As she slid off her chair and bounded across the room, I yelled after her, “We need to brush your teeth before we go anywhere, so head to your bathroom. If you didn’t get any French toast or syrup on your clothes, you can wear the ones you have on, but we need to brush away all that sugar before it settles into your teeth and gives you cavities.”
She skipped into the hallway toward her room on the other side of the house singing, “First I brush, and then it’s art time!”
How Mr. Allen could ever be cruel to her I had no idea.
Grace squeezedout another glob of glue in the top corner of the piece of blue construction paper and then dumped the last of the purple glitter onto the white liquid, covering it completely. We couldn’t get purple with silver and gold specks, but she’d been happy to find the last tube of bright purple glitter on the very back of the shelf at that store in town. I worried it had been sitting there for a decade or more, so I cautioned her that sometimes glitter didn’t act like it should, but as soon as she got the top off and started shaking it over the glued macaroni, it came out perfectly.
Well, too perfectly, I suspected by the way Agatha gave us a disgusted side eyed look as she passed through the kitchen where we set up our art project. I made sure to tell her that I’d clean everything up, including any stray glitter that made its way off the table. When she pursed her lips and groaned, I got the sense she didn’t believe me, but I’d take care of it.
You’d think no one in this house had ever been a child at some point. Were they all born old and miserable?
Her hands covered in glue and glitter, Grace sat back in her chair and pointed at her creation. “I hope Uncle Nico likes it. I’ve never made any macaroni art as good as this one.”
She moved to touch her face, so I quickly lifted her up in my arms and carried her over to the farmhouse sink at the other side of the kitchen. “Let’s get you washed up and brush off any glitter you got on your shirt before you take your present to your uncle. We have to let it dry for a few minutes, so let me have those hands.”
Grace lifted them in front of my face and giggled. “I’m like a purple monster, Tia! Grrr!”
I turned on the water and grabbed her wrists before she made me a purple monster too. “Under the water you go. Here’s the soap. I want you to get under your fingernails too. I think we might have to trim them today. Suds up!”
She did exactly as I told her to, and after I brushed off all the remaining glitter clinging to her pink and white polka dot shirt, I stood her on her feet next to me. “I just have to clean out the sink and the table and the floor so nobody gets glitter all over them when they come in to eat. Then I think we can take your picture to your uncle. How does that sound?”
“Yes! Do you think he’s going to love it? I love it. Don’t you?” she asked excitedly.
As I rinsed away the last of the glitter down the drain, I nodded. “I do. Lots of blue and purple is perfect for an uncle. Very masculine.”
“I used only a little silver glitter for his name. I thought that would make it look good,” she said confidently, sure her art was the best ever.
Taking her hands in mine, I led her over to the towel sitting on the counter. “Let’s dry those hands. We don’t want to ruin the picture with wet hands, do we?”
A look of terror settled into her beautiful face, and she shook her head. “No. Not after all I did to make it perfect.”
“Then let’s make sure there’s not a drop of water on your skin. Dry really good, okay?”
As obedient as always with me, she did exactly as I told her to and then lifted her hands to show me they were dry. With a smile, she said, “All dry. Can we take the picture to him now?”
I loved how sweet and caring she was, so even though I worried he wouldn’t accept her gift with the same kindness of spirit, I nodded and forced myself to smile. “Now seems as good a time as any. Just let me wipe down the table so Agatha doesn’t get any stray glitter on her.”
“Why?” Grace asked as we walked back to where she’d created her masterpiece. “Doesn’t she like glitter?”
I shrugged, thinking to myself that Agatha didn’t seem to like much of anything. Maybe prunes. I could see her liking those. Not glitter, though. That was too happy, too lighthearted for her.
With the kitchen cleaned of all hints of our time in there, I walked with Grace as she clutched her gift for her uncle in her hands. She beamed such happiness with every step that I told myself he had to melt at least a little bit today.
When we got to his office, I stopped her just outside the door. “Let me knock first just in case he’s in a meeting.”
Wide-eyed and excited, she nodded, bouncing on her toes as the moment had nearly arrived to unveil her art for him. I knocked on his office door and heard him grumble something about coming in if I had to. Not exactly the welcome I had hoped for, but I still wanted to think this would turn out well for Grace.
Taking her by the hand, I walked her into his office and said, “Mr. Allen, Grace made you a little present and wanted to give it to you as soon as she could.”
She held out the piece of construction paper, now rigid from all the glue and macaroni plastered to it, and smiled up at him as he sat at his desk. “This is for you, Uncle Nico. I made it with macaroni and glue and two kinds of glitter. It’s a picture of birds flying over the house like I saw yesterday when Tia and I were outside. Do you like it?”
A look of pure disgust twisted his expression into something one might expect at seeing a dead body or a car wreck. Reluctantly, he took the paper by the very edge and dropped it onto the corner of his desk without a word.
I waited for him to say something—anything to let Grace know her gift was appreciated—but he merely sat there staring in horror at what she’d made him. The feel of the room grew tenser by the moment, and when I looked down at her, I saw she understood just how little he valued her thoughtful gift.
“Isn’t it nice, Mr. Allen? Grace made it all by herself,” I said, hoping to shake loose something kind inside him.
But all he did was look up at me with that same expression of disgust he’d worn since she handed him her artwork made especially for him. “It looks like it. Isn’t the glitter supposed to stick to the glue? It’s getting all over the place. I can’t have that in my office here. This is a place of business, for God’s sake.”