The Billionaire’s Housekeeper

“Please, call me George,” he said, looking at her briefly before once again facing the garden.

“Yes…George,” Rita said. She paused before saying his name. It sounded almost unfamiliar to her given the fact that she’d never called him by his first name before. Her accent made her say his name almost delicately, like she was afraid to break it.

She stepped out of the empty art studio, adjusted the blouse she was wearing, and then headed back downstairs to the kitchen to help Beatrice with lunch.

*****

The house felt emptier even before most of the furniture was moved out. The absence of one of Rita’s employers was a new change, but she had sensed the wedge between Julie Ainsworth and her husband George for some time now.

What Rita noticed most was that there were no tears. There were fights, bouts of coldness, and long silent times when Julie would lock herself away in her art studio, listening to Vivaldi, drinking wine, and splattering paint on everything but the canvas in front of her. Calling it art, when it was really her way of throwing a beautiful tantrum. George would call and ask Rita to tell Julie that he would be working late and would not be coming home. Rita could feel otherwise though. She knew he just needed an excuse to stay away from the negative energy of their large house.

Rita obliged though. She would knock on the door and wait for the music to be turned down before Julie would tell her to come in. Rita would come with a book, or a tray of Julie’s favorite chocolates. She always wanted to ease the news, even though it wasn’t outright bad news.

“Mr. Ainsworth says he will be coming home tomorrow. He is very busy at the moment,” Rita said. She said the words slowly, choosing them carefully. She didn’t want to upset Julie further. She would put the tray of whatever goodies she had down on a small round table and wait for Julie to react.

Sometimes Julie would scoff, have a sip of wine, and turn around to turn up the classical music again. Other times her sentences would start with, “Well you tell my husband…” Rita didn’t know what to do then. Whenever Julie had an unpleasant message for George, Rita would keep it to herself. She didn’t want to be the messenger. A back and forth was hardly necessary.

George would be home more often when Julie was on a retreat or a charity function in another country. He preferred the silence, and to pace around the place instead of lock himself in a room. It fascinated Rita how different they were, and she wondered if they had always been that way, or if it was something that occurred over time. He never had bitter messages to relay to Julie. Instead he would nod and “Mmm” to himself before continuing his pacing about the place.

There was always something on George Ainsworth’s mind, but Rita didn’t think it was her place to ask him about himself. They weren’t friends. They were from completely different walks of life, and he was her boss. How strange would it be for her friend to pay her anyway?

She knew that Mr. Ainsworth hadn’t gotten any happier since the separation. There was paparazzi lined up outside. Asking why such a wealthy software tycoon and his debutante wife would call it quits after being college sweethearts. And now that a lot of the furniture was gone, Rita’s workload was significantly cut down. She still loved her job, and she hoped that Mr. Ainsworth would find a reason to still need her even without his wife being the one who mostly needed her.

‘George’, he had asked Rita to call him by his first name that morning. She said the name aloud, but barely above a whisper. It was strange to say, but she admitted that she liked to say it.

“George,” she whispered again to herself.

“There you are!”

Rita screamed and practically jumped out of her skin. She was on the lanai with a feather duster. She had been cleaning, but she picked up an old photograph of George and Julie, and she started to think about them. She didn’t know how long she had been caught in a daydream of former lovers, but she was completely embarrassed to be caught staring into space and whispering the names of her employer to herself.

“Oh, don’t be scared silly, it’s just me!” Jose Fuentez shuffled over to her and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

Rita gave Jose a warm hug. He was the Ainsworth’s gardener and head landscaper. He came once or twice a week to tend to the grounds. He had worked for them for 5 years, and when Rita came a few years later, he and she had formed a lasting friendship.

Where Rita was seemingly shy, Jose was wild and tumultuous. Where Rita was indecisive and kind, Jose would tell it like it is right away. They were yin and yang, total opposites that accepted the differences of each other and welcomed and embraced the similarities they shared.

“Were you talking to yourself?” Jose asked. He put his hands on his hips.

“Me? No…I was just humming,” Rita said. She tucked a strand of her curly hair behind her ear.

“Oh really? Sounded a lot like you were saying George to me,” a sly smile began to form on Jose’s face. He said George in the same way that Rita did. He wasn’t mocking her accent, but making fun of what he was now beginning to think was a new crush.

“It’s nothing! It’s just that…yesterday morning he asked me to call him by his first name. After three years,” Rita said pensively.

“C’est très bizarre,” she said, more to herself than to Jose.

“Yes, bizarre,” Jose said dryly. He eyed her with faux suspicion before taking the feather duster from Rita and twirling it around. He twirled it by her face so that she could snap out of her trance.

“The man is just lonely, Marguerite! He probably wants to make friends,” Jose grinned. He handed her the duster and made his way out onto the greens of the gardens.

Jose was more than likely right. Rita had been working for the Ainsworths and living at the mansion for such a long time that she was so used to things being a certain way. Now that Julie was gone, everything had changed. She didn’t know just how to process everything that had happened over the course of the last few months. Since she wasn’t even a part of the family, no one thought to mention how this may affect her or her job.

“Rita?” It was George. He usually woke up early, and went in to work before 9. It was just after 8:30 now, and he was probably in search of something to nibble on before heading out to run his company.

Rita always got an early start to her work. There was lots to be done overseeing the others who worked at the mansion, and a lot of work of her own. She also liked evenings in her own space and doing what she liked with her time. She usually called her mother in Montreal, or watched some TV. It got lonely, but it was better than how things had been right before she moved to the States. Montreal was not the place for her, even when she missed her mother and the rest of her family terribly.

“Yes, Mr….George,” Rita said, correcting herself halfway. That made George smile.

“Takes some getting used to huh?” he asked when he came into view. He stood by one of the open French doors.

Rita almost stopped dead in her tracks when she saw him. He was always in business attire when he went to work, or sometimes he would wear a polo shirt and very smart slacks. Rita had pressed them, of course. She knew most if not all of the clothes that he owned.