"Tay," she said softly. "Honey..."
He blinked out of his daze and looked at her sadly. "Huh?"
"Babe, Jenni's been calling for the past 2 weeks to see if you want to come over and meet Chloe," she said. "You should return her call. Just to be polite."
Taylor looked at himself. The impression he received only further depressed him. "Nah. I'll go shower and walk over there," he said, lazily getting to his feet.
Mrs. Hanson's jaw dropped open. She'd been surprised that he'd taken the initiative to come out of his reverie by himself instead of her dragging him out of it kicking and screaming. She quickly remembered to close her mouth, though, and said, "Okay. If that's what you want to do."
He just nodded and walked by her.
Taylor knocked on Jenni's door. A minute later, Jenni opened it, grinning. "So, you decided to come and say hello! We were about to ask your mom if you'd died and she was keeping secrets..."
There was a giggle from behind Jenni, and Taylor peered over Jen's shoulder to see who it had come from. He saw a girl with a sweet face and long white-blond hair standing in Jenni's living room. He smiled weakly and waved. She nodded and waved back.
"Taylor meet Chloe. Chloe meet Tay," Jenni quickly introduced. "Now that we've got that over with...we were just about to head down to Rick Neilson's party. Were you coming?"
"Umm...I didn't actually know it was going on," Taylor said, sheepishly.
"Want to go?" Jenni asked.
"Can I ask my mom?" he asked.
"Sure," Jenni replied. "We'll be waiting in my car."
"So Jenni and Chloe hit it off immediately?" Martha asked, teasing up Ashley's hair a bit more.
"Yup," Ashley replied.
"Chloe I take it spoke English," Martha said.
"Fluently," Ashley grumbled. "Pretty, smart, and bilingual. Enough to make you sick," she added with a laugh.
"Well, I still don't know what this has to do with Taylor's question..."
Ashley sighed. "I'm getting to it! Patience is a virtue..."
"Bah!" Martha said. "Continue..."
