Chapter Two: Andrew Comes Home to Two Police Cruisers

It was the Saturday after this past Christmas. I was out on the town, attired in a new tie, a gift from my father. My parents and I had avoided butting heads for a while, and I was enjoying the recent vacancy of any serious yelling matches. My mom actually let me take her car out on a weekend night, a rare treat. My mom still had my cell phone, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me from hanging out with some friends.

I picked up Stephanie and Cory, and we were off to get some ice cream. We dropped by, and my friendly co-worker, Erin, was manning the front. Her eyes bulge, and I momentarily panic; it’s the same look she gives when I’ve fucked up something really important.

“WHY IS YOUR MOM CALLING ME?!”

“Uh, what…? I haven’t had my phone for a couple weeks.”

“WELL YOUR MOM CALLED ME! AND KEEPS CALLING ME!”

Apparently, after Erin sent a text about a drug dog (that’s for another story) to my phone, my mom began harassing her. My mom would try to get Erin to admit to ridiculous crimes. Patty even suggested the lovely idea that we were laundering massive amounts of drug money through Maggie Moos. It got to the point where my mom was perpetually calling Erin, trying to get to Erin’s parents. Erin’s mother eventually had to intervene, and tell Patty G. to quit being the ‘Community Mom.’

I was palpably pissed. This new information stirred hot emotions. I don’t like it when my mom sneaks around, especially given my mom and I’s recent conversations about, namely, not sneaking around each other.

I was going to have a word with my mom about this choice act. At the same time I wondered if it would even make a difference. I decided it was time to head home, so me and the girls split ways.

I pulled down my construction-scarred street, and the all too familiar figures of two Fairfax County police cruisers caught my eye. They were parked in front of my house. A million anxieties rushed through my head. Maybe my mom had finally made good on her numerous threats to have law enforcement types search the house. Or maybe my mom was just trying to give me a nice scare, crazier things had happened. No matter why the cops were there, I didn’t see this night ending well.

I walked into the house and one of the cops was taking down a police report. Great, that meant there was some sort of reportable ‘incident.’ My mom filled me in on what happened, but I took her words with a grain of salt.

“Your sister called the police on me. Allison lied about what she was doing with your cousin, and so I tried to find out what really happened. She started crying and complaining, she must have been too emotional, and called the police. I was just trying to be a concerned parent, like anyone would, and get down to the facts.”

My mom’s recall was half directed toward me, and half directed to the cop. But even more, her tale was fully tainted with the pseudo-caring voice she puts on when she’s talking to a stranger. In this case, a stranger with state-granted authority.

I darted to see Allison. She was at a neighbor’s house, talking to the police. She had been crying a lot, but she filled me in on her side of the story.

Evidently, my sister had been with one of my cousins all day. My cousin and Allison told my mom they were going to shop at the mall at around noon. But their ride didn’t come until three, nothing they could control. When my mom found out about this little delay, she freaked out. My mom started calling my aunt and uncle, and scathing my sister for ‘lying’ to her about going to the mall. My mom assumed that this three hour gap had been filled with sex, heroin use, and any number of illegal activities. In Patty’s own words, she was going to ‘get to the bottom of this.’

When my sister finally got home from shopping, at the outrageously late hour of five o’clock, my mom turned up the heat. My mom would not stop interrogating my sister, determined to find out what ‘really’ happened. She couldn’t come to the obvious conclusion that Allison and my cousin had just hung out for three hours, waiting for a ride.

When I looked into my sister’s account of what happened, I saw too many sad parallels to my own struggles. My mom was using the same scare tactics on my sister that I had grown up with. The only difference was that my sister was even younger and more inexperienced than me.

By then the police had left, satisfied that it was just a minor incident between a rebellious teenage daughter and a worried mother. Nothing noteworthy. I went back to the house, and I gave my mom a pretty substantial piece of my mind. I told my mom that she could go anywhere on this earth, and if she digs deep enough, she could find dirt. I also told her it was almost like she wanted Allison and I to get into trouble. When she keeps the microscope so focused on us, it’s easy to find flaws. I told her that if she wanted to keep calling my friends she could expect to have more parents hand her ass to her. I mentioned that she could go gently caress herself up the bum-bum, as well.

I thought about taking this altercation into the stratosphere. My mom felt no remorse for the lies she had told to the cops, and it made something inside me burn. But the words “pick your battles” resounded in my head, and I decided two cop cars in one night was more than enough, so I backed off.

The next day I was talking to my sister.

“Did mom tell you that I called the police on her?”

“You didn’t?”

“No, I dialed the numbers 9-1-1 to scare mom. Then she took the phone and hit me with it, which is what actually called the cops.”