You know how in colour pencil commercials, the kid and the mom will colour together and smile and later they will drink milk together?

They lied.

My sister wanted to shower so she asked me to help Little Nephew with his homework. Colour an eagle? Easy!!

So I coloured with Little Nephew.

My goddddd….one eagle took up half hour to colour!!!

“Maksu, I want to watch TV.”

“No, you have to finish colouring. Then you can watch TV or play.”

Grumbles. “Will Mommy scold me if I don’t finish colouring?”

“Yes.”

“Then should I scold my teacher for this?”

“No. Come on, let’s colour.”

I carried on colouring the eagle’s eyes while he took the feathers.

“Maksu…” flips pages from before to the letter “C”. “Look, is this nice?”

Shows me a horrribbllleeee picture of a purple car that he coloured.

How do people lie to little kids?!!!!

“Well….yeah, nice…” Sorry, God. “But Maksu thinks the eagle is nicer. Come, let’s finish it!”

Flips back page to the “E” section.

“Maksu, if I colour this very nicely, will my teacher let me colour some more?”

“Yes!! You’ll be the star in class!! Come, let’s colour.”

“But I don’t want to be a star. I want to be a lion.”

“Well, Maksu wants to be a mermaid. But life doesn’t work like that.”

Stares blank at me.

“Umm….Maksu, if lion eat meat, and we eat meat, can we have dinner with the lion?”

At this point, he already dropped his colour pencils and is giving up on his homework.

“Well…umm, maybe… But you probably shouldn’t. You know what you should do? You should colour!!”

Fools around with the colour pencil and laughs at how funny colour pencils are.

I raised my voice. “Colour!! Finish the eagle now!!”

Stunned eyes.

“You have to finish your homework!!”

Quiet. Lips quivering.

Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Think Luna colour pencils. Think commercial. Think milk!!

“Uhh…darling, I meant… colouring is fun! Look, look, Maksu colour the eagle…” frantically colouring the legs purple because that was the nearest colour pencil. “Look, look…”

A few seconds later, I finished colouring the eagle.

Nephew looks down. And looks back at me.

“Very nice, Maksu. Let’s play now.”

Never ever underestimate a 4-year old.