“Bria, sweetie…” Nick croaks. I see Bria withdraw, and she pulls away from Nick, backing into their room. I put my face in my hands. I feel so guilty. Like we’ve been caught doing something totally wrong. Which, in a way, we kind of were. “Bria!” Nick yells, and I look up. Bria has wrenched the balcony door open in their room, and she’s running out onto the beach.
“Let me,” I urge, pushing past Nick and running after Bria. I hear Nick following me.
“Bria!” I scream, running through the sand, and I catch up with her twenty feet away. I fall down into the sand beside her and pull her into a hug. “I’m sorry,” I whisper into her ear. Nick stands about five feet away.
“Why were you kithing my daddy? You’re not my mommy.”
“Bria, it’s hard to explain.”
“Tell me,” she says, whimpering.
“Okay…” I look up at Nick, but he’s just pacing nervously. “Your daddy and I…” I don’t even know what to say. That’s the awful thing. How do you tell a barely five-year-old that you’re going to start dating their father? Especially when you started as their caregiver? “Your daddy and I are dating, Bria. Do you remember when Belle and the Beast did all of those nice things together?”
She nods, and I see tears start to pour down her face.
“But… what about Mommy?” she wails, and my heart breaks. I motion for Nick, but he just stands there, terrified. I’m sure he has no idea what to say in this situation, either. Both of us were clearly in over our heads about telling her. She backs away from me. “Will you thtill be my nanny?” she sobs, and I nod my head yes.
“But in a different way. I’m going to be… less of a nanny, and more a part of your family. Is that okay with you?”
“Are you going to replace mommy?”
I lean forward and look at her in the eyes.
“No. Never. No one can ever replace your mommy.”
“Good. I don’t want you to,” she says, and runs towards Nick. “I don’t want Evi to replace Mommy,” she wails, and Nick scoops her up.
I wipe away the tears that have spilled from my eyes, and I clutch my heart.
Ouch.
“Let’s go inside,” Nick says, hushing Bria as she cries into his shirt. He gives me one last glance, and he shakes his head curtly.
No.
That’s what the gesture says.
This can never happen now.
I follow behind them, feeling like the world’s biggest asshole, even though I know it’s no one’s fault. I go into my bedroom and lock the connecting door.
Bria doesn’t want Nick to be with me, and I know we’re both going to respect her opinion, even if it means walking away from each other.
I proceed to fall down into my bed and cry into my pillow until I fall asleep.
Thirtyeight.
Nick
Mexico makes me stupid.
That’s what I tell myself as we board the plane back to Seattle. Don’t get me wrong. I definitely don’t regret doing anything I did with Evi. If anything, last night solidified my feelings for her, so much so, that I’ve come to realize a few things.
She can’t continue to be Bria’s nanny. I know that fact alone will devastate Bria.
And she can’t be my girlfriend yet. Bria still needs time to get used to the idea.
We’ve gotten ourselves into quite the predicament. My feelings for her overshadowed common sense, and we should’ve just said good night and called it a night. We could’ve introduced Bria to the idea slowly, over the course of a few weeks. That’s what we should’ve done. Instead, I’m left with a daughter who constantly asks questions about Evi and I, and as far as I can tell, she does not want Evi to stop being her nanny, ever.
Obviously, there’s an easy solution, but asking Evi to become a stepmother is overstepping. We’ve only gone on one date so far, and that would be months… years… into the future. As much as I’ve thought about it, she’s still so young. There’s still so much of the world that she needs to see. By dating me, she would essentially be inheriting a child, and that’s heavy for a twenty-five-year-old.