Ballet Slippers Like Jody Hindman's

by Karen Walker

are not gonna happen now.

I'll skip Starbucks, won't be going out to lunch at work. It'll be soup, soup, soup for dinner until God knows when.

Eve can have spaghetti or mac and cheese, and will have to be happy with leftovers.

If I get stopped, I'll say, "Officer, I went to validate the plate. I did. But there's a fine and I can't pay it until next week."

That my ex is a son-of-a-bitch will—oh, ya it will—come out of my mouth.

Hopefully, the officer will feel bad, will say it's okay to go get my kid, then drive home, then drive to the bank on Monday with an expired plate.

***

It took me three months to get the car from him because I have our daughter, and why should Eve take the city bus to school when he isn't using it, having lost his licence again?  

On the title is his signature. A big looming "H" for the years of hell. An "a" for the asshole he was, is, and always will be. Two lying, cheating "l"s, one for the start of us and one for the end of us.

He wanted the car in his name only. I gave in after a fight that raged all day, gave in because Eve would’ve been home any minute and gone pale and silent.

She also has his name. I should've hyphenated it with mine.

Eve tells me no one in her class—not even Jody—knows she takes the bus to school. She gets off blocks away.

***

I'm in the license office because the plate validation expired months ago.

The car is making a clunking sound and there's no air conditioning and the gas gauge's red needle is hovering close to "E".

The clerk says, "There are fines on this plate. Several of them. The total is $740.35." 

"Fines must be paid before the plate can be validated."

I'm the one on empty. I leave. Heading into suburbia to pick up Eve, I'm clunking and I'm sweating driving a car with an expired plate.

I creep down side streets, stay well under the speed limit, and, dreading a siren and whipping lights, make careful full stops at stop signs.

As I creep and dread, my phone rings. It's Eve.

"Aren't you coming to get me? Didn't Daddy give us the car?"

In the background is pissy Mrs. Hindman. "Should I just drive her home? Or is she staying for dinner? It's getting late."

***

When Eve hears the clunking, I'll tell her not to worry.

But, listen, until the car gets fixed, it's gonna be hot without air conditioning. No whining. We'll just put the windows down and be two cool girls.

If she asks what's with the long, long way home and why so slowly, I'll say it's nice out tonight. Let's just chill, take a cruise now that we have the car.

I won't tell her the licence plate has expired, that the fine is $740.35, what that'll mean for the ballet slippers and even groceries. That he's lost his license again. Or how important it is to have things in her name. Because there's plenty of time for that: she's only nine.

All I'll say right now is how nice, how decent of her father to give us the car.

***

Karen's words are in or forthcoming in Janus Literary, Reflex Fiction, FlashBack Fiction, Ellipsis Zine, Brink,  Bullshit Lit, Flash Boulevard, Bloom, The Viridian Door, Blink-Ink, The Centrifictionist, and elsewhere. She/her. @MeKawalker883