The Road to Hell

“What do you mean you are quitting?” Two of the other woman in the hallway immediately turned their heads to stare at her. Alicia took a deep breath and made an effort to lower her voice. “No, I understand what quitting is. Its just that most people give some notice. They don’t, out of nowhere, say hey I am not going to pick up your kid today, good luck.”

Alicia stuffed Chloe’s pink backpack into the small wooden cubby hole outside her classroom. 

“Yes I understand that, Becky but you made a commitment to do a job. No, of course I value your mental health. Good for you for taking care of yourself, really, but who the hell is supposed to pick my kid up from school!”

Alicia ended the call with a frustrated sigh and met the gaze of the other two women. 

“Babysitter quit,” she said, as if an explanation was needed.

One of the women simply nodded before looking away, but the other one rolled her eyes dramatically and walked over to Alicia.

“With no notice at all right? Its this current generation. They have no work ethic and demand all kinds of ridiculous things. I once interviewed a girl who asked for $50 per hour because that is what she thought she was worth.” She said the last part while doing air quotes with her fingers. “Can you imagine? $50 per hour for a dumbass college student to watch my kids while they sleep?” 

Alicia shook her head. 

“I’m happy to pick up Chloe this afternoon if you want”, the woman offered. “I am here anyway. Her and Sasha can have a playdate.”

Alicia stared at her for a second, trying to remember the woman’s name. 

“Dorothy,” the other mom supplied with a grin. “I know it is impossible to remember anything when you have a preschooler right? I’m Dorothy, my daughter is Sasha and I will pick up your kid from school today. Us moms have to stick together!”

Alicia sighed in relief.

“Thank you Dorothy,” she said. “I really appreciate it.”

She called her husband as soon as she was outside.

“Babysitter quit.”

“Becky quit?” Jonathan replied. “That’s a shame. Chloe really liked her right?”

Alicia rolled her eyes. “Yes Chloe liked her,” she said. “Anyway one of the moms at school is picking her up today but you are going to have to do it tomorrow.”

Jonathan paused and Alicia could practically see his annoyed expression through the phone.

“How am I supposed to do a 3:00 pickup? I have clients.”

Alicia paused, remembering her therapist’s advice. She took two deep breaths and attempted to keep her voice light.

“I know it is a pain in the ass,” she said slowly. “But I have meetings scheduled all afternoon…”

Jonathan cut her off.

“Maybe that mom can watch her again? Or you could hire another babysitter?”

Alicia sighed in exasperation. “No Jon, she can’t. Dorothy has her own child. And Chloe doesn’t have another babysitter,. She HAD Becky who quit without warning this morning. Since I can’t meet, interview and screen another person in 24 hours you are going to have to figure out how to pick up your daughter tomorrow.”

She switched the phone to her left hand, using her right to hail a taxi. 

“I gotta go, I’m late. Figure it out .”

She hung up before Jonathan could answer, climbing into the yellow cab and telling the driver to take the streets not the highway. The FDR Drive was often a slow crawl this time of day. 

Later that evening, after grabbing her daughter from Dorothy’s house (Chloe had been very excited, apparently the girls had played “daytime sleepover” in Sasha’s bunk beds.) Alicia threw a frozen pizza in the oven. Chloe was entertaining herself with a giant box of Legos on the living room floor, giving Alicia just enough time to take a quick shower.

As she let the hot water run over her hair and her face, Alicia thought about her dilemma. Jonathan was basically useless. She dreaded the task of finding a new sitter, interviewing, checking references. Maybe Dorothy could watch Chloe for a few more days, just enough time for Alicia to get herself organized. If Alicia remembered correctly, she was a stay at home mom. She probably had plenty of time on her hands and watching two kids was not that different from watching one.

Alicia vowed to talk to Dorothy on Monday. In the meantime, tomorrow was Friday and Jonathan could often leave work early on Fridays. Especially if she left him no other choice.

A few days later, Alicia was awoken by Chloe’s warm body climbing underneath the blanket. Her daughter’s fuzzy pajamas tickled Alicia’s skin and she gave Chloe a big hug, burying her face in her long brown hair. 

“Good Morning Chlo-Chlo.”

“Morning mommy”, Chloe looked up at her, her light eyes hopeful. “Pancakes?”

Alicia eyed her husband’s sleeping form, wondering if she should wake him. 

“Daddy makes yummy pancakes,” Chloe said, as if she could read Alicia’s mind. “But yours are better.”

Chloe sat on a stool at the kitchen counter, lazily scratching her head, while Alicia pulled a large bowl and a box of pancake mix out of the cabinets. 

“Do you want to help me mix?” she asked.

Chloe nodded, scratching at the back of her neck. Alicia watched her daughter walk across the kitchen, still scratching, and her heart sank into her feet.

“Chloe is your head itchy?”

Her daughter nodded again. “Yes mommy,” she replied. “I am very very scratchy.”

Alicia flashed back to moments before, her daughters beautiful long hair splayed across Alicia’s pillowcase.

“Can you sit back down for a second,” she said. “I want to look at it.”

Ten minutes later, Alicia stormed into the bedroom and yanked the blanket off of the bed, startling Jonathan awake. 

“Chloe has lice,” she stated flatly. “You have to go to the drugstore.”

Jonathan blinked sleepily. “Now?”

Alicia let out a frustrated groan. “Yes, you have to go right now.. And strip the bed when you get up please. I have to wash everything.”

She walked out, grabbing her cellphone off the nightstand as she went. 

“Dorothy? Hi. Sorry to bother you on a Sunday morning but I wanted to let you know that Chloe has lice.”

Dorothy laughed. ‘Of course she does,” she replied. “They all do. Like half the class.”

Alicia refrained from screaming. “Wait, Sasha has it too? When did you find out?”

“Oh not until yesterday,” Dorothy said. “But I’m not surprised. Like I said, half the class has it.”

Alicia had no idea that there was a lice outbreak in her daughter’s class. Had the teacher sent a note home? Alicia hadn’t checked Chloe’s backpack in over a week, she had been too busy. 

Dorothy wished her luck and Alicia hung up, heading back into the bedroom. Jonathan was still in bed.

“I’m going to the store,” she said. “Since it seems you aren’t. There is pancake mix already in a bowl in the kitchen. Would it be too much effort for you to just cook it?”

Jonathan looked up at her.

“I would have done it, ” he replied, but Alicia was already gone.

Both the Duane Reade around the corner and the CVS on Broadway were completely sold out of lice shampoo. When Alicia asked the pharmacist at the second store if there was perhaps an unopened box somewhere in the back he had shaken his head, grinning.

“No ma’am. Every school in the neighborhood must have a lice outbreak right now!” 

Alicia groaned, annoyed that he seemed to find this fact so amusing. 

“So I hear,” she mumbled.

Once she was back out on the sidewalk she called Dorothy again.

“Does mayonnaise work? You know like on The Office?”

Dorothy burst out laughing. “I love that episode,” she said. 

“Yes but does it work?”

“No idea. In my experience the only thing that really works is spending hours meticulously combing through your kids hair. Thank god for Netflix right?”

When Alicia arrived back at home, (with two jars of mayonnaise and a tub of chocolate ice cream) Jonathan was in the kitchen eating pancakes with Chloe.

“I made you some,” he offered, gesturing towards a plate on the counter.

Alicia ignored him.

“Did you take all the sheets and pillowcases off of the bed?” she asked.

She did not wait for an answer, storming into the bedroom instead. She grabbed the pile off linens of the floor where he had left them, along with the shirt she was currently wearing and a pair of socks she found underneath the bed, and threw everything into the washing machine. 

Half an hour later both she and her daughter were seated in front of the television, their heads a gooey mess of mayonnaise. Chloe had giggled wildly when Alicia had explained what was happening. “My hair is like a sandwich!” she exclaimed excitedly. 

Alicia had just sighed. It was bad enough that she still had no babysitter lined up for the week, but now this. Alicia no longer wanted to ask Dorothy to watch Chloe, considering her favor was how she had ended up here in the first place. So that really left her with only one other option. 

With one last look at her daughter’s sticky head she grabbed her phone and dialed her mother’s number.

“Hi mom.”

“Alicia sweetheart, what a nice surprise.” As always, her mother sounded like she was outside, probably taking her usual morning walk around the neighborhood. Natasha was 73 years old and in excellent health. “How is my beautiful granddaughter?”

“Yeah, actually that’s why I’m calling.”

Alicia explained the babysitter situation to her mother, leaving out the part about the lice outbreak, since she planned to have all of that under control by tomorrow. Natasha was more than happy to pick up Chloe from school. 

“Of course!” she replied. “Maybe we can all have dinner after. ”

“Maybe. If I get off work on time. This week is kind of busy…” Alicia trailed off, hoping that her response was vague enough to satisfy her mother without committing her to anything. 

“Great”” Natasha said. “I can take her to the park. The weather is supposed to be very nice tomorrow.”

“Whatever you want,” Alicia replied distractedly. How long was the mayonnaise supposed to stay on their heads? The smell was making her queasy and she was dying to wash the greasy mess out of her hair. Chloe, on the other hand, was fully engrossed in The Little Mermaid, happily singing along with Ariel’s adventures. 

Surely it had been long enough?

“Mom, I have to go. Chloe needs me. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Alicia washed out the mayonnaise and then spent the next hour and a half picking through her daughter’s hair with a tiny fine toothed comb. She did the same to her own head, although it was much harder to tell if she was doing it correctly.

She pulled their hair into tight, bouncy ponytails (it still felt greasy and unwashed) and went to put the laundry into the dryer. Jonathan was once more lying in the unmade bed, this time staring at his phone. 

“You could’ve put new sheets on,” she said. 

Jonathan ignored her comment. We should take Chloe to the aquarium today,” he said. “She really loved that sea lion show.”

Alicia rolled her eyes. “Its not a show,” she replied. “It is literally just how they feed them. And it is Sunday; it will be too crowded. The parking lot will be full and we will have to look for parking on the streets and then Chloe will get restless and whine and we will just end up going to Ihop, And we already had pancakes so…”

She raised her hands in a gesture that clearly said the conversation was over. Jonathan never thought about things like that, like traffic or parking or bringing snacks in the car so Chloe didn’t get too hungry. He seemed to think all it took to be a parent was a quick Google search. 

“Besides, she has lice remember?”

Jonathan swiped away the screen he had been looking at and put his phone down.

“I thought it might be fun,” he said quietly. Alicia watched as he grabbed a t-shirt out of the top drawer of the dresser. “I’m going to the gym.”

Alicia spent the rest of the morning washing Chloe’s sheets, her pillowcases, the stuffed animals that sat on her bed, and a collection of random headbands that she may or may not have worn recently. In the afternoon she told Jonathan to take their daughter to the playground, ignoring his snarky response of “I thought she couldn’t go anywhere.”

“I dumped a month's worth of mayo on her head, she’s fine.”

She even got him to cook dinner so she could get in a quick evening nap. (After putting fresh sheets on the bed of course). 

Later that night, after tucking Chloe in and reading her two stories, (she always requested the same two) Alicia flopped down on the couch next to her husband.

“My mom is watching Chloe this week,” she said. “So you don’t have to do anything.”

Jonathan nodded, his gaze on the television.

“That’s fine,” he answered.

“And I will ask the moms at school for babysitter recommendations tomorrow. I imagine we can find someone halfway decent by Friday if we really try.”

He nodded again. “Sounds good.”

Alicia stared at her husband for another minute before standing back up again.

“I guess I’ll go watch TV in the bedroom,” she said.

“Ok, goodnight,” Jonathan replied.

Alicia bumped into Dorothy outside of the cubbies the next morning, right after saying goodbye to her daughter.

“All good with the mayonnaise?” she asked.

“I believe so,” Alicia said. 

Dorothy grinned. “Did you take pics? I would love to see them!”

Alicia shook her head. “No way,” she replied. “My hair still feels disgusting. I may never put mayo on a sandwich again.”

Dorothy laughed. “Well listen, if you ever get stuck in a bind again let me know. I am happy to watch Chloe. She’s a delight.”

Alicia quickly shook her head. “Thanks, but I’m ok.” She smiled politely at the other mom. “I really appreciate it though.”

Dorothy waved her hand dismissively. “No problem at all,” she said.

Alicia said goodbye and hurried out the door towards the subway station. It was a beautiful sunny morning, the sky a clear bright blue, the birds chirping in the trees, but Alicia didn’t really notice. As she walked towards the corner, a woman passed her with a fluffy black puppy on a leash. The dog tried to jump up to greet Alicia, excited to meet a new friend, but she gently pushed him away.

“Sorry,” the owner said. “He’s a baby. I’m still trying to teach him how to behave.”

Alicia didn’t hear her, she was already rushing down the stairs, towards the underground cavern of the F train station. The puppy watched her for a second before turning away and attempting to eat a candy wrapper off of the sidewalk.

“Jojo NO”, the woman scolded. “That will make you feel terrible!” She gently pulled on the dog’s leash and the two of them disappeared around the corner.