Adult Conversation

by Brandy Ferner

  We screeched up to the closest frozen yogurt shop and busted out of the van like a bunch of terrorists. After Elliot got colonic relief and Violet got sprinkles, all was well.

  When we returned home, Elliot reunited with his iPad while I sorted out the events of my frustrating morning with Aaron, all in my head, as I scrubbed the sink spotless. Now that I wasn’t micromanaging Violet on a deathtrap play structure, my mind was free to go through the entire thing with a fine-toothed comb, but I needed June, the ultimate detangler.

  The marriage excavation accompanied Violet and I outside as I monotonously pushed her in a chunky, pink, plastic car, up and down our cul-de-sac. I’m the only one who even plans special dates. His work always wins out over everything. How much more of this can I take?

  And then the self-judgment came in. But this is part of the deal with being a mother. Why can’t you just accept it, April? Accept it and all your problems go away.

  And back and forth and back and forth, until the day rolled into the evening and it was finally time for a napless Violet to submit to slumber. Elliot sat on the couch, reading a comic book. I had no idea when Aaron would get home, so I assumed I would be on full bedtime duty. I couldn’t bring myself to check in with him. I was still too mad.

  While the kids resisted brushing their teeth, my phone dinged with two texts from Aaron.

  I’m almost home. I can put Elliot to bed if he’s still up.

  BTW, total waste. CEO never even showed. So pissed. At least me and the crew got to drink some beers while we waited, but what a joke.

  I felt heat surge from my chest to my eyes and then spread throughout my entire body. Numb. Of course the CEO didn’t show up. Fuck all you dipshits, but mostly you, Aaron.

  When the garage door opened below, it was fortunate that Violet and I were sitting in the glider reading Yummy Yucky behind her closed door because I was seething. Aaron and I were going to hash this shit out tonight after the kids were asleep. This motherfucker wasn’t going to stand me up ever again.

  After I heard Elliot’s door shut, I strategically emerged, finding three missed calls from June, and a text asking that I call her as soon as I could. Shit. Was it Charlie? Or worse, Chet? I stole away to the garage, sat on the concrete step and called her. She picked up immediately.

  “I’m sure you’re in the middle of bedtimes and all that,” she said.

  “No, it’s fine.”

  “Remember when you said you’d be willing to help me? Can I take you up on that—tonight?”

  “Oh my God, what’s going on?”

  “I’m nearly 100% sure Chet’s spending the weekend with someone in Las Vegas, and I’m finally ready to get my evidence.”

  “Wow, okay. Wow.” I paced between our cars.

  “But I can’t do it alone. I can’t confront him all by myself. I’m really scared, April. Will you go with me?”

  I felt Mom Code zap me at my core, like a baby kicking inside the womb. “Of course I will go with you.”

  June audibly exhaled.

  I had said yes before doing the math, but I had to go. I was so livid that my gut was calling the shots. It was not like me, leaving my kids on a whim (or at all). But goddammit, I was going to do the thing that Aaron had the luxury of doing every single day—driving away. The kids would be fine. Aaron wasn’t a shitty dad, just a shitty husband. Sometimes. Today.

  “Thank you. I can do this. We can do this. I owe you,” June said.

  “I know one way you can pay me back.”

  “Anything.”

  “You can tell me where Snoop Dogg lives.” I tried to lighten the mood, yet crossed my fingers that I might also finally learn where Snoop Dogg called hizome.

  June laughed. “Well, I do have something he gave me that you could have. Good enough?”

  “Fuck yes. Is it weed?”

  “You’ll see. And don’t worry, everything’s on me. I’ll fill you in when I pick you up after I drop the boys at Cammy’s. Text me your address. How long do you need to get ready?”

  I wanted to leave before I changed my mind, or saw Aaron. “Like twenty minutes.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  We hung up and I screamed out loud and then slapped my hands on my mouth, both thrilled and petrified. I zipped upstairs on my tiptoes, like a cat burglar, and threw a random assortment of clothes and toiletries into a bag—a few of my nicer date-night outfits, sexy heels, a bikini, and eyeliner—it was Vegas, after all. I rejoiced at having showered and blow-dried my hair earlier that day. “Live every day like you might go to Vegas after bedtime” was my new motto. I waited on the porch, hiding from my neighbors and Aaron, behind a pillar.

  I felt alive.

  June pulled up in her black SUV. I gingerly closed the passenger door behind me, wanting to draw zero attention. In hindsight, sliding in through the window may have been more fitting for the moment.

  “Hi,” she said, a palpable thrill in the air.

  “Thank you for rescuing me,” I said.

  “Me rescue you?” she asked, backing out. “Aaron’s with the kids, right?”

  I shook my head yes, then stared at my phone. I knew I needed to tell him I’d left.

  I’m on my way to Las Vegas with June. She needs my help to catch Chet cheating.

  I hesitated before hitting the send button. There would be no going back. But if Martha was right and I was going to fuck my kids up no matter what, I might as well enjoy myself a little. I might as well spark some motherfucking joy, isn’t that right, Marie Kondo?

  Send.

  The response bubbles immediately lit up.

  What??

  I’m confident you can figure things out without me.

  When are you coming back?

  I don’t know.

  Seriously?? You’re going to Vegas and don’t know when you’ll be back?

  Affirmative.

  I didn’t know why I was using soldier lingo, but it felt right.

  You gotta come back A.B. Tom and I have plans to go surfing tomorrow morning for his 40th birthday.

  Well your babysitter just canceled.

  My phone rang and it was, of course, Aaron. I sent it straight to voicemail, which made me feel queasy, with a wave of whathaveIfuckingdone? This trip wasn’t intended to be a punishment for him, but it was unexpectedly playing out that way. A split second later, the queasiness turned into a rush of freedom and power, like I was wearing a pair of brass TruckNutz. There was no looking back. And I would find out if our marriage could withstand an unexpected trip to Vegas.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Junebug

  Do we have to dress up as maids or some shit? What is our actual plan?” I asked. “There’s no elaborate plan. All I know is that Charlie asked me if I was going to a place called Las Vegas this weekend. I told him no and he said, ‘I thought Dad told you on the phone that he couldn’t wait to see you at Mamelle, the best topless pool in Las Vegas.’” Her eyes widened as she flipped her blinker and we hopped on the 5 freeway.

  “Did Charlie ask what a topless pool was?”

  “Yes. And when I told him it was a pool where you didn’t have to wear a top, he said, ‘Mom, I never wear a top at any of the pools I go to,’ so I think I dodged that bullet, but our family calendar showed Chet away on business this weekend, and now I know where, specifically. That’s a first.”

  Wait just a minute.

  “Are we going to have to be topless at a pool with twenty-year-olds who’ve never nursed babies?”

  “Not sure.” She looked like the yikes emoji with the teeth showing. “I got us a room at the Paris hotel, where Mamelle is. My only plan is for us to be detectives and see what we can get on video, if anything. I know it’s risky.” A silence hung between us as the heaviness of the situation sunk in. “But I can’t have Chet see me or else he will preemptively come after me legally. That’s where I need your help most.”

  “But he’s met me. He fully scanned my soul with his eyeballs.”


  “I doubt he could pick you out of a crowd, or if he did, he might think you’re just coincidentally there.”

  “True,” I said, wondering if staying home for a knockdown, drag-out fight with Aaron would’ve been the safer bet. “So, um, with Chet, are you at all worried that he might be mad if he finds out? Like maybe try to hurt you? Or me?” I wasn’t sure exactly where Chet sat on the psychopath spectrum, but I knew he was for sure on it.

  “I’ve got it covered.”

  “Did you hire a bodyguard, or do we have pepper spray, or did you bring a handgun?”

  “Bingo.”

  “Wait, Chet is enough of a threat that you actually brought a gun?”

  Her head locked forward to watch the road. “When you marry a sociopath, you spend a lot of time at gun ranges.”

  I sighed loudly, with a little moan of horror at the end, realizing that sometimes Mom Code can kill you. I put my head in my hands. A thrilling girls’ trip to Vegas in the name of justice for women everywhere was now a possible double homicide. I thought of Violet and Elliot’s faces when Aaron would break the news to them that I’d left. Or worse.

  “I know it’s a lot,” June said. “Maybe this is the perfect time for Calvin’s gift.”

  “Yes, please, for the love of guns that we hopefully don’t get shot by, what is it?”

  “Open up the glove box.”

  I clicked the button in front of me on the dash and the glove box slowly dropped open. Inside was a small package wrapped in Iron Man wrapping paper.

  “I even wrapped it for you.”

  “Mr. Calvin would’ve wanted it that way,” I joked. I took out the red-wrapped packet and began to open it. I carefully tore the sides of the paper and unfurled it in my lap, like Charlie Bucket in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory opening his winning ticket. There laid three thick joints. “There has honestly never been a better time for this than right now,” I said, dead serious.

  “There should be a lighter in the glove box,” she motioned.

  I held up one of the joints, inspecting it like I remembered doing the few times I’d smoked weed in college. As I flipped the chubby white paper tube over, I noticed there was handwriting on it. It said “For Junebug.”

  “He calls you Junebug?” My head tilted in such awe that my skull almost rolled off my spine.

  “It’s what he used to call his uncle. I don’t know,” she said, brushing off the fact that Snoop Dogg had a pet name for her. “He gave me these a couple months ago and said they were something called ‘Girl Scout Cookie OG.’ I don’t know what any of it means. Maybe it’s his favorite kind of marijuana.” She shrugged.

  There were many things to consider here. First and foremost was that the fingers of The Snoop Dogg had touched these joints, as had his pen, which weirdly seemed as exciting as his hands. It would be sacrilegious to say no. But didn’t I need to also keep myself together to help June? In the first hour of newfound freedom from my family, was I really going to smoke weed in a car on the way to Vegas?

  Yes. Yes I was.

  I held the joint up to my mouth. Night had settled into the sky, helping hide the questionable decision-making going on in the car. “Are you sure you’re okay with me doing this?” I asked.

  “I just dropped a lot on you. Go for it.”

  I flicked the lighter and held the flame to the end of the crinkled paper. The white wrapper lit up orange as the green leaves crackled inside. I sucked deeply, as long as I could and then exhaled the smoke, hoping for a graceful blow-out without coughing. Just like riding a bike, I didn’t forget how. Still got it. A large, stanky waft of smoke clouded up the entire front seat.

  June cracked her window. And then it came. The coughing until I nearly vomited.

  “You all right?”

  I held my hand up, working my way through it, shaking my head and stifling the coughs with my fist. The all-over body tingle came immediately after the coughing ceased. I smiled in slow motion. All my worries drained out of me and were replaced with an inner bubble bath. I took enough hits to feel beautifully limp.

  Cradled in the soft front seat, looking out the wind-shield at the red tail lights all moving toward Vegas, nothing else mattered. Until I felt a sudden need for music. It took all of my strength to turn my one-ton head, but after what was surely twenty minutes of trying, I looked at June out of my half-mast eyes. “Can I put some music on?”

  “Sure,” she said, laughing at me.

  I scrolled through the music on my phone, for how long, I’ll never know. Ninety-nine percent of it was terrible kid music. I saw seven albums entitled “Music Together,” and started giggling. “You have to hear this shit, June.”

  I pressed play. It was the folky “Hello” song that we were forced to sing at the beginning of every Music Together class, which was led by a woman wearing bellbottoms and with hairy pits and white woman dreads, banging on a huge drum at the local community center. When the flutes came in, I lost it. I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe. My bladder control had to fight for its life. I tried to speak but couldn’t, which made June laugh almost as hard as me. Saccharine kid music was funny enough sober, but it was hysterical when high. The two of us laughed for what felt like ten minutes straight. We listened to the entire song. On repeat. It got funnier every time. June was holding it together better than I was, but it was clear that she hadn’t avoided a contact high.

  We exited off the freeway in a town called Barstow that appeared to exist solely for high people with the munchies. She pulled up to the front of a gas station, which sat below a towering dirt hill. Being high in public as a mother was another new thing I was experiencing that night.

  As we continued to drive through the dark desert, my high began to wear off. “I can’t believe I smoked Snoop Dogg’s weed. It’s like he and I are married now.”

  June’s enthusiasm barely reached neutral, making me feel like a celebrity whore.

  “Isn’t there a famous person you’re into, that you’d want to meet? Or bone?” I asked.

  “I just don’t get that starstruck.”

  “Like not even one person? What about a buff longhair like Jason Momoa?”

  “Almost every important person I’ve met has been a huge letdown. Chet and his Hollywood friends have introduced me to so many famous people who are truly terrible human beings. I’m just jaded. Don’t mind me. Go ahead with your Snoop love over there.”

  My high was now completely gone at the reminder of Chet’s sour influence on her life and our reason for going to Vegas.

  “And maybe to Jason Momoa,” she said, with a wink.

  The next three hours passed with the kind of organic sharing that only happens when sitting next to someone for an extended period of time in a moving vehicle. We talked about early sexual fiascos, including the frat guy with the stirrups hanging from his ceiling—and also things like hemorrhoids and cracked nipples.

  As we passed the last of the stubble-covered mountains that led into Sin City, the brightly flickering city lights awoke in the distance, cheering us on. Once in the city, June deftly navigated her way through the jumble of nightly traffic on the Vegas Strip. The radiant flashing lights and gigantic signs pulsated with promises of fun and entertainment, but we were there on business.

  It was nearing midnight as we pulled up to the Paris hotel parking lot, which was in the back, away from all the glitz and glamour. Stepping out of the car and into the hot night air felt like a baptism for me, since I reeked of pot smoke. I had forgotten that this time of year, outdoor Vegas felt like the inside of a fevery mouth. I was probably the only one who actually liked it. We got our belongings from the trunk and strolled toward the back glass doors. The ass end of the casino.

  “Wait,” June said, stopping and unzipping her bag. She pulled out a large hat and pair of sunglasses, and put them on. She looked like a movie star trying to fool the paparazzi. “In case we see Chet while checking in,” she said, shoving me in front of her, like a human shield.
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br />   When we opened the gold-handled doors, Vegas overtook me. The cold, filtered air, the non-stop sound of dinging, the colorful carpet, the smoke, and the people. Oh the disgusting people. The sandals-and-socks wearers, the novelty-sized drink carriers, the ass-hanging-out-ofthe-miniskirters.

  June and I walked along the indoor French cobblestone street toward the check-in desk. The back-door seediness was replaced by the expansive casino area with high, open ceilings and attention to detail, right down to the ornate Parisian streetlights and metal Eiffel Tower leg jutting through the building like Godzilla. Vegas’s flaws and its glory held a special place in my heart. Aaron and I had been regularly visiting Vegas since our college days of young love. We both equally liked the gambling, the people watching, and the amounts of sex we had there, before children. On the hardest days of parenting, he would look at me and say, “Vegas,” and we would both close our eyes and pretend we were there, doubling down, and drinking lava flows by the pool. It felt wrong not only to be there without Aaron, but not even to be in contact with him. It was like I was living in some parallel universe where we never got married. But perhaps this is just what I needed—to be in the world as just myself, a woman attached to no one.

  The best part of Vegas casinos was that children were basically illegal. There were always those few parents who thought it appropriate to bring kids to a playground filled with booze and tits, but aside from that, the ratio of adults to children was perfection.

  We walked through a sloppy-drunk bachelorette party in front of the check-in desk and June lowered her sunglasses while nervously scanning the surroundings for any sign of Chet. She was keeping chitchat to a minimum.

  “How many nights will you be with us?” the gentleman concierge asked with a smile. I wondered the same thing.

  “Just one, for now,” she said.