Sunday Driver

"Sit on your bum!" Jacob yelled at Michael, the oldest of the three, "If the police pull Daddy over, then I'll be going to jail. Do you want that?"

Michael pulled his finger from his nose just long enough to offer a cynical grin.

"Don't make me tell you…"

In one swift motion, the ruddy-faced boy jumped down. CRACK! En-route, he purposely knocked his brother over the head with a flying elbow.

"MOM!" Max screeched.

"Go ahead. Keep it up! You'll be in time out all afternoon," Emma promised Michael. While browbeating him, she was amazed at how far her neck could stretch around.

Michael shoved his finger back in his nose.

Monitoring the tag-team partners in the rear-view mirror, Jacob asked his eldest son, "Goin' dancing?"

A comical wrinkle walked its way across the small boy's forehead.

"Looks like you're cleanin' out the halls," Jacob finished and was preparing to chuckle when Max chimed in.

"Booga-pickin' moron!"

CRACK! Another elbow found its mark.

Jacob erupted, "If I pull this car over, Michael, you won't be able to sit for a week!"

"He started it," Michael mumbled.

"Nah-ah," objected Max. He was furiously shaking his mop of blonde hair.

"Whaaaah…" Of all times, Andrea, the baby, wanted in on the action. The boys had awakened the sleeping bear.

Simultaneously, Jacob and Emma both spun their heads to meet the eyes of the guilty. "Now you've done it," the boys' father hissed through gritted teeth, "you guys woke up your sister." Jacob returned his penetrating eyes to the rear-view.

BEEP! BEEP! During the raucous, the station wagon had drifted into another lane and Jacob received a one-finger salute for his carelessness.

"I've got kids in the car," he screamed out the window, quickly reclaiming his own lane. Shaking his head, he rolled up the window and thought about it. With the way he drove, constantly looking behind him, it was a miracle that they never killed anyone.

"It was Mikey," Max blurted, insuring he was the next to squeal.

"I don't care who started it," Emma chirped, while reaching to turn up the volume on the radio. "Oh…and enough tattle-taling already!" Clearly, this was an afterthought.

"Whaaaah…" For such a tiny person, Andrea bucked and convulsed like an animal, struggling desperately to free herself from the car seat's restraints.

"Max, can you give your sister her bottle?" Emma ordered in the form of a question.

"Can't find it."

"Have you even looked?"

Jake's eyes remained peeled in the rear-view. "You don't have to stand up to find it, Max," he yelled.

"Whaaaah… Whaaaah…" The baby refused to be ignored.

"WELL?" Emma was nearing the end of her maternal rope.

"It's in her mouth," Max retorted.

"Watch your tone with your mother, young man," Jacob warned, "and what is it that you have in YOUR mouth?"

"Nuttin'!" Max' cheeks were puffed out. His eyes were wide with the fear of just being caught.

In a flash, Emma was over the seat, her cupped hand under his little mouth. "Spit it out. NOW! I can't take another one of your choking fits!"

Sppplrt.

"Gum? Where did you get gum?"

Max pointed directly at Michael and smiled. He was more than happy to shift the blame onto his big brother.

Emma lacked the energy to ask the shrugging culprit where he got it from, so she merely shook her disgusted head and turned back around.

CRACK!

"Whaaaah…" This time, Max was the one balling.

"Son-of-a…" Jacob muttered under his breath. The bully had just touched his last nerve.

"O.K. guys, listen to me," Emma started, in an attempt to keep their father sane, "I know riding in the car can be boring, so let's all sing a song."

Jacob glanced over at the family referee. Through his own steam, he managed a grin.

Completely off key, Max belted out, "Jingle Bells. Jingle Bells. Jingle all the…"

"Michael rowed the boat ashore, alleluia…" Michael roared above Max. He wasn't about to let his little brother pick the tune. Besides, it was spring. "Michael rowed the boat ashore." At last, he stopped. No one had joined in.

"Something we all want," Emma insisted during the pause of confusion.

Jacob sighed and used the break to glance out the windshield.

"Whaaaah…" Andrea had selected her own ballad.

"Where's your sister's bottle?"

"She don't want it," Max swore.

"Well, we can't sing until…"

"Whaaaah…Whaaaah…"

Emma's upper torso was now completely over the back of the seat. "O.K. O.K., Mommy's angel."

"What about the song, Mommy?" Michael was growing impatient.

Emma snapped. "First things first!"

"FINE!" Michael threw both arms across his heaving chest and a pout replaced his usual grimace. "FINE!" The anger lasted for a moment and then came the tears.

Max couldn't help it. It was contagious. He also started to blubber.

"Whaaaah…" cried Michael.

"Whaaaah…" joined Max.

"Whaaaah…" sang Mommy's angel.

Jacob's knuckles turned white on the steering wheel. When the three children had finally agreed on something they could do together, the whining chorus ripped through his head, leaving behind a throb that made his teeth ache.

"Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream," Emma continued giving it her best shot.

It took three verses before the sobs and sniffles subsided and the boys shrieked in glee.

Jacob couldn't decide which was better; the crying or the singing. It sounded the same to him.

"Merrily, merrily…"

"Not now, Mikey," Max screamed, priming up for one of his infamous tantrums.

"Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily- life is but a dream…"

CRACK! Max had finally lashed out and redeemed himself.

BRRRRR… The car came to a screeching halt.

"ENOUGH!" Jacob was over the seat, his giant finger waggling in their trembling faces. "If I have to stop this car again, you've both had it!"

"Whaaaah…"

"Whaaaah…"

"Whaaaah…" Andrea didn't understand that the threat was not hers.

"O.K. boys, let's try to keep quiet for the rest of the ride." Emma had softened her tone enough to offset her husband's.

There was weeping. There was hyperventilating. And then, for a magical moment, there was silence.

"Burrrp." Evidently, the baby hated the silence more than the chaos.

Everyone laughed. Jacob laughed the hardest.

"That's mine," one of the boys muttered like a ventriloquist. In turn, a struggle ensued for a G.I. Joe doll, with a Kung-Fu grip.

"Whaaaah…" Still, the baby felt left out.

Exactly twenty minutes from leaving their home, Jacob turned the station wagon onto his mother-in-law's street. With one turn of the wheel, the greatest sense of relief overtook him. It was a wonder that they ever made it there alive.

Pulling up the driveway, he threw the shifter into park and jumped out. There was a warm breeze and not a cloud threatened the sky, but it was the quiet that made him smile. Taking in enough air for his second wind, he turned back to his responsibilities.

Emma was balancing a steaming pan of homemade soup, while trying to fling the baby's diaper bag over her shoulder. Blowing the hair out of her eyes, she spotted Jacob watching her and smiled. He returned it. Thankfully, they had always shared the burdens of the incredibly challenging task called parenthood.

The boys climbed out like they were escaping a fire and started for the house when Jacob's deep voice had them frozen in their tracks.

Wrestling his tiny princess from the car's life-saving contraption, he dropped to one knee and gestured the boys to him.

In an instant, the mischievous smiles disappeared. They both looked scared.

As Andrea drooled all over his neck, Jacob lectured his sons, "Guys, your mother and I have just about had it with your fighting. I know you might both be too young to understand, but you guys are brothers and someday, you're going to need each other. It can be a rough world out there and you're both going to need someone to depend on. It's all about family, guys. Family! You never know what can happen…"
.
Jacob stopped and nearly burst into laughter. It was comical. Both mouths were hung open, both sets of eyes squinting with confusion. Michael and Max had no idea what their father's babbling meant. Suddenly, a shocking truth hit Jacob and he couldn't believe it. He had just given his boys the 'brother speech'. He had finally become his father.

"On your best behavior today," Jacob concluded, simply, "or else!"

Grammy Duff waited with extended arms, while the 'Tornado Twins' rushed her at a sprint.

Jacob wiped the drool from his neck, adjusted Andrea in his arms and followed Emma toward the house. For whatever reason, he looked back toward the car as if he'd forgotten something. His chuckle echoed through the yard. Emma's bumper sticker read: "God Is My Co-Pilot."

Jacob was a believer. There was no way they could have ever handled this life alone.