Suzanne McMinn - Make Room For Mommy

Mrs. Fletcher rose and reached across her desk to extend a pudgy hand to the man who strode with an effortless assurance across the small office. Maggie, pulling herself together at last, rose also. She was graced with a cursory handshake that, despite its lack of warmth, left her hand feeling weak and crushed.

“Ryan Conner, Brandy, this is Maggie Wells,” Mrs. Fletcher introduced in a businesslike monotone. Ryan Conner sat down in the chair across from Maggie, as directed by Mrs. Fletcher. His daughter perched on his knee and smiled.brightly at Maggie.

“We here at the center are hoping Maggie and Brandy will be an excellent match,” Mrs. Fletcher said. “You’ve read the materials I sent you, I assume.” She looked narrowly at Ryan Conner, then went on without waiting for a response. “So you know all about Ms. Wells. She has agreed to commit to the program for at least a year, spending time with Brandy at least twice a month.”

Maggie looked at Ryan, noting that he seemed impatient with the social worker’s explanations. She caught his eye and smiled sympathetically, then frowned as he looked quickly away.

Mrs. Fletcher stopped, and Maggie turned her attention gladly to the child on Ryan’s lap.

“Hi, Brandy,” Maggie said. The six-year-old was an elflike miniature of her father in girlish form. Brown braids in the same shade as her father’s hair swung against her blue woolen coat. Loose white lace tights wrinkled about her ankles as she kicked her feet against the legs of the chair.

“Hi,” Brandy returned. She fidgeted on her father’s knee. He put a restraining arm around her, but she pushed him back and jumped down instead. She walked over to Maggie and reached a hesitant finger out to touch an auburn curl that nestled softly against Maggie’s shoulder.

“You have red hair!” she said, and giggled. Maggie laughed with her, enchanted with the little girl’s honest spontaneity.

She glanced at the child’s father and found him watching with a disapproving frown.

“Don’t be rude, Brandy,” he scolded, his voice softly Southern yet still commanding. Brandy backed away from Maggie, grinning mischievously.

“Oh, that’s okay. But I do prefer to call it auburn,” Maggie said to Brandy, ignoring Ryan Conner’s cool expression.

But she couldn’t resist looking at him again a moment later and smiling. His face remained impassive.

Really, Maggie thought, what is his problem? We’ve just met! He can’t dislike me already.

“Mr. Conner—” she began.

“Ryan,” he corrected. “Only my students call me Mr. Conner.”

“Okay, if you’ll call me Maggie,” she agreed cheerfully. “You’re a teacher?” she prompted, smiling at him encouragingly.

“High school English,” he responded briefly.

Maggie raised an expectant brow, hoping he would elaborate yet knowing somehow that he wouldn’t.

The ice has to break soon, she told herself, or this match will never work.

It was almost as if he had placed a wall between them before they had even met, she suddenly thought. She eyed him stubbornly.

“I’m very happy to meet you and your daughter, Mr.—Ryan, I mean,” she said.

“Yes,” he replied.

Yes, what? Maggie wondered, her silly streak rising to the challenge of the conversation. Yes, it’s nice for anyone to get to meet you? Yes, it’s nice to meet me, too? No, no, she decided, he doesn’t think it’s nice to meet me. He looks like he wants to throw me off a cliff. Forget that I’m offering to do him a favor.

She turned away from his uneasy survey and looked to Mrs. Fletcher for help in the silence that lay heavy in its suddenness.

The social worker took a satisfied breath and rose.

“Well,” Mrs. Fletcher said, “now that everybody’s introduced themselves, I’ll give you a few moments to get acquainted.”

She lumbered out from behind her desk and disappeared into the outer office.

Maggie felt sure she didn’t breathe for at least thirty seconds. She looked across at Ryan Conner and smiled with soldierly resolve, her inner tirade forgotten in her panic at the social worker’s unexpected departure. He stared back at her, head cocked slightly to the side, as if waiting for her to make the first move.

She took the easy way out and turned to Brandy.

“Brandy,” Maggie began uncomfortably, “tell me about your doll. She’s beautiful.”

Brandy proudly held the life-size doll straight out in front of herself to show Maggie.

“Her name is Penny,” Brandy said. “And she’s my favorite doll, isn’t she, Daddy?” She glanced up at her father and he nodded almost imperceptibly. Maggie noticed how the firm lines of his face softened slightly as he looked at his daughter.

Brandy turned the doll back toward herself and tugged Penny’s rumpled red dress down. When she was satisfied, she flipped the doll back around for Maggie’s further admiration.

“She’s very pretty,” Maggie said, showing the proper appreciation for Brandy’s prize doll. “I had a doll a lot like her when I was about your age,” she added, surprising herself by voicing the sudden childhood memory. The happy memory, before her father’s bankruptcy, before…

Maggie blinked quickly, pushing back the painful memories that rushed in on her at the thought of her father. She was annoyed with herself for allowing the hurtful past to intrude. She took a quick, determined breath.

“Who gave Penny to you?” Maggie asked with false brightness, back in control, with the hurt neatly tucked away in long-practiced fashion.

Ryan Conner moved slightly in his chair as Brandy answered, “Mommy gave her to me. Do you still have your doll? What’s her name?” Brandy asked, impatient and clearly not to be sidetracked from her own line of thought.

Maggie noticed Ryan’s discomfiture, and was torn between curiosity and relief that Brandy didn’t elaborate on her mother.

“Her name is Sarah,” Maggie told her, carefully guarding herself from thinking beyond the doll itself. “I still have her. She’s getting rather old now.”

“Do you still play with her?” Brandy asked, her blue eyes bright.

Maggie grinned. “I haven’t played with Sarah in a long time. I used to like to have tea parties with her, though. Do you ever have tea parties with Penny?”

Brandy nodded eagerly. “Daddy plays with me,” she said.

Maggie looked directly at Ryan for the first time since Mrs. Fletcher had left the room. She tried to imagine him playing tea party with his little daughter and her doll, but couldn’t quite manage it.

“If you’d like, and if it’s all right with your father—” Maggie glanced at Ryan. His impenetrable azure gaze answered nothing. And asked…? She wasn’t sure what. “Maybe when it warms up we can have a little tea party together, for Penny and Sarah. And Romeo, of course. He likes tea.”

“Who’s Romeo?” Brandy asked, moving a little farther from her father, a little closer to Maggie.

“Romeo’s my cat. He’s a big, fat, white cat. He just has one little patch of orange between his eyes.”

“And he drinks tea?” Brandy squealed. She turned to her father and laughed, clapping her hand over her mouth in childlike glee. “Isn’t that funny, Daddy?”

Ryan nodded, his lips curving slightly upward in response to his daughter’s exuberance. He stretched out one long arm and, with a broad, strong hand, ruffled her dark head, so like his own, and pulled her back toward him.

Maggie’s breath caught in her throat as she watched him smile.

Ryan Conner looked…human! The smile was gentle and loving, softening the squareness of his jaw into something no longer intimidating. Into something downright appealing.

Something that started a funny little tremble in her stomach. Not nerves.

Attraction.

Maggie swallowed hard, pushing back the thought, stifling the feeling. It was truly insane, and had to be squelched immediately.

Ryan lifted his gaze to Maggie then, and for a second—a heart-touching pitter-patter in time—she spied warmth and softness and…pain? Then, without warning, the mask of coolness shifted back into place.

“I want you to go find Mrs. Fletcher and tell her we’re through here, Brandy,” he instructed his daughter softly, his eyes turning down to meet hers. She wrinkled her nose up at him obstinately, but he set his mouth firmly and she hurried off obediently to the door, still hanging on tightly to Penny.

Maggie recrossed her legs and looked at Ryan. Having glimpsed a gentler side of the man, she felt even more uncomfortable. He’d be easier to deal with if she could decide he was an all-around jerk.

“You have a very bright daughter,” she commented, trying to fill the void left by Brandy’s exit.

Ryan stared narrowly at Maggie, ignoring her compliment.

“Why do you want to spend your spare time with a six-year-old girl whom you don’t know and who isn’t even related to you?” he asked brusquely.

Maggie’s mouth dropped open in surprise at his blunt question.

“Well, you know from the information Mrs. Fletcher gave you that I’m single. I don’t have any children of my own,” Maggie explained. So much for his soft side, she thought dryly.

“I don’t want to know what’s on the form,” Ryan cut in. “I want to know why you think you want to become a part of my daughter’s life.”

Maggie noticed the lightly sarcastic emphasis he placed on the word think, as if he didn’t believe she was really serious about it.

“As Mrs. Fletcher said, I’ve agreed to the specifications on time that I’m willing to commit to the program,” Maggie said coolly, struggling not to squirm under his unflinching gaze.

“Look,” she continued, “I’m not really sure what you’re trying to get at. You seem to have a problem with me.”

There. It was out in the open.

He seemed unfazed.

Maggie shook her head.

“Well, it’s up to you and Brandy whether I’ll be assigned to work with her or not,” she said. “I don’t know what you want to hear, but the bottom line is just that I feel I have something to give and no one to give it to. I don’t think I can be more frank than that.”

“You work at a computer company, I believe,” Ryan stated, completely ignoring Maggie’s honest admissions.

“Yes,” Maggie answered, feeling herself shrink under his tight scrutiny. She was a little rattled by his rapid change of topic. “I’m the assistant director of the local sales division.” She felt better as she told him that, pride in her accomplishments shoring up her flagging confidence.

“I’m sure your job is very important to you.”

“Yes, of course,” Maggie agreed. “But I have plenty of time to give to Brandy, as well. I’m fully prepared to keep my commitment to her, as I’ve said.”

Several times already, she added silently.

“I see,” Ryan said quietly. “Perhaps I need to tell you why I entered Brandy in this program.”

“That would be helpful, yes,” Maggie agreed politely, forcing a smile to her lips. Brandy was such an appealing child. She would be a joy to work with. Getting through this strange conversation with her father would be worth it, Maggie reminded herself.

“Brandy’s mother is very busy with her career,” Ryan said. “She doesn’t live here in Charleston. In fact, she doesn’t even live in South Carolina. She’s in Atlanta,” he explained, his face expressionless. “I entered Brandy in the women’s outreach program because she hardly ever sees her mother. But I don’t want her put in the same position with you that she’s in with her mother.”