He rocks back, raising his eyebrows. “Which job? What are you talking about—do you mean nanny?”
I shrug one shoulder and look away, nodding to myself so that he’ll subliminally get the word Yes going through his head.
“Jack, be serious!” he gasps. “She would be living here! With our sons! Are you crazy?”
“She’s way more qualified than Maddie was,” I comment.
“That’s not the point!” he scoffs, pushing himself back and resuming his back-and-forth march across the room.
“I think it’s a great point,” I counter.
“Jack… She would be living here!” he hisses, barely keeping his voice low.
“Not like we haven’t done it before,” I remind him.
“You act like that makes it less weird!” he scoffs. “It doesn’t make it less weird, Jack! It actually makes it more weird!”
“It’s only as weird as you make it, Chance.”
“And what if things don’t work out?” he continues, his voice edging louder. “What then? It’s not like we can keep this all under our hats. Shit like this always gets out!”
I fast-forward to some imaginary time frame where we have a life together, and it doesn’t work out, and Chelsea flounces like Maddie or worse. Or maybe she doesn’t. Or maybe she just decides to get her master’s degree or something.
Or maybe she sticks around until the boys graduate.
“Jack? Are you listening to me?”
“I can’t help but listen to you, Chance,” I reply sourly. “You are talking pretty loud.”
His eyes are wide. He is halfway to truly pissed off but I think he just needs reassurance.
“And? What are we going to do?”
“I’m going to offer her that job,” I shrug.
Chance opens his mouth like he can’t believe what I’m saying, but I think it’s all just theater right now. This way, if everything goes sideways, he can say I told you so in a couple of years or something. That’s cool.
“You really think it’s worth the risk?”
I take a second to think about it again. Do I? Do I really?
“You know what, brother, I really do,” I announce confidently. “Everything could go wrong, like you say, but everything could go pretty fucking awesome too. And you know what, we deserve a little awesome. For however long that lasts.”
He starts to say something, then stops, then starts again, then stops.
“Plus, wasn’t she like ten times better than you imagined?” I ask.
A smirk twists the corner of his mouth.
“Jesus, that ass,” he mutters under his breath.
“Yeah,” I nod. “And those tits. Fuck. When did she get those fat, beautiful tits?”
“She didn’t used to look like that, did she? Did I miss it?”
“I don’t know, man,” I shake my head. “But there’s nobody to stop us now. Out here in the middle of nowhere, just the three of us… What’s to stop us?”
“Hey, what are we talking about?” Chelsea asks, appearing suddenly at the edge of the room.