Chapter 17

The ice cream parlor had a nice feel to it. Homey. It was bright and colorful, but not plastic and artificial. We got lucky. There were only four people inside, a couple about my age and another about sixty years older. By the time we all trooped in we pretty much filled the place. Me and my six girls. My cousins, Cinnamon's dad and Rosita. Wynter and her parents, along with Jimmy and his. Then that Huntly dude and his dad and LaMarcus and his mom. And somewhere along the way, Kenny, his parents, and his little brother got attached too. Me and the other guys started grabbing empty tables and wrestling them into two long ones. We finally sat down, the ten adults and Kenny's little brother at one table, and the fourteen teenagers at the other.

Kenny had looked at me funny the whole time after he joined us at the end of the concert. Finally, he came over. "I'mmmm..." There was an interesting mix of emotions on his face. Apparently, Cinnamon hadn't taught him inscrutable yet. But he wasn't afraid of me, which was a little annoying since I had a good six or eight inches on him. He was uncomfortable but not embarrassed. For some reason I felt like he was more afraid of Cinnamon than me, worried that she'd be mad cause he messed with her new cousin.

I glared at him for several seconds. My glare is getting better, but it never hurts to practice. "You make the girls do anything they didn't want to?" I asked quietly.

Kenny shook his head, then used his forefinger to push his glasses back up his nose. It was kind of a loaded question, but I knew that when I asked it. "No," he said, "and I don't have any use for guys who do."

I glared another couple of seconds until the meaning of his words soaked in. "We're cool," I said finally with a small smile. I held out my hand and he shook it.

I liked all the parents, though LaMarcus's mom and Huntly's dad didn't seem to be as much a part of the group. Wynter's dad was cool. He reminded me of a baseball coach I'd had in California. He was wearing an ace bandage on his right wrist and had a big, and fresh looking bruise on his right cheek. No one seemed to pay any attention to it, so I asked Wynter.

She sighed. "Daddy's a klutz. In fact the town's emergency people all know him and call him Senor Klutz. This time, daddy was backing the lawn mower out of the garage and tripped over the weed wacker he'd left on the grass." She shook her head. "He suffered an abrasion to..."

"I get the picture," I said quickly, recognizing that she was going into lecture mode. Jimmy quickly turned away from her. He was trying not to laugh.

Doctor Taylor had come up behind Wynter and laid his hand on her shoulder. "Wynter did the preliminary first aid, but was kind enough to allow me to take the x-ray to see if anything was broken. Though she checked it herself to make sure I didn't make a mistake."

Wynter looked up at him and smiled at the compliment.

"She's my best GP intern, though I think Dr. Brees wants to steal her and turn her into an OB/GYN. In fact, he's let her assist in several deliveries."

"I don't think that's what I want to do," she replied. "OB/GYNs are always too busy. I wouldn't have time to do that and your job of running the hospital, too."

"I see," the doc replied. "And just when to you plan to take over the duties as the administrator?"

Wynter checked her watch. "It's too close to my bedtime tonight," she said. She smiled up at him. "How's eight in the morning work for you?"

The doc knew when to retreat in defeat.

As we sat down, I asked, "So who's Junior?"

Cinnamon and the others all glanced at each other. "It's usually assumed to be Jimmy," Cinnamon said.

"So if Jimmy's Junior, then he and his dad can't be the twins," Tami pointed out. Jimmy looked a lot like his dad. "So who're the twins?"

"Wynter and LaMarcus," Jimmy said with a grin.

I looked at Wynter, sitting next to Jimmy, and LaMarcus, sitting at the end of the table and talking to Darlene. "I can see it."

"But Wynter wasn't even in the band," Traci pointed out.

"Sometimes she is," Jimmy said.

"But that's without Jimmy's dad, and then we're called the Wizards of Wynter," Cinnamon added. "Unless she's just performing with the Twins as a guest artist."

My head hurt.

"If you stay until Sunday, you can see the Wizards," Wynter offered.

"Complete with their way big special surprise guest star," Hailey blurted out before Cinnamon gave her the evil eye.

"Guest star?" Tami, Robbie and I said simultaneously.

"It's a secret," Cinnamon explained. Tami, Robbie and I nodded, but Mikee, Kelly and Traci put on their puppy-dog looks.

"It's a secret," Cinnamon repeated. "Nobody even knows he's in town."

"Who?" Kelly asked plaintively.

Cinnamon seemed to consider, though I'd bet big money that she'd already made up her mind. She leaned forward, and all my girls did too. Okay, so did I.

"Tyrone Hayes," she whispered.

"Ty..." Mikee yelled before Robbie clamped her hand over the younger girl's mouth. It happened so fast I knew Robbie had anticipated the need.

"Tyrone Hayes is going to sing with you?" Tami murmured.

"How'd you do that?" Robbie wanted to know.

"No way," I said.

"Who do you think discovered him, pickledick?" Hailey said with a very satisfied look on her face. She pointed a finger down the table. "And his bass player?" She flipped her palm up-and-over in Cinnamon's direction, as if introducing her.

I remembered hearing something about him being discovered in a small town in Colorado, but I hadn't put it together. I don't really care about celebrities. I either like their music, or their movies, or whatever, or I don't. I don't care about their girlfriends, boyfriends, addictions or anything in between.

I looked at Cinnamon with a new appreciation. So my little cuz had discovered the next big thing.

Two girls dressed in cute little pink and white uniforms came out from behind the counter, and that put an end to conversation. Robbie ordered something called a suicide fudge brownie surprise, and the rest of my girls all ordered double and triple scoop hot fudge sundaes. I wondered if I'd still be able to afford college after this.

Then Wynter, who seemed to be the font of decorum for the group, reintroduced everyone to make sure we all knew everybody. She was just finishing, "... and this is Robbie Tate." She looked especially at Huntly. "She plays varsity football with Tony. Their team came in second last..."

Huntly had been sipping a glass of water. He spewed it all over the table.

"Smooth going, shithead," Cinnamon said, using her napkin to blot up some of the spilled water in front of her. I recognized her tone of voice. I'd heard it enough myself.

Huntly didn't notice. He just stared at Robbie. "You're Monster Girl?" he sputtered. "But your hair... ?"

"What about her hair?" Hailey said quickly. "I think it's so the cute."

Huntly looked at Hailey, then back at Robbie. "She cut it. It was long. Longer than Cinnamon's. You're Monster Girl?" he repeated.

Robbie nodded. "That's what they call me. Tony mostly. I cut my hair after football season last year. I needed a change."

Kenny had turned an interesting shade of green that I didn't understand.

"How would you know, shithead?" Cinnamon asked. "They play in Washington."

Huntly sat back in his chair, picked up his napkin, and started cleaning his mess, his eyes never leaving Robbie. "Bitch. ESPN did a special on the best football players in high school. She was one of them."

"I'm not that good. They just included me because I'm a girl."

"She's that good," Tami and I said together.

"Tony's better," Robbie said.

"I'm only fit to carry your shoulder pads, milady," I said with as much of a bow as I could manage sitting down.

Robbie looked ready to argue, then shrugged.

Huntly grinned. "In fact, I watched that special with Kenny. He said..."

"Hey, when's that ice cream going to get here?" Kenny interrupted.

There was a few seconds of silence, then Robbie got up and went around to the other side of the table. She stepped behind Kenny and lightly laid her hands on his shoulders. "And just what did the future Doctor Taylor say?"

"It wasn't important," Kenny said quickly. Then his face changed, and I knew that Robbie was pressing her thumbs into the muscles to the side of the neck. Hard.

"He said, 'I'd sure like to get tackled by her, '" Huntly answered, still grinning.

Robbie smiled and dug her thumbs in harder, then relaxed, tilted Kenny's face up, and kissed hin quickly on the lips.

I considered a comment about, 'You don't know where those lips have been, ' but decided that Kelly and Traci would make my life difficult.

More difficult.

Robbie started back to her seat.

"I said, that I'd like to huddle with you," Huntly added.

"Shithead," Cinnamon said.

"Bitch," he replied.

Robbie moved behind Huntly. "You know, Tony's like a brother to me. He got me on the football team in the first place. So if Tony's an almost-brother, that makes Cinnamon an almost-cousin. You shouldn't talk to my cousin that way. Say you're sorry."

Huntly tilted his head back and looked at Robbie, then he turned and looked at Cinnamon. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry I called you a bitch."

If saying words can hurt, those did, not to mention registering negative numbers on the sincerity meter. Not that it mattered. Robbie had listened to the words but not the tone. She'd missed the fact that for these two, bitch and shithead were terms of endearment.

"That's better," Robbie said. She glanced at Cinnamon, then tilted Huntly's head back and kissed him long and hard, stopping only when the murmurings got louder from the adult table. After all, she was sixteen and he was thirteen. Though his dad looked proud.

I remembered the quick look at Cinnamon and wondered if she'd been silently asking permission. I didn't think these two were boyfriend and girlfriend exactly, but they were something. Maybe she'd picked up on something after all.