A shoe, child’s size 5, smashed into the burger box. Squelch, it went. Tomatoes, sesame seeds and lettuce met the back seat of our small SUV. “Time out!” was the simultaneous yell from the front seats and a small, smack reflex might have escaped the parent with less patience.
We were sitting in the dark, on a freezing night, outside a closed car-rental place. In Witbank. The trusty steed had lost power a short distance into our road trip, and we were stuck.
The kindly tow-truck driver, Kaptein, waited with us for after-hours help to arrive so we could get the emergency hire car. Then, he could take our now burger-covered car to the hospital. It needed help.
There were chips on the floor, water bottles with slow leaks on a seat and the smell of takeaway grease was settling into the upholstery. None of this was close to the looming explosion from keeping two small girls trapped in a small, immobile vehicle.
We couldn’t get out in the freezing cold. And did I say dark?
They were over it. They were over their holiday being delayed. They were over having to stop at the closest town, which had little appeal to them apart from the fun of being hauled onto a flat bed for a short trip to the car-rental place.
Luckily, supper had been found.
The better-than-expected mall closed early on a Friday, apart from the one food outlet well-known for its inferior quality but superior priced burgers and chips. There was no pizza? They were over it.“Don’t worry, we’ll get to our holiday soon,” we promised, throwing another toy over the seat to delay the explosion.
But then it started to become apparent that an hour was aeons away, in children’s time. They kicked the seats in front of them while we phoned, again, the deeply apologetic but unhelpful insurance company to ask how far away their person was.
Did our premium include hassle-free child-handling? We had to check the contract.They were over the confined space and started to bubble and smoke like lava. And so they were let out of their car seats to move around a little, and that is how a foot found the burger box.
They were over our dying cellphone batteries, kept on life support by the USB charger. They were over the few road-trip games we had planned, and they were over us losing our patience. They were even over having their beloved CD of nursery rhymes, by Lucy Cousins, on repeat.
So they exploded, tears. Loud wails in a small car, amplified by annoyance and closed windows.
Then, like a knight in the bitterly cold night, the car-rental saviour finally arrived. We could finally get out, into the tiny office. Never before has Avis created so much joy. The pamphlets, the wall maps, even the rubber stamp was something to entertain two frustrated tots.
Then was the thrill of unpacking our car, watch it being hauled onto a flat bed again, repacking the Class B hire car.
When we finally got to our destination, they were well asleep, completely over it.
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