Moving Forward

Bad Girl

"Avalynn!" I run out of the living room where I just found out my couch and coffee table are completely covered in stickers "Get back here! Now!"

"No." She whimpers, hiding in a corner knowing she's in trouble "I don't want to."

"Avalynn Rachel Pitt." I walk closer to her, picking her up "What is all over my couch and table?"

"I don't know, mommy." She lies, trying to get out of my arms "Let me down!"

"No." I pull her closer, forcing her to look me in the eyes "Why are you lying to me?"

"I'm not." She lies again, quickly turning away.

"Well if you don't know what happened, then why do you have stickers all over you?"

"Kassie threw them and they landed allllllll over me."

"Kassie has been out with daddy all day." I put her down, pulling her into the living room with me "Nice try. Now clean them up. I want every single one of them out of here."

"But mommy I like them." She jumps around in front of me, trying to change my mind "I think they look pretty."

"Well I don't like them in here. They need to be cleaned up, and then when that's done we can work on getting them out of your hair. You better hope you don't need a hair cut."

"I don't want hair cut." She pouts, starting to cry "Please don't."

"Well you might have already made that decision yourself. You have those stickers stuck in your hair really bad. I don't know if I can get them all out."

She sighs, walking over to the couch, scraping the stickers off as best she can and looking back at me every few seconds. She tries to make me feel bad for forcing her to clean them up, but right now I don't really care. She's not looking all that cute to me.

"Here." She hands them to me, giving me a death glare "I'm too tired for the rest."

"You're too tired? Then maybe you should have taken a nap instead of doing this." I raise my eyebrows as I say this, making sure she knows she needs to finish "I want them all picked up. Then once I have them out of your hair you can nap forever if you want."

"I don't wanna nap anymore." She mumbles under her breath as she turns back to the stickers. I try my hardest not to laugh, knowing that's exactly what she would say.

She finally manages to get them all, and I make her sit in my lap while I try to pull them out of her hair. It wouldn't be so hard if she would actually sit still, but she's too busy bitching about it and trying to play with every toy around her.

"Avalynn," I sigh, wanting to give up "If you don't stop then I'm going to just take you for a hair cut."

"No!" She cries, turning to bury herself in my lap "Mommy I don't want a hair cut."

"I know, honey, but you need to sit still then." I rub her back, calming her so I can get this over with. She eventually stops crying, and when I look at her is asleep. I mistakenly think this will make it easier to work on her hair, but in reality I now how to get them out AND not wake her.

Just as I'm about to finish, Brad walks in with Kassie who is screaming her head off. He hands her to me to feed, and he takes over getting the stickers out.

"Did you guys finish everything?" I ask once it's finally quiet again "You were there for a while."

"No, there's still some scripts to look over. We got all but about 2 done. It wasn't too easy with her screeching."

"Yeah, she's been getting good at that." I look down, watching Kassie eat "Did she sleep at all for you?"

"About an hour." He lays Ava on the couch once he's done with her hair "I laid a few blankets on the floor for a make shift bed. I'm not sure how much she liked that."

"Well considering she doesn't like sleep anyway, it must have been okay.  I can't believe we're actually functioning on such little sleep.  It wasn't even this bad for me when Ava was a newborn and I had to be up at 5 for Friends."

"We did get really lucky with her.  Guess that just doesn't happen twice."

I get up, laying Kassie in her play pen and walk around the living room to see that there are also crayon markings all over one of the walls.

"Brad!" I sigh, staring at it "Look what else she did.  She's been really bad with this lately."

"I think she's jealous." He starts walking towards the kitchen "I'll get it.  Don't worry."

"No.  She needs to get it.  We can't keep doing everything for her." I follow him out, starting to get pissed "You've been doing way too much for her lately and it's just making her worse."

"She hasn't been any worse for me!" He starts to get defensive "She's just jealous, that's normal."

"You haven't noticed because you haven't been home!" I finally start to let him know what's been bothering me the past few days "You've been out working on everything, not giving me a chance to go to work, and then you come home and feel bad so you do everything for her!"

"I'm trying to help you once I get home!  I see there's a mess and I know you're tired so I do it to give you a break!" He slams all the cleaning supplies on the counter "You said you wanted to stay home longer this time so I'm trying to let you!"

"I never said I wanted to feel like I was doing everything alone!" I start walking towards the steps "If you really wanted to help you wouldn't be doing everything for her!  She needs to learn!"

"Then maybe instead of bitching you should tell me what you want!  I can't do anything right anymore!"

"You're such as asshole!  I try to talk and you don't listen!"

I walk up the rest of the steps, slamming our bedroom door shut.  He runs up following me, banging on the door when he realizes it's locked.

"Go away!  You can get them to bed since you wanna be such a big help."

"Jen, just let me in."

I open the door slightly, poking my head out.

"Go. Away."