by Dave Cravens
3.
I just mommed the shit out of this morning!
Parker tossed two plates of scrambled eggs, toast and bacon onto the kitchen table before her drowsy son Drew. Her toddler, Ally, wiggled in delight in her high chair at the sight of food.
That’s right, I also verbed the shit out of ‘mom.’
“Breakfast is served, people!” Parker proudly announced. She couldn’t help but relish in her own miracle. In the past five hours, not only had she unpacked the entire car, showered or bathed all her kids, pillaged five different suitcases to find clean clothes and press them, but she’d also managed to clean up and get herself ready before making breakfast. All that, and still twenty minutes to spare before leaving for school.
Drew poked at the rubbery eggs before lifting the burnt toast to examine it like a forensic investigator. “Time of death,” he glanced at his Power Rangers digital watch. “6:55am. Carbon scarring would indicate excessive burning.”
“Oh no!” gasped Ally, slapping her round cheeks to mimic shock. It was one of three phrases she could articulate, along with “What?” and “Thank you!”
Parker patted Drew on the back. “If the eggs are a little overdone, try the bacon,” she suggested.
Drew’s eyes nervously bulged at the crispy black thing on his plate. “That’s bacon?”
Parker ignored the comment. She leaned out of the kitchen to yell up the stairs. “Maddy, are you coming down for breakfast or what?”
“I’m coming!” Maddy answered for the fifth time.
“You bet your ass you’re coming,” mumbled Parker. She had just pulled off the super-mom feat of all feats, and there was no way she was going to let her oldest make them late for the first day of school. Looking to optimize her time, Parker headed for the sink to get a start on the dishes. She wrenched her wedding ring off her swollen finger and set it to the side, only to catch her ghastly reflection in a dusty window.
Parker hardly recognized the woman who stared back in a faded Bon Jovi t-shirt. The morning’s sun practically shone a spot light on her streaks of grey hairs and laugh lines. Her cheeks looked rounder. At least her bloodshot eyes matched the bags beneath them. When did all of this happen? She wondered where the lean, athletic, no-nonsense journalist was hiding and if this new stranger had eaten her.
Valerie stepped out from behind her daughter to join the portrait of reflection. Parker couldn’t help but to shake her head at the sight. Though twenty years older, Valerie remained a testament of confidence. “Are you sure I’m your daughter?” asked Parker.
“The one and only,” Valerie squeezed her daughter lovingly. It was a rare display of pure, unbridled affection that took Parker by surprise. “Why don’t you finish getting ready? I’ll do the dishes.”
“I am ready,” insisted Parker.
“Oh,” Valerie pulled away. “Sure. So, you are.”
Parker rolled her eyes. Maybe the exhaustion was finally catching up to her, but her mother’s judgement suddenly felt like a crushing weight. Parker tried to shake the feeling off. What is wrong with me? She waved her hands. “I’m sorry,” she apologized. Her hands fumbled for her wedding ring on the counter. “I just--” Parker grunted. “Huh.”
“What?”
“It’s my—” Parker’s face contorted. “My ring.” She grunted again, trying to force it on. “Gahhhh, it won’t fit!”
“Maybe, run it over some cold water,” Valerie suggested.
Parker turned the faucet on, blasting her finger with ice cold water. To her dismay, her finger was too swollen to give in. Pain shot up her arm. “Shit! Why won’t it go on?” Her breathing hastened. “Damnit, I need it to go on! Come on!”
“Try some soap.”
“I am, Mom, it’s not working!” Parker found herself shouting. She didn’t mean to, she simply couldn’t help it. “My fingers are just too—” She winced. “Swollen!”
“Swollen?”
Parker closed her eyes, feeling the tears welling up. “Thick! Large! Fat, okay? My fingers are too fat! I’m too fat, and I can’t get my damn ring back on! I just want—” Parker let out a loud roar as she bloodied her ring finger to no avail. The ring would not fit. Parker looked up to the ceiling. “It’s stupid, but, I just wanted Kurt to be here for the kids’ first day, okay?”
Valerie wasn’t used to seeing her daughter so vulnerable, but the exhaustion, the travelling, the coping the everything—it had all caught up. She massaged Parker’s shoulders, helping the moment to pass. “Kurt is here,” she reminded. Valerie gently guided Parker’s chin to look at the two young children sitting at the kitchen table. They were the two most beautiful things Parker had ever seen, joined by a third, Maddy, who finally strolled in with her backpack in tow. Out of all of them, Maddy’s brown eyes and square jaw were the most like Kurt’s.
Parker smiled and wiped the tears from her face. “Thank you,” she said. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me.”
“Life came over you.” Valerie started in on the dishes. “It happens.”
After collecting herself, Parker jammed the wedding ring on her pinky. She turned to her kids, summoned the few remaining watts of energy she had spared over the past twenty-four hours and pumped her fists in the air triumphantly. “You guys ready for the first day of school?”
“Yeah!” shouted Drew, hoisting his fork up. The maneuver flicked bacon bits into Maddy’s eye.
“Drew!” bellowed Maddy.
“Oh no!” added Ally.
Drew shrugged and went back to eating.
Maddy wiped the debris off her face and stormed over to her mother. “We’re not going to be late, are we?”
Parker threw her hands on her hips in a mocking fashion. “Um, we were all waiting on you, so thanks for catching up.”
Maddy threw her hands on her hips to mock her mother. “Um, you’re not dressed.”
“I am dressed. I’m rocking Bon Jovi today. He’s gonna help me unpack bags and work out after I drop you off at school.”
Drew raised his hand as if to practice for the first grade. “But normally you look good!” he argued. “I mean, you used to wear suits, or dresses and stuff.”
Parker clutched her heart, reeling from the blast of honesty. “Yeah, well, that was when I was working. Remember, when I got fired, and we moved across country to live with Grandma, so I could focus more on doing, you know, mom things?”
“You mean Daddy things.”
Parker smiled. Up until now, all her kids knew of the domestic life was Kurt. “Well, Mommies do them too.”
Drew looked puzzled. “So, who did all those things for you? Your mommy or your daddy?”
“My Daddy couldn’t,” answered Parker. “He died before I was born. So, it was all Mom for me.”
“How did he die?”
Valerie left her dishes, as if suddenly relishing the opportunity to explain the family history. “Well, you see,” she said as she approached the table. Valerie wiped her hands on a towel as her mind drifted back forty-some years. “When I first met your grandfather, we fell madly in love. We loved each other very, very, much,” she explained. “But we had waited until the night of our honeymoon to show each other exactly how much.”
Both Drew and Maddy looked at each other in utter confusion.
Parker slapped her forehead. “Oh God.” She knew this story very well but had never thought about the context in trying to explain it to children.
“And that night,” continued Valerie. “I loved your grandfather, very, very, very, very much.”
“Please stop.”
“I filled him with so much of my love that his heart couldn’t take it – and it burst.”
Drew’s jaw dropped. “Like – exploded? No way!”
“And he filled me with—”
Parker stepped in like a coach trying to call off a bad play. “Alright, Mom! Thank you! We don’t need the play by play.”
Valerie arched a brow. She smiled. “Anyway, nine months later
your mother was born.”
Maddy didn’t know exactly what had just happened but decided things had gotten way off track. “So, why can’t you look nice for our first day of school?”
Parker had to work much harder to smile now. Because, giving birth to a child after forty made my metabolism taken an elephant-sized shit! With the added stress of losing Kurt, trying to juggle a full-time job while being a single parent – eating right and exercising just wasn’t a priority. But all of this seemed way too much to explain to an eleven-year-old. Instead, Parker shot a glance at Valerie. “Did you put her up to this?”
Valerie raised her hands into a “don’t shoot” pose, to which Drew immediately took notice and quickly formed his fingers into a gun.
“Grandma! Pow! Pow!” shouted Drew as he pretended to shoot Valerie.
Valerie clutched her heart and smiled. “Ohhhh, right in the heart! You got me!”
“Oh no!” Ally added, more concerned than ever.
Drew aimed for Maddy. “Maddy! Pow! Pow!”
Maddy held up her hand to deflect the imaginary bullets and stomped her foot. “Can we focus here, people? This is about mom’s awful wardrobe!”
“Don’t be rude,” Parker shot back. “And that’s ‘Mom, the Almighty.’ You owe me five bucks.”
In a rare display of solidarity, or in an effort not to get pummeled later by his older sister, Drew suddenly joined Maddy’s plea. “But Mommy, you look so pretty when you dress up. Will you change? Please?”
Parker sighed, looking at the clock again. It was twelve minutes before they had to leave for school. She had to admit her sweat pants and Bon Jovi t-shirt had seen better days. “Fine. You know what? You’re right. It’s my first day of school too, and it wouldn’t hurt to make a better impression. Give me ten minutes to change.”
4.
Twenty-three minutes later…
I look like an extra in an 80’s themed porno.
As Parker screeched her Highlander around the street corner, she couldn’t help but to stare at her cleavage in the rearview mirror wondering if it was too much for a school setting. Her navy dress suit and white blouse were bursting at the seams, amplifying every curve and fold on her body, but she couldn’t help it. It was the one nice looking outfit she could squeeze into in the time she had. Despite the adrenaline rush, Parker tried to breathe slowly, for fear one of her shirt buttons might fire into the windshield and spill her boobs out onto the dashboard. She glanced at the clock – 7:32am.
Parker stomped her foot onto the accelerator.
“Are we late?” asked Maddy. Her fingers firmly dug into the passenger seat’s armrests.
How could we possibly be late, when it took me twenty minutes to cram myself into this skirt?
“We’re in hot pursuit!” Drew gave the thumbs up from the seat behind. He enjoyed the tight turns and the roar of the V6 engine.
Parker gritted her teeth as she rounded another tight corner. She remembered enough about Oak Creek to know that the Elementary school should be after the next bend. At her current speed, they’d have no problem flying in to the parking lot on time, but it was going to be close. “Shit!” Parker slammed on the breaks, jostling her two passengers. Parker was thankful Ally had stayed home with Valerie.
“Shit?” asked Drew. “What’s a shit?”
Our morning is about to take one, thought Parker. And yet -- “Really? You’ve never heard me use that word before?”
“It’s a bad word,” answered Maddy, glaring at her mother. “Don’t repeat it.”
“Your sister is right, don’t repeat it, it’s just—” Parker frowned at the endless line of stopped cars waiting to make a left turn into the school’s parking lot up ahead. An equally long line of cars approaching from the opposite lane were also waiting to enter the lot. It was as though every parent in town had decided to arrive at precisely the same time for the first day of school. Go figure.
“Is this going to make us late?” Maddy whined.
“Cool it, Maddy, all these other families are going to be late too.”
“So, we are late!” The confirmation was all Maddy needed to justify a freak out.
“Mom said ‘cool it’, Maddy!” shouted Drew.
“Shut up, Drew!”
“Quiet! Both of you!” Parker yelled, a little too loud this time as the top button of her blouse popped off and hit the dashboard. She bowed her head. Losing that single button might have just promoted her from 80’s porn extra to the starring role. Parker scanned the surrounding area. Traffic wasn’t moving, she was at the end of a long line, and the last thing she wanted was to initiate a huge “Mom-Fail” on her kid’s first day in a new school by making them tardy. That’s the word, right? Tardy? Stupid word. Parker quickly formulated her plan of attack. “We’re going to park and walk the last few blocks.”
“Park where?” blasted Maddy. “The streets are full of cars!”
“Umm, duh, we’re going to park right here,” she sneered as she pulled into the first driveway of the house on the street corner. It was a small two-story home painted a bright lime green that appeared as though its occupants were already off at work. At least, that’s what Parker hoped.
“Do you know who lives here?”
“I’m pretty sure Grandma knows them,” Parker bluffed. Though the statement couldn’t be that far off from the truth. Valerie Parker, the woman who had killed her husband with sex was a legend in Oak Creek. “Besides, we’ll be back and gone before they know it. Let’s go.”
The trio pounded the sidewalks with a brisk pace, rushing to catch up with the mass of families heading to school grounds. Parker checked her phone -- two minutes to spare. She rechecked the school registration email. “Alright, Maddy, we’re going to drop you off at your classroom first,” she informed with confidence and authority. “Then Drew, you and I will go to your classroom. You’ll stay with your classes and meet at the playground for the flag assembly greeting thingy, and boom, we’re golden until pick up time.”
“Do I have piano lessons after school?” prodded Maddy.
“Maddy, I haven’t even found a teacher yet.”
Maddy sulked in disappointment.
“We’ve lived here six hours, Maddy!” Parker explained. “I know how it important it is, just give me some time, okay? Maybe ask your music teacher if he knows anybody when you see him in class.”
Luckily, Maddy’s homeroom was a short but crowded stroll away. As with most of the classrooms, it featured a side door that opened directly to the playground area. Parker gave her oldest an awkward squeeze before sending her off to the care of Ms. Brandy, a middle-aged hipster in a long flowing skirt, and curly hair and an excess of beaded necklaces.
Maddy stopped halfway into the classroom and looked back at her mother. “You’re gonna be here, right?” she asked. “At the end? For pick up?”
Parker forced a smile. “Of course!”
“You won’t forget?”
Parker’s insides wrenched into a knot, which were already under plenty of punishment from the tight fit of her under-sized pencil skirt. “Maddy—this isn’t Chicago. Let’s make it a fresh start, okay? Please?”
Maddy gave a slow nod. Without another word, she turned and disappeared into the classroom.
Drew tugged at his mother’s skirt. “She’s still mad at you about Chicago,” he explained.
“I got that, thank you,” said Parker.
“She’s dealing with a lot of change and misses her friends.”
Parker blinked in astonishment as she looked down at her little man. Drew’s poignant comments between fart jokes could make him sound like it wasn’t his first trip around life’s merry-go-round. “What about you? Don’t you miss your friends?”
Drew shrugged. “We had a big blowout over Pokémon Go.” He hung his head, as if in mourning. After a brief respite, he looked up to his mother hopefully. “But, this is first grade. I’ll make new friends.”
Parker nodded. At least she hadn�
�t entirely screwed up one of her kids – yet. “Let’s get you to class.”
5.
“Welcome students. Welcome parents. Welcome all, to another fabulous year of learning at Oak Creek Elementary!”
A lot had changed at Oak Creek since Parker’s own elementary days. Twenty years of renovation, demolition and addition had transformed the campus into a mish mash of modern architecture. But the one thing that had not changed was the shrill voice that blasted over the PA system to greet Parker and the hundreds of students and parents who were packed shoulder to shoulder onto the hot black tar of the playground. The voice belonged to a small, petite elderly woman who stood proudly at the microphoned podium that dwarfed her. Karen Heller still wore her jet-black died hair pulled into a tight ballerina bun and donned a stiff, tweed suit.
“Holy hell,” Parker gasped under her breath. “That crazy old chick is still alive!”
“Shhhhhh!” a baby-faced mother angrily glared at Parker and pressed her finger to her lips.
“Relax,” Parker assured her. “Old Yeller Heller gave the same speech even when I went to school here.” To prove it, Parker matched the next refrain of Heller’s speech, word for word.
“—Your children are the future of our community,” Heller started.
“Our nation,” Parker recalled from memory, matching Heller’s cadence perfectly. “And our world.” Parker put her hands together to fain prayer and sell the sincerity to the baby-faced mother.
This performance did little to impress Baby-Face, who angrily pushed her stroller away.
Of course, when Parker was a kid, Karen Heller was only Vice Principal at Oak Creek Elementary. Forty years later, Parker assumed she’d been given the top spot of Principal. Parker assumed the younger, Latina woman, sharply dressed in magenta standing behind Heller just off to one side might be the new vice principal. She wondered if this woman might pray for the day Heller finally combusted into ash like a vampire exposed to too much sunlight, so that she might earn her own battlefield promotion.
