“Denial is an ugly thing.”

Tips: Copy and paste the vocabularies onto a wordpad or MWord, so you can look at it as you read through instead of scrolling up and down.

Part of the song.

French Vocabularies:

1 Qu’est-ce que tu veux faire maintenant?: What do you want to do now ?

2 Dansons!: Let’s dance!

3 Parle à ma main!: Talk to my hand!

4 Tu m’fais trop pitié, tu m’soules vas-y parle à ma main!: You are such a loser, you bore me out, go talk to my hand!

5 Si t’as pas compris, ça veut dire oublies moi: If you don’t get it, it means forget me (literally) / get off my back (colloquial).

6 J’écoute pas, t’existes pas, donc vas-y parle à ma main!: I’m not listening to you, you don’t exist, so go talk to my hand!

7 Si t’as pas compris, ça veut dire non merci: If you don’t understand, it means no, thank you.

8 Avec mes biatches, j’me déhanche dans la rue: With my es, I swayed my hips on the street.

9 Tu es très mignonne: You are very cute.

10 Tais-toi!: Shut up!

 

When Amber re-entered Medical School, she took Paris with her to classes at university. It was only for work that she left her at the Choi’s under my or their care. She juggled two jobs to pay off for her tuition; she worked until 09:00 p.m. at the Italian restaurant I worked at—we had different shifts to swap places to look after Paris since the Choi had their two kids already—and on Fridays, from 12:00 till 05:00 p.m. as a dentist assistant. Fridays were generally good because Paris took naps and would only wake up about one to two hours before Amber returned; I could occupy her during this time. However, when Amber worked at the restaurant till late night, Paris was not coping well. She would cry looking for her mother and chuck tantrums just to get Amber back home. When Yuri was there, it was less difficult because she knew how to deal with the toddler. Nevertheless, Amber did not last two weeks because Paris got a fever after crying for hours one evening and Amber had no choice but to quit.   Amber changed jobs into childcare. This was convenient since she could stay at home and look after the neighbour’s kids, with Paris by her side. The problem was Paris’ jealousy rage at these kids. She wanted Amber for herself. Like father like daughter, I’d say. When Amber scolded her for hitting a neighbour’s daughter, she ran into my embrace for refuge. God knows I’m a dupe when it comes to her, so of course, I’d side with her. The girl cried and dampened my shirt, while Amber was still reprimanding her for behaving inappropriately.   “Alright, Amber, cut it out. She had had enough.”   “Don’t defend her, Sung Yeol. She needs to know she shouldn’t be doing that. I’m working to support her.”   “Amber,” I said firmly, “she’s just a little kid.”   With that, I took Paris to her room and stayed with her until she fell asleep. She looked exhausted from the crying as I watched her sleeping form.   She looks so much like L, I  had mused.   When I returned to the living room, I heard Amber and Yuri talking.   “Was I being too harsh?”   Yuri took a sip of her milk tea and sighed. “Don’t feel bad. I hit Alice and Jaden before. It’s alright to lose your temper.”   “But she’s only a little kid,” Amber said, her voice fading away. Her head was hung down with guilt on her shoulder.   Yuri panicked and quickly added, “I’m not saying you should hit her. I felt like killing myself when I first hit Alice, but since then, she seemed to behave better. I did apologise, though.” When nothing came from Amber, Yuri said, “You know, they do test your patience to the limit and you do try to do the right thing, but if we don’t teach them, in an acceptable manner, how to behave, they won’t know how to.” She patted Amber’s hand. “Like I said, you don’t have to be perfect, just be good enough.”   That brought a chuckle out of Amber and she nodded in understanding.

 

∞∞∞

 

One day, Amber returned home with a friend. And it wasn’t just a mere friend. It was… a rather special friend. And I didn’t like the idea of it.   This brunette dude with a face that looked rather feminine, gorgeous green eyes, and thick English accent, like Yuri. In fact, he looked like Justin Bieber, minus the green eyes and the English accent. The way he eyed Amber was not a simple friendly look. The way Amber seemed to like his presence did not make me happy at all. She was being unfaithful.   Amber brought him home and they studied together in her room. IN HER ROOM. Paris was left with me in the dining room as she devoured French toast squares with scrambled eggs made by Amber—not the normal recipe, but Amber changed it and it turned out to be quite delicious.   I didn’t feel good about the whole idea of A MAN in Amber’s ROOM “studying”. Pretty sure L would have an outrage too if he was here. So, since he wasn’t, I might as well be the er around, then I’d boast to L; who knows he might even give me a reward.   I waited for Paris to finish eating as my brain rolled for an idea to get the little girl to disturb Amber and that Jack dude, regardless whether they were working on an assignment or not. But Paris seemed to take forever. She kept nibbling and gnawing on the pieces and it took her an hour to finish what I could easily demolish in less than one minute. I agree with Yuri, kids do test your patience to the limit.   “Alright, Paris, qu’est-ce que tu veux faire maintenant?1” I asked, grinning widely at the girl. I was hoping she would want to make a racket around the house to disturb Amber and Jack.   The girl made a thinking expression, then threw her arms up eagerly. “Dansons!2”   I smirked. “Dance to what?”   She extended her hand out and gasped dramatically, “Parla à ma main!3”   I threw my head back and let my laughter explode in the room as the eighteen-month-old toddler wiggled her hips and sang in gibberish to Fatal Bazooka’s Parle à ma main. She swapped hands, putting the other one on her hips, and she jiggled again as she sang the second verse. Although she had no idea whatsoever on what the song meant, she got the attitude the song portrays. It was amazing to watch her grow from that little tiny bundle every year; the way she babbled, the say she called Amber "Mumma" repeatedly to get her attention, the way she da