cody ☆ cordelia ☆ emma ☆ gabriel: Third Day of School, 2015

My phone rang around noon (at work), with the school phone number showing on my display. I groaned, picked up, and said, "Who has the head injury?" (They have to call if anything happens to anyone's head.) Kristi at the front desk laughed and said, "Well, the good news is, no head injuries. The bad news is that Cody and some other kids were attacked by bees and stung. Cody has a good-sized sting on his neck. But the good news is that he seems okay."

When I picked them up, Cody said—and I am not joking, I repeated it out loud so I could get it word for word—"Mom, there was a wire attack—well, possibly a wire attack—at school. So they had to call the fire department. And the fireman came in like Storm Troopers, pickaxes in their hands, helmets on their heads, like they were about to raid a bad guy's lair."

I said, "You're … kidding." He wasn't. Apparently there was some sort of burning smell in a classroom, so to play it safe, they evacuated the school and the fire department came to inspect. Which is why they were eating lunch outside. Which is when the bees attacked. About ten kids got stung, some of them multiple times. Kristi told me Cody was the most stoic of them (which surprised me) and he said, "Mom, it was SO PAINFUL when that bee stung me but I actually really didn't cry until I realized I couldn't get my lunch box because it was over by the bees and I was so hungry!" At which point the valiant Sarah and another aide tried to retrieve the lunch boxes—and they, too, got stung. At which point Sarah recruited a (potentially quite handsome, and in uniform) firefighter to come to their rescue, so Cody was reunited with his PB&J and got on with the day.

(You can kind of see the redness there on his neck, but it's considerably better than it was.)

Anyway, he's fine. But so much excitement! He talked about it all the way home, telling and re-telling and adding details ("Leo got stung right on the place where his nail comes out of his finger AND then he got stung on his leg!). With each telling, the bee sting mutated. "I actually think it was worse than a bee. I'm pretty sure it was a yellow jacket." By the time we got home, he was convinced he had been personally targeted by a horde of angry hornets. And then wanted to go back to school, to personally thank all the people who had taken care of him.

Meanwhile, Cordelia was sulking loudly in the car, because all the attention was off her very grave injury (her blister) and on Cody. She gets a prize for sulking.

The best part of the week so far was me asking her yesterday how she was feeling without her little friend Morgan, who switched schools. Remember Morgan? The object of all Cordelia's solicitousness last year? The person upon whom she showered all her affection? The person who never had to tell a teacher when she had to pee, because Cordelia was so acutely aware of her that she'd remind her to go at the right time?

So when I said, "Are you feeling sad about Morgan not being in your class this year?" I was expecting something…a little different. How I wish I had recorded her reaction! She paused, missing a beat, confusion wrinkling her alabaster brow. Then a look of dawning realization crossed her precious, villainous face. I understood that, all past joking about sociopaths aside, she had not noticed that her "best friend" hadn't returned to school. She checked herself, looked quickly at me to see if I had noticed that she hadn't noticed, then lowered her lip down to her chest, gave me the most tragic eyes ever, and began faux-sobbing, crocodile tears rolling down her perfect cheeks. "I miss Morgan so much! I have been so heartbroken that she's not in my class! I don't know what I am going to do without her! This was the most terrible day ever!"

I am going to pour myself a drink. At least we know he's not allergic to bees. And, tomorrow is Friday.