karen

Molly grabbed a second handful of cheese from the display and distributed the cubes to the children.

"What's this no?" Viv said, chewing cheese.

"What?" Molly was trying to catch the dribbles of cheese from Ben's mouth before they hit the floor.

"What's this NO?" Viv was pointing at a sign on the glass case of the butchery. She had recently developed an obsession with NO signs: No Smoking, No Pets, No Barbecuing. The Circle With The Line Through It.

Molly examined the sign. It depicted a woman with a shopping cart containing a baby. Beside the woman stood a child leaning against the glass of the butcher's case. All enclosed within a circle, all crossed out with a line.

"It looks like us," Viv observed.

She was right. It did.

"So, what's it saying?" Viv said. "No us?"

"I think," Molly said, gathering herself, trying to overcome the agitation the sign had set off in her, "it means Don't Let Your Kid Lean On the Glass." An explanation intended as much to comfort herself as to inform Viv. Of course they didn't want kids leaning on the glass, leaving their fingerprints. It was a generic informational sign.

"You mean like leaning on the glass like the way how I'm doing right now?"

"Exactly." Molly couldn't believe how chipper her voice sounded. "So don't."

"Okay," Viv said. "I won't. But I want to keep looking at this sign."

"But we have to finish the shopping," Molly said. "Remember, the juice boxes? You can have one as soon as we pay for it." She didn't respect herself, her never-ending tactics and bribery.

"I love this sign," Viv declared. "And it's my birthday. And I want to stay right here. Looking at it. Forever."

"We have to finish the shopping," Molly said.

Some moments later, Viv was on the floor, kicking and slapping the linoleum. Her barrettes had fallen out. She was screaming, not words but syllables.

Molly took a step back, clinging to Ben, who clung to her. Other shoppers had begun to assemble, to witness. Molly felt hot and helpless. The witnesses murmured and muttered, trying to help.

"I'm sorry," Molly kept saying to everyone, to the world as a whole, "I'm sorry."

She wished she had methods for ushering Viiv back into her tamed self. But she had never developed any methods. The beast within fought its way out while the mother watched in awe.

As the tantrum continued alongside Molly's repeated apologies, the witnesses either lost interest or trained their increasingly judgmental eyes on the mother.