Simple Hearts
Chapter 17
"Good Morning, Ranger," Ellen Plum greeted the frequent guest at her front door. "Did Lucia get off OK?"
"Yes," Ranger breathed a sigh of relief. His mother was driving back to Newark as they were speaking after she made breakfast for them.
"They are in the dining room." Mrs. Plum pointed in that direction.
Stephanie and her father were finishing their morning coffee and Reilley was a syrupy mess happily eating his pancakes.
Frank Plum indicated the chair next to Stephanie. "Have a seat." His wife placed a coffee cup in front of the Cuban man. "Want a piece of coffee cake?"
Before he could politely decline it due to the large Southwestern omelet his mother made him, a piece of cherry topped coffee cake was placed in front of him with a fork. Not to be rude, he tasted a forkful of the still warm breakfast cake and resigned himself to extra time in the gym.
Grandma Mazur came to the table with her coffee cup wearing a big grin.
"How is your friend Louie, Edna?" Ranger asked. He really didn't want to know but from the smile she was sporting, he was curious. Stephanie's grandma always had a story to tell.
"Look," she held up an arm with a wide jade green rubber band around it. She turned it around and it had 'LOUIE' painted on it. "Louie and I are going steady. He knows a good catch when sees it. He's wearing a matching one with 'EDNA'.
"Did they check his eyes in the hospital?" Frank Plum grumbled. "Sounds like he can't see because I'd run from you."
She poked her middle finger up her nose. "You only dream about the excitement I live, Sonny Boy!"
"It's a nightmare."
Ellen Plum sat down at the table. "Mother, I had this carpet cleaned professionally. No food throwing!" she announced. "What happened to your neck?" She noticed a red mark below her ear.
She told the table, "Louie gave me a hickey! I'll have to work around this in my reality show. If you didn't know that this is a hickey, Ellen, then you should try making out sometime!" She pulled her shirt down slightly swaggering away from the table so everyone could see it. "You have to be adopted, Ellen. You're no fun!"
"Mother!"
Stephanie looked at Ranger; he was chuckling with a fork of coffeecake in his mouth.
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"Grandpa, come swing with me!"
The adoring grandfather watched his grandson take off from the car to the jungle gym shaded under a branching Maple. His little legs took off at full speed.
"I'm coming, Reilley!" Frank Plum called out from the driver's seat of his Buick.
He looked at his wife and daughter waiting for him. "I'm fine. I'm getting my full speed back and I'll need it for T-ball." Ignoring the hands to help him, he walked down the sidewalk in the direction of Reilley.
"I guess I should be happy. The doctor told him to take it easy for another week and he is listening," Ellen Plum told her daughter and her male boyfriend.
They watched Mr. Plum walk around it checking all the connecting joints. He gave Ranger a nod of his approval.
Ranger pulled two key rings out of his jean's pocket. 'Here, Babe," he said dropping one in her hand. "When the security upgrade is complete, I'll show you how to operate it next week."
"Does this include a Power Ranger force field all around the house when it's activated?" she teased, but Stephanie could imagine the high security this small house would have installed.
"Babe, that's still in the developing stages," he told her with a smirking raised eyebrow.
"Smart Ass!"
Turning the key with a white cover on it and a 'B' which she assumed meant 'Back' to match the white back door, the kitchen door unlocked. It went with the blue ones with an 'F' to match the blue front door and basement one noted with 'BS'. Too efficient for her, but it did come from the Cuban man in the door checking out all the rooms.
"This is bright," Ellen commented on the empty kitchen, "and it does have a dishwasher." She opened and closed that before checking out the remaining white appliances.
"This is nice, Stephanie," Edna Mazur was down the hall checking out the downstairs bedroom and full bath. "I like this bathroom with a shower and a tub separate like the swanky hotels. I bet the water pressure is good here, too, to go with that fancy showerhead!"
Ranger in his tight black T-shirt told her, "Only the best, Edna, for Stephanie and Reilley."
"I'll have to come over and try it out sometime when I have a hot date with Louie. I'll loofah all the right spots so I'm soft."
He didn't need that image.
"Grandpa, come see my room!" Reilley was running in the house and right through to the stairs and up to his big bedroom. His grandfather was following taking in the interior of the house as he passed through it. "Looks nice, Pumpkin."
"My father will need a nap when he gets home," Stephanie giggled watching her father disappear up the stairs.
"Mom, what's wrong?"
Ellen Plum came through the empty house looking around and visibly upset. "Your new house is very nice, but I can't find your grandmother. She took off for who knows where?"
Frank and Reilley were coming back down to the main level. "Ellen," her husband repeated his words, "she always finds her way back from wherever. We haven't been smart enough to move while she's out."
"Frank, my mother is in a strange neighborhood and could find herself in trouble!"
"That's why we have the police at our house at least once a week! She probably has some type of weapon on her. Feel sorry for the neighbors and Ranger. His property value has to have gone down with her lurking about," Mr. Plum said going into the kitchen to share a glass of 'Kool-aid' with his grandson.
Ellen Plum was following her husband. "Frank, that is my mother!"
"And I've stayed married to you."
Ranger wasn't even trying to hide his mirth as he was kissing her curls. "Babe, your family is something," he chuckled.
Stephnaie playfully elbowed him. "You kept coming back!"
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The windows were measured and Stephanie was locking the backdoor, her mother and grandmother were going shopping with her, but they had to find Edna Mazur.
"Oh, God," Stephanie's father groaned, "look what the wind blew in."
Strolling down the alley towards the cars was Grandma talking into her cell phone.
"Yeah, Rosie, it's a top of the line senior center and it's only 7 bucks to join. They serve hot lunches! I'm signing up for the wine making class and the art class is looking for models. Me in the nude would be an inspiration to those wanna-be oldster artists."
Frank Plum was motioning with his a finger in his mouth listening to his mother-in-law.
"I bet we could get at least 20 or 25 of us in that limousine Stephanie's hot boyfriend owns to come over to Villa Park. We'll be imports from the 'Burg'. Oh, the house is small. Ranger must have bought it when he was still up and coming in the business. An old lady invited me to the Friday night wine and cheese party. They don't water the stuff down here and its real cheese!"
Ranger was holding up four fingers mouthing "I got four offices!"
Grandma was still talking on her pink cell phone. "The spare room here isn't too big. Me and Louie would be on top of each, but at our age that's a win-win thing. Two doors down from the center, a building was turned into an up-scale rooming house. Maybe I should rent a room there just in case I can't make it home after the wine. Louie can just have his way with me. I forgot to mention. He's getting a penis pump!"
"Mother! You can't do that!" Ellen yelled at her mother.
"I got to go, Rosie," Grandma said, "my daughter got her panties in an uproar about something. I got a bunch of membership cards in my purse. Don't worry, I'll have the limo on stand-by so they'll think we're up-town girls. Stephanie's boyfriend is good for it. We should have tried Villa Park way before this, but we'll put it really on the map. Okie dokie. I'm out here."
"Mother, you aren't posing nude and sleeping with a man in a rooming house!"
Grandma waved her daughter off. "All the great works of art had nudies."
Frank told Edna, "You would be a work of horror!"
"Up yours, Sonny!" Grandma motioned with her middle finger. "Just so you know, Louie may be implanted with a penis pump to keep up with me, Ellen!
We're not waiting on those blue pills. Rev it up and we're good to go! Let's go shopping, I need some nighties!" Purse and all got in the back of Stephanie's Baha.
"Mother, you need to act your age!"
"Why?"
Ranger was laughing in the alley holding his side. "Babe, your family is so dysfunctional," he whispered.
"I know. Isn't it great?" she giggled.
"Early dinner at my apartment tonight?" Ranger asked with his patented sexy Cuban eyebrow.
"Dessert included?"
"A delectable Cuban one."
"I'm there."
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"Yo." Ranger answered his ringing cell phone closing a contract.
"Yo yourself."
"Babe." He was concerned as she was shopping with her mother and grandmother. "Is everything all right?"
"Well, I have a small problem," Stephanie said in his ear. "Would you want to change plans tonight and eat here?"
He glared at his cell phone for a second. "No! I want the entire evening with you." His plans were spoiled last night by his mother, nothing was messing them up a second night in a row. "Why?" he asked.
"Would you mind picking up a pizza then at Pino's on your way over here? My mom drank a whole bottle of wine coming from the mall. She's in no condition to cook anything."
That made him chuckle. "Too much shopping with your Grandma?"
"Yeah. I think Grandma's see-thru nighties pushed her over the edge from Victoria's Secret. We had to help my mom into the house."
"I'll get the pizza."
"Love you."
"Love you, Babe." He gave a happy, winning shake of his fist shutting off his cell phone. "Yes!." Ranger had his Babe all to himself all evening and he was getting' some.
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Of course, Ella wouldn't hear of pizza for the Plums, which was why Ranger was carrying a long casserole dish and a plate of chocolate chip cookies up onto the front porch.
"That's not pizza," Stephanie told the Cuban caterer she was holding the door for as Ranger stepped inside. She grabbed the plate of cookies.
"Ella sent dinner."
Reilley came running from the living room with his grandfather as the tail. "What's in there, Power Ranger?" He was sniffing the air. "I smell green beans."
Placing the aluminum pan on the dining room table, Stephanie carefully lifted a corner of foil. "Look."
The pan was split with a middle row of chicken topped with tomato sauce. Potatoes were baked on one side and green beans on the other. There was an Italian smell wafting from the pan.
Ranger told the little boy licking his lips, "Ella knew you liked green beans and chocolate chip cookies."
"What a dinner and hardly any dishes," Frank Plum was glad for the food and the little work on his part so he could enjoy the evening with his treasured grandson.
'I'll put this in the oven to warm up, Daddy," Stephanie said covering dinner back up. She came out of the kitchen with plates, silverware, and paper napkins setting the table. "Do you want me to stay here for when Mom wakes up?"
"Go enjoy your evening, Pumpkin," her father cajoled. "Reilley and I have baseball to watch and 'Thomas the Train' dominoes to play. We will go get some ice cream later. No one made your mother drink. She'll be fine."
His head nodding vigorously, her son liked the evening's agenda.
"Your crazy grandmother left for the hospital to visit the electric car guy with no kneecaps and then a viewing. It will be the perfect evening."
Ranger was hoping his was too!