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you. We think you’re fibbing to us,” Lancer said.
    Good lord. As if the vacation wasn’t disastrous enough, now I’m involved in God knows what.
    “I don’t have it. I’m not fibbing. Go away and bother someone else,” I told them.
    Lancer’s eyes opened wide. “Get her!” he said.
    I whirled around and jumped away, but one of them managed to snag my shirt. I was yanked back, clawing and kicking. There was a lot of swearing and ineffective bitch-slapping, and somehow my foot connected with Slasher’s boys. His face instantly went red and then chalk white. He doubled over, hands to his crotch, and he went to the ground in a fetal position. I ran into the house, locked the door, and looked out the window. Lancer was dragging his partner into the Lincoln.
    I straightened my shirt and returned to the dinner table.
    “Feel better?” Grandma asked.
    “Yup,” I said. “Everything’s good.”
    “Your digestion wil improve when we get your romantic problems solved,” Annie said.
    Little alarm bel s went off in my head and my scalp prickled. We ? Did she say we ? I had enough trouble going on with the men in my life without Annie getting involved. Annie was a sweet person, but she was only a few steps behind Morel i’s Grandma Bel a in the Whacko of the Year competition.
    “Honestly, I haven’t got any romantic problems,” I told Annie. “It’s al peachy.”
    “Of course it is,” Annie said. And she winked at me.
    “I hate to rush everyone, but we gotta get a move on,” Grandma said. “Bowling starts at seven o’clock, and you gotta get there early or al the good shoes are gone and only the fungus shoes are left. I’m going to get my own shoes, but I have to wait for my Social Security check.”
    Rushing through dinner is never a problem. My father doesn’t waste unnecessary minutes on bodily functions. He slurps his soup down boiling hot, has seconds, mops the bowl with a crust of bread, and expects to immediately move on to dessert. This no-nonsense approach to dinner gets him back to the television in record time and cuts down on time spent tuning out Grandma.
    “I was talking to Mrs. Kulicki at the bakery today, and she said she heard Joyce Barnhardt was mixed up in something bad and got compacted at the junkyard,” Grandma said, helping herself to an almond cookie.
    “How awful,” my mother said. “How would Mrs.
    Kulicki know such a thing? I haven’t heard anything.” Grandma dunked her cookie in her coffee. “Mrs.
    Kulicki’s son Andy works at the junkyard, and it came from him.”
    That would be a real bummer if it were true. It was a pain in the ass to get money back on a dead FTA.
    Especial y when the body was incorporated into the bumper of an SUV. Plus, I suppose I’d miss Joyce, in a perverse, sick sort of way.
    After Grandma and Annie took off, I helped my mom with the dishes and spent a few minutes watching television with my dad. No one mentioned rings or marriage. My family solves problems with silence and meat loaf. Our philosophy is, if you don’t talk about a problem, it might go away. And if it doesn’t go away, there’s always meat loaf, mac and cheese, roast chicken, pineapple upside-down cake, pasta, potatoes, or baloney on white bread to take your mind off unpleasant things.
    My mother sent me home with a bag of cookies, a half-pound of deli ham, provolone, and a loaf of bakery bread. If you come to eat at my mom’s house, you leave with something in a bag.
    I stopped at the entrance to my apartment building parking lot and did a fast survey. No black Lincoln Town Car in sight, and I was sure I hadn’t been fol owed. So probably it was safe to go to my apartment. I took the stairs, walked the second-floor hal , and listened at my door. Silence. I pushed the door open and peeked in. No fake FBI guys lurking in the kitchen. Most likely, Slasher was sitting somewhere icing down his privates. I’d made a good connection. Imagine what sort of damage I could inflict