houston, we have a gap

He climbed into the car and dropped his backpack into my lap.

“Know what, Mommy? I have a loose tooth!”

“Really?” I asked, skeptically. “Let’s see it.” He stuck his head between the front seats and wiggled his bottom tooth so vigorously from side to side I instinctively stuck my hand out to catch it. Loose was an understatement. It was hanging on his mouth by a thread. My first thought was he’d fallen down or endured an uppercut to the jaw or some other travesty, but nope. Nothing sinister other than zero to very loose in one school day.

He lost the other one two days later. And because we don’t encourage belief in the tooth fairy, his first question was “So, how much are you guys going to give me for it?”

His daddy, his HERO, gave him $7. And when my eyes nearly bugged out he turned to me and goes “Inflation, you know.”