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.“What?” I scanned the field.“Don’t stare,” she said.“It’s Marley Addison and James Foster—how cute is he?”“Super cute,” I said, watching with interest as Coach Andrew and his girlfriend headed right for the school’s biggest celebrities.Gracie was bearing down on them with a determined square to her shoulders, but Andrew suddenly jerked her around and steered her in the opposite direction.What was that all about?I turned back to Mel.“Foster’s not her kid’s dad, though, right?”“Germaine Longman’s the dad.But she never married him.” Melanie had an impressive knowledge of pop culture.“Think Marley will be doing a shift at the hot-dog booth?”“It’s impressive she came at all,” Melanie said.“She must be a good mom.”“The bar is set so low for celebrities,” I said.“I mean, I hate these things, but when I show up, no one praises my mothering skills.”“I do,” Mel said and put her arm around me.Then released me as some little kid came up and asked for a Sprite.“That’s your third one,” she reminded him gently.“Does your mom know you’re drinking so much soda?”He gave a very tentative nod that didn’t inspire any confidence.Melanie sighed and handed him the Sprite.Linda and some friend of hers showed up a few minutes before two to take over at the drinks booth.After two hours of non-stop serving, Melanie was as relieved as I was to be free again.“Don’t ever sign us up for that much again,” I said to her as we walked away, and she didn’t argue.We found all three of our kids together, eating hot dogs at a picnic table.My mother was there, too, her chair pushed back so she could talk to someone at the next table.As soon as Noah spotted me, he bounced up and said, “They put my hot dog in a bun even though I told them not to and Grandma had to take it back and get me a new one and I got hit in the nose in the bounce house and Simon called me a crybaby.”“Sounds like I missed all the fun.”“I told Simon he was a jerk,” Nicole piped up.“He is too.And I told him to leave my cousin alone and after that he did.” She smiled proudly.“He’s scared of me.”“Nicely done,” I said and high-fived her.“So where’s Daddy?” Melanie asked, affecting nonchalance as she plucked a potato chip off of Cameron’s plate.“He had to go,” Cameron said.“Don’t eat any more of my chips, okay?”“He told us to tell you good-bye,” Nicole added.“You can have my chips, Mommy.”“Thanks, sweetie.So… did you guys have fun with Daddy and Sherri?”“It was okay,” Nicole said cautiously.“I missed you, though.”Cameron was a good kid, but he didn’t have Nicole’s empathy.“We had the best time! Sherri went in the bounce house with us and all these kids recognized her and wanted to play with us.It was so cool!”“That was nice of her.” Melanie’s voice was doing that thing where it got all high again.“I don’t like her,” Noah said suddenly, looking up from his hot dog.He had a smear of ketchup on his chin.“She smiles like she wants us to brush her teeth for her or something.”Melanie stared at him with a kind of delight.“I know exactly what you mean,” she said.I reached over to give Noah a grateful hug.He submitted to it and then said, “Mom? I need to go to the bathroom like right now.”On the way back from the bathroom, I stopped to get him a sno-cone.He couldn’t make up his mind which flavor he wanted and asked if he could get four different flavors on one cone.The high-school girl who was manning the booth went ahead and gave them all to him, in neat little colorful rows.I had to remind him to say thank you.I always had to remind him to say thank you.We were barely five steps away from the sno-cone booth when Noah suddenly bobbled the paper cone, spilling its contents right down the front of his shirt.“Noah!” I brushed roughly at the rainbow-colored ice bits on his chest.“Why can’t you be more careful?”His face screwed up.“It’s not my fault! Why do you always yell at me?”“How can it not be your fault?”“Someone must have bumped me—”“No one bumped you.No one came near you.”“I didn’t mean to spill it! You act like I meant to!” He clutched at his chest.“It’s cold!”“Of course it’s cold!” I snapped.“It’s ice, genius!”Dr.Wilson picked that moment to walk right by us.His eyes flickered briefly over in our direction.He just kept going, but I knew that my moment of bad parenting had been noted and would be remembered.With Noah’s shirt ruined, it was definitely time to leave.Mom wasn’t ready to go yet, so Melanie offered to drive us, but just as we were all heading toward the parking lot, Tanya came sailing toward us.“There you are!” she sang out.“We need help at the dessert booth.One of the moms who signed up for the last shift never showed and they’re swamped over there.I need you two to fill in.”“We did two hours already,” I said.“It’s okay,” Melanie said.“I can do it.I’m happy to help out.”I nudged her elbow.“You were going to drive us home.”She rejected my attempt to rescue her.“You can take my car and the kids.I’ll get a ride back with your mom.”“Thank you,” Tanya said.“I knew I could count on you.”“But not me!” I said brightly.She gave a strained smile.“You’ve helped a lot too,” she said and left.I walked Melanie over to the dessert booth.She stopped and clutched my arm.“No one’s bought our cupcakes!” she said with horror.“You’re kidding me!” We’d spent an entire day baking and decorating those damn things.(Nicole had helped, while Noah and Cameron played video games.) We’d frosted them with thick chocolate frosting and sprinkled colored sprinkles on top.They looked homemade but not too ugly.Cameron and Nicole had split one and begged for more, but Melanie had insisted we save the rest for the festival
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