Page 9 of The Devil You Know
“Oh,” I say. “Right.”
I’m fairly sure that I’m not the boss. If it isn’t Mila, it’s probably Leah. Anyway, it’s definitely not me.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “She won’t wear it again.”
Mila seems to accept this. I retrieve Leah’s hated pink coat from her cubby and walk over to where she’s playing. She’s really having fun with her friends. It makes me sad that she doesn’t have any siblings at home. She’s always telling me about all her friends’ brothers and sisters, and saying wistfully that she wishes there were a baby in the house.
That isn’t exactly our choice though. Ben and I have been working on it for two years. So far, no luck. We’ve been tentatively discussing whether we want to see a specialist or resign ourselves to having only one child. After all, it’s not like our lives aren’t full enough with just Leah. Who isn’t even out of freakingdiapersyet.
When I approach Leah, she’s started singing to herself: “Twinkle twinkle little Mommy, how I wonder what you Mommy.”
“Leah,” I say, “it’s time to go home.”
She looks up at me and smiles with a perfect row of baby teeth. They’re so white, even though I’ve been admittedly negligent about making her brush them every night. “Up above the world so Mommy, like a Mommy in the Mommy.”
Let it never be said that I’ve never had a song written about me.
“Leah,” I say more firmly. “We have to go home.” I add, “Now.”
Iam the boss.Iam the boss.
“The itsy bitsy Mommy climbs up the water spout,” she continues, going back to the toy car she was playing with as if we have all the time in the world, “down came the rain and washed the Mommy out.”
I glance over at Mila, who is watching me and shaking her head.
I amthe boss. I amtheboss.
Oh, who am I kidding? I amsonot the boss.
Chapter 4
Somehow I manage to get Leah home. It involves Mila coming over to have a brief but stern word with her. At which point she instantly puts on her hated pink coat, and promises to never wear herFrozennightgown ever again. I have never felt like such an incompetent parent.
When I get Leah into the house, I find Ben sitting on his recliner in the living room, his laptop planted on his legs, looking cute in his boxers and an undershirt. To make up for the fact that I forgot to kiss him this morning, I lean in to give him a peck on the cheek, but he turns his head to catch me on the lips with a peanut buttery kiss.
Ben has a big jar of chunky peanut butter tucked into the crook of his arm. Leah hasFrozenand my husband has peanut butter. I’ve never seen a grown man who could just eat peanut butter straight out of the jar the way he does. I’ve seen him polish off an entire jar of Skippy in an hour.
Of course, he doesn’t just eat plain peanut butter. Our cabinets are stacked with an assortment of gourmet peanut butters: chai spice peanut butter, maple bacon peanut butter, blueberry vanilla peanut butter… you get the idea. Whenever he finds an interesting new peanut butter online, he’s got to have it. On his last birthday, he went totally crazy over this toffee crunch peanut butter I bought for him. Right now, I can make out the label on the jar of peanut butter he’s holding: coconut lime peanut butter.
Coconut lime peanut butter? That can’tpossiblytaste good.
“Ew,” I say as I drop my purse on the floor of the living room, which is its official place in the house. “Coconut lime peanut butter? You’ve lost your mind.”
“It’sgood,” Ben insists. He scoops out a hefty spoonful and holds it up. “Try some.”
“No way.”
He raises his eyebrows at me. “Don’t make me chase you around the house to make you try this. Because you know I’ll do it.”
I clamp both hands over my mouth. “Do your worst.”
He gets off his chair and makes an attempt to get the spoonful of peanut butter past my lips, but just succeeds in smearing it on my fingers. After that, he gives up, which makes me feel a twinge of sadness. Back in the olddays, before Leah, Ben really would have chased me all over the house to get me to eat that spoonful of peanut butter. He would have tackled me on the sofa and tickled me till I opened my mouth. He gave up far too easily. It makes me feel like he doesn’t even care that I’ll never experience coconut lime peanut butter.
“Were you home all day?” I ask Ben.
“Oh.” He smiles sheepishly. “It was cold out and I didn’t feel like going in.”
Well, great. If he knew he was going to do that, he could have helped me out by bringing Leah to preschool. But I don’t feel like starting that argument right now.
