Then the door slammed open and Ron came back out. "Dad!" she said. "There's a mystery! We should go get Mom!"
"What kind of mystery?" I asked.
"A friend of mine, they're saying he stole the answers to a test. I know he wouldn't do that. We should get Mom."
Reflecting that I wasn't sure if the great detective would interrupt her day for this particular type of crime, I said, "Well, maybe we should figure out what we can first. We can get a runner to go tell her, and see if she can come and investigate."
"I'm going past the hotel on my way home," Christy said. "I could stop by and let her know."
I nodded. "That would be great, thanks."
Christy trotted down the stairs to her motorcycle, and I turned to go in.
"Dad?" Ron asked hesitantly. She stepped aside, so she wouldn't block two other kids who were coming out of the school, and stuck her hands in the pockets of her jeans.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Mom jokes sometimes about you and Christy." She was looking down at the steps. "You wouldn't ever leave, would you?" She made a face. "That's evil when that happens."
In a way, the very idea was funny, but of course I didn't laugh. I squatted and took her wrist, tugging her hand out of her pocket so I could hold it in mine.
"Ron," I said, "Christy is a very nice woman, and she and her boyfriend are good friends of ours, but there's no more chance that anything would happen with me and her than it would with your mother and Fifteen. I love your mother, and she knows it. That's why she can make jokes about it, because it won't ever happen. She is comfortable and confident in our marriage, and with good reason. And, if any of that wasn't true, if I did have any other ideas, she'd know it, wouldn't she?"
She looked up and smiled. "Yeah," she said. "You can't put anything over on her."
"Very true. So, I'm afraid you're stuck with both of us. Let's go in and see what we can learn. Maybe we can detect some things on our own before she gets here."
previous || about || home || next
