It's Definitely Not All Mary Poppins

Emails, Emails, Emails

Pulling into his parking spot, Matthew put his head down on the wheel, groaning. Something about the way the interviewer had spoken to him rattled Matthew to his core. When it was all over, he stood up and didn't offer his hand to Matthew, saying his favorite words, "We'll be in touch."

He slammed his fists on the steering wheel, muffled screams slipping between his gritted teeth. "Whyyyyyyyyyy?" he asked himself, swinging his hands against the car's wheel again. He grunted and leaned the driver's seat back as far as it could go. The headliner fabric was stained from who knows what, but at least it didn't smell as bad as when Matthew first bought the car five years ago. The faint, lingering smell of cigarettes was a welcome relief.

Frowning, he sighed and closed his eyes. "I'll replace it, I promise," he whispered, rubbing the water-stained door panel.

Toby knocked on the window. When his roommate didn't reply, he opened the car door. "So...I take it that it didn't go well."

Matthew turned his head away, shrugging.

"Judging by how you're, like...like, dreading to get out of Lloyd."

Finally turning his eyes to Toby, Matthew got the seat upright and unbuckled himself, swinging his legs out the car door and sighing, face in his hands. "Fuck me."

Toby patted his shoulder. "...sorry," he offered.

"I don't know what happened," Matthew started, his head still down. "Just...something about his phraseology shook me. The guy was so condescending like he seemed to know everything about childcare, and I was just there to usurp his spot as head honcho." He stood, gently closing the blue Beetle's car door. "I don't know," Matt whispered, turning to lock the door, "maybe I should just give up now and recoup my losses." He tore open a new nicotine gum packet and threw a piece into his mouth, the taste disgusting.

"Did he know Audrey?" he asked.

"Again, I don't know," Matthew answered quickly. "I don't know, that's the problem. He searched for me online and found what Audrey said about me, he caught wind of me from another school, a friend of his whispered that I'm a faggot, I don't know. He, just, assumed that I automatically couldn't take care of his kid."

Leaning against the car door, Toby crossed his arms, listening to the traffic just off in the distance. "Aren't you glad Liza and I convinced you to get rejected in more than one field?"

"I'm going to kill you."

"I-I'm sorry," he admitted. "That was really 'Liza' of me to say. I don't even know where that came from."

Matthew looked at his roommate and sighed. "When're you guys going to fuck and get passed this, like, sexually-charged anger?"

Toby snorted, chuckling. "Dude, this isn't first grade. I can hate someone and not want to fuck them. Consider Audrey. You hate her. You want to fuck her?"

He shook his head, glowering. "No. Never. I don't hate myself that much." That was a slightly hypocritical statement to consider.

Toby tipped his head towards Matthew, a smug grin on his face. "She's like the sister I never wanted but got." He sighed, turning away. "The annoying-as-fuck little sister you tried to sell my stuff on eBay that one time."

"I just want to find something," he whined, teeth grinding the gum as hard as possible. In the month since first applying for nanny positions, he'd received a total of three offers. They were so offensively low that he had to decline purely for his morale, or because the children clearly required more intensive care than Matthew was trained for. Acquiring interviews for a school became few and far between, most avenues ending in emails saying "We found a stronger candidate for the position" or "Unfortunately, we feel you would not be a good fit".