I thought my brother was going to have a heart attack. His eyes bugged out of his head, and he turned a weird shade of red.
“Can I have a copy?” Sonya asked gleefully. “I don’t even know what was on them because I haven’t heard this story yet, but I already know it’s going to be delicious.”
“Of course. I have an envelope full of copies, precisely for a moment like this.”
I couldn’t help myself. I tapped my knuckles on the table, too excited by what she was about to tell us. “Mom, focus. What was on the underwear?”
“From butt cheek to butt cheek, written in glittery pink, was, ‘I wished hard enough, now I’m a princess for life.’”
Sonya laughed so hard she lost her balance and knocked into Maya, who was laughing just as hard. If it hadn’t been for the hand that grabbed him by the neck of this t-shirt, Tom probably would have used the gap they’d made to get to Mom.
Beside me, Mark wasn’t in any better state than the wives. Then again, neither was I. I swear I was laughing hard enough to get a nose bleed.
“Wait until I have to choose your retirement home,” Tom fumed. “Dad’s getting a palace, and you’re going to a basement run by the guy from Silence Of The Lambs.”
“You have photos of this?” Mark wheezed, holding his side.
“Lots of them. I’ll give you one as a housewarming gift when you can get back into your house.”
The next victim of Storyville was Ren, who she told us had sucked his thumb so much as a kid that he worried her and my dad. Apparently he’d constantly had it in his mouth to the point it looked skinnier and longer than his other one. A doctor had recommended four different things to put on his nail, but he became immune to them. In the end, they told him he had to get a retainer to straighten his teeth, but instead, they had a series of loops added behind the top row to stop him sucking his thumb.
“That’s what they were for?” he asked, looking alarmed. “You said it was to straighten my bottom row from behind.”
“Nope.” Dad finally joined in. “We were desperate, so we lied our asses off to you.”
Mark looked slightly disappointed by the story. “How old was he?”
“Fifteen. On the days where he’d deliberately not wear it, I’d go to the school wearing a t-shirt that said, ‘My Mommy Loves Me,’ with a photo of his naked butt when he was a baby on it to pass it over. He soon learned.”
Just as both of us opened our mouths, she winked. “Yup, got some of the t-shirts spare. Another house warming present.”
Brett, it turned out, had stopped flushing the toilet after he grew out of using a potty, and because he insisted on privacy and had a small half bathroom to himself, they’d never checked he was flushing it all away when he was done.
Well, until one day when he finally decided to do it and ended up flooding the bathroom.
He’d freaked out and had screamed there was a poo monster trying to kill him, which had freaked Cole out, who was only just under two years younger than him. It was also pertinent to mention Brett was six when he started using the toilet instead of the potty at home.
Thinking he was saving his brother, Cole had grabbed up a couple of handfuls—yes, I almost puked my cobbler back up—and threw it at the wall, then grabbed more and did it all over again.
Both of my brothers looked like they wanted the ground to open up and swallow them.
“It’s okay,” Tom commiserated, putting his arm around Brett’s shoulders. “She got us all tonight.”
Cole’s head lifted, and he took in the way my brother was holding the other one with narrowed eyes. “Don’t I get a hug?”
“No way, poopy hands.” He glanced at the kids. “If you ever touch poop, no one will ever want to hug you.”
I’d like to say the kids were smarter than to believe that, but they all looked like they’d been given the best advice possible. To be fair, it wasn’t exactly bad advice if it stopped them from ever doing it. Even the youngest ones, sitting in their chairs with food smeared all over their faces, looked like the advice resonated with them. Jesus!
Cole mumbled something we couldn’t hear and glared at Mom and Grams. “I think I’ve been through enough now, especially after yesterday.”
Grams smiled over at Mark. “This is true. Cole’s just like his grandpa and hasn’t outgrown the phase in life of doing dumb things. We don’t even need to record them because enough people get to witness it when they happen.”
Cole’s shoulders relaxed at that. Oh, the fool.
“However, we make sure to get copies of the security footage and any photos people get on their phones. Ah, the hours of entertainment and laughter we’ve had.”
Here's where I realized that even though he’d enjoyed the hell out of the stories, Mark was trying not to rile my brothers up too much.