Unraveled- Part 7

Patricia tried to hide a smirk when she saw Yarnell on the ground, little twigs and leaves stuck in his knitting holes. Mr. Big Shot was looking a wee bit bedraggled from his unscheduled descent, and he was still complaining when Samuel drove up, parked and got out with a shopping bag full of acorns.He saw the yarn laying up against the big tree trunk, just laying there with Patricia staring at him like a deputy, guarding a suspect. Samuel started laughing, and despite trying to keep her cool, Patricia started laughing too. And the two of them laughed hysterically while the blue yarn laid there up against the tree trunk. Meanwhile, the squirrel that was in the tree was down standing at the cage, sniffing noses with one of the other squirrels. It looked like they were going to be friends! Yay.

Patricia picked up the yarn and shook it out and held it up by her thumb and forefinger and said, " Yarnell, you are a nuisance right now but I think you already know that. I cannot believe that you caused me to end up with all these squirrels."

Yarnell cleared his fuzzy throat and said, " I'm sorry for the trouble I caused you."to which she replied " I'm extremely patient, but don't push me."

Samuel played with his hair and he gingerly said, " Patricia, I know you mean well and you're generous to a fault but you need to set some boundaries with this Yarnell" looking at Patricia for a reaction. She gave him a side glance and they both started laughing again at the predicament they were in. A bazillion squirrels and a ball of yarn. And a bag of acorns.

" Now what are you two up to?" Howard asked as he strode up to Patricia, like a man on a mission, smiling as he gave her a hug and said, " so what's goi...are those SQUIRRELS? or RATS? What on earth..." He looked at the cages of squirrels in disbelief as Patricia gave a summary of how the squirrels ended up there, with Samuel piping in to lend her a hand. Howard still had his earbud in from a business call that he conducted in Samuel's car on the way over- Samuel omitted the gory details of why they had to head over to Patricia's in the first place. " I leave for four days and I come back and you have ten thousand squirrels in cages and a bag of nuts! What's up with the yarn? Throw it away, it's filthy." Patricia grabbed the yarn before Howard got it and put it behind her back in case he made a move to grab it. Howard teasingly grabbed for it and the three friends tussled over the dirty yarn nest, but Patricia hung on for dear life. Yarnell knew better than to say anything at this point. Howard laughed and looked over at the squirrels again and rolled his eyes.

"You two are killing me, if I didn't love you both, I'd be looking up squirrel recipes so that your problem would be solved.." Patricia knew he was kidding ( or was he? ) and she gave him a little smack on the head as he ducked, but she got him anyway. He put his hand up in front of her and he winked at Samuel, who laughed and pretended he was smacking Howard, who was dialing on his cell phone. He left a message on a voicemail, "yes, we are bringing a large squirrel delivery to your farm and will be there in 4 hours."

" Hey Carl, can you fly over here to Patricia's as soon as you can? Yeah, I know it's short notice but I need you to take a delivery to the squirrel farm down south in Myakka City. I know, but it's 150 acres and they have a large open area. Thanks, Carl, you're the best."

About 20 minutes later, there was a big WHOOSH WHOOSH and a hot air balloon slowly floated up from the horizon and came across the open field with another WHOOSH as it slowly dropped to the grassy pasture. Carl waved and Patricia dropped the tailgate on her truck and the three friends loaded the caged squirrels. The loose squirrel chattered up a storm, so Patricia let her in the cage with its new friend. The three jumped up into truck and drove slowly through the pasture up to the side of the balloon.They handed the cages up to Carl from the tailgate and he wrestled them up and into the gondola. The squirrels were wide eyed as they took in the scene unfolding in front of them, wondering what the Sam Hill was going on now.

Once the cages were loaded, the special gravity button was released and the balloon slowly rose into the blue sky. Howard waved at Carl . " Problem solved! OK, let's go to Samuel's for coffee. I made a big pot of your favorite, Patricia.I know you like dark roast so I made Folgers black gold ", he said as they watched the balloon floating away, and then he added, " Carl said he found two mice in it a few weeks ago and they escaped, I just hope they didn't chew any of the wiring..."

Meanwhile, Patricia was looking at yarn on Amazon, and she found one bundle of the blue yarn in stock so she clicked on it and bought it, and it said that it would be delivered between 4 AM - 11 AM. As she looked at her order, she wondered if it was the exact same color, so she moved the phone closer to get a good look and that is when she swears that the yarn winked at her.

Stay tuned for Part 8 by Rowan Finley, who is THE master story teller! Lets see where he goes with it-