Page 20 of Viking Unchained

Down on the farm . . .

On the way to the tavern, Lydia pulled out her cell phone to call her son. Taking into account the time zone, Mike and her family should be just finishing dinner, which was part of a fixed schedule on the farm.

If her dad didn’t get his meal by seven, after the evening milking, he was grumpy the rest of the night.

“Hello.”

“Hey, Mom,” she said. “How’s it going?”

“Oh, just wonderful, honey. You know how much we enjoy having Mikey here with us. I still say you should move back home, and—”

“Not now, Mom. That subject is a dead horse.”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk! Speaking of dead horses isn’t a joke.”

Lydia had to smile. She could just picture her mother, with the old-fashioned wall-phone at her ear. Oh, not the crank kind, but out-of-date, nonetheless, with its finger dial. On the farm, nothing was thrown away or changed unless it was no longer useful. Her mother even recycled Ziplock bags.

Yep, Mom would be standing in the kitchen, which had been painted yellow and had tie-back white ruffled curtains as long as she could remember. And a big pine table and side benches.

“Is Mike behaving?”

"Of course. He’s been helping his PopPop milk, and he’s been a special helper to me collecting eggs.

Here, he wants to talk to you.”

“Hey, Mom, did you know a cow’s boobies are called tits?” He giggled, and Lydia just knew he would be imparting this bit of information to his kindergarten classmates in the fall.

“I knew that, sweetie. Have you seen Grandpa and Grandma Denton yet?”

“Yep, they came over this mornin’. Grandma hugged me so hard I could hardly breathe, but Grandpa jist shook my hand. They wanna go to the fair with us when you come.”

“Oh, boy! You know how much I like the country fair.”

“Itchy entered his pig, Ester. Betcha he wins a prize.” Itchy was the ten-year-old son of Lanny Brown, the longtime hired hand. He was given that nickname when he’d gotten a particularly bad case of poison ivy.

“Is Nana going to enter her pie this year?” Nana was the name given to her mother, so as not to be confused with his other grandmother.

"Yep. Me and PopPop picked two buckets of huckleberries. I ate so many I thought I was gonna pee blue. But I didn’t.” How like a little boy, to be disappointed over the color of his pee!

"Let me talk to PopPop now, and you behave for them, and for Grandma and Grandpa when you go there next week. Do you hear?”

“I will.”

“I love you bunches, sugar pie.”

“I love you more bunches, sugar plum,” he replied, making a kissy sound into the phone.

She clicked off after talking to her father, who related some of the activities related to the ceremony for Dave, including the fact that the local newspaper did a big spread, even mentioning her and her Silver Strand Studio in Coronado. A very patriotic piece. Lydia hated the publicity, but knew that it made Dave’s parents proud, and that was the most important thing. And, frankly, a similar article that ran in the Coronado paper, as well as Stars and Stripes, would probably garner her more business.

As she pulled into the parking lot, waiting for Kirstin to catch up, she realized that she was in a good mood, looking forward to a good time. And that was a new stage for her in her grieving process.

Maybe I’m finally healed.

Vengeance is mine, sayeth

some people . . .

“Assalam Alaikum.”