“You can find everything on Amazon except a man. But there’s other sources for that.”

“Don’t even go there. I haven’t even filed for divorce. I’m not ready to date.”

“Who said anything about dating? I’m talking about sexy time.”

Marina thought about her size 14 butt and all those sections that now jiggled, and grimaced. The last thing she wanted was to put all her flaws in front of a stranger.

“I’m definitely not ready for sexy time,” Marina said.

Halcyon narrowed her eyes at her. “You’re not feeling all self-conscious about a few extra pounds, are you?”

Marina felt a blush run up her neck. Sometimes she could swear her sister could read minds. And it was never when you wanted her to.

“I could stand to tighten things up a bit,” Marina said. Her sexy nightie had hung like a sack on the much younger and thinner Chastity.

“We’re forty-eight years old. Things don’t tighten all the way anymore. You have to get close enough and use spandex to smooth out the rest.”

“Things were tight on Chastity.”

“Not the one thing that needed to be.”

Marina burst out laughing. She couldn’t help it. No matter how dire things sometimes seemed, Halcyon had a way of breaking them all down to crude and humorous.

When she finally regained composure, Marina grinned at her sister. “Have I told you lately how much I love you?”

Halcyon smiled and wrapped her arms around Marina. “I love you too, baby. And this is all going to be fine. I promise you. I would say I’m going to be right there beside you the whole way, but that would be a damned lie. I’m going to be in front of you, blasting obstacles with my quick wit and laser-sharp tongue. If that doesn’t work, I’ll shoot ’em.”

“Spoken like a true Cajun.” Marina glanced back outside and gave her sister’s arm a squeeze. “Give me a minute. There’s something I need to do.”

As she headed for the back door, she heard Halcyon’s uncertain steps behind her.

“Out back? It’s waist-high with grass and weeds and there’s probably a million snakes.”

Marina opened the back door and pointed to a vine creeping around an old fence post. “There’s also that.”

“What is it?”

“Poison ivy.”

“Good Lord, you’re not going to touch poison ivy, are you? Why? You’ll be one red itchy blob.”

“It doesn’t bother me. Remember that fishing trip?”

Halcyon frowned. “I mentally blocked it.”

Halcyon and Marina had sat on poison ivy wearing their bathing suits, and Halcyon had scratched her butt cheeks for weeks. It hadn’t fazed Marina one bit. It wasn’t until Tommy Cox got caught practicing French kissing on his hand that kids stopped teasing her sister about it.

“You know who else is highly allergic to poison ivy?” Marina asked.

Halcyon shook her head.

“Harold.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to pick a mess of it and rub it in every pair of underwear he owns.”