The Tick

My friend M hates bugs ,all bugs, any creepy crawly, slithery thing.  This is a tough, smart, take no crap from anybody single mom, but bugs are her undoing. They can send her screaming like a, dare I say it, little girl doing that skittering baby step run with her hands fluttering about her shoulders going "oohhh, icky, icky. I like bugs, if I am outside and they are outside where they belong. If they venture inside they are subject to the wrath of Jojo. But this is about M. She hates ticks the worst. Those vampiric little beasties that gorge themselves on you blood until they are bloated green globules, thankfully they usually only get to that point on animals.

M and her daughter B had spent the day before at the park with her sister and her kids, they ran around in the woods and the tall grass. The next morning as M is taking a shower and washing her hair she feels something behind her ear. She knows it is a tick and she starts to freak. She yells to her daughter. "Hurry up and get dressed we have to go to Auntie's quick". Her sister lives in the same building and she was going to  make her pull the tick off, she is afraid to try because she if afraid she'll leave the head behind and that is grosser than the whole tick plus there is just no way she was going to touch it, or even look at it for that matter. Her daughter asks "Why" and M, hyperventilating at this point knowing the little blood sucker is feasting on her. "cuz Mommy has a tick and we have to go make Auntie pull it off." B says "okay Mommy but can I see the tick" So M leans down brushes her long hair aside and shows here the back of her ear, " See right there behind my ear" B accepts this and runs to get dressed quickly.

M is getting her stuff together, calls her sister to tell her of the emergency and that she is coming down when B comes back. She is dressed and ready but she says "Mommy can I look at the tick again?" M lets out an exaggerated sigh, she wants wants to be gone and have the thing removed but she says " Sure honey, look" and again shows it to her. B looks at it and stands back and looks at it again and says " Mom, I don't think that is a tick " to which M says "why?" There is  a note of hesitation in B's voice "cuz it's pink".  Thinking B must be mistaken she says" What do you mean, of course it's a tick" and B replies " No Mom it looks like a sticker, it looks like one of my pink heart stickers" . Steeling her will against what she know is going to make her gag. She pulls the offending creature off of her and looks at it. It is in fact a small pink heart sticker.  You gotta watch out for those, their dangerous little buggers you know.