When I’m halfway down the hall, I remember that I haven’t fed the fish yet tonight. So I go to the family room to feed them. When I get to Noah’s room, I realize I forgot to put the cover over his hamster’s cage. Smurf gives Noah a kiss and then lies down at the foot of the bed.
I don’t sit at the edge of his bed because I’m not staying. I stand with my feet firmly planted on the ground and cross my arms in front of my chest like a bouncer. Or Hagrid. “What is your question?”
“What happens when an astronaut farts in space?”
I consider my response options, and you know what? If immediately wanting to know the answer to that question makes me a bad parent, then I guess this confirms that I am a terrible parent. I slide my phone out from the pocket of my sweatpants and Google “What happens when an astronaut farts in space?”
Turns out a lot of people want the answer to this question, and I’m happy to say that my son thinks like Discover magazine and Mashable. But I am thrilled to find that the first answer that comes up is from Australian Research and Space Exploration…otherwise known as ARSE. So I am going to indulge Noah by giving him an answer…otherwise known as delaying my response to the Dylan Brodie email to the same degree that my son is trying to delay falling asleep.
He sits up and bounces around in anticipation.
“Lie back down.”
He frowns and slams back down into the mattress and pillow. “I. Do. Not. Want. To.” He holds up a finger. “Answer the fart question. Please.”
“Okay, but only if you close your eyes and pretend to go to sleep.”
“Ohhhhhh myyyy Goooodddd, Mooooommmm.” He exhales hard, but he does it. He shuts his eyes, very exaggerated, but he does it.
I win.
“Well, let’s see here…it looks like if an astronaut farts while wearing a spacesuit…there’s a seal around the neck that separates the helmet from the rest of the suit. So they won’t smell it. But it’s trapped there inside the suit.”
I look down at him. He’s opened his eyes. “Very interesting!” He snaps his eyes shut again. “Go on.”
“And if they aren’t in the spacesuit, just floating around in a pressurized cabin…the smell is extra terrible because of the lack of airflow and because the air is recycled.”
Noah covers his mouth and giggles. “I thought so!” He opens his eyes again. “That’s so cool.”
“Well, it looks like it can actually be dangerous too. Because you know how farts are made of gas? Some of those gases are flammable.”
“What’s flammable mean?”
“Something that can catch on fire.”
He thinks about this for a moment and then erupts in laughter, his hands shooting up in the air. “Space farts on fire!!!”
I slip my phone back into my pocket. “All right, young man. Back to sleep.”
“How am I supposed to sleep now that I know there are people farting fire in space?! That is literally the best thing I have ever, ever heard in my whole entire life!”
“I don’t know, buddy. How about we continue this discussion at breakfast? The sooner you go to sleep, the sooner it will be morning and we can Google this further.”
“Fine. Good night.”
I can’t believe that worked.
I tuck him in and give him his seventh kiss on the forehead for the night. “Love you.”
“Luff you,” he mumbles.
Smurf follows me out without my having to ask him to even once.
“Hey, Mom? Can I have a parakeet?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. No more pets.”
“Okay.”
I close the door most of the way and return to the kitchen and my glass of wine and my laptop.
I take a few antianxiety gulps of wine before opening up my email again to see if maybe, just maybe, I hallucinated the Dylan Brodie message.
I didn’t.
It’s still there.
I polish off the glass of wine as I check my schedule. I do have a client who just moved to Idaho, so I have one slot available. Do I want to fill that slot with Dylan Brodie?
I pour myself another glass of wine.
Yes. Yes, I do want Dylan Brodie to fill my slot.
Is it a bad, terrible, very bad idea for me to even consider treating Dylan Brodie as a patient?
Yes. It is bad. Terrible. Very bad.
Of course…it might not be that Dylan Brodie.
I certainly think Mia would have mentioned it if she knew Dylan Brodie.
Although…in our last session, she said she has a sort of double date set up with her best friend and her best friend’s new boyfriend, who’s a stand-up comic, and his manager, who is also her best friend’s uncle… As I recall from the one time I did a deep-dive Google search of Dylan Brodie three years ago, one of his brothers was just starting out in stand-up.
If I learned anything from being married to an actor, it’s that Hollywood is a very small world.
Well, the other thing I learned was do not get involved with actors—especially actors who fall for their co-stars, and let’s face it that’s basically all of them at one time or another.
But as a therapist in The Grove area of Los Angeles, if I were to apply that rule to patients, I wouldn’t have a practice.
I mean, how will I know if it’s the actor/model Dylan Brodie who emailed me unless I agree to meet with him for a preliminary session?
Furthermore, if it’s such a terrible idea for me to date Dylan Brodie, then what better prevention is there than to see him as a client? I would be morally prohibited from having a sexual relationship with him. So if it is the actor/model/gopher from Caddyshack Dylan Brodie, then the only way to truly exterminate him from my thoughts would be to treat him in individual therapy. I’m an excellent therapist—probably. I’m definitely a good listener. He most likely wants to talk to someone about his current girlfriend, who is probably an actress. That would be the opposite of an aphrodisiac.
In conclusion: setting an appointment with this Dylan Brodie who has emailed me would in fact be a good, very good, really excellent idea.
TO: DYLAN BRODIE
FROM: SCARLETT SHEPARD
Dear Mr. Brodie,
Thank you for contacting me.
I do happen to have an available slot.
I have Thursdays at 4:00 p.m. open, starting this week.
Let me know if that works for you.
After our preliminary session, we can decide how to proceed.
Best,
Dr. Shepard, MS, MFT
Double check for typos.
Triple check for That’s So Wizard!, shoelace, or Caddyshack references.
And send.
Professional, to the point, with absolutely no hint of potential conflict of interest due to possible prior street flirtation or invasive shirtless fantasy sex thoughts.
I shut my laptop and take my wineglass to the sink.
Shit.
“I do happen to have an available slot?”
That could have suggestive connotations.
Was that a Freudian slip?
Did I just send Dylan Brodie a Freudian slip?!
Less than one minute later, my phone dings with an email notification.