Holly knew me well. Too well. There was no way I could keep lying to her and I had to think of something. Holly knew about Sam and how his dumping me back in college had led to a downward spiral in my life. I was not proud of it, but that fateful afternoon had in many ways changed my life. A few months after we had moved in together, I told her where my problems had started and Holly openly said if she ever met him, he was a dead man.
“I don’t like the father,” I finally said, turning to her. I had to tell her something.
“There is something about him… I don’t know.”
She frowned. “What is it?”
I shook my head, kept throwing my things in a bag.
“I don’t know. He’s, like, mean.”
“And the kid?”
I had to smile thinking of Ethan. He had been described to me as complicated, but I had found him pleasant and calm, responding more than I had expected him to. I had dealt with children on the spectrum, who showed various characteristics of autism and Asperger’s syndrome, as well as other psychological problems. Ethan was able to connect however, and I had succeeded in getting through to him quite quickly. I wasn’t sure he had autism at all, but it was too soon to tell. I was keen to work with him more, though, he had already sparked my interest.
“He’s very young, but much easier than I thought.”
“Then you’ll give it a go?”
I thought of the moment I’d seen Sam standing in the living room of that grand house. It was like my world caved in around me and I hardly know how I managed to stay standing up. He was the last person I had expected to see. In none of the documentation had I seen his name and I wondered how I had missed it. There was no way I would have agreed if I had known it was his child that needed a nanny. His child from a marriage that was already over. Not that this surprised me at all. Sam was not relationship material. Hadn’t I discovered that the hard way? Even though we had only been together for a few months, I thought we’d had a good relationship. I had been so happy, fool that I was. When I thought I was pregnant, I couldn’t wait to share the news with him. I was ready to give up my studies, to move with him whereever his career took him. I knew Sam had big dreams, he was always talking about the business he would start, the empire he wanted to create. I wanted to help him, naively, I thought I could. But the moment he heard about my possible pregnancy, he told me it was over.
Just like that.
I told him that I needed to take a test.
I remember breaking down in tears, telling him that it was just my period that was late and that it didn’t have to mean anything. But I couldn’t get through to him. His eyes were cold, cruel. He pushed me away, a look of distaste on his face. He didn’t like my being emotional. He was about to graduate, he said he could not deal with this sort of distraction.
That was what he called me. A distraction. Like a loud noise in the street, a car alarm going off. I was annoying, an irritation. He left and I did not see him again. I don’t know how he managed to avoid me on campus, but he must have found back ways, moving out of his student apartment too. I tried calling him, waiting for him outside his place, but it was like he had disappeared into thin air.
I wasn’t pregnant, of course.
Just late.
But I couldn’t tell him.
Those were awful days, right after he dumped me. I was upset and confused. I went to a bar and got drunk and was almost assaulted by a group of young men, out partying for the night. I managed to get away and went home for a few weeks. I almost dropped out of college, but I went back in the end. Something had shifted, though, that had never completely gone away. I doubted myself, my ability to read people. I became nervous, withdrawn. I finished my studies, but I had to go to therapy, take medication. I was wary around men and did not have many friends.
“Natalie?”
Holly came up to me, hugging me. “Maybe you shouldn’t take the job?”
She sensed that there was more to this job that met the eye.
“I’m still thinking about it,” I admitted. “But the money would really make a difference.”
“You mean, Tucker,” she said.
I nodded.
“You know he’ll probably relapse and then all your hard work and suffering is for nothing. Drug addicts are unreliable and ungrateful little bastards.”
Holly had dated a junkie once. I knew he’d broken her heart.
“He’s my brother,” I said and shrugged. “My parents can’t pay, and my other siblings don’t want to.”
“Even Derek?” My oldest brother was an accountant in New York. He was doing well for himself, but he had paid for Tucker to go into rehab once before. He said he wouldn’t do it again. And my sister, Helen, was in the middle of very expensive fertility treatment. Getting pregnant was her main priority.
“I want to do this,” I said. I had not been able to help my parents or Tucker much. I had always been one they needed to worry about. But this job could change that. I could become stronger. That meant facing Sam and moving past what had happened between us, and after that to me.