Nightmarriage 2011: Something Dante Forgot to Mention About Hell

Dante forgot to mention something about Hell in his immortal Inferno. Namely, that in the iciest circle of Hell, Satan clutched a Cherry Limeade from Sonic whilst chewing Judas, Cassius, and Brutus like three different flavors of gum all at once in his foul mouth.

Don’t get me wrong, my readers (I assume a plural readership, but my mom may be my sole reader). I love Sonic’s Cherry Limeades. So does my wife, Becki. But it is possible to love a thing too much, and for something inherently good to become an instrument of evil. Even the maraschino cherry at the bottom of a Cherry Limeade may be something like forbidden fruit in an otherwise blissful marital garden. My wife and I found this out the hard way shortly after our daughter Evie was born in October.

Having a baby will test your mettle, you see. It turns out that a baby is actually a magical creature capable of transforming a seemingly serene moment into one fraught with hostility. That is, a baby is essentially a very small wizard whose “W-a-a-a-h” may as well be a wand of sorts, capable of casting spells of psychosis on unsuspecting parents who believe things are going well enough.

We love our daughter dearly, of course. She is the apple of my eye, and the apple of Becki’s too. To me, she is a Pink Lady. To Becki, she is a Granny Smith. We have our preferences (all partners in marriage do).

One day Becki and I took Evie for a stroll downtown here in Lawrence in (of all things) her stroller. She was still in that very disoriented, early phase of Babydom in which half-smiles are followed by crossed-eyes or three-second bursts of crying that suddenly end in inexplicable silences. It seems to me that babies must experience something like existential A. D. D., with moments of pure chaos on par with wars followed immediately thereafter – without any kind of transition, I might add – by idyllic delirium that can only be compared to the dumb happiness a puppy experiences when stretching out in the sun at the park. This was Evie’s condition when we took her downtown on this particular day, and our happiness was far dumber than hers. We never expected what would soon follow.

After perambulating with Evie in her pram, we decided around 1:30 that we should drive to Sonic for Cherry Limeades. Sonic’s Happy Hour begins at 2:00 p.m., after all, which means our drinks would be half-price. Becki, ever the bargain hunter, has always reveled in deals such as these. She once gave me a coupon for $5 from Old Navy and told me to go there and buy something so I could save money. Since I needed nothing from Old Navy, my response was, “Wouldn’t I save more money by not buying anything at all since I don’t really need anything from Old Navy?”

Onward we drove to Sonic. On the way, a thought occurred to me: It was 20 minutes until happy hour. What would we do in that twenty minutes? Sit in the parking spot at Sonic and wait for the minute hand to hit 2:00 p.m.? (We actually did this yesterday at a Sonic in Columbia, MO on our way back to Lawrence after visiting my family in Rolla, MO for Christmas.)

“Honey,” I said sweetly, “can we just go to Sonic, get our drinks now, and go home? I’m tired. We’re new parents. I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel like waiting around for the clock to strike two.” I thought the logic was sound. We were indeed new parents, as Evie was only a few weeks old, and we were feeling decades older by the minute. I was beginning to see spots before my eyes – liver spots, of course.

“Why don’t you just drive me home and drop me and Evie off, and I can breastfeed her, and then you can go back out to Sonic by yourself and pick up drinks for us?” she replied.

This was probably a reasonable enough request, but I failed to realize it at the time. I replied, “Honey, no. I’m really tired. It’s only going to be $2 difference if we just get our Cherry Limeades now, go home, and crash. I’m exhausted. Aren’t you?”

“Yes. We can do that,” she replied.

“Are you going to be mad at me later?” I inquired, fearing the wrath of postpartum hormones.

“No,” she said.

“Are you sure?” I asked again, fearing she was only complying with my request begrudgingly. “Because I don’t want to make you mad.”

“Yes, I’m sure. I won’t be mad,” she said.

In my communication studies coursework in college, I was taught repeatedly that non-verbal communication is infinitely more reliable than verbal communication. I wish I would have remembered this crucial piece of information that day, as Becki was in the backseat of the car with Evie during this exchange, so I could not see her face as we conversed. This would prove to be a near-fatal error.

It is also worth noting that, early in our days of parenthood (because we’re almost three months into it now, making us seasoned veterans) one of us always rode in the backseat with Evie in case she started crying. We could always plug her puckering mug with a “passie” and thereby silence her. In the beginning, I imagined one of us riding in the backseat with Evie permanently, offering her a pacifier at age 13 if her teenage hormones transformed a shoe-shopping expedition into a sequel to Stephen King’s The Shining.

So Becki was in the backseat with Evie as we drove to Sonic to secure our Cherry Limeades. As soon as I pulled into one of Sonic’s ordering stalls, Evie began to cry. Early on in our days as parents, when Evie cried it was easy for one of us to turn to the other and say, “LOOK WHAT YOU’VE DONE. YOU’VE MADE HER CRY!” Of course, now that Evie is almost 90 days old, we are beyond all such nonsense. We now blame other people when she cries – people we don’t even know are especially convenient scapegoats. “Mailman, look what you’ve done now!!!”

But that day, Becki blamed me.

“If you would’ve just taken us home,” she said in a hushed, curt tone, “Evie wouldn’t be crying. She’s hungry, and she could be at home breastfeeding right now. But no. You had to go to Sonic and be selfish and make her suffer. I can’t breastfeed her here, Chad.”

“You’re mad at me?” I asked. She had said she wouldn’t be mad at me, after all. I had even double-checked. I wanted to make sure I was reading anger correctly. One wouldn’t want to mistake, say, indigestion for anger. Clearly.

“YES. I’m mad at you. She’s crying! And it’s your fault! You need to think about her and not yourself for once!”

Becki was right. But one thing continued to bother me, and I continued to scratch this itch that would not leave me be.

“But Honey, you said you wouldn’t be mad at me. I double-checked.”

“Yes, I said that,” she replied. “But I didn’t mean it. If I’d said I would be mad, you would’ve just argued. You wouldn’t have taken me home and let me breastfeed Evie.”

“But you didn’t even know Evie was hungry then! She was being quiet at the time! And I double-checked!” I said, as if these were magic words that could undo the wicked spell Baby Evie was weaving and casting upon our moronic minds. “You can’t say ‘I won’t get mad’ twice and then get mad! That doesn’t make any sense! That’s not fair! I double-checked!”

“Well, if you’d seen my face when you asked me, you would’ve known I already wasn’t too happy with your request,” Becki replied.

But I couldn’t see her face. She was in the backseat, and I was focused on driving. And I had double-checked. (Did I mention this already?)

“But I double-checked,” I said again. Should I have triple-checked? Should I have brought in a notary public?

“You should’ve known I’d be mad,” she said.

We drove home with our Cherry Limeades in silence, the slices of lime in our cups far less sour than our exchange had been. Poor Baby Evie. She was probably trying to summon the Department of Family Services with her wordless whine.

When we got home, I did laundry upstairs while Becki nursed Evie in the living room downstairs. After half an hour elapsed, we apologized to each other: Me, for being selfish. Her, for telling me she wouldn’t be mad when she knew good and well she would be.

Which brings us to today. We still get Cherry Limeades from Sonic. Last time we visited the Sonic here in Lawrence, we forgot to bring a pacifier for Evie, and she reminded us none too quietly that we needed to remember it next time. Like I said, there’s something about Sonic Cherry Limeades. I propose an amendment to Dante’s Inferno.

“Chad Thomas Johnston is an author, sonuva’ preacha’ man, PhD-dropout, singer/songwriter, music producer/sonic reducer, daydreaming doodler, gorilla/guerilla publicist, cinemaddict, & pop-culture obsessive. He is represented by Seattle, WA-based literary agent Jenée Arthur, who is currently shopping his debut manuscript to major publishing houses.

Follow Him on Twitter: @Saint_Upid

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