Page 13 of SEAL’S Baby Surprise (Lanes #2)

AUSTIN

I stand in front of the van door and try to wrap my head around what just happened. I’d already picked up on the idea that my Lady Mermaid might be a sandwich or two shy of a picnic.

Ark wouldn’t let her hurt herself, and I’d collected up all the sharp stuff I could think of and locked it in the gun safe.

What? Yeah, I’ve got a gun safe. I’ve got a hunting rifle and my granddad’s old pistol. Neither one of them qualifies as a weapon of mass destruction. I take them out to the range for target practice once in a while. I don’t even go hunting.

But, you know, sometimes it just pays to have a little something on hand. Just in case the world gets hit with an EMP or a zombie apocalypse. They’re both registered, and, since I have a kid, they stay locked up.

With Lee acting crazy, and the way she had been waving those scissors around, I just feel happier locking up all the knives, scissors, and even the nail clippers. It’s got a combo lock, and it’s hidden. No, I ain’t gonna share where. What do you take me for? Some kind of dummy?

But now, with the immediate problems taken care of, I just stand there and shake for a minute. What kind of hell has my Lady Mermaid been through to come apart over her hair, of all things?

I’d done a little stint as a bouncer when I’d gotten back stateside. I’d quit when I couldn’t stand the state of the humanity that came into the bar at night.

It had been on the rough side of town, and a lot of the boys who had come in and gotten plastered were hoping to pour out some kind of dream life. But all they’d done was get in a little deeper.

After that, I’d kind of drifted around until I stopped over at a commune for a little while.

They’d had a yoga teacher that knew her stuff, and a couple of licensed mental health counselors, and I’d begun to get my head together.

But there were too many people, so I’d bought the van, fixed it up, and gone on the road.

They say just about every weirdo on the planet winds up in California. Or is that just a line from that movie about kids, native Americans, and buffalo? I should watch it again. It’s a good movie and had been part of my personal reconstruction. I’d watched it a lot while I’d been looking for Julia.

Speaking of whom…“Hey, Judy-Rudy,” I call out as my girl comes running toward me. She jumps into my arms. I swing her around and set her on her feet. “Want to go shopping?”

“Sure, Daddy. I need new shorts. Mine are too tight.”

“Guess I’ve been feeding you too good,” I say. “Want to go to the Dairy Palace for lunch?”

“You bet,” she says. “Can I get a coney dog?”

“Of course, you can,” I say.

As we walk toward the small restaurant, Julia asks, “Why isn’t Lee coming with us?”

“Lee’s not feeling good right now,” I say. “She decided she didn’t like pink hair, so she cut it all off. I think it surprised her, how it looks now. She’s hiding in her bed.”

“We should get her a wig,” Julia says. “That’s what the foster mom did for Charlotte when she had chemo. She had a regular wig for when she went to school or shopping. But she also had costume fantasy wigs. We had fun with them.”

“That’s a good idea,” I say. “Maybe we should get some scarves and veils, too.”

“I like that idea,” Julia says. “It can be like Halloween. Maybe even some masks?”

“I don’t know about that,” I say. “But we’ll see what the Goodwill has.”

We shop at the Goodwill a lot. It often has better clothes than Walmart, some of them with real fabric instead of polyester stuff.

They are having a stuff-a-bag sale, so we get wigs, scarves, ladies’ clothes in different sizes, girls’ clothes in Julia’s size, and even a couple of shirts for me.

Then we stop at the Dairy Palace and get Julia a coney dog, me a double cheeseburger, Ark, a plain burger, and a coney dog and a cheeseburger for Lee, so she could have her pick. Then I add vanilla shakes for everyone and french fries.

We look like Santa Claus and his helper elf going back, what with all the bags of clothes and the food. I settle Julia at her table with her coney dog, fries, and shake, tuck the rest of the food in the outdoor cooler, and go in to check on Lee.

I find her snuggled up against Ark. Looking over her shoulder, I see she is reading the chapter in Little Women, where Jo cuts her hair. I sit in the driver’s seat because there’s no room left on her bed. It’s full of girl and dog.

“Wanna talk about it?” I ask.

“No, not really,” she says. “But I am sorry. When I get scared, I just go all to pieces. And I do stupid things.”

“That’s why I left Ark with you. He’s got good sense about most things,” I say.

She hugs Ark, and the big lug licks her face. “Ew,” she says half-heartedly, “Dog germs.”

“Yeah, he gives super sloppy kisses,” I say, grinning. Then, on a more somber note, “Did you kill anyone?”

“No,” she says. “I ran away.”

“Did you steal anything?”

“No! All I took with me was the top half of that dress. It’s my design, and my brother bought the materials.”

Note to self: Lee’s brother must be loaded. The plot begins to thicken.

“Well,” I say, “If you didn’t kill anyone, and you didn’t steal anything, then I don’t see that anyone has grounds to come looking for you.

Unless you tell me you did something criminal, I don’t see any reason for me to rat you out.

And if you did do something, we’ll go together to turn you in. How’s that sound?”

“All right, I guess,” she says, hiding behind Ark. “I didn’t do anything, honest.”

“Then come have your supper and go through the bags of clothes and stuff Julia and I bought at Goodwill. They were having a stuff-the-bag day, so I got the whole lot for two bucks.”

“Okay,” she says.

“Come on, Ark,” I say, “Your hamburger is getting cold, and fries are just nasty when they aren’t hot.”

Julia is already halfway through her coney dog by the time we come out.

She has it smeared around her mouth and over her shirt.

I’d made sure there were some swimsuits in the stuff we’d bought, so I’m not too worried about that.

We could all go down to the beach after a while.

There is even an old swim cap in the lot, so Lee won’t need to be embarrassed or get a sunburn on the top of her head.

Lee makes Julia wash her face after lunch, and then they dig into the stuff we picked up at Goodwill.

The girls squeal and giggle, especially over the witch wig, with the long white stripe down the side.

I get my tablet and get in some work while keeping one eye on the girls. Every once in a while, they’d come out in ridiculous outfits and parade up and down.

After a while, they both begin to get tired. Then Lee sorts out the stuff they could actually wear and stuffs the extras into two bags: one for ladies’ clothing, and one for kids’. She has a practical streak in the oddest places.

It is too late to go swimming by the time my lady mermaid and my daughter get through playing dress-up. So, they both put on bermuda shorts and white blouses, and Lee wears a simple little brown wig that curls around her ears.

When they’re dressed, we walk up to the pizza place and have an extra-large pie with all the trimmings, and Ark has a canine companion special— which is mostly hamburger. All in all, for a day that started off weird, it is ending pretty nice.