Vic Vaughn is Vicious

Still. “Uh… no,” I tell Bobby. “I can build my own fucking bikes, thank you.”

Bobby shoots me a look. “He never gave you a bike? Why do I have this memory of him giving you a bike one year?”

“Oh. That fucking thing,” I say. “The dragon sidecar. So my pops can roll my gramps around town.”

Bobby laughs out loud. “You fucking Vaughn people are so stupid.”

I put up my hands in surrender. “You can’t choose your family, bro.”

Bobby shoots me with his finger. “Fact, mofo. Fact.”

“Sit down there.” I point to the stool. “I gotta wrap you up before you leave.”

Bobby makes to sit down, and I go hunting for some balm in my cupboards, but the bell over the front door jingles, so I pause and look over at my studio entrance, listening for footsteps. “We’re closed!” I yell it loud and deep, so anyone who has any funny ideas about sticking around will just get the fuck out. “Come back on Tuesday!”

Bobby sits, and I start collecting all the shit he’ll need for aftercare. But the bell over the door doesn’t chime again. “Hey. Go see who that is and tell them to get the fuck out, will ya?”

Bobby salutes me as I find a roll of wrap. He gets back up, pokes his head out of my studio door, but doesn’t go tell the interloper to leave. “It’s a kid.”

I grab some gauze and start putting all my shit on a new, clean tray. “Describe said kid.”

“Small. Blonde pigtails. Cute pink dress.”

“Niece,” I say. Then I stop and shake my head, so fucking annoyed. “Fucking Ronnie does this all the time. She asks me to watch her kids when I’m busy, or drunk, or in a good mood. And I say yes, of course. And then I forget and they just show up one day and all of a sudden I gotta put on my favorite-uncle face.”

Bobby takes a seat on his stool. “That sucks. I’m crashing hard when I get home. What’s her name? She looks just like Veronica when she was little.”

I walk over to the door, peek my head out, and yep. Sure enough, there’s a fucking niece sitting on the leather couch along the back wall of the waiting room.

She looks at me—no smile, just a flat line of a pouty mouth—and we stare at each other for a long moment. She tips her chin up, pulls a notepad out of a backpack covered in flowers, and proceeds to start coloring, ignoring me.

I retreat into my studio. “OK. Don’t tell anyone this, but I don’t fucking remember her name.”

Bobby almost snorts. “What the hell are you talking about? How do you not know her name?”

“Don’t judge me. Ronnie has five girls now and they all look like that. Even the new baby looks like that.”

Bobby just stares at me for a moment. “What do you call them, then? How do you go around not knowing your nieces’ names?”

I smile and point to my brain. “See, listen. You don’t need to know their names because they’re all named after Disney princesses.” Now Bobby really does snort. “Right? So I know the tall one is Snow White. I’m pretty sure Snow White has a real name, and we call this one Rory, but I can’t reconcile these two things. And I know the baby one is called Cinderella. But the other three in the middle? Like…” I shrug. “Who keeps track of Disney princesses? Are you Mulan? Are you Pocahontas? Are you the Little Mermaid? Who are you? Why bother when I can just call them all ‘princess’ and it works?”

Bobby is looking at me like I’m the worst asshole in the history of assholes. “You are definitely going to Hell for that. So which one is this one?”

“Fuck if I know. I’ll just call her ‘princess’ and we’ll be good.”

“Dude. That’s so asshole.”

I just laugh and take my tray over to the little stand, then pull up another stool, sit, and roll myself and my shit over to Bobby. “Turn around. Let’s do this.”

He turns around and I start applying the balm to the new work on his back. “So where are the rest of them?” he asks.

“Rest of who?”

“Your nieces. If Veronica needs a babysitter, why only one?”

“She’s got six kids, Bobby. Who the hell in their right mind babysits six kids? She doles them out to different people. Snow White and Oliver are probably with Ford Aston’s kid. This one is a—”

“Hold on.” Bobby turns to look at me. “You know the boy’s name but not the girls’?”

“There’s only one boy. It’s not that hard.”

“Vic Vaughn, you are the height of assholiness right now.”

“So what? Anyway, this one’s a middle child. The other two in the middle are probably at a sleepover or something. And Cindy is probably with Ronnie because she’s fresh.” Then I pause and shrug. “I know two of them, both the princess name and the nickname, so I think that counts for something.”