Lying in Fredd-o's guest bedroom later that night (where everything is spotlessly, OCD-ish-ly clean, by the way), Grace pokes me.

"Mom," she whispers, because she has this thing where she thinks she's subtle and she's totally not. It's cute, except at ten o' clock at night when I've been driving eight hours and am now trying to sleep in my old friend-enemy-person's house. I grunt back at her, trying to maneuver around the leg she has diagonally in the bed. Who taught this kid how to sleep?

Grace props her head up on her palm. "Look," she says, pointing behind me. "Cat."

"What?"

I flip over. There is indeed a cat perched outside the window, sprawled on the sill. Great. "Yay," I yawn, and pat her back. "Go to sleep."

"I wanna pet it."

"It's like ten. You can pet it tomorrow."

"He'll let me?" she asks, wide-eyed. Gracie hasn't exactly had good experiences with cats ever since my mom almost had a panic attack that time she tried to pick up Frothy.

I close my eyes. Jesus, driving sucks. "Yeah," I promise, because Freddie's a softy. "Now go. To. Sleep. We're going shopping tomorrow."

Wooh.

This is how it happens the next morning:

I wake up, curse Freddie for leaving his stupid cat-attracting window blinds open, shield my face from the evil sun, stumble into the bathroom while Grace snores. Pee, wash face, find convenient toothbrush and paste. Learn that sleeping in jeans makes them uncomfortably tight. Run a hand through my hair, kiss Grace on the cheek, stagger into the hallway in hopes of finding food.

At a fork in the hall where the right side definitely leads to a bedroom and the left leads to an unknown abyss, I choose adventure and go left. I'm still rubbing sleep out of my eyes when I accidentally wander into the dining room.

"Hey," Freddie says from the table, newspaper in his hands. His hair is cleanly brushed; I can smell his aftershave from here. And I'm a total mess. So things are still normal, it appears.

"Yo," I grunt back. Maybe I should be walking on eggshells or whatever, I don't know, but this is weird enough and I figure if maybe I act like we're still sixteen it'll make things easier. Or something. I haven't punched him yet, so obviously something's working.

"Hello! You like bacon?"

"Woah!" I yell at the chick suddenly standing in front of me. Where the hell did she come from?! "Back off, lady!"

She shrinks back, dark hair swinging. Guess I've still got it. For lack of anything better to do, I twitch my hands at Fred-face in pure confusion. Does he have a whorehouse around here I don't know about? He has the grace (ha-ha, I love puns with my kid's name) to look sheepish.

"That's Natalie," he explains, shuffling his papers. The NY Times, of course. Geek. "She cooks."

I blink. "Excuse me? You have a cook?"

Freddie shrugs helplessly, eyes fixed to his paper. "I can boil water on a good day."

"True," Natalie chimes in. I glare and she backs away again. Freddie rolls his eyes.

"Don't be rude."

"I'm not rude," I snap. "If you go get your butler, I'll tell him that, too."

There's a clatter of pots and pans from behind me, and Natalie replies over them: "Rosa cleans on Tuesday's and Thursday's."

"God!" I yell.

"Sam," Freddie shoots back, sounding annoyed.

"Mom!"

We all look around as Grace hurtles into the room. I manage to turn away from the cook just in time for her to slam into my legs.

"Ow," I mutter, then break off my complaint about her running when I see the tears shimmering in her blue eyes. Crap. "Hey," I say, unclenching her hands from my wrinkled shirt and hefting her onto my hip. In the background, I hear The Cook go back to her cook-ish things and turn to face the other wall, even though I'm pretty sure Fred-weird's way too intent on his Times to pay attention to us.

I bounce Grace a little to get her talking. "I woke up," she finally sniffs, accusation in her voice. "And you were gone."

Honestly? I'd been counting on her sleeping waaay later than this. Didn't she not get to bed until, what, ten? It's barely seven! What's up with this kid? "Hey," I say again, patting her back while she sniffles. "I'm sorry, okay? I just came to talk to Freddie about how we're going shopping today. Remember? We're gonna get schools supplies."

Sha-zam. Her voice gets less wavering, more hope-dawning. "Oh yeah. I want to get school supplies."

I am so awesome. In fact, I am officially Awesome ™. Crying averted! Score. "There's some pants and a shirt in the bag," I tell Gracie, letting her drop to the unnaturally clean tiled floor. Water sloshes in a multitude of pots behind us. "Go get dressed and we'll leave soon. Do you know where the room is?"

"Yeah," she answers, rocking on the balls of her feet. Aw, Grace. I think I love her most when she's all happy and bouncy, mostly because it's so far from me that I don't know where it came from. At least she looks like me, though. Kind of. Curly hair, at least, even if it is brown, but whatever. I ruffle said hair as she starts walk/skip out (seriously, how did I spawn her?).

"Oh," Grace says, suddenly noticing Freddie, who lowers his newspaper and smiles nervously. Of course my kid makes him nervous. She hold her hand out and does that kid-wave, just opening and closing her fingers a lot. "Hi, guy."

A pan bangs behind me, and she turns again. The Cook looks nervous too. Christ , does everyone worry that my child's a serial killer? "Hi lady," she says to The Cook, then promptly walks out.

Crisis: prevented. Check.

"So really," I say, once The Cook leaves me and Freddie alone with our bacon and eggs. Mmm, bacon. I may be having a change of heart about her. "A cook?"

He shrugs, having finally laid down the damn paper to eat. Which he does daintily, for the record. Still such a girl. "It's convenient."

"Fredward-o," I say slowly, with as much conviction as I can muster with a mouth full of scrambled deliciousness, "you, my friend, are loaded."

A blush lights up his face. Ha-ha, way to look sixteen instead of twenty-six. I chuckle and down about half my glass of orange juice. Probably fresh-squeezed. "I do pretty good," he concedes, still blushing a little. I'm sure that is so attractive to the ladies.

"Pretty damn good," I correct, because I'm hella right. You know what mansions look like? Well, Fred-chump's house is like a baby one of those. Have I not mentioned that? Besides, if you need more clarification, I got a choice between two different, tastefully decorated guest rooms last night. And a view of what appears to be a kick-ass pool from me and Grace's window. Need I say more?

Freddie finishes off his bacon and goes to dump the plate in the sink. I guess Rosa will get it eventually. "Pear's been having a good year," he offers up as explanation.

"Ooh! Does this mean you can sneak me a new Pearphone?"

"Sam! I can't break the law!"

"Says you."

I stand up and, in the interest of not looking like a doofus, put my plate and glass in the sink too. I'd be worried about Grace not being back by now, but I stuck a couple puzzles in the big obnoxious bag we brought all our essentials in (I borrowed it from Carly; purple flowers. Must I go on?), and Gracie is a sucker for puzzles. Except she throws a fit when she can't find the right piece after a while, which I guess proves she's actually my child.

"Me and Grace are going to get school supplies," I tell Freddie conversationally as he whips out his super-rad Pearphone; it's the newest version. Lucky chiz. "We'll be back in a few hours. She needs some new shoes, too, so maybe a little longer." It feels so weird to tell him we'll be back at his own house in a few hours. Ugh. This is why I didn't even want to do this in the beginning.

Freddie glances up as I turn to head back to our current room. "Oh. Um, not to be, you know—"

"I get the feeling you need to leave for work soon, Freds, so I'd suggest spitting it out."

He reaches into the back pocket of his nice, obviously-foreign-made-pants. "Uh, did you need any mon—"

Jesus. "No!" I snap immediately, not letting him get the word out. I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear while he fumbles. Ha. Serves the dork right. "I'm not brain-dead, Freddork, I have a couple hundred on me. And before you start worrying about me being a total loafer, chill. I put in an application before we left and I start at the high school next week. So— don't. Just don't."

There's silence. Maybe that rant was a little awkward.

"Okay," Freddie says quietly. He tucks his wallet away again. I make a face at it. "I— sorry. Um. I'm going to work now."

"Have fun."

He grabs a briefcase that I just now notice has been sitting right under the table. I blow hair out of my face and slump against the table as he walks out the doorway.

"Sam?"

I glance over at the head he pokes back in. "Yeah?"

A smirk twitches onto his face. "I haven't heard 'Freddork' in about three years. Flashback."

He stays just long enough to catch my surprised laugh, and then he's out.

A/N: Thank you for the reviews. :) Next chapter-- more on Sam's job, Natalie & Rosa, Freddie's life, Grace's existance, etc. Keep reading! I promise it gets less confusing!