There it was, my name, scrawled in harsh black ink, staring up at me for the too-thin-to-be-good news envelope. I tossed aside the happy Cookie magazine with its radiant cover girl Christy Turlington smiling her I-have-no-money-woes smile. The ominously light envelope sat a few inches away. I dreaded its message, but knew I’d not have a moment’s peace until I faced the devil inside.

Please, please, please don’t let the holiday season start with a bounced check. But this was foolish, bounced checks come in, machine generated, perforated, insert finger and clide here type envelopes…or so I’ve heard.

Oh, god, are they breaking up with us? Dropping us as clients? Again, totally foolish, Sean’s business and our personal accounts, as well as our tax accounts and mortgage are through them. We are glory, glory hang-our-portrait-on-a-wall clients.

Screw it, let’s just get it over with. I shook it a bit to get its meager contents to slide to one end, ripped the end off one side and reached in. A small yellow slipped fluttered out.

Great, a correction slip, no doubt I’d thought we had more than we did and the balance forecasting I’d done was all for not because I was figuring everything with more in the account than we actually had. (Are you sensing deeply rooted issues with not having enough money?)

I saw the block letters: CHECKING ACCOUNT BALANCE AMENDMENT.

Shit.
Sigh. Defeated whimper.

Deposit entered as $557.27.
Actually $607.27.
Total credit: $50.00

My hands shook and my belly did flip-flops. I looked at Christy and chuckled, “We’re not so different now, are we?” Then I saw my fuzzy socks, big toe poking out of one, the waist band of my too-short pjs hanging shamelessly beneath my pregnant belly and the lenses of my glasses smudged with Avery’s breakfast.

Christy twinkled back at me, “Not really,” and I thought, “Meh, fifty bucks is fifty bucks.”