Page 18 of Mad Mabel

“Why not?” I say, feeling downright convivial. What a marvelous idea! With the dog, the child might even find herself too busy to visit me. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it earlier.

“Come here, little one!” she says, thrusting out a chubby hand toward Nugget.

Nugget bares her teeth.

“Oh,” she says, withdrawing her hand. “She doesn’t like me.”

“Nonsense!” I say gaily. “She’s smiling!”

Nugget growls at her.

“Oh, don’t worry aboutthat,” I say. “She does that to everyone. Look.”

I reach out a hand toward the little hellion, fully prepared to take a flesh wound and a dose of rabies if it gets rid of the dog. But the damned thing approaches slowly, and licks—licks!—my hand. I rip it away.

“I think she wants to stay with you, Elsa!” Persephone says.

“Balderdash. She’s confused. Perhaps she thinks I’m Ishaan. Anyway, why are you still here? Where is your mother?”

“Sleeping.”

“Sleeping? In the middle of the day?”

She nods. Odd. I wonder, idly, if Roxanne might be a very friendly drug addict. Shedoesalways look tired.

“What if we play Snap?” Persephone says.

“No.”

“One game?”

“Go play with someone else.”

She looks around dramatically at the empty street, then cocks an eyebrow. “Who?”

Impertinent child. “I don’t know. A friend?”

“But you’re my friend.”

“Don’t be absurd.”

She crosses her arms and sticks out her bottom lip. “Why is that absurd?”

“Because I’m eighty-one. And you’re… how old?”

“Seven.”

“How many seven-year-olds do you know who are friends with eighty-one-year-olds?”

“It’s not ideal,” she agrees, after a moment’s consideration. “But beggars can’t be choosers.”

I feel a rare moment of pity for the child. “You’re not a beggar, child.”

She laughs. “I know that.You’rethe beggar. I’m the chooser. Because I choose you!”

It’s irritating to notice somewhere behind my exasperation, a part of me is affected by this.I choose you.It’s hard to imagine a nicer thing to say to a person, especially when you’re not the sort of person people tend to choose. And yet here she is. This loud, bossy, sticky-fingered child declaring, without hesitation, that I’m the one she wants. As if I’m some grand prize and not just the only adult left upright on the street.

Persephone offers me a winning smile, knowing she’s got me. “What do you say? Uno or Snap? What do you say, bestie?”