Saving For Parole, Part II

My nine-year old has always been an onion. There are layers to this girl that I will probably never uncover, or at least not until The Smoking Gun gets them, because she'll either be winning an Oscar someday, running a company, or appealing her federal prison sentence.

Like the time when she so painstakingly forged a note to make it look like her sister had written it.
Dear Chloe: It said. You are stinky like a garbage can. And poop. Your sister, Maddie.

Then she planted said note on her vanity table where I was sure to see it. She watched, later that day, as I grounded Maddie and sent her to a time-out to "think about how much your sister means to you and what a note like that says about your character." She played in her room as Maddie languished in her time-out. Finally, Maddie figured out that she hadn't written a note of that nature for some time (it had been an ongoing issue and she was getting tired of time-outs) and asked to see the note. Because maybe it was an old one and what a delicious turn of events that would be.

But it was even tastier than that."Mom. This isn't my handwriting. Look."Well, duh. The signature wasn't even close. I took the evidence to Chloe's room and held it in my hand where she couldn't see it. Even upon interrogation, the girl was cool as a cucumber. She didn't concede that she had lost until I produced the physical evidence, and even then she was hardly flustered. More like disappointed that she hadn't anticipated the handwriting loophole.

So when my friend, Pam, told me the other day that Chloe had been calling in to morning radio trivia shows, it was less than stunning. Pam drives the girls in to school each day, and she had the radio on to her usual station when she heard the D.J. say, "You know you're on live radio? What's your name?"

"Chloe."

"And can you answer today's useless trivia for us Chloe, and win lunch for two at La Fonda's?"

"Yes." Pam looked in her rear view mirror and saw Chloe in the backseat with Pam's cell phone to her ear, and thinking back, remembered that a "Chloe" had called in a couple of times earlier that week, too.

"What's the number one thing American families fight over after dinner?"

"Which board game to play."

"No, sorry, it's the computer."

"Well not at my house." Click.

An onion.