Author's note: Thank so much to Larkafree2, Maknatuna, Maddy Love Castiel, Nicolene B, QuietCrash, LeeMarieJack, funkypanda, random yet lovable and keacdragon for last chapter's reviews!
Special thanks to Treeni for beta-reading!
[Takes place after the end of 46 Problems (but before the epilogue of that story)]
"Why are we here again?" Lucifer groaned as he poked the plastic skeleton standing oddly enough in the corner of the classroom. The novelty of seeing the place Grace spent most of her days up close had worn off very quickly and Lucifer was only left with annoyance over the fact that he had to leave his little abomination in the care of her grandmother of all people. For some reason Nadine wanted Samandriel to accompany them as well, so not even the trusted baby angel had been available for babysitting.
"Because I just had to choose a good school for my daughter, you know, one where the teachers actually give a damn about their students' lives," Nadine retorted just as snippily as Lucifer had asked his question. Nadine found that sort of mirroring Lucifer's behavior worked pretty well. It seemed to be a language the former devil understood. She also learned that most of the time Lucifer didn't even intend to be quite as rude as he came across, at least when it came to talking to her.
"That was a spectacularly stupid idea," Lucifer agreed with a light smirk. He knew full well that Nadine had been sarcastic, but the woman's snarky side was something he could appreciate about her. Besides, in theory finding a school for Grace where people would care about her and her wellbeing was a good idea. However, being summoned by some teacher who thought that Grace was too old to play with imaginary friends was only annoying.
A fitting reply was on the tip of Nadine's tongue, but before she could voice her thoughts Gracie's teacher entered the room.
"Miss Turner, I thought I should introduce you to Luke and Samandriel, or Lucy and Mandy," Nadine greeted the teacher with a nice smile, "As you can see, they're not imaginary."
In a way, Nadine understood how her daughter's teacher came to the conclusion that Lucy and Mandy had to be Gracie's imaginary friends. From what Nadine heard, Gracie liked to tell stories about the awesome things she got up to with her two friends. It probably didn't help their cause that Gracie used male pronouns for friends with traditionally female names. All in all, it was not exactly Miss Turner's fault that she came to the conclusion a talk was needed.
"They recently rented a part of the house and babysit for Gracie when I'm not at home," Nadine added after a moment of consideration. Not that it was anyone's business who exactly Lucifer and Samandriel were, but why risk starting a rumor?
"So, that's it then?" Lucifer suddenly asked, his face lighting up a little with gratifying surprise, "That was surprisingly just a little unpleasant."
After all, the misconception had been cleared up, so there was no reason for them to stay any longer. Meeting the teacher in person was somewhat useless from Lucifer's point of view, but it wasn't too much of a bother. At least, he now had a picture to the name for the next time Grace talked about her teacher.
"In fact, that was only one of the things I wanted to talk about," Miss Turner replied with a frown as Lucifer had just gotten ready to leave the room again.
"And she had to ruin it," Lucifer groaned exasperatedly. Things could only go downhill from here and the teacher had nobody to blame other than herself! Lucifer decided to ignore Nadine's warning glance. Grace's mother knew exactly what she had done when she asked Lucifer to come to school with her, so Nadine was another woman who only had herself to blame.
"I must apologize for my brother," Samandriel stated in a diplomatic tone. The teacher's bewildered look was a good clue for the angel to know Lucifer had just offended the woman and Nadine's reaction gave away that she was not pleased. Damage control was one skill Samandriel had managed to improve dramatically ever since he started guarding Lucifer.
"Hold on... Samandriel, did you just apologize for me? You never apologize for me! I will apologize myself, if I see the need to do so!" Lucifer narrowed his eyes at his brother for a moment, before he shrugged and added, "Which I don't in this case."
"I apologize, brother," Samandriel replied sincerely. Lucifer was right in this case. The former archangel was willing to admit his wrongdoings these days, Samandriel had seen Lucifer face the consequences of his actions and apologize for them if he thought it was necessary. It was truly remarkable and there was no need to play down Lucifer's development.
"Gracie's enthusiasm for school work has suffered lately. I understand that the whole situation is... difficult, but I can't tolerate her not doing her homework," Miss Turner told Nadine, to bring the discussion back to the topic they should be talking about.
Nadine was pretty sure she would give an impersonation of a fish on dry land if she tried to open her mouth to those -spoken and unspoken- accusations. Before Nadine could find the right thing to say, Lucifer spoke up.
"Grace missed homework exactly three times in the past months," Lucifer stated with conviction, "Once when I moved in, because she was distracted. Once when I was in hospital and once because after working on it for two hours we decided the workload was ridiculous and she should not have to do the rest."
Lucifer should know, he was the one who was always around when Grace did her homework after all. The first time he had not known of the need to do homework, the second time he frankly been too close to dying to think about Grace's homework and the third time was really the teacher's fault. Homework was meant to supplement learning, not substitute it.
"Gracie is also not socializing like she used to," Miss Turner added firmly, "She also hasn't made any effort to make up with Sarah and Dana after the unfortunate incidence. They haven't talked or played together even once."
Miss Turner didn't want to make too much of an issue out of Gracie pulling Sarah's hair over a petty argument, but the way she was -or rather wasn't- dealing with the aftermath was worrying.
"What's the problem with Grace not playing with Sarah and Dana? They're not playing with her either. I don't see you talking to the parents of those little bitches," Lucifer exclaimed before Nadine could say anything. Granted, the teacher might have had, or even might still have a talk with the girls' parents, but since those two were clearly in the wrong there was absolutely no need to have this discussion in a way that suggested Grace had done something wrong.
"I don't think that's an appropriate term to use for young girls," Samandriel stated with a deep frown.
"I said 'little'," Lucifer retorted. Everyone present was old enough for a couple of curse words. Lucifer understood the need to control his language around children to some extent. There was a chance that Grace did not know any swearword Lucifer would use and there was no need to teach them to her. However, with adults it was pretty much a given that they already knew those words anyway. Thinking about it, they had to learn them at some point as well, so it was an accepted part of growing up to adapt a more colorful vocabulary. Still, Lucifer didn't want to argue the issue with Nadine, if he could just as easily watch his language a little. However, if Nadine ever started an argument about the topic, Lucifer knew exactly what he would tell her.
"However, as I understand it Dana insinuated that Gracie's father might not have died had he been a better person," Samandriel added, ignoring his brother's interjection, "I think it's quite understandable given the circumstances that Gracie doesn't wish to play with her anymore."
As Samandriel understood it children often had a very simplistic view on a lot of things. From the movies and TV shows Gracie had shown him, Samandriel thought he could also understand where the idea that only bad people died came from. Still, Dana had been far out of line when she made her assumption. If Gracie, who was the same age group, could understand that good and bad was much more a matter of grayscales than of black and white, the same could be expected of Dana.
"That's the first I've heard of that," Miss Turner admitted, clearly taken aback.
"Maybe you should've just asked Grace then, Samandriel did and she readily told him," Lucifer pointed out smugly. Clearly, Grace would have told Lucifer as well, if he had thought to ask her about her reasons for disliking the girl. All Lucifer had known was that Grace never liked Dana and when Sarah made friends with her Grace also stopped being friends with Sarah. To Lucifer simply disliking someone for the sake of it was comprehensible, but he had to admit he felt a little stupid when Samandriel questioned Grace's dislike of the girls further and they learned the full story. Lucifer felt like he should have known that his little abomination would not dislike anyone without reason.
"Look, Gracie will not miss her homework again, I'll make sure of that," Nadine stated as soon as she got the chance to talk. Somehow Lucifer and -to a lesser extent- Samandriel had taken over, but they clearly didn't know how to end a parent-teacher talk. Nadine gave Lucifer a pointed look for good measure as well. Even if she agreed that giving children too much homework was not good, that was a topic for the next school conference and not something that could be solved by simply not doing the appointed work.
"Fine," Lucifer agreed, rolling his eyes. The next time an unreasonable workload was placed on Grace's shoulders, Lucifer would simply give her the answers and speed up the process like that, if it could spare them from having more of these talks.
"But beyond that, what Gracie does in her spare time is none of your business and I will absolutely not force her to socialize with people she doesn't like," Nadine told the teacher in a no-nonsense tone that made clear the issue was not up for discussion.
"Well said," Lucifer praised Nadine, patting her shoulder for good measure before he nodded toward the door, "I assume we can leave now."
It was not too late to pick up Grace from her grandparents' place and go buy some ice cream. Clearly the little abomination had done nothing wrong and she just as clearly deserved a treat for putting up with her teacher five days a week.