I am shaking with fury as I unlock my phone. The man who smells like Icy Hot is looking at me as though I have just pulled a grenade out of my purse. I suppose he has never seen a mobile phone of any kind. He may still have a party line and a rental phone from Bell Telephone plugged into the wall of his avocado green kitchen. I give him the hairy eyeball until he looks away. I don't want him whipping out his readers to read my nasty-gram as I text it.
I have to re-read her last message before I reply. It will ignite all of my engines. The accusation that I (abbreviated in text-speak to "U" because Mom is a hipster technogeek now) took every valuable thing from my father's house and offered Joe nothing. And then, the candles on the cake, the accusation that I plotted to keep the $2 bills that Dad got for each of us. If I had them, I'd shred them and send them to her in little pieces simply to send her sailing into the outer limits.
I want to scream at her. (Wouldn't Icy Hot love that?) I want to write a courtroom-quality defensive position statement that sets her little Aqua-Netted hair on fire. I want to swear like a sailor so that the "Authorities" she is so paranoid about come and take her phone away. I want to grab a fist full of her hair and slap her (in exactly the way she immobilized our heads in order to slap us when we were kids. But not Joe. He had a crew cut.)
But I don't. The biggest bruise of all will come from dismissing her. From swatting her away like a fly at the picnic.
I simply text, "Please do not bother me with this crap and Joe's. No interest in discussing."
She fires off an even more inventive retort. Character assassination. Criticism for everything I've done since I exited the womb. What a disappointment I am.
Gloves off. Better shield your face, Icy Hot. This one will make your eyeballs bleed.
"How dare you even pretend to think you are qualified to sit in judgment of me? You are a completely selfish, unreasonable, narcissistic monster and I want nothing to do with you. You have shown everyone your true colors and deserve nothing from me. Please do not contact me again. PS - Everyone who has ever gotten to know you has exited your life. YOU are the problem, regardless of what you have convinced yourself of. You can live your small miserable life without the benefit of me or my children in it. You have never been trustworthy or respectable. No future correspondence will be opened or read."
She wastes no time responding.
"The feeling is mutual. Narcissistic describes u. The way u went on yesterday about how wonderful things are. U sounded like you were high on something. U have turned into a total witch. U and Obama are total losers."
Oooh. Good one, Mom. Well if President Obama and I are losers what in Christ's name does that make you (U?) and my idiot brother? I am not sure there is a term for that level of loserdom. Please just go to Hell and stay there.
When we are dismissed for a (luke warm coffee) break, I call Charlotte and tell her everything that has gone on between Estelle and me in the last hour of Jury Duty Follies. She is flabbergasted. Wonders where all the venom and hatred comes from (Not that Mom hasn't always been a wellspring of such things). My best guess is that she percolated and fumed over the conversation we had yesterday, hopped on her Miz Gulch bicycle and rode a few laps around the county plotting her revenge and then took to the phone after a few cups of jet fuel strength coffee (which never mixes well with mood stabilizers).
Just as Kelly and Michael are mercifully signing off for the day, the judge comes in to dismiss us. The three defendants plea bargained their way out of a jury trial and I am off the proverbial hook for 365 days.
I drive home thinking about what I will do with my unexpected freedom.
That is, until I realize I have a voice mail from Mom on my home phone. Oy.
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