(scene opens at the top of the stairs, furniture pushed onto the landing)
Me: What is this?
Gamma: (briskly exiting her room) I’m just doing a bit of cleaning.
Me: (somewhere between shock and confusion)
Gamma: (hands over a clipboard) I’ve come to some decisions about what I want my room to look like.
(camera cuts to clipboard)
Me: Uh, okay.
Gamma: You probably should talk it over with dad.
Me: Sure. I’ll do that. (slowly backs away, exits scene)
(scene opens in mini van)
Me: Alright Delta! It’s a Friday! Still liking school?
Delta: (morose) Not really.
Me: Why not?
Delta: (melancholy sigh) Well…it’s just….it’s just that I know everything already.
Me: Really. Huh.
(prolonged silence)
Me: So, what you need to do is do really well on all your tests and they’ll move you up a grade.
Delta: Move me?
Me: Yeah, if you show them how smart you are, instead of going second grade next year, you go to third. You can skip one.
Delta: (with wonder) Really? I think I will do that! That is a great idea! Thanks mom!
Me:
(scene opens in laundry room, Carrot knee-deep in clothing)
Me: (pulled laundry out of drier, makes face, pulls out “clean” sock and sniffs it, more ugly face)
Beta: (enters basement)
Me: Beta! Slither hither? (puts laundry of “clean” clothes on the drier) Did you do this load I just pulled out?
Beta: (moderately sullen) Yeah?
Me: (hands sock to sniff) When your socks come out of the dryer smelling like feet, it means they came out of the washer smelling like feet. Did you use detergent?
Beta: Yeah. I used one of those pods. (points to laundry detergent)
Me: Welp, they need to be done again then.
Beta: (without blinking, holds up scout sash, clearly savaged by a wild animal)
Me: Oh. Huh. Looks like Epsilon missed you while you were gone.
Beta: (sadly) Glad he stopped before he got to the merit badges.
Me: Those could have been replaced too. Put it on my sewing table. I’ll go to the scout shop tomorrow.
Beta: Hey mom? What’s Epsilon playing with outside?
Me: (distracted) I don’t know.
(Beta leaves, comes back)
Me: Oh. Epsilon 3, Bun-buns 0
Beta: Except for that one, he’s not hurting them. And that one I think was an accident. He’s just chilling with them. Like he doesn’t know what to do with it when he catches it.
Me: Well, he’s a herd dog. Maybe he’s trying to herd the bun-buns.
Beta: Maybe we should get him a rabbit stuffed animal?
Me: He likes to chew on things, I don’t want associating bun-buns with eviscerating stuffies.
(scene opens in rainy dining room)
Beta: (shuffles up groggy) Did you get your other cards?
Me: (sips coffee) Yes.
Beta: (hands over pink envelope) I went to the store, looked at cards for ten seconds and decided this was the one.
Me: Oh boy.
Husband: (from kitchen) Thanks for getting me in trouble, Beta!
Me: He’s not wrong!
Beta: What’s this for?
Me: Because you done good, kid.
(scene opens in screaming banshee theater, sometimes known as the foyer)
Alpha: I want to wear what I want to wear!
Me: I just want you in a collared shirt! You want to be able to choose what you wear in the school photos, then you give me a week’s advance notice instead of forcing me to hunt down the photographer’s website and hunt for the school’s scheduled picture day based solely on the paperwork information your sister brought home for her picture day at a completely different school and a completely different day! You didn’t even know today was picture day until I told you!
Alpha: (sullen) School photos aren’t the real me.
Me: (snarls) School photos are for me and grandmas and all the other lame old ladies in your life that want lame cute photos of you hanging on their wall.
Alpha: Fine! (leaves stage left, slams door)
