I can't decide whether you should live or die
Oh, you'll probably go to heaven
Please don't hang your head and cry
No wonder why my heart feels dead inside
It's cold and hard and petrified
We're going for a ride!

I Can't Decide ~ Scissor Sisters

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After the crazy meet and greet on The Green, we slow roll back to Chuckie's haunted house. I can tell that my uncle is clearly satisfied with the way that things have turned sideways, for everyone else besides him. Because without even a cursory check for Taliban terrorist ninja assassins, he just hits his cul-de-sac and slides the big black Suburban monstrosity right into the garage.

As soon as we pull back up into his garage, Chuckie drops out of the tank with a thud. Once more on the move to his next kill, in the current case that means lunch. Chuckie is clearly famished, after his hard morning of faking all those feelings, that I know damn well he doesn't really possess. So back into the kitchen we go for some much-needed protein, to replenish all the energy it must have taken for him to talk about his "fake feelings".

So we end up standing around the marble monstrosity of his kitchen island, not talking and pounding protein shakes in silence. Lunch turns out to be big cold seared steak sandwiches, with enough horseradish sauce to kill the proverbial horse and pickled bar eggs. All in all, a healthy choice for the up and coming psychopath to boost his low energy back up to normal crazy levels.

After we are finished eating Chuckie heaves up his massive bulk and drops our plates off in his industrial-strength dishwasher. Probably purchased because it came with a lifetime guarantee to get rid of even the most difficult blood and brain stains from your fine dining silverware. For all those dinner party's that tend to end with a bang, for some poor chum.

"So this thing with Mo and Sio, ran a little longer than I thought it would." Chuckie checks his heavy blood proof beat down watch. "So we need to cover a couple of things real fast, before we get you going on your way."

"Okay." I absolutely agree, wanting to get gone just as much as he clearly wants me to go away.

"So St. Andrews has this whole application thing that needs to be done ASAP. But don't worry about that noise, my fancy lady lawyer over in Seaton is gonna handle all that for us." I gather by the "fancy lady lawyer" he means his legitimate business lawyer, as opposed to his street lawyers who deal with all his illegitimate issues.

He hands me over a very expensive looking black business card with the name Deliah D. Delcroix engraved in gold. Just based on the card, I am guessing that the gold script was some intentional advertising or a dire warning. As in, if you can't pay in gold, you best not waste her time and go find yourself someone cheaper to fix your problems.

"She may need you or your mom to sign off on a few things. Like your school records, or that you got all your rabies shots and shit." He snorts apparently amused that kids should have rabies shots.

"Truth be told, DeeDee can be a bit of a witch when she wants to be. Which is arguably most of the time. But then again, I don't pay her for her shy smile and sunny disposition, if you get my drift? So mind your manners with DeeDee, and talk nice to her, like you know how to do. Got it?"

"Got it." I pocket the card.

"Here, I want you to take some cash for gas and whatnot." He slides me over a thick envelope, which I assume is "some cash". Which turns out to be five hundred dollars, stripper glitter-free twenties.

"Naw Uncle Chuck, it's cool. I'm good to go." I try to push back the envelope at him. I already know who I owe, so there is no reason to make the situation any worse than it already is by taking any more than I need.

"Jackie, do you not recall me just saying not fifteen minutes ago, that you were fully funded on this thing?" Chuckie blinks back at me.

"Yeah, I heard what you said to the mother." I agree with him that he spoke these words.

"Then that means you are fully fuck-ing funded on this thing, end of story." Chuckie confirms that his insane master plan is indeed fully funded.

With nothing better to say, I merely nod along see where this is going next.

"Times are tight, right?" Chuckie grunts. "So I don't want you coming out of pocket, just to come see me. And I don't want you worrying about the finances on any of this shit. Cause that's on my end. I got that."

"Your end is to take care of the things that I need you to do." He emphasizes his immediate expectations. "Things like getting that address and license changed over to the house here? Making sure your mom is gonna be good to go with everything. Taking care of Gracie girl so she is happy and healthy. Cause I want all those distractions handled ahead of time. So that when you land over here, you can hit the ground pounding, and take care of the business that needs taking care of. Understood?"

"Got it." I grudgingly agree to take the money, only cause clearly this is another Rule #7 thing for him.

"Now, any questions on where everyone stands here, and what they are supposed to be handling?" Chuckie's dead eyes bore into mine to make his meaning crystal clear. Do not make me have to explain my evil grand master plan twice to you.

"Naw, not so much." I shake him off.

"Okay, so let's get you going so that you can get Gracie girl from school." Chuckie starts towards the front door of the crazy castle. "Oh yeah, before I forget I meant to ask you about something serious. I gotta do some shopping for Christmas soon. So what's your sister into right now, like with Barbie's and bullshit?"

"Naw, actually she's all about Princess Pony right now ...a lot." I emphasize the obvious horror of this hellion. "Like watching that show and singing along with all her friends is like her big thing right now."

"Huh? Never heard of her, she famous or some shit?" Chuckie scowls out, as if this is something crucial that he should know all about.

"Naw, just with the under five crowd." I shake him off.

To be honest, I think it would have been even more frightening if Chuckie was all, "Oh, no shit? Oh holy hell, I love that freaking unicorn! Now that bitch is a boss!"

In my personal opinion, both Chuckie and Princess Pony are both evil as all hell, in their own insane ways. But these two devils on the same team would be a recipe for outright Armageddon. There are some things in life that should just not be tempted, and Chuckie riding in on Princess Pony's back with guns-a-blazing is definitely one of them.

After Chuckie sees me out the front door, I fire up the crappy old Honda civic and head back home. The drive back down home ends up taking me longer than the drive up for the first time. Like somehow this place is now trying to suck back my soul to hell. Just in case I was thinking of running out on my deal with the devil.

Truth is, that I've already run through several scenarios in my head of how this is going to go. Hell, I even have one, where I tell Chuckie there is "no way in hell" we can just up and move our whole life into his house on an ask. Problem is that all these scenarios end with me telling Chuckie "no", and that is not a good thing. The concept of "no-can-do" on favors owed to him is not anywhere in his insane operational manual. So I finally give up on that dead dream and start focusing in on the reality of the situation.

Bottom line, is this really that bad of a thing?

Honestly, I have to go with yes and no, depending on several factors? The first factor is figuring out if this job Chuckie lined up my mother is actually a decent gig, and not some shady under the table hustle? My mother will do pretty much anything for me and Gracie, and has proved that more times than I can count. But one thing she will not do is anything even slightly shady, and forget about anything remotely illegal. No way, no how, not gonna happen, end of story.

The next major issue on this is going to be dealing with the pirate princess in the mix. Leaving the only place she has ever lived, and how this sudden change is going to affect my sister? The pirate princess in the mix, who is infamous for digging in hard on things she doesn't want to do. I am thinking that fight night over Cat in the Hat may pale in comparison to relocating her entire life to a new place. Then again my sister can be strangely okay with some sudden surprises? Either way, it's going to be a tossup with Gracie. At least unless I can figure out how to bribe her off somehow?

Even with the heavy traffic coming home, I am still a little too early to pick up Gracie. So I street park and kick it at the curb in front of Wonder Years. Where I can watch my sister run around with the rest of the giggling girls through the chainlink fence. Seems like Gracie and all the rest of the giggling girls are playing some kind of game that involves stepping on someone else's shadow. I am not exactly sure what the point of this game is? But all the giggling girls running around stomping on each other's shadows really seem to really get a kick out of it, for some strange reason. I suppose it's another one of the many mysteries known only to four-year-old giggle girls that are lost on the rest of us.

When Gracie is finally done for the day, the Wonder Women escort her out to the curb. Where once more I regain custody of the pirate princess. Once my sister loaded back up in the kiddie seat in the back of the Honda, we head back to the house to wait for my mother to get dropped off after her shift at St. Mary's.

On the drive home, Gracie tells me all about her not so "Wonderful day". Which consists of mostly complaining about how wrong it is that some girls (Not her!) got to draw whatever they wanted to (Princess Pony!). But her teacher, Miss Mary, made her only draw numbers (Not Princess Pony!!!)

I try to chime in at the appropriate times of the sad tale of woe at the Wonder Years. Attempting to explain to Gracie that learning her numbers and letters is what she is supposed to be doing at school. And that Princess Pony is for after school, when all her work is done.

Of course, my sister is not hearing any of this, as she keeps insisting that some other girls got to draw whatever they wanted. (Princess Pony!!!) And even worse, they flaunted that fact in her face, especially her archenemy slash-sometimes-best-friend Callista Flynn. (So not fair!) Which I am guessing is the real crux of her issue here, the fairness factor of it all.

My sister is a lot of things, and not all of them are super "sugar and spice". But above all else, she is highly aware of the concept of fair. What is and what is not fair, pretty much defines her entire worldview at the moment. Which really makes me wonder how she is going to handle the big moving news.

As soon as we walk into the house, the nightmare that is my sister's daily dose of Princess Pony and her freaky friends fires up on the TV. Watching that stupid ass rainbow unitard singing along with all its stupid freaking friends is like her big thing. So I just leave her to it in the living room with her new religion, and head out to the backyard. Try to work out some of my issues on the heavy bag hanging on the back porch for a while.

A thousand punches later, I am feeling slightly shaky, but no closer to a solution on this situation. Starting with, how the hell to explain all this insanity to my mother, in a way that doesn't sound as crazy as Chuckie? I finally come to the conclusion that this is just going to have to be one of those things, where the chips fall where they fall, and we will just have to deal with the fallout.

As it gets a little closer to dark, I head into the house to get a start on dinner. Unfortunately for me, I am just in time to witness another one of Princess Pony's spectacular last-second victories over the evil forces of dreaded The Meanies. Which to my everlasting horror, Gracie insists on my watching with her to the bitter end. Even though we have both bared witness to the same nightmarish episode at least thrice.

Once again, my mean dreams of the death of this horror story come to naught. As Princess Pony once again emerges ever-victorious and reigns supreme over the magic Kandy Kingdom. Tragically, the defeated forces of Mean are once more vanquished to the Badlands, on the dark side of Kandy Mountain. To make their mean plots and plans and overthrow the forces of karmic kindness and moral decency.

After the tragic episode of horrorshow is over, I try to shake off the shivers of yet another depressing defeat suffered by my Mean brothers and sisters soldiers. I swear to hell, no matter how hard I root for The Meanies to slay this stupid unicorn once and for all, they somehow always seem to come up short every single time. Personally, I think the Meanies should just stop making all those mean speeches right on the verge of victory, and just kill that crazy unicorn queen once and for all. Maybe then we can finally end her hellish reign of terror over our television once and for all.

Instead, I start another episode for her, while I head to the kitchen to start dinner. I pull open the cupboards and start poking around for something that will feed us all without starting a war. Finally, I decide it has already been a long enough day and just roll with one of Gracie's easy-peasy go-to dinners. Fried salami Mac & Cheese, with a small side salad of chopped up cabbage, with way too much Thousand Islands dressing mixed in.

About halfway through making my sister's organic macaroni and cheese to the correct consistency for Gracie's rather particular tastes, I hear my mother getting dropped off by one of her coworker's cars outside. She breezes through the front door, gives my sister her requisite welcome home hugs and kisses, and heads right into the kitchen for talking time.

"How did it go today with Charles?" She starts in even before her jacket is off and slung behind her chair.

"Some of this some of that." I shrug. "We will definitely be needing to have some coffee later after dinner?"

Our "coffee" code is for not talking in front of Gracie, and only then after she is safely asleep. When the big Meanies who control her little life can speak freely, without fear of the wrath of the pirate princess.

"That bad?" She immediately frowns over at me.

"Mmmm, I honestly don't know?" I shrug her off until later. "I suppose it really depends on how you look at the situation? It's a bit more complicated than yes or no, can cover? "

"Well, Charles has always been more complicated than most." She nods slowly.

"Oh yeah, crazy, complicated and Chuckie, our old amigos together again." Hell, throw in a little chum for fun, and you practically have the trifecta of family vacay covered.

"Okay, that's enough for now then, we'll save the rest for coffee." She nods over to my sister who has decided to rumble into the kitchen looking for trouble.

"I'm hunnngeereey? What are we having for dinner?" She tries to stand on her tippy toes to get a glimpse at what "good for you food" she will soon be forced to eat for diner.

"Well, you're in luck Gracie, cause we are having your second favorite tonight," I smirk over at my mother, who just rolls her eyes over.

"Ah-huh?" Gracie grunts over at me, refusing to get suckered into to this trick again.

It's a well-established fact, that my sister will eat chocolate ice creme for breakfast lunch and diner, if we would let her. Ergo everything else I can make other than chocolate ice creme counts as her "second favorite".

Over dinner, we end up listening once again to Gracie's litany of complaints about the absolute unfairness of it all. My mother absorbs the totality of the tragedy that was my sister being forced to learn her numbers, instead of drawing homages to her unicorn demon goddess. Finally, my mother tucks in a stray snake back into the bad hair day bandana and sighs knowingly down at my sister.

"Grace, by learning all your numbers while other girls color, that will make you twice as smart as everyone else when you go to elementary school." My mother imparts this particular piece of parental wisdom.

"But it's not fair, mommy." Gracie counters right back on the attack.

"Yes, well when you get to kindergarten and you already know your alphabet and numbers? Then you will get to watch even more Princess Pony than those other girls. Who did not learn their numbers, because they will have to make up that work they missed."

"But mommy ...it's not fair now." Gracie is clearly not buying into the concept of "pay me now, or pay me later".

At this point in my childhood, my old dad Dick would have pointed out that "life wasn't fair, so shut up and suck it up." But my mother is not as brutally blunt as my father was, and Gracie is not nearly as dumb as I was at her age. So my mother's approach to parenting my sister is a lot less heavy-handed and a lot more logical path of least resistance. My mother finally decides that fighting this fight with her is going to get us nowhere, and opts for an easy out.

"Okay Grace, I can tell that this issue is very important to you. So I will talk to your teacher and see what she has to say about the situation. But that's the best I can do for now, okay?" She concedes my sister a minor victory, in her eternal war on the forces of unfair education.

"Mmmm...okay." My sister is clearly not pleased with this outcome. But now that the "talk-to-teacher" card has been played, Gracie knows she is out of options.

Maybe my mother is hoping that magically during the night Gracie will forget about all this unfairness she suffered, and move on to her next issue? Which in my opinion is wishful thinking, cause my sister tends to hold on to grudges the way junkyard dogs hold on to territory ...to the death. But what the hell, stranger things have happened today, then my sister giving up on another unfair fight.

So it would seem that Gracie is clearly been having some issues down at Wonder Years lately. Probably because they keep making her do things that doesn't involve watching Princess Pony non-stop. So just maybe, this sudden move might turn out to work in my favor? Who knew that freak of goodness would finally come in handy. I guess its somewhat true what Princess Pony says after all ...if you just try hard enough then all your dreams can come true too?

Now, if only the forces of Meanie Mountian would try a little harder for her horrible death. I'm thinking quick coup d'etat while all the unicorns are safely sleeping and dreaming of cotton candy? Then they can make their mean speeches over the bloody unicorns carcass, but only after the dark deed is done. Then Booyaa ...Princess Pony has fallen! All hail the Mean Queen!!!

It's probably a pretty sad state of affairs when you are overly obsessed with the diabolical death of an imaginary cartoon unicorn princess, who lives in a candy castle on the moon. Even one as evil and clearly deserving of death as Princess Pony.

♦♦♦

~ Author's Notes ~

This chapter is dedicated to quackquackmuthaducka who is a wonderful writer and a very cool chick in my humble opine. So if you're looking for a wild ride with some serious sexy cool chicks drop in and check out her latest at: https://www.wattpad.com/story/154519587-our-greatest-secrets