Mom left the room, Alicia stuck out her tongue at me. I smiled because once in a great while, little sisters can be worth having around. Even if it's just for laughs.

The next morning JoAnne woke me up. "Mark, would you come into the kitchen, Mother wants to ask you something."

I slowly climbed out of bed. As this was my first day of vacation, I had expected to sleep until noon. I kissed Mom. "Morning."

"Good morning, Mark. How was the show?"

"Oh, pretty good."

"Sit down. I've been talking to JoAnne and I have to talk to you next. I have something to ask of you. A favor."

"What's the matter?" I looked at JoAnne, but nothing showed on her face. I looked back at Mom, "Sure, go ahead."

“Well, I was thinking about the trip and we have to make a decision. We can go, but I'm afraid we don't have all the money I thought we did. As a matter of fact, if we go to Florida, there has to be a slight al- teration in our plans."

I was quite surprised. "What slight alteration?"

Mom patted my hand and smiled. "If we go to Florida, you are going to have to pose as a girl."

My jaw dropped a mile. Then I started to laugh. In fact, I laughed until there were tears in my eyes. I looked at JoAnne and Mom, but they weren't laughing. "Hey! Are you serious?" I asked with sudden forebodings.

Mom frowned. “Yes, Mark, I'm afraid so. You see it's a lot cheaper for five girls to travel instead of four girls and a boy. It would mean so much to everybody if you would do this one favor for all of us."

I looked out the window, it was raining. "I'd like to, Mom, but how would I, uh, oh, you know." And with this, I started to laugh again and even JoAnne smiled.