Z is Trying to Kill Me

I am sure there will come a time when you all tire of my seemingly endless tirade against my son. I will also be extremely relieved to reach the point where that little -- deep, calming breath -- boy is no longer giving me topics on which to write.

Sadly, that time has not yet come. Please enjoy tonight’s edition of “Z is Trying to Kill Me Slowly but Surely.”

My mother-in-law baby-sat the kids today and JAO didn’t arrive home until around 7:45. So Z and L were allowed to stay up just a bit past their bedtime to see their father and spend some more time with their Nana. As it was nearing 9:00, a very sleepy Z was curled up next to me on the sofa, sucking his thumb and exuding all kinds of sweet, little boy cuteness.

I believe I have mentioned before that I have grown leery of his innocent angel tactics and very rarely fall for his attempts at manipulating me into thinking he is anything but the Spawn of Satan. Even though I allowed myself to indulge in a few cuddles, I remained on-guard and alert for any signs of a sudden uprising. He can turn on a dime. You always have to be ready.

I was carrying the deceptively adorable child up the stairs and he cupped my face in his hands and put kisses on both of my eyelids. Don’t go saying, “Awwww...how cute” to that! I think he was trying to get me to trip while going up the stairs.

After a brief battle over whether or not the stripped p.j. pants went with the shirt with the baseball glove and ball on it (apparently he’s never seen the old fashioned baseball uniforms), I managed to brush a few of his teeth and tuck him into bed. I pulled his ducky blanket up to his chin and kissed him, Toothless and Rocket (a plastic tree ornament of the rocket from Little Einsteins), and bid them all a good night.

I retired to the home office for some emailing, Facebooking, FoxNews.com-ing (don’t judge me) and generally chilling out at the end of the day. I was just in the middle of an article on Iran sanctions when I heard the tell-tale sound of a young person “sneaking” down the stairs. I use the term sneaking loosely because the kid seems to have no idea that sound travels.

I turned around as he got to the bottom of the steps and I said, “Z...what do you think you are doing?”

His response was to half walk/half shuffle into the office, all the while making a strange tapping noise on the hardwood floor as he moved along. He reached the office chair where I was sitting and it was then that I realized the tapping noise was being made by the small plastic top of a Chapstick tube that he was gripping in between his toes. The air around me was suddenly awash with the unmistakable scent of the lip balm.

“Z, did you put Chapstick on your lips?”

“No.”

“On your face?”

“No.”

“Well, where did you put it?”

He responded by holding his hands up, palms out, in front of my face.

“You put it on your hands?”

“Yes.” Grin. Beat. “And the carpet.”

“WHAT?”

I leapt up from my chair and grabbed him by the shirt collar and ordered him upstairs to show me what he had done. This kid had the nerve to hold his evil, little hands up to me indicating I was to carry him upstairs to witness his destruction!

“No way, Jose, you march your little butt up those stairs right now and show me what you’ve done.”

So, we got to his room and, with some trepidation, I turned on the overhead light. There was no Chapstick damage to be found. I was relieved -- but only briefly.

“Z? Where is the Chapstick?”

Big smile. “Downstairs. Me show you. Come on, Mommy!”

I allowed myself to be lead down the stairs, bracing myself for what I was about to encounter. People, it is just as bad as you might imagine. This kid -- who only last week received not one, but two spankings with The Spoon for writing on the carpet with blue marker, took a tube of Chapstick and smeared and smushed it all into the carpet. And he had the nerve to look all proud about it!

This was not your plain tube of Chapstick, my friend. It was cherry -- bright red cherry. And he did it right next to one of the horrid blue crop circles still evident from last week. Now my carpet resembles a bowl of that freakin’ rainbow sherbet that comes at the end of your meal at a Japanese restaurant!

I called my mother to vent before I went all Medieval on the boy. She reminded me that I once took a tracing wheel and punctured her dining room table with tiny, little holes. And I wrote on my bedroom wall in permanent ink (we didn’t have washable markers back then, you know). And I may have spilled an entire bottle of nail polish remover on her cedar chest, which ate off all the finish.

Dear Karma, you suck.

She sympathized, warned me against beating Z and told me to go write about the incident in an effort to release my frustration. And, under no circumstance, was I allowed to refer to her grandson as “The Spawn of Satan.”

Silly, silly woman. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and sounds like a duck, then Z is evil. Now, where the hell is that carpet cleaner...