Careless Mistake
by Kelli
Part 11
May 2004...
Britney woke up to the sound of the baby crying. She sat up quickly which made Justin's arm fall to her waist because it had been resting on her stomach. She reached over him and turned the monitor off because he was starting to stir and she didn't want to wake him if she didn't have to. He changed positions as she got out of bed and found a robe.
"Oh my goodness, you're beet red," Britney said as she walked over to the baby's crib. "Have you been crying long?" she asked, picking her up.
Even being held in her mommy's arms didn't seem to matter to Mackenzie. Britney sat down in the rocking chair with her and opened one side of the robe and held Mackenzie up to her breast so she could start feeding. This quieted her down immediately.
"Yeah, I knew you were just hungry," Britney said, looking down at her. "You could care less who it was right now as long as they had milk, huh?" she teased.
Britney started to rock gently and rested her head against the back of the chair.
"Oh Mackenzie, what am I going to do?" she sighed. "I love your daddy, I really do. I think I'm just scared....of what, I'm not sure. If I go back to him, this would be it though. We have you now and we'd love each other and it would be forever, I just know it would."
Mackenzie started to make that cute little noise she makes when she's nursing and Britney chuckled softly as she ran her hand over the baby's curls.
"You look a lot like your daddy. You've got the same hair," she giggled. "You've got his mouth and the shape of his face. Thank God you got my nose," she giggled again. "And you've got the shape of my eyes....still can't tell what color your eyes are going to be though. They're kind of staying that deep blue, aren't they?"
Mackenzie stared up at her mother as she talked to her.
Britney looked up when she heard a soft knock on the opened door.
"Hey....you want me to make breakfast before you go?" Justin asked.
Britney smiled at him. She couldn't help it after last night. "How much time do I have?"
"What time do you need to be there?"
"Nine."
"Then you've got plenty of time," he said, winking at her.
He walked into the room and for a second she thought he was going to lean down and kiss her but instead he kissed Mackenzie's forehead. As he was standing up he stopped right in front of Britney's face and waited until she looked at him.
"Good morning," he said before leaning in and giving her a kiss.
"Morning," she said when he pulled away.
He turned when he reached the door. "And by the way, there's nothing wrong with my nose," he teased before leaving the room.
Britney could feel herself turning red. How much of her conversation had he overheard?
A few days later Britney rushed into Justin's house. She was late for their appointment with another person interviewing for the nanny position.
"Hey, sorry I'm late," she said breathlessly as she rushed into the Great Room where Justin and a very attractive young woman where sitting and laughing. She was holding the baby.
"That's okay....I was just letting Mackenzie get to know Buffy," Justin said.
"Buffy?" Britney asked. Then she realized how she said it so she walked over to her and held out her hand. "Nice to meet you, I'm Britney."
Buffy shook Britney's hand with her free hand. "Yes, I know, it's nice to meet you. I'm a big fan of your music and stuff."
"Thanks." She looked down and held out her hands. "Give me just a minute to freshen up. The rehearsals lasted a lot longer than I anticipated and I didn't have time to shower."
"Take your time," Justin said as he stared back at Buffy and Mackenzie.
"Oh no....that would be rude," she said running out of the room.
This was probably the quickest shower she had ever taken and the whole time she kept thinking about that girl holding her baby and looking so comfortable doing it.
"Don't be stupid Britney, nanny's are supposed to be comfortable with babies."
"Did you say something?" she heard Justin ask.
"Where are you?" she yelled, staring out into the bathroom through the glass door of the shower.
"I'm in my room, I wanted to get my little card with the questions we need to ask," he said, standing in the doorway to the bathroom.
She opened the glass door slightly. "You left her down there alone.....with our baby?" she whispered angrily.
Justin gave her a lazy look and shook his head before leaving the room.
"Arghhhh," she said, closing the door to resume her shower.
When she got back downstairs Justin was holding the baby now. He was feeding her from a bottle.
"How long are you going to breastfeed?" Buffy asked her.
"Um, I'm not sure actually. I was hoping to do it as long as I could but it's not very comfortable dancing," she said screwing her nose up.
Justin's head shot up. "I didn't know that."
"Yeah, I have to stop and pump twice during rehearsals so they're not so tender while I'm bouncing up and down."
"Hm," Justin said looking back down at the baby.
Britney started with her questions to Buffy. How long had she been doing this, how many families had she already worked for, things like that. Every answer she gave impressed Britney and she had references to back them up.
"You realize you'd be traveling a lot," Britney said.
"Yes, I realize that. I think that part of it would be fun. Always a different city every day...."
Justin chuckled. "Well it sounds like it's fun but it's draining."
Buffy lowered her eyes and nodded. "I can see that."
"But anyway, you'd get time off when we're both around and sometimes we don't know when that is until about a day or two ahead of time, would that be okay?" Britney asked.
"Sure. What about if you two are together for a week at a time, you wouldn't need me then would you?"
"I don't think so," Britney said, shaking her head.
"So it would be okay to plan trips home and stuff."
"Sure," Justin shrugged.
"How often do you think that would be?"
Britney glanced at Justin and then looked back at Buffy. "Well, we still need to get our schedules down. While I'm touring he'll be promoting a new album and then he tours and I'm not sure what I'll be doing at that point. I'm pushing for nothing," she chuckled.
"So you might end up traveling with him the whole time he's on tour?" she asked Britney.
"Yeah, maybe. That's what I'm pushing for."
Buffy frowned and nodded. "So this would only be a temporary job...."
"Well....we won't know...." Britney said, her voice trailing off. "It might be."
"The bottom line is Buffy, that we don't know. This first half of the year was already planned out before we knew about Mackenzie so we didn't have much say in changing things around. Once I tour then I think we can arrange our schedules around each other. I'm sorry, that's probably not fair to whoever we're going to hire."
"Well, as long as they know that up front, it helps.....a little."
Britney smiled at her. "Thanks for stopping by," she said standing up.
Both Justin and Buffy stood up as well.
"If you have any other questions just call either one of us," she said shaking her hand.
"Thanks. Good luck with the tour......both of you," she added as she shook Justin's hand.
"Thank you," he said before showing her to the door.
When he went back to the room he smiled when he saw that Britney had already picked up Mackenzie out of the play pen and was bouncing her up and down, making her gurgle and smile.
"So, what did you think?" he asked, leaning against the doorframe.
"I liked her. She has good references."
He nodded.
"But it's not fair to give the nanny that kind of schedule is it?"
"I hadn't really thought about it until we started explaining it tonight," he said, shaking his head.
"Yeah. Hey, I didn't get to eat, let's order pizza."
"Sounds good to me. I get to pick," he chuckled as he walked toward the kitchen so he could get the phone numbers.
When he returned Britney was sitting on the couch, with Mackenzie resting against her shoulder and she was watching TV.
"Come watch this episode of "Trading Spaces". I've seen it, it's a good one," she said patting the spot next to her on the couch.
He sat down and kissed Mackenzie's little hand.
"You staying here tonight?" he asked.
She shrugged. "I hadn't thought about it, why?"
"I don't know......it just seems that since the other night," he said softly, "that either you've been here or I've been at your house...."
Since the commercial was on she looked over at him and hadn't realized how close his face was to hers. She couldn't help herself, she was so drawn to him so she leaned in and gently kissed his mouth, letting her tongue trace his lips.
He smiled when she pulled away.
"So that's a yes?"
She giggled. "I'm sure I was going to anyway."
"Good," he said, leaning back against the couch. He stretched his arms out and she snuggled in closer to him.
