Granny Pus craned her neck left, then she craned it right. There was Kelly Ripa dressed like a cowboy for the "Brokeback Mountain" interview she and Reeg were doing with a slightly abashed actor. Then there was little baby Andrew taking to flyswatting technique like Clyde on a ride. The boy was so good at demolishing ants and flies that he needed no encouragement, but from her seedy supine throne Granny pitched in anyway.
"Pretend them's bicycle riders! Swat! Swat! Swat! Pretend that one there's clogging up the street! Swat 'im! Pretend that one 'ere just ran a red. Smack!
Look at that fly on the stool! Geed 'im, Baby Drew! Swat! Swat!"
"Reeg!" Kelly was calling her co-host. She mugged straight at the camera, as if she were pouting right at Granny Pus.
"I wish my name was Drew," one of Andrew's uncles grumbled. It was Uncle Joe, JoJo's and John's oldest brother. Whenever he got drunk all his jealousy and resentment of his nephew rumbled out with the same words: "I wish my
name was Drew." He believed if his name were Drew instead of Joe he'd be playing dominoes in the Meadow Club cocktail lounge or tennis at the Lagunitas Club, or squiring some of the ladies who lunch to brunch at the Getty mansion. He could talk the talk--"Enchanted, madame"--but he wanted to walk the walk. White tennis shorts and tan polo shirts and making big business deals over his cell phone at home. He knew how to make a Spritzer if he had to, for the end of the day. It was just that his mother never got out of her chair and bought some fresh lemons. Hey, he thought, not for the first time, what on earth was with her Beverly Hillbillys talk? She was a KBS girl. Walked to school in Ross wearing her blue plaid KBS uniform fifty years ago. All she'd had to do was play her cards right. Joe belched Diet Pepsi and Meyers Dark Rum and Hershey chocolate, some from the night before. She hadn't.
"Reeg!"
"That Kelly is so cute! . . . Swat that one, Baby Drew! That fly yonder! That's it! Whack! It looks like one of those punks at The VIllage Peddler. Still does. Ha ha ha ha ha," laughed Granny Pus at her own bloodthirsty little joke.
Swat! Slap! Smack! Whack! A baby boy and his trusty flyswatter.
"I wish my name was Drew." Joe murmured.