Bassy Plays Hardball

Bassy had joined me at the table after mom left. The two of us are a study in contrasts -- we literally have nothing in common except our last name and the names of our parents. I stole a glance at him. Goodness, I can't believe he's gotten so tall and handsome now. If we weren't related.... just kidding.
"Vanna," he began, clearing his throat. I knew it was coming. When he wants to tell me something he starts humming and hawing and he has these long pauses in between words.
"What is it, Bassy?" I looked up from the ratatouille to see his blue eyes boring into me. When he wants to get serious, he lets me know about it.
"This adoption business -- if I'm gonna be uncle to these children, I'd like to go to Egypt with you and meet them."
My mouth flew open. "You -- go to Egypt?"
"Is there anything wrong with me going?" he asked me. "I mean, I'm old enough to go now."
"Bassy!" I tried to remind him that he was still in school.
But he had already backed me into a corner. "From what you say on the blog, they sound pretty cool."
I let out a smile. "They're awesome, really."
"Who knows, maybe I could go inside a tomb or two."
There's something more than a little bit unsettling about tagging my kid brother along on tomb raids. What have I done to this poor little boy?

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

I strongly suspect Bassy is going into the family biz.

My mother long ago gave up on my prospects of becoming a musician. To be quite honest, she never really tried. And my father never pushed me. Though I like music, have had guitar lessons, and like playing, there were other things I liked more, namely painting, astronomy, writing, and chess, among others. And of course there were my secret forays to the cemetery at night.

So I'm not surprised that she is now fiercely overseeing Bassy's musical development. Of course, it helps her that he has more talent in his pinky than I have in my whole body. And he seems to have an interest in it, if only because she is pushing so damn hard. What he doesn't seem to have, though, is the 24-7 obsession with music that dad does. He has other interests, like computers and cartoons and cooking.

I think Bassy should do whatever he wants to do with his life, not because mom wants him to do it. Sometimes I wonder if one of these days, he is going to rebel. So far, though, he hasn't, and mostly it's because of his demeanor. He isn't like me at all, and about that I'm actually glad. I think if mom were doing that to me, I would have rebelled already.

More girl trouble

Yo, Bas here. Just givin' y'all the 411 on what's been goin' on here while mom & dad are runnin' around Egypt with Vanna. Don't show mom this pic of me drinkin' llama juice. She'd have a heart attack.

I headed over to my friend Jeannine Ratliff's after school and ran into... her twin sister Paige. Let's just say, even though she's prettier than Jeannine, she's not a very nice person.

She came jumping down my throat for no reason at all. I was actually trying to be friendly with her.

School is a drag, tho. I wish Savannah was here to help me with geometry. She's the math whiz of the family. Truly, I dunno how she does it.

After I finished my geometry homework, I went outside 2 listen to Paige, who'd picked up a guitar and was tryin' to strum a few bars of my dad's pop-classical hit "I Would If I Did."

So, I was outside talking to Jeannine, and Paige came interrupting us, too. One of them is bad enuf. Both of 'em... well...