Rubbing at her hip, she watched Buttons sniff around the forsythia until he found his favorite spot back by what she and Andrew called their penis tree. It looked like a ten-foot green dildo, helped along by Andrew’s careful trimming to keep it a conversation piece.

By the time Buttons slipped back inside, her phone had started ringing. She looked at the display before answering.

“Hey, Mom,” she said, settling onto the daybed and flipping through channels with the sound down low. There went Jerry Springer giving his final thought, another judge show awarding a guy who looked like a gangbanger five hundred dollars for his damaged piano, commercials for credit unions and ambulance-chasing lawyers, a gaggle of yentas carping about some celebrity she didn’t recognize, and a slew of Spanish telenovelas starring busty women in low-cut dresses and guys with bristly mustaches.

It was no wonder she stuck to classic movies.

“Did your brother call you?”

Kate massaged her temples.

“No, but neither have you for three weeks.”

If her mother wasn’t going to play nice, she wasn’t either. The woman lived ten miles away and only came to see Kate once every six months or so, keeping her well out of the running for mother of the year.

“Well, he said he was going to.”

“I haven’t heard from Ryker since he and Nikki went to Aruba. But hey, thanks for asking how I am.”

There was a long pause.

Finally, her mother said, “They’ve been back since Sunday, you know.”

“Good for them.”

“Aren’t you curious as to why he wants to speak with you?”

Kate balled her fist. Buttons, sensing her aggravation, jumped up and put his head on her lap. “I didn’t even know he wanted to call me until ten seconds ago. And it’s not that crazy, considering Ryker and I actually talk all the time. You know, just like regular families.”

“Okay, I was just checking.”

“That’s it? The last time we spoke, I had pneumonia. Don’t you even want to know how that’s going?” Kate felt her blood pressure rise. She’d grown up with a mother who doted on her brother to the exclusion of everything and everyone else, including her father, who had puttered around the house like a forgotten visitor. Ryker was going to be the big, shining star in the family, his light so bright, dear old mom was blind to the rest of the world.