Page 7 of Man Flu

I run outside through the pouring rain and hold my briefcase above my head to salvage what’s left of the curl I tried to put into my hair this morning. I double click the key fob in my purse, and the doors to my minivan unlock. I jump across a puddle and duck inside, falling heavily into my seat.

Thankfully, the lack of traffic makes up for the extra two minutes I spent in the elevator. However, with the rain downpour, there’s a line of five minivans parked against the sidewalk, and I’m the very last one, which means it will take a full minute to reach the bus stop. I won’t be able to see the bus until it arrives—mothertrucker.

I dig around under the passenger seat for my umbrella, finding nothing but a bunch of crumpled drawings Cora smashed under there last week.

Mom, I need to borrow your umbrella for a minute. The memory of her saying that hits me as I jam my fingernail into whatever is metal and hard under the seat. Dammit to hell.

I look like death anyway; might as well just get this over with. I hop out of the van and trudge through the puddles, soaking my feet and legs. There is nothing better than wet feet inside of peep-toe pumps. As soon as I make it up the hill and over to the bus stop, I realize my paper clip has gone missing. How long has it been gone? I don’t want to know how long my stomach has been visibly showing between the perky buttonhole and hanging thread of my blouse.

I clutch my shirt together, squeezing water out at the same time. Now seems like a good time to up the rain-factor too. Instead of just pouring, it’s now flying in horizontally with the wind, as well.

With a quick glance down at my watch that shouldn’t be getting as wet as it is, I see it’s already a minute past the time the bus normally arrives. Thankfully, I’m here, but not so thankfully, I’m standing here like this.

Ten minutes goes by before the bus rounds the corner. Each of the other moms step out of their cars with their umbrella and a second one for their child. Not me, nope. No umbrella here. Fabulous mother alert.

As the bus empties out, Cora is the last one to jump off the bottom step right into a puddle, splashing me, as if I weren’t already soaked to the bone. The joke isn’t on me this time.

“Hi, baby-cakes, how was school?”

She tilts her head from side to side, her bouncy curls swaying with her movement. “It sucked.”

“Cora!” I snap. As if she were using a megaphone, the other moms turn around and glare at me like I was the one who said the word “suck.”

“Just saying it how it is,” she chirps.

“Well, we don’t use that—”

Like I needed icing on this freaking cake, a sports car flies by, hitting the unnecessary, massive drainage hole in the middle of the street, and drenches me from head to toe. I shield Cora, of course, but that mothertrucking bitch has got to go.

“Oh, it’s Tiana!” Cora shouts.

Tiana, like the Disney princess, except she is no freaking Disney princess. She’s Rick’s peach-cake.

I click the button on my key to make the sliding door of the van open for Cora, and she hops in and closes the door behind her before I reach my door. I can take a guess that while Tiana was flying by, soaking me with rain and sewer water, she was taking a selfie that will somehow show me in the background, taking her wrath like a beaten, wet rat. That shit will appear all over Instagram tonight because that’s what this twinklette does. She’s a fitness guru with a side gig of promotion yoga on social media. They have those sorts of jobs now. To add insult to injury, she probably gets paid more than I do.

I drive around the block until I pull into our driveway, watching Tiana as she slowly pulls into her garage next door.

“Mom, why can’t we pull into our garage? I don’t want to get wet,” says my princess who stood outside in the rain for less than thirty-seconds.

“Because, sweetie, all your dad’s junk is taking up the space in there, so there is no room for our car to fit inside,” I tell her.

“Minivan, mom, not a car,” Cora corrects me. Thank you for the reminder.

Cora hops out of the vehicle and runs through the rain she was just complaining about, crosses over the small patch of grass between the houses and disappears inside of their garage. “Cora! No!” You have got to be freaking kidding me. “Cora Taryn Pierce!”

Now, running through the rain as I glance down at my watch, I confirm that I have five minutes before I’m expected to be on that call, and Cora is not in this garage. I’ve told her not to do this, yet it’s like I’ve never said it at all, as with most things that come out of my mouth. I open the door that leads into Rick’s kitchen and storm inside, searching for Cora.

I find her seated at their kitchen island, eating a cookie. “Do you want a cookie?” she asks me.

“Get over here right now,” I seethe through my clenched jaw.

She hops off the stool and brings herself to where I’m standing. “Hannah, you look like you’ve been standing in a hurricane,” Rick says with a snarky chuckle.

“Well, I kind of was, Rick. Actually, you kind of look like you’ve been through a hurricane too.” I point to my ears, signaling at what I mean. “The hairs in your ears are sticking out … too much thinking today? A little brainstorming? You must have too much wind going on in that head of yours,” I say, sounding like the bitter ex-wife that I am.

He takes a cookie from the plate on the counter and chomps half of it down. With his mouth full, he redirects his attention to our daughter. “Cora, you know you’re only supposed to be here on the weekends, sweetie. I know it’s fun here, but we have to follow the rules, okay?”

Cora rolls her eyes and crosses her arms over her chest. “This is stupid. You two and your stupid rules. Why can’t I go where I want to go, when I want to go there?”