Total pages in book: 176
Estimated words: 167940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 840(@200wpm)___ 672(@250wpm)___ 560(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 167940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 840(@200wpm)___ 672(@250wpm)___ 560(@300wpm)
“Aren’t you going to read the card?” I ask, wondering what the letter might mean and if there’s a message in there for me. Like I deserve one . . .
“After I’ve counted my money. I’m rich!”
“All you need to do now is keep the plants alive.” At least until we move out. Soon. Very soon. Because we can’t stay here, not now.
“Dear Lulu,” she begins to recite, running her finger under the masculine script, which turns from a spikey cursive to print after just a couple of words. “Please find en . . . enclosed. You read it, please.” She thrusts it into my hand. “His handwriting is too messy.”
“Dear Lulu,” I begin, “I hope you’re feeling much better this morning.” My heart gives a little pinch. How can someone so . . . provoking be so sweet? “Please find enclosed the sum agreed upon for the position of plant whisperer for the next two months.” From pinch to plummet, my heart hits my heels. He’s not here, and he’s not coming back anytime soon. It’s a fact that makes me feel a little tearful, apparently.
And so it should. I ought to be ashamed. I’ve driven the man out of his house! He obviously can’t bear to set eyes on me.
I scan the rest, intending to give her the highlights, relieved there’s no sign of anything resembling ‘please tell your mom from me to drop dead’. But the fact that there’s not one word in it intended for me makes me feel wretched.
It’s only what I deserve.
“Can you not read his writing either?”
“Oh. Sorry.” My gaze is still on the letter, though unseeing, I begin to read again. “Well, it seems the plants in this apartment like to know how the Yankees are doing.”
“What’s a Yankee?”
“It’s a baseball team. You know, the sport with teams and a bat and a ball. It’s very popular here.”
“What else does it say?”
“His plants also like to know what the weather is like outside and enjoy being read to occasionally.” I consider keeping the rest from her but say it anyway. “Mr Hayes says—”
“Uncle Carson.”
Split the difference? The hot man I almost humped last night.
“—he says he’s sure they’d appreciate hearing some Yeats.”
Is this my punishment? I don’t get the opportunity to explain or apologise, but I do get to read Yeats to a couple of parlour palms? Lulu might like me to read Yeats to her occasionally, especially his tales of fairies. What little girl doesn’t adore the sort of creature who leaves gifts for the kind-hearted and teases the surly?
Hmm. Maybe Carson Hayes is a fairy.
An outsized one?
There are few four-year-olds equipped to read the works of W.B. Yeats themselves, but maybe he didn’t know that, not being a parent himself. Whatever the case, it looks like, for the foreseeable future, I’ll be reading W.B. Yeats to a bit of greenery under the supervision of a four-year-old dictator. Sorry, manager.
“Hmm.” Lulu’s expression turns thoughtful as she taps her finger against her cheek. “I can’t read that good. Maybe we can find some on YouTube, and they can listen from my iPad instead?”
“That’s a really good idea.”
“A good idea that deserves pancakes for breakfast?”
Rose is right. This kid will probably end up ruling the world.
12
Fee
“Get a wriggle on, Lulu. We’re going to be late.” My heels hammer against the marble foyer, and I’m already regretting that I didn’t slip on a pair of flats. “I know it’s called the school run,” I throw over my shoulder, “but that doesn’t mean we have to dash in at the last minute every day.”
“I can’t be fast on Mondays. Also, my feets don’t have wheels,” she retorts as she continues to dawdle.
“Good morning, ma’am.” Mr Martinez, the night doorman—porter?—is still on duty, and he beats me to the door.
“Morning.” I pull my skirt a little from where it’s bunched at my thighs. “I think wheels ought to be included on the four-year-old model, at least between the hours of seven and nine in the morning.” I turn back to my daughter as she idles along, her tiny pink backpack strapped to her back as she watches dust motes swirling idly in a shaft of sunlight almost in a state of wonder.
How could anyone be angry with something so darling?
Frustrated? Now that’s another story.
“I’m sorry?” His voice brings me back from my ruminations, and I give my head a quick shake.
“Kids have two speeds Monday through Friday. Stop and slow.”
“So true,” I reply with a chuckle. “Do you have children?”
“Two girls. My eldest, Sophia, is a senior. She’s looking for a babysitting job if you don’t mind me mentioning it.”
“No, I don’t mind at all.”
“It’s just, you don’t seem to have a nanny or anything, and she has experience—lots of little cousins—and references, too.”
Nanny. Pah! We don’t even belong here, Mr. Martinez.