Bread, Eggs, and Milk

We loved her.

We thought she 

was magic, a witch.

How else would she have known 

I stuck my tongue out at her 

from the backseat? 

We followed her around, asking

boring questions. We ran out of 

breath telling her our funniest

stories. We dreamed up games,

begged her to play. She always won. 

Her Halloween costumes earned us prizes

and she decorated cakes like a pro. Her famous 

pink elephants stealing the show at friends' showers, 

neighbors' birthdays, family weddings. 

She told us how much she once loved our deadbeat dads.

We fought daily for her attention, spread thin 

as it was. Each of us longing to feel her 

warmth shining on our face. Searching 

for a flash of lightning in her cloudy blue eyes, 

or, Lord, please, the life-saving rain of laughter. 

We knew her life wasn't easy. We knew 

having kids was hard. We ate too much. We grew

too fast. We needed clothes and shoes. Books 

and fees. We tried to be smaller.

We lied about our age to get jobs. 

We'd learned early about lipstick. 

We knew when she pulled it

from the depths of the big, black 

purse she always carried, 

the one she claimed she could 

live out of for a month, it meant 

she was going out. We hated going out.

Going out was the worst. Going out

was vague, undefined, open ended. 

We knew there was no point in asking where, 

she only ever gave two answers: Out! 

or, To get bread, eggs, and milk!

We knew there was no point in asking when, 

her answer was always the same: 

When the house is clean.

We told each other she was 

just at the bar down the street,

sipping beer over ice, feeding 

quarters into the jukebox

or maybe shooting pool—

and we waited.

House gleaming, 

stomachs grumbling, 

hearts pounding, 

we waited.