“Oh, absolutely yes.” I pointed my fork at him. “You brought this on yourself the moment you admitted to running from a bird.”
“It was a magpie! Haveyou ever been—”
Tane cut him off with a raised hand. “Let me tell you,” he began, “about young Kai and the Great Christmas Pageant Debacle.”
Kai’s soul visibly left his body.
“No,” he whispered.
“Yes.” Tane sounded delighted. “Because this one … this one is a classic.”
I leaned forward, chin in hand, savoring every second. “I’m listening.”
Kai shot me a look of both betrayal and resignation. As if to say he had accepted his fate, but hated the circumstances leading to it.
This only made me smile harder.
Tane cleared his throat as though he were about to deliver a TED Talk.
“So. The Great Christmas Pageant Debacle.”
Kai slumped back in his chair, arms crossed, jaw set in a rigid line. “It wasn’t a debacle.”
“Oh, it absolutely was,” Tane said. “You traumatized an entire congregation.”
That got my full attention. “Proceed.”
Kai pointed at me. “You don’t have to sound that excited.”
“Incorrect. I absolutely do.”
Tane steepled his fingers. “Picture this … a small rural Australian town. A packed holiday crowd. Children in itchy angel wings. Carols being sung out of tune. And one eight-year-old Kai—”
Kai buried his face in his hands again. “Please don’t.”
“—assigned the role of Shepherd Number Three.”
I snorted. “Important part, clearly.”
“Oh, crucial.” Tane nodded his head, agreeing. “Except little Kai decided Shepherd Number Three needed … flair.”
Kai rubbed his face. “I thought it was boring.”
“Oh, we know,” Tane said. “Because instead of walking onstage like a normal child, he burst out from behind the nativity hay bales and shouted—” Tane spread his arms dramatically, “—‘BEHOLD, MORTALS!’”
I choked. Actually choked.
“I was eight—” Kai protested feebly, but Tane barreled on.
“And then — then — he tried to ‘herd’ the other shepherds with his crook, except he swung too wide and caught Joseph across the shins.”
I wheezed. “He attacked Joseph?”
“Flattened him,” Tane declared proudly. “Kid dropped like a sack of potatoes. Mary screamed. Baby Jesus went flying. Rubber or not, it bounced into the communion plates.”
I had to put my plate down then, because I was laughing too hard to hold on to it.
Kai sat there rigidly, the tips of his ears reddening. “It wasn’tthatbad.”