Chapter 10
LEO
Stanley’s stationed at the front desk like always, bent over the sports section with a pencil wedged between his fingers and his reading glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose.
The lobby is quiet except for the faint hum of the elevator cables and the occasional hiss of rain against the glass doors.
He’s got that look—the one he wears when the crossword puzzle has him cornered.
His brow is furrowed deep, lips pressed together in concentration, and his thumb is worrying the eraser end of the pencil like he’s trying to summon an answer through sheer friction.
“Evening, Professor,” he murmurs, not looking up. Which is how I know he’s truly stumped. When Stanley’s stuck, the whole world could walk through that revolving door and he wouldn’t register a thing until he’d filled in that final square.
“Evening, Stanley.”
He taps the pencil against the newsprint, a soft percussive rhythm. “You’re good with words, yeah?” He doesn’t wait for confirmation. “Seven letters. ‘Pertaining to the stars.’”
“Stellar.”
He writes it in immediately, the graphite scratching against paper, and then he lifts his head and his whole face rearranges itself.
That delighted grin emerges from beneath years of creases and silver stubble, crinkling the corners of his eyes, transforming him from a man doing his job into someone who’s just solved a small but meaningful mystery.
“That’s it! That’s the one!” He sets the pencil down with ceremony.
“You’re a lifesaver, Professor. I was sitting here chewing on ‘astral’ for the better part of fifteen minutes, but that’s six letters and it wasn’t sitting right with the down clues.
You ever have that? When a word’s almost right but your gut tells you it’s not? ”
“Every day,” I say.
He chuckles, that warm rumbling sound that seems to originate somewhere behind his sternum.
Then he folds the newspaper with careful, practiced motions—a man who’s handled paper for decades—and sets it aside.
His hand reaches into the little ceramic bowl he keeps perpetually full on the corner of his desk, that inexplicable cornucopia of hard candies that no one has ever seen him replenish but which never runs empty.
Gold foil wrappers catch the lobby light as his fingers sift through the assortment.
He extracts a Werther’s Original with the precision of a surgeon. “For the little miss,” he says, holding it out to me with that same crinkled grin. “Tell her Stanley says hello.”
I take the candy, feel its weight in my palm. “I always do.”
“I know you do.” He settles back into his chair, the leather creaking beneath him. “She’s a good kid, that one. Got spirit. You keep her spirited, you hear me? Don’t let nobody dull that shine.”
That’s one way to put it, I think, but I just smile and pocket the candy. “Have a good weekend, Stanley.”
“You too, Professor. You too.”
I take the elevator up to the fourth floor, and as the numbers tick by I realize I’m actually excited about this weekend in a way I haven’t been in months.
It’s Friday, which means two full days with Emma.
I’m planning to take her to Blockbuster tomorrow and let her rent whatever VHS tapes she wants—probably The Little Mermaid again, she never gets tired of that one, and maybe something new if she’s feeling adventurous.
Tonight we’re doing pizza, her choice of toppings, and I’m not going to fight her if she wants pineapple even though pineapple on pizza is objectively wrong.
I’ve missed her. I know I see her every evening and every weekend, but I miss her all the same.
I miss her questions, the ones that come rapid-fire and unannounced: Do worms have birthdays?
Who decided which letters go together? I miss the gap in her front teeth when she smiles, that little window she’ll grow out of someday but hasn’t yet.
But here’s what’s surprised me this week—I haven’t been worried.
Not the way I was with the other nannies, where I’d spend the entire day bracing for a phone call telling me that there’s been an incident, that Emma had done something terrible or that they were quitting, effective immediately.
But Annie’s done spectacularly well these last couple days.
Better than well, actually. And Emma’s been… different.
Not drastically different, not like she’s suddenly a completely new kid, but there are small changes.
She’s been less explosive in the evenings.
Usually when I come home she’s wound up and testy, ready to argue about bedtime or dinner or whatever arbitrary thing has set her off.
But this week she’s been calmer, more regulated.
Still Emma—still stubborn, still opinionated, still occasionally difficult—but without that hair-trigger quality she’s had since Rebecca left.
And she talks about Annie constantly.
Thursday night she spent twenty minutes telling me about Annie’s outfit—apparently Annie wore overalls and a striped shirt and “looked like she could be in a magazine, Daddy.” Wednesday it was about how Annie can do a British accent and they pretended to be fancy ladies having tea with the stuffed animals.
Thursday she told me Annie doesn’t like cantaloupe either, which apparently created this deep bond between them that I don’t fully understand but Emma treated like a major revelation.
The apartment’s been different, too. Always tidy when I get home, dishes done and drying in the rack, Emma’s toys put away in their bins, laundry folded neatly and stacked on Emma’s dresser.
Which is impressive, and I appreciate it, but it’s also slightly baffling because I distinctly remember Wednesday morning when Annie stared at my gas stove like it was alien technology and couldn’t figure out how to crack an egg without getting the shell everywhere.
It’s a little strange, if I’m being honest. The contrast between someone who doesn’t know how to work a stove and someone who’s running my household with apparent ease.
It makes me curious about her background, about where she came from and why she’s here.
Most people in their early twenties have at least basic cooking skills, or at the very least have turned on a stove before. Most people know how to crack an egg.
But Annie looked genuinely lost that first morning, and I don’t think she was faking it.
Our interactions this week have been brief.
Hellos when I leave in the morning, goodbyes when I get home in the evening.
Sometimes she’ll give me a quick rundown of the day—Emma ate all her lunch, Emma loved the park, Emma asked about her mom but seemed okay after we talked about it—but mostly she just waves and leaves, like she’s trying to stay out of my way.
Maria called me yesterday and asked how the new nanny was working out. When I said she was doing great, Maria asked what if I learned anything new about her, and I realized the answer was not really, that I didn’t really know anything beyond her name and the fact that she needs this job.
“You should get to know her,” Maria said. “It’s weird not to. She’s not a cleaning service you hired once a month. She’s in your home. With your child.”
Which is true, but there’s also the question of appropriateness.
She’s my employee. I’m her employer. The relationship has defined parameters, professional boundaries that exist for good reasons.
Asking personal questions could be misinterpreted as intrusive.
Or worse, as interest I have no business expressing.
Although it does seem strange not to know anything about the person who’s going to be spending forty-plus hours a week with my daughter.
I’m still turning this over in my head when the elevator dings and the doors open on my floor.
When I walk into the apartment, I find Annie and Emma at the kitchen table with photographs scattered everywhere—covering the entire surface, some overlapping, creating this mosaic of their week that I wasn’t part of.
Emma’s standing on a chair to better survey the spread, her small fingers hovering over the images like she’s curating an exhibition.
Annie’s beside her, one hand steadying the chair, her face tilted up toward Emma’s animated monologue.
“…and this one is my favorite because look at the pigeon, he’s so fat! Why is he so fat? Do you think he eats hot dogs every day? Because we saw him eating the hot dog, remember? That man dropped the whole hot dog and the pigeon just ate it right there and everyone was so mad—”
She’s radiant. Not just happy—radiant. Her voice is bright, her laughter frequent and genuine, not the polite acknowledgment adults usually offer children. She’s actually laughing, the kind that catches in her throat and escapes in surprised bursts.
I hang my coat on the hook by the door and Annie’s head turns at the sound of my footsteps. Emma’s does too, and then she’s running at me full speed, arms outstretched, crashing into my legs with enough force that I have to take a step back to keep my balance.
“Daddy!” She wraps her arms around my leg and squeezes. “You’re home!”
I lean down and kiss the top of her head, her blonde curls soft and smelling like the strawberry shampoo we use. “I am. Did you have a good day?”
“The best!” She’s already pulling on my hand, dragging me toward the kitchen table. “Annie got the pictures developed! The ones we took for our list! Come see, come see!”
“Ah.” I let her pull me along. “The list.”
I know the list. It’s been hanging in the middle of the fridge all week—bright, colorful, covered in Emma’s drawings and crayon scribbles.
She talks about it constantly. What they found today, what they’re looking for tomorrow, how many things are left.
I have to admit, it’s a pretty clever idea.
The sort of thing that turns mundane errands into adventures, which seems to be Annie’s specialty, according to Emma.