“I actually broke in here. I’m a burglar—”
“I’m Lucy, it’s nice to meet you! Are you here to tell me about the babies? Oh! Are you my coworker? It would be just like Blanche to have a manny, so progressive of her.”
I give Lucy a wide berth as I move past the living room toward the bedroom, noting the streaky yellow paint on the walls of the hallway as she continues talking.
“She didn’t tell me I could paint,technically,and it’s more color than I would usually go for, but bold colors are important for babies’ brains, I think, and it was sodrabin here before!”
Before I reach the bedroom, I see garbage bags in a heaping, haphazard pile. Based on the arm of my leather jacket I can see sticking out of one, they contain the contents of my wardrobe that I had already moved in. BecauseI live here.
A glance into the bedroom reveals a more palatable light-blue comforter barely visible beneath an impressive pile of women’s clothing strewn about.
“Do you know how we’re going to split the babies? One for me and two for you? Or swap around so they don’t get too attached to one of us? Maybe it’s better for them to attach and feel more secure…I really only signed up for one, so hopefully the twins are mainly your responsibility.”
She finally notices that I haven’t said a word. What emotion she interprets from my face is anyone’s guess. Confusion, disdain, and weariness would all be accurate.
“Sorry! I don’t even know who you are. For all I know, you might be one of the Sinclairs, and these might be your babies I’m talking about!”
I have nothing to say, so I drop my bag onto the couch and lean against the wall of the entryway, realizing as I see her wince that it’s coated in wet paint.I should’ve seen that coming.As she apologizes, I pull my shirt off, enjoying the way she sputters and finally stops talking.If I knew that was the secret to shutting her up…maybe I should just continue to strip, and she’ll leave.
Her eyes travel quickly down my torso before popping back up to look over my shoulder, and a blush heats her cheeks. She turns to the kitchen, showing me an absolutely delectable ass that’s not at all contained by her shorts.
“Do you want a baby?”
Alright, not done with baby talk yet.
“I mean, you can have my baby if you want. I’m probably not qualified to do this alone. We could share…”
I’ve heard enough. I leave the crazy baby lady in her headache-inducing sunshine-vomit of a house and head out the front door. It slams behind me, but I’m already picking up pace toward the main house, determined to find Blanche and see exactly who she let into my cottage.
“Darling! I wasn’t expecting you so soon. That’s alright, I’ve already started putting out the food. And look at you, I see you’ve found your wardrobe for most of the film!” Blanche kisses both of my cheeks before ushering me to a sideboard filled with finger foods.
“I didn’t know you were expecting me at all,” I admit, shoving a deviled egg in my mouth and wondering why these weren’t a thing in our house growing up. So good, and they make an event seem, I don’t know…fancy.
“Well, I would have thought that Lucy would tell you! I left a note for her this morning that I wanted to have lunch with both of you. Isn’t she just darling? I mean, perfection for what I have in mind—”
“Yeah, Blanche. Listen. I need to tell you that there’s a crazy person in your cottage.” I feel bad about interrupting her, but if we need to call the psych people or whoever would come help in this situation, we need to get the ball rolling during business hours. Maybe there’s a human version of animal control we could call…
“There she is! Lucy, you look like you’ve made yourself right at home! I’m so glad you’ve had the chance to meet my dear Sashaalready,” Blanche gushes as she shoulders past me to greet the new arrival. “The two of you are simply perfect as Henry and me!”
Sighing, I turn to see exactly who I expected. She threw on a yellow sundress but didn’t wash the yellow paint off her face, so the effect is “interrupted while dressing up as sunshine for Halloween.”
Pure confusion flashes across Sunshine’s face.
“Me and Sasha? You and Henry? Your son?” she asks. Blanche moves back to the food and piles a plate high, gesturing wildly as she does.
“Oh, you’re a hoot! No, my dear! Sasha is my perfectly cast late husband, Henry Jr., and you, of course, are the beautiful…me! In my telling of our love story! It’s what you auditioned for,” Blanche says as she shoves a heaping plate into Sunshine’s hands before turning to fill another. I eat another deviled egg and wait until one of them manages to figure out what’s going on.
“I don’t understand…what about the babies? I showed up to a job interview yesterday, and you handed me a baby! I assumed you were hiring me as a nanny…and Sasha was the…other nanny. The manny. Male nanny…”
She shoves a cucumber sandwich into her mouth as if to physically stop herself from saying anything else, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t even slow her down. Blanche has her head thrown back laughing, though, which saves Sunshine from having to carry the conversation.
“The nanny! I’ve never heard such a thing. Darling, there is no world in which you are qualified to nanny my grandbabies. You aren’t trained in early childhood education, and you aren’t certified in attachment styles. Do you know infant CPR?”
She blinks owlishly at Blanche.
“You’re here, my dear, because you have skin I wish I had at your age and an ass Idefinitelyhad. You’re to be me! Opposite Sasha. In my life’s work! An avant-garde tale of the love story of the millennium! Of course, we won’t be sharing our little project with my family just yet. We’ll tell them that you and Sasha are serving as my assistants for now. They’ve learned over the years that it’s best not to ask too many questions.”
Sunshine swallows her third petit four and cuts her eyes to me. “I just…I thought this was all about the babies.”
