I Don't Know About This

SheaTech was one of the leading technology companies in the country and its headquarters was in a high rise downtown. It had been founded in the 1980s by their grandfather and remained in the family to this day. When he died, Julian took over because he was smartest of his generation and it was what the shareholders wanted.

Sneaking in there would not be easy. It was one of the busiest buildings in town…but Nora might be able to work that to her advantage if everyone was too distracted to pay attention to a little girl less than three and a half feet tall.

"I don't know about this, Ed," Rosalind said as she bit her lip. "Do you really think Nora can pull this off?"

He nodded seriously. "Yes because she's going to have to. You're usually busy with homework but I've played spies with her several times because she wants me to show her how to fight bad guys after watching that show. She's actually pretty good at sneaking. She snitches food she isn't supposed to have from behind Maureen's back all the time."

Maureen was one of her nannies. She had several so round-the-clock supervision was available. Julian might be an absentee father but at least he wasn't involved in child endangerment, time machine incident aside.

Rosalind sighed. There was no point worrying about it now. All they could do was hope that Nora got the job done.

===

Nora was a spy. The best spy in the whole world who was only given the most important missions. Director Ed put his trust in her to pull off this Very Important Mission and she wasn't about to let him down.

She knew her brother wasn't really the director of a spy organization but it was more fun to play pretend that way. She had heard them talking earlier and knew this had something to do with saving Mommy so she had to do it right. Pretending helped her feel less scared about messing up.

Her nannies were nice and liked to play with her most of the time but it wasn't the same. Playing with Mommy was special. She used to call Nora her little helper when she was trying out new recipes for her store's café and that made her happy.

Mommy sang the best lullabies too. And gave the best hugs. If playing spies would bring her back, that was what Nora was going to do!

When she made it into the building, the first thing she had to do was get to the stairs. People liked taking elevators because they were lazy—that was what her nanny Jessica said when the elevator in her apartment building wasn't working—so it would be better not to do that.

She saw a sign for the stairs and had to sneak around a whole bunch of people talking to each other or looking at their phones to get to them. After about ten floors, she got tired and realized this wasn't going to work because Daddy's office was much higher than this. She needed another plan.

Nora found her chance after a few minutes of peeking through the door to the stairwell. Someone was pushing a janitor's cart! She had seen an episode of her spy show where someone hid in that to get where they needed to go.

She snuck into it and, luckily, it was going up. The problem was that it went too far up. She had to get out without being noticed by the janitor and go down twelve floors. At least going down the stairs was easier than going up them.

She could read a little and recognized the word "Shea" but the problem was that there was more than one nameplate with that on it. She knew Daddy's name was Julian but didn't know how to spell it. At least it started with a J…she should be able to find that.

After a bit of searching, Nora located the right office. She was too short to peek in the window so she had to risk opening the door if he was in there.

She had been to the office before and knew he had a big desk. If she stuck close to the ground, he shouldn't be able to see her. She opened the door then crouched down to crawl inside.

Daddy looked up in confusion. "Hello? Who's there? Is someone looking for me?"

He didn't get an answer so he got up and Nora quickly crawled around the other side of the desk and under it while he headed to the door to see who might be outside. In the process, she noticed that his phone was on his desk ripe for the taking!

She popped up to snatch it and realized what she was wearing didn't have pockets. She tucked her shirt into her pants and put the phone down the front so it wouldn't fall out.

She had the phone! The problem was that she was now stuck here because Daddy gave up his search and sat back down. How was she supposed to leave without being seen? The most important part of her mission was not being seen!

It would be nice if she had an invisibility shield like on the show. Then she wouldn't have had to take all of those stairs and could get out of here and back to her siblings. They were probably worried.

"Where did my stupid phone get to this time?" Daddy grumbled.

He began rifling through drawers and the jacket hanging on the back of his chair and Nora held her breath. If he looked under the desk, she was toast!

A voice suddenly came out of the intercom, making her jump slightly. "Mr. Shea, the head of product testing is looking for you. Can you head down there right away? It sounded urgent."

Daddy sighed. "I'll be right there. Thanks, Christine."

"You're welcome, sir."

He got up and left the office, still mumbling about where his phone could be, and Nora heaved a sigh of relief. She did it! Now all she had to do was get back to Roz and Ed.

"Sorry, Daddy," she whispered as she watched him walk down the other side of the hallway. "I'll bring it back later."

It took a while to find another cart going back down the elevator but she managed eventually and headed back to her siblings, who were both waiting anxiously. Ed hugged her tightly.

"You're amazing, Nora! Did anyone see you?"

Nora shook her head. "No. Here's Daddy's phone. What do we need to do now?"

"Now we need to go to the store across the street from the Book Nook," Roz said seriously. "I'll get you a candy once we're there for doing such a good job, okay?"

She clapped her hands together excitedly. "Yay! I want gummy worms. The red and blue kind. Those are the best ones."

"You got it. Ugh…we don't have enough time to walk or take the bus. We're going to have to take a taxi. I have some cash on me but don't know if it's enough…Fingers crossed, you guys."

Roz flagged down a taxi quickly and Nora was too happy about accomplishing her mission and getting gummy worms to focus on what her siblings were saying on the ride there. She did her job and now Mommy was going to be saved and everything would be okay!

If they got Mommy back, Daddy would be happy and play with them again. She was sure of it.

Once they got to the convenience store, Nora picked out the gummy worms she wanted and got her sister to pay for them before eagerly ripping the package open and munching on a red and blue one. Delicious!

"Want a green and orange one?" she offered to her brother.

Ed smiled at her and accepted it. "Thanks, Nora. Could I have a red and yellow one too?"

"Yeah. I only like the red half from those ones so you can have it. Roz, you want any? I can share with you too."

"In a minute," Roz said impatiently. "I'm calling Mom's store."

"Okay!"

Nora could wait. She was very good at waiting; her nannies said so. She liked being told she was good at things. Mommy used to do that all the time but now only her nannies, Roz, and Ed did. Daddy was too busy.

He wouldn't be busy anymore after this! She needed to think of a something fun for them to play when Roz and Ed were done with their part of the mission to save Mommy.