Free The Pull of Destiny by Hotcheri

inside voices! One at a- William! Get away from there!”
    There were
three difficult children at the daycare (for some strange reason, every class
has a bunch of troublemakers. Imagine how boring the world would be if they
didn’t). Helen, whose mother was a nurse at the hospital; Jerome, whose father
was on dialysis; and William, whose brother was terminally ill.
    William was the
ringleader. He knew exactly how and when to push Miss Campbell’s buttons and
she hated dealing with him. Because all she did was yell at him to stop and
there isn’t a kid in the world that’ll stop doing something just because you
tell him/her to.
    Closing my
book, I got to my feet and the magical spell that Harry Potter wove around the
kids was broken. They groaned, looking up at me with upset expressions on their
little faces.
    “Please, one
more page,” Zandi begged, her brown eyes pleading with me.
    “Another page?
You guys need to go play!” I said in a mock severe voice, my hands on my hips.
They all pouted at me, making me feel like a meanie, but I had to save the
bigger kids before Miss Campbell caused them lasting damage. “Tell you what.
We’ll continue the story next time, how about that? And look!” I pointed across
the room, to where Miss Campbell's long suffering assistant, Vanessa Ruiz, was
laying out toys for ‘playtime’. “Vanessa has some new toys for you guys!”
    Proving that
all children have one track minds, they all got to their feet and ran off to
bombard Vanessa, leaving me free to go and save William from Miss Campbell's
wild eyed stare. Jerome and Helen, lured by the toys, had left their ring
leader to carry on alone, and that’s exactly what he intended to do.
     
    William was
whining, knowing from past experience that this was the surest way to piss Miss
Campbell off and judging by the grimace on her face, it was working. The smug
smile on William’s cherubic face- not helping matters. At all.
    I walked up to
them, scratching my nose nervously. Miss Campbell was cool when she was normal
( not often ). When she was angry- you didn’t want to be there. “Is
everything okay?”
    She turned to
me, at the same time blindly swatting at William’s hand as the little boy
tugged on her skirt. “No, everything is not okay!” she exclaimed, her nostrils
flaring sharply. Turning on William, she barked “Stop pulling my skirt!”
    Somebody’s a
little high strung.
    “But I need to
use the bathroom!” Surreptitiously, William turned his head slightly to wink at
me. I shook my head, fighting back a laugh. The kid is a mastermind.
    “You don’t
need- he went to the bathroom just five minutes ago!” Holding her head between
her hands and looking like she wanted to keel over, Miss Campbell looked
beseechingly at me. “I can’t do this anymore! I can’t deal with this child.”
    Lord save me
from overly dramatic daycare supervisors.
    “Miss Campbell,
it’s alright, just calm down,” I said soothingly, patting her arm. Calming down
a woman undoubtedly in the throes of a midlife crisis wasn’t what I had signed
up for. “William’s just restless, aren’t you?” The smug smile still on his pink
cheeked face, William nodded and I turned back to Miss Campbell, who was
squeezing the life out of her poor stress ball. “I can take him for a walk,
how’s that sound?”
    “Please,” Miss
Campbell said in a weak whisper as William gave an exuberant, “Yay!”
    He looked up at
me, slipping his hand into mine. “Can we get candy?” he asked, his blue eyes
hopeful.
    Miss Campbell
massaged her temples again. I was sure I knew what the answer to that would be.
“Definitely not.” William’s face fell as she continued. “Just- take him up and
down the hallway. Make sure he doesn’t push any buttons and if you bounce that
ball, young man-.”
    Her voice
tapered off as she gave William a threatening look.
    “Okay,” I said
hastily, seeing William open his mouth to make a stinging retort. “Let’s