Chapter Seventeen Augusta #3
On Saturday Augusta dressed the children for a day at the beach with Colin.
She packed a bag of dry clothes and underwear, hats and sunblock, a cooler with Beatrix’s milk, and four different kinds of granola bars.
What did children eat before granola bars?
They made up such a huge portion of her children’s diet it was impossible to imagine.
Augusta was filling their water bottles at the sink when Jane came in, her flip-flops slapping the kitchen floor. “Mom, my ear is really itchy.”
“Your ear? Is it from the pool at camp?” Augusta had swimmer’s ear as a child. She remembered lying on the couch as her mother put in cold drops.
“I don’t know.” Jane tilted her head to the side so Augusta could look at her ear. It looked normal, but the skin behind it was red.
“Have you been scratching?” Augusta held Jane’s chin in her hand and pushed her hair back around her neck. As she did, a bug fell out. “Oh my God.”
“What?”
“Hold still.” Augusta carefully lifted the hair around Jane’s ear. Another bug. And another. They were huge, like big pieces of rice, their legs translucent white.
“What is it, Mom? Is it from swimming?”
“No. It’s lice.”
“LICE??” Jane screamed. “I don’t want LICE!”
Now that she had seen one, she realized that Jane’s hair was full of them. They weren’t on the top, where Augusta had checked with the comb, but they were all through the back of her hair, all behind her ears and neck.
“What are you doing?” Charlie came in wearing his swimsuit and goggles.
“Charlie, keep away from your sister!” Augusta ordered.
“Why? Is she sick?” Charlie looked afraid.
“No, she just has lice, and I don’t want you to get them.”
“I DON’T WANT LICE!” Charlie screamed. “WHAT ARE LICE?”
Augusta washed her hands and began to check Charlie’s hair along the back of his neck. One, two, three. He had them too, little grains of rice crawling on his scalp. “Goddamn it.”
“SWEAR JAR!” Charlie cried.
“Stay right where you are.” Augusta had a box of lice shampoo in her bathroom, bought during the previous year’s school outbreak.
She’d never had to use it, but it had lived in the back of the cabinet along with the hideous hospital maxi pads and a pack of emergency pregnancy tests.
Augusta checked her hair in the mirror. She couldn’t see behind her own ears or along her own neck, but suddenly she felt overwhelmingly itchy.
Was it psychosomatic? Was she covered in nits?
She and Charlie had napped on the same pillow.
She and Jane used the same brush. Of course she had lice. There was no way she didn’t.
In the next room Beatrix started crying.
Augusta ran to pick her up. Could the baby have lice?
She hardly had any hair. And if she did, was it safe to use the lice shampoo?
It was full of horrible chemicals. Augusta was beginning to hyperventilate when she heard a knock at the door.
It was Colin, come to pick up the children for the beach.
“Don’t come in!” Augusta yelled. “Don’t come in!”
“Augusta?” Colin looked worried and Augusta waved her hand furiously at him.
“We have LICE!” she sobbed. “Scarlet in the tadpole group gave us LICE and NOBODY EVEN PLAYS WITH HER!” Augusta and Beatrix were both crying now and Charlie and Jane were looking back and forth between their parents, trying to figure out who they were allowed to hug and how frightened they should be.
“Scarlet the tadpole?” asked Colin.
“Yes, Daddy,” Charlie said seriously. “She’s a tadpole.”
“Okay, guys. Everything is all right.” Colin came into the house, closing the door behind him.
“You don’t want to come in, Colin.” Augusta waved him away.
“I need to give them the shampoo and then we need to wash all their bedding and then find all the stuffed animals and bag them in plastic. And I think we might need to clean the cars? Or their car seats? And also I think I probably have lice, but I don’t know because I can’t see my own head.
” Augusta felt tears streaming down her face and she swiped them away.
It was horrible. It was mortifying. She had tried so hard to be brave and dignified and now this.
“You can have them tomorrow and I’ll make up the extra day for you, just go and come back tomorrow. ”
“I’m not leaving, Augusta.”
“You don’t want to get lice.”
“I don’t care about lice,” said Colin gently, reaching over and putting his arms around Augusta and the crying Beatrix.
“Don’t let your head touch mine,” Augusta sobbed.
“I don’t care about lice,” Colin repeated, and he took his head and rubbed it against Augusta’s. “If my family has lice, I want it too.”
“Oh my God, you’re insane.” Augusta started laughing, letting him hug her.
“Daddy is trying to get lice!” Jane cried, delighted.
“EVERYBODY IN THE FAMILY HAS TO HAVE LICE!” screamed Charlie.
“Everybody in the family,” agreed Colin cheerfully as Augusta sobbed against his chest.
Together Augusta and Colin set up a lice-combing station in the kitchen, picking out bugs, nits, and eggs with the tiny plastic comb, wiping them on paper towels and crowing with delight when they found really big ones.
It was disgusting but weirdly satisfying once you let go of the horror.
Colin found a bug and few eggs on Augusta’s scalp, nothing more, and together they began the epic cycle of laundry to clean all the sheets and towels and bedding in the entire house.
It was like being with a real caveman, Augusta reflected, picking little bugs out of their hair and grooming one another.
But this time Augusta was done with secrets.