My favorite character, Angela Forrest, is a lovely lady with a charming outlook on life – if something is not as you would like it, change it!
– from Roses and Daisies and Death, Oh My
At 5:23 the next morning Rose was snug under her down comforter deep in a peaceful, dreamless sleep while Malcolm snored gently at her feet. Next door, Daisy was dreaming that she was drifting in a sailboat in the middle of the Bay cradled in Marc’s arms and sipping Long Island Iced Tea from a Star Wars tumbler.
At 5:24 they were jumping out of their beds as the alarm screamed its maddening beep, beep, beep. Malcolm started howling.
“Oh, my God, what do we do now?” whispered Daisy frantically to Rose as they met in the hallway.
“I don’t know. Lock ourselves in and wait for the police,” answered Rose.
A voice from the second floor called out, “Girls, it’s only me. I. Well, the whole gang of us.” The telephone started to ring. “I’ll get it. Not to worry, I know the safe word. I can’t imagine why the alarm went off. Go on back to bed.”
Daisy and Rose put on their robes and padded downstairs to the kitchen with Malcolm behind them. Angela Forrest was standing there in a pilgrim’s outfit complete with buckled shoes, telephone in hand saying, “Oh yes, Champagne Taste. Everything is hunky-dory.” Before she could hang up Malcolm raced into the kitchen and threw himself into her arms. “Malcolm, darling. What a sweet hello. Well, Happy Thanksgiving to you all!” she said as she hung up the phone.
“Mother? It’s 5:30 in the morning. What in God’s name are you doing here?”
“I wanted to get the turkey ready for the oven and then surprise you with breakfast. I think your alarm system must be faulty. I put the code in like you showed me and the next thing I heard was that awful beeping!”
“What code did you put in?” asked Rose.
“Why, my birthday. 0315, just like you said.”
Daisy and Rose looked at each other wondering if their Mother had gone completely around the bend.
Daisy spoke calmly, “Mother, you’re birthday is March seventeenth. Not the fifteenth.”
“I must have forgotten to tell you. It was March seventeenth, but it seemed so very ethnic. While I love the Irish part of my ancestry, I really felt that I needed to pay homage to my Roman side. So I changed it to the ides of March. I’ve always liked that phrase and feel deeply connected to all things Roman.”
Giving her mother a look Daisy shrugged her shoulders. “What can anyone possibly say to that? I think I’ll just go back to bed.”
Read more of Angela’s adventures in The Locket, her very own short story.
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