by Arlene James
“So you think I should let the kids take swimming lessons,” he said, as much to call himself back to the subject at hand as to let her know that he’d been listening.
She snatched a hairpin from her mouth and stabbed it into the twist of hair atop her head. “Absolutely. They’re never too young to learn something so important.”
“I agree,” he said, embarrassed and irritated, “but there’s one little problem.”
“Oh? And what is that?”
He ground his teeth together. “I can’t afford swimming lessons.”
She blinked at him as if that idea hadn’t occurred to her at all. “It doesn’t cost anything. At least, no more than you’re paying me now.”
It was his turn to blink. “You mean, you are going to teach them?”
“Of course. I have certification from California. I used to live there, you know.”
Actually, he hadn’t known, but he nodded, anyway. It was so typically Mattie. Of course she’d teach them herself! He should have expected that by now. Was there anything she couldn’t do? He felt a step behind suddenly, but he was becoming accustomed to that. Thinking rather desperately, he came up with another question. “Where were you thinking of doing it?”
“Teaching them, you mean?”
“That’s right.”
She shrugged. “I have a friend with a backyard pool. I thought we’d start there.”
He cocked his head. “What friend would that be?” Male or female? he wondered specifically.
“Terri Whiteside.”
His stomach dropped. Male or female? he asked himself again, then shook his head over the stupidity of it. What was it to him? Nothing! Except, of course, as it pertained to his children. He wouldn’t want anything untoward to take place in front of them. If Mattie had a boyfriend—and of course she did!—he had better make sure that she understood what type of behavior he expected from her. He opened his mouth to speak, but she beat him to it.
“Now, don’t take that attitude,” she scolded gently. “We won’t let anything happen to them. Terri will be there with us, of course, and she’s a very good swimmer herself. We’ll be very careful, I promise.”
She. She’s a very good swimmer. The level of relief he felt was absurd in the extreme. But then, his children were very precious to him. He had a perfect right to be concerned about who and what they were exposed to. And where they were taken, for that matter. He cleared his throat again, striving for the perfect fatherly tone. “Where, um, exactly does this Terri Whiteside live?”
She gave him an address, which he committed to memory. It was a good part of town, not the country club section exactly but solidly middle class. “I thought we’d start next week, if that’s all right with you.”
He nodded, still feeling as if he’d been given a reprieve of some sort. “Fine. Uh, if you’re sure that it’s all right with her parents.”
She gave him a quizzical look. “Her parents?” Suddenly a smile quirked at one corner of her mouth. “Oh.” She brought her hands to her hips in what was a patently Mattie gesture. “You thought she lives with her parents. Actually, she is checking with her roommates, but I don’t expect any problems. They both work days. Terri works nights, see, so she’s the only one there during the daytime.”
“Roommates,” he muttered, feeling decidedly embarrassed. Why hadn’t he thought of that?
She smiled knowingly. “Yeah. Originally, I was supposed to be there with them, but in the end I couldn’t see any reason to pay rent when I didn’t have to.” The smile became a grin. “Especially since I have complete access to the pool anytime I want.”
Orren felt the beginning of a burn at the base of his throat. “I see. Well, it’s all right with me if it’s all right with…everyone else. Uh, the swimming lessons, I mean.”
She lifted her hands in a gesture of completion. “Great! I brought some sunscreen so we can all lie out in the sun a little while today. I don’t like to expose myself all at once. It’s safer to do it gradually.”
Her choice of words brought to mind a picture that had to be hastily erased. Mattie. Exposed. He gulped. “Uh, you ought to be able to find bathing suits for everyone around here.”
“I already have, but we won’t need them just yet.”
“I see. All right. Well—” he shifted his weight “—I’d better go.”
“Oh, wait just a second.” She suddenly dipped two fingers into the center of her bodice and extracted a folded slip of paper, which she extended unceremoniously. “I recently had my cellular phone reactivated in this area, and I thought you ought to have the number.”
Orren tried to ignore where that bit of paper had come from and the slight warmth that clung to it, but his hands were trembling again when he unfolded it, glanced at the number scribbled inside, then tucked it safely into a front pocket of his navy blue uniform pants. “Th-thanks.” He headed for the door, anxious to get out of there, to think of something else besides the shadowed cleavage between those high, firm breasts.
“Orren,” she called lightly after him.
He paused and glanced back over his shoulder. Why did he feel as if she were holding a gun to his back? “Yes?”
“Will you be home at your usual time this evening?”
He shook his head, then nodded, both an effort to clear the cobwebs from his brain rather than in answer to her question. “Uh, actually I ought to be a little early. We have a fairly light afternoon scheduled.”
She beamed at him. “Great! I’ll be sure to have dinner ready early. Have a good day.”
He was nodding when he went through the door, feeling for all the world as if he’d just escaped with his life. What was going on here? She was the baby-sitter, for pity’s sake, a teenager. Wildly, he wondered if she realized how like a wife she had sounded just then and decided that she probably did not. Never mind the strapless getup, she was still just a girl. Well, if not a girl, exactly, then still far too young to be thinking of him as anything other than her employer.
He probably seemed like an old man to her, divorced and with four kids and all. He certainly felt like an old man sometimes, though lately, since Mattie had come into their lives, things had been easier. He’d been getting more rest and had less to worry him. The regular meals didn’t hurt, either. The kids seemed satisfied, even Jean Marie, who never had anything kind to say about Mattie. Somehow, the money even seemed to go farther. Come to think of it, he hadn’t ever had it as easy as he did just now. Heaven knew that Gracie was no housekeeper and not much of a cook, either. But this was a temporary situation at best. He had to remember that.
Summer would end, and the kids and Mattie would all go back to school. He’d be scrambling for after-school care again, and paying through the nose for it while trying to do everything on his own that Mattie was doing for them now. Mattie would be off at college hitting the books and doing all the things that college kids enjoyed, while he’d be back to the same old grind. It made him tired just to think of it. No wonder he was beginning to imagine Mattie as more than a very intelligent, organized, talented teenage baby-sitter.
Suddenly he had it all figured out. And it was perfectly natural! He wasn’t losing his mind. He wasn’t responding inappropriately to a girl much too young for him. He was just understandably dreading how it would be when this nice little interlude was over. And maybe he was grateful, too. That would be perfectly normal. Now all he had to do was remember what was going on here, then just to enjoy these moments of peace in the chaos that was his life—and rest up for what was sure to come around again. After Mattie. Yes, all he had to do was to remember what was coming after Matilda Kincaid.
Mattie smiled and quickly bowed her head, pretending not to notice as Orren lightly whacked the back of Jean Marie’s head before bowing his own. Jean Marie glared belligerently, tucked her hands into her armpits and only then bowed her head. She did not close her eyes as her father prayed, but she didn’t bump the table with her legs or scatter the flatware besid
e her plate with her elbow this time. She was slowly getting better at accepting the changes around her—and Orren was getting better with his prayers. Mattie’s heart turned over in her chest as he thanked God for her and all she’d done for them. After the Amen, she lifted her head and smiled at him.
“That was very sweet of you, but I just do what you pay me to do.”
“Oh, you do more than that,” he said, passing her a bowl of creamed potatoes. “Just look at the nice new bedroom I have.”
“Dad?” Chaz said from the end of the table. “When can I have my own room?”
It had escaped no one’s attention that Chaz deeply coveted the very masculine new decor of his father’s room, a room that had evidently been meant to be his as soon as his father completed the new master bedroom he’d been building when his mother had left them. Orren lowered his hands to the table and glanced in Mattie’s direction before turning his attention to his son. “I’ve been thinking about that, son,” he said carefully, and then turned his attention back to Mattie. “The thing is, I’ll be needing to take some work on the side to pay for building supplies so I can finish the room. Which means I’ll be needing you to stay with the kids a little more.”
She twirled her fork in her potatoes and said lightly. “That’s fine.”
“I—I can’t pay you a lot extra,” he went on nervously.
“We’ll work something out,” she told him smoothly.
He nodded and dropped his gaze to his plate. Mattie swept her hair away from her face, twisted it and pulled it all over one shoulder, effectively baring her back, thanks to the clinging halter-top bathing suit that she wore beneath her jeans. Just as she’d expected—and hoped—Orren shot a reluctant glance over her. He didn’t want to notice, but he did. Carefully concealing her smile, she asked, “How long do you think it will take to finish the room?”
He scowled, but she knew that look wasn’t for her. “Probably all summer,” he said gloomily, and Chaz groaned aloud. Jean Marie stuck out her tongue at him. Mattie pressed on determinedly.
“I’ve given this some thought, too,” she said, “and I was wondering why we couldn’t just move some things out of the way and sort of wall in one corner with curtains and put a bed for Chaz in there. That way, everyone would have some privacy, and when you get the room finished, or nearly so, you and Chaz could change places.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” he said, lifting his eyebrows at Chaz. Chaz nodded eagerly. Only Jean Marie objected.
“No! That’s not fair! How come Chaz gets his own room, and I don’t?”
“But there will be one less in your room,” Mattie pointed out patiently.
Jean Marie slapped the tabletop with one palm, tears springing to her eyes. “I want my own room, too!”
“Jean Marie,” Orren began sternly, “I can’t afford to build you your own room. Chaz is a boy. He shouldn’t have to share with a bunch of girls.”
“Then why do I have to share? It’s not fair!”
Orren sighed. “Listen, Red, I’d build you your own room if I could, but—”
“You hate me!” she cried, leaping to her feet. “You just hate me! Everyone hates me!” With that she whirled and ran from the room.
Orren was up and after her in a heartbeat. “No one hates you, Red! Come back here!”
In a few moments a melodramatically heartrending scream came from the back of the house. Mattie shook her head as Chaz rolled his eyes, but Candy Sue bought it, her little chin wobbling as she screwed up her eyes and burst into sobs. Yancy, of the ever ready waterworks, was right behind her. Mattie got up from her chair, going around to stand between them and offer each a comforting arm. “It’s all right,” she crooned. “You know Daddy wouldn’t hurt Jean Marie. She’s just upset, and she’s always loud when she’s upset. Isn’t she, Chaz?”
“I’ll say! Especially when she doesn’t get her own way. She’s just jealous ‘cause I’m finally gonna get my own room!”
Yancy suddenly realized what this meant, too. Her eyes growing enormous, she looked at Chaz, yanked her thumb from her mouth and exclaimed, “I stay with you, Chaz!”
Chaz smacked himself in the middle of the forehead, exclaiming, “You can’t, Yancy! It wouldn’t be my own room then!”
Yancy began to cry in earnest, as if Chaz was truly abandoning her by moving into his own room. Candy Sue was momentarily intrigued by the spectacle Yancy was making and forgot to cry for a while, giving Mattie time to comfort Yancy alone.
“There now, sweetheart, it’s all right. Chaz will be just next door, and I tell you what we’ll do, we’ll fix up your room real pretty. We’ll…I know, we’ll fix up one corner or one wall for each of you. How would that be? You’ll get your very own wall!”
“You can have the wall closest to my room,” Chaz suggested helpfully.
Yancy’s tears dried instantly. She looked Mattie straight in the eye and said, “I want my wall yellow.”
Mattie laughed and hugged her, and suddenly they were all laughing. Orren came back to the table just then, his scowl lightening some at their obvious mirth. “What’s so funny?” he asked, seating himself.
Candy Sue endeavored to make the explanation—and herself the center of attention. Leaning forward at the waist she announced solemnly, “Yancy gets wellow wall.”
Orren smiled. “What?”
Yancy waded in with her own explanation. “I want my wall in the girls’ room to be yellow.”
“Your wall in the girls’ room?” Orren echoed, looking to Mattie for explanation.
“Well, I thought each of the girls could have her own wall in their room, and Yancy wants her wall to be yellow.”
Orren’s mouth wiggled. “Yellow?”
“Wellow!” Candy Sue confirmed, and everyone laughed again, Orren included.
He picked up his fork. “I suppose we could afford a little paint.” Mattie smiled at him gratefully. “What about you, Sweetums? What color do you want your wall?”
Candy Sue stared at her father as if she didn’t understand a word he’d just said. Then suddenly she shouted, “Pink!” She looked at each of her stunned audience in turn, chanting, “Pink, pink, pink!” She started clapping her hands. “Pink, pink, pink!”
Yancy was the first to recover. Picking up the chant, she began to clap her hands, too. “Pink, pink, pink!” Then she abruptly switched to “Yellow, yellow, yellow!”
Chaz slapped both hands over his face, shaking his head at the cacophony. Orren chuckled and waved his fork and knife for silence. “Okay, okay. We’ve got pink and yellow. That’s two walls.”
Sudden inspiration hit Mattie. “Two of four,” she said, and Orren seemed to instantly pick up on her train of thought.
“Three girls, four walls. What are we going to do with the fourth wall? Maybe it ought to go to the oldest?” He put his fork and knife down and got up again. “I’ll be right back.”
Mattie hugged each of the girls and Chaz in turn before returning to her own chair. She had managed to get everyone’s plate filled except the two absentees by the time they returned. Jean Marie’s eyes were red from crying, but she had allowed herself to be mollified with the offer of two walls of her own to each of the other girl’s one each. Orren sent Mattie a grateful look, then settled into his chair and began filling Jean Marie’s plate for her. Jean Marie sat silently until he’d finished with her plate and began to work on his own. Then she picked up her fork, slid it into a pile of green beans and looked at Mattie.
“I want my walls to be purple,” she said in a voice husky with the aftermath of tears. “Light purple.”
Mattie nodded in understanding and began to eat, her mind busy with ways to dress up a single room in three different colors for three little girls whose mother should have been there to oversee. She knew she’d have to use the things she’d taken from Orren’s bedroom, and yet somehow she had to make them new again, make them special to Jean Marie as her own, not just her absent mother’s. She decided to ask Orren
if she could dye the curtains and bedspread, and that brought to mind some of her own things that she’d once dyed—bright yellow, as it happened. Suddenly her vision broadened and the room began to take shape before her mind’s eye. She decided to say nothing to Orren about her plans for the room, beyond asking his permission to dye the necessary curtains and bedspread. She wanted to surprise him with what she could do, given the chance. He was starting to take notice, and she meant to fix his interest if at all possible. He needed her. They all needed her. And she needed them. They were exactly what she needed, Orren especially.
She thought about how hard he worked, how hard he tried to do well by his children, how selflessly he sacrificed for them. She thought of his pride in Chaz and his patience with Jean Marie, the respect he showed Yancy, the wistfulness with which he indulged his little Sweetums. He never spoke of his ex-wife, never complained about his lot in life even though he sometimes looked so tired when he came home at night that she wanted to cry for him. Instead he kept his head down and his nose to the grindstone, allowing his life and world to be defined by his children and their needs. Well, what about his needs? Someone ought to think of that. She’d had a little taste of it, and she knew that she wanted to be the one to think of him, to fill his needs. Something inside her recognized that this was what she was all about. She was meant for this. She was good at it. She would be better still. Oh, yes, Orren Ellis didn’t know it yet, but her very greatest talent was going to be loving him.
Mattie straightened and stretched her aching back. Moving around all that junk in Chaz’s new “room” the day before had taken a definite toll on her, but it had been worth it. They’d tacked up some colorful, if rather worn, quilts to cover the bare walls and rigged up a room divider with old curtain rods, a pole, a little baling wire, and a combination of blankets and frayed drapes. It was makeshift at best, but once his bed was set up inside the cozy cubicle, established, Chaz was in seventh heaven. He moved in his belongings with the proprietary air of a new home owner, crawling on his belly to stash his precious stuff beneath the bed, setting up his rickety bedside table and lamp with complete self-assurance, pinning posters to the fabric walls, arranging with scientific precision the plastic milk crates that served as his dresser and closet. Jean Marie turned up her nose at the tentlike structure that had become his very own room, but Chaz couldn’t be bothered with petty jealousy. He was out on his own at last, the single male, aloof from the pack.
