“Uncle Preppy we want mac and cheese!” Max said. “And I think Sammy broke your lamp thingy.”

“No, we want burgers. Aunt Dre can we have burgers?” Sammy chimed in. “And Maxy broke your lamp, not me. I was being good.”

“No Sammy, I want mac and cheeeeeeese,” Max argued with her brother, elbowing him in the ribs.

Preppy leaned toward me while the kids continued to argue. “Is it possible for kids to be bi-polar?” he asked as the twosome once again started laughing and chasing each other around the house. “Seriously,” Preppy said, snapping me out of my thoughts. “I think they need A.D.D. meds. Or lithium. We got any lithium?” He opened and closed each of the kitchen cabinets.

I rolled my eyes. “Nope,” I laughed. “Fresh out, I’m afraid.”

Preppy slumped his shoulders in defeat.

I laughed. “They don’t need lithium, Preppy, they just need to burn off some energy.” I put two fingers in my mouth like my dad taught me to do and whistled loud and long. The kids froze.

“Do you guys kiss and hug like Mommy and Daddy?” Sammy suddenly asked. “Because it’s soooooo gross and they do it aaaallllll the time.” The worth gross sounded more like growth with his two missing front teeth.

“Uhhhhh...” I stammered. I felt Preppy’s eyes on me. My skin broke out into gooseflesh. I was about to change the subject but Max beat me to it.

“You’re real pretty, Aunt Dre,” she said, turning at the waist from side to side with her hands behind her back. “Like my mommy.”

“So are you,” I said, bending down to pull on one of her springy curls. She giggled and my heart seized in my chest. I cleared my throat. “So how about I make you two something to eat while you two go play outside?” I said, opening the sliding glass door. “Don’t leave the yard,” I called out, but I was already talking to their backs because before I finished speaking they’d already darted into the yard and were again a blur of giggles and shrieks. I kept the glass part of the door open, but shut the screen portion.

“They’re such sweet kids,” I said, turning back to Preppy who was looking at me with confusion written all over his face.

“They’re the fucking devil,” Preppy said.

“They’re just kids. Don’t you remember how you were as a kid?” I opened a cabinet and pulled out a blue box of mac and cheese and started boiling some water.

“I don’t think I ever got to be a kid, not like that,” he said, watching through the window as Sammy and Max played leapfrog in the backyard. “I think I went straight from baby to amazing adult with no stops in between in holy terror zone.”

I pushed my index finger against his chest. “And yet...you never really grew up,” I teased.

“Oh you got jokes now?” he asked, tugging on the hem of my shirt.

“Some days.” I was about to turn back to the stove when my eyes landed on the thick scar cutting into his skin, slicing several of his colorful tattoos in half with a jagged white line that used to be crimson.

Preppy lifted his arm to look at what had caught my attention and I felt the embarrassment creep up my cheeks. “I didn’t mean to stare, it’s just that it’s all healed now.”

“You can stare all you want, Doc,” Preppy said, pulling me into his chest. “You can touch all you want too.”

A sizzling sound caught our attention. The pot on the stove was boiling over. Foam spilled over the top, landing on the hot burner with an angry hiss. “Fuck,” I said, grabbing the pot with two oven mitts. I was about to dump out the water and half cooked noodles when Preppy stopped me.

“Wait,” Preppy said. “Set it back down.” He turned the dial to the left, lowering the heat of the stove. “Do we have any olive oil?”

I rummaged through a cupboard and found what he needed, tingles shot up my arm when our fingers brushed as he took the bottle of oil from me but it was hard to deny that I felt anything when my nipples were peaking against my shirt. If he looked over there was no way he wouldn’t be able to see his effect on me.

Preppy poured a bit of the oil into the pot with the noodles and stirred it. Instantly the rising foam fell back down. “All fixed,” he said proudly.

I cleared my throat and wet my dry lips. “Are you going to tell me why you have King and Ray’s kids?” I asked curiously, taking a package of ground chuck out of the fridge. Preppy took the package from me and had already washed his hands and was pressing out hamburger patties before I could protest.

He shrugged. “Beats the fuck out of me. I was with King in his studio and we were going over some business shit. The next minute Doe, I mean RAY, calls King on his phone and then he’s asking me to watch the kids for a while because he has to go meet her.”

“I hope everything is all right,” I said.

“He didn’t tell me what was going on, but he didn’t have that ‘life or death’ look about him, and trust me I’m pretty familiar with that look,” Preppy said. “I’m pretty sure if they’re asking me to watch their kids though, it must be a sign of the zombie apocalypse.”

“Must be,” I giggled, loving the interesting places his mind went.

“Seriously, zombie apocalypse is seriously the only reason I could think of why they would want me to look after their little sex trophies when they’ve got lots of other people to call on.”

“First of all, they’ve seen how great you are with Bo, so that’s Bullshit. Second of all, sex trophies?” I asked.

“Yeah, you know, cause they’re a product of...”

“Uh, I get it. I know how that works, Preppy.”

“Oh DO you?” he asked, wagging an eyebrow.

“Shit,” I said, as a realization kicked in. “The grill doesn’t work. It’s ancient so I put it to the curb with the trash last week. Should we make the burgers in a pan or bake them in the oven?”

“Blasphemy!” Preppy shouted, gasping and looking around like he was making sure no one else heard me. He lowered his voice to a whisper. “You do realize you’re in the south, right?”

“Uh, yeah, but what does that mean? That doesn’t automatically give us a working grill.” I jumped up to sit on the counter, my legs dangling against the cabinet as I watched Preppy move around the kitchen with ease.