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After we were done, we meandered over to a picnic table, where Roxie and Hart were sitting together next to Brent and Ava. As we sat down, Trenda sat down holding her baby named after her older brother Drake. Her husband Simon sat down next to her with two plates of food and set one in front of her. Piper and Emmie sat down opposite Graham and me.
Graham looked around. “Where’s Bella?” he asked Simon and Trenda.
“Drake and Karen are watching her, their son, and Evie and Aiden’s two boys. Ava’s helping,” Piper explained.
“Three people for four kids?” I asked.
“Someone has to keep Bella in line. She tends to boss her boy cousins around. Since she’s older than them by a few years, she thinks she gets to tell them what to do,” Simon grinned with a proud look.
I giggled. “Do they listen to her?”
“Only when she tells them something they want to do,” Trenda laughed. “The time she told them to take one whole pie to the kids' table and just start eating it with spoons, they listened to her just fine.”
Graham and I both burst out laughing. Simon winced. “Yeah, she was mad at them for getting her dress dirty, so she wanted to get them in trouble.”
“So, she’s sneaky and smart,” Graham grinned. “My kind of girl.”
Trenda sighed. “Don’t encourage her.”
“Sounds like she’s going to be a handful when she gets to be a teenager,” I commented. Emmie, Piper, and I exchanged glances and giggled. Emmie might have been the soloist in the church choir, but she’d definitely been a hellion.
“You better start eating if you want a chance at any of the desserts,” Graham said, pointing to my plate.
“I saw a pineapple upside-down cake with my name on it. Trust me, I’m not going for thirds today, just so I make sure I have room for two pieces,” Hart said as Roxie elbowed him.
“My Joy made that,” Graham put his arm around me.
“It looks awesome,” Piper said.
“Joy is one hell of a baker,” Roxie chimed in. “She bakes up a storm and brings in treats all the time to the clinic.”
“Very cool.” Piper nodded, then she turned to me. “What do you do?”
I grinned. “I’m the night tech. I basically get to play with the animals.”
“You get to play with animals?” A little girl who looked like Trenda popped up at my elbow. “What kind of animals? Elephants?”
“Are you Bella?”
“How’d you know my name? What’s your name? Is it true you play with elephants?”
“Who plays with elephants?” A blonde-haired little boy tugged at Bella’s shirt.
Bella pointed at me. “She plays with elephants.”
By that time, the entire table of adults was laughing.
“Okay. I’m sorry to tell you, there are no elephants where I work.”
“How about gorillas?” another little blonde-haired boy asked.
The laughter continued. It took everything I had not to giggle so I could answer his question.
“I get to play with dogs and cats, and sometimes rabbits and turtles.”
“I like turtles. Are they big or small? Big ones are called tortoises, right?”
I stared at Bella. Where were all these questions coming from?
