It was too much. I had to fake a knee injury when I heard him planning an extended hike along the Appalachian Trail. I really liked Spence but when he had to transfer to another school with a better athletics program, I was secretly relieved.
He wasn’t Mr. Right.
He couldn’t be.
My tracksuit was a bit tight, and I resolved immediately to lose a bit of weight. Cramming for finals had wreaked havoc on my diet and Simone and I had been eating way too much fast food. It didn’t help that she had packed up most of the kitchen already. This meant we had no pots and pans left to cook in. She’d left out two plates, which were useful for takeaways and microwave meals, mostly. I couldn’t complain though as she had done most of the packing while I was agonizing about my job situation.
In the end, I went for jeans and a hooded top. Casual, yet ready to sprint across the road to pluck a child out of harm’s way. I met Will outside his office, and we went for a takeaway coffee, strolling through town. The conversation flowed, and I was surprised to find him being rather more pleasant than I remembered.
“If you want the job, it’s yours,” Will said, straight off the bat. “I know you, you know Zoë and I know Zoë likes you. I guess the question really is, how long would you be able to do it for?”
I hesitated. I didn’t want to lie to him.
“The thing is,” he said. “I don’t want Zoë getting used to someone and then they go off again and she has to adjust all over again. She really liked the last nanny, Shelley.”
He cleared his throat. “Anyway, I would love to have someone stick around for longer than a few weeks.”
“I understand,” I said.
I glanced at him while he spoke and wondered why I’d never noticed how good-looking he was. He often had his hair quite short, but it had grown out and the longer, blonde hair suited him. He did not smile often, but when he did, it changed his whole face, made him look completely different. Almost attractive, in a way I didn’t want to think about too much.
“On the other hand,” he then said. “Zoë is remarkably adaptable. She doesn’t seem to mind nannies coming and going and she already knows you.”
“Maybe we should see how it goes,” I said. “I haven’t exactly done this full-time and who knows, you might hate me.”
He slowed down, coming almost to a complete stop before looking at me, quite intensely.
“I don’t think that is likely.”
I blushed. “I mean, I might be really terrible at being a nanny.”
“Or you might hate it,” he said evenly, while walking faster again. “It might bore you to tears, don’t you think? Surely, finishing college and all, you must be thinking about starting your career?”
“Yeah…” I said, my voice trailing off.
I’d never really thought about my career as such.
Careers were for women who wanted to dress up and do full faces of make up each morning, posing on magazines with confident smiles that showed they could achieve anything they set their mind to. I’d never seen myself in an office, or behind a computer, typing up reports or heaven forbid, editing a spreadsheet. Tourism and hospitality was about hotels and stock supply and I would be able to work anywhere in the world. My future planning, such as it was, centered loosely around the idea of travelling around the country, working at various mountain lodges, creating opportunities for me to bump into my one true love.
As professional goals went, it wasn’t impressive.
I’d worked at a ski resort earlier in the year, helping to look after the kids while the parents went off skiing. This was where I’d met Zane.
He’d swept me off my feet. Literally. I was out working on my skiing technique, when he came flying out of the trees on his snowboard, knocking me to the ground. It was quite a struggle trying to get up again and he apologized profusely. Zane was an Olympic snowboarder and obsessed with the sport. He was always training, thinking about training, about the next mountain he had to go to. We were similar in that, at least. But not much else. Our relationship was pretty on-off and currently, we were off.
“I had a job lined up, but it fell through and I kind of need the work now,” I said, opting for honesty.
Will smiled, showing a rather nice set of teeth.
“When can you start?”
Inexplicably, I felt my heart beating faster.
Oh no, I thought.
Was this my blood sugar acting up again? I’d left home without eating breakfast after the marathon dressing session left me with no time to eat.
“Monday?”