Page 52 of Mr. Wolfe's Nanny

“We’re getting a tree, too?!” Ryder whoops when his father nods.

“Can we get a puppy, Daddy?” Jill pleads, watching the dogs with the same intensity as her father. “I’ve always wanted a puppy!”

“We don’t have any puppies up for adoption right now, little lady,” Mrs. Hoskins says, leading us towards the barn where Santa is. “We will come spring more than likely though. But we do have a few grown dogs up for adoption, mostly companion animals who didn’t make the cut.”

“Didn’t make the cut?” Theo inquires.

“Yeah, some for the blind and some for people with other sorts of issues. The training is rigorous and not every dog makes it, no matter what a good girl or boy they are. We’re always happy to give ‘em a home if needed. Like Marilyn, there.”

“Marilyn?” I repeat. I’ve never met a dog named Marilyn.

“The Yellow Lab. Mr. Hoskins has always had a thing for blondes.” Mrs. Hoskins pats at her hair which is graying but was clearly once blonde and I smile. “He named her for Marilyn Monroe. Come along, kids. Let’s go find Mister-er, I mean, Santa!” Mrs. Hoskins says.

Theo and I trail behind the trio. “Did you ever have a dog?” I ask.

“Yeah, a Lab, like Marilyn actually. Ours was named Decker. He was the best boy.” Ah, it’s rare but I love his boyish smile. “Did you?”

“No, Isa had allergy issues when she was small and my parents wouldn’t risk it. So, no dog. I always wanted one though. So, you had Decker the Lab as a kid?”

“Uh huh. My… you know Oliver’s my half-brother, I think?” I nod. “My parents separated for a couple of years when I was five. Jonathan was four.”

“That must’ve been difficult.”

“Not for Jonathan and I so much. He was barely ever home when we were little. Always working, perpetually scowling over something. Forgot our birthdays a time or two even.”

“Oh goodness.” My own father was so attentive that sometimes I forget not everyone grows up so lucky.

“When they separated, our granddad sent him to the New York office for a time to work, figuring absence might make his son’s heart grow fonder or something. But instead, that’s when my dad had an affair with Oliver’s mother.”

“Your poor mom.”

“Yeah. I’ve been told the gossip rags at the time had a field day with it. Mom came from a wealthy family like him. She’d been raised to be the ideal society wife. She was only twenty-two when she married Dad and was eight months pregnant with me by their first anniversary. Jonathan was born a few months after their second anniversary. She focused on being a mom to two preschool-aged kids while he worked ridiculous hours and… well, things kept going downhill between them. After he left, she became sort of obsessed with us having as normal a childhood as possible.”

“Many children grow up in homes without both parents.”

“I know. But Mom had a lot of insecurities that obviously her two little boys weren’t aware of. She felt isolated. Her parents had retired to Florida. Her friends were all part of the country club mindset. She lived a stone’s throw from her in-laws. She was close to them but he was their son. It was a very hard time for her.”

“I can imagine.” Wife and mother at a young age, marriage on the rocks, husband having an affair, stuck living near his family. It’s hard to picture looking at the confident woman she is now but that just goes to show you can’t know what a person’s been through just by looking.

“Anyway, she got us Decker that summer after he left. Honestly, I can’t tell you which of the three of us loved that dog more.”

“Would you want a dog again someday?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. But I work a lot of hours and it may get worse before it gets better during the change over when Dad retires. I don’t want to dump more responsibilities on my staff because, let’s be real, the kids will only manage so much of a pet’s care.”

He’s not wrong but it would be sweet to see this family grow with a furry friend. “One of the first things Jill told me the day we met was that she wanted a puppy or a kitty.”

Theo smiles but says no more of it.

I’ll admit I’m curious for myself about Mrs. Hoskins’s not-quite-ready-to-be companion dogs. Were any of them trained to work with PTSD patients? One of my past therapists had suggested I look into them but I’d felt unprepared for the responsibility at the time.

Are you prepared now? You’re not even living in your own place. It’d be Theo’s dog in Theo’s house with his children.

These are not things I can figure out today but, thankfully, it’s irrelevant at the moment because we’ve joined the short queue for Santa by now and all talk of dog ownership comes to a halt.

“What are you asking Santa to bring you, baby?” Theo asks Jill as we get closer.

“A baby,” the little girl answers with her irresistible elfin grin.

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