Chapter 4

Act 1

Scene 4

Kim smiled as she hung up the phone in the kitchen, dodged her youngest daughter, Annabelle, as she dashed to the fridge to steal a late night snack for her guinea pig, and stepped back into the Great room. As her seven strides brought her to the leather sectional couch, she heard Bell pounding back up the stairs to her room. She snuggled up to her husband Evan's side. He put an arm around her and looked into her bright excited eyes.

Looking at her grin, he said through his own, "Can't wait to see how much those boys have grown!"

Becky finally tore her eyes from the 50" HD plasma screen TV, and feigning disinterest, asked, "What boys?"

Excited, Kim answered, "Your Uncle Paul and your cousins are sailing for the weekend. We thought we'd all race the regatta and then cruise up the outer banks for a few days. Isn't that great? We haven't seen them in so long!"

Beth, looked up from her texting, and in shocked disbelief, asked, "What? This is the last summer I can spend any time with my friends before we all go off to college! You can't expect me to waste time with my stupid cousins!"

Evan said smoothly, "Sorry Beth, family first. You have whole rest of the summer with your friends, you can take a week to spend with us."

Beth looked at her mother, with puppy eyes, and said plaintively, "Mom!"

"Sorry honey. This is something we're all going to do together. It won't be that bad. Tell you what, we'll make a shopping stop at Hilton Head on the way back."

Beth screwed up her face in disgust, lunged off the couch, and flounced out of the room, texting rapidly.

Belle started to run down the stairs, bumped into Beth, who snarled, "Out of the way shrimp!"

Belle stuck her tongue out at Beth, and jumped the last four steps to the floor with a thump. She ran to her daddy and jumped into his lap for her goodnight snuggle. She clasped her hands behind his neck and gave him a big hug.

As she kissed him on the cheek, Evan asked her, "Hey, honey, how would you like to go sailing for a week?"

Belle bounced up and down excitedly, and squealed, "A whole week!"

Becky saw her sister's excitement, and turned her head to say snidely, "Yeah, a whole week. With cousins Lewis and Clark."

Belle froze in mid bounce, and wide eyed, asked, "Aw mom! Do they have to come?"

Kim drew her youngest daughter into her arms, ignoring the exaggerated pout, and gave her a big squeeze. She said soothingly, "Don't worry Belle, they're bringing their own boat. So go to bed. It'll be fine. We'll have fun, you'll see. Tomorrow we're going shopping! Go get in bed. Daddy will be up to tuck you in soon."

As Belle raced up the stairs, Kim turned to Becky and said, "Was that really necessary, honey? There's nothing wrong with your cousins, you always got along with them. It's been two years, you've all changed, so I think you'll all get along better now."

Becky rolled slowly to her feet, to follow Bell up the stairs.

Evan looked at her and said, "Show me a smile, aren't you a little excited?

Becky stopped, gave her father a faint hint of a smile. She shrugged and answered, "I guess, but then, they were always weird around me." Then she started to follow her sisters upstairs.

Evan said, "Hey, munchkin, aren't you forgetting something?"

Continuing to play her nightly game, Becky responded, teasingly, "What's that daddy?"

Evan feigned a lunge at her and cried, "Your hug and goodnight kiss!"

Becky shrieked and bolted up the stairs into her room. The slam of the door echoing back to her smiling parents downstairs.

Kim stood and kissed her husband with a smoky look in her eyes. She said, breathily, "You'd better get up there and get them tucked in and settled down. We won't have much privacy for the next week, so I'll be ready and waiting for you when you're done." She turned over her shoulder and flashed him a smoldering look. Then, trailing her fingertips across his chest, she turned to follow the girls upstairs with an exaggerated sway in her hips. Kim paused briefly to pose at the top of the stairs, with one finger to her lips, one hip and one knee rose coyly, invitingly.

Evan was frozen into immobility for a few precious seconds, but then he surged to his feet and bounded up the stairs, two at a time. Looking forward to meeting his wife of twenty years for some much needed personal attention; Evan tried to breeze quickly through tucking his three daughters in for the night. After all, the older two made it seem as if it where a violation of their civil rights on most nights and hurried him out of their rooms after a brief 'night daddy'.

However, his daughters, it seemed, had different ideas for this night. Going into little Bell's room, he saw she was already in bed, but rolled toward the wall, facing away from him. He knelt to give her a kiss on the cheek and she rolled back into the kiss and threw her arms around his neck with a sob, clinging to him desperately.