Champagne Problems

The mother shuffles into the grocery store, past the automatic opening door, prepared to diligently follow her children’s wanderings, and she frowns. Her spine leans back to accommodate the infant strapped on her chest in a baby wrap, head and fists firmly nestled into the top of her flattened and low-hanging breasts, sleeping and drooling. Her forehead and under-eye circles are heavy-laden with lines of countless nights awake stacked on top of each other. Her son Max, short and skinny, freckled face and brown hair that he won’t let her comb anymore. Mabel, her little, stubborn second child with light brown hair wrapped neatly in a blue bow. Max dressed in the little Patagonia sweatshirt, Levi kids’ jeans, and the Nike air force 1’s. Mabel, in the dress with flowers from Macy’s and her favorite Adidas sneakers. Dylan, the newest addition, wearing a blue Macy’s cotton onesie that says, “daddy’s little prince”. Max starts running once his mother heads towards the shopping carts.

“Max, stay in my eyesight — “

He shoots off with his hands behind him like a make-believe cape and his messy brown hair is sticking up in all directions. Max escapes down the cereal aisle. Mabel pokes her index finger into a banana on display by the fruit section.

“Mae don’t touch that- we will get some in a second” the small girl pushes out her lower lip and lowers her hand away from the bananas in their pile.

The mother sighs and frowns at how consistent they are.

Max is 7 and Mabel is 5. Dylan, 9 months and growing so fast! They are the sweetest treasures in my life. My family is my world. My husband? Oh, he works downtown most days, yeah but the kids are so happy when he gets home at night. He’s the best dad.

The best dad.

Her elevator pitch runs through her mind over and over again.

They are everything to me.

They are everything.

“What will you eat for dinner tonight- you can’t just say bananas.” The mother looks at Mabel who takes a long pause, her eyes looking up at nothing.

“hmm. Can I do chicken nuggets?” She looks off towards the freezer section with one

foot in the air turning side to side. She picks her nose.

“Okay let’s do that, maybe Max is already there.” She hopes. Thinks about getting a bell for Max to wear. Maybe one of those big kid leashes. She tries to ignore the feeling of some of Dylan’s drool sliding down her breasts that his sleeping little dense body is crushing.

The mother grabs a shopping cart from the line of used carts, and Mabel silently starts her climb to get inside the cart, using the ridges of the sides of the cart to climb on, leaping up into it. The mother really wishes she wouldn’t do that every time they are at the store. She ignores her daughter settling into the cart and sitting Criss-cross applesauce, pretending she can’t see it, so she doesn’t have to fight to get her daughter out of the cart.

The last time they had a fight where she had to practically toss Mabel out of the cart while the little girl screamed and scratched off the skin of her arms with her little fingernails like a feral animal, Dylan attached to her chest, also screaming. People looked at them with pity and horror as if she was abusing her defenseless daughter who was bravely fighting for her life. She pretended the scars down her arms didn’t hurt anymore when Dylan grabbed them.

She always hates how people at the grocery store look at her. Like she was a bad mom or she needed pity.

Everyone wants to tell you how to raise your kids. As if you can control the shit they do. As if everything they do is my fault.

The mother pushes the cart with little Mabel sitting sweetly while watching the aisles and all the colors pass by from the vegetable and fruit sections entranced.

I wonder if we will have dinner tonight. Should I be lying to them about this? Does it matter?

They pass by the bananas, and she hands a pile to Mabel in the cart. Her little helper. She hopes she doesn’t start bruising the bananas with her fingers yet.

The mother bites her bottom lip, and her heart starts speeding up a little faster.

I wonder if the people in this store will remember seeing us tomorrow. Oh yeah, they looked perfectly normal family, picking up fruit, kid in the cart, they looked happy.

She only grabs bananas from the fruit and veggie section, normally she would grab brussels sprouts, spinach, the baby carrots Max will eat sometimes, blueberries, apples for lunches, and the pears that her husband likes. She thinks about the things she would normally grab, but today she doesn’t.

Mabel looks up from her entwining fingers at her mom,

“mommy, can we get some pears for daddy?”

“no honey, not today,” she responds and keeps the cart moving down to the next section. Mabel pouts.

For once, it’s going to be a cheap grocery store receipt.

She laughs silently. Still nervous, but the humor helps. Mabel doesn’t notice a thing, of course.

She makes it to the meat section, debating on whether she should plan ahead for the next week. Mabel is singing a song from Sunday school and playing with her hands, pretending to cast spells on people and the turkeys in the deli aisle. The mother looks at the lunch meat, normally she would have to grab that, but not today. She keeps moving and stops to pick up a small box of chicken nuggets from the freezer aisle.

“chickey nuggies chickey nuggies” Mabel sings with a dopey little grin on her face.

“Let’s get you some ice cream, what do you think?” The mother puts on her best fake smile. An excited squeal from the cart answers her. She diverts past the ice cream section, scanning the aisles at the intersection.

“Help mommy look for Max okay?”

“Okay. I don’t see him” she makes an effort of pushing her arms up on the sides of the cart and sits on her knees, looking back and forth dramatically. Mabel loves to be helpful. The mother’s eyes dart behind aisle displays and baskets of the toy balls, looking for wherever her silly son is hiding. Maybe he will find them first like he usually does. She circles back past the deli and meat section to the miscellaneous aisle with the random household supplies.

“Mommy, what is that?” Mabel looks around at the aisle and squints.

“That’s a flashlight silly, you use it to see in the dark.” She moves past the camping-type supplies.

“ohhh.What’s in this aisle?” Mabel’s little eyebrows rise, and she gazes up at the colors of candle displays.

“Some things mommy needs.” She rolls the cart down the aisle to the candles and aromatherapy section.

“Are you getting a new candle, mommy?” She points at the blue one that she has seen in mom’s bedroom before.

“No honey, I’m getting another smelly thing.”

She scans the essential oils for the right one, holding Dylan’s head while she leans over as her back and knees scream at her. Of course, it’s on the lowest shelf. After 5 minutes of turning over little bottles, she finds it, the green one. She looks to see if anyone is also in the aisle.

No one is there.

She grabs a little bottle of the green one. Wintergreen.

Sounds calming, peaceful.

The mother leans down and grabs six more of them. She discreetly checks the aisle again and quickly puts the bottles in the small pockets of the leggings she got on sale. She pushes the cart to the next aisle a little faster than normal. She feels the bottles rolling and clinking against her leg as she walks.

She smiles.

Next is the cleaning supplies aisle. She scans and locates the white Clorox half-gallon bottle and puts it at the bottom of the shopping cart. Mabel sings to herself about a princess and a fairy. She pushes the cart a little faster than before across to the other end of the aisle, mindful of the people who may be watching her.

No, not watching me. They won’t remember this. You’re just paranoid.

Dylan gives her a cute little yawn. She smiles down at him. She looks at the bleach bottle under the cart. The simple twist-off cap without a safety lock.

Anyone could get into that bottle. It’s so easy.

Next, the cart moves to the gift card aisle mixed with school supplies. She doesn’t grab anything.

“Max, I found you! Ha!” Mabel screams. Max appears from the bin on the outside of the aisle not far from the journals. On the mother’s chest, Dylan wakes up and starts screaming as well. She does a few side-to-side swinging motions, and he calms down a bit but keeps making upset little noises.

Her hands automatically go to her hips and her brows furrow, “I told you not to do that again! You have to say in my sight!” She tries to scold him, her motherly habits getting the best of her. She scowls. Max smiles. Not effective as usual. She pushes the cart back towards the freezer section again, knowing Max will follow this time. She sighs and pretends to ignore him.

“Tonight, we are going to have ice cream before dinner and you can’t tell daddy, it is going to be a secret.” She declares after a few moments of silent indignation. Max and Mabel both cheer, and they arrive in front of the ice cream shelves,

She looks down at them both with a bemused expression, “Now what kind of ice cream will you eat?” After five minutes of Mabel and Max arguing over what flavor they think is the best, they settle on mint chocolate. Just as their mother knew they would because it has always been their favorite.

She smiles at the thought, then feels a hint of uncertainty. She keeps her smile up for them and grabs a few pints of mint chocolate ice cream from the freezer. When she leans into the fridge, the cold air makes Dylan restless, and he fidgets on her chest.

After she hands the ice cream tub to Mabel still sitting in the cart picking her nose, she pauses and decides to head towards the wine aisle. She stops the cart when she reaches it, and the kids look up at her. The woman looks at the bottle for a moment and pauses. She slowly picks up a Dom Perignon and looks at the label.

She hasn’t had a sip of alcohol in…

What? Has it been 8 years since the first pregnancy test? The corners of her mouth lift slightly.

Here’s to new beginnings. She puts the bottle in the cart. For later.

They check out in the five items or less section for the first time ever. Max asks why they only got a few things today; usually, they have a heaping cart and a long receipt. His mother tells him that they aren’t going to need too many groceries this week.

Dylan’s drool is now gathering where her high-rise leggings meet her post-baby stomach, which her husband often looks at before mentioning how she needs to work on so that she can get back to the pre-baby body. Dylan seems to like sitting on her baby belly just fine when she holds him on top of it. She misses the pregnancy excuse that made her stomach permissible.

She drives home with the three children in the back, strapped in their car seats, shouting to each other about where Max was hiding while Dylan shrieks from his separation anxiety. She ignores them with her hands relaxed on the wheel and smiles for herself. The little bottles rattle against her thighs as she pushes down the brake pedal. The drool is drying.

The hard part is almost done. Almost there.

They arrive home and she releases the kids from their car seats and returns the indignant infant back into her baby wrap, and she wipes the snot and tears off of his face with a tissue when she gets into the house. While the kids play in the living room, the mother gets the treasured bottles out of her pockets. All seven of them.

Once the grocery bags are inside, once the kids are in the living room with the Disney channel blaring, the mother removes the caps from all the bottles. First, she uses a ridged knife to saw the top lids with the little holes off of each bottle. She gets the first top off after a few trial-and-error attempts in which she almost slices her fingers off, and then she is able to pry off the rest easily. Dylan looks up at his mom as his body is jostled back and forth in the wrap on her chest while she saws off the lids. While Dylan falls back asleep on her chest after all the movement, she opens the tub of ice cream. She places three generous scoops of ice cream in two bowls. Max and Mabel are fighting over a toy in the next room.

Then she carefully places a few spoonsful of ice cream into a little plastic bowl with a shaking hand. Her jawline hardens. The children are screaming in the next room. Her lips tighten and sweat beads on her forehead. Breathing gets more difficult.

She thinks about the moments that led her here. The times Robbie looked at her body with pity and mentioned “losing the baby weight.” When he gave her the elliptical machine in the basement that she didn’t ask for as a birthday gift. She thinks about the nights that he didn’t come home and said that he was stuck in the office. But next time he will do better. She remembers when he said that she didn’t need birth control, they would just be extra careful. And when she tried to get him to wear a condom, he said it felt better without one. It’s not as natural. Babies are so cute anyways. She thinks about how he talked to her catholic mother behind her back when she worked up the courage to tell him that she wanted an abortion this time.

“They will be your everything,” they said. She always wanted kids ever since her mom handed her the first baby doll. Right? “When you grow up and have children of your own…” they all said to her. “You will make an amazing mother one day,” they said. “When you get married and have kids…” they said.

He said, “of course we don’t have to have kids unless you want to. We will wait till you’re ready.”

“Don’t leave him” her friends said when she told them, shaking their heads. “You’re a mother, you can’t do that to your children.”

“Isn’t being a mother the most amazing experience? Don’t you feel like a real woman now?” Sarah said to her one day at lunch.

Robbie joked last month, about the next one. How she needed to get her body ready to make the next one.

She put three more scoops into another bowl. Just for you.

She picks up the essential oil bottle and begins to pour its contents into all but one of the bowls. Then does the same with the next six. When the kids finish the ice cream, she will be ready.

Their mother will be ready to move the children once their hearts stop beating toward the opened bottle of bleach with the top off and a few cups of bleach flushed down the toilet. There will be some bleach left in the mostly empty portion cup and some drops of bleach on the hardwood floor around it. Around them. On their lips.

When their father gets home much later, he will find them with bleach in their mouths and on their hands.

And he will ask in shock, “Where were you?”

And their mother will answer, “I was on the elliptical machine” with tears streaming down the circles under her eyes, her voice raw from screaming after she found them. A few days later, the woman who is no longer a mother will leave him because of unimaginable grief and take only a purse with her. A purse with a bottle of Dom Perignon inside. She will leave behind an empty pint of ice cream on the kitchen table.

The cashier at the grocery store will never forget how she scanned the bar code and placed the tired mother’s bottle of Clorox bleach in the plastic bag and waved goodbye to the two little children as they skipped out of the sliding doors that day before the tragic accident happened that made a mother childless.