To make it short, the Ramseys always lived across the street, our more-or-less twin family, Walt and Ellen -- I can call them that, not Mr. and Ms. Ramsey — and Meredith and Martin, within a couple of years of me and my brother. Walt and Dad are Elks. Ellen and Mom are Auxiliaries.

Walt and Ellen’s split caught us by surprise, but they worked it out to a degree, anyway. Ellen -- just as well we hadn’t called her Ms. Ramsey because now she was Ms. Fairchild, her old name -- kept the place and he bought one the next block over so the kids could go back and forth, something my brother and I were glad about.

Meredith and Martin kept things at both places, so it was more like, which house will you be at this week? It wasn’t always the same for both of them, though it was supposed to be, as Martin might be scheduled for his mom’s place, but because of a game, he’d end up at his dad’s. They worked it out.

Why Ellen remained in the Auxiliary I didn’t get, other than that’s who she is and Auxiliaries don’t have as many rules.

The Elks Annual Gala is an intergenerational thing, basically a dance with a magician for the little kids. As Walt and Ellen have all sorts of things to take care of, they have to be there, but can hardly go as a couple, now being not one. It’s Mom, the orchestrators, who see a solution. We go as four dates who aren’t really couples.

So how to do it? Meredith with Martin or me with my brother won’t work because no girl’s going to a dance with her sibling. We could switch, more fun, but the adult part still doesn’t work because Walt can’t go with Mom because an Elk can’t take out another Elk’s wife, and as I said before, he can hardly take his ex.

So we’ll say that Walt and I make one couple, Meredith and my dad, another, my mom and Martin, a third, and my brother with Ellen, the fourth. Once there, it won’t make any difference.

We kids think it lame, but it’s not as if they asked our opinion.

Mom says that as it can take a guy a while to get his life together after a split, how special this would be for Walt, stepping out with someone as pretty as me. I point out that this hardly seems like “stepping out.” Like I’m supposed to help him get his life together? Maybe Dad could do that, as they have their Elks projects.

OK by me, though, as Walt and I are into astronomy. Lying on our backs to stargaze last year — the others having gone in — we scooted together to keep warm and pulled a blanket over us and maybe I rested my head on his shoulder and maybe his arm got around me. We saw six meteorites and agreed we had to kiss for each one. Our astronomers’ secret, the kissed, that is, not the count.

Martin appreciates my mom knowing stuff when his own is tied up, something I, myself, wasn’t aware of, but it explained why when sometimes I’d come home and find him in the kitchen. Once I saw Mom and him kiss even, but maybe he needed one, his own mom being tied up.

My brother and Ellen, they get along. When her kids aren’t there, Mom sends him over to see if she can use some help and the two of them watch TV, their place having better cable. Once when I stopped by, they were under an afghan, it being winter.

When Meredith’s alone at her mom’s, Mom says that as she needs some male perspective, Dad should stop by there. Once when I went by, they came down from her room where Dad said they’d been looking at her yearbook which I could see right there on the dining room table.

To make it short: despite each couple for the dance being of the opposite generation of the other family, Mom’s solution makes sense.

The corsages, we girls handle, the guys not knowing what kind to get.

How we get to the gala is somewhat like the man who has to ferry a fox, a chicken and a sack of corn across a river type of brainteaser: Walt and Ellen, not in the same car, but everybody arriving as couples in two cars. The solution: Walt takes me in his car and the others take ours, it being bigger. Two in the front, four in the back, as couples should sit together. Our moms had to sit on the boys’ laps to fit four in the back, but as the Chief of Police was an Elk, they could skip the seat belts. Meredith could, too, as she was supposed to sit close to her date, who happened to be Dad.

I’d have put my corsage on myself, it being in our refrigerator, but as Mom says that the presentation’s part of the deal, let Walt do it. It’s not as if I’d on a fancy dress, or anything, but it’s one I might wear if I’m ever asked to a real dance, and Walt surprises me when he pulls out my neckline to attach my flowers. Surprised, but also a little pleased that he sees my bra — not all of it, of course, just the top — as I’d on my push-out. When it’s your friend’s dad and your own mom’s right there, no problem.

Walt actually opens the car door for me, what a date should do. Probably my brother and Martin won’t remember, but that’s not my problem. And once we pull into the parking lot -- it’s packed -- he sticks out his elbow and I grab on, very date-like. Well, not actually grab, as that would have been childish, but hook myself onto. Well not actually just hook myself onto, but somewhat snuggle up against him, even more date-like. It’s pretty fun, walking across the parking lot, me on his arm, his arm on my breast.

Probably a lot of the Elks and Elk Auxiliaries think it great seeing me and Walt, my brother and Ellen, Meredith and my dad, and Martin and my mom, intergenerational at an intergenerational gala.

The decorations are nice, nice for Elks, anyway. Crepe paper, snacks on the tables which our brothers spot within a minute. Meredith and I said we’d teach them some dance steps, but they’d welshed. My dad could have benefited from a lesson or two, himself.

Walt swoops me around like in an old movie. He about crushes my corsage, but halfway through, takes upon himself the task of straightening it, but I didn’t mind, having on my push-out.

The other push-out is the one against my thigh. The nights he and Ellen made Meredith and Martin, he would have been like this, but with me just dancing. When I let my leg chase him a little, he shouldn’t know I can tell, though.

Should I ditch my bra? It isn’t adding much cleavage and it isn’t holding me anywhere different, what the Auxiliaries need whose outfits didn’t allow bras. It’s Nip-Bump City by the punch bowl, our brothers refilling their glasses often.

In the lady’s room, Meredith and I agree that it’s so fun, and she tells me that my dad, too, fixed her corsage on the fly. When she says “fly,” though, she giggles and so do I, and we both know we’ve gotten each other’s dad hard. So fun!

At least they were dancing, our dads, our brothers stumbling around while doing the handclasp thing between them and each other’s mom’s chest, our moms letting them lead. Our moms both show nip, but it’s not their fault because our brothers keep touching her there.