License to Shop (7 page)

Anna, blissfully unaware
of the puppy drama, was still singing when we got to the school an
hour before the school day officially began and saw sleepy parents
dropping off sleepy kids next to the three big school buses that
would take us to the space museum.

The kids, all third, fourth, and fifth graders,
know the drill for field trips. Line up by your teacher, get
checked off for signed permission slips, don’t wander off even if
the empty playground is calling to you. Anyone who didn’t follow
these rules didn’t go on the field trip. By third grade, all the
kids knew better than to disobey even one of these rules. No one
wanted to miss the field trip. Especially not to the space
museum.

Field trips to the space
museum have their own special torments. So many things to touch.
Big, open spaces where excited little voices multiply, shatter, and
echo. If the teacher is wise, like Anna’s teacher Mrs. Glenn, she
carries a big bottle of aspirin for the chaperones.

Since I had gone with
Ryan’s third grade class, I knew that there would be more study of
how far parents and teachers could be pushed than there would be of
the wonders of space itself.

If every parent were
required to watch their child on a field trip, schools themselves
might be abolished. There is nothing that speaks so eloquently of
the strictures of prison than the ecstasy of freedom on a child’s
face when he or she spills from the bus and races pell mell for the
joys of exploring by touching and doing.

As long as we were lucky,
though, and no one knocked over the fake rocket ship, or tried to
liberate a moon rock, we’d all come home with happy smiles. Field
trips were a day out of the classroom for the kids, and they
appreciated it as only prisoners can appreciate being let out of
prison when their sentence was served—with as much disregard for
the rules as possible. Which may speak to why the recidivism rate
in prisons is so high. “The devil made me do it” is probably a
popular excuse for both sets of inmates.

Anna saw her best friend
Sarah, and ran to greet her. The two girls ran off to join the
rapidly growing permission-check line at the front of the third
grade bus. I caught sight of my best friend Deb, Sarah’s mom. She
had a backpack slung over one shoulder, and was not dressed in her
police uniform.

“
Are you going to be a
chaperone? I thought you had to work?”

“
Mrs. Glenn called this
morning to ask me to step in for Sarah Lawson. Her morning sickness
is so terrible, she was afraid she’d be puking the whole
trip.”

“
Hard to puke and keep an
eye on the kids,” I murmured sympathetically. “I’m glad you’re
coming.”

“
Me too. The Chief wasn’t
thrilled, but all his kids had had Mrs. Glenn for third grade, so
he didn’t want to answer to her for not giving me the day off.” She
grinned. Sometimes there is an advantage to living in a small town
where even the Chief of Police has to bow to the wishes of the
local third-grade teacher.

“
Gotta love Mrs. Glenn.
She keeps us all in line.”

“
That she does,” Deb
agreed. “When she called, I thought I would be subbing in for you.
You didn’t leave the puppy home alone, did you?”

“
Seth took her to
work.”

“
Good for him.” She
laughed. “I remember the first time I left Devil home alone. He was
six months, and he chewed up my carpet near the door.”

“
The carpet?” I tried to
picture our puppy chewing up the carpet, but then I stopped. I
didn’t want to picture it.

We watched Bianca, the PTA
president, stroll in with her children. She had a girl in third
grade with Anna and Sarah, and a boy in fifth grade. I groaned when
I saw her backpack. “Uh oh, Bianca is a chaperone, too. We’ll have
to behave.”

“
I’m not the one who
promised to deliver her mother to the ladies of the decoration
committee,” Deb said piously.

“
Oh crap,” I muttered. “I
better call her right now, before I forget.”

Keeping one eye on the
line of children waiting for the teacher to double check permission
slips, I called my mother to warn her about the addition to our
family, and ask her if she’d talk to the PTA sub-committee, like
I’d promised Bianca.

“
Hi, Mom.”

“
Is something
wrong?”

“
No. I just wanted to
touch base with you about your visit.”

“
Don’t go to any trouble
for me.”

Right. I wasn’t going to
fall for that one again. “I’m not,” I lied. “But the president of
our PTA heard about your talk at the library and she was hoping you
could speak to our PTA decorations subcommittee. I told her I’d
ask.”

Her question was
automatic. “What do they pay?”

“
Ummm.
Compliments.”

Silence.

“
Mom? You still
there?”

Sighing.

She was going to refuse. I
tried to think of a persuasive argument. “I know, I know. But any
money we pay you comes from our operating budget and means less for
the kids.”

Silence.

I caved. “Fine. I’ll tell
Bianca you can’t do it.”

More sighing. “No need. My
grandchildren’s welfare is worth a free talk. But please, let’s
keep it to thirty minutes and no longer.”

“
Not a problem.” For me.
Maybe for Bianca, but I had no intention of telling my mother that.
Let her hash that out with Bianca. I had a feeling they talked the
same language, one that I could never interpret quite
right.

“
Molly, I don’t like to be
difficult, you know.”

“
I know.” Well, I knew she
didn’t like to be difficult, even though she always was difficult.
“The kids are looking forward to seeing you.” This wasn’t really
true, as I had forgotten to tell them the news in light of the
puppy news. But some things you simply never tell a grandmother,
not even a grandmother who wasn’t difficult.

“
My plane gets in at 3:00
p.m. Is that a convenient time?”

“
Yes. I can swing by and
get you after I pick the kids up at school.”

“
I could just take a
taxi.”

“
Nonsense, Mom. We have
plenty of room for you and your suitcase.” I added a mental note to
clean out the car.

“
Wonderful. Those taxis
charge too much for short distances.”

“
They do.” I had put it
off long enough. “Mom, one more thing.”

“
What? Is someone sick? I
have some of those disposable surgical masks. Should I bring a
few?”

“
If you want. But no one
is sick in our house. It’s good news, not bad news.” I made my
voice sound happy. “We got a puppy yesterday.”

Silence.

“
What breed?”

“
Mutt
surprise.”

“
Oh dear. I hope it isn’t
a biter. Or a barker. Remember that neighbor we had with the dog
that barked at every squirrel in the yard?”

“
She doesn’t bark at all.”
I didn’t add, “As far as I know.” We’d had the puppy less than
twenty-four hours. Maybe it wouldn’t be an issue. Maybe.

“
Can’t wait to see you,
sweetheart,” she sang out.

I saw Bianca swooping down
on me. “Same here,” I answered dutifully.

Bianca reached me just as
I put my phone away. “Have you spoken to your mother yet,
Molly?”

“
She said she’d love to
address the decorations committee,” I said, embellishing the truth
a bit, and pretending as if I hadn’t just secured my mother’s
consent two seconds before Bianca asked about it.

“
Perfect.” A tiny frown
creased her forehead. “You know. Maybe I should ask all the PTA
moms to show up. The decorations group is only six people. Your mom
deserves a bigger crowd.”

Deb stepped in to rescue
me. She said, “We have a big Girl Scouts meeting that day, Bianca,
remember?”

Bianca shook her head, as
if that shouldn’t be a problem. “We’ll combine the events. Give
your mom the audience she deserves. I’ll make it
happen.”

She walked off, obviously
not needing my permission. Or my mother’s.

Deb just laughed and gave
me a what-can-you-do-about-Bianca shrug.

I shrugged back. But it
burned me a little that my mother would probably approve. She liked
a big audience.

If you want to know how many ways there are to
say, “Stop that right now,” just go on a field trip with a bunch of
third-graders.

On the plus side, if you
want to see true wonder, watch the faces of third-graders when they
get to see what its like to wear a space helmet. All the moms had
cell phones out taking pictures to torment their kids for years
with.

They hadn’t had this
exhibit when I chaperoned Ryan’s trip four years ago, so I
dutifully let Anna and Sarah persuade me to try it. I was a little
dubious when the attendant handed me a sanitary wipe and instructed
me to wipe off the inside of the helmet and toss the wipe in the
big garbage can before I lowered it over my head. But then I
shrugged. How can you call it an adventure if there’s no risk of
catching cold, flu, or pink eye?

From a mystery shopper’s
perspective, I would have given the exhibit a perfect 10 score. The
exhibit was set up to cleverly allow everyone to experience wearing
the helmet, while still allowing the line to move along at a good
pace. The helmet was suspended over a wide set of shallow stairs.
Depending on your height, you climbed up to where you could stick
your head into the helmet, and then pulled it down to settle on
your shoulders.

It was spooky. I could
hear my breath, and I could see everyone milling about, including
Anna, who was wildly waving at me. Somehow, though, instead of
seeing everyone in the museum, they were all floating in a field of
stars.

I absolutely felt like I
was in space. I resolved to have Seth bring Ryan and his friend
Elliot to the museum as soon as I could. All three of them were
geeks, who would want to try out this exhibit.

I liked feeling protected
from the noise and drama going on around me by the big helmet, and
I was almost sad when a chime sounded and I heard a gentle reminder
to, “Please let the next person in line experience this
exhibit.”

When I rejoined the girls,
they were all trying to persuade Deb to try it. I joined in, and we
all cheered when she reluctantly got into line. I was delighted
that I’d remembered to charge the cell phone, so I got a great
picture of her look of wonder. I could use that for babysitting
blackmail in the future, I was sure.

As the girls ran off to
get into another line, this one to try seeing what it felt like to
be weightless, via a trampoline and a harness, Deb asked me, “How’s
the job hunt going?”

“
I have the second
interview tomorrow.”

“
I’ll miss having you as
backup,” she said mournfully.

“
You may still have me as
backup. After all, I have Anna and Ryan to worry about. My personal
days may coincide with school days off. If so, Sarah will always be
welcome over at our house.”

“
You know I’ll take you up
on it.”

“
Of course, the price of
that offer is that you share the sick-day babysitter names and
numbers with me.”

She laughed. “Maybe.” Then
she said, “Are you thinking of getting Anna into the afterschool
program? Sarah would love that.”

I nodded. “It seems like
the most convenient for me, plus she’ll be much less anxious if she
knows Sarah is there.”

“
Have you put your
application in?”

“
No. I don’t even have a
job yet.”

“
There are only so many
slots. You need to put your application in ASAP.”

“
Thanks for letting me
know.”

I wondered what else I
needed to know that I didn’t know yet, but I couldn’t think how to
ask Deb in a way she could actually answer me. Working moms are so
used to being working moms, they don’t really know what needs to be
done since they’ve already been there, done that.

As expected, the field
trip was a blast. But after a day herding third-graders through the
wonders of space, I was tired by the time we reached the part of
the day I dreaded: the space museum gift shop.

Bianca’s daughter, Sabrina, led the souvenir
charge, as usual, with the cry, “I want a rocket ship, and a key
chain, and a moon rock!”

The rest of us chaperone
moms glanced at each other and sighed. Bianca’s husband was
president of the local bank, which I guess meant he made a lot of
money. Bianca’s only job seemed to be to spend as much of it as she
could. Or maybe it seemed that way to me.

I saw Anna looking at me,
a worried frown on her face. “Don’t worry, Mom,” she whispered. “I
know we can’t afford anything until you find out if you have the
job.”

Ah, the joys of having a
worrywart child. “One thing, under five dollars, isn’t going to
bankrupt us,” I said, hoping that was true.