My Mother's Habits/Being Watched

My mother has some habits. They aren't bad habits, there's no heavy drinking or other potentially harmful things. It's just sometimes these habits can be--what's the word?--annoying.

What I'm trying to get at is her thing about picking stuff up from the side of the road. My mom loves to get furniture from the side of the road. Chairs, futon couches, desks, tables, etc.

Today, she saw a sewing table. At ten o'clock, driving home from a friend's birthday party, we (unknowingly, at the time) went to pick it up. Now, it wasn't far from my house, probably about five houses down, but when my mom drove past our curb and pulled up a few driveways down I was wondering if she had forgotten where we lived. Or maybe she was kidnapping us. Either way, when she told two of us to get out of the car and carry that sewing table home, I was resigned enough to get out of the car, no complaints and no hesitation. Sometimes it's just best to do as your mother bids you.

But that thing was heavy.

Rachel and I awkwardly tried to pick it up and got about twenty feet away, waddling every step. Even with my grocery store muscles, it was a weird thing to carry. No grip, no handles, heavier at one side. We took a break a few driveways from our house until Rachel told me there was someone in the window of the house we loitered in front of, staring at us. Reactively, I whipped around, only to see the dark figure drop back the curtain and step away from the window. But I could still see them. And it was creepy.

"Don't look at them," she said and I turned back to see her in the dark, hypocritically staring at the window.
"Let's go," I said, wanting to get home and out of the view of dark creepy figures.

Our fingers struggling to grip the sides of the table, we waddled away, extremely aware that when I had stopped gazing at the window, the dark silhouette had returned. After every couple steps I asked Rachel if they were still watching. She always answered that yes, yes they were. I tried to move faster, but very conscious of the idiotic manner in which I walked and thinking that the speed probably didn't help. If I were that person in the window, I probably would have stared, too.

Our mom came back and helped us. Luckily, this sped up the pace. Still, there's nothing quite like shuffling down the street in the dark of night like a criminal, carrying a sewing table with a free sign on it so your mother can bring more roadside furniture into your already cramped house.

At least now we have a place for sewing.