In which it's not funny

When I walked in the door, I could see a pan on the stove, flames from the gas burner licking the bottom of the skillet.

There was no one in the kitchen.

I wondered how long the pan had been on the stove. There was no oil in it, no food. Just a hot, hot pan, unattended.

I turned off the flame.

I set down my purse, my guitar. I took off my coat. I’d been to guitar class, my once-weekly group lesson for which Scott comes home by 7:30 to take over my household duties until I return at 10.

There was no good circumstance under which the upstairs of our house was deserted with a pan on the stove, and, girding myself for what I might find, I went downstairs.

I could hear water running, and voices bouncing off of the tile in the bathroom, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying.

Both children had had baths before I left, so it was clear that there had been some kind of disaster.

When  I rounded the corner, I saw Scott, his back to me, hunched over the bathtub, scrubbing the boy vigorously.

“Hi, Mommy!” Kai chirped.

Kai was covered in black. His entire face, his chest and belly. Down his arms, his legs. The color made his blue eyes pop and when they caught mine, they were positively dancing with glee.

“Kai found your mascara,” Scott said, in the same accusatory tone you might use to tell your spouse your son had found your stash of hardcore pornography. Or your methamphetamine.  As though I should keep my mascara not in my make-up drawer, but in a wall-safe—the kind that you cover with an oil portrait of a dead ancestor.

Kai’s eyes were still locked on mine when I started laughing. The dried mascara on his face cracked as he broke into a wide grin.

“It’s not funny,” Scott said.

I pursed my lips to stop the laughter, but I couldn't hide the smile.

“No,” I said. “No. Of course not.”

 

Comments

[Mom In Two Cultures]

I always like to try to figure out just what went while I was gone. Ren usually manages without me, though there was the time he called me home from a movie showing because magnitude of a diaper blow-out was beyond anything he could fathom (something to do with the fact the baby had diarrhea on top of the fact that it was lined with cling wrap, so we could collect a stool specimen. Yeah, in hindsight, that was bound to happen). By the time I got there, he had it cleaned up. I think he just needed moral support.

[Mom In Two Cultures]

Oh my, the typos! The baby wasn't lined with cling wrap; the diaper was!

Also, insert "down" between went and while and "the" between because and magnitude.

I promise to preview next time!