Flora & Ulysses

It was not her father at the door.

It was Tootie.

“Tootie Tickham!” said Flora.

Tootie stepped through the door and into the living room, and then she stopped. Her eyes widened. “What in the world?” she said.

Flora didn’t even bother turning around. She knew what Tootie was looking at.

“That’s the little shepherdess,” said Flora. “The guardian of lost sheep and light. Or something. She belongs to my mother.”

“Right,” said Tootie. She shook her head. “Well, never mind about the lamp.” She took another step closer to Flora. “Where’s the squirrel?” she whispered.

“Upstairs,” Flora whispered back.

“I’ve come to check and see if what I think happened yesterday actually happened, or if I’m the victim of an extended hallucination.”

Flora looked Tootie in the eye. She said, “Ulysses can type.”

“Who can type?” said Tootie.

“The squirrel. He’s a superhero.”

Tootie said, “For heaven’s sake, what kind of superhero types?”

It was a good (and also slightly disturbing) point. How, exactly, was a typing squirrel going to fight villains and change the world?

“George?” shouted Flora’s mother.

“It’s not Pop!” Flora shouted back. “It’s Mrs. Tickham.”

There was a silence from the kitchen, and then Flora’s mother came into the living room with a big, fake adult smile plastered on her face. “Mrs. Tickham,” she said. “What a lovely surprise. What can we do for you?”

Tootie smiled a big, fake adult smile back. “Oh,” she said. “I just came to pay Flora a visit.”

“Who?”

“Flora,” said Tootie. “Your daughter.”

“Really?” said Flora’s mother. “You came to see Flora?”

“I’ll be right back,” said Flora.

She ran out of the living room and through the dining room.

“What a truly extraordinary lamp,” she heard Tootie say.

“Oh, do you like it?” said Flora’s mother.

Ha! thought Flora.

And then she was out of the dining room and into the kitchen. She ripped the paper out of the typewriter and looked down at the words; they were absolutely not a hallucination.

“Holy bagumba,” said Flora.

A loud scream echoed through the house.

Flora took the paper and shoved it down the front of her pajamas and ran back into the living room.

Ulysses was sitting on top of Mary Ann.

Or rather, he was trying to sit on top of Mary Ann.

His feet were scrabbling to gain purchase on the little shepherdess’s pink-flowered lampshade. He paused in his efforts and looked at Flora in an apologetic and hopeful way, and then he returned to wobbling back and forth.

“Oh, my goodness,” said Tootie.

“How did it get in here?” shouted Flora’s mother. “It just came flying down the stairs.”

“Yes,” said Tootie. She gave Flora a meaningful look. “Flying.”

“It absolutely scared the living daylights out of me and Mrs. Tickham. We screamed.”

“We did,” said Tootie. “We screamed. There’s just no end to the excitement.”

“If that squirrel breaks my lamp, I don’t know what I’ll do. Mary Ann is very precious to me.”

“Mary Ann?” said Tootie.

“I’ll just get him off the lamp, okay?” said Flora. She put out a hand.

“Don’t touch it!” screamed her mother. “It has a disease.”

The doorbell, as if it were echoing Flora’s mother’s advice, buzzed its terrible warning buzz.

Flora and her mother and Tootie all turned.

A small voice called out.

The voice said, “Great-Aunt Tootie?”