“Yeah.”

“Even on Sunday mornings?”

“We, uh… go out for breakfast.”

A dark suspicion nagged on the edges of Lex’s mind, but she didn’t voice it. Maybe if she ignored it, it wouldn’t be true. “Oh.”

“I saw Grandma once a couple weeks ago. We were having breakfast at Hobee’s.”

“How did dear Grandma look?”

Trish gave her a sidelong look. “Leeex. She’s not a monster. She was having breakfast with Mr. and Mrs. Tomoyoshi.”

Oh, no. Lex’s heart suddenly put on twenty pounds and thudded to the bottom of her stomach. She buried her head in her hands.

“What were they talking about?”

“How should I know? I just went over to say hi. I mentioned you. How you were trying so hard to find a sponsor – ”

“Trish!” Lex jumped off her chair. “You didn’t!”

“Didn’t what?”

“Tell Grandma I was looking for a sponsor.”

Trish pouted and knit her brows. “Oh, did I say sponsor? I must have said boyfriend. Yes, I’m sure I said boyfriend.” But the quaver in Trish’s voice and the whiteness of her face said otherwise.

Lex remembered Mr. Tomoyoshi’s abrupt about-face. Jim’s evasive no. The other business owners who politely turned her down.

Grandma’s influence rooted deep into the Japanese American community because Grandpa’s bank’s loan ser vices had been so reliable for everyone. Lex knew without a doubt that Grandma had been talking to business owners – warning, bribing, or calling in favors so that they wouldn’t agree to Lex’s petition of sponsorship.

“Trish, how could you?”

“I made an innocent mistake.” Trish chewed at her bottom lip.

“What are you going to do?”

Lex took a few deep breaths, but it didn’t calm the simmering in her gut. “I’m going to talk to Grandma.”

Lex didn’t hate children, but right now, she just wanted them all to be quiet.

“Grandma!” Lex’s yell could barely be heard over the cacophony of children’s voices inside Lotus Preschool. Grandma stood at the far end of the playroom, listening while Lex’s cousin’s son Eric prattled about his day. If only Grandma would listen to her grandchildren that way.

“Hi there, Eric. Grandma, I need to talk to you.”

“Eric, say hi to your cousin Lex.”

“Hi your caw-zin Leksss.”

“Grandma…”

“We’ll talk after I drive Eric home to his mommy. Don’t you want to see your mommy?”

Eric smiled up at his great-grandma and placed a sticky hand on the immaculate cream skirt.

“No, we’ll talk now. It took me long enough to track you down,”

Lex insisted.

“I always pick up Eric on Wednesdays.” Grandma watched Eric take out plastic dinosaurs from the toy box. Such an attentive, loving great-grandma. Ha!

“Grandma, stop influencing all the business owners.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She aimed her sing-songy tone at Eric instead of Lex.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.” Lex suddenly felt rather stupid demanding her Grandma do anything. She couldn’t even prove that she’d influenced Mr. Tomoyoshi or Jim. “If I want another sponsor, it’s none of your business, because you’re the one who decided to drop the girls’ team.”

“I haven’t dropped them yet.” Grandma’s sugary sweet voice had a definite sharp edge. “Didn’t we have an agreement?”

“You can’t force me to just find someone to love. Tons of my friends are actively looking for a significant other and not finding anybody.”

“Your problem is that you weren’t looking at all.”

“Dad doesn’t care!” Lex flung out her arms – luckily, there weren’t any bodies over two feet tall in her vicinity. “Why does it matter so much to you?”

Grandma blinked, and for a fraction of a moment, she looked old and tired. She absently rubbed her right hip, the one she’d been favoring the day of the Red Egg and Ginger party. Then in the next moment, the look melted away.

Had Lex imagined it? Grandma never seemed old. She always had the perfect clothes, perfect poise, perfect health. Or maybe that’s what she wanted people to think. Was Grandma feeling her age just like the rest of the human race? Was that what was behind her campaign for more great-grandchildren?

Grandma’s fierce eyes stabbed into Lex with renewed force. “It’s for your own good, you know.”

Lex rolled her eyes. Save me from bossy, control-freak grandmas with good intentions.

Grandma’s eyes narrowed to black toothpicks. “See? You’re not taking me seriously. Well, you’ll take me seriously if you can’t find another sponsor.”

“Why are you punishing those junior high girls? This has nothing to do with them.”

“They matter to you.” Shrewdness glittered in her hard gaze, the same smarts that made her such a good partner for Grandpa’s business. “I am not playing games, Lex. If you don’t start looking for a boyfriend, I can talk to other people who matter to you too.”

A sliver of ice dropped down her shirt. “What do you mean? You wouldn’t.”

“You’ve seen how much influence I have. What if Richard were evicted from his apartment? What if your father’s car were repossessed?”

Would she really do that to her own son? Her grandson? Just for one granddaughter?

Lex had challenged her, put her back up. Like a Tasmanian devil, Grandma didn’t take growls from the enemy as warnings – they were acts of aggression. And she responded in kind.

Grandma bent and picked up Eric. “Time to go home, sweetie.”

Her direct gaze made Lex back up a step. “I had better see more effort, Lex.” Grandma walked out of the daycare.

Lex refused to play dead just because Grandma snarled. But she wouldn’t be stupid either. She dashed in late to the Singles Group meeting on Thursday night with twofold purpose – date trolling, but also sponsor seeking, in the one place she knew Grandma couldn’t penetrate.

Church.

Grandma didn’t understand Lex’s and her three cousins’ faith, but even Grandma wouldn’t go up against God.

Lex had tried talking to the older members of the church last Sunday. They were all distantly friendly to her, a little aloof. They tended to prefer to hang out with their friends, who were their own age and spoke to them in Japanese or Chinese or Korean. The language barrier itself made their relationship with Lex a bit wide. She felt uncomfortable asking them for sponsorship – almost as if it would be rude.

She also realized she didn’t talk much with the married-with-kids crowd. It seemed kind of rude to ask them for sponsorship when most of them barely remembered her name. She didn’t have a clue who else she could approach.

So she stuck with the church family she knew – the singles.

Except Lex had lost precious pre-Singles Group mix and mingle time. Trish had said she’d pick Lex up, but after twenty minutes and no Trish – not that Lex had been ready by 6:30, but she’d been ready by 6:40 at least – Lex had jumped into her Honda and limped to church.

The worship leaders tuned their guitars – Lex had about five minutes. She regretted now how plainly she’d informed all the guys about her non-interest in anything more than friendship. She suspected they were all a little afraid of her.

But maybe she could lean on their sense of Christian charity. “Hey, Alvin.”

“Hi, Lex.” He had the wary look of a trapped animal.

Lex mentally went down her Ephesians List. Alvin was a Christian (faithful attendee) and had a good job (engineer), but there was no physical attraction (bug eyes and wide mouth made him look like a toad), he didn’t play an interesting sport (fishing, which Lex didn’t have the patience for), and he had really bad dandruff (enough said).

“Alvin, would you consider donating to a junior high school volleyball team?”

His eyes lit up, which made him look really freaky, like a frog with electric eyes. “Oooh, a junior high school ministry? How great.”