Then things changed and he wasn't going, and my husband worked today and has to work tomorrow. He would go if I wanted to go .. but I knew he didn't want to go so I figured no.. don't go.
THEN.. my son calls in a really, really bad mood. Seems he is going to his sister's house after all cause he has GOT to get away from the Kiddo's mom. She keeps screaming at him. I told him to quit answering the phone but it was him making the calls TRYING to include her in Halloween but apparently it was becoming a huge argument.
So, my husband figured we'd go .. and let him have some much needed time with non screaming adults. We ditch the candy, no trick or treaters were coming so we left. My daughter is dressed like a bride but a dead one. As if someone slashed her mouth from ear to ear and stitched it up. It looked like a bizarre smile. At one point her significant other said, "Honey, I'm sorry I cut your mouth like that." Daughter did not bat an eye just looked at him very apologetically and said, "I'm sorry I talked too much."
Now back to my son, he showed up with the Kiddo and she had her hair in a pony tail. I was going to make a joke but I prefaced it with "did you do this?" "No, she did." I THOUGHT he meant the Kiddo but when I looked up.. the mother was there.
My heart just sunk. I couldn't even come to my daughter's house and have a good time.
She hovered as if we were the best of friends. It was my daughter's home I didn't want to be rude. I kept trying to walk away, I really did. In fact, my grandson was introducing me to his girlfriend and I just suddenly... took off and left HIS room because she came in as if she belonged.
My husband and M.. my daughter's significant other.. apparently were even laughing as they watched me trying to leave so there'd be no issue at this party. But at some point I was stuck. She started talking about the Kiddo being wired up because she ate three cup cakes.
Have I said before that when I'm in a situation where I don't know what to say because it's not very nice so I should keep my mouth shut, then I'm suddenly lost and don't know what to say? Oh.. yeah, the teacher. I found myself once again in one of those awkward situations, I don't have anything nice to say so.. as my dad taught me, I don't want to say anything at all but I'm stuck now.
I'll be civil. I'll smile. Yes, I know it's a pasted on smile but I'm not telling her to get away and not knowing what to say, I simply said.. "I thought you were watching her!" She tried to explain how she was sneaky. I was puzzled. This child has never snuck anything. She asks for it. Then if I say no she has a temper tantrum but she doesn't sneak.
Of course the mother looked away for just a second and the next thing she knew the Kiddo had her third cup cake in her mouth. Uhm.. you were outside! But I didn't say it. I had that smile and said "it's not any problem for you because she's coming home with us." I was thinking, because I KNEW she wasn't watching her, that it didn't matter to the mother cause the Kiddo wasn't going home with her. So if the kiddo was spastic it wasn't her issue.
Then she started on how she was upset because of some wierd stuff that seems like it's not terribly true about work and not being able to make it to the Kiddo's yellow belt test. Yet all I can think of is, "You don't mind snubbing the laws and the police by driving on a suspended license .. so.. why not snub your boss for your daughter?" But, really, I know most times arrangements can be made for an hour to see her daughter do this.
In the middle of this conversation that I didn't want to have because really.. the whole thing is show. She's being a good mother for those minutes she thinks I'm watching but a good mother is a mother every minute of every day. Period. So, in the midst of this conversation that won't seem to quit I can only picture this smile I'm trying to pull off.. and I can picture myself looking like my daughter's smile in her costume. I wanted to giggle. I wanted to tell this girl she had no real business here. And when my grandson went into the fridge and she was leaning over the top of the fridge door and inspecting the contents of the fridge I wanted to tell her to quit being nosey. All the food and drinks were out in plain sight. Instead I asked her if she needed something and she said she was just looking.
Again I tried to smile that friendly smile but all I could picture was my own face looking like my daughter's. The smile was fake. The smile alone said, 'Go away, I don't like you, the sound of your whiney voice makes me want to scream.' It didn't matter how hard I tried to make it look like I was comfortable in all this.
My husband said it was awful. He couldn't believe I was doing this. He was sure any moment this girl would figure out that I was mocking her. But I wasn't trying to mock her. I wanted only to be civil and hope she went away. But she didn't go away. She kept coming back and I knew if I didn't keep up with the fake smile that was beginning to make me want to giggle but if I didn't keep it up the words, "Go away you stupid bitch!" would have come out of my lips.
My husband said I said that many times over without saying those actual words.. but I was TRYING to be nice.
I tried.. I really tried to be nice but perhaps it's simply been much to much for me to even pull it off. Too much of seeing my son upset, Waayy too much of seeing what the effects of this woman has had on my grandaughter.. or should I say.. LACK of.. Or maybe it was her last stunt of coming to my house drunk and trying to get me to lure my son back to her, and get me to help her be a better mother so my son didn't try to take custody of his daughter. Maybe it's knowing ALL of us of helped her and it didn't do any good.
Or perhaps it's knowing she doesn't have a license and drove the hour and a half to my daughter's house. Maybe it's walking out and seeing her pose for a picture with a soda bottle in her hand when I saw her get a beer. When my son, who was taking the picture, said he messed it up she walked over to him and when she moved I saw the beer bottle sitting there on the floor. Don't be fake. If you're going to drink beer then pose with the beer.. it's the lies. It's not feeling comfortable not even in my own family's home.
She thanked me for keeping the Kiddo for them. "I did it for my son and for her." I was done. I couldn't even summon the fake smile. I'm his mother.. I worry about him and what she'll do to him and his daughter. But I had to leave. I had to get some honesty back in my life because a fake smile, no matter how bizaare you imagine it is still an ugly thing to wear.
A fake smile is, by it's very nature, a lie and I hate lying.