That’s concerning, because only about half the people who are eligible for vaccines in the county are fully vaccinated, and COVID-19 is spreading widely in Florida. “The kids are sitting ducks,” Carothers told me. Carothers struggles to get her son in particular to wear his mask when other kids don’t. “I just feel like it’s all but inevitable that he’s going to get COVID.” So far, more than 500 students in the district have tested positive for COVID-19 this month. Nearly 5,600 students in the district, the seventh largest in the nation, were in isolation or quarantine as of Monday, prompting the school board to schedule an emergency meeting later today. (In response to a request for comment, a school-district spokesperson said, “Students are required to wear masks at school and on the bus, unless a parent fills out an opt-out form. We, as well as all other school districts in Florida, must follow Governor Ron DeSantis’ Executive Order that preserves a parent’s right to choose when it comes to whether their child will wear a mask to school, and also prohibits school districts from issuing blanket mask mandates.”)

Carothers considered homeschooling, but neither she nor her husband can quit their jobs. And she feels that her kids need the socializing thrum of public school. So instead, the kids don’t go to restaurants. They don’t go to movie theaters. They wear masks in public, even though people have yelled at Carothers for being a “child abuser” as a result. On school days, as she sends her twins off to a building filled with other humans and their mucous membranes, she has tried to push past her own memories of getting COVID-19 in December.

For parents like Carothers, this is the most stressful back-to-school season ever. Right now, many parents feel they face a set of impossible choices: Many districts don’t have a virtual-school option. They aren’t mandating that students wear masks. And they are in areas where very few people are vaccinated or wearing masks regularly.