CHAPTER 2
The next few days whirl past in a kaleidoscope of colours. I feel like a rainbow caught in the path of a tornado. I am Dorothy, so dizzy I’m not even sure I’m in LA anymore.
The girls’ schedule is tight. So tight that I barely have time to study. Thea has music practice each morning at eight, which means all four of us need to be ready and dressed by seven-thirty and in the car ready to go. Willow plays football before class, and Harper has toddler yoga on Tuesdays and Fridays at eleven. Thea is pushing to be allowed to walk home on her own, but Mr Ledger is resisting, so I have to make sure I’m back at three-thirty to collect her, but there’s no time to get home on Thursdays and drop her off before Willow’s swimming lessons, so big sister sits in the cafe sulking and reading a book whilst Harper bounces around like a bean in a tin can by the side of the pool as I try to stop her from falling in.
The rest of my time is filled with housework, grocery shopping, laundry, and keeping Harper entertained, and most of the time she clings to me like a joey, so much so that I briefly consider buying myself a pouch to keep her in so I have one extra hand for the rest of my duties.
The Ledger’s household is big, and with my doubling up on the role of nanny and housekeeper, upkeep is practically a full-time job all of its own, punctuated by the incessant reminders I’ve setup up for myself on my new phone telling me where I need to be and when. By the time I’ve put the girls to bed on day three, I’m so tired I turn myself in and sleep for ten hours straight. When I’m not sleeping, I’m studying, and when I’m not doing either, I’m thinking unmentionable thoughts.
Mr Ledger.
At one point I wonder if this is some kind of sexy Stockholm syndrome, lusting after my captor who has detained me with a thousand chores and three demanding children, but every time I look at him my tummy flips and my knees threaten me with the indignity of turning to jelly.
I don’t often see him - and thank goodness I don’t - but somehow whenever I do he’s stretching, or brooding, or wearing a white button-up shirt that’s a size too small. On one occasion I found him taking a swim and I had to run into the utility room and take several deep breathes to avoid embarrassing myself.
Not that I have time to dwell much on these encounters. I now see why he was so desperate for a new nanny. Whatever work schedule he keeps and whatever it is he does, is clearly demanding enough to take up more of his time than most single dads can afford. I’m also starting to wonder if the reason that the last nanny left was burnout, and at this point, I’m too afraid to ask.
I make breakfast, lunch and dinner for the four of them, and whilst I eat with them too, I find the need to slink off the moment I’ve finished to try and get ahead, whether that’s to prep a bath for Harper, make their beds, tidy up their toys, put away their books, read a slither of a research paper or slam another round of laundry into the machine.
I am exhausted and I need a break.
I flick on my desk light as I notice how dark it’s become outside, the cold blue sky creeping up on me until my eyes are seared by the bright LCD.
I finally found an hour this evening to work on an assignment, and far from procrastinating I’ve managed to write more in the last sixty minutes than I previously thought possible. It turns out that an hour is a long time when you don’t get many of them.
My mother always used to say, Oh, what I could do in an hour. Give me an hour and I could negotiate world peace. Your father would be out of a job! I never used to understand what she meant, but I do now.
I used to have so much time on my hands that I could spend a day writing half as much as I’ve done in the last twenty minutes, and I used to think that I’d been working hard.
You can do a lot with an hour, when you don’t have any time at all.
The little lamp light is so bright that it hurts my eyes and I look away as I withdraw my fingers, rubbing my tired cheeks and yawning. As I turn and stretch my legs I realise that I’ve been so focused on my research that my thighs and calves have seized up entirely. I laugh, awkwardly standing up and extending my arms above my head in a tall yawn before looking out the wide windows across the darkened valley, crisscrossed with light.
And then I see him.
He’s standing in the kitchen on the other side of the courtyard, and - deep breath - he’s not wearing a shirt. I drop to the floor instinctively, hoping he hasn’t seen me as my heart races and my chest tightens, and then I reach back up and fumble for the little rocker switch, plunging me back into darkness. I only had the light on for a second or two, and I’m fairly certain he was facing the other way, so he probably didn’t see me.
Probably.
What the fuck am I doing? I blink, questioning my sanity, and then my tummy tingles with naughtiness as my head catches up with my libido.
I want to look.
I want to sneak a longer peek and drink him in from afar. I want to look for as long as I want and not the amount of time that would ordinarily be socially acceptable. I know it's wrong and the sort of thing that would probably get me fired, but as I bite down on my lower lip I decide it's worth the risk.
Because, oh my god.
I move toward the bed, using it as cover to get closer, shuffling along the side as my legs tingle, then as quick as a flash I dart to one side of the balcony doors and stop, holding my breath. As slowly as I can, feeling like a third rate spy, I turn around and peek with just one eye down toward where he had been standing.
And my heart stops.
Fuck.
He’s looking right at me.
I freeze.
Shit.