More Stories from the Twilight Zone by Carol Serling Page B

didn’t talk to her the entire way to school. He sat in the back, sulking beside Sarah, who was also sulking, because she was gaining weight and her face was breaking out from all the fast food.
    â€œSarah, if you don’t like all the stuff Daddy’s been buying, why haven’t you zapped any of the meals in the freezer?” Deb asked her daughter.
    â€œMe?”
Sarah asked, stunned. “
You’re
the mom.”
    Deb jerked as if she’d been pelted with a water balloon. She blinked, stunned, at what a curt, spoiled, thoughtless child her daughter was. And her son, glowering at her because she was two dozen cupcakes short of a Halloween party.
    I’m the mom,
Deb thought, as she dropped her kids off at their schools. It became a litany with the swish-swoosh of the windshield wipers as the sleet crackled down on her windshield.
The mom, the mom, the mom.
    She did feel guilty, but more than that, she was angry. She went home to her filthy house, half-covered with ants, and the cupboards and trash cans overflowing with fast-food containers and tissues; and the nest Kevin had made on the couch, and the remote on the floor. She looked at it all and she blasted into the bedroom, where she found Aidan lying in bed, the light in his eyes leaping to life as she stomped toward him.
    â€œAt last,”
he said.
“How I have been pining for you, my beauty.”
    She stared at him. “Do you love me?”
    His chest swelled. His eyes welled with tears.
“Oh, yes. I love you, with all my heart, and my soul. You are my life. Without you, I’m . . . I’m nothing.”
    â€œThen why didn’t you help me with the cupcakes last night?” she demanded. “Because I’m the
mom
?”
    â€œYou are my one true love.”
He looked puzzled.
“Come to me, be with me . . .”
    â€œI can’t,” she said miserably. “It’s all getting worse. It’s going to be overwhelming if I don’t get back to work.” She broke down sobbing. “Because I’m
the mom.
”
    â€œNo, you are my beloved. My darling. My life.”
He enveloped her in a loving embrace and kissed her tears away.
“Don’t cry, my heart, my wonder, my sweetling.”
    â€œCan’t you help me?” she asked him. “If you love me?”
    â€œHelp you . . . yes, I will help you, yes, my darling,”
he said.
“We’ll weigh anchor in an hour and be gone from here forever.”
He pulled the rubber band from her hair and clutched her face, kissing her long and hard.
    â€œMy beauty.”
    â€œMake it two hours,” she pleaded.
    â€œFor you . . . an eternity,”
he whispered moistly into her ear.
“Soon, we will leave all this behind.”
    She left the bedroom, but she didn’t make the extra two dozen cupcakes. Trembling, she loaded what she had into the car anddrove straight to Ellen’s house. She’d never been there before, but as her arms shook around the Tupperware containers loaded in her arms, she noted the impeccable lawn, the little Japanese footbridge, and the stone lanterns on either side of the entrance. WELCOME FROM THE DEWITT FAMILY , said a little sign on the door with two big cherry blossoms and five little ones.
    Balancing the containers, she rang the doorbell and tried to catch her breath. She thought she was going to faint. As dots of yellow swam before Deb’s eyes, Ellen opened the door. Every hair in place, she was dressed in her black moon sweater, jeans, and black Uggs. She was taking off a pair of rubber gloves.
    â€œOh, good,” she said. “Come on in. I was just cleaning up.”
    Deb stumbled across the foyer into a homey living room filled with antiques. Pushed against the wall beneath a painting of an old forest, there were five large plastic bins, each one labeled with a name: SEAN, MARCIE, HAILEY, DOUG, STEPHANIE . The names of her children.
    Deb and