I got the title of “Aunt Tess” at the bakery the second time Laura brought the kids in.

I also liked it.

“Sure, honey, maybe after we eat.”

“Yay!” she shrieked, arms straight up in the air, and Brock smiled down at her.

“Great, Tangled,” Dylan muttered.

“I’m watchin’ football,” Grady declared.

“So am I,” Rex said, seconded that notion.

“And everyone knows Thanksgiving means football, not cartoons,” Joel told Ellie.

“Boys can watch football in the basement while the girls have girl time with Tangled in my bedroom,” Fern declared while unearthing my chocolate cake from a box. “Now, children out. Go play Wii. Go play football in the yard. Go play anything, just go play.”

Hmm. It seemed cooking for seventeen was putting Fern in a mood.

Joel, Rex, Grady, and Dylan raced out screaming, “Football!” and Brock put a confused-looking Ellie on her feet.

She watched the door where the boys disappeared, considering this dilemma and clearly wishing to play princess games though unsure how to convince her all-male older brothers and cousins this was what they’d prefer. Then, gamely, she raced out after them and I hoped they didn’t damage her crown when tackling her.

“Hey, Uncle Slim,” I heard and I looked up to see a very pretty, dark, curly-to-frizzy-haired girl come forward and give Brock a hug. She was dressed like she was at a costume party and she was a sixties hippie (without headband or funky sunglasses but the rest… all there).

“She lives,” Brock teased, hugging her back and I scanned the room.

Those I knew were there, including Elvira, who was standing at the sink peeling potatoes liked she’d been to Thanksgiving at Brock’s mom’s house every year since she was born.

Yes, I said Elvira.

Although it was me who “asked” her (in quotes because she mostly invited herself), I wasn’t entirely sure why she was there.

I’d since had cosmos with her and the girls (twice) and she was not afraid of texting or phoning to tell you anything that was on her mind (frequently). I still didn’t know her very well.

What I did know was that she was currently in some drama with her sister and they weren’t speaking. She detested (with a passion) her brother’s new “skanky ho” of a girlfriend. And, wisely (I thought) to escape this discord, her parents had chosen Thanksgiving to vacation in Hawaii. Therefore, Elvira was at odds for a Thanksgiving meal and although she had tons of friends, she latched on to me.

I suspected undercover work for Martha but I knew what it was like to face a Thanksgiving alone and the lengths you’d go to avoid that so I’d let her make that play and, when I asked, Fern told me she felt the more the merrier.