Cast
A mother at the end of her tether.

Scene
My day starts before I wake up. My day wakes me.

Work begins before I’ve finished that first sharp intake of breath. It starts with, “Mummy mummy,” and quickly dissolves into a fast-forwarded blur. Movement faster than my eye can track. Objects – little humans – flitting in and out of my field of vision; a storm of sound, everything between rain, hail and thunderous explosions. I exhale and I’m standing in the kitchen with peanut butter on my knife. One of them demands raisons, one of them howls their objection but refuses to clue me in on the alternative.

“Bye honey, love you,” someone says. I recognise that guy from somewhere. Can’t quite put my finger on him. Further demands are flowing in and I tell myself I’ll come back to the guy… but I immediately forgot about him.

By my third breath I’m tugging one item of clothing up and another item of clothing down in what I calculate are the correct directions to result in the expected application of children’s clothing. I’m satisfied with the effort, but two minutes later I realise I only got it half right as I find pants in the hallway and a pantless boy nearby.

I put the kettle on in my mind since there’s no time for coffee in the real world – at least my imagination can indulge in some. Instead, work has me gripping slippery, wriggling flesh and trying to enter the car with no hands. Feet, elbows, teeth. Nothing works so I let one bundle go for the instant it takes to wrench on the handle, but for the billionth time I miscalculate just how much damage can be done in an instant.

One of them is off. I take too long to determine if the best course of action is A) dump child 2 in car and lock the door then retrieve child 1 or B) haul child 2 into air then retrieve child 1. Before I know it, 1 and 2 are disappearing in opposite directions, no doubt intentionally making efficient retrieval impossible.

Screw it. I indulge myself in a sigh. A deep sigh of frustration laced with a hint of anger and a pinch of self-loathing. This indulgence is my favourite moment of today.

Before it drags out to something like happiness or even satisfaction, I snap back to my compounding problem of child retrieval. I’ve neglected this issue for three entire seconds. You’re at work! Go go go!

Okay, 1 is faster but 2 is steadier on her feet. But 1 is sneakier. But 2 will go further out. I go for 2. It takes an egregiously long time. I lost visuals for well long enough for two, maybe three paedophiles to snatch themselves a prize. That’s game over, that is. My job would be finished if that happened. Much more than my job. My career would be over. I would be unhireable. With renewed vigour, I thrust myself towards 2 like Roadrunner, like Sonic the Hedgehog. Superhumanly fast. 2 is in my arms, exploding into screaming liquid on contact. I wipe tears as I cartwheel towards 1, the rubber of my soles burning as I go.

I return to the car, child retrieval ticked off my to-do list. Strap them in like I’m kidnapping them and drive twenty minutes through a screamy, leafy, tantrumy, suburbany, hellish paradise to the goal. The goal is reached. Unbind 1, grip him with handcuff hands, unbind 2, push and drag them both to the entrance. Those gates, open like a mouth, ready to suck them in, gargle them about for six hours then spit them back out...

END OF EXCERPT