"First!" D.W. burst through the front doorway of the Read house, water flopping from her hair, her jumper, and her Mary Janes. She twirled around and stuck her hands on her hips, ready to guard her home from evil intruders. "And where you think you're going?"
"Inside? Where it's not raining?" Arthur shrugged off his raincoat. "I don't see why I had to pick you up from the Tibbles anyway. You can walk home by yourself."
"Not when I don't have a raincoat, Arthur. Not when it's flooding outside. Not when the streets are overflowing with water. Five more minutes and we'd have to travel by canoe! Or maybe hitchhike on a dolphin's back!"
Arthur tapped the toes of his galoshes against the foyer floor.
"Mom!" D.W.'s voice whined and quickly gained momentum, her throat a pint-sized turbine fueled by an afternoon's outside play and frosting-laden cupcakes eaten with Tommy and Timmy. "Arthur's getting water all over the floor!"
"I am not!" Arthur countered, using his foot to push the water around the floor like a mop. If he spread the water around thin enough, it might evaporate before Mom saw. He squinted up at a tall shape, indistinct through his wet, fogged-up glasses. "Mom?"
Mom chuckled and lifted Arthur's glasses from his nose. "Yes, it's me." She took a tissue and wiped down the glasses' lenses before placing them back on Arthur's face. "Do you know what came in the mail today?"
"My Unicornucopia DVD?" D.W. said, bouncing obnoxiously on the balls of her feet and shifting in a loose semicircle around Mom. Her system, Arthur observed, was still full of sugar. That's the way Mrs. Tibble worked, get D.W. hopping and full of energy and then send her home.
"No, sweetie," Mom said. "I'm talking about this." She held out a large envelope in front of Arthur.
Arthur gaped at the address on the envelope. "Alright! Another postcard! I've been waiting forever for this one!"
"I'll go set the VCR up," Mom said. "But before watching the tape, Arthur, you need clean up this mess. "She pointed to the damp and dirty muck on the floor.
Arthur's eyes rolled upwards. "But Moooooom...!"
Mom shook her head. "No procrastinating. Start now." She headed for the living room, ripping open the envelope and fetching the tape out. "And get dry," she called over her shoulder. "I don't want you trailing water all over the house."
D.W. crossed her arms and sniffed. "Why not? Arthur's stupid dog does that all the time. And sometimes the water comes straight from his...MMPHH!!"
Arthur smothered D.W.'s head in a towel and rubbed vigorously, giving Mom an eager smile. Just look like you're having a good time, he thought to himself. Then Mom won't suspect a thing. And if he rubbed a little too vigorously, well...
"Ow.... Ow... Ow! That's not hair, that's my ear!" D.W. struggled free of Arthur's grip, her hair poofing out in all directions. "What's so great about watching those tapes anyway? It's just Bus Stop." She lifted her arms up past the top of her head, waving them around like the alert ears of a donkey. Or a rabbit. "'Blah-de-blah-de-blah,'" she droned in a nasally voice. "'I'm Bus Stop and this my dad Bo. I fly around with Lost Fajitas. And I go to all these places and meet other kids who are more interesting than me. Boy, I'm so hungry, I think I'll shove my camera right into this plate of rice!'"
Arthur draped the wet towel over his shoulders, pretending for a split second that he was Bionic Bunny and could just use his hurricane-breath to dry D.W. off. "Stop making fun of Buster!"
"But he doesn't care. I think he likes it."
"Well, he's not here to say anything." Arthur snapped his towel in D.W.'s direction. "And since I'm his best friend, it's my duty to tell you to quit it!"
"You're not the boss of me, Arthur Read!" D.W. tossed off her wet, muddy shoes, and scampered away, sliding across the floor on the soles of her leggings.
"You're really lucky, Buster," Arthur said aloud, groaning heavily when Mom came back with a bucket filled with warm water and a mop. "You don't have to deal with a little sister."
Arthur started to tackle the shoeprints on the floor, wiping each mark methodically and all the while silently wishing D.W. didn't exist.
D.W. dangled her legs off the edge of the sofa. "When's Bus Stop going somewhere special? Like the moon? Or Mary Moocow's barn? Or the garage where Crazy Bus lives?" She scrambled upright and planted her feet on the sofa cushions.
"You're making places up," said Arthur.
"I am not!" D.W. said, punctuating her insistence by jumping on the sofa. "The moon's real. I've seen it in the sky at night! You're just trying to trick me like you always do!"
"Quiet! I'm trying to watch. Do you want me to call Mom? I think it's time for your bath."
D.W. considered her choices: sitting quietly next to her stupid old brother, or the bath. "I'll be quiet."
The camera view jiggled as Buster entered the living room of his mom's Vermont friends. He introduced himself to both of them, petted the dogs, and met the family's three kids.
Buster's unmistakable voice drifted through the speaker. "So Gillian is your mom too?"
"She's my step-mom," the girl said.
"Boy," Buster answered, clearly impressed. "That's a lot of moms!"
"Wow," D.W. whispered. "She must be the luckiest girl in the world."
Arthur hit the pause button on the remote, leaving the blurry image of a border collie on the TV screen. "What do you mean?"
"She has two moms and no dads! Think of it, Arthur. Two moms means twice the bedtime stories. Twice the boo-boo kisses. Twice the lullabies!"
"...and twice the baths," said Arthur, amused at D.W.'s suddenly sour face. "Weird...I wonder where her dad is?"
"Oh, he's probably forced."
Arthur wrinkled his nose, unsure if he should even ask D.W. to explain herself. Oh well, he thought. Maybe it'll be funny. "What?"
"Forced," D.W. repeated, certain that Arthur was too stupid to understand the simplest of concepts. And he's supposed to be in Big Kid school and everything! "You know, sometimes parents are forced and then they don't live in the same house anymore."
"That's divorced, D.W., not forced! I'm gonna call Buster tonight and ask about it, okay?"
"Hi, Buster. Are you busy?"
"Nah, my dad's just cooking dinner. What's up?"
"Well, D.W. and I are watching the last video postcard you sent. You know, the one with the farm in Vermont?"
"Oh, yeah! That was pretty cool. Weren't those dogs cute? And I liked it when I learned where maple syrup comes from."
"I was just wondering about that family."
"Yeah?"
"Where's their dad?"
"Oh. They don't have one."
"That's kind of weird."
"Not really. I don't have a dad most of the time either, remember?"
"But your parents are divorced. That's different."
"My mom explained it to me. Sometimes, instead of a boy and a girl falling in love and getting married, a girl and a girl fall in love and want to get married too. But it's not really called marriage. Um...I think it's called a 'civil union', and you can't get that done in all places, just some."
"A girl and a girl can love each other the same way a boy and a girl do?"
"What???" D.W. stumbled backwards at Arthur's words. "That's gross! Yuck! It's bad enough having to kiss and hold hands with a boy, but kissing a girl? Eeeeeeewwwwww!"
"What's D.W. saying?"
"She's saying girls liking girls that way is kind of gross."
"Hah! That's D.W. all right. Always acting silly."
"Yeah," Arthur said, forcing out a chuckle. "Silly."
"Hey, Arthur. Weren't those cows I saw really neat? Arthur?"
Buster's voice sounded muddled, like he was speaking underwater. Arthur stood motionless, his hearing dulled by shock.
"Arthur?"
"I...let me call you back later, Buster, okay?"
"And then..." Arthur said, keeping his playground audience (comprised of most of his friends) utterly enraptured by his words. "Buster told me it's called a 'civil union'. It's like being married, but you're not a boy and girl!"
Binky laughed so hard he nearly slipped off his perch on the top bar of the gym. "That's funny! So it's like a law somewhere? Where girls can marry girls?"
Arthur nodded, his mouth agape.
"Is there a weird law where you can marry your toaster or your TV?" Binky asked.
"I'd like to marry Nemo," Francine said, joining in on Binky's gigglefest. "I'm sure my cat won't mind!"
"It goes against all cultural mores to marry inanimate objects," Brain said authoritatively. "Though there have been documented cases of people marrying their pets. But that's usually attributed to the individuals protesting a law they believe is wrong."
"Are there civil unions where there are boys and boys?" Muffy asked.
"Yeah," Arthur replied, shuddering at the mere thought of boys kissing boys. His brain froze again, unable to fully comprehend the concept. "I - I guess so."
Muffy leaned in closer to the rest of the group, delighting in this week's offering of juicy gossip. "And they'd kiss too, won't they?"
Everyone fell to the ground, rolling in the grass and kickin their legs in waves of disgust. Muffy added a "Vomitrocious" and a stuck-out tongue just to make sure they all knew where she stood on the idea.
"D.W., put that vase down. It's probably very expensive."
"But Mom, look at the pretty horsies on the front! Aren't they Arthur? Aren't they pretty horsies?"
Arthur bleahed at the pink and glitter-tinged monstrosities and took the vase from D.W., trying to ignore her usual shopping mantra of "Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!" as he searched for the vase's rightful shelf. "Where'd you find this, D.W.?"
D.W. pointed towards the back of the store. "Over there, where the two women were kissing."
Did that just happen? No! He just had it on his mind a lot lately. That's all. He didn't really hear his own sister talking about seeing two women kiss in the store, did he? No. That's impossible. He'll just ask her to repeat herself, and then he'll hear what she actually said. "What did you say?"
"Where the two women were kissing, and one of them was Bus Stop's mom."
Arthur laughed, more out of confusion than amusement. "Okay, enough with the jokes. You're fibbing."
"I don't fib when it's important! And I only see things that are real."
"Then what about Nadine?"
"You apologize to her right now!"
Ignoring D.W., Arthur hurried down the aisle and found a long row of horse-themed pottery. He stuck the vase back on its shelf, then peered across to the next section. Buster's mom Bitzi stood at the far end of the aisle, engaged in deep conversation with Ms. McWord, the woman who wrote all those Scare Your Pants Off Club books.
They shared a joke.
They laughed.
They took turns stealing sips from a single tall latte.
And then Ms. McWord. Kindly and cool Ms. McWord. That Ms. McWord leaned in and kissed Bitzi on her bright red lips.
Arthur screamed.
Arthur gulped, pacing up and down the entrance to the apartment complex in a vain attempt to calm himself down.
"'Buster'," he muttered. "'Guess what? I think your mom and Ms. McWord are friends. Isn't that cool?' No... No... 'Buster, those two moms in Vermont? I think your mom would fit right in with them!' No! 'Buster, remember when we read about those two boy birds that adopted an egg and...' ARGH!"
He ran through about a dozen different ways to tell Buster about that kiss when Bitzi's car pulled into the parking lot.
"Buster!" Arthur waved, most of his anxiousness forgotten once he set eyes on his best friend. "I got something to say!"
"Oh, honey. Can it wait?" Bitzi smiled wearily as she turned the car's engine off. "I'm afraid Buster's had a long airplane trip and he's really tired."
Those lips. Those red lips. Those lips that touched other lips. Talking to him? Arthur shook his head to clear it. "Uh, no Mrs. Baxter. I really want to talk to him now. Could I? Please?"
"Well," Bitzi said. "Alright, but only for a few minutes. I'll just take your luggage upstairs, okay sweetie?" She planted a quick kiss on Buster's forehead (those lips!) then hefted the bags and left the two boys alone at the car.
Buster nodded, stifling a yawn between spread fingers. "You have to hurry up, Arthur. I flew in from Hawaii, remember?"
"Uh..." Arthur gulped, staring at Buster's drained but happy face. "Um..."
"Yeah?"
"You promise you won't get mad if I tell you?"
"Sure. Why would I get mad?"
"Well, because...because it's about your mom."
"Huh?"
"I-saw-her-kissing-Ms.-McWord-the-other-day."
Buster blinked slowly, looking as if Arthur had said something in Portuguese. Or in Martian. "Wha--"
"Your mom," Arthur repeated, slowing his words down. "Was kissing Ms. McWord."
"Oh."
"'Oh'? That's all you have to say? 'Oh'?"
"What should I say?"
"I dunno." Arthur heaved his shoulders. "That it's weird? That it's wrong?"
"Why should it be wrong?"
"But...but..." Arthur sputtered, desperately fishing his mind for answers. "What about your dad? Don't you care about his feelings?"
"My mom already told me. She likes Ms. McWord, Arthur. Maybe in the same way she liked Harry Mills. She doesn't really know yet. But isn't it cool? I mean. E.A. De Poe herself!"
"Buster, you're not listening! You might have two moms!"
"And why is that weird?"
"You hung around those kids, and their...their two moms. And I watched the video of them together and I just thought it was weird, okay? It was weird, and I'm not used to weird. Nobody is! Everyone else thinks it's gross. Francine and Binky and Muffy. They didn't like it either."
"Big deal!" Buster said, a little harsher than he intended. "So what if other people don't like it? Lots of families don't just have a mom and a dad. Look at the Tibbles. They're living with their grandma. And Fern doesn't live with her dad either."
"Two moms? Who love each other? Like parents?"
"They're not 'like' parents. They are parents. Like your mom and dad. Like my mom and dad. And they all love their kids the same way."
"But...but they can't have babies. With each other. Parents are supposed to have babies with each other. That's what being a parent means!"
"A lot of couples like them adopt kids. Isn't it better for kids to live in a loving home, even if there aren't any dads around?"
"I guess... It's still weird."
Buster managed to work his way out of the passenger seat of the car. "It's not weird, Arthur. Just different. I guess I thought it was kind of weird, too. At first. But...those kids are just like us, and like everyone else I met on the trip. They're different in a lot of ways, but the same too."
"And your mom?" Arthur said. "Do you know if she's--"
Buster shook his head. "But...I don't think two moms would be that bad, y'know? Twice the dinners and twice the desserts? Mmmmm... Wouldn't it be great, Arthur?"
Arthur laughed, his first real, amused laugh in weeks. "I guess your stomach will always make your decisions for you, huh?"
Buster shrugged, not feeling as tired as he did a few moments ago. "Wanna come inside? Mom says there's leftover pizza, and I can show you all the neat stuff I collected on my trip."
"Okay!"
The best friends headed into the building together, Buster eagerly telling Arthur about all the wonderful kids he met and the cool places he visited. And Arthur listened, laughing at the right moments and asking all the right questions. And he was certain that no matter what happened to either of them, nothing would ever get in the way of their friendship.
Well, except for maybe Top Supermarket Clerk.