Sweet Innocence

The power went out today, with the three girls all on our laptops, K and Paige sharing hers.

“Hope it's out for only 90 minutes,” one daughter said, staring at her low battery.

“Ugh, forgot the modem would go out,” I said. “Internet kicked me off.”

“Well I am reading a book online,” my oldest daughter announced. “and it's really weird to have the author here to answer my questions. How do you pronounce Anjelia?”

“An-gel-leah. They call her Leah later in the book.”

Things got quiet again as she continued to read. In the background, I could hear Paige and K playing the Sims. “Ewww, it's a boy!” hollered K. “I'm gonna make 'em do it again so we can pop out a girl.”

“Yeah, we don't like the boy babies,” Paige agreed. Then she slyly looks out from beneath her lashes at me. “Unless your mom gets knocked up by my dad, and it's a boy baby. We'd love a boy baby then.”

K looks up innocently. “Uh, huh, we would. We would love him to pieces. Won't even mind when he's a little stinky-smelling, like boys are.”

I roll my eyes at Silver, ignoring them. Silver is looking at them with disgust written across her face. She opens her mouth.

“Don't,” I advise. “It just encourages them.”

Both little girls start writing down a list of boy names.

The rest of us turn back to our laptops.

Soon Silvery laughed. “I can totally hear your voice in your books,” she said. “You're such a smart-ass. It takes a minute before you realize it.”
The three of us laughed, and while I would like to say it sounded like three bells tinkling...

“Ever notice we kind of cackle?” My youngest said to Silver and I.

The laughter stopped abruptly.

Paige muttered. “Witches.”

I closed my laptop. “Come on,” I announced. “No sense sitting around while the power's out and our batteries run dry. Let's go to Target.”

“Yeah,” Silver jumped up. “Just like old times. We'd always run to Target when the power went. Not that stupid new one, either. The Super one. The good old one, where they don't sell food and all that other crap.”

Outside all the neighbors were gathering, setting their cases of beer into a community cooler to keep on ice until the power returned. We waved, driving down the street. “Bunch of alkies,” I muttered to Silver.

“Yup,” she agreed. “Wanna stop by the liquor store and get a bottle of wine so we can join them when we get back?”

“Okay.”

Halfway to Target my phone rang. It was my best friend Liz, who I hadn't heard from in a while and lives down the street. “Girlfriend!” I answered.

“What are you girls doing?” she asked. “I saw you go down the street. Come have a beer.”

“Target,” I said.

“Ahhh, should have known,” she laughed. She'd always gone with us shopping in the past. “We haven't had the power go out in such a long time, but I was thinking about that one time,” she starts laughing harder here, making me laugh too. “Remember when you'd gone to that sex toy party and won that big giant candle that looked like a dick?” She roars.

“Yeah,” I giggled back.

Silver rolled her eyes too, her head pressed against mine so she can to hear Liz's voice through my turned-up volume.

“So you decide to light it, 'cause it's dark and none of the kids will see it until it's burned down to a shapeless blob the next day,” she says, mimicking my voice and then snorts here, unable to control the laughing from bursting from her nostrils, “except, that was the one time the power came back early, and you had just lit it,”

Now I'm laughing really hard, and Silver says loud enough for Liz to hear, “And remember how pissy--”

“--Dickhead was?” Liz finishes. “That's the best part, how he sucks up his chest, covers K's eyes, and snaps, 'Reee-naaa!' You'd think he was a minister, instead of a two-timing, fat-ass, donut-sucking liar.”

Silver's still laughing, “Ohmigod, he was such a prude!”

From the backseat, we can hear the little ones' chattering as they point out chubby little prairie dogs. (While they're cute to traveling tourists, they're extremely annoying and abundant here) However, one was roadkill. A mere lump on the road. A bird swooped down and picked at the meat on the carcass, flying off between cars to avoid being slaughtered itself.

My child says, “Oh look. That little birdie (are you kidding? It looked like a huge, disgusting vulture) doesn't know the prairie dog's dead. He's trying to help his little buddy up.”

“They're so precious,” Paige agrees.