Page 16 of The Birthday Manny

He shook his head, a reluctant smile appearing on his handsome face. “Go ahead, sit down. I know you want to.”

“I do. You’re sure I won’t fall?”

He held up his hand like he was going under oath. “Promise.”

I’d seen so many of these online and in the stores, but I’d never seen one in person. Unlike a lot of them, this one didn’t have a back to it, but it was one piece of circular cloth with a hole in the middle. If Lexi hadn’t done it yet, I bet it would be no time before she was lying with her head coming out one side and her legs shooting out the other so she could fly. Gingerly, I backed into it and sat down.

Kevin moved toward the couch, then looked at the distance between it and me. The room wasn’t exactly huge, so we’d be able to talk fine, but it might be a little distracting with Lexi playing on the floor between us. Instead, he pulled a bin of blocks over, picked the lid up off of the floor, put it on, and sat down on that. The chair hung low enough with my weight that we were practically eye to eye. A little flustered, he said, “I hope this is okay. It’s not very professional, but…” He shrugged.

“Since I’m applying for a position to watch your daughter, this seems pretty perfect to me.” I wouldn’t embarrass him by saying that every interview before now had been much more structured and without any of the children present. That worked for those families, but this felt right between us, given our first meeting.

He clutched his hands in his lap, resembling a kindergartner perched on a bucket. I sort of wanted to lick him and claim him as mine like we’d done in elementary school. I bit back a chuckle at my own ridiculousness.

“About that. I’m not sure that it's appropriate for me to hire you since…” He gestured between us.

I had a feeling he was going to say that, so I’d been mentally preparing to convince him otherwise while we’d built Lexi-ville. “I don’t agree. What happened the night we met at Rafters was great. Amazing, really. And we were two consensual adults out for a night of fun. This is another situation entirely. You need someone to watch your child. Someone who will take care of her and keep her safe while you work. Not to toot my own horn, but I’m a fantastic manny.”

He gazed at me speculatively. “May I ask how you decided to pursue this as a vocation?”

“I’d be surprised if you didn’t. My sophomore year of college, I needed a job, so I went to the career center. They didn’t have a lot of openings that would work with my schedule, but there was an open babysitting job. The parents were a flight attendant and a doctor. The kids were getting a little older, and the mom wanted to go back to work, but she needed to make sure someone was always available to pick her children up from school and help them do their homework, that kind of thing. The husband’s schedule wasn’t stable enough for that.”

“And they needed someone who lived in-house? To be honest, that’s the other thing I’m worried about. I wasn’t really looking for a live-in nanny or manny or whatever. My hours aren’t unpredictable, so a nine-to-five person would be the ideal candidate. I was even happy settling with someone who could only do part-time.”

Shoot. Shoot. Shoot. I’d been waiting for a couple of weeks, hoping a job would come up sooner rather than later. I’d had a feeling this would be the biggest issue when the agency sent me the information for the Wadsworth family. Even before knowing that Kevin—my Kevin, hook-up extraordinaire—was the parent, I’d been prepared to plead my case.

I didn’t mind sleeping back in my childhood home at all since my parents really were awesome, but I loved working with kids and feeling like I was contributing. If anyone needed that, it was the man who’d strolled into a bar with what I now knew were the signs of parenthood displayed on his shirt.

“Actually, no, originally, they didn’t need a live-in childcare giver. It was while watching their kids, though, that I finally figured out what I wanted to be when I grew up.” I air-quoted the last bit. “Up until that point, I was only taking my core courses in school, but I had no idea what direction to go after that. All I’d ever really wanted was to marry a nice person and have a family. Then, all of a sudden, I stumbled into this job that feeds most of those desires, and I knew it was my path.”

Kevin leaned forward, balancing precariously on his bin. “I’m surprised you didn’t decide to pursue teaching then.”

“Yeah, a lot of people have said that, but really, I love it all. I enjoy helping with homework, but there’s more to guiding a young person’s mind than just book stuff, you know? Look at Lexi.” The little girl’s head jerked up at the sound of her name. I waved at her, but since nothing interesting was going on, she went back to vrooming her trucks. Her father and I smiled at each other before I continued. “She’s two, right?”

He nodded. “Two and a half.”

“So she’s probably helping pick out her clothes already.”

Kevin chuckled. “More like demanding. I had to bribe her with baking cookies this morning to get her into the dress I wanted her to wear. I’m sure you can imagine how it went after that.”

Considering she now had on a pair of gray sweatpants with a gray Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle shirt with blasts of pink color, I was pretty sure I knew. “That sounds about right for her age. And one day, she’ll want to put all her clothes on herself, then she’ll want to zip her own jacket and tie her own shoes. At breakfast, she’ll want to pour her own cereal and milk into a bowl or make her own chocolate milk.”

“Strawberry,” he said. “She likes the Nesquik strawberry powder.”

“Ah. A girl after my own heart.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “I’m not sure if it’s about the taste or the fact it’s pink. She likes all red and pink foods.”

“Like ketchup,” I said in a teasing voice.

He covered his face with his hands, groaning. “Oh God, don’t remind me.”

Seeing as how I really wanted this job, I didn’t think now was the best time to tell him that I couldn’t forget. Didn’t want to forget. Ketchup might well be my favorite condiment ever since it drove off the men who weren’t deserving of this curly-haired cutie and gave me the opening I needed. Now that I was back in his orbit, I was damned sure going to take advantage of it.

“Anyway, then there’s also the other stuff. My cousin, Barry, gives me a hard time, says I don’t want to grow up since I’d rather sit on the floor and play blocks instead of getting my hands dirty and doing real-men’s work.” Another air-quote. “But there’s so much more to it than that. Children have amazing imaginations, and if you’re open to it, you can learn so much from them while also guiding them. It’s an honor, really. Don’t you agree?”

Kevin blinked, looking completely stunned. “Uh, yeah. I…do, actually.” A slight smile tilted his lips. “You still didn’t tell me how you went from a part-time babysitter to a full-time manny for that first family.”

“Oh yeah. Sorry. I tend to get a little passionate about why I do what I do. So I was talking to the mom about how much I loved it and was considering dropping out of college.” Kevin opened his mouth, and I held up my hand. “I didn’t. I have a degree in early childhood education, which I don’t really want to use yet.

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