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Back The Nesting Save as PDF
Chapters (56)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Acclaim for The Nesting
  4. Dedication
  5. Epigraph
  6. Prologue
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  48. Acknowledgements
  49. Author Note
  50. Keep Reading …
  51. LIV, 1998
  52. II
  53. III
  54. About the Author
  55. Also by C.J. Cooke
  56. About the Publisher

Can you start on Monday?

Warmly,

Tom

Antler artwork   4   Antler artwork

THE NANNY

Now

I could not believe it.

I had to scroll up and down a few times to make sure there was no P.S. Just kidding, loser! at the bottom of the email. I even zoomed in on the email address to make sure it was from that Tom, the same Tom with the crinkly grey eyes behind rimless glasses, the same Tom whose sadness had swirled around the room when his baby girl said ‘Ma-ma’, and then I had to say the email out loud to check that I wasn’t getting the wrong end of the stick – ‘can you start on Monday?’ really did mean ‘we’re offering you the job’, didn’t it?

I clapped my hand to my mouth and gave a little scream. I thought I’d come across a little too wired-to-the-moon, especially when Maren was asking all the questions about my nursing degree and vegan cookery.

Speaking of which, I had five days to learn everything I could about veganism, and I figured I ought to brush up on some first aid … When I managed to get my hand to stop shaking I emailed back and said I’d be delighted to accept the job, and a reply came back shortly after saying that he was delighted too, and that details of the flight I’d need to book to Norway would follow shortly after from Maren, as well as money to pay for it.

I could hardly keep still in my seat. It was as if every emotion in existence had come blasting into the train carriage in a torrent, drenching me and leaving me gasping for air. I always did feel things a little stronger than the next person, but usually it was Bad Feelings that I felt strongly. I’d basically gone through life like a dandelion clock, blown to smithereens over and over by an endless series of misfortunes that gusted into my life. But now – now – things seemed to be actually working out, and while it wasn’t a feeling I was accustomed to, it was the best high ever.

A woman sat in the seat opposite staring at her phone with a frown, and I desperately wanted to reach across the table and shake her by the shoulders, screaming, I’ve got somewhere to live! Isn’t that great? And I wanted to shout about how I felt this was meant to be, that those little girls needed me in their lives and that the book I was writing was going to basically write itself, now that I was going to live in Norway surrounded by moody fjords and sinister, abandoned fishing villages.