Mountain Man’s Nanny

by Kelsey King

  Mountain Man’s Nanny

  Copyright © 2018 Kelsey King

  authorkelseyking.com

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  Contents

  Newsletter

  1. Parker

  2. Kacee

  3. Parker

  4. Kacee

  5. Parker

  6. Kacee

  7. Parker

  8. Kacee

  9. Parker

  10. Kacee

  Epilogue

  About Kelsey King

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  1

  Parker

  “Daddy!” Evie screams, and I immediately drop the axe from my hands. I run to the front of the house and find my six-year-old daughter standing on the lawn, looking down the driveway. My five-year-old son, Jackson stands besides her, pointing excitedly at the truck parking carefully near the grass.

  “Are you okay?” I ask Evie, though I already know the answer now that I see she is. Evie runs toward me, and I catch her, lifting her up into my arms. Jackson slams into my legs below her.

  “Auntie Penelope’s here!” Evie exclaims. I wave at my sister as she steps out of her truck and she waves back excitedly.

  “I can see that,” I say, releasing a sigh of relief. “Don’t scare me like that, kid.”

  “Sorry, Daddy,” Evie replies, before wiggling to be let down. As soon as her feet hit the ground, she sets off at a dead sprint for her aunt. Like me, my sister has dark hair and green eyes. Unlike me though, Penelope smiles almost constantly, like she’s always happy to be wherever she is.

  “Wipe that look off your face, Parker,” Penelope teases the second she gets close enough for me to hear. Each of her hands is claimed by one of my children, holding tight like she’d run back to her truck if they let go. “You love when I visit.”

  “Sure,” I say, her scowl not going unnoticed as she passes by, Evie and Jackson dragging her toward the house. She sticks her tongue out at me, and I act wounded by it before following them inside.

  “Got anything to eat around here?” Penelope asks, lifting her arms enough that Evie and Jackson have to let go of her hands. Watching Penelope rummage through the pantry, I consider how I really do love it when she visits. I’ve been living in the mountains for over four years. I only drive into town when we need to stock up. A little bit of human contact goes a long way, and I enjoy seeing my only sister as often as she can manage to come up and visit.

  “You’ve only got potatoes and winter squash in here,” Penelope complains, breaking me out of my own thoughts. I come up behind her where she stands in front of my open cabinets.

  “Yeah, I’m due for a trip into town, I think,” I tell her, though it’s obvious. Penelope rolls her eyes at me.

  “You think so?” Penelope quips. Jackson jumps off the kitchen chair. I’m tempted to scold him for standing on it, but he’s always been a little monkey and climbing anything he can.

  “Wait!” he says, jogging to the fridge. I watch him curiously as he digs around and uncovers two fresh apples. “I was saving these, but you can have them.”

  “Why don’t we share them?” Penelope suggests, and Jackson agrees enthusiastically, running to get a plate while Evie gets the kids’ plastic apple slicer. While they are busy, Penelope turns back to me.

  “You know why I’m here,” Penelope warns. I shrug, sitting down at the table. When I first decided to move, I found the house years ago in a state of total disrepair, and it just felt like home. I bought it, then repaired and rebuilt the structure from almost scratch. It was built from dark wood and has several windows to help maximize the natural light and minimize electricity usage. The cabin is only one floor, with the kitchen and living room existing in one giant room, barely separated by a little dividing half-wall. Off to one side is a hallway that has the bathroom, my bedroom, Evie’s room, Jackson’s room, their playroom and library, and the guest room—which Penelope uses when she stays overnight. The ceilings are relatively high, and the whole place feels warm and homey. I love everything about it.

  “I’d like to think you came to visit me and your niece and nephew,” I taunt. She sighs and sits down next to me, taking my hand in hers.

  “I always do,” Penelope says. “Really, I do. But I still worry about you.”

  “Penelope, come on, not this again.” I groan, wrapping a hand around my neck and squeezing at the tension.

  “Yes, this again.” Penelope gives me a pointed look. “Parker, you’ve been up here almost five years. Evie’s old enough to be in school. You should move back to the city, or at least consider it. This thing you’re doing—just living up here alone—it can’t be good for you and the kids. No social interaction aside from each other and the solitude is turning you into an introverted mountain man.”

  “I’m fine,” I insist, as I do every time we have this conversation. I glance out the window at the trees and the hill over the lake. I always thought the sunrise looks the most beautiful at the top of that hill in my little piece of these Montana Mountains. Living up here, outside of Whitefish, is the best thing I can think of for my children and myself. Evie and Jackson climb into their chairs at the kitchen table. Evie gingerly works the children’s apple slicer while I observe her, in case she needs help.

  “Parker,” Penelope says softly, squeezing my hand again. “I think you should move back with me. I don’t know why you won’t.”

  Yes, you do, I think to myself. Four years ago—or to be specific, four years, seven months, two weeks, and five days—I became a widower. My wife, Rebecca, the mother of my two children, was murdered thirty miles away in Kalispell during a mugging gone wrong. In one moment, I became a widower, a single father of two, and single-mindedly focused on protecting my children from anything in the world that could harm them. Living in the mountains is my way of keeping my family safe. If I could, I’d insist Penelope moves in with us, too. The city has so much theft and violence, so many terrible things that could happen at any moment, for no reason at all. I have two children to think about. I can’t take risks like that—not anymore.

  “I just can’t,” I tell her. “You know I have my reasons. Plus, I think of Becca everywhere there, which makes it even harder on me. It’s not good for us there. Plus, we’re fine up here, aren’t we?”

  “Sure are,” Evie agrees. Jackson nods, his mouth full of apple slices.

  “They don’t know any different,” Penelope whispers to me under her breath.

  “They don’t need to,” I tell her. “They’re safe. That’s all I need.” I lean back against the chair, accepting the piece of apple that Jackson hands me. “Thanks, kid.”

  “Y’welcome, Daddy,” Jackson says, biting another slice in half. Evie presents the three of us with her fully sliced second apple proudly.

  “Thanks to you, too,” I say, and Evie beams at me. Penelope is still looking at me like she fully intends to keep talking about this, so I quickly think about a new topic.

  “Hey,” I say, and the kids look up at me. “Remember when we were talking about how you wanted to start doing schoolwork?”

  “Yeah!” Evie exclaims; Jackson echoes her sentiment. “Why? Do you have an idea?”

  “I decided to start homeschooling you,” I tell them. Jackson looks baffled, but
Evie jumps up.

  “Daddy!” Evie says. “You’re going to teach us math?”

  I put a hand over my chest as if she’s wounded me. “What? You think I don’t know math? Some daughter you are,” I tease.

  “I’ve never seen you do math.” Evie shrugs. “But if you’re sure—”

  “I’m sure, baby,” I say, giving her a wink. “Trust me.”

  Evie twists her lips and sits back down, focusing on wrestling her apple pieces away from her brother. Penelope raises an eyebrow at me the second I glance at her. I know her thoughts are only seconds away from coming out of her mouth. She never even considers filtering her opinions, which I’ve grown accustomed.

  “What?” I ask because it’s better to just get it over with. She’ll say it eventually anyway.

  “You’re not a teacher,” Penelope states matter-of-factly. I groan, rolling my head along my neck to ease the tension. “Don’t make that face. You’re not qualified to homeschool.”

  “I’m not an idiot,” I tell her defensively. “I graduated from high school.”

  “And then you became a contractor, and now you’re, what? A lumberjack? A professional hermit?” Penelope asks with attitude. “You think you can teach them everything they need to know? Give them everything public schooling would offer? What about meeting kids there own age? They’ve never socialized with other people before. Just you, and me, and whatever squirrels they trap while you’re not looking.”

  “They have each other,” I say. “To socialize with. That’s enough.”

  “It’s not,” Penelope argues. “Not really.”

  I look at Penelope, and she stares right back at me with a determined glare. She’s only older than me by three years, but ever since our parents died when I was only fifteen, she’s been very protective over me. Even now, when I’m twenty-nine years old, six-foot-four, and strong enough to lift her over my head if I decided to, she still has that same urge to protect me from everything.

  Including myself.

  “They’ll be fine,” I reassure her. “I’ll read them books. Teach them math. It’ll be great.”

  “Do you actually remember anything from being six?” Penelope asks me pointedly. I frown at her.

  “What’s that matter?” I ask. “I was a kid.”

  “Oh my God,” Penelope says, dropping her face into her hands. “You really don’t know what you’re doing. Parker, you’re not a teacher. You’re not even, like trained to teach or anything. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

  “It’s not going to be easy,” I agree. “I know that.” I look over at Evie and Jackson, the two of them sitting with their heads bent together, carefully rearranging apple slices to make faces on the tabletop. Jackson glances up at me and grins when he notices he’s being watched. I can’t bear the thought of anything happening to either of them. “It’s for the best though. I need to protect them, Pen.”

  Penelope throws her hands up and lets them smack against the table in frustration.

  “You’re so dramatic,” I tell her. Penelope playfully whacks the back of my head. “Hey, watch it—”

  “You’re so dramatic,” Penelope repeats. “If you want to homeschool them so badly, maybe you should just hire someone. A tutor, or something.”

  “I don’t know any tutors.” She looks at me like she’s well aware of that fact.

  “You’d be hiring someone,” Penelope says. “You don’t need to know them. Put out an ad for a private tutor or a homeschool teacher or nanny.”

  “I don’t need one,” I repeat slowly. Penelope rolls her eyes in disagreement.

  “You really do,” she fires back, and I glare at her persistence. I know I’d be better off hiring someone. I know logically my kids should be going to school, or at least having a trained professional teach them, but it’s hard to subject them to strangers. Logic, however, is one thing, and emotions are entirely another. I know I won’t be a good teacher, and I know between work and managing the land that lessons would be sporadic. I also know there’s pain, violence, and fear in the world too. Anything could happen at any time. I don’t want to send my two children out into that alone, unprepared to defend themselves. And letting just anyone into my home is out of the question. I’m nowhere near ready to invite someone into our lives. Plus, tutors and nannies are usually women. If I hired a man, I wouldn’t trust him, not after what happened to Rebecca, and if I hired a woman, I’m afraid my kids would get too attached.

  My strongest fear, the one that holds me tight when I try to sleep at night is that I might forget or unintentionally replace Rebecca. Evie and Jackson were so young when she died that they don’t remember her. The kids were just infants at the time. Evie only has fleeting memories of her face. I’ve shown them both pictures and told them a couple stories, but it’ll never be enough to express how much she loved them and how I loved her. Rebecca’s family was a non-presence in her life. If I forgot her, that’s it— her memory is gone forever. So, I’m hesitant to do anything to disrupt my life, to invite anyone in who might occupy any sliver of space she once had.

  “They need school and tutoring,” I say. “And they need food and shelter, and they need a father, and I’m going to do it all myself.”

  “Come hell or high water?” Penelope asks, unconvinced.

  I clap her on the back. “That’s the spirit,” I say. “By God, I’m a jack-of-all-trades,” I quip.

  “Well, don’t come crying to me when they can’t add two plus two by the time they’re sixteen,” Penelope teases. Evie looks up at her, her brow creased.

  “Is it seven?” she asks.

  Penelope motions to her, as if this proves her point. “See?” Penelope says. “Look, just consider it.”

  “I don’t need to,” I reply.

  She pats me on the cheek. “I know,” she says. “But at least pretend you will.” She claps her hands together, making Evie and Jackson both snap their heads up to look at her. “Alright, this place is pitiful. Who wants to go into town and get a real meal?”

  “Me!” Evie shouts, raising her hand at the same time Jackson exclaims, “I do! I do!” I pinch my sister’s arm.

  “Hey,” Penelope says, pulling away from me. “When was the last time you ate something you didn’t make yourself?”

  “Last time you were here,” Evie answers before I can lie on our behalves. I glare at her, but she just grins back. She’s too damn honest, which makes me both proud and frustrated.

  “Alright, let’s go. Everyone in the truck,” Penelope orders. She scoots off the bench and stands, stretching out, popping the joints in her back before she offers a hand up to me. “Pretend to think about it?”

  “Sure,” I say to amuse her. “Now are you gonna feed me lunch or what?”

  “Oh, now he wants lunch,” Penelope says. She breaks into a sprint before I can catch her, laughing as she runs out the front door.

  2

  Kacee

  I crack one eye open. The sun smacks me in the face, and I groan, rolling away from the window and burying my face back into my pillow. I lay there, motionless, for another full minute before sighing and lifting my head.

  “Why are you so bright?” I ask the sun then flop onto my back, staring up at the ceiling. After a bit of introspection, I grab my phone and check the time. It’s 10:37. I ignore the unread text messages and drop my phone onto the bed and scrub both hands over my face. Sleeping in is still a new concept for me.

  I used to be a nanny, up until two weeks ago. I worked for a European family for over a year. The family is German, and I studied the language while I was in college, so we had hit it off right away. Since I had gone to college to learn early childhood education, working with kids comes naturally to me. I rack up experience and certificates like it’s my hobby, and when the Millers were hiring, I was the most qualified candidate.

  The Millers had to return to Germany because Mr. Miller’s job only required them to be in the United States for a year. I miss him and his wife
, but I miss their children even more—Lauren, Emily, and Lucas. Two girls and their little brother, all three of them under the age of nine. I loved every day I spent with them, and I miss them every time I think of them. I had quickly become a part of their family, and we all cried when they told me they were moving back home.

  I sigh again. After the Millers left, I was somewhat excited to have my free time back for a while. I had saved up a lot of money while I was working for them, and I had used the past two weeks as a stay-cation. My best friend, Penelope, and I had gone to the beach a few times and shopped in town, but mostly I lounged around my apartment catching up on Netflix shows. It’s been relaxing and refreshing.

  However, now I’m bored and need to get myself back out there. Penelope told me to get a hobby, but my hobby is taking care of children. That really is my favorite thing to do. I love playing and creating and being silly with them. I don’t exactly know what to do when I’m not doing that, so I don’t know how to structure my days without revolving everything around my job.

  I force myself to get up out of bed and make myself a cup of coffee. I pull out my phone again and check my unread text messages. There’s one from my mom asking how I’m doing, but I ignore it to deal with later. My parents and I aren’t always on the best of terms. We all love each other, but we don’t quite connect on an emotional level, which makes for stressful phone calls.

  I see I have a text from Penelope asking if I’m around. I return her text then go back to sipping my coffee. My phone buzzes almost right away.

  Penelope: Up for a guest?

  I look around my apartment and decide it’s clean enough.

  Kacee: Sure!

  *

  Penelope: Sweet! I’ll be right there.

  I send back a smiley face emoji and get myself a bowl of cereal, and realize I really need to go grocery shopping.

  By the time Penelope shows up, I’m halfway through a bowl of Froot Loops. She lets herself in with her key and flicks on the light in the living room.

  “Don’t mind me, I’m just here to remind you to live,” Penelope says, dropping herself into the other chair at the kitchen table. She looks around. “Damn, I forget you have no sense of style sometimes. This place looks like a barn, and a spaceship had a baby.”