The Summer Nanny

by Holly Chamberlin

  After, she had enjoyed a quiet dinner with her mother, Harry and Winston hovering in case random bits of food fell from the table. Now she was alone in her room, and though she was very tired she wanted to think about how to tie up a few loose ends before she left this crazy phase of her life behind. One of those loose ends was how to dispose of the “gifts” Cressida had given her this summer. Amy was glad she had returned the vintage compact. She had no idea what Will would do with it, but that was not her concern.

  Amy had already decided not to consign any of the items Cressida had given her; she didn’t want to profit by them. As for the bag with a torn lining, well, she would never donate that to a thrift store without first having the lining repaired, and while her mother could easily handle that task, Amy didn’t want to burden her with something so unimportant. The bag would go into the garbage.

  The stained Coach scarf. . . . Amy frowned. She did really like the colors, but the scarf was tainted for her now, and the taint had nothing to do with the permanent stain. The scarf, too, would go into the trash. The silk blouse that was too small she would give to a thrift shop.

  But there was one more item to consider. Amy reached into the open drawer of her bedside table and removed a small, blue velvet box. Carefully, she opened it and looked at the sterling silver and cubic zirconia ring tucked inside. Why didn’t this ring feel tainted like the bag and the scarf Cressida had given her? Would keeping it and wearing it prove there was something shallow in her nature that could never be avoided? Amy just didn’t know the answers to those questions. She closed the box and put it back in the drawer. She would hold on to the ring for a while. It really was awfully pretty.

  Suddenly a huge yawn escaped Amy. She scooted down in the bed, turned off the bedside lamp, and within minutes she was asleep, another landmark day behind her.

  Chapter 135

  “When’s the bus due?” Amy asked.

  Leda checked her phone. “It’s scheduled to depart at eleven, so it should be here pretty soon.”

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s a few minutes late,” Vera pointed out. “Hayley doesn’t have to make a connection after all. And it’s too bad Phil came down with that nasty cold. I know he really wants to be here.”

  “Did you know Phil gave Hayley a check as a going-away gift?” Leda asked. “He wasn’t sure it was the right thing to do, but I persuaded him that Hayley wasn’t stupidly proud.”

  Vera sighed. “What a sweetheart he is.”

  Amy linked arms with her mother and Vera. “This is so exciting. I can hardly believe that Hayley’s leaving Yorktide. I’ll miss her, but I’m so happy for her.”

  “Any regrets that you’re not the one getting on the bus?” Leda asked her daughter.

  “Not one,” Amy said promptly. “This is where I belong.”

  Vera smiled. “Good, because I’m relying on you to show up for work once construction is completed. Maybe one day you’ll be my right-hand woman.”

  “Ugh, don’t use that term!” Amy cried. “It’s something She Who Must Not Be Named used to say.”

  Leda was glad that already Amy seemed to be able to speak lightly of the woman who had manipulated her so thoroughly this summer. As Amy and Vera got into a discussion about plans for the opening of the new restaurant, Leda looked to where Hayley was standing with her mother. She recalled how early in the summer she had fantasized about a miracle happening for Hayley, if not a knight in shining armor then the appearance of someone who would believe enough in Hayley to go to some lengths to help her move onward and upward. She felt grateful to Marisa Whitby for having the kindness and the wisdom to act on Hayley’s behalf.

  Hayley left her mother to speak with Amy, and Leda thought it the perfect moment to approach Nora with a gesture of renewed friendship. There was something different about Nora Franklin this morning, something lighter and less burdened. Leda didn’t think she was imagining the change.

  “Hayley has a perfect day for traveling,” Leda said when she had joined Nora. “Not a cloud in the sky. I think it’s a good omen.”

  Nora smiled. “Thank you for being a friend to my daughter.”

  “It’s always been my pleasure,” Leda said sincerely. “She’s a remarkable person.”

  Nora shook her head. “I don’t know where she comes from, I really don’t.”

  Leda ventured to put her hand lightly on Nora’s arm. Nora did not pull away. “Come to my house for coffee this week. Say, Thursday afternoon around three if that doesn’t interfere with work?”

  “I will,” Nora said. “Thank you. And . . . and why don’t I bake something for us?”

  Leda smiled. “That would be wonderful,” she said earnestly. “A lot of people in Yorktide miss your baking. I especially miss your famous raisin scones.”

  “I’ll have to dig out my old recipes. I remember one for cherry strudel that was always a favorite with Father Mark.” Nora smiled. “In fact, I think I’ll pop into the rectory after work later today and say hello. It’s been a while.”

  A peal of laughter caused Leda to turn. Amy and Hayley had their arms around each other’s shoulders. Leda glanced at Vera, who was smiling fondly at the girls, and then back to Nora Franklin, still standing by Leda’s side. These people were her family. This was her community. What an amazing summer it had been for them all.

  Chapter 136

  It was an auspicious day to begin a journey; there wasn’t a cloud in the very clear blue sky. And, Hayley thought, this was only the first step of her journey. Who knew where it would eventually take her?

  Volume 1 of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was tucked safely in her roomy travel bag, a bag borrowed from Vera. Mrs. Latimer had made Hayley a totally gorgeous bracelet with lapis beads. From it hung a genuine sterling silver charm on which were engraved the words CARPE DIEM. Amy had given her a little shopping bag of special soaps, lotions, and hair products. Nora Franklin had prepared a hearty lunch for her daughter. And Phil Morse had given her an astonishingly large check to help cover her initial expenses in Boston. Hayley had never felt so loved and appreciated. She knew that she would never forget this moment, the feelings of anxiety and sadness mingling with feelings of anticipation and gratefulness.

  Her mother returned from a conversation with Mrs. Latimer. “Take good care of yourself, Hayley,” she said.

  “I intend to,” Hayley promised her. “You’ll call me if Dad gets out of hand again, won’t you?”

  “Don’t worry about me,” her mother said firmly. “You just work hard and learn new things. Promise me.”

  “I promise,” Hayley said.

  “Here. I have something for you.” Her mother reached into her old leather bag and withdrew a small, round medal on a chain. “It’s Saint Michael the Archangel,” she said. “My grandmother gave it to me when I was a girl. You know I haven’t been to church in years, but I still believe in God and I believe this will help keep you safe.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” Hayley said. She took the medal and secured it around her neck. Maybe her mother’s belief would be strength enough for the both of them. She glanced at her watch. The bus would be here at any moment now. If she had any thoughts of turning back from the path she had chosen, now was the time to do it. But she had no such thoughts. Her only regret, and it was one she felt keenly, was that she had hurt Ethan Whitby in the way that she had.

  It was at that moment Hayley’s attention was caught by a gray BMW turning smoothly into the station lot. It was another moment before Hayley recognized the car.

  The driver’s door opened and Ethan stepped out. Hayley felt her heart begin to thump painfully. As Ethan strode toward her, Hayley could see that his expression was one of purpose, though his blue eyes looked pained. Hayley was vaguely aware that her mother was no longer at her side. She found herself stepping forward to meet Ethan.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked when they stood mere inches apart. Her voice was trembling.

  Ethan looked d
irectly into her eyes. “Marisa called to tell me that you were leaving for Boston this morning,” he said quietly but urgently. “Don’t be mad at her. I just couldn’t let you go without one last attempt at convincing you to give our relationship a try. Please, Hayley. I know I promised I’d keep away but . . . I’m sorry. I just couldn’t. I just can’t.”

  Hayley felt something blossom in her heart. What had her mother said? Love could bridge even great distances. “It’s all right,” she said with a sigh of relief. “Don’t apologize. Please don’t ever apologize.”

  Ethan moved a little closer. “I fell in love with the person you were this summer, Hayley. And now I want the chance to fall in love with the real, unaltered Hayley. No lies. No half truths. And I promise the same.”

  “You lied to me?” Hayley asked, smiling through the tears that had begun to leak down her cheeks.

  Ethan grinned. “I might have exaggerated my knowledge about the Red Sox. But that’s what guys do around a pretty girl. They brag. Wait. I lied again.” Ethan took her hands in his. “You’re beautiful, Hayley. I want you to know I’ve thought a lot about what you told me, and I respect your concerns that because we’ve come from such different backgrounds it might be difficult to make a future together. I really do. And you’re right. I’ll probably never know what it’s like to wonder where the next meal is coming from. But that doesn’t change the way I feel about you and our chances for a life together. It just doesn’t.”

  “I don’t want to feel beholden to you,” Hayley said urgently. “I want us to be equals in whatever is to come.”

  “I wouldn’t want it any other way,” Ethan assured her.

  “Maybe one day we could go to the Folger Library?” she said.

  “And Stratford-upon-Avon. And the Tower of London. And Versailles.”

  Hayley laughed. “Just two history nerds bumming our way around Europe?”

  “Maybe not bumming exactly. I can’t put up a tent for my life. But no stuffy hotels. Just charming B and Bs. Maybe we’ll rent bikes!”

  “And this time I’ll be the one to save you from the path of a speeding car. Not that I want any speeding cars in our future,” Hayley added quickly.

  “Our future,” Ethan breathed.

  Hayley smiled. “Yes. Let’s believe in a future. But Ethan? I need to go to Boston and be on my own for a while. I need to prove a few things to myself. I have to finally embrace the fact that I’m allowed to live my own life, that I have the right to live my own life, apart from my parents.”

  “Of course. I think you’re doing the right thing. But we can call each other, and maybe one day you might want to come to Connecticut for a weekend?” Ethan smiled. “You know, to see my sisters.”

  “Yes,” Hayley said. “I’d like that very much. And I’d like to see your father and stepmother, too. Marisa has been so good to me. I’m not sure I deserve all your family has done for me.”

  “Yes, you do,” Ethan said fervently.

  “I want you to meet someone,” Hayley said suddenly. She took Ethan’s hand and led him to where her mother was waiting. “Ethan,” Hayley said, “this is my mother, Nora Franklin. Mom, this is my friend, Ethan Whitby. Ethan is the one who gave me the book I showed you.”

  Nora held out her hand, and Ethan took it in his. “It’s very nice to meet you, Ethan,” she said. Hayley noted how her mother looked Ethan squarely in the eye, how she smiled pleasantly. There was no sign of deference or embarrassment in her demeanor. It seemed that a miracle had indeed been wrought.

  “As it is to meet you, Mrs. Franklin,” Ethan replied, with a slight bow of his head.

  “Now I’ll let you two alone,” Nora said, moving away.

  “She’s lovely,” Ethan said earnestly.

  Hayley was pretty certain that no one had ever called Nora Franklin lovely before now, and she was grateful for Ethan’s kind behavior. “The Gibbon book is in my bag,” she told him. “It’s the best gift I’ve ever been given.”

  And then Ethan embraced her, and with her head nestled against his shoulder Hayley felt more peaceful and secure than she had ever felt in her twenty-one years.

  Before letting her go, Ethan whispered in Hayley’s ear. “ ‘Her eyes in heaven would through the airy region stream so bright that birds would sing and think it were not night.’”

  “All aboard!”

  Ethan’s lips met Hayley’s in what was an even sweeter and more passionate kiss than the first time they had come together. Then, Hayley made her farewell. While the driver stowed her large bag in the bus’s luggage compartment, Hayley, holding tightly to her carry-on, boarded the bus. She found a window seat about midway down the aisle and slid into it. Only when her friends and family were long out of sight did she stop waving. Life can be so strange, she thought. At the start of the summer the very last thing she could have imagined was that she would be off to Boston to take a job as a research assistant to a professor of medieval history. Or that she would have met someone like Ethan Whitby—intelligent, kind, a fellow history buff, and above all, someone undeterred by her past.

  Suddenly, a text message appeared on her phone.

  Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you, did my heart fly to your service.

  Hayley smiled and texted back. Shakespeare?

  The Tempest. Will’s words but my sentiment.

  So, what was it that did the trick, the plunger or the mud mask?

  I’ll go with the mud mask. xxxx

  Hayley laughed out loud. Maybe, she thought, one day she would tell Ethan the truth about how she had once considered marrying him as an escape from her awful life. She knew for sure that he would understand and forgive.

  Chapter 137

  Hayley’s bus had pulled out of the station, bound for Boston. Mrs. Franklin had gone off to her shift at Hannaford. Ethan had headed to his parents’ house before the drive back to Connecticut. Amy stood with her mother and Vera. She would miss Hayley, but she also knew that what mattered most was that Hayley grasp the opportunities she had been given.

  “I’m so happy that Hayley and Ethan have worked things out,” she said with a contented sigh.

  “What really just happened there?” her mother asked. “You knew something had gone on between Hayley and Ethan, didn’t you?”

  “I was sworn to secrecy,” Amy explained. “Let’s just say that Hayley couldn’t believe someone like Ethan, so educated and cultured, would fall in love with someone like her. But he did, and she fell in love with him, and even though she sent him away for what she thought was his own good he came back. It’s so romantic.”

  Vera smiled. “Romance doesn’t always have to end in disaster. I’m trying to believe that.”

  “Come on, Mom,” Amy said. “Let’s go home. I want to get started updating your website. And it’s almost time for lunch.”

  The three women began to walk toward their cars, past another bus discharging passengers. One of those passengers, Amy noted, was a jovial-looking man wearing round, old-fashioned spectacles and carrying a beat-up brown leather satchel. When he stepped on to the pavement he suddenly came to a halt and smiled.

  “Hello,” he said to Leda Latimer.

  “Hi,” Amy’s mother said brightly in reply.

  The passenger behind the man nudged him, and with another smile the man with the satchel walked toward the taxi stand.

  “What was that about?” Vera asked.

  Leda fiddled with the collar of her blouse. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice a bit higher than usual.

  Vera smiled. “The hellos you exchanged with the guy who just got off the bus.”

  “It was more than a hello,” Amy noted, looking toward the jovial-looking man waiting in line for a taxi. “It was like a meeting of the minds or something. Like you’ve known each other for years.”

  Vera frowned. “I wonder who he is.”

  “That’s the new heart specialist from New York. Trevor McIntyre.”

  Amy whirled around to
see an elderly woman she recognized from around town. “I saw his picture in the Daily Chronicle,” the woman went on in a conspiratorial manner. “My niece works at the hospital, and she told me he’s been widowed for three years and wanted a fresh start here in Maine.”

  “Whoever he is,” Amy said when the woman had moved off, “he definitely likes you, Mom.”

  Leda dropped her hand from her collar and blushed. “Don’t be silly. What would a heart specialist see in a fiber artist like me?”

  “You sound just like Hayley,” Amy scolded. “Don’t underestimate yourself.”

  Her mother turned toward the taxi stand. The jovial-looking man waved. Leda waved back.

  Amy laughed. “This is too funny!”

  Vera linked one arm through Leda’s and the other through Amy’s. “I think I’ll do some discreet checking about this Dr. McIntyre,” she said, “and you can’t do anything to stop me.”

  Leda raised an eyebrow. “Did I say that I would?”

  The three women continued toward their cars.

  “How about tuna melts for lunch?” Amy said brightly.

  “Can I invite Margot over?” Vera asked. “I think she’s off today.”

  Amy smiled. “Of course. We’re one big happy family here in Yorktide!”

  Please turn the page

  for a very special Q&A

  with Holly Chamberlin!

  Q. What prompted you to write a story about two young friends working as nannies for families vacationing in southern Maine?

  A. Frankly, the idea of a family hiring a nanny or an au pair has always fascinated me. For one, the notion is so foreign to the world in which I was raised! And I saw in the idea a way for two very different characters—Amy and Hayley—to experience two very different journeys simultaneously. Each young woman’s experience with the family for whom she works challenges her in ways that prove necessary for her emotional growth. Plus, there was some fun to be had in the scenes that take place at The White Hart, the pub where all the women working as nannies gather to share their stories.