And Many Things He Hopes Not to Hear

I’m writing from a prompt I was to have written to for my writing group last month. So at least you know that I’m behind everywhere.

That prompt: you leave the baby’s occupied car seat on the hood of the car. When you drive away the car seat and the baby roll off the hood and bounce into the street. The baby’s fine but the next day you must fess up to your spouse. Write that scene.

I should note that two couples in our group are pending their first child–I’ve got four. Still.

“Um, so…when I took the baby…”

“Veronica.”

“Right. When I took Veronica to Loews yesterday while you were napping I kinda forgot something.”

“You want me to watch her while you go back to get it? What? The caulk?”

“Dammit now I forgot two things. Well, one thing still really.”

“I’ll watch her. You can go. I’m fine. I put the keys up on the hook and I think I saw your wallet in the door.”

“OK, cool, but this was different than that. I…ileftthebabyonthehoodanddroveaway.”

Everything in the room stands still. Then his wife carefully places the fork on the edge of the plate next to her eggs. It tinks. She’s clearly considering what to say next; he’s running down the list of things he expects to hear and many he hopes not to hear.

The husband wishes he’d admitted to fucking the receptionist at work instead.

“Thank you for telling me that. Now I should tell you something too.”

“…”

“Ididthesamethinglastweek.”

“OK then.”

“We should probably try not to do that again.”

“Yeah. Probably not.”

269 words on day 493