Shady loves to get me into trouble. I always wonder how a little kid could be so crazy as to get the closest thing to a big brother he will ever have in trouble all the time. But this time it was a flat out bald-faced lie! I am good to him, as good as an older “brother” can be I think, but he flat crossed the line this time, and I am getting sick and tired of it!

Just before Christmas, he went into his piggy bank without Mamaw’s permission (and yes she monitors this closely), and he bought himself a bunch of candy (without Mamaw’s permission) and he knows good and well we ain’t supposed to be eating all that junk. We have enough treats as it is, and we eat real good around here. He don’t need to be spending it all on crazy stuff like candy neither!

Well, Mamaw called him in to do a total count of his piggy bank, as she always does with both of us, and she does this to try to teach us to keep up with a ledger. She is real good with money, too good. She will make a dime scream and spit out nine cents change. This time when she called him on the spent money though, Shady decided to accuse me of stealing, yes stealing his money! He was short about five dollars. That may not seem like much, but when your Mamaw is strict like ours, we have to give account for every cent.

Now Mamaw doesn’t mind us spending our piggy bank money at all, but she wants to know about it every time. And that makes sense; we are kids after all, and she even let me get that fishing tackle box one time, because I had saved up for it, and it was on sale. But I don’t like being lied on, no sir! That dog will NOT hunt!

Mamaw called me to the side and said, “Pete, I know you didn’t take that money, because I saw all that candy Shady was a munching on, and that was after he didn’t eat half his supper for two days in a row. He must have bought it at school from the concession stand, and hid it in his room.”

Then Mamaw said something strange; she told me “Since you the one that is being accused, and you a little more grown these days, I am going to let you handle this whatever way you choose. All I ask is that you not get ugly or mean with it; but you can handle this on your own, son. Mamaw doesn’t always have to get in the middle of it. I know the little one put me slam in the middle of it, Praise God, but I aim to let you handle it.”

She kept talking, “I told Shady I knew he was lying, and I was going to let you handle it. Apparently I don’t talk plain enough to keep him from telling on you constantly, and bless God you ain’t the only one that is growing tired of it! I aim to let you take care of it this time, but remember, like the Bible says, “In your wrath, remember mercy like the Father in Heaven.”” I told her I wasn’t mad, I was more sad that he keeps accusing me of stuff, and I ain’t never been a thief, and I ain’t about to start stealing neither!

Wow! That is all I could think. Mamaw has never trusted me like this before, but she did say I could handle it how I chose, so I set out to pondering. I was thinking, “How I can I break him from always lying about me? My mind was working for sure, but this time it had to be good, heh heh heh.” I know Mamaw doesn’t like me scaring Shady, but this was a big deal since he had never accused me of stealing before. I had to choose another way, than using a ghost or haint to do it.

At school the next day I got with Jewel at second break, the same way we always do and I told her what Mamaw had said, and about Shady lying on me and saying I stole his money. She immediately hatched a plan to handle it. “Peter, I say we let him get letters from an angel.” I was intrigued, so I said to her, excited, “What are you thinking about?”

She went on to explain, “Well, we will have to get your grandmother involved, and maybe your Uncle Muddy, but my plan is to write simple beautiful letters from his angel, five or more in total and number them. I will write them on linen stationary, put them in an envelope with a gold seal, and his name “Eduardo” in beautiful handwriting on the front. These will be small, about the size of a small Christmas postcard. Then I will put a short message on each one, letting him know something we come up with each time. Then, your grandmother will put them in his book bag every other morning.”

I liked that plan. Shady is just gullible enough to believe that he got notes from an angel, and Jewel has beautiful penmanship. She actually learned how to write in calligraphy, and it is real pretty to look at. That weekend when Mamaw went to buy groceries, Jewel and her mother met us up there. Jewel filled her in on the plan, and Mamaw actually LOVED the idea. She had assumed I would cook up some mean ghost story or something, but not this time.

Mamaw told both of us, “Y’all, lets give him them angel letters slow, and that will give the little one time to think, and wonder what is next. He has already been harassing Pete, a-wondering how Pete is going to punish him. That alone is enough of a punishment, but doing it this way keeps it nicer; that way he won’t be having any nightmares. I am proud of you two!” We asked her, “How will we know if he read them?” Mamaw said, “Leave that to me; I will check every day putting the new one in, to see if he read it.”

Mamaw flat loved what we were doing, and when we got home she made sure that Uncle Muddy would play along if he was somehow called upon. He assured us he would; he even took Double Mamaw aside and explained to her how we were going to break Shady of all that lying. Double Mamaw told him, “Well, I will do my best to go along with it; that child lies like a dog. I can’t believe my late sister’s kid does such as that. I guess Charlene can’t spank him all the time; this will work if y’all do it right.”

Now we had ‘THE PLAN’ in motion. Yeah this was going to be a doozy. Mamaw said we could drag it out for a week or two, but not much longer than that. I will tell y’all more as this unfolds. Y’all can carry on with me as I wind Shady up with “his angel.”