Page 13 of Pucking My Biggest Fan

“You can say no. It’s a lot of people and a lot of noise.”

“It’s a work night,” I say. “What do the kids wear?”

He smiles like I’ve solved something bigger than an outfit question. “Nora used to handle that. Last year Carol did, and Margot came home in something with a bow, and we don’t talk about it.”

“No bows. Got it.”

“Fair warning — Carol will have opinions about the dress.”

“Carol can have opinions. Margot gets the final say on her own dress.”

He looks at me for a second. “That conversation’s going to be something.”

“I’ve had harder ones with landlords.”

“Margot will want your opinion. Also — the week after the dinner, the season starts. I’ll be on the road more. A few days at a time, sometimes longer.”

“We’ll be fine here. I’ll leave you reports on the fridge.”

“all fine, margot ate seconds,” he says, quoting, and I have to straighten the salt and pepper. He noticed the note. Worse, he memorized it.

“That was a good report,” I say.

“It was the best thing I read all month,” he says, and then, easily, like it’s nothing, like it’s a thing you can just say to a person, “She does better when you’re there, you know. They both do. Honestly, the whole house does.”

Then he carries the plates to the sink, because to him it was nothing. A nice thing a decent man says to an employee.

I wipe the table, which I already wiped.

Before Teddy’s bath, I knock on Margot’s doorframe with the dinner news. She marks her page with one finger and listens: fancy party, two weeks, new dress.

“Grandma picks the dress,” she says, flatly, the way you report a known problem.

“Not this year. This year you pick. If Grandma doesn’t like it, she can talk to me about it.”

A long look. “Anything I pick?”

“Anything within reason.”

“I’ll make a list,” she says, and goes back to her book. It’s the first thing she’s asked me for since I got here. I go run Teddy’s bath and don’t make it a thing.

Upstairs, my room is the same as I left it. Bed made, window cracked, suitcase open on the closet floor with half my clothes still living in it. Three and a half weeks and I never finished unpacking. The dresser Gus bought for this room has six drawers, and I’m using two of them, because two is easy to empty in a hurry.

She does better when you’re there. The whole house does.

That’s what he said, and an hour later it’s still with me, and this is the problem. Not him. Not the job. The job is the best one I’ve ever had. The problem is that tonight, at that table, listening to Teddy explain his day with his fork in the air, I was happy. Off-guard happy. At-home happy. In a house where every person likes me because they don’t know who they hired.

Margot asks me for nothing and I know how to do that. Teddy asks me for everything and I know how to do that too. But their father thanked me tonight with his whole face, over a stack of dirty plates, and I had to leave the room. He has no idea who he’s thanking.

Because here is what I know at that table, every night, and have known for three weeks: their father was FOURTEEN. The scar on the hand that pours my coffee is the scar from the photo. For over a year, that kind, careful man paid a monthly subscription to talk to me — to JUNO — about sleep and dinner and nothing at all. Now she passes him the salt, and he doesn’t know. I carry that through every breakfast in this house. It is not getting lighter.

I skip the tea I usually make and go down late instead, when the kitchen is dark and everyone’s asleep. Rice, a fried egg on top, soy sauce. I eat it standing at the counter without turning on the big light. The ice maker grinds, drops nothing, and grinds again.

“Not now, Brenda,” I tell the ice maker, quietly.

Bex texts while I’m rinsing the pan: how’s the palace. did the widower do anything hot today. I look at it a while and don’t answer, which I’ve never once done to Bex. I put the phone in my pocket. Then I take it back out and open a message to Deanna instead.

Deanna, it’s June. I don’t think the placement works long-term. I can stay until you find someone — I won’t leave them short. Nothing happened. Everyone’s been great. It’s me.