Almost Home. Debbie Macomber

see the butcher-block island in the middle of the kitchen. “Mission fuzzy,” I whispered.

      Brenda put her black-gloved hands over the skylight to angle a better view. “Command center, I report zero activity.”

      I leaned on the skylight a smidgen, balancing most of my weight on the roof. I could smell Brenda’s perfume, sultry and earthy.

      I gasped.

      Brenda said, “Holy Tomoly.”

      It was Alanna. Alanna Post.

      I had known Alanna the Man-eater for years. I avoided her at all costs. She was perfect. Blondish hair, highlighted just so, curling under right at her shoulders. Heavy, but annoyingly perfect, makeup. Thin. Oh, I hated how thin she was! Probably a size six. Designer clothes. And always, always, a condescending sneer or raised eyebrow to make it clear that she thought I was a chubby spider beneath her feet. An awkward orangutan with a poofy butt.

      And there she was in Snaky Stephen’s house, the doctor that I was going to dump anyhow! I leaned over the skylight, scooching toward the center, then hissed, “It’s the female praying mantis.”

      Why are you spying on Stephen on his roof? What about that romance novel? How about getting down?

      I gurgled as Alanna the Man-eater slipped off her dress. Underneath, she was wearing a red negligee, black fishnet tights, and black heels.

      This I could not have! Stephen had dumped me a month ago. I hadn’t even slept with him, and already he was getting in the flesh with Alanna the Man-eater?

      “She has deplorable taste!” Brenda whispered. “If I had an outfit like that on, I would have added a halo and tail.”

      “That patronizing witch,” I muttered. “Did I ever tell you Stephen has a flabby bottom?”

      We leaned over for better viewing angles.

      “Those boobs!” Brenda said, dismayed. “They have to be fake. No one has boobs that upright, do they?”

      “No one should have boobs that bouncy-ball perfect, even if they’re fake. It isn’t fair. It’s against the sisterhood of women, the Society of Decent Females.”

      Brenda and I scooched a bit more onto the skylight. Alanna had stretched out in front of the fire on the fake thick white fur. If I was wearing that red getup my stomach would be slouching over like a bag of red flour, with the wrinkles etched through my thighs doing little for my sex appeal.

      “I wanna be up there, I wanna be up there,” my sister whined from the ground. “Why don’t I ever get to do any of the fun stuff with you two?”

      “That’s easy,” I snapped. “It’s because you’re always pregnant, Fertile Myrtle!” Christie had three kids at home with her husband, Cary, the nicest man on the planet.

      “Well … well … well!” she sputtered. “Poop!”

      I sucked in my breath as Stephen with the flabby bottom stepped into view. He paused when he saw Alanna the Man-eater. I could see his shock. I pushed my feet hard into the roof so I wouldn’t fall off of it.

      I’m thirty-five, and I’m climbing on roofs to spy on my ex-boyfriend. What’s wrong with this picture?

      “I have got to use this in my next movie. Do you mind, Chalese?” Brenda asked, pushing her night-vision goggles on top of her head.

      “If I said I did, would you not use it?”

      “Silly lady. I’d use it anyhow.” She winked at me.

      “Brenda,” I snapped, “how do you think I feel seeing myself in your movies? All the dumb things we’ve done? Everything stupid I’ve said in my life since we were kids streaming out of some actress’s mouth?”

      “Think of it as being famous without the fame. You’re never mobbed by paparazzi, are you? There’s something to be said for that, sweetie. And you don’t need to hire bodyguards.”

      I grunted and tugged at the eyeholes in my hat. Brenda and I wrote wild, crazy, thrilling, romantic stories, sometimes with talking animals, when we were kids. She went on to write screenplays, and I went on to be a children’s book writer and illustrator. Who knew we’d end up clinging to a roof?

      We moved onto the skylight a smidgen more when the Man-eater stood up.

      “Can’t he see the piranha beneath the makeup?” I asked.

      “Nope. He’s a man. All he can see is the negligee and bra cup.”

      “Men are beasts.” I growled for effect, slashing the air with my claws. Brenda growled back at me, gnashed her teeth.

      It was at that beastly second that I heard a crack beneath my hands, then another one.

      My face froze in terror.

      “Oh no. Move slowly,” Brenda panted. “Slowly.”

      I felt the crack beneath my knees. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. This couldn’t be happening. The skylight was not breaking, was it? What was I doing on top of a skylight anyhow?

      I watched the alarm in Brenda’s eyes grow to free-flowing fright as another crack ripped through the night. My mouth went dry as stone, and my body started to shake.

      “Back up, Chalese!”

      I tried, I did, but panic turned my bones to liquid.

      Another crack. As Brenda and I locked mortified gazes, the skylight shattered completely, the noise deafening, and we went smashing through it, our fall broken by Snaky Stephen’s butcher-block counter below.

      Brenda swore. I screamed. Then she screamed. I swore.

      We landed hard, on our knees, but I did not hear any bones crack, any heads splitting open, any limbs disengaging. A piece of glass conked me on the head and splintered.

      I groaned. Brenda moaned.

      I heard the Man-eater screeching and Stephen yelling “What the hell? What the hell?”

      Perhaps he wouldn’t recognize us with our black-knit hats on? Our black leather biker jackets? Our leather pants?

      The Man-eater was still at it with her high-pitched, earsplitting howls.

      I turned to Brenda and whispered, “Let’s get out of here.”

      “Ya think, Sherlock?” she whispered back.

      We scrambled off the counter, averting our covered faces, hoping we could slink right out of that house. I’d pay Mervin Tunnel to come in and clean up the mess tomorrow. He’d keep his mouth shut; he owed me a favor anyhow.

      We had almost limped our way to the kitchen door, glass trailing in our wake, when I heard Stephen say, incredulously, “Chalese, is that you?”

      Crashing through a skylight like a drunken angel was not the worst part of my week.

      Stepping on the scale and noting that, yes, all by myself, I had bravely packed on an extra fifteen pounds was not the worst, either. Nor were the two zits on my cheek, as the zits will undoubtedly complement my hot flashes.

      Resisting pressure from Gina Martinez, my friend the pet communicator, who was pestering me to stage a “pet rescue” of a horse she was convinced was “depressed and anxious,” was not on my list for Most Terrible Part of the Week.

      Knowing that my next children’s book was already late and I was nowhere close to being done with it had my nerves hyperventilating, but it had not made the list.

      Also not on the list was Brenda’s dance on top of a bar in town singing the Pretty Woman theme song. That I went up there with her does not need to be mentioned, except it was one more humiliating thing in my life that I have done, especially since I cannot sing.

      The worst part of my week was when the reporter arrived.

      It