SYNCHRONICITY (The Lone Wolf)

26

The first Monday after Sebastian's birthday, Alison stood in the former kitchen of Bill and Mary Brown and looked at all the empty counter space that she wasn't used to seeing. She grabbed a sponge and some soapy-bleach water and cleaned the entire kitchen as well as the bathroom. Again.

She had virtually nothing in the narrow room that was the kitchen except a single frying pan and two small sauce pans and Sebastian's percolator, as well as his electric skillet. Between the two of them, she and Sebastian barely had a full set of dishes, six glasses and five non matching coffee mugs. The cutlery was permanently borrowed from Mario's. Mary had left her white curtains for them because there were more windows in the house than there were doors. She had moved her little stereo from her bedroom to the living room of the large apartment as well as her television. They still didn't have a table to eat at and sat on large pillows on the floor, using plastic milk crates that Sebastian had lifted to serve as make-shift tables. One of their saving graces was that she had a fully furnished room for Beth to stay in when she visited for sleep overs, which she hoped would be often.

He was coming home from work later and later in the day and he was always tired and sore and very, very grumpy, only wanting a shower, food and sleep. The weekends were spent looking for things at yard sales to furnish their apartment with. She found a table with four chairs for $15 in the paper and she telephoned the man and practically begged him to hold the set until she could get Sebastian over to see it. Exhausted from the day, Sebastian sighed and only relented when she was near sobs. He rang Topher to borrow the car so that he could get the table and chairs home sight unseen.

The next weekend, Sonny told them that he was taking them to the furniture store to purchase real furniture for them. When asked why by Sebastian, he told him that he was tired of hearing them argue and seeing her mope around, pretending that everything was alright. The holidays were upon them and he told Sebastian that he wouldn't survive if he didn't do something to make his girl happy.

"You gonna kill me Sonny?"

"Nope. Won't have to. She will."

Lynn had gone to one of the local discount department stores and purchased cookware, dishes as well as new linens for her niece in the hopes that it might lift her spirits.

The week before Thanksgiving, she fretted as to who's Thanksgiving dinner invitation to accept...they were invited to sup with Lynn, the Browns and Topher and Judy. Sebastian wanted to dine with his best friend and she wanted to spend time with family, which included the both the Browns and the soon-to-be Masseys and she had worked herself into a tizzy fretting over it. She walked downstairs to ask her grandfather's advice.

"Why don't you just stay home like I do and be done with it?"

"Sonny, I've never cooked a full Thanksgiving dinner before! I don't even know where to begin!"

"Sure you do. You've helped your aunt before and last year, you helped Mary. You know what to do girl..."

She left his apartment feeling worse than when she first went in there and she telephoned Lynn.

"Hello?"

sniffle

"Hello?"

sniffle "Sorry."

"Oh honey...what's wrong? Is Bast being a big ol' jerk again?"

"No." sniffle

"Then what's wrong Sweetie?"

"I don't know what to do about Thanksgiving..." she sighed shakily.

"Well, what do you want to do?"

"I want to see all y'all, but I want to see Mary and Bill and the boys and I want to see Toph and Judy..."