Page 23 of The Nanny and the Nerd
She folded her hands on the table and lowered her voice. “Today, while working with a small group, Phoebe wasn’t pleased that her teammates weren’t working quickly enough, and she used some naughty language to convey her displeasure.”
He totally understood that. Nothing annoyed him more than when his coders and developers couldn’t keep up.
He sat back. “What did she say?”
The teacher leaned in. “She told them to bust their asses.”
“I believe I overheard you use that exact phrase back at your office,” Penelope chimed, appearing quite pleased with herself. She was getting back at him for the purse clusterfuck comment!
“Did she say anything else?” he asked the teacher, but Phoebe’s voice carried over from the other side of the room.
“I called Cassie Klein a butthole like that guy says in the video game. You know, Uncle Row, the game you play at night with thepow, pow, pow!” Phoebe finished, yelling out the sound of the machine gun audio with decent accuracy from her spot at the cozy corner table.
He was about to compliment her on it, then glanced at the teacher and the nanny and found them wide-eyed.
He’d screwed up again!
“Phoebe,” he said sternly, calling her over.
The little girl dragged her feet as she crossed the room with her drawing in her hands.
“Why did you call Cassie Klein a b—” he began when the teacher cleared her throat.
“Abadword?” he said, amending his original question.
His niece touched the tail of her braid as her expression crumpled. “She made fun of my hair. She said it looked stupid.”
He frowned. “I watched that braiding tutorial seven times.” He turned her little body to assess the quality of his work. He’d thought he’d nailed it.
She looked over her shoulder at him, then shrugged. “Yeah, well, you still suck, Uncle Row.”
“How about instead of saying your Uncle Rowen sucks, you say that, with a little practice, you’re sure he’ll improve,” the teacher offered, but Phoebe wasn’t buying it.
“No, Mrs. Bergen, he really sucks at doing my hair,” the child deadpanned.
Penelope leaned in and smoothed one of Phoebe’s many errant strands of brown hair. “I love braiding hair, so that can be something we do together,” she offered. And he had to hand it to her. It was a damned good answer but, just like with her teacher, Phoebe was a hard sell. The kid scrunched up her face and shook her head.
“Is that a picture of the boat you were telling us about at sharing time, Phoebe?” the teacher asked, blessedly shifting attention away from his shit braiding job.
The scowl melted from his niece’s face, and the child beamed. “Yes, Uncle Row said if I keep getting all my spelling words right, he’ll take me to the fancy boat with the big pool.”
Dammit! The kid wasn’t wrong! The last time he’d been summoned to meet with the teacher, it had been about Phoebe’s lackluster spelling test performance. He’d forgotten he’d offered up the reward of a yacht vacation in the Caribbean.
“You are off to a great start, Phoebe. I see a boat with a pool in your future!” the teacher chimed.
Phoebe sucked in a big breath, then held her nose and sank to the ground, pretending to be in the pool.
Mrs. Bergen chuckled. “On that note, I don’t want to keep you any longer than I have to. How about I put a list together of fun family activities you can do to support literacy? I’ll send it home with Phoebe next week.”
“That would be helpful. Thank you,” he said, raising himself from the tiny chair.
“It was nice meeting you,” Penelope said, reaching across the table to shake the woman’s hand and, in the process, knocked over her bag. And it was like a recycling plant exploded.
“I’m so sorry!” she said, gathering the contents and stuffing them back inside.
He leaned over and picked up a book with dog-eared pages, then read the title.
A Life Spent on an Island: A collection of short stories.
