Not Your Typical Mother

After a day out on the town and Emily getting a brand new, top of the line iPhone, it was nearing late afternoon and Danielle noticed her stomach rumbling. She'd never had much of an appetite, always 'eating like a bird' as people would say, but she hadn't eaten yet that day and had been running all over town. Danielle had gotten Emily a phone, some clothes, a new purse and even a pair of shoes. She knew it was too much and she was spoiling her, but she just couldn't resist.

Having Emily back with her was so wonderful, even given the circumstances, and she couldn't help but splurge. Danielle recognized that it was probably sending the wrong message for her to buy her a bunch of stuff to replace what she'd sold for drugs before flunking out of school and ending up back home; but a part of her didn't really care. Having her daughter home under any circumstances seemed better than the alternative, which had been far worse than she had even anticipated.

"Wanna grab a bite to eat?" Danielle asked.

"Sure, I could eat. Where?" Emily replied.

"Anywhere you want," was Danielle's reply.

Emily's face scrunched up in thought as she took a pensive drag on the cigarette that now always seemed to be burning between her fingers.

"Chili's?" she offered.

It was a boring chain restaurant, but Danielle had taken her daughter there many times when she was younger because the atmosphere was playful.

"Sure," she answered.

Danielle turned onto the freeway and headed down the interstate to the restaurant as Emily seemed to puff furiously on her cigarette, trying to finish it before they arrived. She managed the feat, taking a double-pump and flicking it out the window as they pulled into the parking lot. Danielle resisted the urge to chastise her for littering and instead let it slide in favor of keeping the peace.

They were seated at a table near the back corner of building, mostly out of sight of the rest of the patrons and in a relatively quiet area.

"I've missed this place," Emily whispered to herself.

"They didn't have a Chili's near your school?" Danielle giggled.

Emily rolled her eyes before replying.

"I'm sure they did, but this one specifically has a lot of good memories," she replied.

Danielle smiled and nodded, appreciating the reminiscing teenager's gratefulness.

"Yep, lots of mother-daughter days capped off at the old Chili's," Danielle agreed, reaching her hand out and placing it on Emily's lovingly.

Emily responded by smiling back at her mother.

"I really love having you home," Danielle whispered, already feeling her eyes stinging with the threat of tears.

"Mom! Chill out! I like being home too, but you need to stop crying every time we hang out," she half-joked in embarrassment.

Danielle sniffled and used her pointer finger to delicately attempt to wipe away any budding tears while keeping her eyeliner from smudging.

"Besides," Emily began, her smile widening and a gleam appearing in her eye, "you can do something to show you're the cool mom you've trying to be."

Danielle's brows knitted in confusion.

"I know you're not cool with me smoking, and I know you're freaking out about Darren and school and everything else that's been going on. But you've been trying to be chill and not come on too strong and I appreciate that. But if you really want to be a 'cool mom' then you should order a cocktail," she said, the gleam returning to her eyes.

"Why?" was all Danielle could say.

"Because I'm underage and I want to some. Plus, I don't think I've ever seen you drunk in my life," she chided.

Danielle felt something in her mind screech to a halt, like she'd just applied brakes to a speeding semi-truck.

"Absolutely not Danielle," she replied tersely.

Danielle immediately began pouting, her lips puffing out and down like she was at least ten years younger than her current age.

"No, I will not buy you alcohol. It's illegal and plus, you need to be getting your life back on track not making it harder for yourself," she whispered harshly to the pouting teen.

"There it is," her daughter replied.

"There what is?" Danielle asked.

"Your real opinion of me, that I'm 'off the rails' and 'screwed my life up,' and need to be fixed," she shot back sharply.

Danielle knew she was being manipulated. Knew that her daughter was using her teenage wiles to try to control her and corner her into doing what she wanted. Even still, it was hard to hear.

"That's not fair Emily, you know I don't think that way," she replied.

"I don't know anything mom, you've been handling me like I'm a delicate porcelain doll all my life and as soon as I break out on my own and make some mistakes it's 'all on hands on deck' to try to put the perfect little daughter back together. It's just, bullshit," Emily fired back.

Danielle was honestly a bit shellshocked at the direction of the conversation and the discovery of her daughters' suppressed feelings. Before she could process or reply, however, the waiter had walked up to take their drink orders.

"Get you anything to drink? It's still happy hour so we got half-priced margaritas and mixed drinks," he said.

"Um," Danielle was lost in thought and unable to answer straight away.

"Just water for me," Emily replied while Danielle continued to struggle.

Danielle stared blankly at the drink menu, unable to formulate words as she fought back tears.

"You said you wanted Tito's and club soda, right?" Emily interjected, pouncing on the opportunity, and daring Danielle to object.

"Is that right?" the waiter asked, looking at her expectantly.

Danielle relented and simply nodded her head.

"Great, I'll be right back with those," he said and walked away briskly.

Inside Danielle was a tangled mess of emotions ranging from anger, sadness, and confusion.

"How long have you felt this way?" was her long-awaited response.

Emily fidgeted with her napkin-wrapped silverware, not making eye contact as she spoke.

"I don't know, a while," she replied.

Danielle again fought back tears and swallowed hard before responding.

"I'm sorry I, I didn't know you felt that way honey," she replied.

Emily stopped fidgeting and looked up at her, a small smile forming.

"I know, I should have said something a long time ago. I guess it just felt like I was expected to be this perfect little angel and you were living vicariously through me. I didn't want to let you down," she explained.

"Did that contribute to the whole college thing?" she asked.

"Yeah, probably. I couldn't wait to break out of the perfect daughter persona and experience what it was like to party and be reckless. Obviously, it got out of control, and I took it too far," Emily admitted.

"If we wouldn't have made you feel like you couldn't make any mistakes, I'm sure you wouldn't have felt like you needed to break free like you did. This is clearly a lot more of our fault than I understood at first. I'm sorry honey, I hope you know anything that I did I did because I love you," Danielle said.

Emily smiled warmly and nodded before answering.

"I do, and I appreciate everything you and dad have done for me. I just have to be able to be my own person, make my own mistakes, and still feel like I'm your daughter too," she replied.

"Of course, honey, things will be better now," Danielle agreed.

The waiter returned with the drinks and took their food orders. They ordered the soup and salad combo to split and a side of French fries.

"I'm not really that hungry anymore, but whatever, we're here," Danielle noted.

"Same," Emily agreed.

Danielle noticed Emily eyeing her glass of vodka and club soda with jealousy and rolled her eyes.

"You're too much," Danielle snorted.

Emily giggled too.

"What? It's a lot harder to get my hands on something to drink staying with my goody-two-shoes parents than in the dorms. I'm having freaking withdrawals!" she joked.

"Goody-two-shoes?" Danielle scoffed.

Emily's eyes almost seemed to roll out of her skull in response.

"Don't even try to deny it mom, you and dad are like the dictionary definition of goody-two-shoes. I'm pretty sure they put your pictures in there as 'exhibit A' and 'exhibit B,'" she teased.

Danielle full-on laughed at her daughter's joke, snorting like a loon as she tried to compose herself.

"You're so embarrassing," Emily said while trying to smother her own laughter.

Danielle felt a surge of adrenaline and defiance bubble up inside of her, like she was tapping into a side of herself that she never wanted to admit was there.

"Would a goody-two-shoes do this?" she asked, grabbing the cocktail.

Danielle watched in amazement as her strait-laced mother downed the entire glass in four gulps.

"Ahhhh," Danielle sighed, exaggerating her refreshment as she slammed the glass down on the table, empty.

The waiter stepped up with the food right at that moment with a very amused look on his face.

"Looks like you enjoyed that," he mused as he placed the food down on the table.

"It was delicious, thank you," Danielle replied triumphantly.

"Might be cheaper just to buy some shots next time," he joked.

Emily shot a challenging look in her mother's direction, clearly daring her to push the envelope.

"Line 'em up," Danielle said, accepting her daughter's challenge.

The waiter seemed to be caught off-guard, waiting to see if she was going to say she was joking. After several awkward moments he proceeded.

"Happy hour special, five 2oz shots for twenty bucks," he offered.

"Sounds good," Danielle agreed immediately.

"Vodka again?" he clarified.

Danielle simply nodded and the waiter walked back to the bar.

"Wow, maybe I was wrong," Emily said, chewing on a French fry.

Danielle smirked back, the warmth of the alcohol feeling very nice in her stomach.

They picked at their food for a few minutes until their waiter returned with a rectangular platter of 5 identical shots of clear liquid. He placed it on the table in front of her as she pushed away her salad and stepped back to appraise the table.

"Everything tasting alright?" he asked.

They both answered in the affirmative and he disappeared to the other side of the restaurant.

Danielle stared at the row of shots, a mixture of excitement and anxiety whirling around in her belly.

"Well? You were gung-ho a few minutes ago. Did you lose your nerve?" Emily challenged playfully.

Danielle didn't answer, instead picking up one of the glasses and bringing it to her lips. She took a deep breath and tilted her head back, swallowing the contents in one healthy gulp. The vodka burned the back of her throat and warmed her esophagus as it made its way down to her stomach. Not wanting to give her daughter a chance to tease her again, she grabbed the next glass and repeated the process.

This was already the most alcohol that Danielle had ever ingested in one sitting, and there were still 3 more glasses. She worried that her low tolerance and relatively empty stomach were going to punish her for this later.

"I think you need some help," Emily whispered, grabbing a glass before Danielle could stop her and slamming it.

"Mmmmm, I missed that, shit," she said.

Danielle was starting to feel a little of the alcohol now and was less concerned about what had happened than she probably should have been. When her 18-year-old daughter repeated the process for the third time with the 5th and final shot it barely even registered as an issue.

"This is crazy," Danielle said, half to herself and half to her daughter.

"Crazy awesome, this is like the most fun I have ever had with you," Emily effused.

"That was probably way too much, I'm not used to doing stuff like this," Danielle said.

"Pfft, you're fine. You had like 5 shots of vodka, total, big deal. You'll be pretty drunk but that's the point," Emily replied.

Danielle was already feeling it, her ultra-low tolerance, empty stomach, and low body weight making the effects of the drinks take their toll expediently.

"You look kinda tanked mom," Emily said, laughing.

Danielle laughed, feeling the drunkenness envelop her in a warmth of pleasure.

"I think I'm getting there," she replied.

"Well shit, they're not going to serve you anymore and three shots isn't going to do much for me," Emily replied with frustration.

Danielle wasn't really that keyed into the conversation but nodded anyways.

"We should stop somewhere on the way back home so we can keep this party going," she suggested.

Danielle was feeling very agreeable, and she had to admit that she was having a blast.

"Stop where?" she asked.

"A gas station or something, grab some beers or White Claws," Emily pressed.

"I guess we could," Danielle agreed.

"Awesome, you're the best mom!" Emily replied enthusiastically.

Danielle smiled and nodded, just wanting to make her daughter happy and wanting this day to continue. She paid the bill, and they headed out of the restaurant, Emily not even making it two feet out the door before lighting up. She sighed as if Heaven was being inhaled into her lungs and exhaled a long stream of smoke up into the air. Danielle felt a pang of jealousy at watching her daughter achieve such an obvious physical release.

Emily noticed her mother staring at her and smiled.

"You know, the first cigarette I ever had was when I was drunk. There's something magical about the combination of cigarettes and alcohol," she said through a haze of smoke.

Danielle licked her lips, feeling like she could taste the slightly bitter warmth of the cigarette smoke on her tongue.

"But it was probably easier for me, I had been vaping for a while and some guy made fun of me for never having had a cigarette. He said that to get the full-effect I needed to have just one cigarette, to know what I was missing," she continued.

"Wait, were you vaping before you left?" Danielle said, snapping back into reality for a moment.

"Duh, mom. Practically everyone vapes now, even if they've never even had a cigarette like was the case for me. After I tried my first one, I would occasionally bum a smoke from someone when I was drunk at parties but continued to vape the rest of the time. As you might expect though, I started partying more and more and eventually realized I was always looking forward to my drunk cigarettes. Darren was also a cigarette smoker too, so it became way too easy to steal his smokes. Eventually he bought me my own pack, so I'd stop stealing his and I've never really looked back," she explained while they got into the car.

"Wow, I had no idea you were already addicted to nicotine before you even left," Danielle said.

"Yeah, but a bit of an issue with that was the fact that I was vaping a ton and my tolerance was super high. As soon as I switched over to cigarettes full-time, I was already smoking like a pack per day. The vapes are kinda dangerous in that way, you're hitting it compulsively all day, non-stop. You get super addicted and sort of don't even realize it. It wasn't until I had to physically light a cigarette each time that I was craving that I realized I was a nicotine fiend," she continued.

"Hmm," Danielle mused, before pressing the button and starting the car.

"I bet you'd like vaping though, the flavors are pretty cool," Emily suggested.

"Didn't you just say that they were dangerous?" Danielle asked.

Emily snorted in a short burst of laughter.

"Well, yeah, unless you don't really care about getting addicted to nicotine. Plus, you really should experience what it's like to satisfy a craving to something that you've become addicted to at least once. It's so satisfying," she continued, flicking her ash out of the window.

"You're a bad influence, you know that?" Danielle joked.

"Me? You're the one drunk driving with your young impressionable daughter in the car," Emily shot back sarcastically.

Danielle laughed and surprised herself with the lack of concern about her very reckless and illegal behavior.

"I guess that's true," she mused.

Danielle pulled out of the parking lot and merged, heading back towards home. Danielle continued to feel the increasingly apparent effects of the alcohol has she drove. More than a few times she caught herself drifting over the center line and Emily would grab the wheel and chastise her playfully. The unexpected thing was that Danielle laughed right along with her, not really coming to terms with how legally and ethically wrong she knew it was. As reckless as it was, Danielle liked driving drunk and didn't think any deeper on it than that.

When they were only a few blocks away from their house Danielle pulled into the parking lot of a 7-11, bumping into the curb when she judged the distance incorrectly.

"Jesus mom, you're fucking wasted! That was actually kinda scary," Emily admitted, although her tone was far less serious than her words.

Danielle again couldn't help but giggle, the warm intoxication smoothing out her mood and making everything either funny or inherently enjoyable.

"Okay, let's do this. Try to keep it together, if they notice how drunk you are they might call the cops to report a drunk driver," Emily warned, taking on the role of being responsible while her mother languished in her drunken recklessness.

They entered the small convenience store and went straight for the coolers with the alcohol. The variety was intimidating, and Danielle realized then how inexperienced she was when it came to everything that was out there in the wide world of alcohol. In fact, it was probably the first time she'd bought anything other than a bottle of wine at the grocery store for a get together or social gathering.

"I have no idea what I should be getting," she admitted to her daughter as they stared into the illuminated shelves.

"Just get the White Claw variety pack, it comes with 12 and a bunch of different flavors," Emily urged.

Danielle looked at the rectangular white box and thought for a moment what her husband was going to think when he saw that in his fridge.

"What about your dad?" She asked, feeling far less confident suddenly.

"You're over 21 mom, if you want to have an alcoholic beverage in the privacy of your own home it's your business. It's not like we're buying crack," Emily snorted.

It seemed reasonable enough to Danielle, so she opened the glass door and grabbed the box of hard seltzers. As they turned toward the register Emily placed her hand on her mother's shoulder to get her attention.

"Ask him for an Elf Bar, it's a vape and I think you'd really like it," she urged.

Danielle was immediately against the idea but didn't voice her concern right away, instead thinking about the intense relief she remembered on washing over Emily's face when she lit up her cigarette stepping out of the restaurant.

"Fuck it," she said through a wry grin.

That elicited a matching grin from her daughter, who obviously approved of her mother's sudden wild streak.

They finished walking up the register and Danielle placed the white box on the counter.

"I'd also like to get an um...," she stammered as she struggled to remember what her daughter had said.

"Elf bar," Emily whispered from behind her.

"Elf bar," she blurted.

The teller, a middle eastern gentleman in his 50's stared at her with a bored expression on his face, obviously expecting something.

"ID," he said finally, exasperated at the effort of needing to speak.

"Oh, sorry," Danielle apologized, grabbing her billfold from her purse, and removing her ID.

She handed it to the teller, and he eyed it and gave it back.

"Which one?" he asked, motioning towards the array of flavored nicotine products displayed in a clear plastic shelf next to the register.

Danielle felt a pang of anxiety as she stammered again, unsure of what to pick. She just pointed at the first one in blue and the man behind the counter grabbed the box and rang it up. When they'd finally completed the transaction and made their way back to the car Danielle was more than a little bit flustered.