by Kate Hewitt
And yet…
“I don’t know,” I said at last. “I’m… honored, of course. Very.”
Nathan’s face was already falling, disappointment turning the corners of his mouth down, clouding his eyes and slumping his shoulders, like something vital had just drained out of him. “Of course, I understand.”
“I’m not saying no,” I added quickly. “You’ve just taken me by surprise. I need to think. It is a big decision.”
“Yes…”
“What would the duties be, exactly?”
Nathan raked a hand through his hair. “I don’t even know. Just… being there, I suppose. Taking the girls to school. Picking them up again. Doing… well, doing what Laura did.” He gave me a guilty look, as if he’d said something wrong.
“Yes, but the particulars? Meals? Housework? Laundry?” I supplied as gentle prompts. All of it?
“Yes, if you could. Would. Anything…” He shrugged, helpless, wanting me to take over. To step into his life and wave my magic wand. Me. It was so incredible, so outrageous, I wanted to laugh—or cry. How could I possibly fix anyone, especially this broken family, when I was nothing but a jumble of shattered pieces myself?
And yet…
Oh, and yet.
I was tempted. I was terrified.
I wanted, deeply and instinctively, to back away from all of this the way I would from a dangerous animal, a towering threat. If I came into their lives, if I let myself love those three sad-eyed girls… well, then none of this would be safe anymore. I’d kept myself apart for over twenty years. How could I contemplate now living my life differently, letting people in? I didn’t even know how. I’d do it wrong.
You’d just be the nanny.
It felt like a safeguard.
“Take some time,” Nathan urged. “Of course.”
“Not too much time,” I reminded him with a small, hesitant smile. “If you’re going back to work next week.”
He gave me a small smile back. “True.”
I shook my head again, taking a sip of coffee. My mind was still spinning.
“If you like,” Nathan said after a moment, “I could write up a list of duties. Make it… official. And, of course, I’d offer a proper salary, health insurance…”
I’d never had health insurance. I’d just avoided doctors, along with everyone else, but I was forty now and perhaps I’d need proper medical care.
“All right,” I said. “That is a good idea. And perhaps I can get back to you… tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow would be wonderful. I’ll send you the list by tonight. What’s your email address?”
I shook my head. “I don’t have email. I’m sorry.” I didn’t even own a computer, and there was nothing smart about my phone. There had never been any need for either.
“Oh. Right. Well, then, why don’t I run it by your apartment? In Queens?”
I resisted the thought of him seeing my shabby little apartment. “That’s too much trouble.”
“It isn’t…” But I knew he didn’t have a car, and it would take nearly an hour to get to my apartment from here on the subway and bus. “Do you have time now, then?” Nathan asked. “I could write something up right now, if you don’t mind waiting.”
I hesitated, sensing his desperation, feeling my own uncertainty. The shock remained. “All right.”
“Why don’t you come up to the apartment and we can talk through it there?”
I nodded, and we left the café, walking in silence around the corner to Nathan’s building, and then up in the elevator.
The apartment smelled familiar as I stepped into the darkened foyer—slightly stale, admittedly, but still a welcoming smell of people and life.
“How long are the girls with your in-laws?” I asked as I followed Nathan into the kitchen. I was starting to feel a little tense; I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been alone with a man, and I hugged my bag to my chest, half-wishing I hadn’t come up here. Already my heart rate was skittering, blood rushing in my ears. All around me, the apartment yawned, cavernous and dark and empty. No matter what he’d just asked me, Nathan was still little more than a stranger.
“A week. It’s so quiet without them.” He gave me a twisted, wry smile. “I thought I’d like the break, but I’m not sure I do.”
I nodded, unsure how to respond. My heart was racing now, my mouth dry, a buzzing sound in my ears. I took careful, slow breaths, trying not to let Nathan notice.
“I’ll make the list,” he said, brushing past me so I quickly stepped back, my back hitting the edge of the island. “Sorry.” Another quick smile. “My study is back here.” He gestured to a door that led off from the kitchen. “But, if you agree, I’ll turn it into a guest room, just in case.”
“Just in case?”
“If there were ever any late nights…” He looked uncertain. “You could sleep over, sometimes, save you going back to Queens. But of course you wouldn’t have to. It would just be a convenience…”
Sleep over? I pictured myself waking up to sunlight in the kitchen, a sleepy Ruby in her pyjamas. “That’s very kind.”
“I’ll just be a few minutes. Make yourself comfortable.”
As if I could. I decided I might as well tidy up while I was waiting, keep my hands busy.
As nervous as I was, already I knew in my heart, in my bones, that I would say yes. I couldn’t keep myself from it, from longing for it, even though it scared me. To care about people again… to give them that power over me… I wasn’t even sure I was capable of it, but for the first time in over twenty years, I wanted to try.
A plate slipped out of my hands and fell into the sink with a clatter, thankfully not breaking. I picked it up and rinsed it off and placed it in the dish drainer.
A few minutes later, I heard the buzz and whirr of a printer, and then Nathan came into the kitchen holding a piece of paper. “Oh, wow.” He looked around the clean kitchen with a beam of pleasure. “Maria, you didn’t even have to… but thank you.”
I nodded, waiting for him to give me the paper.
He gestured to it. “Do you want to look over it now? Ask any questions? Then you can have a think…”
“All right.” I felt nervous as I took the single sheet, Nathan’s earnest gaze heavy on me. Quickly I scanned the few lines.
Take girls to school every day at 7:45 a.m. Manage housework and laundry as needed. Pick up Ruby from preschool three days a week at 12 p.m.; care for her on other days. Pick older girls up at 3:15 p.m. Manage after-school activities as needed. Make dinner. Off duty from 6:30 p.m, onwards, and weekends unless needed; if so will pay extra.
The figure named at the bottom was a good deal more than I was making now.
“I know it isn’t much to go on,” Nathan said. “And we can discuss things in more detail as we go…”
“It’s fine.”
Of course, there was so much I didn’t know, but I didn’t think I could stand to nitpick through the details—would I be responsible for grocery shopping? Would I make breakfast? What did “manage after-school activities” actually mean? What I understood from this sheet was that, just as Nathan had said, I would be doing everything Laura did. I would be stepping into her empty shoes.
I raised the piece of paper in a gesture of thanks. “I will think about all this. And let you know tomorrow.”
“All right, that’s great. Thanks, Maria.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to say more. I stepped around him to get out of the kitchen, and he followed me into the foyer, opening the front door for me.
“I appreciate this so much. Just thinking about it, I mean. You don’t even know…”
But I did know. I knew how empty and aching his life was, because mine was too. And I knew how much he needed me, because I was realizing, to both my dismay and fear, that I needed him and his children.
I just nodded, and then I was outside the apartment, in the elevator, out on the street, breathing in lungfuls of cold, clean air as tears I did
n’t understand pricked my eyes. I didn’t know whether I was sad or happy or something in between. All I knew was I felt far too much, and I hadn’t even started yet.
* * *
That afternoon, I gave Neriha my notice. She stared at me in disbelief.
“You are going to work as a nanny? For that family?”
“It’s a good opportunity, with good benefits. Health insurance…”
“Maria, in all the time I’ve known you…” Neriha shook her head slowly. “You’ve never done something like this.”
“There was never the opportunity.”
“But do you even know these people? Do you even know how to take care of children?”
“I know them a bit,” I said defensively. “And I know enough about children. Besides, does any nanny know the family before she works with them?” I shrugged. “This is normal.” Even if it felt like jumping off a cliff, letting myself fall and fall.
“What about your friends? Your community? You’ve been in Astoria for almost twenty years…”
“I’ll still be in Astoria. I’m not moving, Neriha.” And surely she knew I had no real friends. No real community. Yes, there were people in my life, like her and Selma, a few others, but they remained forever on the fringes. Perhaps they all assumed there were other people closer in, when there never had been.
“Won’t you feel lonely?” Neriha pressed, and I almost laughed at the ludicrousness of such a question.
Lonely? I’d been lonely for twenty-six years. For the first time since the war, since everything, I had the chance not to be lonely. And, for the first time, I was willing to take it.
“I’ll manage, Neriha. But I’m sorry to be leaving here so soon. The Wests need me next week.”
Neriha shrugged, as if to say “it’s your life”. And finally it felt like it was. My life, rather than just drifting as a ghost.
That night, I texted Nathan, not brave enough to call and speak in person, telling him I would accept the position. He texted back immediately, saying I could start on Monday, the day after the girls got back. If I wanted, if it was okay, I could come over on Sunday afternoon to see them when they got back from Boston. I said I would.
I could hardly believe the steps I’d taken, the possibilities unfolding in front of me, and so fast. This was really happening. My new life was beginning. After all this time, I was finally coming alive, and it brought me both joy and terror.
Part Two
Fifteen
Nathan
“Welcome back, Nathan.”
A solid handshake, the pleasing thud of my bag hitting my desk. A smile as I rolled my shoulders, something in me that had been clenched hard for nearly two months finally, finally, starting to relax.
I was back at work, and it felt good. After weeks of uncertainty and worry, I felt like I knew what to do, what was needed. I wasn’t stumbling around forgetting things, feeling as if I were disappointing everyone. I gave Frank a firm smile as I willed him to forget my drunken evening of just a week ago. Life was different now; I was back in control. Maria had started officially yesterday, and so far things seemed to be going well, the girls adapting to her presence, and Maria proving herself to be quietly competent. Risky though it had seemed, I’d made a good choice. Now, for the next eight or nine hours, I could forget everything but this.
“Why don’t you update me on what’s been going on,” I told Frank.
Jenny came in with a coffee and I smiled my thanks. I’d needed this. I’d needed this so much. To have my own space, my own life, again. To escape, if just for eight hours.
It had been strange, having Maria in the apartment all day. I’d spent a frantic couple of days transforming my study with its dark walls and cheap office furniture into a decent bedroom, just in case she’d need it for the late nights I might be working—fresh paint, a new bed and bureau and a small chair upholstered in ivory linen that matched the new curtains framing the single sash window. I was pleased with the result; the room was small but it was comfortable. When I’d showed it to Maria, she’d seemed surprised but accepting; I’d told her it was just a precautionary measure, and I hoped she didn’t feel I was taking advantage of her generosity.
The night before Maria had started, I’d done a crash course online, trying to find out what a new nanny needed. I’d ended up on MetroBaby, a chat forum for well-heeled Manhattan moms. I’d had a jarring moment when I landed on the homepage and Laura’s login details came up automatically. She’d never mentioned this site to me, but why would she? We’d never talked about things like that.
Unable to keep myself from it, I clicked on her account and read through her profile—mother of three girls, Upper East Side, was all it said, and that felt like both a relief and disappointment. I wasn’t sure I wanted to nose around in Laura’s private stuff. I didn’t know what I’d find. Then I realized I could go through all the messages she’d posted. It hadn’t taken long, because there was only one.
Does anyone else feel like there has to be more to life than this? I’m not talking about the drudgery of taking care of kids—housework, laundry, cooking, wiping dirty butts and noses. I get that, and it’s okay. It’s good. I just mean all this striving… the nice apartment, the premium parking space, the private schools, the five-star vacations… what’s the point? I feel like there needs to be more, and I want to know what it is.
I read through the message three times, growing colder and colder as the words emblazoned themselves on my brain. This was what Maria had hinted at, and yet it was much worse, more real, seeing it there on the screen, knowing Laura had typed it. Felt it.
Had she really thought our life together was pointless? And when she mentioned striving, I knew who she was really talking about me. Me.
Curious now in a kind of horrified, rubbernecking sort of way, I’d scrolled through the responses, both infuriated and strangely satisfied by their general tone:
Are you seriously complaining about all those things? How about you count your blessings, bitch?
Nice life if you can have it.
Try yoga. Or just grow up.
I’d closed my laptop and sat back, dazed and reeling. It had never occurred to me before now that Laura might have been actually, actively unhappy. All right, yes, I understood now that I’d worked too hard. So did every business person in Manhattan.
And fine, I might have neglected our family a bit. A bit. I was trying to be better now. But this? This emptiness Laura had been feeling, the way she’d seemed to have been questioning everything we’d built our life on, how she’d been looking for something else? And she’d found it at Global Rescue.
Of course, I told myself, it was just one message. Maybe she’d been having an off day; maybe she’d been having PMS. It didn’t have to mean anything.
I’d lurched up from the desk and started wandering around the apartment, pulling out drawers and riffling through their messy contents as if I were looking for something in particular. Some clue that just had to be there, because Laura needed to give me more than this; I needed to be able to make sense of it all, somehow. Somehow.
I yanked open medicine cupboards and bedside table drawers, plunging my hand into the mess of Laura’s things in a way I hadn’t been able to make myself do before. Then I riffled through the stack of paperbacks by her bed, and dug through the clutter of lip balms and old receipts in her bedside table drawer. Nothing called out to me. Nothing said, This is who I am. This is what I was keeping from you. This is why.
Eventually, the house even messier than before, I’d stopped, knowing it was all pointless. Senseless, just like her death. Why did I keep trying to discover a reason, find meaning in the way things had happened? There wasn’t any. There couldn’t be.
Feeling leaden, I went back to the desk and opened the laptop. I found the post about what to provide a new nanny, and I read through it doggedly.
Make a detailed list of all duties, children’s scheduled activities, house rules, screen time guidelines,
etc. Explain how all the appliances in your home operate. Provide a copy of your signed contract. Provide her with her own phone, if she doesn’t have one, and credit card, MetroCard, etc, as needed.
Clearly I had my work cut out for me. I had no idea of the timings and locations of the girls’ activities. I wasn’t even sure what all the little icons on the washing machine meant.
By the time Maria arrived on Sunday to meet the girls, I’d managed to tick off most of that list. I’d bought her a smartphone and a MetroCard and opened a bank account for household expenses in her name. I’d even managed to find out when and where the girls’ activities were, written on the calendar in the kitchen. I’d traced Laura’s handwriting with my fingers, a loopy scribble. I’d come up with a daily schedule, and even a few house rules, although I felt as if I were cheating, pretending we had this normal, orderly life that no longer existed. Maria, I suspected, would see through my little charade instantly.
“The girls will be back in half an hour or so,” I’d said a bit awkwardly. Now that she was here, in my home, it all felt a bit bizarre. What were Paul and Elaine going to think, that I’d hired a woman I barely knew to take care of my children? And yet I trusted her.
“Is there something I can do while I wait?” Maria asked. “Tidy up?”
“Oh, no, that’s okay…” I’d blitzed the whole apartment that morning.
“Or perhaps you could take me through things?” Maria suggested. There was the barest hint of a smile in her voice. “The activities and schedule…?”
“Oh, yes. Right. Of course.”
And so I did, outlining where the girls’ schools and activities were, what food they liked for dinner, where the washing machine was. Maria listened silently, her expression composed and alert, yet also calm. She calmed me, somehow, and it was a huge relief to think she would be doing all these things now, not me, a thought which also brought the familiar accompanying dose of acid-like guilt.