by Tammy Walsh
“Sorry,” she said. “I need to mention something. You asked for references, but I won’t be able to give them. Not unless you send someone to Earth.”
“Why not?”
She couldn’t meet my eyes.
“Because… Because… I was sworn to secrecy,” she said.
“Secrecy?” I said. “What sort of secrecy?”
“It wouldn’t be a secret if I told you, would it?” she said, eyes glinting with mischief. “I educated children of rich and powerful Titan families. I had to sign non-disclosure agreements before they allowed me to take on the position.”
I knew many of the rich Titan families. I wondered which ones she was referring to.
“But… How am I supposed to know you’re as qualified as you say you are?” I said.
She shrugged.
“You’re going to have to trust me,” she said.
“Trust you? I don’t even know you! You just came off the street. You could be anyone. You might be dangerous.”
“Do I look dangerous to you?” she said with an arched eyebrow.
Yes. You look like the most dangerous woman I’ve ever met.
“No,” I said. “But looks can be deceiving.”
“My methods are unusual,” Bianca said. “But they work. You have to understand how children think and work with them.”
“Work with them how?” I said.
“You talk to them in a way they understand,” she said. “You tell them stories that engage their interest. Difficult kids are often very smart. They need to be taught differently to how most kids are.”
She was asking me to trust her with the son of my dead sister. But I couldn’t take that risk. He’d already seen three governesses come and go. He needed some stability in his life and I didn’t think she was the one who would provide it.
I got to my feet.
“Thank you for coming today,” I said. “We’ll be in touch.”
“Oh,” she said.
She scooped up her bag and shook my hand. She must have sensed something was wrong.
“If I said something wrong, I apologize,” she said. “If I could give you references, I would.”
“I know,” I said. “It’s just… he’s a very special boy. He’s had a hard time of it lately. Him acting up like this… It’s just a phase. He needs someone who’s going to be firm but fair with him. He needs to be forced into shape and I’m afraid your style of doing things isn’t going to do that.”
Bianca nodded but the look in her eyes was cold and hard.
“I see,” she said. “Well, thank you for your time. Don’t worry about showing me out. I know where the door is.”
She moved for it and froze when she reached it. She spoke without turning around.
“The governess you hired before me, the one who left abruptly? She was strict, wasn’t she?” she said.
“She could be at times, yes.”
“And he didn’t respond well to it.”
“No,” I said.
“And the governess you had as a kid, she was strict too? And you were a little wayward as a child and she straightened you out?”
I was gobsmacked.
“How did you know that?” I said.
She turned to face me.
“I’ve spent my life studying people,” she said. “I know them, understand them. I’ve seen how the experiences they had as children molded the adults they became. Maybe the approach that worked on you all those years ago isn’t the right approach to use with him. Maybe he needs more than just a governess.”
“What does he need?” I said.
“A friend.”
She let the word hang between us. I thought I was sizing her up for this position and instead she’d been the one sizing me up.
“Thank you for your time,” she said. “I hope you find the person you’re looking for.”
Her insinuation was clear: “It isn’t me.”
“Thank you,” I said distractedly.
She opened the door. Waev was there to escort her out. I watched her walk down the hallway and admired the way her skirt clung tightly to her hips and narrow waist.
Far too pretty, I thought. And far too smart. She would be a distraction. I needed to focus on my work, especially with funding my new mine.
I shut the door and hoped the next applicant would be more… typical for the role.
Dry, drab, strict, and unyielding.
Was that really what Cleb would react to?
Why not? It had straightened me out, hadn’t it?
For the most part.
I kept to my office for the next two hours, peeling through page upon page of dry legal documents. I ran a successful mining company and would open a new operation soon. But first I needed additional funding. I could put everything I had on the line to do it myself but it would be taking a huge risk.
I needed outside investment from trusted partners. I had to schmooze at various social gatherings over the next few weeks.
It was my biggest weakness. Socializing.
If only I could outsource it as I outsourced almost every other part of my business. But the investors wanted to meet the Titan behind the opportunity. I didn’t blame them. I would too.
I just wish it didn’t have to be me.
A scream.
I bolted to my feet and appraised it.
It wasn’t a scream of pain. It might have come from someone passing in the street outside the house. Sometimes people became overly excited.
When the scream didn’t repeat itself, I bent back down over my files.
Then it did come again.
Unless I missed my guess, I would have said it came from a young throat—from Cleb’s throat.
I was out of my chair faster than I could think. I ran to the door and threw it open. I peered up and down the halls but couldn’t see any of the servants.
Left, I thought. It’d come from that way.
I didn’t slow until I reached the glass doors that opened onto the broad garden. The sun was bright and caught the endless lawn and bushy woodland in the distance.
The other servants stood on the back patio, clapping their hands and grinning at the sight of Cleb running and turning, trying to escape from Bianca, who chased after him.
I stood there, slack-jawed. I had never heard Cleb smile before, never mind laugh. He’d transformed into a normal, happy little boy.
When the servants saw me watching, they immediately quietened down, lowered their heads, and stared at the floor. Some quickly hustled indoors.
Bianca brushed her hair back from her face and braced her hands on her hips. She panted when she looked up at me.
The world shifted on its axis.
Her face was fresh and red with exercise and filaments of hair clung to her sweaty forehead. She brushed it aside and didn’t seem concerned that she looked a bit of a mess.
I was, in a word, stunned.
Cleb took Bianca by the hand—another first—and led her toward the back door leading into the house. He drew up when he saw me.
“Oh,” he said. “Hi, Uncle.”
Uncle.
It was the first time he’d called me that. I realized with grim embarrassment that he’d never referred to me at all. Not by name, title, or otherwise.
How had I not noticed that before?
“Can I… have a word with you, please?” I said to Bianca.
“Sure,” she said. Then she turned to Cleb. “I’m going to talk with your uncle for a minute, okay? I’ll join you in your room later so you can show those fancy toys you told me about.”
“Okay!”
He told her about his toys?
Cleb took off at a run into the house.
“No running!” I said feebly.
Cleb slowed down to the fastest walk known to Titan and proceeded up the stairs.
I spun on her.
“How did you do that?” I said. “He’s been here three months and he’s never played like that!”
“He’s a little boy,” she said. “They all play like that, given the chance.”
That rubbed me up the wrong way.
“He’s going to want you to stay now,” I barked. “That was your plan all along, wasn’t it? That might be how other families like their children to be treated, but not here.”
She blinked in surprise at that. A series of lines drew across her face as she frowned at me with incredulity.
“I was outside with Waev, who was showing me the beautiful flowers in your garden when Cleb started talking to me. There was no plan. He spoke to me.”
I ground my teeth, chagrined. I’d flown off the handle. All she’d done was be friendly to Cleb.
“I apologize,” I said. “I didn’t mean anything by it. Sometimes I see ploys where there aren’t any—”
“I understand now why Cleb acted up the way he did before,” Bianca said, ignoring my apology and going on the offense. “You asked me how I got him to play like that. The answer is simple. You have to be in the same room as him to do it. That’s the magic ingredient. And not spy on him from the bathroom.”
If I turned any redder with embarrassment, I would have exploded. Others had beaten me in negotiations before but never so quickly or with apparent ease.
I swallowed my pride.
“I want you to be his governess,” I said. “I’ll give you the same deal I gave the previous one.”
“Oh no,” Bianca said, her eyes meeting mine. “You’re going to do no such thing. You’re going to give me something a lot better than what she got. You can bet your bottom credit on that. And that’s if I decide to accept the position. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some toys to go look at.”
I knew a losing position when I saw one. With Cleb in her back pocket, she held all the cards. I didn’t have a leg to stand on.
She took off up the stairs with the energy of a newborn gazelle.
She was going to cost me, I thought, and cost me big.
And yet, I couldn’t help but smile. There was no such thing as a dead cert in business. Things always came with risks. But I would have staked everything I owned that she would take me to the cleaners.
What frightened me even more was that I wanted her to.
Because then she would be in my house and I could gaze at her every day.
I might lose the battle, but I would win the war.
Bianca
When I left Traes’ office, I was devastated.
I didn’t get the job. Now I didn’t know what I was going to do. I would have been out on the street with nowhere to live. I didn’t have enough money for a room or even food. I’d become too weak to look for work.
I would have been reduced to begging in the streets and relying on others’ generosity. I might get arrested by the local police, who would match me with a report filed on Rang and, before you could say “Icebox,” I would be back in Asshole’s shithole, chained to the wall and routinely beaten and abused in equal measure.
That ran through my mind as Waev led me toward the door. I couldn’t take one step across the threshold or my worst nightmares would come true.
When Traes asked me for references and I had to come up with a reason why I couldn’t provide them, I was quite impressed with my ingenuity. I didn’t know where the rich family story came from. Probably watching too many Empire episodes?
Still, it was a lie. And no, I wasn’t proud of it. But sometimes you had to take a risk to get the things you wanted. Besides, it was only a little white lie. So long as I eventually achieved what I was lying about, it was only retroactive lying. It would come true in a few weeks.
That had to count for something, didn’t it?
Waev opened the door but I didn’t step out.
“Thank you for coming to see us, Bianca,” he said. “If you make it through to the next round, I’ll be sure to contact you soon.”
He smiled at me warmly but I couldn’t leave. I couldn’t tell him the truth either. He was about as likely to take a risk on me as Stinky was of winning the Most Beautiful Creature In The Galaxy Competition.
So, I took him up on his offer.
“I have another interview later,” I lied. Boy, this was really becoming a habit, isn’t it? “Would it be possible for me to stay here and walk around your beautiful garden while I wait?”
Waev looked me over, gauging whether or not I was someone he could trust.
“Of course,” he said, shutting the door and ushering me inside. “We have some of the best flowerbeds in the neighborhood.”
“I’ll bet you do,” I said, relieved.
I’d bought myself time. Not much, but a little.
I’d better make it count.
He prattled on about flowers and shrubs and hedges and things I had no idea about. I smiled and nodded along amiably, focusing my attention on glancing inside each room we passed.
Cleb. I needed to find Cleb.
If I could find him and develop a connection with him, Traes would have no choice but to keep me on as the governess.
We were deep in the third flower patch when I saw Cleb. He floated nearby, occasionally casting a look my way but too shy to come near me. I could see he did want to approach.
I plucked a flower—what resembled a Bow and Arrow plant back home. It had a thick stem and a long bulge of flowers that took up the top quarter. I twisted the stem around my hand and under the flower. I snapped it forward so the head popped off like an arrow and sailed through the air, striking Cleb’s shoe. The flowers exploded like a flower bomb.
He beamed at me and plucked his own flower. He tried to do the same but it didn’t work and fell to the ground at his feet.
This was when most adults made a crucial mistake. They would rush over to help the kid. That was the wrong way to do things. You wanted them to come to you so they developed confidence in approaching you.
I plucked another flower and shot another “arrow” at him. This time, I aimed even higher and hit him in the chest. He tried again but did even worse this time, somehow making the “arrow” fire backward.
He plucked another one and approached me. I pretended not to notice him. He tugged on my shirt. I waited a moment, secretly itching to turn to him immediately. It’d been so long since I held a child and I missed it. I let him do it twice before I turned to him.
“Oh,” I said. “Hello, little man. Can I help you with something?”
He extended the flower to me. I crouched beside him and took it.
“What’s up?” I said.
“How do I shoot like you?” he said.
“It’s very simple,” I said. “Are you ready? Come closer and I’ll show you how to do it.”
I sensed Waev watching us. I wished he wouldn’t—there was a chance Cleb would feel self-conscious but I could understand his interest. Cleb was a part of the family and they were all concerned about him.
I held him close and remembered how good it felt to work with children, their warmth, and their happiness. There was nothing like curling up with a good kid for company.
I helped him and we shot the “arrow” together. It hit Waev’s foot. He hopped on the spot and pretended like he’d been shot.
Cleb giggled and I noticed immediately how the house workers snapped to attention. It seemed laughter wasn’t a common commodity for this kid. I wondered why.
“Great shot!” I said. “Were you aiming for his foot?”
Cleb nodded.
“Do you think you can hit his hand?” I said.
Waev held his hand out like a target.
Cleb took careful aim and poked his tongue out in concentration. He released the flower and it struck Waev’s extended hand and exploded in an explosion of petals.
“Well done!” I said. “High five!”
Cleb didn’t know what that meant. I guessed it wasn’t a thing with Titans but he grinned as he slapped my hand, and then Waev’s.
Waev shared an incredulous look with the other house workers and looked at me with
genuine warmth in his eyes.
“Thank you,” he mouthed.
I shrugged my shoulders. If he was impressed with that, he was going to be amazed with my next trick…
Cleb opened up to me after that, walking with us and helping tend the gardens. It was a good thing to get a child’s hands dirty in soil, I always thought.
I struck paydirt when I told him I was from a far and distant planet that no Titan had ever been to before.
“Really?” he said. “I don’t believe you.”
“It’s true,” I said, not knowing if it was really true or not. “Do you want me to prove it to you?”
He nodded his head shyly.
“Okay,” I said. “If I am from a planet that Titans have never visited before, that means I know nothing about Titans, right?”
“Right.”
“So ask me a question. Something anyone who knows about Titans must know and I guarantee I don’t know it.”
Cleb thought for a moment before raising his hand.
“Have you got one?” I said.
He nodded.
“Great,” I said. “Hit me with it.”
“What is the emperor’s real name?” he said.
I thought long and hard and pretended I was going to answer a couple of times before shaking my head.
“I don’t know!” I said.
Cleb gasped and looked from me to Waev and back again.
“You must know!” he said.
“I promise you, I don’t,” I said.
He told me, and it sounded so foreign I couldn’t have repeated it back to him if he asked.
“Wow,” I said. “You must be very clever to know something like that. Say it again.”
He did, and I feigned my astonishment.
Waev smiled but pretended not to.
“I’ll leave you two to it,” he said. “I’m afraid I know all the answers to these questions and I might accidentally reveal them.”
He had a better sense of humor than I expected for a stiff head of the household. He also had a good sense of a developing relationship. He was my crutch when it came to being with Cleb. Now we were alone and I got to see if he would continue to trust me without his friends nearby.
Cleb sprayed the flowers with a liquid in a bottle. The flowers made a sucking noise and reached out for him with their leaves and petals. Okay, now I was astonished. They had actual living flowers on this planet?