It was a Saturday, and I was driving my son to Secaucus, New Jersey. He was seeing a movie with friends. 

Why was I driving a kid who has his license?  

Long story. 

Why was I driving a kid from Bucks County to see friends in Secaucus, an hour and a half away?

Longer story. 

They’re also not terribly interesting stories. 

There was no point in driving home once I dropped him off. I wasn’t anxious to spend six hours on the road, driving back and forth. 

I planned to hole up in my favorite Jersey café. I discovered it when my son first started taking classes in The Garden State in 2023.  

As we neared the movie theater, my stomach grumbled for that café’s chocolate chip scones. My son alighted from the car, I turned the wheel, and —

Wait. Why do I feel weird? 

That café is only 20 minutes from the movie theater.  

Why is my gut telling me not to go? 

I mean, yes. I have to be in a bikini in, like, a month. But one scone isn’t making my Spidey sense tingle. 

Huh. There’s a Starbucks right next to the movie theater. Maybe — maybe I can wait there? 

Yes, my gut said, Svengali-like. Go to Starbucks. Stay close. 

I’m not sure which part of my body cried out for that scone, but it was articulate and, quite frankly, convincing. 

He’s 17! He can take care of himself! 

Yeah, scone body part. He can. Let’s go get that scone. 

Well now there goes my gut Svengali again. What the heck? 

I capitulated to the gut Svengali. I sat in the Starbucks, eschewing the food there because nothing is a Java Love scone once you’ve set your entire day on having one. 

When the movie ended, my son texted me. He and his friends were ridesharing to a nearby mall. Could I pick him up in half an hour? He was tired. 

Wait. What? 

All you did was sit in a movie and you’re tired? I got up at five to do sit-ups so I could devour a scone and you’re tired? I’m not tired. I mean, yes, I had four cups of tea at home and a trenta iced tea in Starbucks, but —

Sorry. Talking too fast, right? 

In half an hour’s time, I picked my son up. Flushed, he flung himself into my car. “Something’s wrong!” he said. 

Then he fell asleep. 

For the entire 90-minute ride home.  

He didn’t even wake up when he coughed. Not for the first cough. Not for the second. Not even for the 67th cough. 

By the time we got home, it was well after eight in the evening. My head was spinning. 

I was hungry, having had nothing since breakfast because I refused to stoop to the level of a non-Java Love scone. 

I had to pee, because that’s what happens when you have four cups of tea, a trenta iced tea, and a car ride the length of a tight movie. 

I was aching to get out of my pants.  

And my beagle, Pete, was jumping all over me, having thought my eight-hour absence meant I was probably dead. 

Beagle barking. Gut screaming, I told you so! Scone body part crying — still — over the lost scone. Talking sweatpants luring me with their Siren call. 

You might think talking inanimate objects are where my problems begin and end. 

Not at all, my friend.  

My son woke up long enough to stumble into the house, kick off his shoes, and flop into bed. Before I even had Pete convinced I was still alive, my son was again sound asleep. 

I dumped everything I had in my arms, nuzzled Pete, and beelined for the bathroom. Then I grabbed the thermometer.  

Pete followed me into my son’s room. He sniffed through the adolescent piles of clothes on the floor while I waited for the thermometer to beep. 

What — what’s that glinting on the floor? 

Oh. A thumb tack. 

Wait. Why is there a thumb tack on the floor? 

No — why are there many, many thumb tacks on the floor? 

My gaze drifted to the Dunder Mifflin flag usually tacked to my son’s ceiling, now on the floor. The Hamilton poster hanging sideways. The wall of playbills with the conspicuous gap. 

And Pete, traipsing through the thumb tack minefield. 

As I scootched Pete away from the thumb tacks, broken glass near the trash can caught my eye. 

Am — Am I in Kevin McCallister’s bedroom? Am I a Wet Bandit? Is Pete? 

The thermometer trilled. My son’s temperature was 102. 

Huh.  

What had my gut sensed that my scone body part hadn’t? What if I had gone home after I dropped him off? What if he had driven himself? 

As I shoveled a grilled cheese and fries into my wise old gut — that bikini isn’t going to be pretty — I reflected on the what-ifs.  

I’m a big what-iffer. 

I have found my gut to be right more often than it’s wrong. I tend to follow it, even if it’s ridiculous. 

And right now, it’s telling me a scone is in order.

Want one?