Tonight we only have Veronica with us. Drew’s dad still feels bad about making me think he was a stalker so he’s offered babysitting services whenever we need it.

He had told me as we were leaving to make sure I let Liz know how nice he is for offering up his time for us. He also mentioned to stress the fact that he is doing this out of the goodness of his heart. Drew’s mom had called me the other day and said that whenever he leaves the house he runs as fast as he can to his car, gets in, and locks the doors.

I’m pretty sure Liz has scarred him for life.

We pull into Carter and Claire’s driveway and park behind Liz and Jim’s van.

“Honey, have you hugged your va**na today?” Drew asks me with a smirk as he turns off the engine and pockets the keys.

“Will you stop it with that? I already admitted that Dr. Madison was a bad idea. Stop reminding me,” I complain as I get out of the car and get Veronica unbuckled from the back seat.

Drew has been teasing me nonstop about our botched marriage therapy session. I don’t understand how I could have judged Dr. Madison so wrong.

“Didn’t you Google her or anything first? Find out what she was about?”

“Of course I did,” I say in exasperation as I grab Veronica’s hand and we walk up the driveway. “Her add in the newspaper said she was 'new age' and 'holyistic'. I didn’t understand the 'new age' thing. I figured she was just an older woman who wasn’t happy with getting older and instead of telling people her age, she just made up something called ‘new age’. Sort of like when babies are newly born. Or like, ‘How old are you?’ ‘Oh, I’m new age!’

And being holyistic, you would think that therapy session would have centered more around being holy and close to God. We could use some holyistic in our marriage. We haven’t been to church in years.”

Drew closes his eyes and shakes his head as he rings the doorbell. I know he totally agrees with me and is just too annoyed about the whole therapy thing to say anything else.

“It’s about time you got here!” Carter says as he opens the door. “Charlotte and Sophia have already pulled hair, clawed eyes out, and one of them shoved the other into the bathtub and turned the shower on. Not sure who did it since we found both of them crying and sopping wet.”

Carter steps back and holds the door open for us so we can walk inside.

“Hey, man, nice shirt!” Jim states as he comes from around the corner into the living room.

Tonight, in honor of game night, Drew is wearing the shirt I got him for Christmas last year. It’s got a picture of a Twister mat and says: How about a game of Twister? Right hand on my penis, left hand on my ass.

“Veronica, why don’t you go on back to the playroom and see what the girls are doing?” I tell her as I bend down to help her remove her coat.

“Don’t tell me what to do, devil woman!”

I stand up and glare at Drew.

“What? Can I help it if she has everything from ‘Billy Madison’ memorized?”

Veronica takes off running down the hall before I can scold her. Technically it’s Drew who needs scolding, but at this point there’s no use.

“Come on, everyone’s in the dining room,” Jim says as he turns and leads the way.

An hour later we’re in the middle of a game of Mad Gab. I hate this game. Well, I hate it when it’s my turn because I never get any of them right. But it is pretty funny when it’s someone else’s turn. On one side of the card is a popular phrase, but the words are kind of jumbled together so you can’t tell right away what the phrase is. You have to say the words out loud over and over until it starts to sound like the right phrase. For example, the last one that was done, the card said: Abe Odd Hull Luck Oak. The answer, written on the back of the card was: A bottle of Coke.

“Alright, it’s Jenny’s turn,” Claire announces as she pulls a card from the box.

I groan, preparing for the fact that I will lose again.

Claire holds up the card and I read the words, mumbling them to myself.

“No, no, no. You know the rules, Jenny. Say them out loud,” Liz scolds.

I huff and start reading the words really slowly. “Hiney…duck…hiss. Hiney…duck…hiss.”

Liz is leaning over close to Claire so they can both see what the answer should be and they are laughing hysterically.

“Hiney…duck…hiss. Hiney duck hiss. Hiney duck hiss,” I say, trying to say it a little faster in the hopes that it will spark something in my mind.

Nope.

“Oh God, I can’t!” Liz laughs, holding on to her stomach and resting her forehead on top of the table. “Hiney duck!”

“Try saying it really, really fast,” Drew suggests, laughing as well.

“Hineyduckhiss. Hineyduckhiss. Hineyduckhiss. This is dumb. It makes no sense,” I complain. “Just tell me the answer.”

Claire continues to laugh as she turns the card around to show everyone the answer.

“I need a kiss? You have got to be kidding me!”

I really hate this game.

“Oh, I told you guys about the charity thing I’m doing at the shop this weekend, right?” Liz asks as she starts packing up Mad Gab to put it away.

“You mentioned something about it but refresh my memory,” Drew says as he leans back in his chair and rests his arm on the back of mine.

“Well, you know how last year we did a silent auction and all the proceeds went to The American Cancer Society? I wanted to do something a little more outrageous this year and with more of a theme that matches my store. So, I am having a vibrator race,” Liz announces.

“Whoa, really?” Drew asks. “Is that legal?”

“Why wouldn’t it be legal? I’m having it in the lot behind the store which is completely fenced in, and there will be security at the door to make sure only eighteen and up are allowed in. There will be bets and different heats and lots to drink. So make sure you all have a fantastic vibrator to bring with you. Or you could always buy a new one at the store when you get there.”

Before I can ask any questions about the vibrator race and how exactly it works, Claire shushes all of us.

“Do you guys notice anything?” she asks.

We all pause and listen.

“It’s really quiet. Why is it so quiet?” Jim asks.

With five girls in the house and a ten year old boy, there should definitely be a lot of noise coming from down the hall. The fact that we’ve been able to play a game uninterrupted for an entire hour should have clued us in that something was up.

We all jump up from the table and race down the hall. Drew is the first one to the playroom door and stops dead in his tracks in the doorway, blocking all of our views.

“Oh, holy Mary Tyler Moore,” he mutters before turning around and placing his arms on the doorframe so no one can get in. “You do NOT want to go in there.”

We all stand in the hallway giving each other equal looks of fear and horror at what could possibly be happening on the other side of Drew.

Is someone dead? Did the cat fights finally get serious and one of the girls is now missing an eye? What if it’s Veronica? Oh my God, my baby is going to have to go through life wearing an eye patch like a pirate! On National Pirate Day she’ll be expected to dress up and talk in a funny voice the whole day because she’s a pirate every day and everyone will just assume she’s really good at it. But what if she isn’t good at being a pirate? She’ll be hated by all for not knowing what “walk the plank” means. I don’t even know what the hell it means!

“Drew, what the fuck, man? What did they do?” Carter asks as he pushes me to the side so he can see over Drew’s arms.

“Oh my fuck,” Carter sighs. “You might as well drop your arms. They’re going to have to see it sooner or later. Claire, take a deep breath first.”

Drew finally moves out of the way and we can all see just what has happened in the play room.

All five girls are sitting in a circle in the middle of the room, and each one’s face is completely covered in black Sharpie marker. And when I say completely covered, I mean completely. Absolutely. Lips, nose, eyelids, ears…covered. We all slowly make our way into the room, our mouths drop open in shock. It’s not until we’re fully inside the room that we notice the extent of the damage. As I turn around in circles, I’m kind of amazed at the detail of the scenes drawn on the wall. In black Sharpie. They actually drew a castle with a princess in the tower and a moat. It’s a pretty good picture.

“Holy hell, is that a dragon? Dude, who did the dragon? That’s pretty good,” Drew asks.

“I did!” Charlotte pipes up. She immediately wipes the black smile off of her face when she sees the murderous look on Liz’s face.

“I just painted these walls,” Claire mumbles as she takes on a catatonic look and stares at the ceiling.

“Gavin! Have you been in here this entire time?” Carter shouts.

I didn’t even notice Gavin sitting sideways in a chair in the corner with his legs hanging over the arms, flipping through a book.

“Yep,” Gavin answers as he continues turning the pages without looking up.

“Um, and you didn’t think it was necessary to tell us the girls were painting their faces and the walls with a marker that doesn’t wash off?” Carter scolds.

Gavin finally looks away from his book and notices the girls in the middle of the room, all sitting silently and still clutching the permanent markers in their hands.

“Heh, heh. Nice job, cootie faces!”

“Shut up, you piece of crap!” Ava yells.

“AVA!” Liz yells.

“What? I’m not allowed to call him a piece of shit, am I?” she replies as she crosses her arms and pouts.

“She’s got a point. She’s not allowed to say ‘shit’,” Jim whispers to Liz.

“I just painted these walls,” Claire mutters again.

“This is the best game night ever!” Drew exclaims as he pulls out his cell phone and starts snapping pictures. “Girls, say, ‘Once you go black, you never go back!'”

I walk over and smack his arm, snatching the phone out of his hand. “Alright, girls, everybody up, clothes off and into the bathroom.”

Liz and I start herding the girls out of the room and across the hall.

“Gavin, go get some soap and water and start scrubbing these walls,” Carter says as he makes his way over to Claire and wraps her in his arms.

“Why do I have to clean the walls? I didn’t draw on them. This is HORSESHIT!”

“GAVIN ALLEN! I JUST PAINTED THESE WALLS! DID YOU HEAR ME? I…JUST…PAINTED…THESE…WALLS! IJUSTPAINTEDTHESEWALLS! IJUSTPAINTEDTHESEWALLS!” Claire shrieks.

“Is she losing her shit or is she trying to do another Mad Gab?” Drew asks me. “Because if it’s a Mad Gab, I’m going with ‘A just plain teddy swallows’.”

Chapter 14 - Racers, Take Your Mark

The weekend is finally here and even though it’s been an exhausting week with work, getting up at all hours of the night with Billy and giving Veronica eight baths in the last three days to try and get marker off of her face, I’m excited to go to the charity event that Liz is having. And I’m not going to lie. I'm a little nervous. I’ve never been shy about sex. Ever. But since having Billy, I don’t feel sexy. Most likely from the fact that I get maybe three hours of sleep every night. But still, I think today will be good for Drew and I. The marriage counseling was a bust and the dinner with our neighbors didn’t provide us with any kind of help, so I’m hoping maybe this will do the trick. Maybe it will give me the spark I need to feel sexy and get back on the sex train. I feel bad for Drew. We used to have sex every single day, sometimes two or three times. I know he’s frustrated. I’m frustrated too. I want to want to have sex. I miss sex. I miss sex with him. I’m determined to make today a success even though all I want to do is go back to sleep.

“Okay, you’ve got your traditional rabbit, which has rotating beads and tantalizing bunny ears. According to my chart, it has a one hundred percent success rate of completion within five point three minutes,” Drew states as he looks at a page of the binder in his hand.

We’re in our bedroom with all of my vibrators spread out on the floor. Drew is determined that I win this race today so he has spent all week analyzing vibrators, making flow charts, and running diagnosis tests on them.

“Next, we have your standard silver bullet. It’s simple, straightforward, and could be our ace in the hole. Pun intended. No one would think to use the bullet because it’s so small. But this baby’s got kick, highlighted by my report of a one hundred percent success rate within two point seven minutes. I think we really need to set that one aside as a contender.”

I pick up the silver bullet and set it apart from the rest.

“I’m nervous about this race. Do you really think I have a chance to win?”

Drew closes his binder and squats down next to me at my place sitting on the floor. “Baby, you’ve got this thing in the bag. You could win this thing with your eyes closed and your arms cut off. You just have to believe.”

I nod my head and motion for him to proceed with the binder of stats.

Thirty minutes later, we’ve narrowed down our selection to the top two, which is pretty amazing considering I have no less than thirty-seven vibrators. As we pack up the rainbow of colorful objects and place them back into our suitcase of fun to slide back under our bed, I hear the front door open and close.