Julia Fierro - Cutting Teeth

Allie could tell herself, “It’s okay. You’re just a part-time mom.”

The vroom vroom sounds resumed, and Allie closed her eyes against the glare of the low sun.

Just for a moment, she thought.

When she woke, with a jerk that made the springs in the chair screech, Rip was squinting down at her.

“You okay?” he asked.

The boys. She gripped the ties of Rip’s life jacket to pull herself up out of the chair. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust, for the purplish black sunspots to fade.

There they were, still making their slow, methodical rounds, eyes trained on the tiny wheels of their toy cars.

“Oh my God. I fell asleep. Susanna asked me to watch them for ten fucking minutes, and I fell asleep.”

“Well, NBs like us can’t really be trusted, can we?” He winked at her.

“NB?”

“Nonbiological parents,” Rip explained. “Sometimes we don’t get full credit, you know?”

“Even you?” Allie said. “I would think Grace would constantly sing your praises. You’re such a great dad.”

“You think so?” Rip asked, his voice hopeful.

“Hell yeah,” she said, feeling the urge to amp it up. This guy needed a boost.

She leaned toward him, close enough that she could see the silvery shadow of his stubble. “A lot of these mommies,” she whispered, glancing back at the house, “they’re just going through the motions. But you…” She paused. “You really mean it. You love the kids. You love the process. ”

Rip gathered Allie into a hug, nearly lifting her off her chair. His life jacket pressed up under her chin, and she smelled seaweed and mildew.

“Okay.” She laughed, patting his back. “You’re suffocating me.”

He released her and backed away. “Sorry. That was just a really nice thing to hear.”

Michael walked onto the deck, in a pair of shorts and a sweatshirt, stripped of his usual hipster look.

“Alrighty then,” Michael said. There was mischief in his smile. “If you two are done making out, Rip, we can go for that paddle now.”

Rip chased after Michael, who had started the climb down the ten feet of rocks leading to the beach. Rip slung his legs over the seawall, then turned to Allie.

“Hey,” he called. “Thanks.”

He made a loud mwah sound and blew her a kiss.

Allie pretended to catch it and winked.

“No prob, my nonbio brother.”

Rip disappeared behind the wall, then Levi’s singular high-pitched wail sliced through the air. The boys were a pile of flailing arms and legs rolling across the weathered floor of the deck.

“Cut it out!” Allie ran over and peeled them apart, hoping it wasn’t too late. That Susanna hadn’t heard.

Levi gripped a handful of Dash’s hair in one white-knuckled fist. Dash pounded on Levi’s back with the heel of his hand. Dash’s nostrils pulsated and then Levi’s head was thrown back, mouth open to the pink-tinged sky in a silent scream.

She had to stop the scream, had to stuff it back into the boy.

“Shhh,” she said, “Don’t cry. It’s okay.” Allie was almost whispering, and it reminded her of the fights she’d had with her younger brother as a kid. Her pleas to pacify him— I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. You can hit me back! — after she’d walloped him, knowing that if he screamed, her father would come running with an open hand.

“Dash said he was going to throw my car”—Levi paused, mustering steam before howling—“in the ocean!”

The seagulls scattered to the far end of the beach, and Allie wished she had wings of her own.

The boys sat a few feet apart, each singing his own pathetic song, the it was him, not me — he hit me, no I didn’t routine. Their cheeks were flecked with sand and snot and tears.

When Susanna called, “Hey!” from the window upstairs, the boys fell silent.

“Everything okay, babe?” Susanna asked. “Do you need me to come down there?”

The boys stared at their matching orange water shoes. Why couldn’t Allie produce that kind of order in them? What was it about sweet-voiced, ready-to-burst, waddling Susanna that terrified them into gulping down tears?

Allie waved to Susanna.

“We’re fine,” Allie shouted. “Everything’s fine.”

She crouched in front of the boys.

“Come. Here,” she said, curling her index finger.

The boys crawled forward on hands and knees.

“Stop fighting right now,” Allie whispered fiercely. “Or else Mama is going to get really mad at Mommy. Is that what you want?”

Levi shook his head no. Dash rubbed the top of his toy car.

“Listen to me,” she said, shaking Dash’s scabbed knee. “If you don’t cut it out…” She felt her lips tighten. “You’re gonna be in big trouble.”

“No, Mommy,” Levi whimpered, his lower lip trembling. “Don’t say that!”

“No crying,” Allie snapped. She hated when her attempt at discipline backfired — Levi crying harder, Dash grudgingly silent.

Levi clamped a hand over his mouth, but sobs slipped through his tan fingers.

“If you don’t start being good,” Allie said, “there’ll be serious consequences.”

“What is consequences ?” Dash asked hesitantly, garbling the word, so it sounded more like con-sickness. Allie saw the promise of defiance in the lift of his chin.

She stopped to think. Her answers to Dash’s questions never came out right.

“It’s like when you do something bad, and so something bad happens to you in return.”

“Something bad is going to happen to me?” Levi wailed, and stood, shouting toward the upstairs windows, “Mama! Mama!”

Allie pulled Levi into her arms, shushing him, but his cries rose like a siren. Her hand flew to his grotesquely stretched mouth. He mustn’t disturb Susanna, she thought, as his wet lips blubbered under her fingers.

“Nothing bad is going to happen,” she said.

She pressed her lips to his cold, damp forehead and shushed him until he was quiet, his big eyes looking up at her, waiting.

“Mommy,” Dash said, a sharp reprimand. He had his hands on his hips, his chin tucked to his chest. “You’re making my brother cry. You’re doing a bad thing.”

She let her hand slip from Levi’s mouth. “Levi wasn’t listening. I asked him nicely to stop crying.” Her eyes scanned the back of the house, searching the windows for the disapproving faces of the mommies.

Calm down, she told herself.

“Boys,” she said, as placidly as she could, “nothing bad is going to happen. But you will have a time-out if you don’t start doing good listening. A big one. No Thomas trains.”

Levi gasped.

“No,” Dash whispered.

For a moment, she admired the smug look on his face. It took balls to call her bluff.

“Fine then. No iPad for a whole week.”

A flicker of rage narrowed Dash’s eyes.

“Okay, Mommy. Okay!” Levi cried. “We be good. We do good listening!”

“Dash?” she asked.

Behind them the waves whispered as they ran over the pebbles on the beach.

Dash stared at his knees. He nodded, and mumbled, “Okay.”

The screen door opened, and as soon as shuffling Susanna appeared, Levi flung himself into her arms, his head knocking into her belly. Her hair was wet, sleek, and dark, and she smelled like old-fashioned soap — something cheap, like Ivory — but in the moment it felt perfect and almost exotic, and Allie wished again that she and Susanna were alone. In bed. Their damp bodies tangling on crisp white linens. Curtains billowing into their Cape Cod ocean-view hotel room.

“Be gentle with Mama,” Allie said. She tried to ignore Susanna’s questioning look: I leave you alone with them for ten minutes, and … Allie wanted to defend herself, to explain that it was the boys who were making her look bad.