A Catered Birthday Party by Isis Crawford

Author:Isis Crawford
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2009-09-14T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

The van let out an unpleasant squeak as the vehicle came to a stop in front of Joyce’s house at 106 Passerville Drive. Not good, Bernie thought. They were definitely going to need a new vehicle soon. She looked at her watch.

“We still have time,” she said to her sister.

“Not that much,” Libby protested.

“Enough. You always overestimate how long things will take.”

“And you always underestimate,” Libby retorted. “Which is why you’re always late.”

“I’m not late,” Bernie protested. “I’m just not prompt.”

“How can you say that stuff with a straight face?” Libby asked.

“Practice. Lots of practice. Now, do you want to go see Joyce now or do you want to do this tomorrow?”

“Definitely not tomorrow,” Libby said.

Tomorrow would be even worse, she thought. They had two dinners they were catering, plus a large order from their supplier coming in that would have to be put away, plus one of them would have to go to Sam’s Club, always a time-consuming process, plus, for some reason Libby could never figure out, Monday was always a busy day for lunch.

“This probably won’t take long,” Bernie said, more to convince herself than her sister.

“You might be right,” Libby said. “If this visit follows the way we’ve been going, Joyce will probably throw us out of the house as soon as we say hello.”

“Probably,” Bernie agreed. She was feeling much cheerier since her little encounter with Richard. Even if it turned into a Pyrrhic victory. What could she say? She liked winning. “But it’s worth trying,” she pointed out. “Joyce could tell us a lot, being Annabel’s best friend and all.”

“True,” Libby said as she studied the house Joyce Atkins lived in. “But she would have to want to do that.”

“There is that,” Bernie agreed. “But we know she was pissed at Annabel over the dog biscuits Annabel was about to start selling. That was pretty clear. Maybe she’d like a sympathetic ear.”

“Maybe,” Libby said.

Actually, she was sorry Joyce’s car was in the driveway. It was true she’d told Bernie she’d come to Joyce’s after they’d gone to Richard’s—no one had twisted her arm—but on further reflection she realized she hadn’t thought the whole scheduling thing out very well.

“Still worrying about the time?” Bernie asked.

“I didn’t say that.”

“But you were thinking it,” Bernie said. “You know,” she continued, “we have some meat raviolis in the freezer.”

“So?” Libby said.

“Well, if we’re crunched for time we can use those instead of the kreplach.”

Libby gave her The Look.

“It’s not so bad,” Bernie said. She was stung by Libby’s unvoiced criticism.

“Bad? It’s terrible. How could you even suggest that?” Libby cried. The thought outraged her.

Bernie gave a sheepish shrug. “I just wanted to save a little time. And raviolis and kreplach are pretty similar. Essentially, they’re both dumplings with a meat filling.”

Libby pounded on the dashboard of the van. “They’re not similar,” she said. “Not at all. That’s like saying roast beef and roast pork are similar because they’re both meat.” Bernie opened her mouth to say something, but Libby steamrolled over her.

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