Page 48 of Doctorshipped
Then she turns to me with a hand on her hip. “Why didn’t you say Miss Jayme was here in the first place?”
Before I have a chance to answer, Fiona turns for the door, leaving me sitting on the edge of her bed as she darts into the hallway and flies down the stairs as quickly as she thumped up them.
When I walk into the kitchen, a plate of cookies that Jayme must have brought with her in that bag she was carrying sits on the center of the kitchen table. Both Fiona and Jayme have a glass of milk in front of them. Jayme’s sitting cross-legged on one of our kitchen chairs and Fiona’s in the other, relaying far more of the details of the teasing episode than she spilled to me.
Jayme listens patiently. I feel like an intruder, not knowing what to do with myself in my own home. I walk to the refrigerator, attempting to give myself something to do.
“You did the right thing,” Jayme assures Fiona. “Unfortunately, people will tease us in life. Everyone gets teased or mocked at one time or another. Maybe knowing that it happens to everyone will help you. Even Noah will be teased at some point. Or maybe he already has been.”
Fiona stares at Jayme, taking in her every word—not telling her not to talk, like she did to me.
“I used to get teased like crazy in elementary school,” Jayme says.
She takes a big bite of her cookie, closes her eyes and says “Mmmm. These are good.”
She was teased? I wonder what she got teased for.
I root around in the meat and cheese drawer. I’m not hungry in the least, but I can’t seem to make myself leave the room, and I can’t just stand in the middle of the kitchen staring at these two while they bond over teasing.
“You were teased?” Fiona asks Jayme.
Fiona takes a big bite of her cookie and through the mouthful she mumbles, “These are so good. I want to learn to bake these next.”
“They’re easy. I’ll totally teach you. And, yep. I was teased for having braces and this wild curly hair. I even got teased for doing well in school because I liked big words and always got A’s.”
“Why would people tease you for getting A’s?”
“I don’t know. Jealousy? Maybe just needing someone to pick on? Whatever it was, it hurt, even though I tried not to let it.”
I peek out from the fridge, a bag of lunch meat salami in my hand. Fiona’s nodding her head at Jayme. A calm smile fills her face.
“Then there were the years where boys teased girls because they liked them,” Jayme says.
“What?” Fiona makes a scrunched up face. “That’s weird.”
“Boys are weird,” Jayme says without hesitation.
Then, as if she just realized I was in the room, Fiona looks over and asks me, “Daddy, what are you doing hunting around in the fridge for so long? Are you going to eat that salami?”
I look at the bag in my hand. “Yes. I thought I would.”
What?
Well, I said it, so I’m committed.
I walk over to the other side of the kitchen, grab a plate out of the cupboard, and start pulling salami out of the bag and placing slices onto the plate piece by piece like I’m making my own salami-only charcuterie board for one. Two sets of eyes watch me.
“Wouldn’t you rather have a cookie?” Fiona asks. “Miss Jayme baked them. They’re oatmeal butterscotch.”
Jayme looks at me. Her eyebrows are raised, and her arms are crossed across her chest again. Her eyes dance with mischief. She obviously gets far too much pleasure from taunting me.
“I’d love a cookie,” I say, not taking my eyes from Jayme’s.
She lifts the plate and extends it to me. If I didn’t know my daughter had eaten one already, I’d have the instinct to have them tested for poison the way Jayme’s smirk widens as I pluck a cookie off the plate and place it among my weird snack of plain salami slices.
Jayme sets the serving plate back down on the table and turns her full attention back to Fiona. “You know you’re amazing, right?”
“I don’t know if I’d say amazing.”
