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“Katy? What’s going on?” I answered. I tried to keep my voice friendly so that my words did not come out accusatory. But I believed I may have failed in that endeavor.
“Hey, Ricky,” Katy said. “Listen, I am stuck in traffic. There is some big accident and traffic hasn’t moved in like an hour. I’m not going to make it on time to pick up Zoe today. I’m so sorry.”
I cursed silently and squeezed the phone a little. This was not what I needed to hear. I regained my composure and returned to the call. “Ok, I understand. I’ll get her. Thanks, Katy,” I said.
“Yeah, I’m so sorry,” Katy replied. She could probably tell I was angry, but I wasn’t angry at her.
“It’s not your fault. I got to run. Talk to you later,” I said.
I ended the call and turned off at the next exit. I would have to circle around a bit to drive towards Zoe’s school. Shit. This was going to be bad. I was going to be almost an hour late to pick her up. I called the admin office at her school to let them know what happened and that I was on my way. They would keep her in the office until I arrived.
I really needed to hire another nanny. It had been almost a month since Lisa Williams, Zoe’s former nanny had quit to move across the country with her husband who’d just gotten a new job. It happened very quickly and it was very inconvenient as it left us in a bit of a lurch. I’d been trying to hire someone, but so far all of the applicants that I had just did not have the right temperament, the right experience, and there just didn’t seem to be that right connection that said they were a good fit. This shouldn’t have been that hard, and in recent weeks I’d been working so much that I just hadn’t had time to really get back to the interviewing process. It was so repetitive.
So, Katy had been picking up the slack a bit here and there, but she had her own family and I didn’t expect her to really be a nanny to Zoe.
I would have to get back to the selection process. I just hated that I wasn’t able to be there more for my daughter, but I had to work and I was doing the best I could on my own. I hoped I could find a good nanny, a nurturing woman who could be there for Zoe after school.
I’d reached out to my circle of friends and family and after getting the runaround and the constant advice of how I should start dating again--which was annoying beyond belief-- I’d finally secured a meeting with a woman named Julie. My friend Ben and his wife Becky had recommended her after I’d spoken with them on the phone last night. I was actually supposed to meet with her today, but due to a change in my work schedule, I had to put it off until tomorrow.
I didn’t know a lot about her other than she was twenty-five, and that she had been a nanny for a neighbor of Ben and Becky’s. They’d moved and she was now looking for something regular. Becky told me she was fantastic, so I was really looking forward to meeting her. I trusted Becky’s instincts.
Becky also told me Julie was beautiful and that I should ask her out at some point. This was the last thing on my mind. I wasn’t sure what it was that made all of my friends think that I needed to be set up for romantic encounters. I was not ready. It had been over two years since Amanda had passed, but I still wasn’t ready to get romantic with anyone. This wasn’t what I wanted to do now.
But when I really thought about it, I realized they could all see that I was lonely, I was broken, and I was not dealing properly with my grief and allowing myself to move on. I understood all of this perfectly, but it was still hard. I just couldn’t let myself go there.
I kept thinking about the guilt, and how I would betray Amanda. We’d never really talked about what would happen if one of us passed on. We were too young to think about it really, but I knew that deep down Amanda wouldn’t have wanted me to be lonely. I wouldn’t have wanted her to spend her life alone if the roles were reversed.
Yet, knowing all of this, I couldn’t bring myself to go on and find someone that might end up taking her place in my life. My wife was dead. My angel, my partner, my entire world — she was long gone. I was alone.
And that was the way I was going to stay. At least for now.
Julie
What was that noise?
I felt the grip of fear embracing me as a shiver ran over my body. I’d heard something… it probably might have just been the wind. It had been really blowing like crazy this evening. I didn’t want to admit that I was afraid of being alone at night in a big and a quiet house, but I was spooking myself out now. I just wished the Normans
would come home soon. I hated waiting for people, but I supposed that the longer they were out, the more I got paid. It paid to think positively.
The Normans had tapped me to babysit for them that evening on super short notice. Luckily, I had nothing else going on and I was able to accept the job, but this was not my ideal scenario. I’ve always loved kids, and their kids were both as sweet as could be, but I needed something full time. Picking up a few hours here and there babysitting wasn’t going to cut it.
So, I was thrilled earlier when Becky told me their friend Ricky needed a full-time nanny for his daughter. I was so excited. I had been advertising everywhere and not really getting much response since my previous employer had abruptly moved out of the city two weeks ago. It had been rough, but luckily my roommate and best friend Tessa was sweet enough to pick up the slack on food and bills until I was fully employed again.
I was sitting at the table doing some sketches when I heard the scratching noise again. The house was dead quiet since I put the kids to bed about an hour and a half earlier. I thought maybe I might turn the television on to distract me, but I stopped myself as I wanted to be aware of if the kids were up wandering around or fighting sleep as four-year-old’s often did. I couldn’t remember a time when I had ever fought the idea of having ten straight hours of sleep at the end of every day with no other responsibilities. One day they would miss this period in their lives, too.
I stopped sketching and glanced around. I waited a moment and held my breath to hear nothing but deafening silence. Then I heard the scratching again. My overactive artistic imagination started to go into overdrive and I was picturing some maniac trying to break in.
I knew that I would not rest easy until I went to investigate. The noise was coming from upstairs. I glanced up at the ceiling for a few seconds, just listening. I heard nothing. Then I stood up slowly and I continued to listen intently. There it was again. What was that I was hearing?
The sounds of the house settling interspersed with the slight bit of scratches that I continued to hear. I was feeling a bit uneasy, but I forced myself to walk through the living room to the staircase. Then I made my feet march up the steps, moving slowly, step by step, one at a time. I was trying to be quiet because I didn’t want to wake the kids up, and because I did not want to face what might be something terribly frightening making that awful sound.
I felt silly. I was being scared over what would probably turn out to be nothing. Really, as I thought about it, I had just been feeling very uneasy. I was uneasy with life. Losing my stable source of income which I’d held for almost two years had really shaken my confidence and made me re-evaluate where I was in my life. What was I doing? I loved being a nanny. I loved working with kids and taking care of them, but was it really what I wanted to do professionally forever? I wasn’t sure. Well, actually I knew the answer to that question. It was no.
I wanted to be an artist. Ever since I was a kid, it was all I’d wanted to do. After high school, I applied to several art schools, but they had all rejected me. This hurt my confidence so badly that I hadn’t touched a brush or even sketched anything for almost a year afterwards. Gradually, I came to it again and I just did the art for myself. I desperately wanted to be a real, professional artist. That was the dream. And one day I wanted a family with several kids.
And of course, I needed the perfect man to make that happen. I was becoming increasingly aware that this perfect man did not exist and was only a figment of my imagination. My dating record was less than stellar. My last relationship had lasted only three months and then I’d been dumped out of the blue. I wasn’t really given an explanation at all. “It just isn’t working out”. That was all Jeremy had said, but without any real explanation at all. It was unbelievable. But I had the worst track record with men.
It was no wonder I was saving myself for the right guy. I was proud to be a virgin. I always told myself that I would give my V-card away to the right man, not necessarily the guy I wanted to marry, but the right man. It was going to be a very special thing and he would have to be the perfect man to make that happen. I wasn’t exactly sure what criteria that man would have to meet but I was sure I would know it when I met him. That I was certain of. All of my girlfriends thought I was crazy.
