Tricycle Thief

"Angelica broke my flector!" Susie said in despair, looking at the broken orange doodad.

"And she looks like a mudpie!" Lil said, causing the babies to begin to giggle. And then they began to laugh, Tommy falling down he was giggling so hard.

Angelica grit her teeth only for Mr. Carmichael to walk up to her. "Are you alright Angelica?" he said, kneeling down and making sure she was okay.

"I'm fine… just mud," she said.

"Well, why don't you go get cleaned up. Lucy has the change of clothes your dad brought over." Angelica nodded and went off, feeling a bit better that someone cared she'd gotten icky. "Let me see the reflector," Randy said, walking over to the bike. "Yeah, that's busted but I know we have another one in the garage. We'll get that taken care of real quick."

~MC~MC~MC~

The next day Randy was startled from his yard work by Susie crying out about her tricycle. Hurrying over he found her staring at the empty shed, crying out about how her bike was missing and how Angelica had stolen her tricycle. Phil and Lil were holding Angelica by the arms while Tommy was looking about nervously and Susie was demanding they punish Angelica-

"Susie, what is the meaning of this?" Randy asked, hands on his hips.

"Angelica stole my tricycle!" Susie wailed.

"No she didn't," Randy said.

"But she's riding-"

"Her own tricycle. Drew bought it for her so you two wouldn't have to share."

"But my bike isn't in the shed."

"Mmmhmm," Randy said, folding his arms over his chest. "And remember how I told you that you couldn't go inside the shed because I was painting it… and that we would put your tricycle in the garage?"

"…oh," Susie said weakly.

"Don't you think you have someone else you should talk to?" he pressed.

Susie nodded before looking at Angelica. "I'm sorry I said you were a tricycle thief."

"Well-" Angelica looked at Randy before quickly accepting the apology.

"Now, I think we need to wash all of you up," he pointed to Susie and Angelica's hands, both stained red, and Tommy who had gotten some paint on his shirt. "And then you kids can begin playing again… politely."

And they did. And Cynthia didn't get to take a balloon ride into the lower atmosphere even though technically she should have been too heavy to be lifted by that balloon but honestly at this point the laws of physics tend to get dumped on far too often so why complain?