His Nanny Mate (Moana and Edrick Morgan) novel Chapter 221

#Chapter 221: The Classroom Aide

Moana

Even though I half expected to hate the bodyguard who Edrick supposedly found for me, I actually wound up liking my new bodyguard, Kat, quite a lot. During my interview with her, I found out that she was funny and sweet, and she got along well with Ella and loved kids in general. She really seemed perfect — almost too good to be true. Although I still didn’t like the idea of being followed around by a bodyguard all day, I figured that if I had to choose one, then I would choose Kat.

The next morning, I returned to work with Kat and Ella by my side. The headmistress and everyone else were under the impression that Kat was just a medical aide that my doctor wanted me to keep nearby due to pregnancy complications, and I preferred to keep it that way. If news got out that the late bloomer with all of the mysterious absences from work was walking around now with an undercover bodyguard, then it would only create more of a fuss over me. I was already despised enough by most of the other teachers as it was, and I could only imagine what it would be like if they all figured out that I was being sent to work with a bodyguard because I was having crazy PTSD episodes due to the soap opera that was my life.

After the first class of the day, I was already happy to have Kat there. She was actually very helpful with the classroom duties, and it took a lot of stress off of me. By the time that Ella’s class came in, I was already feeling a lot better to be back at work. In fact, in between classes I even found myself talking to Kat quite a bit, and I had to admit that it felt nice to have someone at work who I could talk to since the other teachers seemed to collectively decide that I was a danger to be around. By the middle of Ella’s class, I had almost completely forgotten about my dream and my drawings as well, and everything felt normal for a little bit.

However, I quickly noticed that Ella was sitting by herself that day. Her little group of friends that she was normally stuck to like glue were sitting on the opposite side of the room, and every so often I would catch them giving her dirty looks or whispering. Ella kept her head down and just paid attention to her coloring, but I could tell that it was bothering her.

The whispers and gossip that I occasionally heard about myself bothered me, but not too much. But as I saw Ella being separated from her friends and being treated like an outcast, I couldn’t help but think that it was because of me. Everyone still thought that I was bad luck because I was a late bloomer, and if they thought that Ella was my biological daughter, there was no doubt in my mind that they saw her as a pariah as well… And that hurt me to my core.

…

That night, as I tucked Ella into bed I decided that now would be a good time to talk to her about it. After I finished reading her bedtime story, I closed the book and set it down on the bedside table before leaning over and tucking her in.

“Ella, can I talk to you?” I asked gently, to which she nodded as she looked up at me with her big eyes peeking out over her blanket. I took in a deep, ragged breath, then reached out and brushed a loose strand of hair out of her face. “Is everything going okay at school? I noticed that you weren’t sitting with your friends today.”

Ella simply shrugged. I could tell that she didn’t want to talk about it, but it needed to be addressed.

“You can be honest with me,” I said. “If you had a fight or anything, I promise you won’t get in trouble. I just want to know what’s going on.”