This Modern Love

I slammed on the brakes, causing the truck to come to a neck breaking stop. I turned my head to face the four boys’ face in the back seat.

“Listen, if I have to stop this car one more time, I’m kicking one of you out!” I threatened.

They looked away from me, trying to hid their smiles and giggles. Their breathing gave away some of their snickers.

“Yes, mom,” Louie managed to giggle.

I let out a sharp sigh and returned to driving. I saw Scotty snickering, covering his face with his palm in the corner of my eye.

“What are you laughing at?” I snapped.

Scotty wiped his face and cleared his throat.

“Nothing,” he lied, looking through the windshield.

“Liar,” I mumbled, turning into the Wal-mart parking lot.

“You do sound like our moms,” Scotty chuckled, quickly looking away from me.

I rolled my eyes and scoffed, pulling into an empty parking space.

“Sweet! Let’s get a cart!” exclaimed Louie, jumping out of the car.

“Let’s not!” I corrected, starring him down.

Louie sneered at me, crossing his arms and walking towards the front door.

“God, Candace, just kill all the fun, why don’t you,” Kevin scoffed.

“I’m not going to be responsible for one of you fools pushing him into a moving car!” I explained.

“It would have been parked, thank you!” Keir corrected me.

“Oh, that just makes it so much better,” I mumbled to myself.

The Wal-mart greeter did what he did best, greet us. He insisted that Louie needed a return sticker in case he got lost. I told the old man that if he put the sticker on him, Louie was going to go home with him. Louie remained sticker less.

“Dude!” Louie exclaimed, running past the camping isle into the toy section.

“Oh god,” I sighed, slapping my palm to my forehead.

Scotty laughed and rubbed my shoulders.

“Let’s hope you never have four sons to take care of when you get old, huh?” he teased.

“If they did even a quarter of what you guys do, I’d be sending them to a boot camp in Aruba,” I spat.

“That’s a little harsh, don’t you think?” Mason asked with his tongue in his cheek.

Louie came back with two plastic light sabers and a cape.

“LIGHTSABERS!” he yelled, hoisting a blue one in the air.

Keir grabbed the other one from Louie’s hand, and decided to battle him.

They were making sound effects and noises,. They barley hit each other’s light sabers. They were just doing spinning tricks with them. Louie hit a lantern off of the end cap, causing the whole end cap to fall apart.

We all took in a sharp breath, instantly backing away from the mess.
Louie dropped the light saber and cape, and started to walk off snickering.

“LOUIE VITO!” I yelled, earning a wide-eyed stare from Mason. “GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE AND PICK IT UP!”

Keir sighed and started to pick up the lanterns.

“Nuh-uh, he knocked it over, let him pick it up,” I instructed, pointing a stern finger at Keir.

Keir dropped the lanterns, and raised his hands in surrender.

Louie hung his head and sulked back to us.

“Just like my fucking mom, man,” he mumbled underneath his breath.

Mason and Scotty started snickering.

“I’m never going out in public with you guys again,” I sighed.

“Hey, I usually play mom when we go out together. I’m on break," Mason declared, swishing his mouth to the side.

“You chose the wrong time to be on break, Mr. Mom,” I chuckled.

Louie picked up the lanterns, and neatly stacked them beside the broken shelf.

“Thank you,” I said, patting his back. ”Alright, pick out you guys’ bags and lets go.”

Mason and Kevin grabbed four tote bags and a large suitcase. Mason threw one of the tote bags at Louie, who was looking at air mattresses. Him not seeing the incoming bag fell over from getting hit on the side of the head.

“Scotty,” I sighed, rolling my eyes. “Control your friends!”

“My friends?” he chuckled. “Now they’re my friends because they are causing trouble?”

“That’s exactly correct,” I replied.

Scotty shook his head, still laughing.

“Nuh-uh, that’s not how it works!” he insisted.

“Yes, it is. You’re whipped now. And I had big hopes for you, too, Scotty,” Keir said.

“What do you mean?” Scotty asked, squinting his eyes in confusion.

“I thought you were going to be a ladies man,” he answered dramatically.

“I love how you just know all of these things, when the last time you say the three of us,” I interrupted, pointing a finger from Scotty to myself to Louie. “Was when we were in first grade.”

“I could tell he was going to be a ladies man, because he used to play doctor on all the girls underneath the slide, and then refer them to Mason when he was done,” Keir spat.

“That rule still applies to this day,” Kevin teased.

Mason flipped him off, and continued to run the bags through the cheek-out line.

“He was a ladies man. He used to get laid all the time. But since Harry met Sally,” Louie sourly said, pointing at me. “He got all, I dunno, whipped.”

“What you mean to say, Louie,” Kevin continued, wrapping his arm around Scotty, who folded his arms across his chest and licked his lips, interested in what was going to be said. “Is that Scotty has turned into a genuine, kind, protective,” Kevin continued in a sweet voice, petting Scotty’s head. “Angelic little fuck head!” he spat, slapping Scotty on the back of the head.

Scotty shrugged and pulled me into his arms.

“See, to get this, you have to know what women like, and they don’t like dudes who think they are the shit,” Scotty preached.

“The easy ones do,” Kevin pointed out with a chuckle.

Scotty shrugged and nodded.

“Yeah, that’s true,” he agreed.

Mason’s pocket started to sing Bloc Party. He threw the bags at Louie, who was more prepared this time, and answered his phone.

“Yo, yo, hello?” he asked in a sad attempt to rap.

WE walked by the Wal-mart greeter, who waved at us as we walked past.

“Yo, Tomato Paste wants to talk to you,” Mason said, tapping my shoulder with his cell phone.

I tossed Scotty the car keys as a hit that I was not going to try to drive with those idiots causing trouble in the back seat.

“Hello?” I asked in the phone, a little nervous.

“Hey! Do you want to come over and kill some time?” he asked, I could hear the large grin in his voice.

“Oh my god, you have no idea,” I sighed.