The Emergency Contact

I was filling out the school form, the usual one that arrives crumpled in a bag, smelling faintly of stress and banana. “Emergency Contact Name,” it said. I wrote mine. Obviously. Because I am The Emergency. Capital T, capital E.

Then it asked for a second contact.

And I… paused.

There was a brief moment where I considered writing “Alexa”, but I wasn’t sure if humour counted as neglect on an official form. So I just sat there, biro hovering, brain quietly spiralling.

There’s no one else.

No partner.

No nearby bestie.

No ex who wants to be contacted unless the school is on literal fire, and even then, he’d probably send a thumbs-up emoji and ask if it resolved itself.

It hit me harder than it should have: I’m not the backup plan. I’m the plan.

The one who makes the decisions.

The one who gets called when someone’s bleeding or melting down or forgot their art project for the fourth time in a row.

I looked at my own name, sitting there so neatly in blue ink, and felt this strange cocktail of pride and panic. Like, wow, look at me - a functioning adult person, doing the thing.

And also:

Why is no one supervising me?

I still forget to eat unless a snack physically blocks my path.

I lose my keys in the front door.

My coping strategy for anything remotely medical is to google “can stress kill you” and then watch crafting videos until the dread wears off.

And yet here I am. The adultiest adult in the room.

The one in charge of two small, loud, sticky, brilliantly odd little humans who think I know what I’m doing because I can open the milkshake bottle and make triangle sandwiches.

Sometimes I imagine what it would feel like to not be the emergency contact.

To be someone who gets contacted after the situation is already resolved.

“Hey, everything’s okay now, just wanted to keep you in the loop.”

I think I’d cry from the sheer luxury of that.

But instead, I’m the one who answers the phone when it says “School calling,” and my stomach instantly falls out of my body.

Because I know it’s not a birthday invite or a good-news update.

It’s “Hi, could you come get your child? They’re not coping today.”

And I say yes. Of course I do. Because I’m the grown-up.

Even when I don’t feel like one.

Even when I’m tired of making decisions, of choosing dinners, of being the voice of calm while also fighting the urge to run screaming into a bush.

I write my name on the form. Again.

I stare at it for a second. It feels like a mix between disappointment and an achievement. A “look mum, I’m doing it, all by myself” moment, which is absolutely terrifying but my face will never show it.

I put the form in the folder, seal it with a sticker because I couldn’t find actual tape, and stick it in the school bag between a squashed cereal bar and a half-finished sketch of a wizard duck.

And I breathe.

Because I might not have it all together.

But today, I remembered the form.

And I remembered the sticker.

And for right now, that’s enough.