6. Maddie
CHAPTER 6
MADDIE
“ C harlie, breakfast time.”
Charlie, who was clearly a morning person, opened the door to his bedroom. He had already dressed for the day, Maddie saw. It was no surprise to her that a six-year-old could dress himself, of course, but she did find it a pleasant surprise how much joy he seemed to take in the task. She had also been happy to see that he had some of the options an ordinary boy of his age would have had — she’d wondered whether his father would always dress him in clothes with designer labels, but today he was wearing a T-shirt with a superhero on it.
“What’s for breakfast?” he asked her.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Do you know how to cook?”
“I’m all right at it. Let me know what you want and I can give it a try.”
“French toast?”
“I think I can manage.”
Charlie grinned and joined her in the hallway. The two of them made their way down the stairs to the kitchen.
As it turned out, the staff was nowhere near as large as Maddie had imagined it might be when she had first moved in. There was a groundskeeper, as she’d thought, but she rarely saw him. There were cleaners, but they were hired to come intermittently. Eli did have a cook, but the cook’s job was to make dinner, not breakfast — breakfast had turned out to be one of Maddie’s duties. Eli had said she was welcome to just pour Charlie a bowl of cereal each day, but she’d gotten into the habit of making him something a little nicer, and she could tell that it meant a great deal to him.
Something occurred to her as they reached the kitchen. “It’s Sunday,” she said.
“I know,” Charlie said. “I have a calendar in my room.”
“Isn’t your dad at home?”
“Probably not,” Charlie said. “Probably he’s at the office.”
“On Sunday?”
“Yeah. Why not?”
“Well… most people don’t go to the office on Sundays,” Maddie said.
“Oh. They don’t?”
“I don’t know about everybody, but a lot of people take Sundays off and stay at home. Some people do that on Saturdays too.”
“Well, not Dad,” Charlie said. “He works every day. Hey, can I have strawberries on my French toast?”
“Sure you can.”
“And powdered sugar?”
“No problem.” If Maddie could find powdered sugar, that was. She went to the refrigerator to look for the strawberries.
“Your dad is a hard worker, isn’t he?” she asked Charlie, knowing that she needed to approach this subject with care. She didn’t want it getting back to Eli that she had talked to Charlie about him. For that matter, she didn’t want to question Charlie’s father to him. He shouldn’t have to wonder whether his father cared more about work than he did about family. He was only six years old, after all.
She started the French toast. Charlie climbed up on a barstool at the kitchen island to watch her work.
“Yeah,” he said. “Dad works hard. He has to.”
“Does he?”
“He has a really important job,” Charlie said. “Do you know about Dad’s job?”
“Why don’t you tell me about it?” She knew that Eli did something in tech, but she wasn’t sure exactly what it was. She also wasn’t confident that Charlie was going to be able to explain it, but maybe she would be able to figure it out based on what he could tell her.
“He works on computers,” Charlie said.
“Do you mean he uses a computer?” That could be almost anything.
“I mean he fixes other people’s computers,” Charlie said. “Or something. He says he makes them safe to use. I don’t know why computers wouldn’t be safe to use.”
“Got it.” It had to be some sort of data protection. In Eli’s defense, Maddie could see why that work was important, and why his clients might need him to be available all the time. “That sounds like an important job,” she said.
“Yeah, it is,” Charlie agreed rather importantly, as if he was the one with the job to be proud of. It made Maddie smile — it was nice that he took such pride in his father and his work.
“Is that what you want to do when you grow up?” she asked. “Work with computers like your dad does?”
“No, not really,” Charlie said. “I know it’s an important job, but it seems boring. And he has to work all the time. That’s what he told me — he has to work all the time because of how important his job is. So maybe I want to have a less important job.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. And that way, if I have kids someday, I’ll be able to play with them.”
He said it matter-of-factly, but it still made Maddie’s heart break a little. It was clear to her that he was aware of the fact that he was missing something in his relationship with his father, and that was immensely sad.
Charlie didn’t seem to be sad about it, though. He went to the fridge and took out the carton of orange juice. Over the past week, Maddie had come to realize that he was capable of pouring it for himself, so she didn’t try to help him. She focused on the toast she was making instead.
“So,” she said, “What kind of job might be less important than what your dad does?”
“I don’t know,” Charlie said. “Maybe a doctor or something.”
Maddie choked back a giggle. “I think you could be a great doctor,” she told him sincerely.
“You do?”
“I do. But you have to go to school for a long time to become a doctor. Do you like school?”
“Sometimes,” he said. “I liked my teacher last year, but everyone says one of the first-grade teachers is mean. So I’m not sure if I’m going to like that or not.”
“Maybe the teacher won’t be as bad as they say,” she suggested.
“Maybe,” he agreed.
“And anyway, it’s only for one year.”
“One year is a long time,” he informed her.
She supposed that was true when you were six. “Well, you have a lot of time to figure out what you want to be when you grow up,” she told him.
“I know. Maybe I’ll be a lifeguard like you were. Is that fun?”
“Very fun,” Maddie said.
“Do you have to go to school for a long time?”
“Not as long as doctors. You need to be a good swimmer, though, so you’ll have to practice that.”
“I’m already a good swimmer.”
“Great! Maybe we can go out to the pool and you can show me.” She had noticed the pool in the backyard on her first day here, and she had been itching to get out and try it. She suspected that Eli would tell her it was fine to go during her downtime, but the fact of the matter was that she hadn’t really had any downtime yet.
That was why she was asking Charlie about Eli’s schedule. It wasn’t only about today. She had gathered that he was a bit of a workaholic, of course, but she hadn’t expected that he would be at the office every morning when she woke up and that he would return home well after Charlie had gone to bed for the night. She was excited to be Charlie’s nanny, but she had also been eager to enjoy the suite of rooms she’d been given — and she had had hardly any time to do that.
What was more, she felt sad for Charlie. It wasn’t as if he was neglected. His father clearly cared for him. But not to have an active parent in his life — that was a very sad thing. It made her want to intervene somehow, to talk to Eli about the fact that he was working too much. But she was sure he wouldn’t want to listen to her about that. And besides, it wasn’t any of her business and she knew it. She should stay out of it.
She put the French toast on the table and Charlie started to dig in. “This is great,” he said. “Usually it’s just cold cereal for breakfast.”
“That’s what your old nanny used to make for you?”
“Katie said she wasn’t hired to cook,” Charlie said. “We’d have cereal for breakfast and sandwiches for lunch. I think it’s cool that you make real food.”
“I like cooking,” Maddie told him. “I don’t think I’m great at it or anything, but it can be a lot of fun.”
“Maybe you can teach me how to cook something,” Charlie said. “Hey, that’s a job, right? Being a cook?”
“That’s a job. You have a cook who works here in your house!”
“So maybe I can do that when I grow up. Do you have to go to a lot of school to cook?”
“You have to go to special cooking school,” Maddie said. “But that’s probably a lot of fun, because I bet you get to eat everything you make.”
“Oh, that would be fun,” Charlie giggled. “Okay, I think I want to become a cook.”
“Sounds good to me,” Maddie said. “If you want, we can make something together for lunch.”
“What can we make?”
“Anything you want. How about spaghetti and garlic bread, do you like that?”
“Ooh, yes.”
“Then that’s what we’ll do!”
“Can we still go swimming first?”
“Sounds like a plan to me.” Maddie smiled. “I haven’t gotten to try the pool yet.”
“I haven’t been in it since Katie left.”
“You haven’t?”
“I’m not allowed without a grown-up. And Dad never has time to take me.”
Somehow, that didn’t surprise Maddie in the least.
The two of them changed into swimsuits. It was a treat to Maddie to wear a casual suit instead of her usual guard suit, and though she still opted for a one-piece — it seemed a little inappropriate to choose a bikini while she was working — she picked a blue-and-white halter that showed off her tan and felt a little more fun. She met Charlie outside and he cannonballed right into the water while Maddie laid her towel on one of the pool chairs and settled in to sunbathe and supervise.
It was a warm and relaxing day, and she kept one eye on Charlie as she started to relax, but she wasn’t paying attention to what was going on behind her, so she was surprised by the sound of a voice.
“That’s a nice swimsuit.”
Maddie sat bolt upright and turned. Eli was standing there.
It was strange — he’d seen her in a swimsuit before, of course, and this one was far from indecent, yet for some reason she was more conscious of the fact that she wasn’t wearing much than she had when they had met on the beach. Instinctively, she grabbed her towel. “I thought you were at work,” she managed.
“I came home to pick up some documents,” he said. “My office looks out on the pool, and I saw the two of you out here and thought I would come say hello.”
“Dad!” Charlie came splashing over to the side of the pool and climbed out, getting water everywhere. “Are you home from work? Can you come swimming with me?”
The excitement on his face nearly broke Maddie’s heart, especially when Eli shook his head. “I have to go back to work,” he said. “But it looks like you and Maddie are having a good time, huh?”
Charlie looked disappointed, but not crestfallen, and Maddie could only assume it was because he was used to this from his father. “Yeah,” he said. “We’re going to make spaghetti for lunch.”
“Maybe you’ll save me some.”
“We will!”
“Okay. You two have a fun day swimming,” Eli said. “I’ll see you tonight.”
Maddie doubted it. Eli was never home at a reasonable hour. But she didn’t want to say anything about that in front of Charlie, so she kept quiet.
Eli looked over at her once more.
He seemed to really take her in, looking her up and down as if he was seeing her for the first time, and Maddie was aware once more of the fact that she was wearing nothing but a swimsuit. Eli seemed to be noticing that too. She wondered how it could feel like such a big deal, given the way they had met — but maybe it was because her guard suit was just a work uniform. This suit was one she had specifically bought with the intention of looking and feeling cute — though she hadn’t thought she would ever wear it in front of someone she was working for. She wondered if she would have chosen it if she had known that Eli would be stopping at home. Maybe she would have put on a cover-up.
That was silly. It was just a swimsuit. They were swimming. What else was she supposed to wear?
But even so, she found herself unable to fully relax until Eli had walked away and she and Charlie were on their own once more.