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“Cool. Thanks, Mom.”
“You’re welcome.”
By the time I got off work and journeyed into her bedroom, Kyra had a pile of stuffed animals and a separate pile of dolls. All the boxes were ripped open. “I wanted to open them and make sure there wasn’t anything missing.”
“Makes perfect sense,” I said. “You are my daughter.”
Kyra rolled her eyes, then explained, “The boxes are ripped and look yucky. Can we get storage bins maybe?”
“Look at you, motivated to organize,” I said proudly.
“Well…” Kyra waited. When I didn’t say anything, she asked again, “Can we get storage bins? Please?”
“What brought this on?” I asked. She’d never been interested in cleaning her room, much less getting rid of or storing old toys.
She bit her lower lip. “The girls at the dance school all said they don’t play with dolls anymore. They said stuffed animals are for babies.”
“Oh,” I replied. My baby was being pressured to grow into a full-fledged teen.
Her eyes were a bit misty.
“Yes, we can get storage bins. You want to go now?” I offered. “We can pick up dinner on the way home.”
“Really?” she asked excitedly.
“Really,” I replied.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“You’re welcome.” I shouted to Max, “Get dressed, Max. We’re going shopping.”
“Ah, man!” he groaned from his room.
At the local bargain retail store, we piled four huge plastic storage bins with lids into the shopping cart. Max wanted to push the cart at first, but I scolded that he would not be able to see where he was going. He pouted for the rest of the
shopping trip. Not that he hadn’t already been pouting, just more so now. He didn’t believe me when I said I couldn’t see where I was going, either. He thought it was because he was short and just a kid. No matter what I said, he didn’t believe me, nor did he perk up. I changed the subject by asking Kyra about her room.
“Did you get rid of all the empty and half-empty water bottles that were all over your room?” I asked.
“Yep,” she said.
“What about all the scraps of paper?”
“Yep.”
“Mom…” Max’s warning came a little too late.
I felt the shopping cart ram into something, then heard a male say, “Umph” as he was reamed with the cart loaded with storage bins. I heard a loud thunk as he fell. “Ow! What the…”
The voice was a little too familiar for comfort, but Kyra and I immediately shifted to the front of the cart near Max to see what had happened.
Ray was sprawled on the aisle floor in an awkward position. Kyra and I covered our mouths in dismay and embarrassment. Max, on the other hand, burst out laughing, pointing at Ray with one hand while holding his stomach with the other.
Ray sat up, then looked briefly from me to Kyra. Then he glared at Max. “Well, I’m glad you find this funny, Max,” he said sarcastically. “I never thought a shopping cart would almost kill me. I always thought it would be a massive raging fire.”
I finally came to my senses and extended a hand to help him up. “I’m so sorry, Ray. I really am. I wasn’t paying attention, and it’s bad enough I couldn’t see because of the bins.”
He accepted my hand and used it to pull himself up. Zing, zing, zing.
