Page 110 of Eleanor & Grey

I’d just accidentally called a little girl a bitch.

I glanced around me and everyone was quiet. They were all staring my way with their mouths agape and their eyes wide open.

Then I looked at Caroline’s mother, who looked as if I’d just taken a crap on her high-heeled shoes. “Your employer will be hearing about this!” she scolded me. “You can count on that!”

Then she placed her daughter into her car and drove away.

I walked over to Lorelai, who was smirking a bit. She looked at me, giggling, and smiled wide. “You’re kind of crazy, Eleanor,” she told me.

She wasn’t wrong.

I put her into the car and buckled her in, then I combed her hair out of her face. “Hey, I just want you to know that you’re special, okay? You’re special, and smart, and beautiful inside and out. If anyone ever tells you anything other than that, they are a liar. Do you understand me? What Caroline told you was nothing but lies. You. Are. Amazing.”

She nodded slowly.

“Can you say that? Can you say you are amazing?”

“I am amazing.” She smiled, and I swore in her smile, I saw young Greyson.

“Yes.” I nodded, tapping her nose. “You are.”

I hopped into the driver’s seat and pulled away from the curb to head back to the Easts’ house.

“Hey, Eleanor?”

“Yes?”

“What’s a little bitch?”

“It’s a person who isn’t very nice,” I said matter-of-factly. I glanced toward her in the rearview mirror and shook my head. “But don’t tell your father that. I’m pretty sure he’d fire me for that. Okay?”

“Okay.” She went back to staring out the window, and a few seconds passed before I heard her whisper, “I know, Mom. I like Eleanor, too.”

I swore my heart skipped five beats at those words.

We got back home, and in the pile of blankets on the living room floor was Karla watching the fourth Harry Potter movie.

She looked back toward me with an Oreo in her mouth and her eyes widened. “Sorry, I couldn’t wait to start the movie.”

Lorelai’s mouth dropped open. “You’re eating sugar and we’re not at Grandma’s house!” she exclaimed, pointing a finger at her sister.

“Yeah, I know. I needed a mental health day,” she said, stuffing another cookie in her mouth.

“What’s a mental health day?” Lorelai asked.

“It’s when you eat junk food and watch movies all day,” Karla replied.

Lorelai raced over to her sister and lay down, grabbing a handful of cookies for herself. “I need a mental health day, too!”

I smiled at seeing the girls cuddled up together, eating cookies and actually looking as though they were enjoying each other’s company.

“Maybe a different movie for Lorelai now, Karla,” I said.

She groaned. “But she just watches Frozen all the time.”

“‘Let it goooo!’” Lorelai dragged out.

“Please. Anything but that,” Karla begged.

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