Not Ready for Mom Jeans (17 page)

“Um, laundry, scrubbing the microwave, lint-rolling the couch, and looking on the Internet to see if our neighbors are sex predators.”

As I said it, my inner voice shouted,
YOU ARE A LOSER. LO-SER. DID YOU HEAR ME? GET A LIFE, YOU DORK. HAVING A CHILD HAS TURNED YOU INTO YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW.

“Oh, exciting. Do you think you could tear yourselves away for a trip to Lake Kilgore?”

“You guys want to go to Lake Kilgore this weekend?” I asked.

“Sure, why not? I’d like to get everyone together before I start feeling yucky. That is, if you guys can tear yourselves away from your exciting plans,” she said.

“I don’t know, it would be pretty difficult … I guess we can come,” I said, and laughed.

“… shots of steroids in my fanny …” Mule Face’s voice wafted into my office.

“So, this weekend, let’s do it,” I said loudly, in an attempt to speak over Mule Face’s story.

“OK, great. Your dad and I were thinking about renting the old cottage from Mrs. Sweet.”

“You mean the one we used to rent when we were little?”

“Wouldn’t it be cool?” my mom asked.

“I guess so. Do you think Mrs. Sweet updated the place? I remember it being somewhat rustic, to put it nicely.”

“Eh, who cares? It’ll be fun.”

I immediately pictured Sam’s brain exploding when she sees that we have to share one bathroom.

“Fun? Yes, it will be,” I said.

Friday, May 16

“Is it Route 4 or Route 173?” Jake asked as he clutched the steering wheel.

“Uh, I don’t know,” I said, and Jake’s head snapped like a rubber band toward me. “Route 4,” I said quickly, and prayed I was right and we wouldn’t end up in Iowa instead of Wisconsin. “I forgot how pretty the drive is up here,” I said lightly.

“I have no idea how pretty anything is right now. My head is pounding and none of these jerks will let me change lanes,” he said. “Thank God,” he said as he successfully wedged our car in between two others on the parking lot that was the highway.

Apparently, every other person in the Chicagoland area decided to drive up to Lake Kilgore this weekend.

Goody.

Also, Sara decided that today would be a good day to let us know
exactly
how much she hates cars, her car seat, her new shiny Whoozit toy, and me.

She didn’t stop screaming the entire way up to the lake.

At some point after we passed mile marker 83, I got out of the car (on the highway, which should give an indication of how awesome the traffic was) and plopped into the backseat. I tried to shove everything from a bottle to a pacifier into her mouth, but to no avail. She wasn’t having any of it. So Jake and I drove with our screaming child in the back for the next two hours before we finally arrived in the town of Lake Kilgore.

“Why are there so many bikers here?” Jake asked as he surveyed the motorcycles zooming by our car.

“I don’t know. I don’t remember it being a biker town. It doesn’t look that bad,” I said as I eyed the swarms of leather and bandannas. “Maybe there’s some kind of bike rally or something.”

(For the sake of accuracy and proper reporting, it was more like, “MAYBE THERE’S … SHHH, SARA … DON’T YOU WANT YOUR PACI? … ARE YOU HUNGRY? … SOME KIND OF … WHAT’S WRONG, BABY GIRL? … BIKE RALLY … PLEASE STOP CRYING … THIS WEEKEND.”)

“What road are we supposed to turn on?”

“Um … Bloomfield Road,” I said as I checked the directions.

Jake peered at every street sign as he drove ten miles an hour, which did not make the bikers very happy, so they whizzed by us and occasionally gave us the finger.

I rolled down my window, stuck out my hand, and yelled, “RIGHT BACK AT YA!”

“Nice,” Jake said.

“Three hours in a car with a screaming baby and I’ve turned into Gary Busey,” I muttered.

“Bloomfield Road!” Jake said triumphantly. At least, that’s what I think he said. All I could really make out was “B … eld … oad!” since I was still deaf from Sara’s screams, which resembled the sounds of a lamb being butchered.

He turned the car down a gravel road, peppered with beautiful lake homes.

“Oh! Look!” I said as I caught a glimpse of the shimmering lake. “We’re going to have
such
a good weekend,” I said to Sara, who responded by turning a new shade of purple.

I opened the window a little more and stuck my face out. “The houses look like little gingerbread houses!”

“3789 … where are you?” Jake muttered.

I got excited when he slowed down in front of a huge, palatial beach cottage. “Is this it? I don’t remember it being so big! It’s amazing.”

“3758, no, that’s not it. Here it is! 3789. It’s …” He trailed off.

Not exactly what I would call a resort home. One level. White peeling paint. Plastic flamingos dotting the front yard.

“Why is that woman with purple hair waving at us?” Jake asked, and pointed to a woman standing on the front porch.

“Oh God. That’s Mrs. Sweet. I can’t believe she looks the same as she did twenty years ago.”

Jake pulled the car up the long driveway and parked. “I’ll stay here with Sara, why don’t you go talk to the owner,” he said as he stretched his arms over his head.

“Good idea,” I said as I leapt out of the car, away from my screaming child.

“Hi, Mrs. Sweet,” I said as I walked toward her. Her expression changed to one of confusion.

“Who are you?” she said, and furrowed her penciled-in eyebrow.

“Clare Finnegan,” I said as I surveyed her false eyelashes.

“Who?”

“Clare. Finnegan. My parents rented this place this weekend. They’re coming up in an hour or two.”

“Oh. I don’t know any Finnegans.” The poor woman looked totally confused.

Then, I remembered.

“Flannagan,” I said, and her face lit up.

“Oh yes! Flannagan! Come right in,” she said, and waved me into the cottage. Even though my dad’s family rented the place every year for like twenty years or something, Mrs. Sweet still thought we were “the Flannagans.”

“Probably looks the same as you remember it! I kept all of the original furniture,” she said proudly.

It was not something to be proud of.

The first thing that hit me was the smell of mildew and old, musty furniture. Clearly, cleaning or Scotchgarding the furniture hadn’t been done in, oh, a hundred years or so. The next thing I noticed was a six-foot-tall statue of a knight in a suit of armor in the kitchen.

“That’s Charles,” Mrs. Sweet said, and jerked her thumb in the knight’s direction.

“Um, great. And the bedrooms?” I said as I walked toward the back of the cottage.

“Three bedrooms just back there.”

I peeked my head into the master suite. Well, OK, “master suite.” Towels tacked over cracked windowpanes and a king-sized bed with mattress hard enough to crack vertebrae.

“I redecorated that second bedroom,” Mrs. Sweet called as I peeked my head into a bedroom decorated with a wolf theme. A giant mural of a wolf killing what appeared to be a rabbit hung on the wall and the twin bed was adorned with sheets depicting wolf slumber.

I stifled a laugh and peeked my head into what would be Jake’s, Sara’s, and my bedroom. It looked somewhat normal, until I caught sight of the bed.

“Where’s the mattress?” I said to Mrs. Sweet as I pointed to the bed, which only had a metal frame and a full-sized box spring.

“Oh, my last renter burned it down while smoking in bed. Good thing I was able to save the box spring,” she said, and smiled at me, pumpkin orange lipstick on her teeth.

“Good thing,” I said, and tried to decide how to break the news to Jake we would be sleeping on metal coils all weekend.

“Oh, and you probably have one of those cell phones, right?” Mrs. Sweet asked.

“Yes.”

“Good. There’s no phone line here. Never has been.” Mrs. Sweet adjusted her purple hair a bit.

“Oh, right, I forgot.”

I stifled a laugh as I remembered how, in the days before cell phones, phone calls for us would go to Mrs. Sweet’s house. She would stand on the front doorstep of her house, located next door, and ring a cowbell and shout, “FLANNAGANS! YOU HAVE A PHONE CALL!” loud enough to awaken the dead three states over.

“How old’s your little one?” she asked.

“Four months,” I said.

“Oh, well, there’s a swing set in the backyard.” She pointed out the window.

I leaned forward and peered out of the dusty glass. I saw a swing set, oh, 98 or 99 percent covered in rust, with a very dangerous thorn bush planted right behind the swings.

Since Sara isn’t up-to-date on her tetanus shots and I do not wish to spend my weekend picking thorns out of her skull, I think we’ll pass on the swing set.

After Mrs. Sweet left, Jake and I started to unpack all of the crap we brought. Sara, thankfully, had worn herself out and passed out in her car seat. As Jake and I were unloading the travel swing we bought specially for this weekend, seeing as how Sara turns into Captain Howdy from
The Exorcist
whenever she doesn’t have access to a swing, we heard my parents’ car pull up the driveway.

I smiled and waved my hand. “Hello all!”

Sam was the first to get out of the car.

“What. The. Hell.” She yanked off her sunglasses. “Is. This?” she said, and surveyed the cottage.

“Our beautiful vacation cottage for the weekend!” I said, and smiled widely.

Oh, this is going to be good. So, so good,
I thought.

I might even forgive her for asking me if I’m allowed to wear two-piece bathing suits now that I have a kid. (For the record: I’m terrified to try on my bikini. I’m afraid no fabric would be visible, for all of the stretched-out white skin would encompass it like a volcano swallowing a tiny pebble.)

“No. Hell no. This place is disgusting,” she said, and wrinkled her nose.

“It’ll be great,” my dad said, and placed his hand on her shoulder.

“Are you serious—” She started to shriek when my dad squeezed her shoulder. “OW! What? Fine,” she grumbled as he gave her a
shut the hell up now
look. She snapped open her cell phone and started dialing.

“Aw, it looks just the same, doesn’t it?” my mom said.

“Sure,” I lied.

“You’ll see it’s
exactly
the same,” Jake chimed from the trunk of our car.

“Yeah…. Yeah…. For sure…. He is so weird…. Can you say freak?” Sam droned into her phone as she wandered inside.

Jake and I grinned at each other and he held his hand up in the air and started to count down.

Five … four … three … two …

That’s all it took.

“MO-OM,” Sam shrieked from inside.

“Jackpot!” Jake yelled as he pumped his arms into the air.

My dad glared at both of us as he walked in the door.

“Sam, I told you not to complain this …” His voice disappeared as he walked in.

“So, Mom. Feel good to get away?” I said as I put my arm around her shoulder.

“Yep.” She nodded firmly, but her voice was soft.

“When’s Mark coming up?” I asked as we walked toward the cottage.

“He’s coming up for the day tomorrow. He has to work tonight. One of his Asian Web sites is going live, so he’ll be working until late,” she said.

The three of us walked inside together.

“Dad, I refuse to sleep in a room that has wolves all over. Who effing decorated this place? I—” Sam stopped as we walked in the door.

“Like your room?” Jake asked her with a grin.

“At least you have a mattress,” I quickly added.

“What are you talking about?” my mom asked.

“Nothing,” I said with a smirk.

“Wait a freaking second,” Sam said as her eyes tore from one corner of the room to another. “Where the eff is the television?”

“Oh yeah, didn’t I tell you? There isn’t one,” I said sweetly.

Sam’s eyes widened. She opened her mouth. Jake, my dad, and I all glowered at her. She closed her mouth and narrowed her eyes and stomped into the Wolf Room, slamming the door.

“WAAAAAA!” Sara wailed as she woke up.

“Thanks, Sam! You rule!” I called through the closed door as I picked up Sara.

“I hate you! I want to punt all of you!” she called back.

“Punt us? Like a football?” my dad said, confused.

“Apparently.” Jake shrugged.

“Hike! Hike!” I called through the door to the Wolf Room.

After we unpacked, we went out to dinner. My mom wanted to go back to a restaurant my parents used to take us to when we were little, the Red Caboose.

I used to call it The Funnest Restaurant Ever, since it had about twenty different video games, three or four pool tables, and one of those bowling games with a hockey puck. It was the most happening place in Lake Kilgore.

The five and a half of us walked in and the first things we noticed were (1) it was completely empty, except for three drunks at the bar, and (2) the video games had all been replaced by slot machines.

We stood next to the front door, huddled together, until my mom stepped forward.

“Let’s sit here,” she said, and pointed to an empty table.

We all silently stared at her.

“This looks good,” she said, and we realized she was serious about wanting to eat here.