A Pocketful of Gems

Chapter 5: to set before a king - Part 6

Spencer shook me awake sometime later and I sat up stretching and looked around.

"Whoa," we were almost to our destination. I looked at the clock –it was ten minutes to 10. With how Eve drove we'd be at Auntie Gale's within an hour.

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We parked on the street in front of Auntie Gale's beautiful gray brick and glass house. Her street was line with large mature oaks with little white picket fence skirts and flat smooth lawns of lush green grass.

The front door opened and a female version of my father dashed out and scooped us all into a very tight bear hug.

"You got here safe," I'm so relieved. She paused a moment, "you got here kinda fast considering you said you were leaving at 5."

"My wife has a heavy foot," Abel told her.

"Wife?" she looked over at Eve. They smiled at each other. "Something tells me I'm gonna adore you."

Auntie let us go and we followed her tall slim figure into the house.

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"Did I tell you Morgan got a boyfriend?" she asked after closing the door behind us. "I'm sure she would have stayed if I'd told her you were coming but I let her go to the mall with him and some friend –not sure if you wanted her dangling from your ankle all day."

She spoke quickly, miming sign language with her hands. An unconscious act she often did.

"Morgan did tell me about the boyfriend, didn't know she'd told you yet, though. You taking it well?"

"Of course," she signed.

"She's 12," I signed back.

She laughed, "we talked about it, I met the little cunt –I mean kid. I took him into my office so he could admire my katana collection and see all the gold medals I won. He was actually such a great kid."

"You have a katana collection?" Abel asked. Auntie Gale put her arm round his shoulder and led us trough her house to the office that stuck off the side of her house. The office had two doors –one led from the house to the office and the other from the office to the waiting area outside her office. She would often see select patients in her home office.

She led Abel over to the wall displaying her collection and the hanging glass case with her medals and began telling him what she'd won some of the more prized ones for.

"I recall you said she was a psychiatrist?" Spencer asked looking at the certificates behind her desk.

"Auntie Gale deals with people who were victims of abusive relationships." I told him.

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Eve eased up beside me. She was watching my aunt signing to Abel who signed back, much slower. It didn't even surprise me that he could sign. I recalled signing to him during class and he had understood.

"Is she... deaf?" Eve whispered.

"Hmmm, no, Auntie Gale is only a partially hearing impaired."

"Is this why you wanted a face to face meeting?" Spencer whispered out the side of his lips.