Fortunately for me, Lucy wasn’t exactly bursting out of bed that morning, and Millie never liked to get out of bed until after noon if she could help it. I zipped into the kitchen and made coffee and grabbed two muffins out of the fridge and put everything on a tray with some sliced oranges and brought it up to their room.

Knocking first.

“Come in!”

Millie sat up in bed, which was already covered in books and magazines. Lucy was watching the news.

“We’ll be down in a minute,” Millie said.

I held up the tray, “I brought you breakfast. For the bed in breakfast. Which you will eat now.”

“You brought us. . .breakfast?” Lucy sat up.

“I always knew we raised you right,” Millie joked, taking a mug. “Does the living room still smell like dog barf?”

“Only faintly,” I noted, handing Lucy her mug and muffin. “The garage smells more because the rug is in there.”

“Well, we’ll get to that this afternoon,” Lucy said, putting her muffin on a stack of books about education. “I wanted to talk to you—”

“Actually I’ve got some stuff to do,” I cut in. “So enjoy your breakfast and. . .I’ll see you in a bit!”

Millie sipped her coffee. “Mmmm. Hey, isn’t tennis on?”

“I think so!” I called back as I tore down the stairs into the laundry room to grab our beach towels.

Plan B.

Berry screeched up to our curb in Mato thirty minutes later, and, not even breaking a sweat, vaulted out of the car with an armful of spray paint. “I brought black and green and blue and orange and yellow and pink. And purple!” She stepped up toward the letters on the grass and frowned. “Fuck.”

“Yeah.” I sighed. “Fuck. You think this was because they didn’t win the game? Like somehow the tie is my fault?”

“I mean, it could be anything, but yeah, the game probably didn’t help.” Berry straightened her shoulders, dropping the rest of the cans on the grass. “Okay, what’s the plan?”

Shaking the can of pink paint, I stepped up to the lawn and began drawing a pink square around the letters. Then I divided that square into thirds. And thirds again.

“Tic-tac-toe,” Berry asked, shaking the can of green.

“Even better,” I said. “Saturday Night Fe ver.”

Saturday Night Fever, another film starring John Travolta, released in 1977, about New York discotheques. Featuring several key hits by the ultimate disco band, the Bee Gees, an Australian group who wrote three mega hits for the movie including: “Stayin’ Alive,” “Night Fever,” and “How Deep Is Your Love.”

And “We Should Be Dancing.” The best.