Free Life After Coffee by Virginia Franken Page B

later, the teacher with no name somehow grabs Billy from behind and manages to fold his arms square across his chest, holding his wrists in both of her hands. She has the willful facial expression of someone who’s done this plenty of times before.
    “Billy. I am holding you because I will not let you hurt your body or your mother’s body. I will let you go when you calm down.”
    Billy doesn’t calm down. He’s wiggling like a fish tangled in a net.
    “Mommy, no! Make her stop—she’s hurting me!” he screams, bucking up against her restraint. What do I do? What do I do?
    “It’s probably best if you just go,” says his teacher.
    “Really?” I ask.
    “It’s just easier. He’ll calm down quicker. We’ve been through this with Billy before.” I didn’t know that. “Just go for now.”
    Stay or go? My natural instinct is to tell this woman to get her hands the hell off my son—but then what? Watch him as he goes on a rampage around the classroom? Let him wage a full-on war against Regina?
    “Billy, I need you to listen to your teacher and try to calm down. Mommy will see you later,” I manage to choke out. I then duck my head down and leave the room, fast. I haven’t even got the balls to give an apologetic look to my almost-friend.
    I step back outside into the sun and push down the sob that is threatening. It’s not even nine, and this is shaping up to be one of the worst days of my life ever. And that’s a title not won easily.
    As I approach the parking lot, I see a gaggle of mothers surrounding my vehicle. That’s why no one’s in class yet. And then I remember: Violet. My instinct is to run to the car, but a flash of insight tells me that if I do that, I’ll look guilty. I’ve technically done nothing wrong. Well, maybe technically I have. But really I haven’t. My mother used to leave me in the car for an hour at a time when she ran errands. Mind you, that was in the eighties. She also used to drive around town with me in a Moses basket just slung on the backseat when I was baby. I doubt that would fly these days.
    “Hey,” I say to the group. The nervous comes out as hostile.
    “Is this your car?” asks one of the gaggle.
    “Yes,” I reply.
    “Your daughter is trapped inside!” she says, gesturing to the back where Violet’s running Titanic hands down the window and yelling, “Let me out!”
    “I just dropped off Billy. I was gone for two minutes.” In the background I hear someone say, “That’s Billy’s mother.” Apparently this is somehow significant as there’s suddenly a ripple of comprehension through the crowd. I hear another voice speaking into a phone: “It’s okay, the mother has returned to her vehicle.”
    My God. Someone actually called the cops! A heavyset woman wearing nothing but Birkenstocks and a paisley shirtdress pushes through the crowd; she has a fire extinguisher over one shoulder.
    “Stand back!” she yells, and starts at a run for the back window.
    “STOP RIGHT NOW!” I yell. She catches herself just before she throws the fire extinguisher through the window. “What are you doing?” I ask. It seems a pretty sensible question. It’s not hot out. My daughter is in no danger. Or at least she was in no danger until people started threatening to throw fire extinguishers in her face. These women have gone insane.
    “I was going to save your daughter!” she puffs, dropping the fire extinguisher to the ground.
    “By showering her in glass?” This gives them all pause for the moment. The mothers at the edge of the circle start to step away, maybe perturbed by the realization that shattered glass in the back of a car might actually pose more of a realistic hazard to a kid than being left alone for a few moments. “I was gone ten minutes.”
    “It’s against the law,” says one of the mothers. I bite back an urge to say, “Blow me.” Instead I open the car door, get in the driver’s seat, and slam it closed again. I start up the engine,