My Mornings

[Interior, kitchen, early morning. Three children run around the kitchen getting ready for the day. Peppermint sits at the kitchen table, drinks coffee.]

[Middlest Boy]:	[Off] Pepper! PEPPPPPPERRRRRR!
[Peppermint]:	What?!
[Middlest Boy]:	[Entering] My shoes are too tight.
[Peppermint]:	[Middlest Boy], sweetie, they're on opposite feet. Take them off and try again.
[Bigglest Boy]:	[Off] Peppermint? Is it pants day?
[Peppermint]:	No. You can wear shorts.
[Littlest Boy]:	[Entering, carrying a toy screwdriver] Peppymitt?
[Peppermint]:	What precious?
[Littlest Boy]:	[Looks in her cup] Wizz it?
[Peppermint]:	What I’m drinking?
	[He nods.]
[Peppermint]:	Coffee. It’s not for children.
[Littlest Boy]:	[Puts toy screwdriver down, reaches for her cup] Me gets coffee.
[Peppermint]:	No, precious, you get water. Here’s your water cup, you can bring it in the van.
[Littlest Boy]:	Want coffee.
[Peppermint]:	Coffee is a tool of the devil and the instrument of our destruction. Also it makes your bladder hurt. You don’t want that. Here’s a banana.
[Littlest Boy]:	What’s ‘precious’?
[Peppermint]:	You’re precious.
[Littlest Boy]:	Me [Littlest Boy].
[Peppermint]:	You’re my precious [Littlest Boy].
[Middlest Boy]:	OK my shoes are on now.
[Peppermint]:	Nicely done.
[Middlest Boy]:	Will you tie them?
[Peppermint]:	I will. How’s that?
[Middlest Boy]:	I think it’s … too tight.
[Peppermint]:	Hmm. [checks] Well, you’ll need them tight if we lose containment and have to get into our EVA gear and leave the capsule. Right? Because there’s no atmosphere. You don’t want your socks to get sucked out into space, do you?
[Middlest Boy]:	I guess. I guess they’re not tight anymore.
[Peppermint]:	OK, into the capsule. [Bigglest Boy], are you ready?
[Bigglest Boy]:	[Off] Yes!
[Peppermint]:	Do you have your homework?
[Bigglest Boy]:	[Off] I didn’t do my math!
[Peppermint]:	Ooo! I hope your teacher doesn’t find out!
[Bigglest Boy]:	[Enters] Ha, ha. Do I have time to just do it now?
[Peppermint]:	Nope. C’mon, get in the van. Your father’s in the van, too. [With emphasis] And he’s waiting.
	[Bigglest Boy exits, running out the front door at top speed.]
[Littlest Boy]:	And me!
[Peppermint]:	And you. Up you go. [picks up [Littlest Boy] and holds him, balancing him on one hip, finishes coffee and sets the empty cup in the kitchen sink]
[Middlest Boy]:	Peppermint? Why do you drink coffee now when you used to not drink coffee?
[Peppermint]:	Well [Middlest Boy], because remember when I was telling you in science class the other day? that without chemicals and their processes, life itself would be impossible?
[Middlest Boy]:	Yes-s-s... but –
[Peppermint]:	This is one of those chemical processes that, without it, my life would be impossible.
	[Exeunt.]