Chapter 26

James was getting ready for bed when Clover’s video chat request rang on his phone.

“Hey babe - what are you doing up so late?” James asked after answering. “ ... And dressed like a ninja?”

Clover was wearing a black sweater, black jeans, and a darkly-colored tourist baseball cap. She laughed. “Our host city’s tap water doesn’t taste very good,” she explained. “A bunch of us are going out to the reservoir to cast a cleansing spell, as an anonymous thank you. How’s the big project?”

“We’re on track - I think the presentation will be good. It’s mostly in Sig’s hands now,” James told her.

“And the kids?” Clover asked.

“Weird thing,” James said. “At dinner tonight I did the usual, ‘How are things at school? What’s new?’. And the kids did their usual: ‘nuthin’.”

“But then after Laurel and I finished the dishes and she was on her way out of the kitchen, she stopped. ‘Hey dad?’ She said, ‘I kissed a boy’.”

“She waited just long enough for me to turn to face her, then she smiled and pranced away. I swear for a second she looked like a storybook happy teenage girl.”

“Aww!” Clover exclaimed, holding her hand to her heart. “What else did she say?”

“Nothing,” James said. “She went to her room and closed the door. I’ll ask more when I think she’s open to it.”

“Wow, Laurel well-adjusted,” Clover said. “Maybe I should leave the country and let you do all the parenting more often,” she added with a wink.