Good Things I'll Never Do Again

Twenty-Four: Halloween

"All of the dust and cobwebs in my house just became decorations. Thanks Halloween."

~Unknown

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September comes and goes without another hitch. I'm finally in a routine, just like I had been before the girls came. But it's a new, exciting routine. The days are never the same, which is strange and thrilling.

One day, I found out Kristen's email address and sent a fake summons to court, which actually led her to a huge petitioning rally for the allowance of public nudity at the courthouse. She had to sign dozens of petitions being handed to her by naked people just to make it up the steps.

As for the girls, I think we've reached some sort of mutual agreement. We all keep ourselves busy, they aren't such a pain in the you-know-what and I take them to McDonald's after school for ice cream.

They fight with each other, but they work it out eventually. Aimee calls the girls every night to "check up on them" (in other words, check up on me), and despite the occasional reproof, she seems to be more comfortable with the idea of me taking care of her kids. There's still nothing from their dad.

I knock down my days at Red Ribbon's from Tuesdays and Thursdays to just Thursdays.

I'm so busy at the PTO, taking the girls to soccer, and keeping everyone alive that Red Ribbon's takes the back burner.

Don't get me wrong...I'm at the end of my rope about 99% of the time. I'm not cut out for parenting. But, to my surprise, I'm not bad at it, either.

Before I know it, it's October.

There's definitely a chill in the air, which means I have one more thing to keep track of--the girls' coats. They lose them everywhere, even though there's a nice coat rack near the front door. So I just let them freeze on their way to school now. It's not like they'll get hypothermia in the 45-degree weather, but maybe they'll learn a lesson.

When I walk into Percival on Wednesday, there's a gigantic blow-up pumpkin near parent pickup.

"What the..." I murmur, scowling at it before going inside.

The interior of the school is even worse. In one corner of the lobby, a creepy skeleton wearing a pirate hat sits on a treasure chest with a gauzy backdrop behind it. Every time someone walks by, it says "Gimme yer candy!" and my frown deepens.

There are gummy spiders, webs, pumpkins, leaves, and witch hats plastered to every window and fall leaf garlands wrapping around the whole room.

My guess is that there's some Halloween store nearby that is very happy that the school bought out all of its decorations.

Barb meets me outside the PTO meeting room before I can go in.

"Beverly," she pants. "I don't know what I'm gonna do!"

"Try calming the heck down," I suggest. "There's plenty of air in here for the both of us before you pass out."

She sucks in a breath through her nose before her words spill out in a rush. "Twopeoplearedressingasprincessjasmine."

I open my mouth, close it, then point at her. "I'm assuming you didn't just say the word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, but that's the only thing I got, so try again."