseudo-organized by the time Peggy called time. “Ready…” she teased as Topper raised a plastic whistle to his lips. My heart started to pound. “Set…”
Go!
Swede barked and Beth’s little Posey yipped when the whistle blew, the room exploding with excitement and frantic energy.
I identified as the latter. My nightshirt’s hem stopped mid-calf, so I worried the balloons would fall out the bottom.
“We’ve got to stuff the balloons in really tightly,” Erica said, reading my mind.
“It’ll expand the shirt Santa Claus–style and prevent the balloons from slipping out and getting away. ”
She and Allison took turns using the hand pump and blowing up the balloons while Teddy stuffed them under my nightshirt.
I caught the two moms motioning to each other, agreeing that they too would shove balloons in, but subtly so they didn’t hurt Teddy’s feelings.
It reminded me of when I was a little girl; we’d been on vacation and I’d told my mom I could eat an entire banana split sundae myself.
She told me to go for it and congratulated me after I all but licked the bowl clean.
It was years later that I found out she’d been sneaking bites while my dad distracted me. Brooke Lupo hadn’t even liked bananas.
Heart twinging, I glanced over at the other teams and couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at their strategies.
How had Maisie ended up in the nightshirt?
It was so big on her; she looked like a ghostly bride with her long train.
All she was missing was a veil. My dad, Charlie, and Beth—my sister’s teammates—were going for optimal balloon production, having formed a full-on assembly line.
I smiled, shook my head, and refocused on my own team. Beads of sweat had formed on Allison’s forehead, and Erica’s hair was falling out of her ponytail. My stomach had also grown enormous, blocking my view of Teddy.
Are we winning? I wondered, pulse racing at the possibility.
Because okay, this was fun.
“Five more minutes to fill your nightshirts!” Peggy said, then held up something that looked a lot like a sewing needle.
“What is she going to do with that?” I asked at the same time Jay shouted, “Mom, you’re evil !”
Beth knowingly laughed, but neither she nor her brother enlightened us. “Ouch!” I squeaked when someone poked me hard in my stomach. “Watch where you put your hands, Theodore…”
“I’m sorry!” Teddy shouted. “And it’s Edward!”
Apologizing, I bent my knees to stop several balloons from escaping my nightshirt.
“Good idea, Olivia…” Erica was almost breathless from the pump.
“Erica, let’s switch after five more,” Allison said. Slowly I was starting to resemble Father Christmas getting ready for bed.
My sister wasn’t far behind; she had started to blow up à la Violet Beauregarde from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Beth urged them on like a field general while stuffing in balloons with both hands. “I—can’t—breathe!” Maisie squealed.
Pop!
Pop, pop, pop!
I stiffened at the balloons bursting against my skin. “Teddy—” I started, but then felt someone’s arm snake up my back.
“It’s not me!” he cried.
“Don’t worry,” Erica said. “I’m squeezing in more balloons.”
At the cost of others! I thought, again feeling the sharp snap of plastic.
“Watch your fingernails,” I gritted out. “They’re popping balloons faster than you’re adding them.”
Erica didn’t respond; instead, one of her nails scratched my back.
“One minute left!” Topper warned as I winced.
“Go, go, go!” Beth yelled from across the room, eliciting an eye roll but also a couple giggles. What was this? What was this level of sheer craziness? And why was I enjoying it so much? Despite Erica’s perfectly manicured fingers, laughter bubbled up in my lungs.
The whistle blew. “Drop your balloons!” Peggy shouted. “I want to see all hands in the air! Top Chef hands now!”
“Nice reference, Nana,” Charlie weakly said, one of the many raggedly breathing, coughing, and exhausted balloon-blowers. Almost everyone fell to the floor, as if just barely surviving Erica’s favorite kickboxing class. (Per her vlog, it seemed like a nightmare.)
“Now comes the fun part.” Peggy beamed with steely eyes.
“Mom, don’t scare the children!” Erica choked out.
She waved a dismissive hand, already approaching my corner. “Team Green, I will start with you.” She raised her sewing needle. “One pop equals one balloon.” She smiled at me mischievously. “Olivia, this will be quick and painless…as long as you stay still.”
My stomach’s churning was so choppy that I almost asked to go to the bathroom.
To, you know, vomit.
But Peggy was too quick. With expert precision, she stabbed her needle through my thin nightshirt. Maisie laughed when I flinched at the first pop.
Erica surreptitiously filmed the scene. I glanced over my shoulder at Beth, hoping she wouldn’t notice her sister. We need evidence, I thought. Otherwise, Quincy and Gwen will never believe me when I tell them…
“Sixteen balloons for Team Green!” Peggy proclaimed.
Teddy hit me with high fives.
Team Yellow was up next. Nick was still standing, but he massaged his biceps while Finn had gone green. Beth’s husband still looked thin in his bloated nightshirt. Their tally was ten balloons.
“Thirteen balloons!” Peggy told the red team, and I laughed when Sage and Connor hoisted Bryce in the air. They were in second place.
Last but not least, we turned to Team Blue. Maisie looked stone-cold serious as Peggy went to work. All smiling smugly, Charlie, Beth, and my dad counted each pop aloud. “Boooo!” people chorused once even Maisie relaxed enough to join in: “Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen!”
“And we have our winners!” Peggy grinned. “Team Blue has won an all-expenses-paid trip to Backdoor Donuts at midnight tonight!” She turned to Nick while I did a double take at the mention of midnight. What bakery was open that late? “You don’t mind driving, do you, sweetie?”
“Not at all, Nana,” Nick said, mumbling, “As long as I get an apple fritter.”
* * *
Topper had filmed tonight’s shenanigans and broadcasted it once us losers had cooled off later.
It turned out Erica accidentally popping balloons and scratching my back hadn’t been that bad, but my expression had been caught on camera.
“You look like you want to murder her,” Bryce oh so sensitively commented, garnering more than a few laughs.
But it kind of made me feel like a bitch…and a little bad for Erica. If I’d known I’d given her a death glare, I would’ve apologized in the moment.
Tail between my legs, I went looking for her later, finding her in one of the house’s small studies with her laptop. “Scrolling through summers past?” I guessed, spotting the Shutterfly icon on her MacBook screen.
Erica visibly jumped at the sound of my voice. “Oh, it’s you,” she said, exhaling. “I thought you were my mother.” She muttered. “Or Beth.”
I gave her a look. “I sound like them?”