“Momma…” Three. Two. One. “Momma!”

I could literally set a timer for it. Knew when it would happen, why it would happen, and most of the time, where it would happen. This time, I’d managed to almost make it out of the grocery store. Almost. Why in the hell every store—and I mean every last one of them—had to display candy by the registers was beyond me.

And they wondered why people shoplifted.

Oh, I don’t know…maybe so we don’t have to deal with a full-blown toddler meltdown over a friggin’ chocolate bar and a few Tic Tacs.

It’s so much easier to shove a T-bone steak down the front of my pants than try to get through checkout with the incessant “I want” followed by the shrieking wails of a child who was told no. And forget ignoring the kid. Nope. That only makes it worse. So yes, even though I’d never actually stolen a steak from a grocery store, I could see the many benefits of doing so.

However, after what felt like ten years of dealing with battle cries worthy of CPS’s attention—Trevor was three, so clearly it didn’t take me ten years to learn, but c’mon…after dealing with it once, it feels like an eternity—I’d finally learned how to combat it.

Without taking my eyes off the screen in front of me, the one tallying up how much my weekly grocery bill would cost me, I reached into the pile of food that had yet to be crammed into canvas bags, grabbed the container of baked goods, and handed it to Trevor.

“Momma.” Three. Two. One. “Oh…cookies.”

And that, my friends, is how you thwart a checkout meltdown.

By this point, I’d stopped glancing around, already knowing the looks being directed at me by complete strangers who didn’t know my story, didn’t know what it was like to deal with the temperament of a toddler—or at least hadn’t experienced it in the last five to ten years. It used to upset me, the way they judged me silently. Now I just pretended like I didn’t see it, like it didn’t even faze me.

What was that, Mr. Compton? You think I’m raising the next state pen inmate? Maybe I should’ve taken lessons from you…I mean, your boy Robbie is quite the successful entrepreneur. From what I hear, he grows the best weed in town.

And I personally found it ironic that the people whispering beneath their breath about how I’m not doing him any favors by giving into his outbursts are more than likely the same people who would be grumbling “Control your kid” had I not given Trevor that package of cookies.

I figured, as long as I didn’t raise him to be a hypocritical, judgmental asshole, then I could call this whole mom thing a success.

Probably some of the best parenting advice I’d ever heard was “Pick your battles.” Granted, I was sure most of that advice started with a mom who faced two options: the kid or me. Because, really…that’s what it comes down to. If I take away the radio from Trevor because he didn’t eat all his vegetables, then that means I now have to be grounded from the radio, as well. Later, it’d be the TV. Then leaving the house. My God. A week of sitting at home without cable, music, devices, entertainment of any kind just because my kid fucked up. How is that fair? Side note, maybe this explains the overconsumption of wine by mothers. So…you pick your battles. And right now, I chose to leave the grocery store with a week’s worth of food and a happy child by my side.

My phone vibrated in my pocket, so I slowed the cart down to dig it out. Normally, I would’ve waited until I left the parking lot before calling the person back, but I immediately saw my best friend’s name on the screen. Stephany was pregnant and ready to pop any day now, so when she called, I answered.

“Is it time?” I asked while aiming the key fob at the back of my van, wondering why the trunk wasn’t lifting. I couldn’t hear anything other than incoherent, muffled cries strung together by hearty sobs. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Apparently, asking Steph to repeat herself was the wrong thing to do. That only seemed to make her angry, on top of whatever this other emotion was—I didn’t dare call it fear, because I was quite certain that didn’t come close to describing this. The entire time I listened to her garbled complaints, I continued to mash down on the button, my frustration mounting over the fact the trunk wouldn’t open.

Suddenly, something tapped my shoulder and pulled me from the mental bubble I seemed to have been stuck in. It was like standing in the middle of a crowd, convinced you were alone, only to blink and realize you were surrounded by other people. Startled, I nearly dropped my phone—barely catching it before it could hit the pavement—and spun with a gasp until I faced the sexiest man alive.

My momma always told me to make sure I had on clean undies and shoes before leaving the house. The shoes in case I got pulled over—as I got older, I seriously questioned how often my mother had been asked to step out of her vehicle when getting a speeding ticket—and the panties in case something worse happened and a hot doctor had to strip me down to my skivvies. Now, standing in front of this hunky man, I wished she’d thought more about the importance of makeup and the usage of a hairbrush, adding those to the list of must-dos before leaving the house.

“I, uh…I didn’t mean to frighten you, but I think your van is over there.” He pointed behind me, and sure as shit, there was a silver van, identical to the one I stood behind, except the trunk on the other one raised and lowered with every press of the button on the fob.

Meaning…yeah, he stood and watched me point my keys to this van, while the one behind me opened and closed. Humiliation suffocated me until I mumbled something similar to a thank you, and I scurried away to the open trunk behind me.

“Leigh!” I heard coming from my phone. I pulled it back to my ear, assured the call hadn’t disconnected. “Leigh! What happened? Did you not hear a word I said?”

“No, not really. I’m sorry, Steph. It seems I was on the verge of grand theft auto.”

“What?” she shrieked. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I’m leaving the grocery store. I wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing and went to the wrong vehicle. Damn Toyota. Making three hundred million identical silver vans.” I grabbed Trevor from the front of the cart, the package of cookies opened and clutched in his tiny arms, and put him down so he could climb into the back seat.

“That’s why you should always use the unlock button first. If you don’t hear the locks disengage, then you know it’s not your ride. Plus, it’ll save you from looking like the moron wandering around the parking lot with your remote under your chin.”

I held the phone between my shoulder and my ear while transferring the sacks to the trunk. “What are you talking about the remote under my chin?”

“You don’t know that trick?” She continued to speak, saying something about using your head as an antenna—which gave me visions of putting your face too close to the microwave—while my attention moved to the hunk of human next to me.

It was the same guy who’d informed me of the van mix-up to begin with. Just my luck, he was parked next to me, unloading his own cart into the back of his sporty black sedan. I wanted to crawl into my trunk and hide for the foreseeable future.

“Leigh!” There Stephany went again, yelling in my ear simply because I’d stopped paying attention to her. I swear, some days I felt like I had two kids—one who’d shout “Momma” until I answered, and the other who’d scream “Leigh” until I gave her the attention she so desperately wanted.

“Oh my God, Steph. What? I’m trying to leave the store without stealing someone else’s car or getting arrested for sexual assault.”

Silence passed through the line before she said, “As much as I’d love to hear all about this sexual assault charge you’re trying to avoid, I called for a reason.” Suddenly, I remembered her hysteria from earlier. “I’m in full-blown paranoia mode, and I need you to help me through it before I change my mind on this whole parenting thing.”

“First of all, you can’t change your mind. You can’t just say you don’t want to do it anymore. As hard as it is to believe, it’s nothing like The Game of Life.”

“Sure I can. People do it all the time.”

“Your husband may beg to differ.”

“I’ve seen him give me looks when he thinks I can’t see him…I’m pretty sure he’s plotting something behind my back. For all I know, he’s totally on board with this.”

The sexy stranger walked over, and my heart skipped a few beats. I thought he was about to talk to me, maybe hit on me or something. And then, for a split second, I wondered if he knew I was single. I mean, he saw Trevor with me, so maybe he assumed I was still with my son’s father. In a last-ditch effort to tell him I was available without coming out and telling him I was available, I angled the phone speaker closer to my mouth—you know, so he’d understand I wasn’t talking to him, but that he was more than welcome to use the information however he saw fit—and said, “That’s why I’m glad I’m single.”

“What?” It was obvious in Stephany’s tone that she questioned my intelligence.

Almost cautiously, the man grabbed the side of my empty shopping cart and pulled it away from me. In the sexiest voice I’d ever heard, he said, “I might want to take your pants off when you get home.”

My libido spiked, and I couldn’t do anything other than stand there and clench my thighs together, taking far too long to realize what he said made no sense. I stood in shock, completely ignoring my best friend’s complaints in my ear, and replayed his words. That’s when it hit me. He didn’t say he wanted to take my pants off, he said I might want to take them off…when I got home. Had I absorbed the rest of his sentence, I wouldn’t have missed the “and pretreat that before it stains” part.

Pretreat what?

Stains?

I glanced down and noticed the dark red glob of ketchup on my pants…dangerously close to the apex of my thighs. “Oh, shit,” I cursed to myself, forgetting all about Stephany on the phone or the hunk of man in front of me. Searching for where it had come from, I immediately noticed a smashed ketchup packet wedged beneath the plastic flap on the child seat in the front. Due to the amount of sticky red goo on my pants, I could only assume it had exploded when I set Trevor in the cart.

Which means I’d walked around the entire store looking like a bad tampon ad.

I offered the man a weak grin, hoping he understood the humiliation I felt. With a quick nod, he took my cart with his and headed a few spaces away to push both buggies into the cart corral. I used that opportunity to slam the back gate shut, slide the side door closed, and hop into the driver’s seat, where I furiously jabbed my finger into the push start ignition, not relaxing until the engine came to life with a soft purr.

“What the fuck is going on over there?” Stephany asked, her voice now coming through the stereo speakers in the van. At the sound of her famous F-bomb, I glanced in the rearview mirror, noting Trevor had already buckled himself into his booster seat.

“Oh my God, Steph.” I was breathless, sounding as if I’d run a marathon versus desperately trying to leave the parking lot before my future one-night stand—wishful thinking, but at this point, it was the only thing keeping me from losing my mind—could come back and humiliate me more. “I just walked around the whole store with ketchup on my jeans.”

“That sucks…you should take your pants off when you get home and pretreat them.”

“You’re so helpful,” I said, using the same tone a middle finger would if it had a one. I backed out of the space and maneuvered around the parking lot toward the traffic light, the entire time mentally cursing my best friend for things she couldn’t control.

“Anyway…are you ready to listen to me now? I’m in the middle of a crisis and need my person to talk me off this ledge.” Stephany was actually the complete opposite of needy, so I knew this was nothing more than her pregnancy-induced hysteria talking.

The closer she got to her due date, the worse it seemed to be. No lie, she actually called and woke me up at three in the morning once because she worried her unborn daughter would have long nails and possibly scratch the placenta. No matter what I tried to tell her, she was convinced little Becky was in the womb digging her nails into her lifeline. When I tried to reason with her, pointing out that was about as likely to happen as her biting through her umbilical cord, she started to freak out over the prospect of her using the cord to pull the placenta off the uterine wall.

That time, I said, “If she can do that, imagine what she’ll do to the boys on the playground,” and then hung up. But unfortunately, I couldn’t exactly hang up on her now. If I did, I’d spend the entire drive home sick to my stomach over an embarrassing situation I could not change.

At least I didn’t have to worry about seeing him again.

“Yeah, go ahead.” I took some napkins from the center console and began to wipe off my pants while I waited for the red light to change.

“So, I was watching this show…” And that’s where most of this started with her—a show, or a movie, or magazine. I blamed her doctor for putting her on bed rest. If she had other things to do, I was sure she wouldn’t obsess over the strangest things. “And the girl was such a bitch. It was like she believed she could say whatever she wanted because she was pretty and popular.”

“First of all, what in the hell were you watching?” The light turned green, and I glanced up to see Trevor in the rearview mirror. He sat there, eating a cookie with a goofy grin on his face. I wasn’t sure what he found so funny, but I wasn’t about to ask. He was being quiet, and that was all that mattered at the time.

“Some show on MTV about lavish sweet sixteen parties.”

“That right there might be your problem. Those shows are made for the drama. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were told to act that way prior to filming. I mean, they need ratings, and drama gives them that. But besides that, I don’t understand how this show has you freaked out.”

“What if Becky turns out like that? She’s a girl, so of course I want her to be pretty. No one wants an ugly kid.” No matter how many times I tried to tell her that she would never look at her daughter and think she’s ugly, Stephany refused to listen to reason when she was lost in the throes of paranoia. “But what if she actually ends up being pretty? Like gorgeous. And she acts like this little bitch on this show did?”

“Easy, Steph. You just have to smack some sense into her.”

“What if this fucker’s mom smacked her, but it still didn’t stop her from being a turd?”

“Steph, you for real need to calm down and think about this from a more logical standpoint. You have me. Do you seriously think I’d let your daughter turn out to be a bitch?”

“Fish,” I heard come from behind me. I glanced again in the mirror, finding Trevor giggling with a cookie in his hand. “Trev, you know better than to repeat Mommy’s car words.”

“You’re a fucking fool if you think that little boy isn’t going to go to preschool calling other kids fishes and hassles.” She blew out a giggle. At least she seemed calmer than before. “Anyway…on the other hand, what if Becky ends up being one of the little witches who tags along with the mean girl? Like her posse?”

“How about you don’t say ‘posse’ again? Mmmmkay? But seriously, Steph, all jokes aside, you have nothing to worry about. There are so many more important things to focus on rather than how popular your daughter will be in sixteen years.”

I winced as soon as those words came out of my mouth, fear settling into my gut over how fast it’d take her to panic and freak out over the “more important” things that could—and according to Stephany, more than likely would—happen between now and Becky’s sweet sixteen. However, I was met with silence. Which had the potential to be far worse than her verbal anxiety.

“Yeah…such as being kidnapped in the middle of the day,” she said, sounding as if something else held her attention. “Holy shit, Leigh.”

“Ship.” The little echo behind me caught my attention, but I was too invested in Stephany’s sudden change of tone. “What? What’s going on?”

“A kid was kidnapped today. Like not that long ago. There’s an Amber Alert all over TV. Little girl, just under three years old.” Her worried voice slammed into my chest, sending fear straight into my heart.

Again, I found Trevor’s reflection in the mirror, and counted my blessings that it hadn’t been my child who went missing. I didn’t even want to imagine what that little girl’s parents must’ve been going through. It was a nightmare no one should ever have to experience.

“That’s awful. What information have they given?”

“Not really anything yet. Hold on, I’m changing the channel to the local news. Maybe they’ll have more about it there.”

While she focused on the TV, I craned my head to the side, not able to fully settle my tight chest until I saw my child with my own eyes—not his reflection, not through a mirror, but him. He giggled and kicked his feet, mumbled things I couldn’t comprehend past the mouthful of cookie he tried to talk through. I smiled and set my attention on the road ahead, slowly accelerating with the other cars after the light outside our subdivision turned green.

“Apparently,” Stephany continued, “she was kidnapped near the corner of Alabaster and University Park.”

I withdrew my foot from the accelerator and coasted down my street, confusion consuming my thoughts. “Wait…are you sure? I was just there. That’s the grocery store I was at—the one right there on the corner.” I thought for a second before asking, “Do you mean across the street from Publix?”

She was quiet for a few more beats, and as soon as I pulled into my driveway, she returned with, “No. She was abducted from the parking lot in front of the store. It must’ve happened right after you left.”

I grabbed the phone from the cup holder and switched the audio from the car before cutting the engine. “That’s so awful. I can’t imagine…” I stepped out of the van and turned to slide the back door open for Trevor to climb out. That’s when I swallowed my scream, practically choking out, “Holy shit! Ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod. What the fuck!”

“Leigh!” Steph screamed in my ear. “What the hell is going on?”

“I think I kidnapped that missing girl.”

“You what?”

My fingertips tingled and my head felt like it was about to float away from my body. Shallow breaths ran through me, short and quick, my chest heaving without the impression it would slow anytime soon. So this is it, I thought to myself. This is how I die. This is what it feels like to take my last breath.

And somehow, the one thought that floated through my head was: Damn those fuckers who said your life flashes before your eyes. I’d always said that when the time came, it wouldn’t matter how it happened, as long as one of those “life’s memories” that “flashed in front of my eyes” was the time I went to a Jaded Regret concert and got a private encore from Tanner Hart in his hotel room after the show.

I loved my son, but I didn’t care to relive the birth—anyone who says they would were either so drugged up they couldn’t feel the pain, or they’re pathological liars. His baby coos and smiles were heartwarming, invaluable, and totally capable of pulling me off the ledge of sleep-deprived insanity, but when I think about him being that small, all I can remember is the colic and hours upon endless hours of crying. Hearing him say “Momma” for the first time was a high unlike any other. Except after two years of hearing it nonstop, even when I was on the toilet, repeated over and over again until I responded with my full, undivided attention—let’s be real, kids know when you’re only halfway listening in a desperate attempt to pacify them—doesn’t have the same effect.

There were lots of amazing things in my life I wouldn’t mind reliving, but none of them came back to me as I stood there with the side door slid open, staring at the chubbiest little cheeks, the brightest blue eyes, and a headful of dark curls.

“Cookie,” she cooed while holding out her hand to show me the half-eaten, sugary treat clamped between her tiny little fingers.

I glanced back up at Trevor and watched him kick his legs in excitement, a genuine smile lighting up his face. With a contagious giggle, he handed the girl another one.

“How in the hell did you manage to kidnap a kid?” Steph’s voice rushed into my ear.

“I’m assuming she climbed into the van while I was putting the groceries in the back.”

“Okay…but how did you drive all the way home without seeing her? Without knowing you had someone else’s kid in your car?”

I didn’t like her tone, but I wasn’t exactly in the position to argue. “She’s sitting on the floorboard behind my seat, so I wouldn’t have been able to see her from the front.” As if my brain needed a few minutes to absorb the reality around me, I finally understood what I had in front of me. “Holy mother fucking shit balls. What the hell am I going to do with her?”

“Uh…keep her?” Stephany broke out into uncontrollable laughter, ignoring my frustration and panic. “No, for real though, you need to take her back. Go return her.”

“How? Take her to the customer service counter and say, ‘Hi, I’m just here to return a small child who accidentally ended up with the rest of my groceries’? Hell no. Shouldn’t I call someone?”

“Leigh…you call when you find a lost dog, not when you steal someone’s kid.”

“Oh my God, Steph! I didn’t freaking steal her!”

“Sure. Tell that to the mob of people gathering in the parking lot. Or…should I call it the scene of the crime.”

“I hate you, Steph.” Resigned to my fate, I picked the little girl up and slid her into the seat before buckling her tiny body in. In hindsight, I probably should’ve put more thought into her not being in a proper seat for her size, but from where I stood, I was facing kidnapping charges. I didn’t have much mental capacity left to contemplate the possibility of additional child endangerment charges.

“Just take her back. I’m sure her parents are worried sick, and once you explain the situation, everything will calm down.”

“Shouldn’t someone call the police or the store? Something to inform them I’m on my way?”

She hummed in thought while I restarted the van and backed out of my driveway. “Probably not. All I can envision is you showing up to a line of SWAT, weapons drawn, helicopters hovering overhead.”

“You’ve been watching the movie channels again, haven’t you?”

“This isn’t about me, Leigh. This is about you and your grabby hands. You just couldn’t handle the fact that I’m having a girl and you’re stuck with a sticky, smelly, gross boy.”

The drive back to the store didn’t take near as long as the drive home had, which could’ve had something to do with my more-than-likely dangerously high heart rate. Stephany remained on the line the entire time, proving why she was my best friend by doing everything in her power to keep me calm.

When I pulled into the parking lot, it was impossible to miss the flurry of activity directly in front of the store. I realized as I turned down a lane, heading straight toward the blue and red lights, that this was the same aisle I had parked in not that long ago.

“Holy shit.” As slow as I could without going backward, I crept closer to the crowd.

While potty training Trevor, there were times he’d shit his pants and not tell me. I never understood why he’d choose to sit in feces rather than inform me so I could clean off his ass and change his undies. Now, as I made my way toward cops with a stolen child in the seat behind me, I wanted nothing more than to turn around and take this sweet little girl home, just to keep from getting in trouble or looking like a freaking idiot.

For real…who accidentally takes off with someone else’s kid?

Me. That’s who.

All because I’d embarrassed myself in front of a deliciously hot guy.

A uniformed officer noticed me, grabbed his belt, and held out his hand, as if warning me to stop. So I did. In the middle of the aisle, I put the van in park and unbuckled my seatbelt. “Steph? Stay on the line. If something happens, please get someone down here to take care of Trevor, and call a lawyer. Oh, and get bail money.”

“Hey, Leigh?” she called out, stopping me from exiting the idling vehicle. “If they give you shit, you should tell them that the return policy was unclear in regards to toddlers.”

I rolled my eyes, even though she couldn’t see me, and climbed out. I tugged on the handle for the side door and waited for it to automatically slide open. But before I could get the little girl out of the seat, I noticed a familiar face in the crowd. And within seconds of us locking eyes, he recognized me, and then broke into a frantic sprint in my direction.

“Fuck me,” I mumbled beneath my breath, watching the sexiest man alive run toward me.

There went my theory of never having to see him again.

After freeing the child from the seat, I lifted her out of the van and set her down on the pavement. Giggling, she trotted to her dad with her hand held high in front of her, excitedly saying, “Cookie!”

It was such a touching moment to witness. The little girl ran into her father’s arms, where he cradled her close to his chest with his eyes closed, utter relief exuding from his softened features. It was so emotional I could’ve imagined music playing in the background and everyone in the parking lot breaking out in synchronized dance with lighters held high above their heads.

“Pucker.” The child version of the F-bomb coming out in her angelic voice was enough to break through my dreamy visions of a young girl reuniting with her worried father.

I snapped my attention to him and found him glowering at me, brow taut with intense fury. “What the hell is wrong with you? Why would you take my daughter?”

I held up my hands in surrender, frantically looking around to make sure no one had their guns drawn and aimed at me. They didn’t. But we did have everyone’s undivided attention as they all watched with caution, several officers carefully making their way toward us.

“She must’ve crawled into the van without me seeing her. My son had cookies, and I’m assuming that’s what she was after. I didn’t know she was even there until I got home and opened the door to let my son out. It wasn’t intentional. I swear.”

As his anger lessened, his expression softened.

“I’m so sorry. I feel horrible about what happened. It was completely unintentional, and as soon as I noticed her, I came straight back here. She sat quietly behind my seat the entire time, eating cookies. You have to believe me…I had no idea she was there.”

Thankfully, after several questions from the police—some asked to me, some to Trevor, and a couple to the little girl whose name was Allison—it was all over. They peeked around the van, ran my name and plates, verified everything I’d told them, and we were free to go.

“Hey, Leigh?” Stephany asked on my way home.

“Yeah, Steph?”

“Being a mom terrifies me.”

“Hey, Steph?” I asked, finally calming down after my afternoon.

“Yeah, Leigh?”

“Just don’t kidnap anyone’s kid and you’ll be fine.”