I am using the bathroom, and I can hear Maj talking to her homework in the room across the hall. She is in the last stages of a research report on local invasive species. The project is due tomorrow, and all she has left to accomplish is the foldering of her typewritten report and the final placement of various drawings, graphs, and charts on her poster-board.
She sighs heavily, “You and I have a long and troubled history, Mr. Glue. Remember that book report a few weeks ago where I had to glue a whole page of typewritten text to construction paper? What was up with all that bubbling and slopping, Mr. Glue? That was unacceptable. You made me get teased at school. Annoying.”
Snort.
“OK, so I am going to resist the urge to pour you all over the back of these pages, even though that is so how you should work. I am going to put small dots in the corners and then smear them with my fingertip and then turn you over and press you down nicely and . . . AIIIEIEIEIEIEIEEE! What is going on with this bubbling? Do you know how much work I put into these graphs and drawings, Mr. Glue? Sassless adhesion! I need sassless adhesion!”
I reach for the toilet paper. Find none. DAMN IT.
“Mr. Glue, I do not want to hear from you about the wonder of the gluestick. I know of the gluestick wonders, but I do not have a gluestick and there is no way Mother is going to drive me to the store for a gluestick. YES, I KNOW THAT WOULD BE BETTER. Shut up, Mr. Glue. Shut up and focus.”
I pull some Kleenex from the box on the counter and finish my business. I rinse and dry my hands and then grab a roll of toilet paper as I walk down the hall to Kallan’s room, “Hey, Kallan?”
Kallan is lying in her bed reading a gossip magazine and listening to music. She pulls earbuds from her ears as I enter the room, “What?”
I throw her the toilet paper roll, “I wonder if you could maybe demonstrate the procedure involved in unwrapping this . . . just so I know that you are indeed capable of changing the toilet paper roll.”
She laughs and unwraps it and then throws it back to me, “Sorry about that.”
I put my two index fingers in either side of the roll and extend my arms, “Could you start the toilet paper going for me?”
“AUGH! Do not speak to me of hole-punches! We can make this work if we just cooperate. Stand with me and not against me and the piercing will be clean!”
Kallan reaches forward to rip the beginning of the paper free from the roll. I pull until I have about three feet in my hand, and then I rip it off and present it to Kallan with a floaty swish, “Please accept this token of my esteem and appreciation of a job well done.”
“I am not inclined to go in search of a hole-punch. Just yield! Settle yourself on the pokey bits and yield! Go in the three pronged folder! His job is to prong you! Yield! Go in, I say!”
Kallan stands holding the length of toilet paper for a moment, “Really, Mommy? What am I supposed to do with this? Oh wait!” She squats beside me and tucks the end of the paper into my sock as I pretend not to notice what she is doing.
“LET ME MAKE A HOLE IN YOU! DON’T YOU WANT TO WEAR A JACKET? LET ME DRESS YOU!”
I walk out of the room, Kallan right behind me. I lift a hand to greet an imaginary guest, “Oh, Kallan’s teacher! What a surprise to see you here! Let me just make you a cup of tea . . . what? There is? Oh, that is so embarrassing!” I reach to pull at the toilet paper that trails behind me as Kallan giggles hysterically, “Would you like sugar in your tea?”
“BAD BOY OF UNHOLINESS!”
I tuck the toilet paper into the back of my jeans, “Hey, Kallan? This would be way worse . . . Hello, Kallan’s teacher! Nice to see you! What? I do? Goodness, I must have had some sort of wiping problem. I hate when that happens, don’t you?”
Kallan is rolling on the floor, giggling happily. She reaches up for the end of the toilet paper and pulls it from my waistband, “Hold on. I have a better idea.”
“AIIEIEIEIEIEIEEE! You ripped! Bad boy, you ripped!”
I turn to Kallan, who has wrapped the toilet paper around her neck like a scarf. She extends a hand to shake mine, “Hello, it is so lovely to meet you. Isn’t this a lovely party?”
I shake her hand and gesture with my other hand, “There . . . ummm . . . seems to be something around your neck.”
“Listen, all of you. You think I care? I will duct tape all of you and the heck with my grade. I better see some cooperation starting IMMEDIATELY or I will duct tape you to this poster board by your lips. Think about that for a second . . . don’t think I won’t do it, because I have had it up to here with your sass.”
Kallan tilts her head back and runs admiring fingers along an imaginary piece of jewelry, “My husband bought me this pin over in Peru because he is the sort of man who thinks a pin is a good apology for failing to invite me to go on that trip with him. If we get to be better friends, you will realize that my husband is a fool. He does have good taste in jewelry, though.”
“Mr. Glue, there is just no way you can be clogged. Fine, I will just squeeze you a little harder and . . . AIAIIEIEIEIEIEEEE! . . . I said I wanted sassless adhesion! These are puddles of sass, young man. Puddles of sass.”
I reach to brush Kallan the socialite’s hair away from her neck, “The pin is lovely, but I was talking about this. Is that toilet paper?”
Kallan reaches awkward embarrassed fingers for the necklace of toilet paper and pulls it free, “Oh my. It appears I have had some sort of wiping problem. Don’t you hate when that happens?”
And then Kallan and I shriek with laughter.
“One more word about how you dream of Scotch tape and I swear I will drown you in glue. DROWN YOU. That is not even a threat. It is a promise.”
Kallan wraps the toilet paper around her neck again, and she and I start the skit again, working to control our giggles.
Maj calls from the other room, “I can hear you, you know. You two are insane . . . an embarrassment to this family, if you want the truth.”
Kallan and I have to use the toilet paper to dry our tears.
So much giggling.
