Chris Evans Imagines

#80. Runs In The Family » Frank

After the ordeal that Frank had gone through with his niece, Mary, and his mother, and Mary's gift for math, his daughter, Abby, decided to keep her gifts a secret from her father in fears that she may be part of a custody battle next.

Abby was 3 years older than Mary, and figured out around the same time as Mary that she was gifted, but not in math. Abby's gift was in English, history, and architecture.

She tried to hide it the best she could. She'd pretend to struggle with her English homework and ask Frank for help, even when the help he gave her was wrong. She'd botch her English tests and purposely get lower marks. She hid all her classic novels that were years beyond what her reading level should've been, her history books, and the one architecture book she had picked up from the local bookstore without Frank knowing.

But in the end, her attempts to cover her gifts were futile, as the night of parent-teacher interviews at school, her teacher, Mrs. Mayer, placed a 300 page history book in front of Frank.

"What's this?" he asked.

"Abby left it in my classroom a week ago," Mrs. Mayer explained. "She hasn't been looking for it, so I left it for tonight. I've noticed the past few weeks that she's been sneaking classic novels and history books into class and reading them when she thinks no one is paying attention. As for her English tests - " Mrs. Mayer reached into a drawer in her desk and pulled out an English test " - I gave her this as a study guide after her last English test. I found it on her desk one day during lunch and took it. It confirmed my suspicions."

Frank took the practice test and looked over it. The questions were far beyond grade 5 levels, and Abby had answered every one of them correctly. Mrs. Mayer had the test corrected, and wrote a big "A+" in the top corner. He picked up the big history book in his other hand and flipped through the pages. The print was so small he could barely read it, leaving him surprised that Abby could.

"What does this mean?" he asked. "She's been failing English on purpose?"

"That's what I think," Mrs. Mayer said. "I think Abby may have some gifts of her own, she just hasn't wanted to share them."

Frank kept thinking the conversation over in his head as he drove home. He couldn't understand why Abby would keep such a big secret from him. He didn't understand how he hadn't noticed sooner. He felt like an awful father. Maybe his mother was right, maybe he shouldn't have had either of the girls.

No, Frank couldn't think like that. He was a great father to Abby, and was doing great at raising Mary. Just because he didn't know this one thing that Abby obviously didn't want him to know did not mean he was a bad guardian.

When he entered the house, both girls were up watching a movie on TV with Roberta. Abby turned first and smiled at her father.

"Dad!"

She jumped from the couch and hugged her father, Mary following close behind her.

"Hey girls," Frank said.

"How was the parent-teacher?" Roberta asked.

"Whatever Mrs. Mayer said is a lie," Abby insisted, causing Roberta to chuckle.

Frank faked a smile and told the two girls to go get ready for bed. As they ran off, Roberta turned off the TV and stood to speak to the man.