Good Things I'll Never Do Again

Twenty: Busted

"Too bad you can't photoshop an ugly personality."

~Anonymous

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 "It's literally the weirdest crap in the universe!" I fume, angrily cutting up a magazine for the students to decoupage onto a vase. Finn put me in charge of it because it would help me relieve my stress. Dusty had been watching PBS this morning because I was trying to "enrich her mind" more often, but the junk on there was stupid. "They say Humpty Dumpty couldn't be put back together again, and so people just assume he's an egg." I shake my head. "And what do eggs do, specifically, when they fall?!"

Finn stops painting the mural and considers it for a moment. "They crack, I presume."

"They crack! Exactly! And does the song ever say anything about Humpty Dumpty cracking?!"

"I don't believe so."

"No, it doesn't!" I snip a picture of Kim Kardashian in half, and I have to say, it's pretty satisfying. "Like, what are they teaching kids? I was trying to be a good caretaker and get Dusty off of watching The Walking Dead, but honestly, it probably has better lessons in it than Paw Patrol!"

Finn carefully adds a shadow behind one of the dancing women in the mural and says, "Does Dusty like sea creatures?"

"Doesn't everyone?"

"Try Octonauts. I heard a—a few of the children Dusty's age talking about it. They seemed very knowledgeable."

I prop my chin up on my finger. "I'll do that. Probably better than the cannibalistic dolphin show they watched..."

An idea comes to me and I sit up. "Maybe I can take them to the aquarium! That's what a good person would do, right?! Like a field trip."

Finn glances at me and gives a half-second grin. "Lovely."

"Is there even an aquarium around here?" I wonder out loud.

"I—I believe there's one thirty minutes outside of town. I went one time."

"Is it good?"

"It has a whale shark."

"Perfect." I squint at him. "I never pictured you as an aquarium guy."

He flashes another awkward smile. "There are only so many art museums a person can go to. I manage to get away from the paint every once in a while."

I tilt my head to the side. "Would you...wanna go with us? You could probably teach them about sea stuff! And I could...go buy snacks or something. It'll be fun!"

Finn glances at me again before going back to work on his mural, trying to suppress an amused grin. "Are you sure you're not just scared to take them by yourself?" he asks quietly.

I glower at him. "No." I cut up a few more Kardashians before saying, "But, you could, you know, carry the snack bag and tell Dusty to stop trying to scale the big glass walls. She'll probably listen to you."

He gives me a skeptical look, but before he can respond, the back door of the art classroom bursts open.

I jump in surprise, half expecting a SWAT team to come storming through the building.