By the time Mary got home, the first thing she noticed was the gauze wrapped around little Sheldon's knee.
Surprised and heartbroken, she asked, "What happened?"
"I think he tripped and fell on his own, I'm not exactly sure..." Georgie realized his mother was on the verge of exploding and quickly tried to explain.
"No, it was Bobbi! She's a little demon!" Sheldon, seeing his mother return, felt like he finally had backup and stuck to his story.
Just then, Meemaw and Mike arrived at the Cooper house. Seeing the injury on Sheldon's knee, they were just as surprised.
Meemaw asked curiously, "Moonpie, did Bobbi hit you?"
Sheldon, though feeling wronged, shook his head and answered honestly, "No, but her smile... it was terrifying. It was scary."
Her smile? How scary could a cute little girl's smile be? Meemaw couldn't wrap her head around it.
Mary, on the other hand, didn't care about the details. All she heard was that Bobbi had bullied her baby boy again. She said agitatedly, "That's it. I'm going over to the Sparks' to have a word with them."
Saying that, Mary rolled up her sleeves and headed for the door.
"Wait, Mary—"
George ran out of the kitchen, grabbing his wife's arm. "I already looked into what happened. Shelly initiated the conflict and fell down on his own. It didn't have much to do with Bobbi..."
Coincidentally, George had been in the house drinking a beer when the incident happened. He had immediately asked both his sons about the situation. He was also the one who had cleaned up the scrape on Sheldon's knee.
Knowing that his youngest son only had a minor flesh wound, George wrote it off as kids just playing around. After all, as a football coach, George had seen plenty of injuries; a scrape like Sheldon's would probably heal on its own if you didn't treat it fast enough.
Not wanting to blow things out of proportion, George continued to persuade her. "Mary, you're too emotional right now. If you go over to the Sparks' in this state, you're only going to make things worse."
"So, what do you suggest we do?" Mary looked at her husband with a hint of dissatisfaction in her eyes.
In her heart, she felt that as Sheldon's father, George should firmly stand up for his son when he was bullied.
"How about this? When I have some time, I'll go talk to Herschel," George said, trying to diffuse the tension. He then smiled and added, "I've already got dinner ready. Let's not let this ruin everyone's appetite."
Since George hadn't found a new job yet, he had recently started taking on some of the housework.
Mary watched her husband retreat into the kitchen and shook her head slightly, her face full of disappointment.
During dinner, the atmosphere was heavy due to Mary's sour mood.
However, Mary's bad mood didn't end there.
The next day at noon, when Mary returned home from her work at the church, she was still worrying about her youngest son's safety. Her mind was racing, flashing with images of Sheldon being bullied by Bobbi in various ways.
Finally, under this mental pressure, Mary couldn't wait for her husband to handle it anymore. She grabbed a bottle of tomato juice from the cupboard and stormed out of the house.
After searching for a bit, Mary arrived at the bowling alley, tomato juice in hand.
Herschel's wife, Brenda, worked right there at the bowling alley.
---
"Mary? What are you doing here?" Meemaw, who was killing time at the bowling alley, spotted Mary.
"Nothing." Mary hid the tomato juice in her sleeve (or purse) and asked, "Where is Brenda?"
"She's right up ahead, at the first counter," Meemaw said, pointing the way, then asked uncertainly, "Why are you looking for Brenda? Are you joining a league?"
"Mmhmm," Mary shrugged ambiguously and walked toward the counter.
"She definitely doesn't look like she's here to bowl..." Meemaw was puzzled and quietly followed her daughter.
Since she spent a lot of time there, Meemaw actually had a decent relationship with Brenda. She didn't want to see her daughter get into a fight with Brenda here.
Mary marched up to the service counter and immediately saw Brenda working.
It was a case of enemies seeing red. Mary aggressively pushed through the crowd and slammed her hands on the first counter.
"Can I help you, Mary?" Brenda asked with a professional smile.
"Cut the act," Mary stared her down intensely. "Your daughter, Bobbi, hurt my Shelly. You owe us an explanation."
"What? Bobbi hurt Sheldon? Where..." Brenda, who had no idea what had happened, looked surprised.
"Hah, still pretending?" Mary sneered and prepared to lay into her.
Seeing the conflict about to escalate, Meemaw quickly squeezed through the crowd to the counter.
"Calm down, Mary. This is Brenda's workplace," Meemaw tried to soothe her daughter first.
Because of Mary's shouting, the customers at the first counter had backed away. Instead, a large circle of onlookers had gathered nearby to watch the drama.
If this continued, it would definitely affect Brenda's job—she might even get fired.
After pulling her daughter back, Meemaw smiled apologetically at Brenda and explained the cause and course of events. She also clarified that Sheldon's injury wasn't actually serious.
Hearing the whole story, Brenda relaxed. She looked at the customers Mary had disturbed and asked, "You came here to make a scene over something that small?"
In a town like Medford where jobs were scarce, Brenda felt Mary was making a mountain out of a molehill by disrupting her work over a kids' squabble.
"It is not a small thing," Mary snapped.
Anything involving Sheldon's safety wasn't small to Mary. Seeing Brenda not taking it seriously, she shouted, "You need to apologize to us and promise that Bobbi will stay away from Shelly."
In Mary's view, this request wasn't excessive.
"You come to my workplace, make a huge scene, and you expect me to apologize to you?" Brenda saw the crowd of onlookers growing and got annoyed. "And what if I say no?"
That attitude really set Mary off.
"I knew your whole family was no good. Especially Bobbi—I could tell she was a bad seed from the day she was born!" In a fit of rage, Mary threw all caution to the wind and started screaming insults.
Meemaw, standing to the side, couldn't even stop her.
"Excuse me? Bobbi is a bad seed? From what I can see, your Sheldon is the real freak..." Brenda, hearing someone insult her cute daughter, was instantly enraged and started tearing into Mary's son.
When it comes to their children, mothers don't hold back. The argument escalated instantly, and the scene became increasingly chaotic.
Finally, Mary's anger overrode her reason. She pulled out the tomato juice she had been hiding and splashed it frantically all over the counter.
Brenda, covered in tomato juice, wasn't about to take that lying down. She grabbed a can of whipped cream used for desserts from the counter.
And so, the battle between the two mothers turned from a shouting match into a food fight.
After the skirmish, both of them were looking incredibly messy.
Of course, the unluckiest person there was Meemaw. She had only wanted to break up the fight, but thanks to the two women losing their minds, she ended up covered in both tomato juice and whipped cream.