eb93c43e214c621f9157c05b4b6a6878

“Oh,” he said quietly, then placed his head on his paws and sort of stared off into space for a while. Finally, he said, “Okay, so if it doesn’t exist, we don’t have to look for it, do we, Max?”

“No, I guess not.”

“Well, that’s definitely a load off my mind.”

“Yeah, same here.”

Though I had the distinct impression, from that brooding look in his eyes, that he was still thinking hard about the subject he’d raised that morning.

And so, I have to confess, was I!

CHAPTER 10

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Odelia felt sorry about her sudden outburst, and hurried over to her hubby to apologize. Lately she’d been feeling a little more vulnerable than usual about how she looked, but that didn’t mean she had to work it out on her husband, of course.

Chase was staring at a small mound of earth on the lawn.

“Babe?” she said as she walked out of the house, Grace on her arm.

“Now will you look at that,” he murmured.

“What is it?”

“A mole, I think. And if we don’t catch him, he’s going to destroy the whole lawn, and then your dad’s lawn as well.”

“I’m sure he’ll behave,” she said. With four cats in the house, no mole in his right mind would want to settle in their backyard permanently.

Grace muttered a few unintelligible words, and she stroked the little girl’s pink cheek affectionately.

“She’s getting bigger every day, isn’t she?” said Chase. “I swear each time I look away, she grows a couple of inches.”

“I don’t think she grows that fast,” said Odelia with a laugh.

“Pretty soon she’ll outgrow those diapers and we won’t have to keep changing them.”

“About that. I’m sorry I yelled at you, babe.”

He feigned surprise.“Yelled at me? When did you yell at me?”

“You know. When I blamed you for my belly and the size of my hips.”

“Your hips are fine, and so is your belly. And as far as your boobs are concerned, I can personally attest they are very fine indeed.”

She laughed.“Your daughter seems to agree with you.”

“That’s because sheis my daughter, and she inherited my good taste.”

They glanced at the rose bushes, which were nicely in bloom, and she noticed how Brutus now emerged, looking less than happy.

“What’s wrong with your cats?” asked Chase. “Do they also seem moody to you?”

“Yeah, something is going on, all right,” she said. Though she didn’t know what. Lately she’d been so busy with Grace she hadn’t had time to check up on her cats.

“Brutus?” she called out. “Are you all right, sweetie?”

“I’m seeing birds,” said Brutus with a sigh. “And now Harriet doesn’t want to talk to me anymore.” And then he disappeared through the opening in the hedge.

“He’s seeing birds,” she said. “And Harriet is upset about that for some reason.”

“Cats,” said Chase. “They’re a mysterious species.”

Just then, Max and Dooley entered the backyard from the front of the house. They looked just about as gloomy and downcast as Brutus.

“What’s up with you guys?” she asked, a touch of concern in her voice. If they were sick, she’d have to take them to the vet.

“Love doesn’t exist,” Max said darkly.

“Yeah, true love is a joke,” said Dooley.

“Hey, now,” she said. “What’s all that about?”

“It’s true,” said Dooley earnestly. “We saw it for ourselves.” And then he told a long and frankly rambling story about Odelia’s hips, Charlene’s hot date with a manger, Dad’s flirty ways with Sue Burnett, Mom’s steamy romance and Harriet breaking up with Brutus over all the bird-watching he did when he was asleep.

It sounded disjointed, but she thought she got the gist of it at any rate.

It seemed to her time to sit down with her clowder of cats, for they’d made a lot of assumptions about a lot of things as usual.

So she called out,“Brutus! Harriet! Get over here. Now!”

Brutus and Harriet came running, the tone of her voice brooking no contest, she pulled out a couple of chairs on the patio, and declared the meeting officially open. Meanwhile Chase was studying that smallish mound of dirt more closely, even going so far as to dig his hand in to see if he couldn’t catch that mole.

“Okay, look,” said Odelia. “Love isn’t perfect, all right? And neither are relationships. Yes, they get bumpy from time to time. So I might get upset with Chase about something, while in actual fact it’s me who’s struggling with whatever is troubling me in that moment. And sometimes couples will drift apart for a while, or go through some issues they need to work through, together or apart, but that doesn’t mean that love is dead. Or worse, that love doesn’t exist.”

“So… you and Chase are not splitting up?” asked Dooley.

“No, absolutely not,” she said. “I love Chase very much, and he loves me, and that means we work through any issue we face.”

“But… you were yelling at him.”

“Okay, so that happened, but that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped loving him, or he’s stopped loving me. At the end of the day, we’re all human, and so we’re not perfect, and neither is the love that we share.”

“But what about Tex and Marge?” asked Max.

“Yes, we saw Marge reading a steamy romance book,” said Dooley.

“And Tex was flirting with a patient,” said Max.