Life's a Beach by Claire Cook

the little girls jumped up to touch the microphone.

    “Don’t touch that,” the dance guy said.

    “Are
you
the teacher?” the same little boy asked.

    “
I’m
the teacher,” the educational consultant said. “Don’t touch that.”

    “Testing,” another kid said to the microphone. “Testing one two three.”

    One of the twins stood up. “Tomorrow,” she belted out. “Tomorrow. Tomorrow’s a day today . . .”

    “Somehow that doesn’t sound quite right,” I said to her mother.

    Riley jumped up. “And now it’s time for a commercial break.”

    “She was still singing,” Allison Flagg said to me.

    The sugar-high kid was back. “Sugar high, sugar high,” he chanted as he hopped around.

    Riley stood on his tiptoes to get closer to the boom mike. “In the rare case an erection lasts more than four hours,” he said, “seek immediate medical attention.”

     

    7

    “HE SAID WHAT?” GERI ASKED AFTER RILEY WAS OUT OF earshot and I could tell her. “You’re kidding, right?”

    “Nope.” I opened Geri’s refrigerator and closed it again. I couldn’t possibly be hungry. “He’s a natural mimic, that’s all. I think he gets it from my side of the family.”

    Geri shook her head. “You’re the aunt. You don’t have a side of the family. But it’s not like they don’t show the commercial all day long.”

    “Yeah, I think I even saw it on Nickelodeon once. Anyway, he got a big laugh, and I heard somebody say he thought the kid was ready to direct.”

    “Do you think he knows what it means?”

    “Directing?”

    Geri gave me a look. “Uh, no.”

    “Oh, that. How would I know? He’s your kid. I just drive him.”

    “Well, it’s certainly a teaching moment. And one I’m going to hand right over to Seth as soon as he gets home.”

    I refused to allow myself to picture Seth discussing four-hour erections with Riley for even one millisecond. Geri sat down at her kitchen counter and opened a plastic file bulging with newspaper clippings and computer printouts. I knew I’d better wrap it up quick or Geri would be obsessing about her fiftieth again. “Well, anyway, Riley was fine, especially compared to the sugar-high kid. After listening to that one, I was thinking maybe I’d get my tubes tied, just for extra insurance.”

    As soon as it came out of my mouth, I regretted it. Geri’s eyes lit up. “You know, if you got rid of Noah now, you could still have kids,” she said.

    I wondered if my sister and Allison Flagg were in cahoots. “What is it with the kid stuff today? Is there something in the water? Plus,
if
I wanted to have kids, which I don’t, why couldn’t I have them with Noah?”

    “Come on. Noah’s far too self-absorbed to have children. He can’t even remember he has you.”

    “Thanks,” I said.

    She nodded. “Of course, it’s your fault as much as his. People treat us the way we let them.”

    “Why do you hate Noah so much?”

    Geri flipped through her file for a minute, then looked up again. “It’s not so much that I don’t like him personally. I just can’t stand his type. You know, artsy-fartsy, full of himself, too-cool-for-school. He thinks he’s such an original, but he’s really just as much of a cliché as the rest of us.”

    “Wow,” I said. “You have way too much time on your hands. Maybe you should have a few more kids yourself, just to keep from overanalyzing people who are none of your business. You’re not even close, by the way. Noah’s nothing like that. And, just to set the record straight, from where I sit, Seth isn’t exactly a prize.”

    Geri didn’t even have the good sense to be insulted. She just leaned toward me the way brides do when they’re throwing a bouquet. “It’s not too late if you change your mind, you know. How about that fifty-six-year-old woman who just got pregnant?”

    “Give me a break, I’m only forty-one. And, anyway, didn’t it turn out she was faking it?”

    “That doesn’t