Page 8 of Coast to Coast

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m not an asshole, guys. I have a conditional offer, and part two of the interview will be at the Minutemen’s game tonight. Sam will be pitching, but I’ll be in the stands helping Kelsey and Tom.”

“Wait, is this Tom Campbell from the Blizzards?” PJ practically jumped through the phone. He got even more excited as he began to piece together what he’d learned from the news and realized that as their nanny, I would have a front-row seat to their lives.

“Yeah, sorry. I don’t know much about hockey. Their son is about sixteen months old and needs a nanny who can travel back and forth between Boston and Colorado. The position also includes travel time for some away games, first class all the way.”

“You realize how much travel hockey players do? And you’re going to be responsible for a cranky toddler on an airplane?” Juno asked, unable to hide her shudder. “Remember the flight to Miami with the screaming child whose ear hurt?”

Juno reminded me of the flight on which we were seated next to an unaccompanied minor who must have had an ear infection. During takeoff, she felt intense pain, and it never subsided. The two of us spent the entire flight from Logan to Miami doing our best to console the poor girl. Every time the flight attendant looked at us, she gave us a thumbs-up and proceeded to avoid our row, letting us be responsible for the child.

“His mother will be with me for our first trip, and from what she said, he’s been flying since he was three months old,” I explained, almost as much for my benefit as theirs.

“And what, you’ll be going to a bunch of hockey games? For free?” PJ asked, his jealousy showing once again.

“Peej, I’ll be there with a toddler. Even if I were interested in the game, I would probably spend most of my time wiping sugar crystals off his face after I’ve bribed him with cotton candy.”

Juno cringed, “Sounds sticky.”

PJ loved sports, but Juno feared little kids. The unpredictability of small children and their tendencies to find their way into literal, sticky situations was more than enough for her to avoid them altogether.

“Are you sure this is what you want? I know you want to be independent, but Mom and Dad aren’t pushing you out of the nest,” PJ pointed out.

Yes, I wanted independence. Yes, I wanted my parents to no longer need to make my rent payments. But I was at a crossroads with no idea which path I wanted. I had started to look at this position as a reset. It would give me time to think, work through my options, and set a new path.

“It won’t be my forever job, but I need some time after what Zander did. I’ll be able to lick my wounds, make a plan, and figure out what I want to be when I grow up.”

“Shh, don’t say that too loud. Daddy needs someone in marketing. He’ll start a pressure campaign if he knows you’re looking for a job,” Juno said. Juno had accepted a position at the pharmaceutical company my father led. We’d stopped calling her a nepotism baby only because we’d realized how much it hurt her to think she hadn’t earned her position. While Dad’s name got her in the door, she’d earned the position and excelled at everything she did.

“Well, if Daddy asks, I need you both to help me in a little white lie. I’m going to tell him I accepted a marketing position for the Blizzards.”

“How are you going to explain it when you’re in Boston? Or pictured with a toddler on your hip? Or the fact that you don’t know anything about hockey?” PJ asked, pointing out the obvious flaws in my plan.

“Don’t worry. I’ll figure something out. I’m sure there’s a market on social media for family interaction. And they don’t need to know every time I’m in Boston. I can slip in and out of town, and they’d never know it.”

The conversation then morphed into PJ’s updates on the start of his classes. He was starting his second year at Boston University Medical, and outside of class and studying, the most social interaction he got was these phone calls with us.

All three of us had gone to BU, where our parents had graduated, and their parents had also graduated. All three of us had received so many benefits growing up and never had to worry about our education costs, but it came at the expense of having autonomy in our decisions. I think PJ was happy with his decision, and Juno was great at her job, but this nanny position might be precisely what I needed. I could leave the nest, get my bearings, and then decide on my long-term goals. If this position gave me a little more time to focus on my music, I might be able to reconnect with myself at the same time.

TOM

Watching Crew be so excited to go to the baseball game finally gave me the adrenaline boost I needed to get through pre-season. Kelsey and Sam had traveled during last year's season, but Crew was still too young to show much interest in my games. The first time he’d seen me in uniform, he’d cried. He had grown so fast and changed so quickly that I hated being away from him for even a day or two.

Calliope was technically still interviewing, but Sam, Kelsey, and I had already decided that she’d have to royally fuck-up tonight for us not to hire her. She didn’t have nanny experience, but she’d been a natural with Crew and was one of the first people I’d felt competent enough to navigate the required travel.

We packed into Kelsey’s Beamer, which she parked in the player’s lot, which is one of the perks of being the family of one of the players. Since it was unlikely that Calliope would ever take Crew to a baseball game without Kelsey, she didn’t feel it was necessary to fill her in on the family room and how to access it. Sam hadn’t been able to get us our seats in the usual spot behind home plate, but we were seated with a group of WAGs and player families.

How would Calliope fit in with the WAGs on the Blizzards? As our nanny, she could access the family room with Crew when she attended the games. Who knew if the wives and girlfriends would accept her or not? I expected extra scrutiny about my relationship with her.

My eyes darted to Calliope for about the hundredth time since she arrived. Yep, confirmed. She was hot, and even if I could get the guys to leave her alone, they wouldn’t miss that I was sharing a home with her. I could already hear the teasing every single time I went home to her. Honestly, I wasn’t even sure I could ignore it in such close quarters.

“Are you a baseball fan?” Kelsey asked her as she settled Crew on her lap in the stadium seat. He’d spent the entire game moving back and forth between our laps at the last game we’d attended together. While Kelsey had always been patient with him, I could tell that the heat and her pregnancy pushed her to capacity.

“Come on, Crew, come to Dadda,” I said as he launched himself into my arms. He sat there for less than a minute before leaning to Calliope with open arms.

“Ooof, easy, buddy,” the air was forced out of Calliope’s lungs as Crew forced his way into her lap. I watched as Calliope winced as my boy elbowed her chest.

Yeah, buddy, those girls are hard to miss. My eyes dropped quickly to her tits, which Crew’s little body mashed painfully.

Fuck, Tom. Stop thinking about your nanny’s tits.

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