Family Comes First- ASOUE

Chapter 31: Hook, Line, and Sinker

*Violet's POV*

After a few days of living with Aunt Josephine, we mentioned the incoming hurricane since it seemed like she didn't know a thing about it. Duncan and Klaus told me to approach the topic lightly since Isadora had Astraphobia and Lilapsophobia. When I asked what those meant Klaus explained that the first meant 'Fear of thunderstorms' and the second meant 'Fear of severe weather', which included hurricanes... I promised I would remember so. We told Aunt Josephine about Hurricane Herman and she seemed to have our coats the very next second and she was ushering us out of the door to go get food and supplies. She was scared of cars, worried that the doors would get stuck and she'd be trapped, so we had to walk all the way down the hill into town to visit an outdoor market. By the time we got there, our legs were all sore from walking.

"Are you sure you won't let us cook for you, Aunt Josephine?" I asked as we reached the barrel of limes. "We promise to be careful."

"And when my sister and I lived with Count Olaf," Duncan said, "He made us do a great deal of cooking. The Baudelaires and us have cooked together too."

"Duncan," Josephine said, "It is grammatically incorrect to say 'The Baudelaires and us'. You wouldn't say 'Us have cooked dinner'; you'd say 'We have cooked dinner'. So the correct sentence would be what, Duncan?"

He swallowed back a sigh. "The Baudelaires and we have cooked together too." He corrected himself.

"And to answer your question, Violet," she continued, "As your guardian, it is my responsibility to cook for you. Besides, I wanted to try a recipe for cold lime stew."

"Limeade?" Klaus asked.

Josephine pouted. "No. Limeade is a drink, and this is a stew. Violet, would you please go fetch a few cucumbers? I'm going to make chilled cucumber soup in a couple days."

I groaned inwardly. I was getting tired of the cold food and the grammatical corrections, and of her being fearful of everything. As soon as I knew I was out of everyone's line of sight, I started walking more angrily, letting my movement reflect my attitude. "Ahem?" I heard behind me, and saw Duncan had come with me. "Sorry I thought you had noticed me by now, but I guess not..."

I let out my frustration with a deep breath and smiled. "Sorry. I was just thinking."

"I can tell. You wanna talk about it?" He asked me.

"I'm just... A little underwhelmed, but overwhelmed. Does that make sense? Like I expected more than a jumble of phobias and grammar talk in a cardigan, but at the same time, her cold soup and corrections are suffocating."

"I know what you mean. You're not just upset over the fact you have to eat the cold soup though right?"

"It's all cold soup! The way she deals with her phobias is all cold soup. Afraid the radiator will explode? It's fine! We can freeze! Scared that your car door won't open? Don't worry; we're perfectly content walking nearly six miles round trip to get limes and cucumbers! Real estate agents got you down? Now you can make Isadora Quagmire live in a constant state of anxiety for the low low price of the respect of your nieces and nephew! No, no, it's fine that we can't touch the doorknob. We get it! It's so fragile that one touch will make it explode and hit our eyes! We'll just push the door- oh wait you said we could get splinters from touching the door so let's go back to that doorknob!"

I sighed. "I just want chicken strips..." I mumbled. He laughed a little.

"Come on," he said.

"Where are we going?"

"Nowhere, just come on."

I giggled. "Aunt Josephine is gonna get scared if we're gone too long, you know."