you need to be in front of your son's school at two twenty pm on the dot. you need to leave work at one thirty to allow for shit to happen because shit happens, but since you were over an hour late this morning because the person who informed you you would be changing your schedule from now on, purposely did not wake you up on his way out because he's all about tearing you down with told you so when you fail, and your lack of failure lately has got to be wearing on him. so your boss is not happy and your coworker wants these details seen to and since you were late you do not insist upon leaving when you need to. you are in the car 14 minutes after you should have been. you are dead flat on empty. it is hot, you are thirsty. you do the digging for change on the bottom of your purse on the way to the gas station, collecting some $4.25, out of which you splurge $0.75 on a diet coke. you pay with a handful of sticky hairy quarters, pump your gallon and a half and go. it is hot, you get shitty gas mileage, you wonder which is worse, bad aerodynamics or the air conditioner, you pick the aerodynamics and you sweat. you make the best time you can considering the fact neither your tires nor your brakes are actually safety features anymore. you do 80, 85 as long as you can, thinking rather ruefully about that four star safety rating, knowing the chances are a horrendous wreck would fail to kill you and just leave you maimed. the drive gives you time to reflect on your life. for the longest time you have been allowing your ex to tell you "well you just have to pay it" when there was no money, and you played the cashflow like a maestro until this month when he brought that crashing down. perhaps 'i'll hold you down and fuck you in the ass till you give me the money' was an idle threat, perhaps not; it's not like it hasn't happened before, and whether or not it's still in him to do that the words just the words took you threw you back a half decade and if you remeber correctly it really pisses him off when you scream and cry in pain, and these are the excuses the bottom line is you gave him the money you gave him more or less all of it and the checking account the whole cashflow juggling thing came crashing down and is most likely beyond rescue at this point and you allowed this, you did. and in two weeks you'll be free of this but this is small comfort in the face of total financial ruin, and it is two fourteen, and you have six minutes, and the traffic in front of you comes to a dead stop. you begin to freak just a little, your cell phone has been turned off, you are going to be late, and incidentally let's not forget the bit about life being in the toilet, not even for a moment. the coming to a stop you manage with practiced skill, many's the car you've nursed through needing work. the stupid bitch behind you whose car is not even old enough to need replacement tires or brakes has to swerve onto the shoulder to avoid hitting you and you think well at least i'm not stupid, it could be worse. the traffic the traffic the fucking traffic and your cell phone is off and it is two nineteen you are at least ten minutes out and the traffic and you think of your son standing outside the school waiting worrying and you start seriously crying like freakout crying. the traffic is constant until almost the exit, no particular reason for it except that people are fucking stupid and can't merge. off at the exit two twenty six still several traffic lights to get through, you pull up in front of the school at two twenty nine and where is your son? you creep slowly along, looking, an idiot motherfucking excursion driving bitch damn near backs into you fucking look before you back the truck up you stupid yuppie cunt and there he is, poor kid's been out there waiting, he gets in the car mommy why are you crying i said i was in terrible traffic and i was worried you would be scared.
i didn't mention any of the rest of it.
