Liz grabs my arm and pulls me up from my chair and drags me out into the school hallway.
We walk down past a few other classrooms and she stops and turns to face me. “Talk.”
I take a deep breath and let it all out in one enormous explosion of truth. Everything I’ve been feeling and have worried about and stressed over for the last few months. It all comes pouring out of me.
“I’m so tired, Liz. I’m physically tired and brainy tired and Drew is just no help at all, and I don’t understand how he can NOT see that I need help or ever even ask me if he can get up with Billy in the middle of the night or change a diaper or fix Veronica lunch or get her ready for school or help me with the other fucking million and one things I’ve got going on,” I complain, as I start pacing in front of Liz. I grab onto a lock of my hair and start twirling it around my finger, something I do when I’m nervous or freaked out. And I’m freaked out right now! I’m also not paying attention to just how fast I’m twirling and before I know it, my finger is stuck in a knot of hair right next to my head.
“My finger’s stuck. MY FINGER’S STUCK!” I yell in a panic.
Liz rushes up to me and puts her hand over my mouth so I stop yelling and tries yanking on my arm with her other hand.
“Mmmmmmmmmffffff!” I mumble-scream into her hand.
Liz huffs and shakes her head at me. “I am going to remove my hand from your mouth. Don’t you dare scream.”
I nod my head at her so she knows I’ll be good, and she slowly removes her hand from my mouth. Once she’s satisfied I’m not going to freak out every classroom in the hallway, she gets to work trying to free my finger from my hair, and I go right back into my complaining.
“All he wants me for is sex and then when I do try and give it to him, he wants to do it the same way we always have, and I think there’s something wrong with me because I just don’t want to do it the same way we always have, and I don’t know if I want to be a dirty whore anymore even though he still wants a whore, and I just didn’t feel right calling him a slut on Saturday but maybe I will next time, but now I don’t even know if there ever WILL be a next time, and Jackson is just so nice and pretty and helpful and he knew immediately that I just wanted sleep and some help, and I don’t know what to do! What the fuck should I do if I don’t want to be a dirty whore anymore, Liz?!”
The sound of someone coughing stops my rant and Liz and I both turn to see one of the teachers from the kindergarten class standing behind us with a line of kids, everyone staring at us with eyes wide and mouths open. Twenty five-year-olds are looking at me like I’m crazy and who knows, I probably am. I think I’m cranking up. I’m going to have to leave my kids and go live in a nut house with my finger still stuck in my hair and I don’t even LIKE nuts.
“Mrs. Dellena, what’s a dirty whore?” one of the kids asks his teacher.
“Sorry, please excuse us,” Liz says with a kind smile to the teacher as she grabs my arm and drags me down the hall where there are no classrooms or children to horrify, forcing my finger to magically get unstuck from my hair.
“Yay, you did it!” I tell her, holding my finger up in front of her face.
She bats my finger out of the way and looks at me in shock. “What the fuck just came out of your mouth?”
“I thought I’d never be able to use this finger again,” I tell her in awe.
“Shut the hell up about your finger! What the hell is really going on with you and Drew?” she demands.
“I know. It’s a lot.”
“You’re damn right it’s a fucking lot. Why the hell haven’t you mentioned all of this before? I thought you guys were just going through a typical dry spell that everyone goes through when they have multiple kids. This is way beyond that. I want to kick Drew’s ass way more than usual right now,” she says angrily.
“It’s not all his fault,” I say with a sigh.
“The fuck it isn’t! You’re his wife. His soul mate. He should be taking care of you and making sure all of your needs are met, not leaving it up to the eye candy living across the street. And Jenny, that kid is total jailbait. You need to stop any and all thoughts you might be harboring about him.”
“Hey, don’t judge him just because he’s done time. He is a very nice person. And how the hell do you even know he was in jail?” I ask angrily.
“Jenny, he’s like nineteen! He’s thirteen years younger than you, and he lives with his mommy and daddy. Do you really think you can just divorce Drew and this kid is going to take on a thirty-two-year-old with two kids? How the hell is he going to support you with his paper route money?”