all i need [Zach] is air to breathe

[Andrea Irene Brennan]

In another world, Andie liked to think that she would have made something of herself, had a job a little more dignifying than being someone’s housemaid. She liked to think she would have finished school, probably excelled in either Charms or Potion-Making… though, honestly, what kind of job would she have been able to get anyway? A factory job, sweating herself to death while sticking her arm in dangerous machines with the risk of getting a limb chopped off? A desk job where she might have to deal with constant sexual harassment because of her inability to move out of a room in time, or out of a room period? Maybe in this imaginary world, women could do something more than sit around, and if that was the case… what kind of job would she have held?

Andie had to sigh to herself, looking in the broken, dusty mirror to make sure she at least looked halfway presentable. Christian had already gone off to school, she’d ushered him out the door less than twenty minutes ago. She hadn’t exactly… told him about her newfound employment just yet, mostly because it was honestly a toss-up as to whether or not she’d still have this job by the end of the day. It had happened before, after all. Someone had agreed to hire her, but after just a day of Andie’s presence, they’d… well. Needless to say, Andie had been given many false leads before in her life. No need to give her son or herself hope when it would only get crushed hours later.

Regardless, it admittedly did feel good to finally be able to dress up for a job. Her best clothes were always reserved for work, or for Sunday church and brunch with Grams. To finally look like a productive member of society actually made her feel like one. Like a real person, rather than an animal that kept getting kicked down. Like a woman deserving of the role she found herself in – a caregiver, a mother. And that, in and of itself, brought some kind of light to her eyes. So with one last sip of her coffee (and dumping the remainder down the sink), Andie double-checked herself one last time in her son’s mirror (she didn’t own one of her own, obviously) before heading out the door into a bustling New York City morning.

Now, if anyone found it odd that a poor Irish woman from Queens was getting on a bus with the last change in her pocket to get to the Upper East Side, they didn’t say anything. It was relatively assumed that she was one of two things: a maid, or a prostitute. And nobody was quite brazen enough (at least on this particular morning) to ask which one was the case. Though, admittedly, it probably also didn’t help that if she did explain, her explanation would comprise of her trying to say that a young, single, rich man with a lot more time on his hands than someone like her had was her new employer. And, well. She was a relatively attractive-looking woman. Even if it was heinously inaccurate to say it, Andie understood the reasoning behind certain peoples’ assumptions.

The bus ride was long, and after the second stop, Andie gave up her seat to an older man that looks like he was about to fall over on his way to the factory if he didn’t sit down. She hadn’t gotten a thank you, but she didn’t exactly care, electing to stand the rest of the way even though more than once, the man behind her consistently pretended to “bump” into her, rubbing up against her backside like she was some kind of prostitute. To which Andie would always subtly ram her elbow backwards, just to make herself clear. Even if he never seemed to get the memo.

So she was honestly thankful once the bus came to a stop close enough to get off, and with an irritated glare over her shoulder as she exited the bus (which was returned by a sardonic smirk, ’Seriously. Men.’), Andie struggled to put all that behind her the second fresh air hit her nostrils. Or, at least, as fresh as Manhattan could be.

Besides a few days ago, when she’d first come here for the interview, Andrea Brennan had never been to the Upper East Side before. It was crisper, cleaner, and a hell of a lot nicer than the Queens she was used to, and she found her eyes roaming with every passing step as she made her way towards the address her new… employer had provided for her. Christ, what she wouldn’t have given to have been able to raise her son in this neighborhood. Did crime even happen here? Did parents have to constantly worry about their children wandering home with bloody faces and bruises all over their body? Did any of them ever panic over what they were going to put on the table?

No, she had to put thoughts of being a mother aside. She had to be childless, while she was here. In most cases, Andie preferred being honest with people, but over the past several years, she’d learned a trick. If she wanted to get and keep a job, people (especially the generally single and/or easily attracted men that generally did the hiring) couldn’t know that she already had a twelve-year old son that suggested things about her past that simply weren’t true. Thus, Zachary Mason did not know her as Andrea Brennan, the half-starved and exhausted mother that strove to put food on the table for her son. He would know her as Andrea Brennan, the housemaid that only had interest in earning pay and making a life for herself. Which, in a sense, both of them were true.

His house was the second-to-last one on the street, and Andie looked up at it – she’d been here once before, answering the newspaper ad. And somehow, out of the doubtlessly dozens of other domestic servants that had likely come and applied… well. Zachary Mason had picked her. Maybe it had been her charm (she doubted it, she had about as much charm as a brass doorknob), or maybe it had been her honesty and straightforward attitude (that she’d at least admit she had – others would probably call it abrasive bluntness). Or maybe that it had been that she was willing to work for cheap. (Because Christ, who offered that much to domestic servants? Thank the Lord he’d picked her, otherwise he might have been saddled with someone that had actually let him pay that bull amount of money he’d initially tried to offer her – maybe anyone else might have just snatched the money and ran.) Still, as she looked up at the house, far larger than any home she’d been in before, let alone cleaned, she surprisingly didn’t have any fear or anxiety. She was here to do a job. Might as well get started.

So, with her ragged coat wrapped tightly around her, and her small bag tucked safely inside it, Andie made her way up the small walk and padded up onto the porch, her business-like expression already in place as she lifted her fist to knock.

When the door eventually opened, Andie cleared her throat, looking up at her new employer with an expression that almost resembled defiance as she proclaimed, ”Andrea Brennan, Mr. Mason. We agreed I’d be here by nine? Sorry if my being early causes some kind of… problem. Bus came sooner than I’d thought. But I figured I might as well get started as soon as possible instead of waiting out here uselessly in the cold.” She spoke it all with a succinct, business-like tone, eyeing the… (admittedly) handsome young man on the other side of threshold. God, she hoped she didn’t futz this job opportunity up.