Page 5 of Soaring into the Midlife

Unkey Lukey looked like he was about to hurley worley.

"Seriously?" I tried to picture Allison, Broadway diva, and vampire extraordinaire, getting all mushy over a creature that was half fox, half snake.

Avery chimed in next, her tone just as sugary, "Yes, who's the most adorable little terror? You are!"

"Okay, I'm officially weirded out." I exchanged another look with Luke, who seemed equally disturbed by our sisters' sudden descent into baby-talk madness.

"Excuse me, but we called to check on you two," Luke was clearly trying to steer the conversation back to saner waters. "Not how random I-still-don't-believe-they're-real, magical creatures are doing."

"Oh, we're fine." Allison was unfazed. "This place isn’t nearly as bad as we expected. Oh, hey listen, do you have any source for bumblecat pollen?"

I blinked, racking my brain. Bumblecat? That sounded like something out of a kid's cartoon, not our already bizarre life. Luke opened his mouth, probably to ask what in the supernatural world bumblecat pollen was, but I shot him a quick glance, silently telling him to let it go. For now.

"Um, no?" I squinted at the phone as if it could somehow make this conversation less bizarre. "What the effing eff is a bumblecat?"

Luke had that pinched look on his face, the one he gets when he's two seconds away from freaking out. "Are you sure you're safe? Should we come to get you? What is going on?"

"No, it’s okay," Allison said with her usual dramatic flair. "Blanche is really sweet."

"Whois Blanche?" Luke practically screeched, ready to take off at vampire speed to rescue our younger sisters, council’s orders be damned.

"She’s the warden, remember? You knew that," I reminded him.

"Right..." Luke trailed off, fanning himself theatrically with his hand, because even in a crisis, Luke wouldn't be caught dead without a bit of dramatics. "Okay, okay. But are you twosafe?"

"Perfectly fine," Allison said, airy and light, as if this was all another day and not a complete deviation from everything they’d ever known.

"Okay, seriously, spill it. You're not holed up there playing house with a petting zoo, are you?" I prodded, tapping my foot impatiently on the kitchen tiles.

"Actually," Avery said with an edge of excitement, "we like it here more than we thought we would."

"Except for the time Blanche almost killed us because she got so mad the nathua’s parents were killed," Allison added nonchalantly, as if it were no biggie. "But don't worry, we used our vampire speed and ran away in plenty of time."

"What?" Luke's shriek cut through the air like a banshee at a ghost party. "Don't make me come down there and kick her ass. I'll?—"

"Luke." I shot him a glare, which he completely ignored.

"Charm her pants off," he said, his voice still a high-pitched squeal, before he took a deep breath to regain some semblance of composure. "Not literally her pants. Oh, you know what I mean." He waved his hand dismissively.

"Right." I bit my lip, trying hard not to laugh at his dramatics. Luke could be all poise and snobbishness but throw him into family drama, and he turned into a soap opera star.

"Chill, you two," Allison said nonchalantly. "Blanche and Arric are too busy trying to out-shout each other to even glance our way."

"Seriously." Her giggle was infectious, even through the tinny phone connection. "If this was a play script, I'd slot them into an enemies-to-lovers subplot right around the middle of act two."

"Are you two for real? This isn't Hollywood." Luke's face scrunched up like he just bit into a lemon.

"Listen, we gotta bounce," Allison said suddenly. "We've got some glamorous duty of mucking out a stall. Duty calls,"

"Toodles." Avery's cheery farewell followed, and then the line went dead.

Luke and I were left staring at the now-silent phone, our expressions mirrors of bewilderment. My lips moved soundlessly, mouthing the words that had us both stumped. Muck out a stall?

"Since when do divas do barn chores?" I turned to Luke. "I swear, if they come back knowing how to milk a cow, I'm signing them up for the next country fair."

"Are you sure we shouldn't be going up there?" Luke's fingers drummed an anxious staccato on the kitchen counter.

"I think they're fine." I tried to inject a dose of confidence into my voice. "The council isn't daft enough to send them somewhere super dangerous. And hey, maybe it's high time those two did something other than terrorize us with their twin telepathy pranks."