Turtles may have a long life in the wild but with small boys they are an endangered species. Very soon Wiggly went miss- ing. According to Michael he was simply playing with both “toitles” when Wiggly disap- peared. Herman spent the morn- ing moving heavy furniture back and forth trying to find Wiggly. No success. When Daddy came home that night he repeated the process, still with no luck finding Wiggly. Michael was very restless when we put him to bed that night. Herman and I were lying in bed ourselves when it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, Michael ate Wiggly. We woke him up and cross-examined him but the only
confession we got was that he kissed Shmiggly but doesn’t know what happened to Wiggly. A couple of days later Wiggly was found dead inside our sofa slip cover. Frankie called his Dad on the telephone to tell him the news. “Poor Wiggly, he’s all broken up,” he said. Michael told me “Wiggly doesn’t walk any more.” He told his Daddy, “Wiggly lives in a different house.” THE CONSPIRACY THEORY There were times when I was certain that Frankie and Michael conspired to see how they turn their mother into a nervous wreck. One day Frankie took my nail polish and painted my pock- etbook, bureau, bedspread, air
Mike with wounded bird
Herman with Children Stephen and Wendy
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