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Skylar follows me to my room and insists we continue playing, but I just want to sleep. Jet lag, emotional disturbance, work…
These are things a simple nine-hour sleep can solve.
Skylar, however, is perfectly content with playing with my limp body, so we work out some form of compromise where she uses my torso as a sailboat.
I’m far too exhausted to even feel the weight press down upon me, and so I drift to sleep, feeling more like a dad than a mother.
It's not unusual for mothers to assume the role of being their children’s personal rollercoasters. But this was Thomas’s thing when he still lived with us, and he did it without so much as a complaint, even though he was already tired of the family.
This is the only way I can spend time with Skylar, and yes, I’m still complaining…especially when my sleep doesn’t last long.
“Mommy! Your phone.” Skylar’s tiny hands can’t hold the weight of the device over me for long, so it falls off and lands smack dab on my face, adding to the chaos in my mind apart from the blaring ringtone.
I’m forced to rise from my slumber and feel like a vampire being coerced to wake up in the daytime.
“Well, thank you, darling,” I muttered sarcastically and snatched the phone from my face. I’m sure there’s going to be a bruise there.
“Hello?” I mumble.
Skylar, low-key, mimics me in the background. I used to think she was making fun of me, but I soon realized that children learn better through modeling than any other method.
Maybe she’ll learn to be a bossy ass woman, just like her mommy.
“Ma’am, the New Jersey refinery construction. We’re facing some problems.” Gretchen’s voice sounds panicked, and I would have been worried if this wasn’t how she almost always sounded.
“Yah think?” I grunt and begin pushing myself up.
“Yes m?”
“That was a rhetorical question.” I slash through her unnecessary answer with a sigh. “I’ll be in the office in thirty minutes. It hasn’t burned down yet, so trust me. You’re already doing a good job.” I assure her, but even she knows that’s a setup.
I’d say something like that first, and then once I see the problems we’re facing, all hell might break loose.
That’s not my fault. I wouldn’t criticize them if I genuinely didn’t see something wrong with their work. I’m literally too tired to shout unnecessarily.
“Mommy?” I hear the shrill voice of my daughter when I push myself up.
“Yeah, baby?”
“Sleep.” She points to the bed and frowns up at me.
It might be for the wrong reasons, but she’s right. I need to sleep. But how can I when there’s a problem with a project we just launched?
“I know, baby. I’ll try to when I come back. Mommy won’t be long.” I hope I mean that I genuinely wouldn’t stay so long.
I walk into the shower, take a bath, and stop in front of the full-length mirror.
I look like a dry-aged clump of the nastiest part of beef.
My eyes are all soggy, and the dark bags underneath them keep getting heavier. The wrinkles on my face aren’t too noticeable. I need never to smile or frown because it’s not a pretty sight when I do.
I lock the door to prevent Skylar’s intrusion and undress myself completely. It’s been a long since I have admired myself in the mirror, and that’s because Thomas had made sure the activity felt pointless to me.
Whatever my face threw at me for my lack of sleep, my body compensated doubly.
There’s flesh in every good corner and crevasse. I’m a little voluptuous, so, there’s a little belly fat, but nothing too exaggerated. It doesn’t make me feel any less insecure, though.
There are problems I have with this body, but I’m mostly just happy that my exhaustion didn’t tell on it. My face would almostalways be sorted with a proper shower and a healthy application of makeup.
