Babs and I had picked Maddie and Tuck up from their after-school program before heading back to the practice facility. She hadn’t been too keen on the idea of us getting the kids without her, but it made more sense to already have them with us. That way we could get Rachel from work and go straight to dinner before the game. I’d tried to make her see the logic of it all, and when that failed, Babs had sweet-talked her. The kid could charm the toque off an Eskimo if he wanted to. Babs had one of Tuck’s hands in his, and Maddie had the other. Tuck’s giggles were getting out of control, but it was impossible to be annoyed by it. He stopped on each step, refusing to move up to the next one, thereby forcing Babs and Maddie to lift his weight and swing him upward. Maddie wasn’t a ton of help on that score, but at least Babs didn’t seem to mind. Oddly enough, I minded. Not that Tuck was playing around or anything like that. Tuck was a kid. Playing is what kids do. I minded that it was Babs and not me that Tuck was holding on to.
