Page 4 of Perfect Imperfections

“Is Mrs. James your teacher?” Cam asked, bending her head down to smile at the girl.

Her tiny wet blonde head nodded. Mrs. James. Good to know. Now Ellie knew who to rip a new one for not paying attention to her students.

“Charlotte! Charlotte!”

Speaking of. The woman frantically waving her arms on the other side of the pool, terrified expression on her face must be the teacher in question.

“Charlotte? Is that your name?” After one more cough, the tiny head nodded. “Hi, Charlotte. I’m Ellie and this is Cam.”

“Hey, kiddo. Is that lady screaming your name your mommy?”

Charlotte gave them a hesitant smile and shook her head. “No. That’s Mrs. James. I don’t have a mommy.”

Ellie wiped at the water dripping down her cheek. A tear might have leaked out to join the wetness of her appearance at the sweet girl’s matter-of-fact statement. No mother and being bullied? Couldn’t life give the poor kid a break?

Nope, because life could be a real asshole to people. She knew that as much as the next person.

“You want to handle the teacher?” she asked Cam. “I’ll stay with Charlotte until the medics get here and—”

Her words were cut off as the screaming sound of the Zoo’s emergency vehicle overpowered the noisy crowd. Vehicle was a generous term. The thing was just an extra-outfitted golf cart used to transport injured people to the front gate for an ambulance ride. A man and a woman in EMT uniforms jumped off the cart as it slammed to a stop in front of the birdhouse.

“About damn time,” Cam grumbled, standing. “I’ll go let them in.”

As her friend went to show the EMTs through the back of the aviary to the outside exhibit, Ellie tried to keep Charlotte talking. She took some biology classes in her undergrad program, but it was mostly concerning animal biology, not human. One thing she knew was never to let a person in danger of hypothermia go to sleep. She couldn’t say if little Charlotte had been in the water long enough for that, but she wasn’t taking any chances.

“So, Charlotte, do you like penguins?”

Nice question, Ellie. The girl just had a traumatic experience dealing with the animals and here you are shoving it in her face.

Crap. This was why she had no social life. Tact, thy name was not Ellie.

“They’re okay. I like elephants the mostest, but Daddy says I can’t have one. He says they’re too big to fit in our backyard.”

Oh, thank goodness she had a dad. Ellie couldn’t take it if the poor girl had no one.

“He’s right. Elephants need a lot of room. In fact, the elephant enclosure we have here is only one area for our elephants to play in. They have an entire yard behind the big gray fence that only special people can see.”

The little girl pulled her head away from Ellie’s chest, bright green eyes big and round. “I’m special. My daddy always says so!”

Sounded like a great dad. She wondered if super dad knew about his daughter’s bully troubles.

“I bet you are. Maybe I can work something out and we can find a time for you to have a visit to their special yard.”

Charlotte squealed with delight. The smile on her little face warming Ellie’s heart.

“Really?”

“I’ll talk to my boss.”

She was sure Tammy would say yes. This entire incident was going to be a PR nightmare. Thank goodness it happened in the penguin enclosure where the birds were relatively harmless and not somewhere like the tiger exhibit. If anyone fell into a predator exhibit, the DART team would have to be called and there was always the possibility the animals would have to be put down. Tragic, but human life trumped animal. Something not everyone agreed on and that had brought up many fierce debates among everyone in the zoology and animal rights field.

Her thoughts were interrupted as the sounds of heavy boots hitting the cement reached her ears. Suddenly, two EMTs crouched by her side. She glanced up to see Cam standing behind the two emergency personnel, a worried smile on her face. The male EMT unzipped the large bag he carried, pulling out supplies, including—thank goodness—an emergency blanket. As he opened it, taking the towel from around Charlotte and replacing it with the shiny PET film around the small girl’s shoulders.

“Hey there, my name is Jayla, and that’s Jay,” the female EMT nodded to the man, then winked. “No relation.”

That got a chuckle out of Charlotte.

“What’s your name?”

---