Rocky Mountain Mayhem Read Free Page A

Playa.
    “Woo-hoo!” Wendy squealed and handed them
out. “I’m all about the koozie!”
    Vivian examined hers. “Boy, this is looking
ratty. It still has lime grime and sand stuck on it.”
    “I thought we needed a remembrance and didn’t
wash them,” Lucy said.
    “Aw, that was a great trip,” Kate said.
“Except for the Jon dying and you being accused of murder thing,
Viv.”
    “I’ll cheers to that,” Wendy said and
laughed. “So what’ll it be for now?”
    “Beer me,” Vivian said. “Wait!”
    “What?”
    “Are there limes?”
    “Hello!” Lucy said. “You’re dealing with an
expert here. They’re cut up and in a baggie, ready to go.” Since
Lucy had the conveniences of home, she had run to the store and
bought an assortment of snacks and beverages for the trip and cut
up limes for Vivian’s Dos Equis.
    “I never should have doubted you.”
    A look of satisfaction crossed Lucy’s face.
“No, you shouldn’t have.” She then added, “Bottle of water for me,
please!”
    “You got it,” Wendy replied as she got
herself a beer. “And Kate, what are you having?”
    “I’ll stick with water for now, too.”
    “What?” Vivian said. “You pregnant?”
    “I don’t know, I could be,” Kate replied.
“We’ve been working on it. Hard.”
    This brought on laughter and woo-hoos.
    Vivian offered a toast. “Here’s to working it
hard!”
    More woo-hoos as they squished their koozied
beer and water bottles together.
    “So how’s the separation… reversal?” Vivian
asked Lucy. “It’s been, what, a month now since you moved back
in?”
    “Viv!” Wendy laughed. “You make it sound like
a vasectomy reversal.”
    “I didn’t know what to call it.”
    “Well, I moved back in. We got back
together.”
    “And?”
    Lucy sighed. “No sex.”
    Groans all around.
    “I’m working up the courage to, um…”
    “To what, Lucy?” Vivian asked. “Why go back
if there’s no intimacy? Isn’t that one of the main reasons why
y’all separated in the first place?”
    “Yeah, but there are good things in our
relationship, and I just want to get settled back in before I push
the issue.”
    “Well I think I’d push that. Hard.” Vivian
giggled. The girls in the back uh-hummed.
    Salt-N-Pepa’s “Push It” sprung into Vivian’s
head, and she sang a few lines.
    Changing the subject, Vivian turned to Kate.
“So y’all are working hard on a baby. How’s everything else
going?”
    “We’ve settled into a good rhythm, ha ha, and
everything else is good. Work is fine, busy, building a children’s
museum in San Antonio. Y’all should come down for the opening in a
couple of months.”
    “How’s your brother, Horny Huey?”
    “Hugh’s fine. Still single.” Kate nudged
Vivian’s arm.
    “Oh, no. Negatory. It’d be like having sex
with you, and although I love you, I don’t ‘love’ you.”
    “Just thought I’d mention it. He’s
successful, single and lives 25 miles from you. And he loves
children.”
    “Thanks for that, but no.”
    They’d made it out of the city and were
headed into the mountains. Kate pulled out her camera and snapped a
few pictures, then said, “Wendy, catch us up,” Kate said. “How’s
your niece doing with her cancer treatment?”
    “Lizzy is just over 2 years old now and doing
remarkably well,” Wendy said. “Better than I had thought possible.
Dr. Burzynski is a miracle worker as far as I’m concerned. The
tumors on her liver are gone, and there’s only one left in her
lungs and it’s shrinking. She’s going to make it.”
    Vivian offered another toast. “To Lizzy!”
    “So how are you and Jake?” Lucy asked.
“What’s the latest?”
    “It might be over,” Wendy sighed. “He moved
back to North Carolina a few months ago.”
    “You didn’t tell us he moved,” Kate said.
“Did y’all break up?”
    “No, we’ve been doing the long distance
thing. He comes back to Houston at least twice a month and I went
up there once, and