Crazy About the Baumgartners (12 page)

“You
know
what I want,” she cried.

“Yes,”
he replied softly. “I want Gretchen too.”

I
felt my heart swell at this revelation. Was it really true? They did love me?
They did want me? It was just Mrs. B’s fear of some social worker coming along
and taking the baby because they found out the Baumgartners were polyamorous
that was keeping them from acting on it? Not that I blamed her, really. The social
worker who had been assigned to the Baumgartners was a very straight-laced
sort. She reminded me, in many ways, of a young Maureen Holmes. And the
requirements and background checks and home visits had been extensive and
rigorous.

Mrs.
B was right—if we were all lovers and anyone did find out, they would
take Holly back. I closed my eyes, feeling tears stinging my eyes. I couldn’t
risk them losing the baby. I would never do that. I wasn’t going to jeopardize
Holly’s future for my own selfish pleasure. So once again, the thing I wanted
most, I couldn’t have.

“We
can’t, Doc,” Mrs. B said, and I nodded in agreement, feeling tears slipping
down onto my pillow.

“Yes
we can.” Doc’s words didn’t change my mind—and I knew they wouldn’t
change hers either. But what he said next made me doubt. “What we can’t do is
live our whole lives afraid of something that may or may not happen. What kind
of life is that?”

“I
don’t know,” she said with a sigh. “I wish I knew what to do.”

She
said she didn’t know, but she did. I knew too. Even if Doc wanted something
different—even if we all did—there were more important things.

That’s
what I told myself as I buried my face in my pillow and cried myself to
sleep. 

I
don’t know why I was surprised when we ran into Maureen Holmes at Dairy Queen.
They vacationed in Key West every year around Christmas. What should have
surprised me was the fact that it had taken so long for the Baumgartners to run
into her the first time. Still, when we ended up in line together, it was more
than a little awkward, for so many reasons, not the least of which was the fact
she’d fired me, and the Baumgartners had turned right around and hired me.

And,
of course, there was also the fact that now I knew what Maureen Holmes looked
like without her clothes on.

Awkward.

Especially
since Doc and Mrs. B and the baby stayed in the car while I took Janie and
Henry up to the window to get ice cream. I decided to just pretend I didn’t see
them, but that didn’t work for long because Janie recognized Rebecca Holmes and
struck up a conversation with her, and Henry then started talking to Rebecca’s
brother, Isaac, and Mrs. Holmes had to notice me then. It took her a minute.
Not to place me, I don’t think—she recognized me when she looked at
me—but to make some sort of sense of why I was paying for the Baumgarter
kids’ ice cream. Thankfully, the Baumgartners saw what was going on and got out
of the car, bringing the baby with them.

“Maureen!”
Mrs. B smiled brightly, Holly on her hip as she approached. “How are you?”

“Hello.”
Maureen gave her a smile back, although it wasn’t quite as bright. “I assume
you’re at the time-share?”

Doc
hung back, watching, not saying anything. He just nodded to Mrs. Holmes and half-smiled,
although it didn’t reach his eyes. The kids were already gathered in a little
group, the girls talking about boys, and the boys talking about sports. Janie
and Henry loved Key West, but the older they got, the less they got along, and
they really missing having friends around. And I missed it for them, because I
had to break up and redirect the constant bickering or we’d all go insane.

“Yes,
same old place.” Mrs. B laughed, bouncing the baby. The sun was in Holly’s
eyes—she must have taken her hat off in the car—and she was fussy.
“Are you, James and the kids here for long?”

“Just
a few weeks.” Maureen tucked her short hair behind her ear, glancing over at
the kids. They’d gravitated to one of the picnic tables, girls on one side,
boys on the other, chatting between licks of ice cream. “You know, our church
does a vacation kids camp here every year.”

“Oh
that’s right.” Mrs. B used her hand to shade the baby’s eyes, but Holly was now
fussy and didn’t want to be soothed.

“Here,
I’ll take her, so you can talk.” I held my arms out for the baby and Mrs. B
handed her over.

“So,
Gretchen is working for you now?” Maureen Holmes gave me a cool glance as I
carried the baby, putting her up over my shoulder—a position she loved,
because she could see everything—as I walked toward the picnic tables to
join the kids.

“What
does a nosey pepper do?” Henry asked.

The
kids all looked at him, then at each other, their ice cream cones in various
states of melting in the hot, Florida sun.

“Gets
jalapeno business!” Henry exclaimed and everyone cracked up.

I
smiled, rolling my eyes, glancing back at the Baumgartners and Mrs. Holmes. I
couldn’t help looking at her differently since I’d now seen her naked. Granted,
those photos had been taken years ago, but still. I couldn’t believe that girl
and this woman were the same person. The Mrs. Holmes I knew thought sex was
exclusively for procreation and that anything else was a sin. I think their
religious ideas mostly came from her husband, who seemed even more into it than
Mrs. Holmes. At least she slipped up once in a while and took the Lord’s name
in vain or let profanity slip, but I’d never even heard James Holmes say
“goshdarn” let alone “goddamn.”

I
couldn’t imagine restricting myself to the level that the Holmes’ had. Not only
could they not have sex unless they were making babies—and Mrs. Holmes
couldn’t have any more kids, had had a hysterectomy due to a cancer scare years
ago—I couldn’t figure out what they said to each other when they were
having sex? How did you fuck without saying, “Oh God!” at least once? I don’t
know, maybe it was okay to say it in the middle of sex, if you were praising
Him? I didn’t think the Holmes’ even had sex anymore, since Mrs. Holmes’
operation. I’d never heard them, in the entire time I’d lived with them.

Mostly,
I felt sorry for the kids. Isaac and Rebecca were spoiled rotten brats, but it
wasn’t their fault. They had to live with Maureen and James Holmes. I thought
they would have been better off adopted out somewhere rather than have to live
under that kind of repression. They were going to grow up to either be just
like their parents and raise repressed kids just like them, or they were going
to go absolutely wild once they got out of the house. I was betting in the
latter. In fact, I once told Ronnie I thought Becca Holmes would end up
pregnant before she was out of her teens. Probably sooner rather than later.

“I’ll
ask my mom if we can go!” Janie said excitedly, already hopping up off the
picnic table. I hadn’t been paying attention to what they were talking about,
but I put a hand on her shoulder, sitting her back down.

“Ask
your mom what?”

“Becca
said there’s a huge fair, today and tomorrow! They have face painting and a
bouncy house and rides and everything!”

I
glanced up to see the “adults” were still talking, but they were moving closer
to us, walking toward the picnic table.

“Can
we go, Gretchen?” Henry asked. “Please? Pretty please? Ask Mom for us! She’ll
listen to you.”

“I’m
not sure if you really want to go to this fair,” I said, frowning.

I
knew exactly what they were talking about. The Holmes’ church—which
wasn’t really a church at all, more of an offshoot of a regular church that had
gone all cult—sponsored a trip every year to Key West for the kids. There
was a week-long camp where they played games, sang songs, swam with dolphins,
memorized Bible verses, and prayed a lot, and in the end, they had a big
celebration where they hired clowns and had fair rides and all sorts of things
kids love.

The
kids earned “points” all week long to “spend” at this fair. One of the ways to
get the most points was to bring non-religious friends with you to camp, or
even to the fair at the end. They believed that teaching children their beliefs
from a very young age was the best way to convert them to the “ways of Christ.”
I’d heard it enough when I lived with the Holmes’—had pretended to be
“saved” myself, so I wouldn’t have to listen to Mrs. Holmes proselytizing all
the time. They’d only hired me because they’d known my aunt and thought I was
already part of their religion. My aunt had died—complications of
Lupus—the year before I got the job, so they had no idea I was lying
through my teeth.

“I
know the kids would just love it!” Maureen smiled at Janie and Henry, standing
behind her own daughter, petting her dark head. “I can have them back
tomorrow.”

“We
can go?” Janie was bouncing in her seat.

“Please,
Mom!” Henry was already begging. “Please! Please!”

Mrs.
B looked at Doc. He shrugged, an
“it’s up to you”
sort of gesture.

“I
guess I don’t see why not…” Mrs. B hesitated, glancing at me.

I
shrugged too.

It
wouldn’t kill Janie and Henry to be around the Holmes’ for a day or two. You
didn’t get converted in a day. And if I knew those two, they’d come home with
all sorts of rancor at the idea of anyone trying to convince them to do or
believe anything. I didn’t like Maureen Holmes, and she didn’t like
me—not anymore, not since she’d found condoms in my purse and fired me
for assuming I was having premarital sex, which I was, but that wasn’t the
point—but I didn’t think she was evil or anything. Just sadly misguided
and slightly delusional, like most fundamentally religious folks.

“Great,
I can pick them up in an hour.” Maureen glanced at her watch. “Same old place?”

“Yep,
same old place.” Carrie smiled. “It was good to see you, Maureen.”

The
kids couldn’t sit still the entire ride home. They couldn’t talk about anything
but the fair and playing with the Holmes’ kids. I helped Mrs. B pack an
overnight bag for each of them.

“Gretchen,
are you okay with them going?” she asked as we carried the bags downstairs,
putting them on the kitchen table.

The
kids were out back, working on their sand village. They build one every year,
and it got more and more elaborate. This year, there was a castle with a moat.

“I
know they didn’t treat you very well.” She went to the refrigerator to get a
wine cooler. “But she is an old friend.”

“It’s
fine, Mrs. B.”

“Will
you please start calling me Carrie?” She brought two wine coolers over to the
table, handing me one.

“Sorry,”
I apologize for forgetting—again—about her request. “Um, I
shouldn’t be drinking this, should I?”

“One
wine cooler won’t hurt you.” She winked, clinking her glass with mine. “We’ll
be without kids for the night. Well, almost. And Holly’s finally started
sleeping through.”

I
took a swig from the bottle, loving the fruity burn down my throat.

“We
were really close once, you know,” she told me.

I
nodded. I knew just how close they’d been.

“What
happened?” I asked.

“She
was engaged to James at the time. The man she’s married to now. For a while, I
thought they might break up. That she might… I don’t know, break free of that
life?”

“Yeah.”
I remembered when my aunt had joined the church, how gradual the slide was into
crazy, until before you knew it, the person you once knew didn’t exist anymore.

“I
don’t mean to be judgmental.” Mrs. B drank her wine cooler, looking out the
back sliding door at the water. “If she was happy, I’d think it was wonderful
for her. I have nothing against religion or spirituality. But… does she look
happy to you?”

“Oh,
I know she isn’t.” I shook my head. “She’s a very angry, bitter person.”

“That
just makes me sad.” Mrs. B sighed. “Do you think they’ll be okay with her?”

“Oh,
they’ll be fine.” I waved her concern away. “There will be some sort of
pressure to convert, there always is. At every gathering, there’s a preacher
who does a call up to the pulpit for the unsaved to accept Jesus into their
hearts and all that. But Janie and Henry are old enough to know their own
minds. And thankfully, they’ve had your influence. They’ll be fine. And they’ll
have a blast at the fair. It is a lot of fun.”

“It
broke my heart, the way they treated you.” Mrs. B frowned. “I can’t even imagine,
firing a girl in her twenties for suspecting she was sexually active? What did
they think, you were going to be a nun?”

“No
premarital sex allowed.” I tipped my wine cooler up, taking another drink. “No
non-procreational sex actually.”

“Really?”
She hesitated, licking the top edge of her wine cooler bottle, her tongue a
soft, velvet pink. The sight of it made my ass clench. If there was a God, I
was going to hell for what I was thinking about her.

“I
don’t think they have sex at all anymore.”

She
gaped at me. “I can’t even imagine…”

“I
can’t either.” I snorted. “You know, Mrs. B…”

She
raised her eyebrows, tipping her bottle at me, and I remembered.

“Carrie…”
I corrected myself. “You and Doc have been so good to me. I can’t even thank
you enough for everything you’ve done.”

“You
don’t have to thank us, Gretchen.” She reached over, touching my hand, taking
it in hers. “The kids love you. We love you. You’re part of our family, you
know.”

“Thanks.
That means a lot. I love you guys too.” My God, if she only knew how much. “It
just… it really hit home, after seeing her again. I could still be there, in
that house, living with that. It wasn’t easy.”

“I
know, you haven’t had it easy.” Mrs. B squeezed my hand. “I’m sorry.”

“I
don’t feel sorry for myself.” I shrugged. “I count my blessings, and I’m glad
I’m here with you. I just want you to know that I won’t… I won’t do anything to
jeopardize this. It’s important to me. With the Holmes’ it was just a job. This
is more than just a job to me.”

“Gretchen,
you’re more than just a nanny to us,” she assured me, leaning closer. Her
cleavage was showing, her blouse undone three delicious buttons. “And there
will be a time, soon, when we can be… more than just friends. More than just
family.”

I
felt her knee touch mine under the table and shivered. We both knew what she
meant.

“I
hope so.” I swallowed, daring to say it. Daring to say her name and mean it. “I
love you, Carrie.”

“Oh
sweetheart, I love you too.” She smiled, lifting my hand and kissing my palm,
closing it around her kiss. “More than you know.”

Mrs.
Holmes picked up the kids, as promised, about an hour later. They were
literally bouncing off the walls by that time. Henry was actually careening
like a pinball around the house and he bolted for the door when he heard the
knock.

“I
didn’t feed them,” Mrs. B said, handing her the overnight bags. “I hope that’s
okay?”

“Oh
they’ll get plenty,” Maureen assured her. “Corn dogs and elephant ears and all
that deep fried awful fair food. They’re not allergic to anything, are they?”

I
saw her new nanny, corralling Rebecca and Isaac as they ran around in the yard
at the front of the house. She was very plain, brown hair pulled back in
ponytail, dark eyes, wearing a long sleeved blouse and long cotton skirt, even
in this heat.

“Nope,
no allergies,” Mrs. B said. “Go crazy. Do we need to send them with any money?”