Page 42 of Drilled (Dad Bod Contracting 2)
“Listening skills are important,” I say. “As are introductions. I’m Audra Donovan.”
She shakes my hand and smiles at me. “I’m Nina Bod.” She points across the yard at another girl with similar brown hair in similar messy, uneven pigtails, who seems to have Imogen and Jesse cornered by the adult drinks cooler. “That’s my little sister, Ella.”
“Nina and Ella Bod, hmmm?”
She nods. “Yep. We’re named after Papa and Mama’s favorite singers, Nina Simone and Ella Fitzgerald.” She pauses, takes a breath, and then launches into another monologue. “Mom died when I was five, and Ella was only one. Mom was gonna have a baby, but Papa says things just went sideways, whatever that means. Mama went to be with Jesus, and so did the baby. I don’t really remember her very much, ’specially ’cause Papa misses her so much he won’t talk about her ever, and Ella doesn’t remember her at all, so it’s just me remembering her. Which is super hard, sometimes, but I have an old photo album under my bed with pictures of her. Plus, Papa has this old camera and he used to take a lot of pictures of her, but then she died so he stopped and I stole the camera and now I keep it under my bed and look at the pictures sometimes. But that’s a secret. I don’t think Papa would stop me, but he’d get sad and he’s just starting to be less sad, even though you can’t really tell most of the time unless you know him really well like I do, since he’s such a grumpy old bear all the time, but he really is a lot less sad now than he used to be.”
“Wow, I—”
Nina claps her hand over her mouth. “Ooops. I shouldn’t have told you any of that. Papa says I need to learn to keep private business private and not go spewing our collective family tragedy out to any old person who’ll listen to my ever-running mouth.”
I laugh. “I won’t tell him you told me, how about that?”
She glances at James who’s popping the top on a beer and eyeing us. “Oh, I think he already knows. He’s a really good guesser at things like this.”
I laugh. “I imagine he is.”
She glances at me. “Are you Imogen’s stubborn girlfriend who Papa says is making Franco act like somebody pooped in his oatmeal?”
I snort, choking on my drink.
She sighs, shaking her head. “Me and my mouth. I wasn’t supposed to repeat that either. But I’m curious.”
“He said that to you?” I ask.
She shakes her head solemnly. “Oh, no. Papa never talks like that in front of us. But sometimes the uncles come over and they drink that nasty brown stuff and talk loud, and I hear them because Papa thinks I’m sleeping but I’m not. Uncle Ryder and Uncle Jesse came over the other day and they were talking about Uncle Franco, and they said it was because Imogen’s girlfriend was being stubborn, and they were the ones who said that oatmeal thing about Franco. Even though I know for a fact Franco doesn’t eat oatmeal, because he stayed the night one time and Papa made oatmeal for us the next morning and Uncle Franco wouldn’t eat it because it had something called carbs in it.”
“So you have Uncle Franco, Uncle Ryder, and Uncle Jesse.”
She nods. “Yep. But they’re not our real, actual uncles, you know. Papa was an only child, which is why he’s so bossy with us. It doesn’t make sense to me, but Papa says a lot of weird stuff. The guys are Papa’s best friends, and Papa says they’re like brothers, so that’s why they’re our uncles.”
“You’re lucky to have so many awesome uncles, huh?”
“Yeah.” She looks at me. “But if you could do something to make Uncle Franco go back to normal, I’d really appreciate it. He’s been kind of lame lately, and I’m so not here for it.”
I laugh hard, because Nina is really something else. “Yeah, I’ll see what I can do. No promises, though.”
“What did you do, anyway?”
I sigh. “Well, that’s hard to explain, kiddo.”
“Hard to explain, or hard to explain to a ten-year-old?”
I laugh again. “Can’t put much past you can I, Nina?”
“Nope. Papa says I’m too smart for my own good, and just smart enough to know it.”
“Sounds about right, I’d say.”
She eyes me again, and I can tell that she’s not finished with me yet. “So, did your husband die or something?”
Again, I choke on my drink. “What? God, you’re something else.” I wipe my chin, and then wipe my hand on my skirt. “No, I’ve never been married.”
“What? You’ve never been married? Do you have a boyfriend?”
“No.”
“So why are you alone? You’ve got to be as old as Papa, and he says he’s two days older than dirt. Plus you’re pretty, so it can’t be because you can’t get a man.”
