Let's Make A Deal

Since all bad news tends to land in one big shit pile, it makes perfect sense that it would be Lars on the other end of the phone. The Ladies in White leave to discuss my necrotic limb.

He needs to come over to get Pat for some project he's helping him with (Pat is 15. Unless he is building a model of the Space Shuttle to scale, I doubt that there is any parental input needed for any project the school can dream up as a method of torture.)

Can he come over and get him after dinner?

Well yes, but dinner is sort of up in the air at the moment, considering the Ladies in White are about to throw a net over my head.

I contemplate the loaded question.

"Well, you can...but we have not eaten dinner yet. I am not home."

He immediately assumes I am consumed with my new job and ignoring the children because I like the people at work better. It's his rallying cry. And how he justifies that he hasn't worked a full day since Jesus wore short pants.

As he sighs that sigh that suggests that I am a hopeless excuse for a parent, I tell him that I am at the doctors with a foot injury and that they are not sure I do not need to be admitted. I purposely leave out the details of said injury. Let him think that I mangled a limb with the lawn mower. A blister gone awry seems so pathetic and avoidable. He'd just heap on more blame.

He asks if he should pick up the children.

Of course he does. If I am discharged and sent home, it would be a most safe and caring thing to do to ensure that I suffer and die alone. Who needs company during times of pain and suffering anyway?

I tell him I need to call Pat and Hil and tell them to make a pizza for dinner and to please not argue over which one. And that I will call when I am on my way home, because darn it, I am not taking a spin in the ambulance to the ER to be admitted for a blister.

Hil reads me like a book when I call. Asks if I am coming home at all. She must share some DNA with Charlotte. Never misses a trick, even if I am doing my darndest to sound cheerful to the point of mania.

The Ladies In White return. I immediately launch into a diatribe about my new job and kids at home. Play the single mother card. I have cats. One is blind!!!!

They are shaking their heads. I am frantically devising an escape plan, even though my pants remain slung over a pleather chair.

Thankfully, they are Let's Make A Deal gals. They will write a sky-high dose of an antibiotic if I promise and swear to keep an appointment they are making for me to return on Saturday afternoon.

I raise my hand, Girl Scout style, and swear on everything I know to be holy.

I snatch the script, put on my pants, grab my purse and run out the door. I hand my business card to the rude job seeker and disappear into the night.

I am running so fast I do not even realize that my foot is throbbing and feels like I just ran across hot coals.

I hesitate at the car door.

Am I making a huge mistake?