Our Life Together

School Days

"Mom! Hurry up!" Gabe yells "We're gonna be late!"

"We'll be fine." I walk down with Liv and all her daycare stuff "We have plenty of time to drop her off and still get to school."

"But we can't be late! If we're late then my friends might not be in our group. I can't go on a field trip with annoying people."

"Trust me.  It's a bunch of 7 year olds. They'll be annoying either way."

"Are you sure you don't want me to go?" Brad acknowledges my last comment "You can go to the office instead."

"No, I wanna go. This place sounds cool." I grab some coffee and meet Gabe where he is already waiting in the car. Brad walks out with Olivia and puts her car seat in before I drive away. She cries almost the whole way so Gabe helps me by holding her hands.

"I'll be right back, DON'T do anything stupid." I quickly grab Olivia's car seat and carry her into the day care. Since I have the car running, I spend most of the time looking back to make sure Gabe didn't get any ideas.

I get back to the car and he quickly sneaks to the back. He laughs about something but I choose to ignore it, probably not wanting to know what it is.

We get to the school a few minutes later. I follow Gabe as he practically runs up to his classroom. The teacher walks over to us the second we walk in.

"Hi, Mrs. Pitt. This is your list of students." She smiles and looks at Gabe "Are you excited?" He nods his head before running over to where his friends are.

I stand next to the rest of the parents watching as they play.  We talk for a little about everything before we're finally ready to leave.

"Come on, mom!"  Gabe pulls my arm "They have the creepy stuff over here."

"Boys are so weird."  I mumble under my breath and follow.  Gabe and his friends are already holding up the fake spiders and other bugs.

"Let's scare her."  Gabe tells them thinking I won't hear.  I stand behind them so they can try.

"Hey, mom."  He walks over pointing towards a toy display "There's something Olivia might like over there."

I walk over looking at my surroundings knowing what this is.  They put whatever fake bug they decided on over here somewhere.  I see it in the corner on my eye and act scared when they throw it in front of me.

"Oh my God!  What is that!?!?"  I yell.

"Relax, mom."  Gabe walks over to pick it up "It's just a bug." He then decides it's okay to throw it in my hair.

"Gabriel!  Get it out!"  I scream "That's not funny."

He jumps on my back and digs around in my hair, clearly messing it up, and finally gets it out. 

"It's not real."  He hands it to me "See?  Calm down."

"It's very known that the whole time."  I put it back on the display thing "I'm an actress.  I know how to act scared."

He mocks me before begging me to buy him every weird thing he's sees.

"Pick something out for your brothers.  They always get you something."  I look through the piles of toys Liv might like and pick something out that she can stick in her mouth.  That's all she does right now anyway.

"I think we need all of this."  I turn around to see Gabe holding a pile of toys smiling from ear to ear "We'll love it."

"Fine."  I grab it from him.  We pay for everything and then finally go do what we came here for.  The caves.

Gabe and his friends run ahead of me, luckily not destroying anything, and wait for me inside.  I catch up to them and let them walk ahead and play.

"That thing looks dumb." One of his friends points to a crystal "What happens if you touch it?"

"I don't know."  Another answers "We aren't crystal scientists."

"Mom!"  Gabe yells "What happens if you touch these?"

"They stop growing.  Don't do it."

The walk about from that idea and go closers to the middle.

"When are we gonna see all the bugs?" Gabe asks them "I wanna catch a real one to take home."

"You should try to scare your little brother with them!" His friend suggests "He'd freak out."

"That would be awesome!"  The fourth one adds "You have to do it."

"Okay, help me find some." Gabe says.  I act like I haven't heard them and continue to look around.  One of his friends runs up to him with a huge ass spider in his hands. 

"This is perfect!" He says handing it over "You just need something to put it in."

"I know,"  Gabe looks back at me "Can I have the little bag thing from my lunch?  I ate all the fish crackers earlier." 

I hand it to him, still acting oblivious to the situation and watch as he shoves the bug in the bag.  He looks over to see if I noticed and I act interested in the crystals.

We walk around a few more minutes yet, and then the boys decide they want to play on the playground stuff.  I sit at the bench with some of the other parents and watch them all.

"Okay, boys, we gotta go!"  I get them all together to walk back.  They complain about having to leave and eventually fall asleep on the bus ride home.

"Gabe, you gotta get up."  I nudge him "I can't carry you."

We get out to the car to find out that Brad already picked up Olivia, and all I need to do is go home.  Gabe falls asleep again, so I have Brad carry him up to his bed once I get home. 

I walk in the house to see Liv sleeping, Jack and Liam watching TV, and my dinner waiting for me on the counter.