Pancakes & Pandemonium - Culinary Competition Mystery #6

Chapter 5

(Amy)

Amy watched a shower of sparks shoot around inside the fireplace when Alex threw on another log. The warm glow from the fire made the house feel cozy. Or at least the living room did. The rest of the dark, cold home felt sad and foreboding. Spending the night in front of the fireplace, cuddled up with her hubby on a memory foam mattress commandeered from the guest bedroom, could've been romantic. But it wasn't.

The neighborhood was filled with the pulsing hum of countless generators. Word had quickly spread that the power company couldn't even estimate when electricity would be restored since the damage was so extensive. The storm had cut a swath of destruction right over the heart of Kellerton, leaving few buildings unharmed. The town's power grid had been decimated to a pile of exploded transformers, downed lines, and broken poles thanks to the straight-line winds.

To add insult to injury, the natural gas coming to their home had been shut off. Amy had found that out when she tried to make dinner. The burners on the stove should've lit with a match, but they didn't. The mystery as to why was solved when Alex took a stroll around the block to check on their neighbors and discovered an overturned pine tree, festooned with caution tape, sporting a broken section of gas line tangled in its roots. He found out from workers who were assessing the damage that there had been so many breaks in the lines from uprooted trees that the entire system had been shut down for safety reasons.

The mechanical whine of their neighborhood's only sources of electricity wasn't exactly a romantic soundtrack for the evening. Neither were the loud sighs every two minutes from Amy's mother. The sound of annoyance drifted over the end of the elevated hideaway bed and settled down onto the floor around Amy. She lifted the quilt up so Alex could climb under the covers then rolled away from him. The relationship with her mother was perennially difficult. He knew that. So she was still having a hard time understanding why he had thought that funding her mother's surprise visit would be a good thing.

Amy scooted Pogo closer to her until he was nestled into a furry ball against her chest. Her canine companion was wary of her mother, even though Alex didn't appear to be. Pogo growled every time he looked at the stranger who had invaded his house.

"Too bad I'm here," her mother said after a particularly drawn-out sigh. "You could be making babies."

"We've decided not to have children," Amy said as she balled her hands into fists.

"What? Is there something wrong with one of you?"

Alex cleared his throat. "No. We're both healthy. It's a decision we mutually agreed upon."

"What does that mean?"

The frame on the hideaway bed squeaked. Even though Amy was still facing away from the bed, she could feel that she was being watched. Alex touched her shoulder under the quilt yet stayed silent. It was apparently up to her to answer her mother's question. "It means we've both agreed that we don't want to have kids."

"You always were a selfish brat."

Alex gasped as Amy rolled toward him and glared at her mother peering down at them over the end of her bed. The only light in the room was from the flames flickering in the fireplace. Very appropriate since the conversation was getting more hellish by the second.

"How is deciding not to have children selfish?" Amy asked.

"I want grandchildren, and you won't give them to me."

"You and I haven't seen each other in years. I often wonder if you'd have any contact with me if I didn't make the effort to call you every month. What difference would grandchildren make in your life if you don't want to be a part of mine?"

"I could say I'm a grandma."

"You can still say that, whether it's true or not. You've lied about so many other things in your life, so why not make up stories about fake grandchildren too?"

Amy closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Nobody could push her buttons like her mom. After a few verbal jabs and pokes, words came flying out of her that she would never dream of saying to another person. This time, she couldn't help but remember the times her mother had said she hadn't been drinking when it was obvious, even to a child, that she had been. The hurt that Amy had buried deep inside long ago still sometimes bubbled to the surface when a particularly hard-hitting comment from her mother cracked the shell she had mentally encased herself in.

Her mother snorted. "You sound just like Catherine. I was trying to be nice to her, but she had to bring up her old high school boyfriend. The nut case was still whining about how I lied to him about her seeing another guy so that I could steal him away from her."

Under the blanket, Alex's fingers closed around Amy's hand. "So did you tell lies to break them up?" he asked.

"Yeah. She deserved it for being so stuck-up." The bed frame creaked and groaned. "I don't want to talk anymore. I'm going to sleep."

Alex squeezed Amy's hand a little tighter as he rolled toward her. He laid his arm gently over her stomach and kissed the hot tears that were rolling down her cheek. There was nothing they could say that wouldn't be heard by her mother. But nothing really needed to be said. Her mother had demonstrated exactly how manipulative and heartless she could be. There was no doubt that there had been a heated rivalry between her and Catherine in the past. Had her mother finally taken the ultimate revenge on her high school nemesis?