About two blocks short of school, your mom pulls into an alleyway.

“Get out here and walk the last two blocks.”

Why?

“Don’t forget your lunch.” She hands you the bag.

I already have my …

“Take the bag.”

You walk down the street in the early morning carrying two lunch bags. A dark wind picks up causing a cloud of maple seeds to cascade around you. From nowhere, a tan Delta 88 Oldsmobile squeals into the driveway directly in your path. Two men, both their faces covered with ski masks, jump from the car and pull you into the backseat. Behind the wheel of the car sits Ms. McCallister in a shiny black jumpsuit.

“Buckle in kiddo,” she says, backing out of the driveway. “The ride is going to get bumpy.”

As the Olds shifts into drive, someone rear-ends the car hard. You look out the back window and see your Mom chomping on a cigarillo and driving with a small handgun pointed out the back window. Bullets fly. Ms. McCallister races down the block, taking skidding turns through busy intersections.

“We may have to drop him,” she yells to the thugs in back. “What’s he got?”

The two men dig into your lunch bag. They open your thermos and pour its soup out the window. You hear your mom swerve to miss. They peel back the bread from your peanut butter sandwich and find nothing inside. The entire bag of baby carrots is thrown to bounce off the family Kuga hood.

“I can’t shake her!” yells McCallister. “What’s he got?”

“We didn’t find anything, Maggie?”

“Did you look in both bags?”

“Nah, just one, we’ll look in the other.”

“Christ. You know what they say, ‘A woman needs men like a fish needs …’ ”

At this moment, the car hits a small prius driven by a stunned priest. The Olds goes up on two wheels then skids onto the boardwalk of the beachside. The priest steps from his automobile shaken, looks both ways, then looks to the heavens and crosses himself.

Your mother appears one block later, driving the Kuga up the granite steps of a park entrance.

“Damn It! I thought we lost the bitch!” one of the thugs shouts.

A meek voice comes from the front seat. “Am I going to kindergarten today?”

“Shut up, Tommy,” says Ms. McCallister. “Mommy’s gotta shake the fuzz.”

Hot dog vendors, roller skaters, women walking dogs, traffic cops – all of them barely jump from the way of the speeding vehicles. Three police cars join the back of the chase.

Ms. McCallister gets to the end of the boardwalk and bursts through the gates of a raising drawbridge. She clears easily. Your mother barely clears, as the police cars veer over the edge and into the water.

“Maggie, we found it!” one of the thugs reaches from the holds up a sapphire the size of a kiwi.

“Looks like this is where you get dropped off,” the other thug says. He grabs you by your collar and reaches for the door handle.

Wham! Your mother is on Ms. McCallister’s back fender. Wham! The Olds is jolted sideways and spins 180 degrees. You are thrown loose from the thugs. Wham! The Old runs into a parked car and both thugs are thrown through the front windshield.

Two police are at the car with guns drawn. “Freeze! Nobody move.”

Your mother storms up to the car and pulls you from the backseat. She removes her sunglasses and bends down, exhaling smoke in your face. “Are you okay now?” she asks.

I think so. 

“Do you still want to hide in the back seat and find out what I do?”

No, you say, no. Not really.

“Good. Remember that. I love you more than anything.”

Your mom turns back to Ms. McCallister as she’s getting loaded into the police van. She slowly looks her ripped and bloodied jumpsuit up and down.

“Jesus, Maggie,” she says. “Who gets arrested while wearing that.”

She tosses the cigarillo to the ground, puts her sunglasses back on, and walks back to the Kuga. It’s time to get to school.