As much as Bob was proud of his lively and precocious son, it sometimes felt as though little Gino had the devil in him. Almost as soon as Gino gained confidence in walking on his own, he ran wherever his little legs could take him, and he caused all sorts of trouble. He went from a vocal and somewhat colicky infant to a hyper, temperamental and enthusiastically noisy toddler.
Once upon a time, Bob had self-righteously thought that Bart Simpson became such a brat because Homer and Marge were oafish and meek, respectively, and could not adequately discipline the boy. But now, Bob realized that some children were indeed born with an irrepressible spark of mischief, or perhaps an inferno of mischief.
One afternoon, Francesca came home from shopping with a screeching, bouncing Gino. It would have been an understatement to say that Francesca looked more than a little frazzled.
"Your son got out of his stroller and nearly ran into the street. I keep telling him not to do that, but...ugh."
Francesca placed Gino next to Bob and trudged off to the bedroom. Bob sighed as Gino ran around in circles, still shouting.
"Alright, young man, it appears that someone needs a nap, and I'm not just referring to you."
Gino hated naps, and he whined and screamed all the way to his room, but at least he didn't punch and kick this time. Bob set Gino into his crib and went to join Francesca for their afternoon nap.
Bob and Francesca didn't get to relax for long. Only five minutes later, they heard a loud smacking noise from Gino's room.
Francesca sat up and groaned.
"Oh, what has that boy done now?"
"I'll take care of it," Bob said.
"Grazie," Francesca murmured, falling back to sleep.
Bob strode to Gino's room and found his son standing up in his crib, smirking. With a growing dread, Bob looked around the room and saw one of Gino's picture books lying by a squashed cricket.
"Gino, what have you done?!"
Gino looked quite pleased with himself.
"Papa! I squish!"
Bob should have known better than to read the original Pinocchio to Gino. He had almost forgotten how impressionable children could be.
Bob turned his head, and he saw that Gino had managed to escape from the crib without being noticed.
"Gino, where are you?"
Loud, almost maniacal little laughter came from Bob's office, and he ran in the direction of the sound, nearly stumbling on his own huge feet.
Bob burst into his office and found his son sitting on the desk, knocking off everything on it.
Already irritable from his interrupted nap, Bob lost his temper.
"Gino, STOP THAT! Look at this mess!"
Gino finally stopped and became quiet, though it led to an awful, tense silence. The little boy's lip wobbled, and Bob really didn't want him to start crying. He quickly picked up Gino.
"I'm sorry, Gino, Papa's sorry."
He would need to find Gino some sort of constructive hobby.