Nanny dearest, p.1
Nanny Dearest, page 1
Flora Collins was born and raised in New York City and has never left, except for a four-year stint at Vassar College. When she’s not writing, she can be found watching reality shows that were canceled after one season or attempting to eat soft-serve ice cream in bed—sometimes simultaneously. Nanny Dearest is her first novel and draws upon personal experiences from her own family history.
Nanny Dearest
Flora Collins
To Bramy, whose love and support remain unmatched.
Contents
Prologue
Part One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Part Two
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Part Three
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Acknowledgments
PROLOGUE
I wake from my nap. There’s no baby gate, so I slip out soundlessly with Lolly. Annie is in the kitchen, so I go to Mama’s room. She said goodbye but I don’t want her to go yet.
Her door is closed. I reach up and turn the knob and hum our special song. It’s quiet. She’s sleeping. But I want to play! Lolly wants to play, too. The ladies who stay with her tell me not to bother Mama when she’s sleeping, but she tells me to anyway. It’s hard to get into the bed myself, so first I tug on her arm. She doesn’t wake up. I kiss her hand, but she doesn’t wake up. I lift Lolly up and let her kiss Mama’s face. That always works. But this time she stays asleep.
I want Mama! I grip the blanket and use it to scoot myself onto the bed. “Mama, wake up!” I jump on the bed with my knees. I’m not allowed with my feet. But she doesn’t move. I clutch her face and kiss her lips. That’s how Sleeping Beauty in the story wakes up. I sing to her, our special song.
But she stays quiet. Her eyes don’t even open.
I sit back, crisscross-applesauce. I feel the cry build up in my throat. I plug it in with my thumb.
I hop off Mama’s bed. I’ll go into my bed now. Show Mama that I’m a big girl who can sleep through naps. Maybe then she’ll want to play.
I bury my nose into Lolly’s fur and tiptoe out of her room.
She doesn’t ask me to come back.
PART ONE
1
“I would recognize those bangs anywhere,” she says, clutching her large faux-leather bag, pink nails pinching the synthetic hide. I can see the laugh lines beneath her glasses’ rims. I swallow, my tongue darting between my back molars, bracing myself.
“They stuck, I guess.” I laugh lightly, a meek trickle that escapes from my lips before I can stop it. She smiles again, this time with teeth, and I see how her front two overlap, barely discernible. But she’s standing so close that it’s hard not to notice.
“You live around here now?” She stopped me in front of a church and behind us the congregation trickles out, chatting among themselves. A child wails for lunch. The sun beats down hard and yellow, speckling the sidewalk. I raise my hand like a visor, even though I feel the weight of my oversized sunglasses, heavy on the bridge of my nose.
“Yep. Moved down to Alphabet City after college,” I answer. She nods, pushing a wisp of red hair behind her ear. She is letting the sun in, the pupils of her green eyes shrinking with the effort.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” It’s a statement, not a question, one that she says confidently, as if it’s a sign of character that she is easily forgettable, that fading into my brain’s recesses is some kind of compliment.
The church group disperses and I step away to let a family by.
“I’m sorry. I don’t.” And then, even though she is secure in her stance, amused perhaps by my social transgression, I fumble for some excuse. “Forgive me. I-I’m not good with faces.”
She laughs, then—a long, exhilarating sound, like a wind chime. “I don’t blame you. I think you were about three feet tall the last time you saw me.” She reaches out a hand, dainty and freckled. “I’m Anneliese. Anneliese Whittaker. I was your nanny.” Her hand remains in the air for a moment, outstretched, like the bare limb of a winter tree, before I take it.
“Sue. Sue Keller.” But of course she knows who I am. She says she was my nanny.
“I used to babysit you when you lived upstate.” I flinch, unintentionally. She knew my mother. “How’s your dad? He always wanted to move back up there later in life.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, savoring the tenderized spot there, made bloody by my anxious jaw. “He passed last year. Car accident.”
Anneliese puts a hand to her mouth, her eyes widening behind the glasses. “Oh honey, I’m so sorry. You must miss him a lot, don’t you? He was your whole world back when I knew you.”
I offer her a smile. “Yes, well, aren’t most little girls that way with their fathers?”
The child is still screaming for lunch. His mother is speaking to another woman, the three of them the only people left in front of the church.
“Yes, well, I guess that’s true. You and your dad had a special bond, though.” She gazes at me then, her face full of compassion, those green eyes penetrative.
And we’re silent, for a beat too long. So I find myself shuffling, moving around her. “I actually have to meet a friend.” I check my wrist though I’m not wearing a watch. “But it was funny running into you.” I give her what I hope is an apologetic smile, backing away from her, toward the curb.
She stops me, one of those tiny hands on my wrist, almost tugging at my sleeve like a child. “Wait. I’d love to see you again.” She digs around in her purse. I catch sight of a book, earbuds, some capped pens, a grimy-looking ChapStick. She takes out a receipt, uncaps a pen, and leans the paper against the church’s stone masonry, scrawling her number. The figures are dainty, like her hands.
“I’m sorry to keep you waiting. Tell your friend a crazy lady stopped and demanded you spend time with her.” She laughs again, that wind chime chortle, and I pocket the receipt.
“Nice to see you again!” I call, making the traffic light just in time. When I cross the street and turn, she’s gone, consumed by the hordes, no sign of that red hair glinting in the sunlight.
* * *
“And you stopped? I would’ve kept on walking. No time for nutso people like that,” Beth says through the phone as I pace my studio, absentmindedly throwing trash away, smoothing out the creases in my bedspread, my phone nestled between my shoulder and ear. I set it down and put her on speaker. I have the urge, suddenly, to rearrange the furniture in this miniscule apartment. To move the bed to the other side of the room, away from the window, from the noise of the street.
“She knew my name, Beth. She called out ‘Sue.’ I wasn’t going to ignore that.” Outside, a siren wails and I pull down the shade.
“That’s why you always wear headphones. So you have an excuse not to deal with those kinds of people.” Beth smacks her gum, the noise ricocheting through the tinny speaker.
“So you really don’t remember if I had a nanny called Anneliese?” I crumple up the wax paper from my bagel, letting it drift to the floor. The old family photo albums from that period are in storage, buried deep inside the disorganized cardboard boxes I hired movers to collect when I cleaned out Dad’s apartment.
“Dude, we met when we were five. I don’t think I knew my own mom’s name back then. I certainly wouldn’t remember who your babysitter was.” I close my eyes and massage my temples, my usual insomnia-inflicted headache edging toward a dull throb. I don’t remember a long-term nanny. I never had any babysitters growing up, just my dad.
I hear Beth say something to her girlfriend, a bark, and I walk away from the phone for a minute with a twinge of annoyance that she’s not giving me her undivided attention.
I think of Anneliese’s face, those teeth, the green eyes. The hair. And.
And.
I am running in a field with her, in the yard behind the house upstate. The garden is giant. Huge sunflowers, hedges high enough to block the sun. Beneath me, the grass is lush, dewy, tickling my bare feet. And the sky is white, hot and blazing. And she is behind me, shrieking, her freckled arm outstretched, a paintbrush in her hand tinged blue.
And I feel its slick bristles on my back and I fall, stumble. But I am laughing. And she is, too, her orange hair like a halo, eclipsing the sun.
I open my eyes.
“Anyway, I’m having some people over next weekend. I know you hate parties these days but you’r
“I remember her.”
Beth pauses mid-ramble. “What?”
“I remember her. Anneliese. The woman who stopped me today. She’s not nuts. I remember her.”
There’s a heavy silence on the other end. “Are you sure? You just said you didn’t.” Beth’s voice has lowered an octave, as if she’s whispering. Which I know is for my benefit, so her girlfriend won’t hear.
I tighten my hand into a fist. “I’m serious. She was my nanny. We used to play this game with paint.”
Beth sighs. “Still weird to me. You’re not thinking about calling her or anything like that, right?” But I’m already reaching into the garbage bag I use as a hamper, sifting through it for the sweats I wore earlier today. I take out the receipt, smoothing it out against my knee. It’s for shampoo, coconut Herbal Essences, and I can smell it on her, as if it’s 1996 and I am on the floor of my blue-carpeted bedroom and she is swinging her princess hair to and fro as we play Candy Land, the smell even more enticing than how I imagined Queen Frostine’s scent.
Tears prick my eyelids.
“I want to see her.” It comes out sounding infantile, testy even. And I hear Beth breathing, willing herself not to lash out.
“Okay. Okay, Suzy. Just meet in public and bring some pepper spray. Remember, she stopped you in the street. She really could be anyone, even if she did babysit you a thousand years ago.” I hear her put another piece of gum in her mouth, the wrapper like static.
“I know. She’s just a nice middle-aged woman. And maybe she has some cool things to say about my parents.” I know that will get Beth off my back. Any mention of my parents gets anyone off my back.
I hear her breath as she blows a bubble, the snap of the gum sticking to her lip. “I’m just trying to be a good friend. Don’t fault me for it.” Her voice has lowered again. “I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: you’ve been spending way too much time alone. It’s not like you and I can tell it’s getting to you. It would get to me.” But my finger is already hovering over the End Call button, eager to get Beth off the line.
“I appreciate it. But for real, now I have work to do. I’ll text you.” She spends one more minute reminding me to come to her party next weekend and I promise I will, even though we both know I won’t, and I hang up first, still fingering that crumpled receipt, studying the perfectly shaped eights in the handwritten phone number, each the same height, the same size.
Outside, a dog barks. And I bark back, loud and sharp, laughing at myself, my apartment easing into darkness as the sun sets.
2
May 1996
The house is massive. Just staring at it, she already feels lost.
She knew the family was rich, their house tucked into what used to be farmland so the husband could focus on his writing. Behind the house is a lake. It snakes through to her part of town—she’d capture frogs there as a child, wading into the swampy parts of the water. Once she brought one home, plopped into an old tomato sauce jar, and upon seeing his little girl clutching the jar so gingerly, her dad plunged his fleshy fingers into the container and grabbed the frog by its bulbous neck. Its eyes bulged so big she was sure they’d roll out. But instead, in what he described as a science experiment, a homespun biology-class frog dissection, he cut its throat with a steak knife, made her watch the creature’s green-tinted blood spurting out, dribbling down the wall.
She didn’t bring home another animal after that.
She reaches the front porch of this mammoth house, with upholstered chairs, a swing. A tiny spider scurries its way up a rail, disappearing into a crevice in the freshly painted wood. She knocks on the front door.
There’s silence and she knocks again, louder this time, using the heel of her hand. And finally she hears shuffling, a grunt as a jammed doorknob is turned. And then she is standing in front of a tall, slim man, checkered shirt tucked into slacks, glasses perched at the end of his nose. He looks far too old to have a daughter so young. It’s bizarre to see him in real life, as if he’s walked out of the jacket flap of one of his novels. He’s narrower than his picture, the real world diminishing him into a regular middle-aged man.
“You must be Annie,” he says, and sticks out his hand. His fingernails are finely cut, his cuticles scrubbed, like a woman’s. She takes it, after a pregnant pause.
“Yes, yes I am.” She looks up into his milky blue eyes and he smiles nonchalantly, like she could be anyone. But she’s used to that.
“I’m Mr. Keller, as you may have gathered. Come on in. You can wait in the living room and I’ll get my wife.” The front hall is bigger than her childhood home, empty except for one round, gleaming table showcasing a bouquet of sky-blue hydrangeas in an enormous cut-glass vase. The walls are lacquered in a deeper shade of the same blue, and the old parquet floor is so polished Annie can practically see her reflection in the planks. It’s so quiet, she finds herself tiptoeing, her soles flexing, so as not to make a sound.
He leads her to a room filled with color, orange couches, blue vases on the fireplace mantel. Lemony sunlight glows on the dark, reflective end tables, and the back wall is lined with books organized by color. Silver-framed photos on one table show the Kellers with some famous people—the mayor of New York City and others Annie isn’t sure she recognizes. The Sony Trinitron TV is half-concealed inside a massive cabinet stenciled with a curling pattern of vines and grape clusters.
She’s never seen anything like it, her mouth parting in awe as she imbibes the whole room. Who knew you could make a home so beautiful?
The man stands awkwardly by the entrance, staring at her staring. “I’m glad we have somebody around to admire it. We haven’t had guests yet.” He smiles at her and this time it’s genuine, his eyes crinkling. She smiles shyly back.
“Belle, the nanny’s here,” he calls into the cavernous space. When no one comes, he turns to Annie and holds up a finger. “One sec. Make yourself comfortable.” She perches herself on the edge of the sofa, placing her hands on her knees, prim and proper like she imagines you’re supposed to do in houses like this.
And then a woman comes in, her jeans dirty, peeling off gardening gloves and tossing them on a pristine mirrored table. It makes Annie wince.
She’s blonde and tiny, also older than Annie expected, five feet even, in socks. When Annie stands to introduce herself, she towers over her. But she’s one of those people who seems tall. Unlike the husband, she’s all business. No smiles, no niceties. Just a cursory glance, a hand extended. “Sorry, I was out back gardening. I didn’t hear you arrive.” She doesn’t sound apologetic. “Susanna is two and a half, almost three. So basically we’re looking for a nanny, every day nine to seven. I’ll be gone most days—either in the city or at this office space I’ve rented in town. Claudette said you have your associate’s in early childhood education?” She sits, taps her fingernails on her arm, waiting for Annie to begin.
“Yes I got my GED at seventeen and then did that program. And I basically raised my siblings, too. I’m one of five and Mom died when I was twelve, so since then, they’ve mostly been my responsibility.” Mrs. Keller’s eyes widen at that, her tongue clucking with pity. “I’m certified in CPR, first aid, and water safety.” Annie settles on the sofa again and takes the certificates out of the dog-eared folder, laying them gently on the table, smoothing out their edges. “I can clean on the days Claudette is off. And I can cook, too, if you ever want a break from the kitchen.” She smiles softly at Mrs. Keller, who snorts.
“Oh trust me, I don’t cook. But it’s good to know that you do.” And the interview continues, Annie marveling at that brilliant room, grinning with no teeth. She doesn’t want them to notice how crooked they are. It wouldn’t fit here, in this gorgeous, orderly space.
Finally, Mrs. Keller turns to her husband. “To be honest, it seems impossible to find anyone reliable in the sticks, and I really need to get out of this godforsaken house some more, so if it’s up to me, you’re hired. What do you think, babe?” And it’s like Annie is out of the room. She shifts her gaze to the floor, the carpet a mesh of pinks and oranges, swirling together in a kaleidoscopic pattern.
